Saturday, January 9, 2010

The creation of an Intelligent Beauty - Discovery

I was over at my BFFs house watching movies, playing Scrabble, and doing hoodrat stuff. Eventually we realized we needed to get some food so we decided to make a run on a late night before continuing our regularly scheduled Scrabble marathon and hoodrat stuff. We decided to do McDonald's and I decided on my usual, a #1 with a Coke (Big Mac meal for those of you who don't know). We came back to her house, sat down, started eating, and I realized that my Big Mac wasn't as good as it used to be.

The next day I was on the phone with my BFF and was telling her about the sandwich. I usually do a meat hiatus for a few months and the weird tasting burger was probably my trigger to doing so. For a few weeks, I just stopped eating meat. I made my veggie lasagna, rice and peas, lots of greens, even bought a veggie burger or two from Burger King (yes I said Burger King). When I went to my mom's for dinner she was fine about me not eating meat when she cooked a steak or a roast. But something had changed: I was getting sick from the smell of the raw meat.


At first I didn't think anything of it; I just thought it was that way because I hadn't encountered any raw meat in a while because of my hiatus. But the more I'd smell it at her house the more I'd get sick to my stomach. Then it advanced to me not being able to smell COOKED meat. Once again, I didn't think TOO much of it, but realized that I needed to get myself checked out.

I went to Walgreen's and bought a pregnancy test, just to be on the safe side. MCF and I had a small tryst about a few weeks prior and even though we used condoms, they cannot always be trusted. After I came home with the test, I went straight to the bathroom to take it. I was supposed to wait two or three minutes for a result; but as soon as I brought the stick from the toilet to put the cap back on, it was already positive.

I sat the stick down on my storage drawer while I waited the remaining minute and a half in complete disbelief. I flushed the toilet and washed my hands and then I looked at the stick again. Wrapping the end in a piece of tissue in order to pick it up, I looked at it a third time and then threw it in the garbage.

For about a week I carefully placed any garbage around the used pregnancy test stick, looking at it every time I used the bathroom just to check that it was positive. I had hoped that the vertical line would magically disappear and it would end up being a negative test and I really wasn't pregnant. But each time I looked down there was that damned plus sign.

I decided to go to urgent care at the local hospital just to make sure. Many women have taken those tests and got a false positive and the box said to go to the hospital or your primary care doctor if the test was positive. I checked into the urgent care and waited around for the triage nurse to call me.

About 30 minutes later, I was in an exam room with a bra and hospital gown on laying down on a cot waiting for the attending to come to my room. I probably looked like I didn't have a care in the world but I was secretly praying to EVERYBODY'S God that they would do the exam and tell me that I wasn't pregnant. The nurse came in, took my vitals, and told me that she was going to be inserting a catheter so that she could get urine directly from my bladder.

After that uncomfortable procedure, I had to wait another hour for my urine sample to be sent to the lab and get my results. I passed the time by finding a good "Law and Order: SUV" episode on TV before the nurse and attending came in with another machine: a vaginal ultrasound. What is a vaginal ultrasound? It's two big words for "you're pregnant."

They took the probe and put some lubricant on it while telling me what they were going to do and why they were using a vaginal probe. Since I was only about four weeks into my pregnancy, any movement wouldn't show up on a regular ultrasound and viewing the fetus vaginally would show more clearly. I just laid back on the cot in disbelief while they inserted the probe to show me my newest bodily addition.

I looked over to my right towards the ultrasound screen and saw a little heartbeat. I was in awe. As the attending pointed out the fetus' head, feet, and heartbeat; I started to cry. Here I am carrying a child. Another human. Inside of my womb. What.the.fuck?

The attending finished up the exam, left the room, and then the nurse said that I could get dressed and they would be bringing me my release papers. After I had gotten dressed, a social worker came in with pamphlets and other literature (and a lunch box because I was starving) about childbirth and options outside of abortion if I didn't want to have the child. I told her that it wasn't my time to have the baby and that I had no problem getting an abortion but also thanked her for the literature. I got my release papers along with additional paperwork stating my due date as well as a list of doctors within the hospital's network.

I walked out of the door, got into my car, and drove home. What was I going to do? Here I am 31 years old, no husband (or boyfriend that I thought gave a damn), a job that wasn't really going anywhere, living in the hood and pregnant. The ten minute ride to my house felt like the green mile because I had some decisions to make and quickly.

2 comments:

  1. Ooh. Even though I know the outcome, I like that you kept us, the readers on edge. Girl I've had an ultrasound but that vaginal one sounds nothing nice! Long live Mickey D's for the revealation?

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  2. Hey VZ...
    To be honest, I picked this storytelling up from ABelleInBrooklyn and her Empire State of Mind series...I liked the way she broke it up for the blog.

    But the vaginal ultrasound wasn't that bad actually...it was really simple and if you've had sex, you can handle a vaginal ultrasound. real.talk. (lmao)
    KMN

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