Dad, thanks in advance for not reading this one.  To spare us both the AWK. 🙂

I always thought Baby Moons were stupid.  No hate, hear me out! I mean, don’t get me wrong, I get it.  This is the last time you’ll be away, just the two of you, for like…ever. Blah blah. But my thought was why spend $$$ on a vacation when you’re going to be all round, and waddley, and you can’t have festive beverages, and you’ll be tired.  Doesn’t sound that fun to me.  Instead, I proposed, a baby-makin-moon.  Full of eating, drinking, being merry, and carefully timed shenanigans of course 😉 (from here forward known as shenannies).

We wanted to wait a HOT SECOND after we got married before “trying”, which thank God we did because who know trying would be so…trying.  But in December we were kind of on the same page  about getting this party started.  I had been taking prenatal vitamins for months before the wedding, per my doctor’s recommendation.  And had been tracking my cycle on my phone app, so while I was still relatively uneducated on the science of all things ovulation, I figured I was pretty regular so I had a decent idea of when would be aptly timed to take this trip.

Also, shout out to Delta for losing our luggage for a week after our Honeymoon and the subsequent vouchers to make up for it, which made this trip possible.  You’re the real MVP.

I had never been to Chicago, Kenny went for work and loved it, so we thought, why not go to a freezing cold tundra in the dead of winter?  So, off we went.  The trip was great, aside from the gross hotel room we had at the under-construction Marriott.

#ProTip: I love the HotelsTonight app, and always have better luck with smaller, boutique hotels than the big chains.  I should’ve gone with that, but we ended up checking out early and going to this awesome hotel right next door, The Gwen.  Amazing experience, highly recommend. If you want a referral code, hit me up.

Anyway, we ate what felt like all of the pizza that had ever been made, did a historical tour and a mob tour, went to this bomb Speakeasy, went to a few museums, tried some great tacos, went to a Bulls game, and saw a friend who moved there.  We also managed to squeeze in a fair amount of shenannies if I do say so myself.

It was a great time and I am really glad we did it. The best part is that we (I) had no expectations, yet.  I had no notion that anything would work right away, but I knew I was 33 and that we should probably get this train moving.  I wasn’t positive, I wasn’t negative, I was just like here we go. Caveat: I did go to a psychic with my friends in August.  I don’t even know if or how much I believe in that nonsense.  But she did say things about past and current affairs that were on point, so when she said “warn your husband that when you start trying and he thinks it will take a while that it probably won’t. Also, I see twins, do you have those in your family?”, I definitely perked up a bit.  (That lady can essentially kick rocks, by the way). But other than her crazy predictions, I was just in for the short or long haul.

So, when we got back and about two weeks later I started feeling really weird; lightheaded, a bit woozy, just off.  Also, I typically had some pretty key and regular predictors the few days leading up to my period, VERY tender breasts and breakouts on my face.  Weird things were happening, but those typical things weren’t happening, and I thought…could that crazy psychic lady be RIGHT?  The FIRST TIME?  No way?

Took a test a couple of days before I was due, negative.  Took another test the day after it was due, still negative.  Ok, I thought, you hear that just the activity of trying could mess with things, so I moved on.  Then started the spotting, which I thought was my period starting.  Normal.  But then for almost two weeks, only spotting.  Strange.

Finally, I called the doctor about the extended spotting, they recommended I come in for a blood test just to “rule out” pregnancy.  And given the bleeding and the negative tests, I went in knowing it would be nothing.  But then, the nurse calls and says “believe it or not your blood test came back positive (WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAT) but just very low.  So, it’s either just starting or it might be a chemical pregnancy.”

Inner monologue: What in the crap is a chemical pregnancy!?!?!
-Essentially it is that the sperm and egg met, they hung out, fertilization happens, but never fully completes implantation and then you get your period about a week after it is usually due. Often due to chromosomal abnormalities.

If you want to read more about what they are check here.

Doctor sends me back in for blookwork in 48 hours to test again and see if it is going up or down-you’ll hear this 48 hour theme recurring for me a lot.  I go back, not knowing what to think at this point, and I get the call at work that it was going down, that this was a chemical pregnancy, and heard the term miscarriage for the first time.  It was crushing and so confusing.  And I was at work and had no idea what to do. Thank goodness for work IM where I could tell my supervisor I had to leave early and run away.

They scheduled a follow up appointment about a week later with one of the midwives at the OBGYN office who explains that his is a normal part of process (normal for who?), and that a very high percentage of women experience this, some who don’t even know (lucky me for knowing), and not to worry because this doesn’t impact your future ability to get pregnant (oh good, I will definitely NOT worry now).

It was a really shitty way to start the first month in the trying to have a family journey.  I know everyone’s struggle is different, and I can imagine trying for months and months with no result would be equally frustrating and upsetting.  But, for me, this starting point just really messed with my head and my ability to think positively moving forward. I yearn to go back to that naive week in Chicago where I was just in the “whenever it happens it happens” mentality.  Picturing it wouldn’t be instant, but also never picturing it would include such a roller coaster of devastation in the meantime.

Still a big fan of my baby-makin’-moon concept, just saying.  It did work, technically.  Just didn’t work as well as we hoped.  But, nevertheless, I highly recommend it! 😉 Maybe when I do get preggo the baby moon concept will become more enticing to me too!