The 40WW

I reached the ten-week mark today and that is quite a milestone for me. How far I have come. Betas and sacs and fetal poles and yolk sacs and sonograms and heartbeats and growth measurements and more blood tests and arm buds. Ten whole, long, baby-growing weeks. I’ve never made it to the seven-week mark before, let alone the double digits. All of my unhappy endings were early, but long enough for me to get attached.

Ten weeks and yet it all still doesn’t feel real. I’m waiting for some seemingly inevitable bad thing to happen. I hyper analyze every twinge, throb and slight pain. I check for “disappearing symptoms” (not that I have many symptoms anyway). I can’t tell if my growing stomach is from the babies inside or from my tendency to eat so very much all day long.

I haven’t had a single sonogram since I was officially released from the RE. I won’t have another sonogram for 10 days. 10 days. Might as well be 10 weeks. I don’t know how I can get through that many days without some sort of scientific proof that these babies are alive and kicking inside me. That forces me to rely on faith and to believe what I can’t see; two things that I have never been very good at. And harder still when you’ve already had babies taken away from you.

I want to buy cribs and cute little outfits and pick out a stroller and settle on names. I want to feel certain that they are coming this spring.

So to pass the time, I am counting down the days. How many days till the next sonogram? How many days till the next doctor’s appointment? How many days till I am out of the first trimester? How many days till the babies are viable outside of me? How many days till the end?