I always knew I would be a ball of nerves throughout my first pregnancy. What if something bad happens? What if Zippy’s not ‘ok’? I figured I’d relax for all subsequent pregnancies. Sure there’s less time to think about all the things that can go wrong when chasing after a toddler. Turns out, however, when I’m alone with my thoughts I’m just as big a ball of nerves and what ifs?.

My big fear this time has been spina bifida.

The first time around I started taking prenatal for a full 3 months prior to trying to conceive. Since supplements are not the best way to get vitamins, I was also eating enough spinach to make Popeye jealous. It took longer than I anticipated conceiving Nicki, so there was plenty of time for the folate to build up in my system. Neural tube defects was one of the things I didn’t (excessively) worry about.

I started taking a prenatal again only a few weeks before we wanted to grow our family again. I figured we were looking at roughly the same time line to conceive, and would thus have time to build the folate back up in my system. I was wrong. And because life is more hectic these days, I was also occasionally forgetting to take my prenatal. There was one week in particular where my parents were visiting where I forgot the prenatal four or five days in a row. I was pretty beside myself when I realized that. I resolved to do better, and got one of those Sunday through Saturday pill boxes. Nothing makes you feel old like needing a pill box organizer, but at least it worked.

This Saturday I got our NT screen results. Negative for all things, including neural tube defects.

Phew.