Monday, March 11, 2013

Our Family Is Growing By Two Feet

Yes, you heard it! Our family of five is becoming a family of six! 

     Our little bundle of joy was the main reason why I decided to start this blog. I figured it would be a nice place for me to record our journey in life together as family. 

     Growing up, there was one thing I knew for sure in life. I wanted to be a mother. You know how people will ask you, "What do you want to me when you grow up"? Well, I would always say a teacher. Teaching was the next best thing on my list. I love children and what better career choice than helping children learn and grow? I was always afraid to say I wanted to be a mom because that wasn't what people wanted to hear. They wanted to hear a career path. Even when I would tell relatives that I wanted to be a teacher, it still wasn't good enough. The most common thing said, " teaching doesn't make much money". I understand that, but that's not why I wanted to get into teaching. I wanted to do it for the enjoyment of teaching children. But that's a whole different story. 

     Anyways, I couldn't wait to have children of my own. When Calvin and I were dating, he was aware of my love for children. The longer we dated, the more we talked about it. Because we frequently visit Disneyland, towards our 5th and 6th year of dating, we started talking about how awesome it would be when we can bring our kids and to see Disneyland through their eyes.We did agree that we wanted to graduate from college, get good jobs, get married, and then have children. Over our 6 years of dating, we had accomplished step 1, 2, and 3. Next on our list was to have the children we always wanted. 

     Once we got married, children was on the top of my list of things to talk about. Calvin wanted to wait until at least a year of marriage and then we would start trying. Can you guess what I wanted? Yup! I wanted one NOW. So we compromised and we started the "Not trying, not preventing" method.

     During the first week of November 2012, Calvin and I traveled to Miami, Florida for his business trip. It was our first time there and was supposed to be a fun filled trip. Yeah, that didn't happen. I was having MAJOR mood swings on our last night. There was a mix up at our hotel and it just set me off. I was feeling so stressed out and just wanted to be alone. Now when I think back on it, I feel bad because I was taking it out on my husband and we were suppose to have gone out to a nice dinner for our last night there. I was just not having it. I locked myself in the bedroom crying, while Calvin was in the living room. I also noticed my sense of smell was stronger. We did not book the room, Calvin's work did, so I had no idea it was a "smoking" room. While crying my eyes out in the bedroom, I could have sworn I smelled cigarette smoke. When I asked Calvin about the smell, he said he couldn't smell anything. Sure enough, we were in a "smoking" room, which irritated me even more thanks to my crazy emotions.  I finally calmed down and we ended up ordering delivery and eating in our room. That night and the next morning was horrible. I woke up in the middle of the night sweating my butt off! I rarely sweat and usually am always cold. Plus, the A/C was on full blast. I thought that was so odd, but went back to sleep. Then early morning around 4 am, I had the worst stomach ache. I was suppose to fly out at 8 am, Cal had a later flight because his work booked his flight, but I was nervous that I wouldn't make it due to being in so much pain. So we changed my flight to the only available around 12 pm. My stomach ache finally subsided, but I kept dry heaving. That's when I said to Calvin, I think I'm pregnant! I didn't want to get my hopes high because there has been many times where I thought I was pregnant, but it was false alarms. 

     This time felt different. I was two days late, my sense of smell was stronger, I had intensely dramatic mood swings I couldn't control, the sweating, and now the dry heaving. When Calvin informed his work that he needed to be with me to make sure I was okay before i left and explained my symptoms, she even asked if I was pregnant! Because we were on different flights back home, we agreed that once Calvin lands, he needs to pick up a pregnancy test before coming home. 

     So around 2 A.M. on Saturday, November 10, 2012, I took the pregnancy test. I was super nervous and covered the results with the test box as we waited. I wanted to record our reaction and to stop myself from looking too early. Well, my dear husband doesn't always listen to me. I told him NOT to look at it because I wanted to record our reactions together. The first thing he does is go into the bathroom and flicks off the test box revealing the results. Of course my eyes dart over before I'm able to set up my iPhone to recording mode and see what I've always been wanting to see. The blue PLUS SIGN. I quickly picked it up before Calvin saw it and had the BIGGEST smile on my face, but I was still upset at Calvin for removing the box so I was yelling at him. What a way to start off huh? Oh the joys of being a married couple. Anyways, Calvin couldn't tell if it was positive or not because I was smiling, but also yelling at him. 

I then showed him this beautiful test!!
 
Two to make sure! Look at those solid blue lines :)

























     I can't speak for Calvin, but I had a million emotions running through my head. I was extremely happy to finally be pregnant and getting to be a mother like I always wanted. But then the fears start rolling in like finances, parenting, labor and delivery, etc! But after calming down and telling myself to take everything one step at a time, I was able to enjoy the moment. 

The excited Parents-to-be
Please excuse how tired we look. We both had long flights to deal with before taking the test!

     The first person I told was my bestest friend in the whole entire world, AJ. She was the first person I told when I got engaged, a bridesmaid at our wedding, and so it's only fitting she was the first person I would tell I was pregnant. I had already texted her earlier that day as I was waiting for my flight that I was feeling all these symptoms. She knew how badly I wanted children and she too wanted us to have children soon. So we both agreed once I get home to take the test, a phone call means "pregnant" and no phone call means "not pregnant". Once Calvin and I hugged and celebrated, I picked up my phone and called AJ. She picked up and said "helloo.....?" and I said " IM PREGNANT" and that's when the tears started rolling.


     Needless to say, it was difficult for us to go to bed after that. We were just too excited. 

     The next day we went over to my moms house and told her we were pregnant. She just woke up from a nap and I think was still out of it. So when I told her, it wasn't this big, dramatic reaction. Of course she was very happy for us and super excited. That evening we were supposed to have dinner for Calvin's mom's birthday. So we stopped and got a birthday card and concluded our birthday wishes with " Happy Birthday Grandma!". When we first gave her the card, she read through it and smiled giving me a hug. I don't think she quite got it, because she did a quick double take after she hugged me and looked me at with an even bigger smile and gave an even bigger hug. His dad was confused and asked what happened, so she handed him the card and he was so happy for us! It's their first grandchild which I'm sure makes them extra excited!

On December 11, 2012, we got to see our bundle of joy for the first time at 9 weeks :)
     As of today I'm 22 weeks and 1 day, which means we know the sex of the baby. What do you think we're having? Is it going to be a little Mickey or a little Minnie? Stay tuned!

2 comments:

  1. I haven't known you for very long, but one thing is for sure: you love children and you're one of those people that was made to be a Mother. I'm so happy for you and Calvin! I'm also glad that you decided to document your feelings and excitement. I know if I was your child, I'd love hearing all about how I started. I know it was a little stressful and there was yelling, but it's kind of funny now how you found out isn't it? :)

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  2. Aww Hope, that means so much to me! Thank you for brightening my day with your sweet words. It's definitely funny to look back on now!

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