Do You Want To Know A Secret?

I've been keeping a secret for many weeks now. But I think I finally have the courage to tell. John and I are pregnant. I'm over 20 weeks along now and I guess it's time to spill the beans.

Obviously, people in my in-person world know since I've been showing for a long time. But I have been reluctant to write anything about it because of everything we went through last year and what we've been through up to this point. It's been a tough road already. But I can't live my life waiting for something to happen and I deserve some happiness. I am hoping and praying that everything will be all right and I feel ready to talk about it.

We found out we were pregnant the day before the year anniversary of losing our baby. It was surreal. I had been taking tests all week and they were all negative. I wasn't going to take another one but since I had it, I might as well take it. It was faintly positive, which meant I needed to go buy 8 more tests. Which I took half when I got home (all positive) and half the next day (all positive). This was all on a Friday, so I didn't go to the doctor for a blood test until Monday. We had a nice family weekend and I went into the doctor's office first thing on Monday to have blood drawn.

The results came back in a couple of days and my hormone levels were high, which was a good sign. Then that Saturday we left for the beach. The vacation was fun, and I had a sonogram set up for the Tuesday after we got back. My doctor wanted to start monitoring me regularly because of my history.

Well, that Tuesday came and I had the sonogram. We saw the heartbeat and I was crying and it was wonderful. Then the technician saw something strange and was poking around. That something strange turned out to be another heartbeat...another baby. We're having twins. I was floored and in all honesty, here I am 3 months later and I still don't believe it half the time.

I was alone at the appointment since John had a meeting. But I drove right over to his office to tell him. He met me in the parking lot and here is a summary of our conversation:

I show him the sonogram pictures.
Me: Do you notice anything different than what we're used to seeing?
Him: No, should I?
Me: Keep looking.
Him: I don't see anything.
Me: John, we're having twins.
Him: You're shitting me.

And that pretty much sums it up. After a lot of exhaling and tears, we hugged and he had to get back to work. I called my parents and told them. They were shocked of course. In fact, I could hear my dad interjecting a "Holy shit" every now and then.

Needless to say, the past 20 weeks have been exciting, overwhelming, terrifying and worrisome. I had my cerclage surgery back in September and thankfully that all went well. I have a mack daddy cerclage. It's a permanent cerclage (most people get a temporary one that is removed before delivery). This is a crazy stitch that doesn't get removed (I have to have a c-section). The surgery was an insane 2-hour procedure and even though I was numb I was awake the entire time. I will not get into the actual experience of the surgery as it was quite awful. Thankfully the anesthesiologist talked to me the entire time or I would have been crying throughout the surgery. Recovery was tough on me and it was very painful. But my wonderful doctor is confident it was successful and after almost 2 months, it looks great. But we've still had our share of scary moments, including a trip to the emergency room a few weeks ago.

I won't get into tremendous detail, but I was having very similar symptoms to what I had when we lost the baby last year. Thankfully, all is all right and the babies are perfectly fine. I have what is called a subchorionic hemorrhage. It's common and I've had a couple throughout the pregnancy. But this one was dangerously close to one of the placentas and it was causing a lot of bleeding and cramping. So....I've been on bed rest since then (I'm in my 4th week of bed rest now). And thankfully it's working because it seems as though the bleed is either too small to see or it's gone. YAY!

So, I am still terrified that something will happen to prevent me from bringing home my babies. But I don't know if that will go away until I actually bring them home. All I can do is think positively, continue to pray and take care of myself. And that's what I'm doing. I feel like all of this has to be meant to be. To find out we're pregnant the day before the anniversary? And then to find out it's two? It's all too much to be a coincidence. I have to believe it's happening this time and everything we went through is behind us.