Smidge

We got a note from Butterfly the other day that the "cat was out of the bag", so we could go ahead and share the news with our circle of friends now. Yahoo! Goodness it has been hard to keep this under my hat for the past few weeks, but I did it. I was just about bursting though.

AC broke the news earlier this morning here, and has linked to Butterfly's blog, but I just have to add a few details of my own.

This has been a long and painful road Butterfly and The Boy have walked these past couple of years, and we hurt for them as they faced each disappointment along the way. Our hearts went out to them as they struggled with the heartache of infertility, and we felt so powerless to ease their pain. Goodness it is hard when you children hurt and there is nothing you can do for them.

We supported them as best we could and tried to be there to offer a shoulder to cry on or just listen when feelings needed to be vented, but this was a very private walk they had to take and we waited until we were asked for help before we offered any.

Acquaintances on the other hand, would make flippant comments and jokes about having babies, or what was wrong with them, or what were they waiting for, and Butterfly felt like screaming at them. She was hanging on by a thread each month, and these people would walk all over her hurting heart with their casual words. There is a huge lesson to be learned here for all of us. Think before you make a flippant comment to a young married person about not having a child yet. Infertility is a huge problem in our society today, and there is no heartache quite like it.

When Butterfly and The Boy started infertility treatments the drugs sent Butterfly on an awful roller coaster ride of emotions and she and The Boy needed the love and support of family and friends to help them hang on while their little family unit chugged up one huge hill and careened down another. What a ride we were all on.

To make this rather long story a little shorter, just let me say that this summer Butterfly went in for an IUI treatment and it was successful. Oh joy!

On the day of the treatment The Boy couldn't get the day off work, so AC and I took Butterfly to the Infertility clinic and sat tensely in the waiting room for her. AC and I were amazed at the size of the place and the number of couples coming and going the whole time we sat there. The waiting room was large and almost full. A steady stream of people moved through the efficient and busy office.

After a while AC and I noticed that people were glancing at us out of the corner of their eyes, and it then dawned on us what people must be thinking. I bet we were the talk of the day around some dinner tables that night. Can't you hear it now? 'You wouldn't believe this old couple sitting in the waiting room at the infertility clinic! They must have been at least 60! What in the world are they thinking?' Ha, ha, ha. What a hoot!

Anyway, after the treatment, came the waiting time. Each day seemed ten years long, and at one point Butterfly said she felt like a "watched pot" and a watched pot never boils. So we tried to give her lots of space and let her tell us how she was doing when she was ready. I felt like this big elephant was sitting in the room with us and we all just pretended like it wasn't there. Oh so difficult to do, but we did it.

On the August long weekend AC and I were working at the local music festival and Butterfly came to meet us at the front gate at the end of one of our shifts. The Boy was out of town, and she quite often joins us for dinner when he is away so we didn't think anything strange about her meeting us and coming home with us. We piled into the car and merrily chatted on about the music festival and how much fun we were having. We were still chattering on about people we met during our tour of duty that day as we entered our kitchen. I was unpacking coolers and thinking about what to make for dinner when Butterfly handed us each a little gift bag and said that seeing as we were working so hard at the festival this weekend she bought us something to help us get through the next couple of days. I took the bag and thought it was a piece of fudge or something like that. As I reached into the bag I heard a commotion behind me. AC was rushing across the room towards Butterfly, and I then saw clearly what was in the bag. A pair of baby booties! The IUI was a success, the test positive, she was pregnant. We stood in the kitchen, crying and hugging and crying some more. Oh joy, joy, joy.

It was still very early in the pregnancy, and many things could go wrong at that stage, so we had to reign in our urge to shout the news from the housetops just yet. But inside the house we let our joy run free. AC and I started calling each other Grandma and Grandpa and we liked the sound of that let me tell you. Oh joy, joy, joy.

So, here we are almost at the three month mark and have been given the go ahead to finally spread the news far and wide. Come next April, little Smidge (Butterfly called the embryo Smudge, but now that the embryo is officially a fetus I changed the name in my mind to Smidge) will say hello to this old world and I will answer to the name of Grandma. Oh joy, joy, joy.