My edumacation part 2

In their stunned silence, I think they had time to process what I said. My dad's expression changed to one of shock. He put his hands on his hips with the PT still in one. His face sterned up and he said, "Well, take this anyway. We have to make sure." Then he handed me the thing.

I did NOT want to pee on the little tab. I knew. I knew because until I got pregnant, I was clockwork. I knew what I did to get that way. I just knew I was pregnant - I already had his name picked out. I reiterated that I didn't need to.

"Just.take.the.test!" he repeated.

In the meantime, mom's a wreck. She can't believe I just admitted to having sex, let alone getting preggers. I know this is what she's thinking because she's saying it quietly under her breath.

Let the fun begin...waiting on baited tendrils. There is silence, for real - pin drop silence (occasionally they'd whisper to one another, like they were plotting my demise). Waiting that loooong 15 minutes for the test to return its results.

Finally, I'm watching it change. Of course it's positive. Even though I know, it was a hard thing to do - showing it to them. I waited until someone asked. Then I just handed it over. The real fun starts now...

My dad throws his hands up in the air & starts yelling. Not at me, through me. Then he just rants around, literally. We have a dividing wall between our living room & kitchen, which can be entered on both sides. He's going around & around and around, just yelling into the air. Yelling things I won't repeat. Even at the time, I knew it wasn't necessarily directed at me. It was a situational thing.

Mom was crying quietly, I was pretty much bawling. They were so disappointed. I didn't expect to be so moved by that part. I was expecting to be yelled at. I was expecting anger, but in my mind I didn't expect to be hurting so much by their disappointment.

This lasted for about 30 minutes. I asked to go to bed. Mom gave me a hug & told me we would work it all out & everything would be fine. I don't think she believed it, but she said it.

I went up to my bed & nearly cried myself to sleep. Right before I was about to be out, my dad came in & startled me when he opened the door.

"Lex," he said quietly, "are you asleep?"

"Not yet," I said.

"I just wanted you to know that I am behind you. We'll get you in to see a doctor & work it all out from there. We need to know how far along you are, if everything's going alright and stuff like that. (long pause) I love you."

"I love you, too, dad." When he left, my crying started fresh. Of all the things my dad ever said to me, I think that was the most important - ever.

I was scared. I was worried. I was in a different place, too. I had no idea how things were going to end up, I just knew that I had to deal with it, so I did. I can honestly say that I had no clue, absolutely no clue what was in store for me. I think young minds really deal differently with things like this. I was not thinking about what comes with a child, but what a child brings to me. Unconditional love.

Next time, I'll tell a little about the whole process, what we went through & all that good stuff. This is really all about the education (really, school) - that comes later, when Steven was 2.