So there I was...

The week after J left... miserable, emotional, reclusive and any other adjective that you would describe a normal newly alone mom of two under two. Life was crazy. The kids were crazy. Pretty much the norm for the beginning of a deployment, except I had been feeling really out of sorts and very not my normal, let it roll off my back, self.

After enough eye twitching events occurred that week, I decided to do what every girl does when they feel more like a female version of the hulk, than their usual self... I took a pregnancy test. And like any girl who takes a test and sees two lines, I took four more.

Huh. That's interesting. Pretty sure I've stated here, very clearly, just how *done* I was being pregnant {{maybe once or twice}}. So you can imagine my complete and utter surprise at seeing two lines, four times. I had this moment when I was staring at the tests where I seriously considered calling the manufacturer. It says to call with questions, "Hey, um... could four positive tests be wrong?" Probably not... Then I did what I'm sure many of the other moms have done when they have a teething four month old, an defiant two year old and a husband deployed seven thousand miles away: I cried... For days.

Ok, ok. Tell me now what an awful person I am. People try for years... Spend thousands of dollars... Every child is a blessing... I'm not denying any of that... But until you are standing on the high dive, about to jump into the three-kids-under-three and a soldier-husband who has been gone a week and has already said the words "the next deployment" - pool, You can't judge me or anything I say.

The first few days weren't great. I honestly NEVER in my life thought I'd be here {{payback's a bitch... I am the first to say, "Don't you know what causes that?"}}. My first pregnancy was AWFUL. I threw up all day long every day, the whole pregnancy. The second wasn't much better and I'm not too ashamed to admit that my initial shock was selfish questioning if I would be able to handle it all, again. Plus, can I mention the fact that I had *just* gotten down to pre-pregnancy weight from 2.0?

It took a good week. I wallowed in self pity on my couch waiting for the crippling morning sickness to kick in, totally cutting myself off from everyone. Then I put my big girl panties back on and accepted our little gift for what it is and found the bright side of having another baby... even if meant having three kids, three and under.

J has been AMAZING through the whole thing. As soon as I told him he was SUPER excited!! He was so happy he told everyone he worked with and I quickly was getting congratulations from people, when I wasn't feeling so celebratory. Some women would be annoyed by this, but it actually helped me. It took a while, but now I am OVER JOYED at our pending arrival!

I made the decision to keep the baby under wraps until we knew the sex. I knew we could stop a lot of well-intended, yet hurtful comments, by waiting until there was no gender question.

So last weekend, we went down and had our gender scan. J was able to listen over the phone and watch the scan via the internet. It made me SO happy that he could be there, even though he wasn't in the room...

And so... Ladies & Gentlemen... I introduce to you

16wk - Baby Girl #3. Due 11/2 {{five days before 2.0's first birthday}}