I've written a bit about my infertility issues. For the most part, however, I keep it on the Attain Fertility website and Facebook community. While I do discuss the fact that T and I have been trying to have a baby for an eternity awhile with friends and family, we never, ever discuss it in front of the boys. Nonetheless, I swear they somehow know.
Perhaps this is just the age when they get curious about their friends' little brothers and sisters and where new babies come from, but both T and I have recently fielded quite a few questions lately. Most of the questions are about how babies get out of their mommy's tummy, but T also got one uncomfortable question about how they get in there. Because the question came from our 4 year old, T neatly dodged it by saying that you had to be married first. Don't worry, we'll clear up that misconception at a more age appropriate date!
I have never once directly indicated to either of the children that we would like another baby. But, man, they are perceptive!
A few months ago I was looking through the teeny, tiny adorable little baby girl shoes at Target. Not because I even hoped to think I might eventually have one of those, but because I needed them for a photo shoot. While I tried to decide between the mini red ballet slippers and the shiny black mary janes, Hollis, picked out his own favorite. He brought over a tiny pair of pink mary janes with a white stitched flower on the toes and handed them to me saying, "When we have a baby sister, she can wear them."
My heart melted.
But I held back my tears and casually told Hollis that I didn't know if he would ever have a baby sister. I still purchased his little pink shoes. (See photo above.)
In the time since that day, I strongly suspect the boys have discussed the possibility of having a baby brother or sister. While the boys were in the bath last night and I was at a parent association meeting, T overheard an interesting conversation. Holden asked Hollis, "When is Mommy going to have another baby in her tummy?" Hollis replied, "Mommy can't have a new baby. She has to get fat first!"
When T told me about this I nearly peed myself laughing, but then I had to pause to wonder where my very perceptive children have picked all of this baby stuff up. Because, you see, there's this:
I just took a test yesterday afternoon. Only a few hours before Holden began quizzing his younger brother.
When the double line immediately started to appear, I called T upstairs and waited until he'd seen the test before I burst into tears. After 16 months, several rounds of clomid and one cancelled appointment with a reproductive endocrinologist, I am finally pregnant. And apparently my children are more reliable than EPT.
I'm also scared to death. Part of it is the usual, "holy crap, what have we done, I'm turning 38 29 in two weeks, we must be insane" stuff. But the rest of it is about all the pregnancies that have come before this one. So many times this beginning has ended badly. I'm almost afraid to let myself hope and yet, for some completely irrational reason, I actually feel good about this.
I'm trying not to wait for the other tiny, pink, flowered shoe to drop.
