I didn’t know how scared I was until our midwife said the word “induction.”

What’s silly is that I KNEW it was coming. My blood pressure has been rising, and my  platelet count has been falling. I told Ryan yesterday that this would be the verdict at today’s appointment, but I wasn’t really ready to hear it.

It’s not the induction I’m afraid of, really. It’s that… it’s here. No more waiting.

During the entire appointment, I felt… Actually, I can’t decide whether I felt overwhelmed by so many emotions or if I felt numb. I think I asked the right questions, gave the appropriate answers. Went through the motions…

Near the end, our midwife asked me what I’m afraid of. I think she was surprised by my reaction.

I stumbled through my response… I’m afraid something will go wrong… I’m afraid I’ll do something wrong… I’m just afraid.

Finally I said, “We’ve been trying to have this baby for almost seven years.”

Somehow, that’s what made it click for her. She said, “It’s hard to believe something will go right when your only experience is with everything going wrong.”

That’s it, exactly.

No matter how many benchmarks we’ve successfully passed, in the back of my mind, I’m still waiting for the other shoe to drop.

It’s like I’ve stepped into somebody else’s life. Somebody who gets to have a baby. In my bones, I’d begun to believe that that would never be me.

I’ve been waiting this whole time for the whole thing to cave in on me. I hate to admit that. It feels like a betrayal of my sweet boy.

It’s the truth, though.

Sometimes it feels like I’ve been pregnant all these years; others, it’s like I barely blinked and have catapulted into this moment.

Sunday at 8:30pm, we will check into the hospital and the journey will begin.

I am excited, nervous, ecstatic, and terrified. I’m not yet really feeling those emotions, not yet, but I will. When the shock wears off… or, when the contractions start.

Either way, time’s up.