Friday, July 17, 2015

A Funny Thing Happened On the Way to My Surgery



don’t feel like my life has ever followed a predictable script, and I see that as a positive. If I have developed any skill in life, it might be the ability to “roll with it,” no matter what curveball has been thrown my way.

Well, it seems we have been thrown another curveball.

Chris and I travelled to San Antonio in mid June for the second phase of my reconstructive surgery. The surgery was something I was looking forward to, and having been through the first phase of surgery so recently, I wasn’t really nervous about going through with it. 

A tropical storm had been hitting San Antonio the week of my surgery, so I rearranged our flight to get us in to San Antonio the afternoon prior to my scheduled operation. Chris and I arrived in Texas, ate some delicious Tex Mex food, and checked in to our hotel. We walked around the neighborhood, relaxed, and I did my scheduled pre-op prep work: showering with antibacterial soap, no eating or drinking after midnight, etc.

The morning of the surgery, we woke up early and drove to the hospital in the rainy remnants of the storm. As I was waiting to be admitted to pre-op, I met a lovely woman who was also going to be going through her second phase surgery with another surgeon from the same surgeon’s group I was using. We spoke about how wonderful our experiences have been with PRMA, and compared notes about the recuperation from the first phase of surgery. 

I was then called in to pre-op, where a friendly nurse administered my IV port, and spoke with me about my reasons for traveling all the way to Texas for surgery. Another nurse came in and got my urine sample and asked me several questions about my health history. She then left the room for a few minutes.

Another few minutes passed. And then another few. I began to worry because the clock seemed to be ticking closer to my scheduled surgery time, and I had not yet seen my surgeon.

The nurse came back in. She was holding two familiar looking objects in her hand, and had a strange look on her face.

“I did the test twice,” she told me. I then realized she was holding pregnancy tests.

My jaw dropped open. I covered my mouth and screamed. It was THE LAST THING I would have ever expected to happen.

“I think I am going to go get your husband now, so you can tell him the news” the nurse told me. I looked at her and shook my head. I still had no words.

When Chris came in the room, he took one look at my face and said “what’s going on? Is something the matter?”

And then I broke the news to him. And we both sat there, dumbfounded, joyful, confused, floored by the unexpected news of our pregnancy.

 

I don’t know if I believe in dreams, or signs, or if I just think sometimes the world presents very strange and uncanny coincidences.  

About three weeks prior to our trip to San Antonio, Chris came home from work a little late one night, while I was giving the kids a bath. He came into the bathroom and told me that something funny had happened at work. He said one of his co-workers, a guy he hardly works with, had come up to Chris and told him he had had a dream about me being pregnant.

I just laughed. 

Chris told me if, for any reason, I WAS to become pregnant, he wanted me to be assured that he was okay with having a third child.

I laughed some more. I told Chris there was no way I was pregnant, or would become pregnant, and that he should go tell his co-worker to not waste his dreams on me.

 

This crazy news comes with a whirlwind of emotions. I am thrilled to be pregnant. I totally thought I had closed the book on that chapter of my life when Oren was born. I love babies. I love my kids. I am 100% sure that I have room in my heart for another child, and I am psyched for Emmy and Oren to have another sibling. I am amazed by my own body, actually kind of PROUD of my body, and by its ability to get pregnant just three months after a really intense, invasive surgery. But I also feel guilty that it is so easy for us to get pregnant, as other friends struggle to have their first or second children. I’m also sad that I won’t be breastfeeding this baby. I am also worried about being 40 and pregnant. I am also nervous about having a third c-section.  

It’s crazy. It’s amazing. It’s silly. It’s strange. 

I guess I’m just going to do what I do best, and roll with it.