life, in a nutshell: part II

As we were leaving my doctor's office, I was instructed to make an appointment at the hospital for a second ultrasound to "confirm" the pregnancy. After seeing three babies, clear as day, on the monitor, I didn't need confirmation, I needed a drink. 

I bid farewell to my doctor's office once and for all since here on out I would have to start seeing a perinatologist as I was now considered a high-risk patient. As if being pregnant with one isn't nerve-wracking enough, three babies was going to take my neuroses to a whole new level. 

JR saw me to my car (we drove separate) and he headed off to work. With Jake in my backseat, we headed home. This news was just eating away at me. I HAD to tell someone. I needed someone else to distract me from my own thoughts. I needed to hear the voice of the one person in life who has always reminded me that everything was going to be OK, no matter what the circumstances. I needed to call my brother, David. The second I heard his voice, my voice began to quiver and my eyes, once again, started to well up. He knew I had my appointment that morning and judging by my tone and overall demeanor, I could tell he thought I was calling to deliver some unfortunate news. Little did he know it was the very, very, very opposite. 

"Uh oh. Is everything OK," he asked. 

"Oh yea, everything is fine!" I sarcastically replied. "I'M HAVING TRIPLETS!!" 

Crickets. 

After a few more expletives on my end, he let out a high-pitched giggle in disbelief. "Not funny," I callously spoke. "What are we going to do?!??" After about ten minutes of some big brother reassurance, I had calmed down a bit and the reality of triplets was slowly starting to sink in. 

When we I got home, I didn't know what to do with myself. Jake wasn't much of a conversationalist back then so I decided to call my mom. This conversation was going to go one of two ways. She was either going to:

1. Panic and start crying or 

2. Be over-the-moon happy and start crying. 

Thank God it was the latter. She was happier than a pig in shit. The excitement in her voice was as though she had just been called down to the Contestant's Row on The Price is Right. I could just envision her running around her house, flailing her hands over her head while squealing with delight once we hung up. This has never been denied nor confirmed. 

With one parent down and two to go, it was time to tell my in-laws. Now, I need to preface this with, I love my in-laws. JR and I have been together for over nine years and recently celebrated our five-year wedding anniversary. His parents have never treated me like anything but their own daughter. I really lucked out in that department, and from what I can tell, the feeling is mutual. However, I have to admit, I was a little nervous to deliver our news to them. Moreover because I didn't want them to worry for us. I also didn't want them them to think that this was something we had CHOSEN. We were always on the two and done plan. The concept of multiples, much less spontaneous triplets, wasn't even a feasible thought. In our minds, we probably had better chances of becoming meth addicts than conceiving natural triplets. 

When JR got home from work, we headed to my in-laws. It was a weeknight and we pulled the ol,' 'Oh, we were in the neighborhood and decided to stop over' routine. It was a blatant lie. On the drive over, my stomach was in knots. I felt like we were back in high school getting ready to drop the bomb on my boyfriend's parents that he had knocked up his younger, underaged, freshman girlfriend. 

As the four of us sat there in their living room, my mother-in-law asked us how my appointment went. We both let out a nervous laugh to which she immediately questioned us with "What?!?" JR's 'I've got this' response still makes me laugh to this day. 

"There's three in there," he blurted out. Those choice words even took me a minute to process what the hell he was even talking about. I stuck my hand into my purse and handed off a wad of folded up ultrasound photos to my mother-in-law.

As they unfolded like an accordion, she gazed at them in excitement, confusion and disbelief. Once the dust settled, they assured us, "We're here for you if you need us. Anything at all." After the day we had just had, it was exactly what we needed to hear. 

When we got home and put Jake to bed, we decided to put a post on Facebook about the pending arrival of our litter. It was the fastest and easiest way to get the word out. The second I hit 'post,' the comments, texts, and phone calls began to flood in. It was overwhelming. So much so that I had to turn my phone off. I remember going to bed that night feeling surprisingly calm even though I had three babies in my belly. THREE! 

I have always been a believer that everything happens for a reason. Even though, at the time, it was hard to make sense of, I knew God had three perfectly good reasons as to why he was doubling the size of our family. As I laid there in bed that night, I couldn't help but thank him for not not splitting the other egg, too.