I had suspected I was pregnant but wasn't really ready to face the truth yet. My husband P and I had recently started 'trying' – though that isn't really the right word for it – we had simply just stopped trying not to!
So when my usually clockwork-like period was late, I had my suspicions. However, a few days into being 'late' I noticed some bleeding and thought, "Aha, ok, I was wrong." But, I have to admit that I did feel a little pang of disappointment. I had said nothing at this point to P of course, so he was happily none the wiser.
Fast forward two days and my 'period' hadn't gotten any heavier – super unusual for me! Trying to be casual, I offhandedly mentioned to my mum that I thought I might be but that my period had arrived – except it was being weird. She was onto me like a cat spying a mouse.
So I got a pregnancy test and guess what? The results were positive. Really positive twice. I have since found out there is no point doing more than one home test if you get a positive result first time because home pregnancy tests only very rarely give false positives. They can give you false negatives, sure, but false positives are virtually unheard of. This is because they measure for the hormone human chorionic gonadotropin (hCG). This clever hormone is generated by the cells that form the placenta, which starts to build itself as soon as the fertilised egg (known as a 'blastocyst') lodges in the uterine wall.
The funny thing for me is that I could swear I felt it when the blastocyst attached itself. About a week and a half earlier, I was in bed, asleep, and was woken by a definite twinge in my belly, in the uterus area. Not painful, just...different. I had never felt anything like it before. I did wonder if it could be something to do with conception, but then dismissed the thought as silly and turned over and went back to sleep. The 'period' I also experienced was simply spotting, probably due to the implantation of the fertilised egg.
Telling P was great – he was totally shocked – we both were really. I think we just expected it to take so much longer than it did – I'm 35 and have never even had a scare, we just thought my age would mean we would have to try for longer. We count ourselves as being so very lucky that we have been blessed so soon. And now we have our fingers firmly crossed that it will stay where it is and keep growing...
Physically, I don't feel anything at all yet (except for very tender boobs!), which adds to the feeling of unreality – is it really in there? I've since been reading up on it like a complete swotty nerd and whilst there aren't any physical sensations or outward signs yet, there's definitely a lot going on in there!
Did your body give you any signals to tell you were pregnant before you did the test? What were they?