Waiting

It's been a very long ten (actually 11 - it's technically Monday morning, now) days since the IUI, and I expect the next five (4) until the pregnancy test to be just as long.

It's also been pretty weird. (Note: spelled correctly!)

After getting over (somewhat) the initial freakiness of the situation right after the IUI, I immediately had this overwhelming sense of vulnerability.

Actually, I don't know if "vulnerability" is the right word, but a sense that there's this hugely fragile, tentative, tenuous thing possibly going on inside of me, and anything that I do wrong could mess it all up.

The thought that I could have a little, tiny, proto-human floating around inside me, looking for a soft, squishy place to settle in for nine months or so, just made me want to put myself in bubblewrap and sit around thinking welcoming thoughts.

I just had this image of Zippy the Zygote (yeah, you got a problem with that) coming in for a landing and just then, I slam on the brakes or jump at a loud clap of thunder or sneeze or, hell, roll over in bed and "Aaaaaiiiihhhh!" s/he goes tumbling back out into the abyss of my uterus, wondering where the hell that comfy endometrium that went!

Now, at about 10 days post ovulation, if the egg were fertilized, and if implantation were going to occur, it's likely that it has by now.

I guess that makes me, on the one hand a bit less skittish, in that at least Zippy wouldn't be free-floating anymore, on the other hand, what with the placental connections that might be forming, now would be when all those rules about what to eat and everything else like that really start to matter.

Trading one neurosis for another, yippee.

As for what I'm feeling, physically, it's really hard to say.

I think I am possibly more sleepy than usual, and maybe a bit more grumpy and sensitive (like PMS, but starting too early for that), and maybe I'm more aware of smells (or maybe there are skunky-funky dogs in my house, and who wouldn't smell that? Oh, Shrike wouldn't.) but it's hard to say.

Or maybe I just think I'm experiencing all those things because I'm looking for them.

Besides, all that could be caused by the progesterone that I'm taking, so I'm not considering any of it to really be "sign" of anything.

On the other hand, overall, I don't feel particularly different, nor do I have any kind of sense that anything spectacular is going on in there.

I'm not sure what I expect - maybe a warm, glowy feeling or orchestral music emanating from my uterus or swirling rainbow sparklies circling my pelvic region or something - but it seems like I should feel something or just somehow know if I were, in fact, pregnant.

I suppose if that were the case, all those manufacturers of home pregnancy tests would have gone out of business long ago, though.

Maybe I'm just trying to protect myself from being disappointed, or maybe it's because I do have some "intuitive sense" about it or maybe it's just because it's all so fucking surreal to even be actually trying that the possibility of being actually pregnant is almost incomprehensible but, as much as I hope that I'm wrong, I pretty much expect the test to be negative on Friday.

I will, of course, be disappointed if that's the case, but not devastated. After all, this is just our first attempt and how often does that work?

(Except for fourteen year olds in the backseats of cars. Then, all too often.)

On the other hand, if I'm wrong, I'll be thrilled, of course, but also shocked.

As I was telling Shrike today, it's kind of like the lottery. When you buy a ticket, you really hope to win - and you can certainly have that money spent in your head before you even get out of the Quicky Mart - but you don't expect to win.

Then, you're disappointed when you don't win, but not at all surprised.

That's kind of how it feels. I'm really, really, really hoping for a positive beta on Friday, and that's certainly the scenario that I prefer to imagine, but I also fully expect it to be negative.

On the other hand, Shrike pointed out that our odds of getting pregnant are a lot better than our odds of winning the lottery.

She does have a good point there . . . .