Testing, testing....
Hi there, welcome to my diary of impending fatherhood. I’ve set it up this blog to maintain a record of our – well, let’s be frank – mainly my experiences as the prospect of fatherhood looms. To write a bit about what it’s like for the man as the pregnancy develops and some observations on what it’s like to be a dad when, all going well, the day comes.
The first few entries may come in a bit of a flurry. I’ve been putting off getting down to this for a while, my thinking being once I start I’ll be writing at least one entry a week. But then if I don’t get moving the whole business will be over soon (well, in about next eighteen years) and if writing something once a week is a commitment too far then what on earth am I doing having a baby? Good point.
To begin - my girlfriend, the lovely Rachel, is pregnant. About ten weeks pregnant right now, so at this stage the baby is apparently about the right size to fit in the palm of your hand (although I wouldn’t recommend it). Or as Rach told me last night, her grapefruit is the size of a uterus.
We first found out for sure about 6 weeks ago. I bought a Twin Test Pack but luckily you can test for single babies with it too. There were some anxious minutes, and Rach did the test again the next day because that line – which is only ever there if it is a positive – was really pretty faint and really, how ridiculous, and look, the leaflet doesn’t mention if the line is really faint so maybe… nope, she was pregnant!
Although once we started ‘trying for a baby’, which is a more polite way of saying 'having unprotected sex' but sounds a bit sporty, there was always the possibility that it might actually work it still came as a bit of a shock. Despite mentally bracing myself - which in anticipation of the ‘trying’ part is a pretty peremptory process not unlike saying you’ve read the software licenses - it still caught me on the hop. In some ways it was always going to be too soon, the walking holiday in the Lake District relegated to the back burner until our child is old enough to hate us for bringing it with us, but we’re in our early thirties now so we knew couldn’t wait for ever. And we’ve both known for years that we wanted to have kids together at some point.
You know, in the future.
But this was it - now! We had created a human, and Rach was already building it. And I'm going to write about it, which is a lot less tiring.
And I’m not sure she was all that keen on going to the Lake District anyway.
The first few entries may come in a bit of a flurry. I’ve been putting off getting down to this for a while, my thinking being once I start I’ll be writing at least one entry a week. But then if I don’t get moving the whole business will be over soon (well, in about next eighteen years) and if writing something once a week is a commitment too far then what on earth am I doing having a baby? Good point.
To begin - my girlfriend, the lovely Rachel, is pregnant. About ten weeks pregnant right now, so at this stage the baby is apparently about the right size to fit in the palm of your hand (although I wouldn’t recommend it). Or as Rach told me last night, her grapefruit is the size of a uterus.
We first found out for sure about 6 weeks ago. I bought a Twin Test Pack but luckily you can test for single babies with it too. There were some anxious minutes, and Rach did the test again the next day because that line – which is only ever there if it is a positive – was really pretty faint and really, how ridiculous, and look, the leaflet doesn’t mention if the line is really faint so maybe… nope, she was pregnant!
Although once we started ‘trying for a baby’, which is a more polite way of saying 'having unprotected sex' but sounds a bit sporty, there was always the possibility that it might actually work it still came as a bit of a shock. Despite mentally bracing myself - which in anticipation of the ‘trying’ part is a pretty peremptory process not unlike saying you’ve read the software licenses - it still caught me on the hop. In some ways it was always going to be too soon, the walking holiday in the Lake District relegated to the back burner until our child is old enough to hate us for bringing it with us, but we’re in our early thirties now so we knew couldn’t wait for ever. And we’ve both known for years that we wanted to have kids together at some point.
You know, in the future.
But this was it - now! We had created a human, and Rach was already building it. And I'm going to write about it, which is a lot less tiring.
And I’m not sure she was all that keen on going to the Lake District anyway.
posted by nickcoulter at 2:56 pm
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