I have been immensely lucky to have had three healthy pregnancies without much of a fuss.
Since the very early stages of each one of them, my body was eager to let me know that change was coming (probably in the second or third week of pregnancy, long before I was supposed to take a pregnancy test). With my first daughter, those signs included extreme tiredness and a very sharp sense of smell. With my second daughter, it was a food aversion to spinach (which I was not able to eat at all during that whole pregnancy). And with my third daughter, it was mainly nausea.
With that being said, pregnancy tests have been for me more like a protocol-step – I need to have one to make sure I am not imagining things – more than to use them to find out if I was pregnant or not.
Fast forward some time and it is now a whole different story. Here I am realizing that many women (including myself in this possible fourth pregnancy) have to wait for two weeks without much clue (or with mixed signals) as to whether or not a pregnancy is on the way.
And, boy…is it HARD!
For me, it’s been hard because I am still nursing my third child. So, those tender breasts could be a sign of breastfeeding or they could be a sign of pregnancy. Same thing with tiredness and other symptoms.
It’s so difficult when every day you wake up and the first thing you want to do is take a pregnancy test, knowing that if you do it too soon, you will get a negative result, even though you are growing a baby inside.
It is hard when you don’t want to miss any symptoms, but at the same time, you don’t want to envision things that physically are not happening.
And I bet it is even harder when you are dealing with other things such as infertility, rape, and unprotected sex, to name a few.
Some of the feelings that I have had during this two week waiting period include:
Anxiety: I have been feeling anxious to know the outcome.
Nervousness: I am nervous about two things: First, how I am going to feel once I know the result of the test, and second, the changes that are going to come if the test does come out to be positive.
Frustration: I feel frustrated at the whole situation that this time I am not able to read my body.
Alertness: I try to be more aware than usual at every sign of my body to see if I can decipher whether or not I am pregnant before I can take a test.
Restlessness: I want time to go by faster.
Hope: I feel hopeful about the possibility of expecting again.
Trust: Last, but not least, I trust that God has a purpose for all of this, and whatever the outcome is, things are going to be OK.
