I did it!

I am feeling positive today. And I did it!

I met with my manager, and I thought it might help me break the news if I brought my scan letter with me to show him. So we chatted a bit in our little meeting room, and then I said 'So, are you stabilized? I'm going to drop a bomb' and he said 'Oh, not really, but go on' and I brought out my letter, unfolded it and said 'I'm genuinely really sorry, take a look at this...' and he did have a sort of colour dropping moment at seeing the paper, but he hadn't even read it yet...then I could see him reading it, and registering...and he said 'OH! Another baby!!!', and I am telling you, he looked relieved. A surprise to me I assure you. Then he said 'God, when I saw you bring out the piece of paper I thought it was your resignation letter! This is much better than that, this I can handle!'.

Horray!

HA! So, it was not part of my master plan at all but it seemed to have worked out in my favour, to have inadvertently introduced an even worse fate for him than me being pregnant, a resignation. A perfect plan, I wish I had thought of it on purpose. To present an even more (apparently) devastating option first...then that worse option being eased aside by a (relatively pleasant) baby - genius.

Then I proposed my plan, my scheme. I had slaved over a hot calendar for a long while, calculating Fridays; how many there were between now and May, how many annual leave days would I have allocated between now and May, are they the same amount? I am working 4 days a week now, with Fridays being an unpaid 'off' day. What emerged from my plotting was this: could I change back to a 5 days a week contract, and take every Friday as annual leave instead? That way my working conditions wouldn't change at all, but I would be paid again at a full time salary AND not have an unnecessary load of time off before the baby was due. If I leave things as they are, I'd be finished work at the end of March! That's too soon, that's SO soon. Frankly, aside from actually not needing nearly 2 months off before my due date, financially, this is better for me. I can work longer, probably over 6 weeks longer, and get paid 20% more for the time I am working (when I think of it that way, the day off work actually DOES have a big impact!). I am paying all the bills myself now, the mortgage, the nursery fees, food, clothes, everything, you name it. I NEED the money right now. The benefits for the company being, I can work probably over 6 weeks longer, shrinking the gap of time where nobody is holding down the fort. It's win-win. And my manager agreed. Horray again!

Then he said 'I'd have to get this approved by [the Director] (she whom I harbour my irrational fear of)'. I said 'WAIT! Not yet!'. This was for 2 reasons: firstly, I want to wait until I am at least 12, or probably 13 weeks, just to make sure all is well and I don't cause a big official kafuffle unnecessarily. Secondly, she [the Director] (she whom I harbour my irrational fear of) only just now knows who I am, and thinks I am alright. My manager had said to me that she 'thought I was good and they should keep me' after I had presented my *wiggly* presentation the other week. I don't want to wreck that already!!!!! God it would just instantly ruin anything good/OK that she thought of me now; the moment she hears that I am pregnant, AGAIN, I am sure she will roll her eyes and take a big huge sigh (actions that may occur only in my mind) and go 'UGH, that Heather....just....ugh'. [Off with her head!]

I feel such a great weight lifted. It's such a relief, telling a secret that is holding you down. I am really glad I don't have to do any lying to get to my scan appointment, and now, I feel like if somebody notices I am a bit chubba in that kind of way, and suspects, who cares? I'm certainly not going to put up any poster advertisements at this point, no no, I will have to continue my terrible clothes campaign. But the overarching sense of Who Cares is soooooo relaxing. I am still not sure how relaxed I will be tomorrow morning as I am presenting, recorded on webcast, a 3 hour training session. The ever-constant question for me lately, What On Earth Am I Going To Wear? repeats itself again.

In other feeling positive news, I made a roasted squash soup last night, and ate it tonight. A new 2011 diary from my husband's college has also just arrived in the mail, and I needed a new diary. My youngest son is finally getting his first molar, at past 14 months, which I thought would never come. It was so nice, just now, rooting around in his mouth with the bonjela and feeling some rough pokies in his upper left side. Drugged and lidocained he has now stopped crying and has gone back to sleep. Ahhhhh.....

Ahhhhhh again. Maybe I will even sleep well tonight? AND I will now treat myself to a shower. It's sort of sad, but it doesn't get much better than this....