Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Maternal instinct



This is our little man's first photo shoot. That face! He was graced with a fairly even temperament and an intrinsically happy disposition. He was an obscenely easy newborn. And while he may be getting a bit more bossy now since he turned two, he at least maintains his manners. i.e: Let me do it myself! PLEASE!

The pregnancy was a bit of surprise. By "bit" I mean we had no clue. When birth control companies boast 99% effectiveness, the remainder is obviously based on actual people who use birth control and still get pregnant. Officially, we make up that 1% margin.

I knew I was pregnant about 12 hours after it happened. How I would know this innately, with no previous pregnancies, and zero knowledge about pregnancy in general, well, my acute knowledge suprised everyone. Everyone but me. Maternal instinct apparently starts tout de suite.

When I told JohnnyMac we were late. He simply said, ok. I reiterated we were late. Not late for dinner late, but late for nature late. Again, he simply said ok with calm eyes and voice. He asked me what we should do first. I opted for pregnancy test. I took multiple. All signs pointing to yes. Why I thought a 2nd or 3rd test would actually be the most accurate, I can not say. As if the urine on the first tests was somehow compromised. Or as if I had put the stick outside for a moment and directly in the path of a pregnant dog in the neighborhood. No. The first result was the same as the last result. Large blue plus sign.

I called my Ob-Gyn's office and spoke to her Nurse. The nurse asked me how late I was, and I replied "About 12 hours." The Nurse seriously guffawed (loudly) into the telephone. I don't think she stopped her laughter for several mintues. She cleared her throat and informed me most women don't become concerned until they are four weeks late or more. Four weeks late or more? I told her there would be no patiently waiting four weeks to confirm. She tried to placate me. She suggested home tests and since I had already accomplished this preemptive measure, I shared my results. She then shifted her attention and took me a bit more seriously before responding with a "Hmmmm. There are rarely false positives."

She then asked me how I knew I was late, what kind of tracking did I do. I told her. She asked me how long I kept track, was it for a few weeks, a month? I approximated fifteen years. She laughed. And told me in her two plus decades of being a nurse, she could not recall a patient ever knowing quite that quickly. She told me I would be the talk of the office that day.

Maternal instinct. When it comes, it apparently comes full force.

1 comment:

Vodka Logic said...

Funny, Even though we were trying, I knew when I became pregnant as well. Amazing.

xx