The revelation

We told our parents and siblings the day before Thanksgiving, my mother’s birthday. We had decided, even though it was still early in the pregnancy, to tell the extended family (aunts and uncles and cousins) on Thanksgiving Day, but wanted to give our immediate families a heads up before hand. We were in Birmingham that night, so we called my parents on the phone. They happened to be in the grocery store when I called, so I had to try and tell them while they were checking out. It was all very weird and not very fun. I was trying to tell them at the same time, so I wanted them to put the phone on speakerphone, but they couldn’t figure out how to work it; neither of them had their glasses out and therefore could not see the keys, and they ended up hanging up on me once. Then when I finally did them both on speakerphone and told them, it took my repeating it several times for them to actually hear me. Now, my parents are really not as blind and hard of hearing as this makes them sound. This is proved by the fact that when we called my brother and his wife right afterward, we went through nearly the exact same process.

Since we were at Andrew’s parent’s house that night, we told them in person. Everyone was ecstatic and elated and teased us for letting it happen so soon.

The discovery

Two weeks after moving back to the US after a three-year stint in London, before we were even out of our temporary housing, we found out we were pregnant. Actually, I found out first. On a whim, I bought a pregnancy test while Andrew was away on business for a few days. I never dreamed that I was actually pregnant, but something made me want to try anyway. I have never been so shocked as when I looked at that thing and saw the little plus sign. I looked at the instructions a million times to make sure it was right. I took the other test the next morning, and then I went out and bought another two-pack when it was positive, as well. News as important as this wasn’t meant to be conveyed over the phone, so I had to wait three days for Andrew to get home before I could tell him. I asked him to sit down; I was shaking so hard. I told him I had something to tell him.

“You’re pregnant,” he said nonchalantly without even looking at me as he was opening a piece of mail.

“Yes,” I replied nervously. His eyes shot up at me.

“What? … What?! … You’re pregnant?! Oh, my God. We’re going to have a baby? We’re going to have a baby!” (I just kept nodding my head through this.)

We figured out that the pregnancy was a result of our month-long drive through Europe and desperately tried to guess the due date. Andrew, whose birthday was the day before I took the pregnancy test, said it was the best birthday present he’d ever received.