The Discovery

I work as an Emergency Room nurse in a busy hospital down here. I call it "down here" because when you're from Washington State, everything is either "down there" or "over there". I still don't consider myself a "californian"; these people are strange with weird habits like putting avocado on their turkey burgers (turkey what?) and drinking carbonated water. Not soda. Just water with bubbles in it. I've had patients actually ask me if they can have a bottle of seltzer. After almost three years I still look at them funny and explain that sorry, I'm a foreigner.

Anyway, back on the subject: How I found out I was pregnant.

It was a pretty nice Sunday in the ER; nobody was dead and/or dying, the doctors were in pleasant moods, and none of the nurses were on the edge of an emotional meltdown. I was chatting with my friend Ariele and, for some reason, mentioned I was late. I was mostly joking; you can't say "late" at my job without people flocking to your aid. "Late, what? Late? Late for work? Late for dinner? Late? LATE-LATE? (When you're late as in pregnant, it's always 'late-late') Do you need to lie down? Are you all right?!"

Ariele suggested I take a pregnancy test. Now, the benefit of working in a hospital is that I get free pregnancy tests at my disposal. I know this because I'd been casually using them if I was twenty minutes late for the past year or so. So I sort of smirked at Ariele, said "Oh yeah, okay. I'll go take a test and then we can pick out names." So off I went to you know, take the test.

I'm standing in the dirty hold, which is the area we put everything dirty - tools, bedpans, urinals, whatever. It has a place to test urine and to do pregnancy tests for patients. So there I am in the dirty hold, which is always hot and smells like - well, you can probably guess what it smells like.

As I'm standing there, I look at the test like I'd done numerous times before, bracing myself for disappointment. No, that's not a shadow for the proof line. That's not a shadow. That's not a - wait, is that a line? That's a second line? IS THAT A POSITIVE LINE?

It's a positive line. I start screaming. Here I am in this little room and I'm screaming my head off; I throw the door open and march out, yelling at the first two co-workers I see. Meanwhile, across from me in a little seating area are three family members of a patient, all hoping to God or Buddha that I am not their loved one's nurse. Debbie and Joy are asking "What? What?" all the way to the room, and I don't say anything, I just point grandly at my work on the counter. Debbie looks at it, and then looks at me. She's fairly sure I've lost my mind at this point and am asking her what the thing on the counter is. So she tells me, "Yeah, that's a pregnancy test." I beam and announce, "Yeah, it's MY pregnancy test! And it's positive!"

Commence more screaming. The people right outside by this point are wondering how they can smuggle their loved one out of the ER and to another hospital.

Long story short, the entire department and half of the ambulance personnel know I'm pregnant within about twenty minutes. There's a lot of screaming and a lot of hugging and a lot of grumbling from the doctors, because they know this means I'm going to be even more emotional and snarky than usual for the next few months. Somewhere in this mass celebration, Nate (one of our EMTs) says, "Wow, what did Matt say?!"

Matt. . .Matt. That name sounded really famili-shit. That's right, in all my boisterous excitement I'd forgotten to tell my main man, the guy who slipped one past the goalie in the first place.

I cleared my throat, and casually called Matt to, y'know, let him know he was going to be a daddy. He knows me too well; he was well aware that everyone at work probably knew before he did, and was fine with it. Thank heaven for small favors.

And that's how we found out about Peanut.