Empathy

If you read my last update in November, you might remember the "however"...

Yesterday, DH and I drove two hours to the office of an ob I'd never met before to see an ultrasound of a perfect embryo with a perfect heartbeat. Our surrogate is pregnant. Our due date is October 20.

We transferred a single embryo on February 2. 9 days after the 6 day transfer, her beta was 234 (she'd POAS the afternoon before and got a good line, and had a crazy strong line the morning of the beta). Betas have been climbing appropriately and she's been nauseous and tired. But it was still nerve-wracking to be in the room holding my breath for the ob to get a clear ultrasound picture.

There's no reason to believe there will be any problems, and every reason to believe we'll have smooth sailing, but almost 8 years of dealing with infertility and 2 miscarriages for unknown reasons have a way of keeping us unsettled. Once we get through the NT scan, I think I'll be less on edge and more willing to truly believe we'll have a baby this year.

I have a lot of empathy for my husband, and husbands generally. I really feel like I understand what it's like to be the husband: I know intellectually that we're expecting, but it's completely abstract and will be for quite awhile.

It's hard not to tell everyone - we previously decided to wait until the NT scan to tell our families and so far are sticking to that. A handful of people in real life know, but it's awfully nice to be able to share the news and updates on twitter (and here, though I don't expect I'll be blogging all that regularly about it). I experimented today with telling strangers that we're expecting a baby via surrogacy, and it was oddly fun. Lots of curious questions, but the reaction is generally positive and enthusiastic. The only awkward part about telling our families will be that both my mother and my MIL offered to be our surrogate when we were trying to have C (and didn't need a surrogate), so that may lead to some interesting comments/conversations (they're both in their late 60's, so easy to just refer to medical advice.) And I can only imagine my grandmother's reaction (she doesn't filter, and she's religious, anti-doctor, etc.) so we'll be waiting awhile for that one.

I'm planning to induce lactation, and will be starting that process pretty soon. I have my yearly mammogram this week, and my annual exam in April, but will talk to my lactation consultant about getting on the pill soon (I'll likely be following the Newman-Goldfarb protocol since I have plenty of advance notice.)

Time is passing very quickly. Life is busy - C turned 2 in December and is a marvelous creature. He's incredibly verbal, loves to sing and dance (his particular favorite for dancing is what he calls "The Jump Song", which the rest of us know as "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", and his favorite for singing is "Two Little Kitty Cats" which he learned at Music Together, though he's mostly memorized "Do-Re-Mi" from the Sound of Music), is funny and stubborn and loving and will ask to read books all day long (mostly about construction equipment). I can't wait to find out what his brother will be like.