Twin-tastic!

Today was the day.  The first scan.  Nervous questions circulating in our brains leading up to this  day whipped up into a worry-cyclone by yesterday evening.  Would the baby be healthy?  How far along am I really?  Are all the body parts present and accounted for?  

Thom and I ate comfort food of beef chilli and big chunky chips in front of the TV, each in the silent knowledge that the other was wrestling their own anxieties.  A few friends sent supportive texts.  One read: 'Good luck tomorrow.  Hope everything is in pairs (except the head of course) :-)xx'.

My friend has flexed a pretty impressive and eerie 6th sense about me from the beginning of the pregnancy.  Before the missed period, before the test, he told me there was something strange with me.  I laughed it off then, but his extra-sensory perception was proved right.  After that and a few other incidents of him sensing all things pregnancy-related from a distance,  I could have seen the prophetic potential in his text.  Because today, to our extreme surprise, we indeed saw two of everything on the ultrasound screen.  Two hands, two legs, two feet.....on each baby.

So here they are, the two amazing little babies that were waiting inside to be discovered.  They were active, flipping and reaching for each other, giving the ultrasound operator a job to measure their length and check their age. They are 12 weeks and 6 days today, on the day we saw them for the first time.

The  next stage of this adventure is mapped.  There are 4 of us.  Thom has been browsing double-buggies on eBay and training courses that might propel his career into a twin-worthy wage bracket.  I have been imagining their little bodies, snuggled up and entwined, keeping each other company until we say 'hello' face-to-face.  Under the jittery excitement, there is fear, but I've decided that 'scary' is not a word I can use to describe things I have yet to live through.  Also, this news warrants an extra piece of pizza.  After all, I am eating for three.

4 weeks post-test

Over the last few weeks, I've told a few trusted people.  It felt needed as otherwise I don't think I would even know that I am pregnant.  There was no sickness. Feeling pretty normal.  If anything, better than normal. Energised and content.  Online articles tell me that's the hormones.  In any case, there was nothing to complain about.

Except that I wished for some kind of sign.  A bump.  A little vomit.  Something to tell me it was happening.  I have only been tired and my ability to fall asleep is verging on the hilarious.  Sit still for more than a minute in a warm spot and I'm gone.  Not just snoozing but deep, heavy sleep that feels almost drug induced.

Psychologically, there is far more to report.  Thom and I have entered into a world of worry. Well at least I have.  What can I eat is only the first question followed up by what would be the best thing to eat.  I am suddenly aware of all the things that enter my body. The polluted air, the flu-like cold of the person next to me on the tube, the chemicals in my toilet cleaner, my not-quite-organic body lotion. 

A world of worry and also of guilt.  After all, am I not responsible to make my body a safe haven for the little foetus?  I'm discovering that my body wasn't so much a temple, but a shrine to modern medicine.  I wouldn't think twice about popping a pill to control my now voracious hayfever before.  Now, I have survived the worsening symptoms until my sinuses are entrenched with goo and my throat is raw and scratchy.  

I am left to negotiate competing risks, weighing up the costs to developing junior inside and my own health, using a lot of medical advice that perches itself firmly on the fence.  I am only comforted by blogs and forums with armies of women who have trod this uneasy ground before me.  I soothe myself with the thought that this is but the first of many hurdles that will require my weighing up the risks between a range of imperfect and uncertain choices.  I might get good at it eventually.

On the plus side, being pregnant has brought cooked meals almost every night by a dutiful, culinary husband.  I am waiting my bangers and mash to be served up shortly, complete with steamed broccoli at my request.  Father-in-law has also dropped by flowers today and last week, a package of tiny baby things arrived from Mom in the States.  Not too bad, eh?