So for those of you who’ve been following (or haven’t), yesterday was the day to find out if the last round of Clomid/hCG injection was successful. And it was! So, yay. Baby Q-Brit (to be known until further information is available as “Stormageddon”) is due sometime in mid-September. Yes, I am at about 4 weeks now. Yes, that is crazy early to be telling people (although IRL I’ve only told a couple).
Here’s why: I do not have the sort of job that’s going to jive well with pregnancy, and I need help on managing the intersection of job with baby symptoms ASAP–both from the minimizing-early-symptoms POV and the juggling-so-I-don’t-have-to-tell-the-whole-world-yet POV.
EDIT: Okay, so some (most?) of you already know that I had to walk out on my job yesterday during a time that I really, really should not have done so. That particular situation is unlikely to repeat—I can probably count on sufficient breaks to keep food in my stomach—but it is apparent that this is something that I need to figure out and fast.
I have a Very Serious job that requires me to be in public on a regular basis in Very Serious situations. The amount of control I have over my schedule is relatively little—for the most part, I need to be “on” from 8:15 am to 11:00 or 12:00 every day, and 1:00-3:00 most afternoons. I can usually squeeze in breaks for a quick bite/restroom break in there if I need to. The upside to this is that I rarely have to work outside my official 8-5 schedule—the downside is that I don’t usually have much say in how I spend the hours from 8-5.
There are 3 of us with this exact job here in my location. The other two are very nice men with school-age kids and we’re all pretty close. We traditionally rotate all duties equally; I can probably get them to cover for me in situations like today’s without needing to explain, at least for awhile. I’m sure they’re going to figure it out if they haven’t already. They may or may not ask, and I may or may not mind telling them.
Our boss is in a different location and as such, if I can avoid more scenes like today, I can probably put off telling him. I’m figuring, BTW, that I’ll tell everyone when I get past the 10-week ultrasound (so let’s say, to the start of March). It can also be a relatively physical job, and because its so public and the office culture is very social, I suspect keeping quiet longer than necessary will be more trouble thank it’s worth.
Yes, I feel better now that I’ve eaten. I’m (almost) sure I can keep eating on a regular basis for the rest of this week and can quickly acquire motion-sickness bands and ginger candy and can keep crackers or nuts with me. (I might even be able to keep ginger ale with me in one of those metal water bottles.) What else do I need to keep in mind?
Also, I have a compulsive need, as Expat knows, to tell the truth, especially if I haven’t come up with an excuse. So I really, really need to have stock answers prepared. Especially truthful ones that stop short of “I’m pregnant,” because there are some people you just don’t lie to.
And thirdly, what else do I need to worry about in the immediate future?
By the way, I’m in a field that most people come to as a second career, and then there’s an influx of people who are starting in it from the start, but those people are mostly much younger than me. So all the women I know either (1) already had kids when they started or (2) don’t have kids. I only know 1 person who’s done this job while pregnant, and I’m going to ask her for advice, but her district is very different from mine. (It’s a district where I interviewed for a transfer 2 years ago, that I mentioned was awesome about letting her work half-time for like 5 years.)
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