on pregnancy

Let’s be honest. We were young and foolish.  Mind you we got married as mere babes, I had turned 21 only 5 days prior.  At the time of Addy’s conception were were experiencing a period of carelessness in tandem with baby fever. I had stopped taking the pill for whatever weird reason. We had a relatively brief period of unprotected sex.  By the time I arrived home from a friend’s wedding I had returned to my senses and decided to wait to have kids.  I was pregnant.   I think we knew that we could get pregnant, but the reality was not in effect. I did not realize that I had super-turbo eggs that were shooting out of me ready to be fertilized at the speed of light. I know that now (not helpful!).  Hence I think I conceived Owen as I was phasing out the pill.  I use the words “we were trying” liberally.  Since we got pregnant with O nearly the instant we thought about it.  

The truth is that once I knew of my pregnancy I was ambivalent at best.  I was in nursing school with a semester remaining and a husband who got pain $8/hr to work with crazy kids.  I cried so much.  I avoided telling people, which became increasingly difficult as I lost weight and vomiting round the clock.  I puked everywhere.  I would stop to and from clinicals just to pull the car over to puke.  This did not lend to my initial acceptance of our child.  For a long time I felt guilty that I didn’t feel elated.  As people asked me on a daily basis if I was “SOOOO excited,” I would feign agreement.  I used to feel so horrid, I was afraid that Addy would someday think it was about her.  It had NOTHING to do with her.  She is amazing.  It was about us or me or both of us.  We tend to not think things through before doing them and then have twinges of regret.  I have since come to clarity.  Life happens in ways that we don’t anticipate or even want.  It can be difficult and emotional.  Addy is not an unwanted child.  She is loved, adored and cherished.  I guess I just wanted to wait one more year.  A year to work, get established and move without the stress of a newborn.  Instead I got the opposite.  Most people would probably tell me to stop whining about it, but instead I will blog about it.  

I am admittedly a control freak.  I like to have a choice.  I want to have 1 more child, but having one right now would be bad (so I think).  I think it is even more important since I am a working mom, single breadwinner, with current career aspirations and NO sick time.  Thankfully I am now the poster child for IUD’s.  Andy and I talk about this often, we still mourn the loss of our twenties.  I think that is real.  We gave our twenties to our kids and it has been hard in many ways.  We jumped into marriage at a young age and then subsequently into parenthood.  We weren’t ready, maybe for either.  But here we are, happy and in love with each other and our kids.  We couldn’t undo it if we wanted to, and the truth is that we wouldn’t.