How we found out…

By
Elena @ Every Avenue Life
-
41
645

Ok, so here’s the story  how we found out I was pregnant.

{Disclosure: I didn’t really proofread this post since I had just enough energy to finish writing it, so please ignore typos and mistakes}

How We Found Out…
As many of you know, May was the first month we were given the self-imposed green light to start trying for a baby. Everything was in place and we were ready to go. Our plan was to try Shettle’s method for a girl. We both really wanted a girl first ( though of  course we’d be ecstatic to have a boy too), so we thought it wouldn’t hurt to use Shettle’s method in case it’d give us more of an edge. For those not familiar with Shettle’s method, it’s based on a theory that male sperm is fast but weak and female sperm is slow but very strong, so if you time intercourse to be very close to ovulation, the fast boy sperm would get to the egg faster, or if you stop intercourse a few days before ovulation, the strong female sperm will survive longer than male sperm. So it’s kind of some natural selection kind of deal. It also had to do with the alkalinity of the vagina and sperm, orgasms and a few other things ( i won’t get into the details, if you’re interested, feel free to google it).

{If you’d like to skip the ovulation timing part and go to the testing, click here }

So the plan was to start having sex a week before the big O and stop 2-3 days before it. It was going to be relatively easy for us, because my cycle has always been like clockwork, and I always ovulate on the day I’m supposed to based on the 14 day cycle. In addition to that, I had been tracking my basal body temperature ( BBT) for about 6 months, which would show THE day of ovulation as well as when I’ve ovulated. So I was pretty confident we’d know when to stop.

We were also very prepared for it to take 4-6 months for us to get pregnant and we determined to have fun and not focus on the goal. The week of baby making dance came and we, indeed, had a lot of fun. It was more fun than I thought it would be. We stopped the baby dance ( BD) 2.5 days before the supposed ovulation and just waited. I was very confident there was a very small chance I’d be pregnant that first month, hubby on the other hand kept telling me he was sure I’m pregnant. I dismissed his words as the usual macho man confidence in his sperm. Haha!

I kept tracking my temps and honestly was getting more confused. I always get a dip the day before ovulation ( some women do, others don’t). The dip happened a day early, but the temperature never rose up, so I figured that wasn’t it, then 2 days later, it dipped down again and the next day I saw the usual spike informing me that the ovulation has, indeed, happened. But what was confusing is it happened 1 day later than it was supposed to. We had already stopped having sex 2.5 days before my supposed day of ovulation and now it turns out I ovulated 1 day late. That was it, I thought. There’s no way his sperm could survive 3.5 days there waiting for the egg ( I know some sperm can live up to 5 days, but most die within 3 days). So that made me even more confident in the fact that there was no way on earth I could be pregnant that month. There was too long of a wait between last BD and my Ovulation, plus what are the chances of being pregnant the first month, really?

 

So I went on pretending like nothing happened and there’s no chance I could be pregnant.

I was still watching my temps and cramps very closely. On the 10th of May (5 days post ovulation {DPO}) I got very distinct cramps early in the morning, my temperature took a massive dip too ( some women get an implantation dip and this was a huge dip I’ve never seen before, that was followed by higher temps). I told hubby and he said “This is it!”. I was still very sceptical, and figured he was just saying that because all his info comes from what I tell him, so he doesn’t know that dips and cramps simply happen sometimes.

How We Found Out…

So the next day we had plans to go celebrate a friend’s birthday that I had organized and then go boating the next day. We talked long and hard about the possibility of me being pregnant. I refused to believe it was possible, because Ovulation came late and because it was our FIRST MONTH, for God’s sake. Hubby on the other hand was SURE we have conceived and got really mad at me when I told him we’d be going out the next night and the next day. He accused me of welshing out on our plan to keep me safe and away from germs and smoke and parties the first chance I got. He had a point, but I really didn’t want to miss our friend’s birthday. We looked over all the books to figure out if I was pregnant what was happening now and if me being exposed to certain things would influence the baby somehow. Remember, we weren’t willing to take even a minuscule chance. The biggest concern for me wasn’t the germs or  people, since that early in the pregnancy my body hasn’t had a chance to lower my immune system yet for the pregnancy. Out biggest worry was the smoke. All our friends who were going to be at the party smoke, some smoke cigarettes, other smoke cigars and others stronger stuff. There was no way I could stay away from smoke. I tried to convince hubby that since the baby wouldn’t be attached to me at this point, anything in my blood stream would not get to it. I knew it was wishful thinking because from the 1st day of implantation there’s little capillaries that go into a mother’s system, but I just really didn’t want to skip our friend’s Bday. I kept repeating: “I don’t think I’m even pregnant, honey!”. The conversation was going nowhere, so we decided to see how things go tomorrow and talk about it then.

So on Wednesday, the day of the dinner, while working, I kept having a strong urge to test. I knew it was impossible to get a true result this early (6DPO), but I just wanted to know. I guess I was hoping that if it’d show negative, I’d have more leg to stand on trying to convince him to go to the party. At some point in the day I looked over at hubby and with a sly smile said: “Do you want to go test?”. I told him I knew there was no way it was going to show positive this early and that I just wanted to do it for fun. He shook his head in disapproval, but agreed and we ran to the bathroom.

Now you have to remember we were both going there KNOWING that even if I am pregnant, the test will show negative. The average time that tests show true positive is 16DPO. Some women get it as early as 8-10DPO, other get false negatives up until 18DPO.  I was still over a week from missing my period.

So we get to the bathroom,I do my thing, while hubby watches all excited, pull my pants up and walk over to him to look at the stick turning together. We naturally moved into the area with more light and stood there full of trepidation. “I know I am not pregnant”-I kept repeating. We kept twisting and turning the test while waiting for the line to appear. The control line was starting to get dark and then I thought I saw IT : “Honey, do I see something?”. I turned the test slightly to drop some light on it. I thought I was seeing the faint line behind the white, like the test was see-through, but not actually the pregnancy line…. Then the line started getting darker and we both whispered: “I think it’s there”. In a few seconds there was no doubt. We looked at each other in shock and disbelief!
– “I told you my soldiers did the job the first time through”- he said.
– “Hey, it’s not just up to you! There’s lot of things that go into the whole process and make it happen”
– “I just told you! I knew you were pregnant”

How We Found Out…

We just kept looking and grinning and repeating “Omg, I think it’s there” . To explain the kind of emotions that went through me is probably impossible. I remember a hot flash running through my whole body.

I still couldn’t believe it. The very first second we realized that the line is there, I felt an amazing mix of emotions:
FEAR – definitely fear of “What have we done? Now there’s no way back”
ELATION –  I can’t believe it’s happening!
DISBELIEF – How could it be? It’s out first month, my ovulation came a day late, we were doing Shuttle’s for a girl, which means we stopped sex 3 days before O.
RELIEF – Oh thank God, we can make babies (one of my big fears was that it would take us long to conceive)
HAPPINESS – We did it! We are complete!
and then finally, about 15 minutes later
UTTER EXCITEMENT – This is it. Something we’ve been preparing for almost a year and it’s here. 

WE ARE HAVING A BABY!

If you’ve ever planned a pregnancy or had an unplanned welcomed pregnancy, you must know exactly what I am talking about. If you’re still to create a family, just wait until that moment when you look at the line. It’s by the far most emotional moment of anyone’s life and until you experience it, you won’t know what it feels.

The shock wouldn’t wear off for a while. Even now as I am pre-writing this at 15DPO, I still cannot believe I am pregnant.

Of course, I immediately called my mom, who being an older woman, was very sceptical of how I could know this so early. They didn’t know until 2 months in.

How We Found Out…
At the party. Left to right: me, Chia, Elena

We also did end up going to that dinner. Now that we knew I was pregnant, we could tell our friends not to smoke around me. We wouldn’t go boating though.

But that meant actually telling our friends this early on. Yikes!  One of them, Elena, called me 20 minutes after us finding out, like she felt something… I couldn’t help it but tell her- I had to tell someone. I also told the birthday boy right away, because he’s an amazing trustworthy sweet man. The tough part was my two guy friends that were in town from NYC and Miami and were going with us. One of them, Robbie, used to be my best friend when I worked in NYC- we had so much fun together. Since me quiting modelling and moving back home, we’ve been slowly growing apart. He’s very judgmental and can be really rude, too. So I just wasn’t sure I wanted to tell him yet. The other guyfriend was, Alex, one of my photographer friends from NYC, single guy always looking for chicks, who’d also not understand the whole pregnancy thing, though would always be nice about it. So I was a little bit worried about telling both of them.

As the dinner was progressing, Elena kept throwing me dirty looks and telling me in Russian, so that noone understood, that I needed to tell Robbie, that he’s be very upset if I didn’t tell him or if he were to find out some other way. I kept telling her I needed time and I would tell him when I can. And that was happening while Robbie was making fun of us for being vegan 🙂 hahaha Like hell I was going to tell him then.

How We Found Out…
My very first test

Hubby also thought I needed to tell Robbie, because he just wanted him off our back for the whole “not going boating” thing. So I was under freaking pressure 🙂

So finally I couldn’t handle the dirty looks anymore and I shoved my cell phone with a pregnancy test picture on it into Robert’s face.  His reaction was great: “You’re preg nant? Seriously? Guys…I couldn’t be any more happy right now! Congratulations!” I loved his reaction, mostly because I expected something snide from him.

The rest of the evening went great. They all smoked outside, and I’d just stay inside while they were doing that. So I didn’t get even a whiff of smoke.

The next day we were finally able to slow down and digest the news. I started reading on chemical pregnancies, which of course freaked me out. I was determined not to get to attached until at least the blood work was done, but hubby made it impossible, with his “Everything is going to be great- I know it!”
After reading some forums, we started realizing that getting a positive at 6DPO is not quite the norm. Most women get a positive at around 13DPO and most get a very faint line. I went back to my chart to make sure I ovulated when I thought I did and there was no mistaking it. The ovulation happened on the 5th, I tested on the 11th. There was this overwhelming urge to make sure I was still pregnant, that it’s not going to fail implantation or what not. I’m sure a lot of you understand. SoI started testing daily to make sure the line gets darker which it did day by day until at 9DPO it was the same color as the control line and the next day much darker than the control line. I stopped testing then, but I continued taking my BBT to make sure my temperature stays up.How We Found Out…

As many of you know, this early into pregnancy there’s this huge fear of miscarriage, that’s the reason most people don’t even announce the pregnancy until 12 weeks. I am still worried about it of course, but I’m hoping everything will be ok.

I kept reading about early positive tests and one of the things that jumped out at me was the fact that in you’re pregnant with twins your HCG grows much faster than if you’re carrying a single baby and it shows up earlier on a pregnancy test due to the increased HCG.
Hubby got super excited at the idea of having twins. I LOVED it too, but I am a bit more realistic- we have no family history- the chances were small.

So on Monday 1 day before I was supposed to miss my period, I went in for blood work. My progesterone came back at 38, and my HCG was 587  ( the HCG range for that week is 72-426 and according to most women on the forums, their progesterone was in the low 20s). That was screaming twins. A later HGC test showed my level raising to 18,000 in week 5 (normal range: 18 – 7,340). My levels explained the early positive test, but we were definitely very curious about twins and had to wait until our first ultrasound which we were determined not to have too early and wait till the standard 8 week one.
Next post about ultrasound, symptoms, blood work and doctor’s visit…

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41 COMMENTS

      • I’m jealous this happened so fast for you. Though, you have been planning for nearly a year. We’ve been trying without success for 10months. This is the first month I will actively try charting my BBT. It was always unreliable with me in the past. So far so good though. Fingers crossed that this is my month.

        I’ll just have to wait eagerly for your next post in the meantime.

  5. Wow! What a post 🙂
    The first emotions are priceless 🙂
    And it IS really cool “the soldiers got through” the first time 🙂
    p.s. Are you sure it’s “Chia, me, Elena”? 🙂

  6. CONGRATULATIONS! So happy for you, Elena! And… you’re quite the scientist/statistician! I’m impressed! As sick & tired as you might be feeling right now, I hope you are able to enjoy this precious time in your life!

  7. Aw, man! Love you, love this post, and I can’t wait to read it to Scott later. : )))
    I seriously laughed out loud at that first picture. Andrew is hilarious!

    Glad to know you’re feeling at least good enough to compose such a gigantic blog post. 🙂

  9. Ok that’s just mean to leave us in suspense!! Great story, love the pics of the tests all lined up getting darker. Your baby (babies!) are going to love this one day. XO

  11. I totally freaked out the first time I saw a positive test, too! Even though it was completely planned, it’s a little scary when you know it’s for sure happening!!

  12. This is so exciting! Why did you guys wish for a girl first? I think I’d rather have a boy first, a big brother for my second and (or) third baby!

  13. I wish I had taken photos with our positive tests, yours are great! I still have all the positive tests from both babies…is that gross?! lol
    I remember feeling exactly the same when I got my first positive test, a mix of ‘what have we done?!’ and ‘oh my god it’s happening!’. When I got my positive in my second pregnancy I burst into tears at the thought of being so sick again and hubby said “Just think of all the new pregnancy magazines you can buy!” LOL
    Hope you’re feeling a little less nauseas each day 🙂 Can’t wait for the next instalment! x

    • Hahaha, Michelle, it’s a little bit gross, but I can’t make myself throw away mine, so I can’t judge 🙂 lol

      I honestly can’t imagine what you felt for the 2nd pregnancy. There was a point in my sickness that I would start crying at the sight of food, because it was just such an effort to eat.

  14. Thanks a lot for sharing! The reading gave me real pleasure and some coments did too.
    I want girl too and I want twins too,but we also do not have history for this…
    Its so exciting to read all this…
    I have a lot of fears thinking about having baby, but even its early to talk about it,cause I even didnt start my being fit and eat healthy program.
    I already think how I can protect myself and baby from smoke?In family of my hubby even 3 yo girl dreams to grow up and start smoking,they do not care about it. first time I realized it when it was 5 adults sitting at the kitchen and smoking neat 10th months baby. I got mad and triyed to explained them someting, but no luck. They are just not capable to understand this. They totally didnt get me and when I said I will never show up here being pregnant or with baby their reaction was like Im overreacting.
    It seems i will stay in hotel each time we go to visit husband’s family worst smokers of France ever!!!

    Thanks again for the post and looking forward to learn more. Its also time for me to start reading over from begining to help myself to get on this track.

    Olga

    • Oh that’s horrible, Olya! You’re doing everything right, losing weight, getting healthy. And I’m so with you on this one: I’d never come around people who smoke while pregnant or with a young baby. Second hand smoke is as bad if not worse than actual smoking.

  15. Just found your blog! Super exited for you! And WOW that happened fast!! 🙂 My husband and I are going to Sweden for two weeks at the end of the month, and than (or possible while abroad) we plan to start trying for number 2- hopefully it happens fast for us!!

  16. Congratulations! You know, twins aren’t in my family history either, but my mother had two sets! It’s possible. I hope you guys have a great pregnancy!

  17. Seriously so excited for you guys! Our first was quick like that- only I didn’t even have a chance to get the cap on the stick before the lines were both super dark. That fast. Can’t wait to hear more

  18. Congratulations! Our first month of trying I completely panicked when I realized that we got pregnant right away, and then lost it the next day. I kept saying “seriously, who manages to get pregnant right away?” But I guess it’s not that unusual.

  20. I’m just now getting around to reading your good news! Congratulations!! So excited for you guys!! Looking forward to reading all about your pregnancy journey.

    • Jill, we did it once a day on day 8,7,6,5 and 4 before my usual O date. I think we also did it on day 3 in the morning. We stopped 2.5 days before O. From what I read if the sperm count is fine, then there’s no need to skip a day in between. The more sex, the more chances.

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