Just Practicing

We got in some good "parent" practice this week. In fact, it's probably safe to say that we became experts in the area of "staying up all night and worrying."

The initial worrying began when our last ultrasound of our singleton showed that the gestational sac was measuring about 5 days behind the embryo. (FYI- If this happens to you, do NOT google. Rather, just skip to the end of this post.) As a result, for the past two weeks, we have, at times, been a bit fearful of what our next ultrasound would reveal.

However, we know that these babies-- the ones that FINALLY made the cut-- are the most strong-willed, determined, persevering little guys/gals on this planet given all the obstacles they had to overcome. And so, for the most part, we remained hopeful that this little one would laugh in the face of Dr. Google's statistics and catch right on up to his brothers/sisters.

And we continued to remain hopeful until roughly 1:00 p.m. on our scan day, at which point the panic began to set in. As I mentioned earlier in the week, our scan was moved from Monday to Thursday because of the Diwali holiday. I point this out, only to show that we were well aware that this was a week of Diwali celebrations.

And despite knowing this ahead of time, we still let our fears get the best of us.

Shortly after our usual "window of notice"--  9 a.m. to 11 a.m.-- came and went, Duane and I began to email back and forth, speculating on why we had yet to receive our scan. Duane did a fair job of maintaining moral for a few hours with messages like  "Diwali hangovers for sure! I bet we'll hear soon."

But eventually, as morning turned to afternoon here, which meant afternoon was turning to night in India, we began to stress. Really bad. Duane called and told me he was sick to his stomach. At this point I was sick too. Mainly because: (a) Duane rarely calls me at work, and (b) Duane never worries (at least when he does you'd never know it).

And so now, the two of us are convinced that we didn' receive a scan email because it's bad news. And that because its such bad news, we will surely be receiving an alternative phone call any minute. It was a horrible afternoon.

I met Duane after work to commiserate. By now it's evening our time, and middle of the night India time. Which means of course, that I could email till I was blue in the face, but that regardless, our friends in India would still be doing what normal people do in the middle of the night--- sleeping.
Of course now, I am convinced that it's such bad news that our doctor couldn't bear to call me in the afternoon and needs to sleep on it before she breaks it to me. (I know, I know, totally ridiculous looking back but those of you who have been there know where I was coming from.)

Finally, I email around 4 a.m. our time-- because I am still awake at this point and it is now daytime in India-- with a subject line akin to "Can somebody please let me know if everything is ok???" (I have no doubt that at this point in time I have been placed on the "Crazy IP" list.) Our doctor gets right back to me to let me now that everything is just fine. Reports were received a day later because of the abundance of appointments moved to Thursday.

Moments later we received the most beautiful picture ever. (Am I allowed to say that? Because to be honest, this little guy-- we're already convinced it's our boy though we haven't any reason for this hypothesis-- really is a bit more photogenic than his twin siblings.) There he was, measuring right on target, with an appropriately sized gestational sac (hooray!), and a heart rate of 168 bpm.

Anybody know how to say relieved in Hindi? Because that's what we were. So. Relieved. After a short cry, we began to ooh and ahh over the cuteness his little elbows and eyeball-- because there really aren't a whole lot of other body parts to ooh and ahh over at this point--  and reflect again, as we find ourselves doing daily, on how incredibly grateful we are to be at this point.

This surrogacy stuff, it's not for the faint of heart. I am always quick to boast of all that we have "gained" from going this route-- a wonderful surro community, appreciation for a beautiful culture, and most importantly, our three little growing babies.

Nevertheless, nothing can compensate for not having those babies HERE, during those times when you NEED that reassurance that everything is okay!

Thankfully, however, everything WAS okay, which allowed us to spend the remainder of our weekend worry-free -- well, as worry-free as you can be throughout this whole experience-- as we "practiced" dressing up in silly costumes for future embarrass-our-children moments.

Happy Halloween!