The Week I Took 50 Pregnancy Tests
The wicked games our brains play with those damned two lines
My husband and I want children one day. This is something that we have both known since we began dating. It was never a question of whether or not it would happen, we just assumed one day in the far future we would become parents.
Far future being the key term here.
After about a year of being married and me struggling with my mental health, I was put on anti-depressants and begun to feel a lot better after a long-haul struggle. I had been having issues with my stomach as well having been diagnosed with Ulcerative Colitis. The medication for this had also begun to help.
I was on the climb.
I decided to take it one step further and finally tell my birth control to kick rocks. It had been a long ten years of yo-yo’ing with that little pill package and I finally felt confident enough in my income, age, and relationship status that if an “oopsie” occurred, we would be alright.
My husband and I decided this was a good idea. I threw the last package of my pills into the trash and went to bed. No plans of having a child in the near future and no worry or thought that coming off the pill would be a true mind game.
But, something happened that first month that I wasn’t on the pill. something that I genuinely never saw coming.
For some reason, once I had stopped taking the pill, I was convinced, after years of being told to be careful, that now I was going to get pregnant whether I liked it or not.
I started to read articles about how easily you could get pregnant even after just coming off the pill. Different articles would contradict one another, saying it took months for it to completely disappear from your system.
I wasn’t sure on which article my brain was supposed to land for trust and truth.
For someone who essentially has ten years of schooling in medicine and health, I didn’t know a whole lot about the female menstrual cycle. That first month I came off the pill, I learned more in four weeks than I had my entire life.
Awesome job, school system.
I learned that, no, I likely wasn't going to get pregnant right before, during, or right after my period. This is not of course always accurate, but the chances were low. You only ovulate, if you do ovulate, once a month. You’ll likely have your withdrawal bleed, and your cycle could be skewed for the first couple of months.
Etc. etc. etc.
The game was simple, just don’t have sex during that special week, and you'll be safe.
But, the more you deep dive into learning about your body, the more your brain (or, my brain at least) starts to analyze the possibilities, the outliers, the anomalies.
Did you know that sperm can live in a women’s body for up to 5 entire days?
Now, I feel a little bit idiotic that I didn’t know this type of stuff. I think being on birth control for so many years just led me to feel safe, guarded, and pretty in control of my body in that area.
When I came off the pill though, I lost control and it felt like I was entering a deep dive of possibilities.
I was going to get pregnant, I was sure of it.
I’m healthy, young, and have a regular period (cough, birth control pill).
Flash forward to the week my period was meant to be due.
I happened to discover where the hospital I worked at stocked the pregnancy tests for patients. A couple of days before my period was meant to arrive, I strolled past them and when no one was looking, decided to take one.
What could it hurt? I had never peed on a stick before prior. I was probably pregnant. After all, I had been off the pill for an entire three weeks now. I was having sex, and I was surely fertile. I may as well find out right now, at 11 am on a Tuesday at work in between OR cases.
I peed, I waited, I looked.
Negative.
I shrugged, honestly unsure of how to feel, and carried on with my day. I’m sure it was just early. I was even a little bit nauseous that morning. So there was really no doubt that I was with child.
This little habit I created, however, started to occur every day. Then a couple of times a day.
Before I knew it, my period was three days late, and I had probably taken a total of at least twenty-five pregnancy tests.
Where was my second line? I was late, obviously, because I had to be pregnant. I mean, I had to be.
Right?
My husband had no idea this was going on at the time. I can only imagine him reading this now, rolling his eyes. We weren't even trying. But, for some unknown reason, I had just gotten it in my head that it would be happening now.
How naive. How misinformed!
My period ended up arriving a total of six days later with probably fifty pregnancy tests in the garbage disposal laughing at me.
I started to deep dive into journals and science and read about the actual facts of what was happening to my body. It is astounding how little we are taught, and then just proceed to take a small pill with no idea what it is doing to our body.
We just know that we are women, and we can get pregnant. Therefore, if we want to enjoy ourselves, we need to prevent it.
It is now almost a year later and I have finally returned to my normal cycle. We are not pregnant, we are not trying but we have still pulled the goalie. If it happens, we are happy. For now, we continue living.
I haven’t taken a pregnancy test since.
Okay, that's such a lie. But for sure less than three a month.
I feel wholeheartedly for women who are trying to get pregnant and waiting each month for those two lines to show up.
I am entirely certain that when you are questioning it, those couple of days before your period, you can magically make a second line appear with your eyes.
It is, quite frankly, a cruel game.
Sources:
Sakkas, D., Ramalingam, M., Garrido, N., & Barratt, C. (2015). Sperm selection in natural conception: What can we learn from mother nature to improve assisted reproduction outcomes? Retrieved February 08, 2021, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4594619/
Wright, K., & Johnson, J. (2008, October). Evaluation of extended and continuous use oral contraceptives. Retrieved February 08, 2021, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2621397/
