Sitting here, counting back to the date of when we conceived makes me want to cringe. Valentine Day, of all the days. However, Gavin and I have created our “little alien” and we couldn’t be happier.

We found out on 11th March 2016, Gavin sat outside the door with anticipation whilst I took the test, when I came out our reactions were very similar. Gavin fell to the floor with a big grin on his face whilst I turned into a corner of the room, like a naughty school girl, laughing hysterically. We both hadn’t realised how quickly this would happen as we had only officially agreed to start trying in February. I hadn’t had any symptoms of being pregnant in the first four weeks of “little alien” being conceived, so we were very unprepared for the results of the pregnancy test. In fact, it took a further three tests for reality to sink in with both of us.

That weekend I called my mother to ask if she would help start to paint a bedroom that we were planning on renovating. She came on the Sunday morning and spent the full day helping to paint and creating a feature wall, unbeknown to her that we were really getting the nursery ready.  I also went to my GP that week to inform him of our findings and to register with the midwife. Whilst he was completing the pre-checks, I was found to have a pregnancy related heart murmur and high blood pressure, so he referred me to a specialist. Around this time the farm also bought twenty pet lambs and it was my responsibility to rear the flock.

Week six was when I started to feel rough and suffered from, what I can only describe as extreme exhaustion. For example, when I went to work, I had to go for an hours sleep in my car at lunch times and then when I got home I had to have a further hour of sleep on the sofa. This continued into my fourteenth week, when I started to gain more strength and the baby wasn’t using all of my reserves. I could see this was starting to annoy Gavin as he had to take on a lot of my daily chores. For instance, he had to look after the pet lambs and cook all the evening meals during this time.

On the 11th April 2016 I went for a heart murmur scan, which was an ultrasound on my heart. The sonographer was very particular in not going down to my belly as the baby wouldn’t have formed fully at that point, however this was very disappointing news to us both. It was confirmed that I did have a murmur but it wasn’t anything to be concerned about at this stage, I was told to expect a further scan in three months time.  I also had my first appointment with the midwife around this time, the meeting lasted an hour long, going through Gavin and I’s medical history and taking blood tests.  My arm hurt for at least a week after, due to the amount that she took.

By week eleven, Gavin was starting to get eager to start telling people our news. We had agreed prior to this that we would wait for the first scan before telling anybody. However we wanted to create mementos to give to our family so Gavin had organised with his best friend to come up one evening. When he arrived we went up into the nursery and with our pre-made signs we took the pictures. I then created cards on the internet and they were delivered the next day to make sure that we received them in time.

On the 4th May 2016, Gavin and I went for our first scan. The experience wasn’t what I expected at all, there wasn’t a friendly “Congratulations” from the sonographer, just straight down to business of checking everything medical-wise. The baby was in the wrong position, so I was asked to do star jumps. However, this didn’t work so we were sent off for an hour, to take a walk and drink plenty of water. When we came back the baby was in the correct position and we were able to get some pictures to take away with us. I was asked to take more blood tests, so they could check for down syndrome and other issues, the test results came back clear after a week. The best part of the day was that the due date was confirmed as 11th November 2016.

That evening Gavin decided that he couldn’t wait any longer and that we had to tell people. We started with my mother, when we arrived at her house we found my brother was with her as well. We decided to play a trick on them so I posted the card into her letter box and then went to join Gavin, who was hiding at the side of her house. I called her mobile and asked her to go look in the room as I thought I had left something at hers when I last visited. She said she would call me back, so Gavin and I waited. However we didn’t hear anything and she didn’t call me back. Gavin and I ended up walking into the house where she said “what the…”. My mother and I are very close and I think she was bemused by the fact that I had managed to keep a secret from her for so long.

We then went to my grandmothers home, I wasn’t expecting the reaction we got from her as she already has great-grandchildren. However she surprised me by being over joyed and very excited about our news. We then went to Gavin’s parents house, where we found lots of visitors. Gavin and I toyed with the idea of not telling them, however Gavin was persistent and so he handed them the card explaining that these were the results of my heart murmur scan. When Gavin’s mother opened the card, she burst into tears with our news and his father decided it was time to have a celebratory cigar.

Finally we went to Gavin’s grandparents house,where we were able to deliver our news. Due to the time we decided to tell Gavin’s sister and my father the next day. When we got back from telling both of them, Gavin’s grandmother had sent us our first baby present, it was two pairs of booties for “little alien” once it was born. That weekend we went to buy a baby book to be able to jot down key dates and keep all the memories of our growing “little alien”. I think it would also be good to add that the pet lambs are doing really well and are continuing to grow every day.

Much love
Rebecca