Katie texted when I was in the cab:

Katie: All good? Hope you’re okay. Let me know if you need anything. Chocolate? Hummus? Kx

Me: All fine, the deed has been done. Going to get an early night. Call you tomorrow x

When I got home, I considered curling up on the sofa to watch TV, but my mind was scrambled and my ability to focus lost, so instead I climbed back into bed and under the duvet, setting down a large mug of peppermint tea next to me. I had only just managed to stop myself from popping two Nurofen and making a G&T in the kitchen, forgetting for a moment that I was meant to be off regular drugs and alcohol right now. Half of me was thinking what a fat lot of use this recently purchased Nespresso machine was going to be. The other half of me thought carrying on like I might be pregnant was futile. And I was desperate for coffee.

Of course, I hadn’t yet thought to stock up on decaf pods.

Back in the spare room, I took another slurp of tea, although it was barely warm now. Going through all this probably wasn’t a good idea right now. I gathered the papers up into a pile and pushed them into the folder. I was about to put it back in the cabinet when my attention was drawn to another folder. The label said: ‘Donor Docs’.

The sperm donor documents were filed alphabetically next to Oscar’s ‘Divorce Docs’. It seemed quite bizarre that two such momentous, life-changing events for us now amounted to a few pieces of paper sitting cosily alongside each other in the same cabinet. So close, yet light years apart at the same time.

I went through the pile, licking my finger and casting my eye over each piece of paper. There had been a consultant I particularly warmed to when I’d had my embryos frozen; she had sent me a very kind and supportive email, following the awful task of having to tell me that my eggs were of such poor quality, there was only a slim chance of one being successful. It was also following a consultation where I had opened up to her that I wasn’t quite sure when I would be able to use them anyway, because my ‘boyfriend’ didn’t want any more children. ‘Don’t lose hope,’ she had said at the end, ‘I know it’s hard to process right now, but there are other options. Looking for a sperm donor could be worth exploration.’ I remembered the pain anew as I read it.

There were a number of leaflets and letters from the sperm donor bank. Profiles of a few possible candidates. And then a long trail relating to the one I’d chosen, plus a lengthy signed contract.

There was a gap of three months between being told my eggs were poor before I was to return to the same clinic for the IVF procedure. Also inside the folder was the pregnancy test I had used at home and which had revealed the positive result. The little screen which once showed two blue lines had almost faded completely into an off-white now. I wondered whether it was crazy to keep something like that for sentimental value. For a while I had referred to it daily, such was the disbelief that this moment had finally arrived for me again.