Waiting For You

Chapter 9: Fourth of July

Chapter 9: Fourth of July

Sam

While I was shooting up with IVF medication to stimulate my egg production, Lia was also taking prenatal pills every day and other medication to thicken her endometrial lining. In normal and not so gross English, that basically means she was making her womb comfortable for a baby to live in for the next nine months.

So on embryo transfer day, we're confident we did everything by the book. We decided on a single embryo. Dr. Cho thinks it's a good call, since Lia is young and has a really good, strong uterus, which means a better chance at the embryo taking.

Now the only thing Cho needs to do is impregnate my wife...

Well shit, that's a fucking weird thing to think about out of context.

The procedure is quick and smooth. The doctor reassures us that he's done this a thousand times before and that we have nothing to worry about. I'm holding Lia's hand and we're both staring at the TV screen on the wall, watching the catheter moving inside of her. We even see the embryo get squirted out. It looks kind of neat, in a weird, sci-fi, alien technology sort of way.

"And that's it," Dr. Cho says after a few more minutes.

"So I might be pregnant right now," Lia grins.

"You can expect positive results from an at-home pregnancy test in two weeks, sometimes even earlier than that, but don't be alarmed if it takes a bit more time, that's normal too," Dr. Cho informs us as he removes his latex gloves and straightens up to his full height. "Now you know the drill. You stay in bed today, let your husband pamper you a little bit. No strenuous physical activity for the next few weeks, which includes sex," he says.

"I'll try to keep my hands off her," I say jokingly.

Lia hits me on the shoulder.

"We're going to have you stay put for about an hour, and then you're free to go home," he continues to explain, an amused smile on his face.

The next few days are definitely interesting. To be honest, I think my wife might be going a little bit stir crazy, and I don't blame her. At least I get to go to work for a good chunk of the day, while she has to stay at home and do as little as possible.

Her sister Abby came over on Saturday and kept her company, which I think helped a great deal in distracting her from everything. They got started on wedding preparations and browsed through different bridal shop websites for dresses.

It's a bit out of my area of expertise, so I went out to the bar with Tyler and Joey to play some pool and shoot the shit. I think it was good for me too to get out of my head and think about something other than the baby Lia is probably carrying.

We're going to buy a few pregnancy tests next week. Even if it's still a little early, Dr. Cho said we could potentially see a faint positive... and we're too fucking excited to wait much longer than that.

The fact that we've got plans for Independence Day definitely breaks up the monotony of waiting around for things to start happening. We spend most of Tuesday evening making red, white and blue cupcakes for the occasion, as well as my mother-in-law's birthday cake. I'm not much use in the kitchen, but with Lia bossing me around I manage to not be a complete waste of space. If anything, it's nice just spending time together.

On Wednesday we get to sleep in a little longer than we might've if it'd been a workday, but we're still ready to leave for Lia's parents' well before noon.