Your great sense of humour is going to be your greatest gift! –friend, via e-mail

I’ve said I don’t know how many times over the past few weeks, “I have to laugh; if I don’t laugh I’ll cry.”  So that’s it.  I’m choosing to laugh.  And I wanted to share at least a few things I’ve laughed about as we’ve walked through this situation.

First off, the day I discovered I was pregnant–the same day–I logged on Facebook and was greeted, at the very top of the page, with a picture of Dr. Seuss’ Sam-I-am next to a lengthy quote, which began:  “You can get pregnant in a car.  You can get pregnant in a bar.  You can get pregnant on a hill.  You can get pregnant on the pill.”

Seriously.  I am not making this up.

Reading through, it was made clear by the end that it was a tirade about Todd Akin, who was all over the news at that point.  But I still about fell off the sofa.

My sweet husband’s first words on finding out were, admittedly, “Holy crap!”  After a pause, he brought up something I hadn’t considered:  “Wow.  Aren’t you glad we didn’t adopt that sibling set of three?”

Um….yikes!!

Two days later he and I sat in our Sunday school class and tried to keep a straight face as the teacher read one of the points for the day:  “Have you questioned God’s timing while you were waiting to be delivered from difficulty?”  Um, yeah…doing a lot of questioning God’s timing lately, thanks.

Not long after I was sitting in my doctor’s office, having an “official” pregnancy test done, and laughing (at that point, nervous laughter) about the whole ridiculous situation.  The nurse wrapped a blood pressure cuff on my arm as I murmured, “I’m going to have a fifteen-year-old, a thirteen-year-old, and a six-year-old.”  She laughed.  “You’re just going to live in your van!” she announced with a smile.  A pause while she took my pulse….and then something clicked.

“Oh, my word….we’re going to need to buy a van!”

(On a side note, does anyone have a Mazda CX-9 they’d like to sell for a reasonable price?  I’d really like to avoid the whole van thing.)

It’s funny to finally start telling people, because I love to see the variety of reactions.  One is the relentlessly positive, “That’s wonderful!  Congratulations!!” from people who clearly don’t know the whole story.  Others immediately get concerned; I’m an “old” mom and they know it.  A reaction I got yesterday (which I really appreciated) was, “Congratulations?  With a question mark?”  That was a mom who understood.

My favorite reaction, though, which I don’t get very often, is when people burst out laughing.  They get it.  I know when I have a laugher that I’ve truly found someone who gets it.  Those are the people I’m planning on hanging with for the next seven months.

Because I’ve got to keep laughing.

Okay, enough baby talk…..back to my regular topics next week, I promise.  🙂