Tasting Happiness

I’m 28 weeks. The babies are 7 months. I cannot believe it. Day 197. 84 days left (well, most likely at least two weeks less than that). Survival goes up to 90 percent at this point. Of course, we are hoping for many more weeks, but there is a modicum of assurance in that percentage. Time is going by at a glacial rate, and yet when I see how far I have come it seems like time is flying. And yet another oxymoron.

But it is another week under our belts, which is easing me slowly into thinking maybe just maybe everything will be okay. Wow. It took 28 weeks to start feeling a little safer in this pregnancy. But I’m not counting any chickens until they hatch.

To celebrate this viability milestone, I bought a mini Carvel cake, the best ice cream cake in the world. Not that I need an excuse to buy one. It is, as Carvel says, what happiness tastes like. Who doesn’t want to taste happiness? Not not me, that is for sure. I feel a little guilty as I eat something that has a label that looks like this: VANILLA flavored ICE CREAM WITH artificial CHOCOLATE CRUNCHIES. I love how they shrink the font on the bad words and play up the good words. Whatever. All that artificial whatever makes it dee-licious.

On Tuesday I have another high-tech ultrasound in the late afternoon (what was I thinking, so late? How ever will I distract myself all day?) I’m excited to see what is going on with the babies. The u/s machine in my doctor’s office is so small and it is always angled away from me, since it is most important for my doctor to see what she needs to see. I can barely make heads or tails of the fuzzy images that I can catch a glimpse of. These growth and measurement exams are much more thorough and the screen mounted on the wall guarantees me a good view. And as long as I don’t get Attila the Technician, then I will have a nice guided tour of the babies and their latest developments. Nicole can’t go because she is off on Monday and then in Boston from Wednesday on. I don’t really like going alone, because these are the sort of moments that need to be shared, and not with strangers or Attila the Technician.

Tomorrow, one Nicole’s day off, we have to get up at the crack of dawn and drive out to Long Island o get the seatbelt and car alarm on the car fixed.

Pictured above is the world’s best ice cream cake. Also pictured above is me at 28 weeks. I am in my pajamas and they are striped, and I would like to pretend that that is making me look bigger. But I have a feeling that isn’t the case. Perspective: My chest is HUGE in real life and it is dwarfed by my stomach here. I almost look flat-chested. I’m in denial, but my body has definitely gained some girth around the back side. And maybe in the thigh area too. Ugh. All for a good cause, yes, but still. Through years of TTC and m/c and all those meds I have not been one with my body. Maybe the ice cream cake has something to do with it, too.