And so I think, again.

I have a folder of photos that I should probably unlink from my Picasa account to prevent them from inadvertently popping up and shocking any unwitting viewers who might be browsing my wonderful collection of mostly cat pics. (And why wouldn't they be? He's cute. Look!)

This folder of photos reveals a flat stomach, a bright smile, a handful of BFPs ... and a few grisly clumps of products of conception, recorded not necessarily for posterity but rather for medical viewing and then never able to be deleted. The former were the first in what would have been a series of growing bump pics. Or so I thought. The series never went further than that.

This time, I didn't bother. I was afraid of wasting my time – you know, the time that was definitely much better spent wallowing in anxiety and panic – as well as my heartstrings. Also, I wasn't really getting "fat." It didn't seem so interesting.

Recently a few people asked if I'd been taking pictures to record the changes and were disappointed for my sake that I hadn't. A friend wondered if I'd email her a "bump pic." There was nothing to send. The lack of photo-documentation began to seem a bit sad. And why let sad happen if it can be avoided?

So avoid it I did, by pulling out my camera and dusting off the same spot on the shelf where I placed it last time. A new photographic series began, late, but better that than never. If you'd like to see, too, here we are: a page to visually track the final sixteen or so weeks of growing this baby.

This new series has a prologue, a snap taken from the last series, as reference (yes, I agree that it does look like I'm sucking it in), and then begins with a pic taken at 24 weeks, the point of viability. That's kind of fitting in this context, as any claim that I'm "fattening" is also becoming more viable. This week, an even 26, I was asked for the first time if I'm pregnant (or, rather, if I'm "waiting for a baby," a very cute mistranslation of a French expression into English). That's a good sign that this might just be real.