Thursday, May 08, 2008

Hope Springs Eternal

I couldn't get to sleep last night, and I needed to go to the bathroom, so I did a test. It was negative. Ten days past ovulation, so that doesn't necessarily mean anything. But in the morning, there was the thinnest thread of a second line. I know, I know, you're not supposed to even look at the test after ten minutes, but I got excited just the same. J~ got excited too. I did another test this morning, a different brand, and this one was flat out negative. And then I searched the web and read about evap lines and realized I'm probably not pregnant after all.

Here's an excerpt from PeeOnAStick.com:

"Question: The line appeared after the 10-minute time limit. Is it still positive?
Answer: No. You can't rely on any test results that appear after the time limit... HPT's are rapid assay diagnostics, which means any results appearing after the "rapid" time limit of 10 minutes are invalid-- after this time, natural changes in the chemicals may cause lines to appear. (Please don't e-mail me to say this happened to you and you really were pregnant. The odds of having this occur and still end up pregnant are the same as the odds of having any false negative and later detecting pregnancy. In other words, the test is still considered negative... )"

Here's the ridiculous thing: I keep looking at this morning's test, hoping a second late, meaningless line will appear.

Of course J~ and I will probably buy more tests in the coming days. Of course more negative results will not completely deter me from the fantasy. I know the pattern by now: I will wait at the edge of my seat until the day after tomorrow, when I will likely begin to bleed.

Or maybe I won't bleed! See, there it is already, hope springing eternal. Any seeds of doubt are muffled by more rosy scenarios rolling though my mind. In case I do bleed, I'm already turning over the motor on next month's fantasy-engine. This must be what compulsive gambling feels like. Yes, it's good to be hopeful. But it's also exhausting.

8 comments:

Aunt Becky said...

I had those happen to me too.

Hope that you have a kick ass outcome.

Rian said...

I just wanted to say that I have been TTC for over 3 years, which equals a lot of HPT's and I have never had an evap line.

With this pg I didn't see the line until later. So don't lose hope yet, it is still early.

Antropóloga said...

That sounds so stressful. I wish you more certainty! Well if we are wishing stuff, I wish you a baby.

Sam said...

I'm at four days past ovulation and I have very little hope that I'm pregnant. Hopefully this will reduce the misery when my period starts next weekend.

Anonymous said...

Ah, yes. I've been there ... again and again and again. Hoping for you.

~Beth

Anonymous said...

For what it's worth, in all of the million hpts I've done, I've never gotten any sort of line when I wasn't pregnant -- and I tended to scrutinize them for hours afterward.

I would say that your result was about as inconclusive as you can get. Definitely test tomorrow. I'll be sending good wishes your way.

Anonymous said...

I am keeping my fingers crossed for you - both of you deserve the best outcome.

Anonymous said...

Utterly exhausting, indeed!

The only time I bound out of bed in the morning is when I was peeing on sticks.

I am hoping right along with you!