Tick, tock, tick, tock
The simplest way to break down my life till this point would probably have to be in new beginnings. Sometimes the change was graceful and other times quite abrupt. Baby stage (my Mom says I was awesome, which doesn’t surprise me 😉 ), childhood, teenage years, about five minutes of young adulting, then marriage, then a very blurry stage where I had four children in a matter of five years, trying to maintain my sanity while raising four babies under five for a bit, making Aliyah (immigrating to Israel), the adaptation stage to a new country, and then – we found this peace.
All this led up to where we were about seventeen months ago. Kids were getting a bit bigger, we were sleeping through the night and the occasional nap, dare I say. My husband loved his job. We were able to leave for family outings without strollers, diapers, and all the other crap that could fill a freight ship just to get through a day with babies and toddlers. Taking regular showers without wondering whether that cry is actually real or in your head. And then for G-d knows what reason, my biological clock started to tick again. This clock that I was sure was smashed to smithereens after all the girls were born. It’s as if my body was like “holy crap, get one more in, you’re getting old!” . I wanted to smell the baby smell. Cuddle a sweet infant again, I couldn’t imagine that at my age I was “done” having children, an age when most women these days were just starting their families. I must admit I was enjoying this relaxing stage of my life but that damn clock was ticking so loud that it felt like it was going to perforate my eardrum. So I asked Ian if we could try again, “uh, no babe, that ship has sailed” , “they are getting big, the baby would be so lonely with such a huge age gap”,”things are finally easier”…I pushed and nagged him for a while and then at some point after a bit of sadness and a touch of resentment I started to realize he was right, his reasons were so valid. Who could blame him? We slept. We went out with friends. Plus, money and space was tight as it was. Also, we had our “seder” which is a Jewish term for “order”. Things made sense. I counted my blessings and decided to enjoy how peaceful things were finally. And then there was this calm. Little did I know, it was the calm before the storm of the freakin century.
Smooth as a baby’s bottom until one day…
Which brings me to this portion, I was quite the super mom/wife. I worked, I was home when the kids came home from school, I prepared hot meals, I made time for my husband, time for friends and kept a tidy home. In a nutshell, I was grown-upping the hell out of it. I got shit done. Then one fine day when my youngest was six, I found out I was pregnant yet again.
Now don’t get me wrong, I was excited because as you know I wanted another baby, but I had moved on. Accepted. And then POW! I was so nervous Ian would flip out with the news. I felt for him, I kept thinking about all the reasons he was “done”. Even so, after a bit of freaking out (me) I told Ian the news and he hugged me and wished me a “B’shaa Tova”(“when the time is right”) and “mazal tov” (“congrats”). He was taking it pretty well! His smile brought me calm and I continued on my way expecting some change but since I’ve been raising four, what’s one more, right??
Wrong. I was so wrong.
Okay. I mentioned earlier that we made “Aliyah” (moved to Israel) in 2011 (which is a whole other topic I’ll revisit later on). This is important and relevant because having a baby in America is a handheld silver spoon with ooohh’s and awww’s experience. In Israel, on the other hand it’s more like being thrown onto a roller coaster mid-ride without a seat belt. I didn’t know what was about to hit me.
So I did what you do when you find out you’re prego. I called the OBGYN to make an appointment. I was shocked to find out that I could not get an appointment till I was eight weeks along! Having been six years since my last pregnancy I was a bit worried. I was eager to find out if everything was okay in my “advanced maternal age” of 35 years young, yeah, wonders for my ego. But either way I accepted the first trial and decided to try and relax and pray for good news. Weeks went by and the night came when I had my first appointment. Ian came home to be with the girls and off I went to the OB all by my lonesome. I mean I’ve done this four times already so I didn’t need any hand holding. Why pay for a sitter?
The Israeli OBGYN (Let’s call him Dr. Smiley)
I walked into Dr. Smiley’s office and sat down across from him at his desk. He’s a tall middle aged man, well dressed, with a fully shaved head shining in all it’s glory. He looks up at me very casually, half smiling “so, why are you here?”. I explain that I had a positive pregnancy test and I’d like to confirm my pregnancy. He responds “okay, lets check you out” (in Hebrew). I waited anxiously in the dreaded exam chair. I was shaking from anxiety. I wanted to see that little heartbeat and move along through my new path. Dr. Smiley starts the sonogram… I explain how scared I am… I studied his expression, wondering if I could read anything of value while he concentrated on the sonogram. His expression was very serious, “hmmmm..”. So I respond “is every thing okay, is there a heart beat?” He then looks at me and says “ken, hakol beseder (yes, everything is fine). And thennn, “At rotza haftaah?” Now in my experience with my poor Hebrew the word “haftaah” is used in kindergarten a lot when the kids come home with a “haftaah” from parties – I thought it meant “present” . I giggled, “sure, is my present a healthy heartbeat?”. He replies “no..HAF-TA-AH! A surprise”. Confused as hell, it all makes sense when he continues by saying “Don’t worry, Evrising iz fine wiz bos of dem, you see? One heartbit, two heartbit” pointing at the screen. “Teumim, you know? Twins”. He started to talk about things I should be aware of but my brain turned to mush and all I could hear was a combination of my own frantic laughter, and blah,blah,blah. I mean, Dr.Smiley acted like he had just told me about the weather forecast. I muttered, how? There aren’t twins in our family? Doc turns to me and says “well you ar za firzt”. Hmmmkay…I was in such denial that as I walked home I almost ran back to the office just to ask him if I heard correctly. I called my good friend and if I remember correctly, I spoke a mile a minute in a daze -“Ian’s gonna freak! He just got used to the idea of one! I’m gonna turn into a blimp! But we already have four, OMG there will be six of them! We need a bigger car! How am I gonna handle a twin pregnancy?” I was freaked to say the least. She calmed me down and I now faced telling my other half our insane news. The word ‘haftaah’ , ‘haftaah’ kept repeating in my brain.
Forgive me but I’m getting a little p.t.s.d now so I’m going to take a break now…
‘Honey, you’re as white as ghost! Is everything okay?!?‘ coming soon…
The Only Six Pack I Have 