I didn’t mean to get pregnant. Though, admittedly, we weren’t exactly being adults about the whole contraception thing either…
The menstrual cycle tracking was what gave it away. I’ve followed the ebbs and flows of my monthly cycle for a few years now and the longest I’ve ever gone between periods was 34 days. Until September, when all of a sudden Day 35 rolled around and I was so tired that sleeping on the kitchen floor seemed like a better option than climbing the stairs to bed.
Something was going on.
Denial is a powerful thing however and so, as I reached for the box at the pharmacy, I told myself that this was simply to rule out “the whole pregnancy thing” before looking into the more likely causes of my symptoms. I’d even told Axe Man not to drive up to be with me, reassuring him with: “It’s not like we actually think we’re pregnant.”
I dialed his house phone just before I sat down on the toilet. Cup in one hand and phone in the other, I carefully peed in the direction of the cup and got most of it on my hand. I’d read the instructions to the test about four times, which is about four times more than I read the instructions on how not to get pregnant. This I was going to get right. “I just stick it in the cup and then put it flat on the sink,” I explained. “Then we wait.” Axe Man didn’t say much but a few minutes later, I was half way through making tea when he gently reminded me about the task at hand. “Did you look at it yet?” he wondered. Of course I hadn’t. I’d forgotten about it.
Marching back into the bathroom, stomach all a flutter but mind still firmly in denial, I peered at the tiny gray screen. It had only one word on it:
Pregnant.
“Do you want to sit down?” I asked. He didn’t. “Well I do,” I mumbled. “Because it says we’re pregnant.”
“Oh no!” he cried. Followed a little more feebly by “I mean, errrr…yay? But, really baby…oh no.”
He didn’t have to explain himself. I was right there with him.
This was the first time ever that I’ve witnessed Axe Man in anxiety, though his response was practically Buddha-like compared to mine, which vacillated between laughing hysterically and yelling “Holy fucking shit” at the top of my lungs. It seemed so unlikely and unreal that I must have looked at that plastic stick every five minutes, just to check it hadn’t changed its mind. It hadn’t.
An hour or so later I had calmed down and Axe Man was jumping in the car; we needed to be together. While I waited, I did what any sensible woman would do. I pulled tarot cards.
Ace of Cups
“With the Ace of Cups, you are a vessel for deep spiritual love and you can’t help but let it flow through you. It also comes with an invitation. Will you say yes?”
Of course I would. Despite the shock, there wasn’t a single second of hesitation; I was having this baby. Ironic, since it had been less than a month since I declared that I didn’t need to parent. “I’m perfectly happy playing auntie to all of my friends’ kids,” I’d said to myself and anyone who would listen. And yet, pregnancy test still wet from my bodily fluids, here I was knowing - knowing deeper and more clearly than I had ever known anything in my life - that I would be a mumma to this little soul. And I couldn’t wait.
Tearing up, my eyes scanned to the bottom of the screen where the following words were waiting for me: “The Ace of Cups can signify conception, pregnancy or birth. Look for confirmation from other cards in the deck such as The Empress or Four of Wands.”
Not that I needed more confirmation than the magic plastic wand in my hands but it might be worth noting that I’d pulled the Four of Wands (celebration and joy) only the day before, when I was still wondering what the hell was going on. I’d also pulled the Three of Swords (heartbreak and loss) but I didn’t want to think too deeply about that. “Perhaps that means this pregnancy is going to throw up some really hard stuff”, I had mused that day in my journal.
The next card was Judgement: “This card is calling you to rise up and embrace a higher level of consciousness. You may be at a crossroads, one with long-lasting effects.”
No fucking shit this was a cross-roads moment and I could feel the pull of it, dragging me upwards towards the boldest, truest version of myself. So much had come together in just the few weeks before, offering integration of struggles I had been in for years. Though I hadn’t seen it until this random Thursday when everything changed, the pieces I needed had fallen into place just in time.
King of Wands
“The King of Wands represents a moment in time where you can step into being a visionary and a leader. It is a task that you will need others to get involved in to achieve the outcome you envision.”
Yeeesssss, of course. Too long we’ve been bandying around the phrase “it takes a village” whilst forcing parents everywhere to raise their children in isolation. I’ve had visions of community for so long and have made great strides towards it; building my tribe of women in New York City and then moving into a co-housing community in the Hudson Valley in the spring of 2019. This pregnancy felt like the first real test of that community structure. As for the leadership piece, perhaps that refers to my writing, perhaps to the way I live my life. Probably both. I’ve known for a couple of years now that it’s time to get my writing “out there” a little more and maybe the cards were telling me to get that book written with the nine months of my life I had left before total chaos hit.
I put the cards down just as Axe Man strode through the door. Jumping into his arms, I wrapped myself tightly around him and we stood, swaying, crying and loving each other. What a journey we were on together. What a shock, what a game-changer, what a gift.