Where were you when you found out that you were going to be a parent? Did you sit on the edge of your bed, holding hands with your partner while you both giggled and waited for the big news? Maybe your partner had arranged some sort of elaborate reveal? Perhaps it was in an insta-worthy bathroom filled with lots of light and loveliness?
For me, I was in our ensuite.
Two of the three lightbulbs had gone out and the cleaner hadn’t been that week, so there was a bit of toothpaste residue in the sink that was annoying me. Mrs TDV had come downstairs after waving the Clearblue stick in her wee and was sitting on the arm of the sofa in what appeared to be an upright foetal position. Really, we both knew that there was a good chance she was pregnant, as she’s never that late. For some reason though, I didn’t feel overly nervous, as I think I had already told myself that this was it.
“You go and look. I’ll follow you up,” said Mrs TDV after the three minutes were up. So I went upstairs to the ensuite, where the little white stick was upside down next to the tap. I was sort of cautious picking it up. Not because I was nervous about what it would say, but because I worried about splashes of wee being on it. Is that a thing? I’ve never done one of these tests, so I don’t really know. I hope I washed my hands afterwards.
Anyway, the moment of truth had arrived. I turned it over and looked. It was at this point that I realised I didn’t know what the different lines meant. There were two blue lines. Is that what it’s supposed to have? One says it’s a control line. What’s the other line, then? So many questions! But in the end, I asked just one to clarify:
“Does a blue line mean you’re pregnant?”
“…yes…” replied Mrs TDV after what seemed like a pause that rivalled Davina McCall in her Big Brother days.
“We’re going to have a baby,” I replied excitedly, as a feeling of nausea swept over me.
These were my immediate thoughts:
- How can we afford a baby? We’ll have to make some cuts to our extravagant lifestyle.
- I’ll have to dismantle the wardrobe in our dressing room to make it into a nursery.
- Well I guess that means we’ll not be going to Thailand for Christmas, then.
- Where did I put the instructions for that wardrobe? It was a nightmare to build.
- Oh man. We’re having a baby. This is real.
So from there, we switched off the one light in our ensuite and went downstairs to look at each other for a while as the news set in.
Things just got serious.
Picture credit: Clearblue
