SOCIAL MEDIA

Tuesday, January 10, 2012

The Day I Told Him He Was Going To Be A Daddy

... was ironically enough in an In-N-Out parking lot.

Like I mentioned on Monday, I found out I was pregnant on December 1st while I was in San Diego visiting my family. Unfortunately, my other better half couldn't tag along with me this time because of work. So when I found out I was pregnant, I was 400 miles away from him and I had to make the decision to either tell him a.) over the phone, b.) through a text message, or c.) in person.

Personally, I knew that if I told him via phone or text I would always regret it. But I needed confirmation that I was making the right choice. A part of me was sad that a few people, like my family and a few close friends, knew before he did. But that's just the way it worked out, and in the end, I'm kind of happy that it did.

I chose to tell him in person.

Which means that I had to wait 5, horribly long, miserable days to tell him. It might as well have been 500 days; it was torture. Every time we talked on the phone or exchanged texts, I was dying to scream, "You are going to be a daddy!" but I had to refrain.

I enjoyed the next 5 days back home, of course, but I've never been more ready to get on a plane and get home. Those 5 days, as long as they were, gave me so much time to process everything on my own. It gave me the time to think about how he might react and how I would want to tell him.

I had always day dreamed about that moment when I would tell him, but this time it was for real. I knew I wanted to buy a baby onesie of his favorite sports team (San Diego Chargers, represent!)
and present it in a creative way to him. So my mom and I went on a mission to find the perfect baby jersey and found it on our first shopping trip, score!

That plane ride home was soooo long. It's only a 45 minute flight from San Diego to Tucson. But there were not enough games of Tetris of Tiny Wings that could pass the time fast enough. I put the baby onesie in a little box, wrapped it in Christmas wrapping, topped it with a shiny, silver bow and placed it on the very top of my personal belongings in my carry-on bag...

Can I just say that a major "God thing" also happened in regards to my flight. When I originally booked it back in October, I purposely chose a flight that arrived at night so that Joshua would be able to pick me up after work. A few days before I was supposed to leave San Diego, Joshua told me that he ended up having the day that I was flying in off of work. So naturally, I was bummed because that meant that I could have come home sooner and told him that morning instead! The day before I was to fly home, I double-checked my itinerary and it was for 7:05 AM and not 7:05 PM!! My "oops" ended up being a "yay!" :)

When I got off the flight, I went immediately to baggage claim and waited tortuously for another 10 minutes to get my bags. When I finally obtained them, I jetted straight out of the airport and directly to my sweet hubby waiting for me in the car at the curb. He brought Hartley, our puppy, with him and that just sealed the deal for me: my two boys would be with me, and I couldn't be happier.



We exchanged kisses and hugs and drove away. The gift was sitting right on the top of my carry-on bag and he asked what it was. I told him I "had a little something from San Diego" for him and that he needed to open it "immediately." He didn't understand why he needed to open it so fast, but he was curious anyway and explained to me that he wanted to get out of downtown and away from traffic to a "nicer location." Haha! There's my husband for you. He didn't even know what I was about to tell him and he was scouting out the perfect place.

We decided to drive to the top of Mt. Lemmon, which has breathtaking views of all of the city, and spend the day up in the snow. But on the way, I realized that that would be an additional 45 minutes in the car and I COULD.NOT.WAIT. any longer. I told him to pull over and he did... into the In-N-Out parking lot.

He shook the gift and said "it wasn't heavy" and proceeded to open it... and that's when he saw the little, blue (unfortunately I could not find it in a gender-neutral color) baby jersey and said with a smile,

"Are you kidding me?"

I shook my head and starting sobbing. I was not anticipating that sort of reaction from myself. I didn't even cry when he proposed or when we exchanged our vows. But I just lost it. He grabbed me in an embrace and said over and over again, "Oh my gosh, babe, oh my gosh, oh my gosh!!!" and looked at me like I suddenly looked different :)

It was one of my most favorite moments ever and I am so, so happy that I waited to tell him in person. Seeing his face was priceless.

After we sat in the car for a good 10 minutes just hugging and crying, we got out and took Hartley on a little walk around the building and somehow the baby jersey slipped out of the car and disappeared. We looked everywhere and it never showed up. To this day, it's a mystery. Fortunately, I took a lot of pictures so we have those memories. And the jersey isn't what really matters, anyway :)

We ended up eating at In-N-Out (duh!) and baby D is already a fan of their burgers. The drove home was filled with calls to his side of the family (mine already knew) and all of our friends. It was perfect.

We are 11 weeks pregnant and due on August 5th.

If baby is 11 days late, he or she will arrive on Daddy's 30th birthday. What a gift that would be.