Into the Dark (ORIGINAL AND UNEDITED EDITON)

Ten

On my lunch break, I decide to leave the office. I need fresh air.  I need to breathe and to think.

I'd done pretty well in isolating the situation from the forefront of my mind- managing to focus on almost nothing but the ten patients I'd seen this morning, navigating my way through the usual routine of avoiding antibiotics, and referrals to dermatology and physiotherapy for follow-ups.

Ironically, my third patient was a woman in her late thirties, who had apparently been trying for almost two years to get pregnant and was now wondering if IVF was the only viable option. It had made me feel ungrateful and selfish given the direction of my current thoughts.

Perhaps since his sperm seems to be some sort of fertility miracle, Jake could help them out. I mean how fertile was he? Once? On the first go? Seriously?

Coming from a doctor I know how ridiculous that is. Once was all it took. Maybe not for Louise Waters and her husband, but for Jake, once was all it took.

The appointment with Louise hadn't been the first time my thoughts had wandered. The contents of the top drawer of my desk had slipped through the cracks of my concentration when I wasn't working hard enough to prevent them doing so. The moments of quiet felt weighty now with the magnitude of what it meant for us. No more eerie calm in my head. It was loud and getting louder.

Grabbing my jacket from the hook behind my office door, I rush past reception and out into the bright summer day. I stop for a takeout coffee from the deli Jake had asked me out in that day, sipping it as I walk along to Torrance park - a small but always busy park, a short walk from the surgery. 

Because it's a warm pleasant day, the park is busier than usual and lots of women with buggies and small children seem to be trying to send me some kind of blatant screaming message - the birds singing and the sun shining down on their picture perfect motherly forms. Soon, the women with  pushchairs and small children start to  hold a new sort of enticement for me and I stare at them wondering about the moment they first found out they were pregnant. Did any of them have to deal with the kind of life altering situation Jake and I do?

Pregnancy was life-altering enough on its own, it changed your life and your body forever. This situation of ours was beyond the realms of what new parents normally have to deal with. Jake would now have someone else to worry about and yet another burden to consider. How could I have been so careless? How am I supposed to tell him this now that we had so much else to worry about?

I find a spot on a bench near the middle of the park by the small bowling lawn and sit down, my take out coffee cooling in my lap but warming my fingers. Yes, the calm waters of my mind are definitely more lively now, a gentle swaying that's picking up speed and motion. I feel sick again.

Okay, I need to think about this sensibly. The first thing I need to do is book an appointment with my doctor.   I need a qualified professional who isn't myself to tell me that I am indeed 100% pregnant, and if so, clarify how pregnant I actually am.

I feel slightly hysterical. I never thought that when I became pregnant I'd feel hysterical about it.   I always thought I'd feel excitement and joy and I actually resent the fact that its not what I feel. I want to feel the rush of excitement and anticipation and I want Jake to feel the same. Instead I feel nervous and afraid and worried about everything. The timing was truly awful.

I give him a key to my house and then I tell him I'm pregnant. I mean am I the biggest man trapper there's ever been? God where's Rob when I need her?  I contemplate calling Tash but I don't know if involving my family right now is the best idea either.  As soon as I do, it becomes real.  As soon as I tell my sister I'm pregnant she becomes an aunt. That makes her involved in a way I don't want her, or anyone to be quite yet. Maybe because I'm not quite ready to acknowledge this as a real thing yet.