It was unexpected and soon turned into a horror story. Lola was all Ruzek, right down to her bootstraps and had hit school like a hurricane. She was absorbing everything and apparently she was an angel in the classroom but when they got home everything seemed to explode out of her like a volcano. She was never still and constantly wanted people to listen to her and her alone.

Mae was far more chilled out but she still loved attention. The attention she craved though consisted of cuddles and being close to her parents. Lola would get a little too crazy for her sometimes and she would seek shelter with her Mom or Dad. She was reserved around strangers although when she did feel comfortable she was a delight and had such a sweet personality. Lately though they had noticed she was a little more outgoing and finding her feet as she raced through her second year of life and more than willing, when pushed far enough to put Lola back in her box.

That had shocked everyone. Mae was standing up yelling "No, don't." at her sister as Lola was touching her doll and when Lola refused to give it back Mae screamed at her. "Don't" and snatched it out of her hand and pushed her over. It was the first time Mae had stood up for herself and they didn't know whom to back. Lola, who was shocked and crying and they had told Lola off for pushing Mae away before or Mae who had pushed her sister over but at least was standing up to Lola who always dominated her.

Mae had learnt to stand up for herself and she gradually got bolder once she figured out that she could make Lola go away and get her own way. Lola didn't love it but they had to let them work it out and only jumped in if it went too far. Lola did think it was unfair, she did understand why Mae was suddenly fighting back and why she was allowed to get away with it.

One thing they had also learnt, especially once Lola was at school and it wasn't particularly fun either was that children often bought illness into the house and stomach flu could rip through the entire house in the blink of an eye. Lola had started it and it quickly bought down Mae and Sam followed. They had thought Polly had avoided it but a few days later it hit her like a ton of bricks.

Days later Sam dragged her out of bed and to the Doctors.

"So, I think before we go any further there is one thing we need to rule out." He had taken a history and done some vitals. "Any chance you could be pregnant?"

"I wouldn't have thought so. My implant has only been in a year and it's been fine." Polly had the implant put back in when Mae was about six months old. They hadn't really done much to prevent a pregnancy until then, although they did use condoms occasionally once Polly unexpectedly started getting her period again. They occurred randomly but they decided they didn't want to push their luck once Mae wasn't just having breast milk anymore. Mae had been a totally different experience for Polly, she fed beautifully and seemed to just love being close to her Mom and struggled to give it up whereas Lola started to fight it towards the end.

"So no un-protected sex lately. Like you've used barrier protection? Condoms?"

"No." He snorted, they hadn't even thought about condoms since before she fell pregnant with Lola. Polly glanced at him and he was staring straight ahead and looked a little pale and she noticed a faint trail of sweat on his brow, if he hadn't already had the stomach flu she would have sworn he was coming down with it. Polly rested her hand on his as he was wiping his sweaty palms on his jeans. She wasn't quite sure why he was so freaked out, a few weeks ago he was asking her to think about having another baby and they hadn't ruled it out but now they were contemplating moving to New York so Sam could take the job at the Bronx Zoo. The timing of an unplanned pregnancy wasn't ideal.

The Doctor insisted on a urine test and Polly could barely pee in the cup she was so nervous; Sam's reaction had put her on edge. "Okay." He looked at the test result. "It's positive."

"What?" she gasped.

"Polly, this nausea and vomiting is not all just the stomach flu. You are pregnant."

"But she has an implant in and it's been fine. I know the last two times they mucked up and we took them out but it's in there and she is fine." Sam sounded a little hysterical. It seemed like all they had to do was mention the word pregnant and Polly's uterus rolled out the welcome mat.

"You know there is always a slight chance of falling pregnant even with the implant. Nothing but abstaining is 100% guaranteed."

"How far?" Polly asked quietly, although if she had to hazard a guess she was pinning this on the weekend in New York. It felt like something that they would do, get knocked up on what was supposed to be just a bit of fun. Polly's head was spinning, they'd drunk a lot that weekend and Polly had certainly had a few drinks since then. Her mind had gone there instantly. Had they damaged the baby?

"Well that will be a little harder to pinpoint because you haven't had a period and unless you can judge when you had sex it's like throwing darts at a board. Like some couples will say, well we had sex once last month or something like but if not that then it's too hard to guess. I will take a blood test, that should give us an estimate depending on your HCG levels but I suggest an sonagraph to measure the size of the fetus might be useful."

Sam held her hand while they did a quick scan and it seemed Polly was about six weeks pregnant judging by the size and that put them firmly in the New York weekend. Sam had gone to New York for work and taken Polly with him for a long overdue dirty weekend. It was perfect and they had enjoyed the time away and it felt like the final piece of the puzzle was back in place and they found their groove. They were on the same page again.

Polly asked him about the drinking and Sam had been a little stunned, it was the last thing he was thinking about but the doctor assured then that it was unlikely that it would have affected Polly or the baby. Plenty of women consumed alcohol before they realised they were pregnant and had perfectly healthy normal babies. As long as it wasn't excessive or sustained they needn't worry. Polly certainly hadn't drunk anything for the last few weeks, she felt too shit for that.

"Well that's a fucking surprise." Sam waited until they got back in the car before he said anything. They had a follow up appointment in a few days to check the blood results. The Doctor wasn't sure that Polly's symptoms were not caused by the stomach flu though, and that was their hope.

"You don't sound happy?" It wasn't as if they had decided not to have any more children. They had talked about it in New York quite a bit and made the decision to wait a while longer. Mae was just 18months old and Lola was almost six, but they were enjoying Mae right now and wanted her to be a bit older so agreed to talk about it again once she was two, though the smaller age gap between the two would be nice. Well it seemed that the decision had been made and that was going to take a bit of getting used too.

"I would say shocked. That was unexpected. I drove here worried about you and this stomach flu and I am driving home still worried about you." Polly turned a shade of green as he drove and he pulled over quickly when she scurried around for the bucket they had bought with them just in case Polly needed to vomit. "You are a fertile little bugger aren't you?" Out of the three pregnancies they had only made the conscious effort to get pregnant with Mae.

"You and your fucking termites, those bastards would chew through wood."

"Well that's a lovely way to describe it." Sam screwed up his nose. "So Lola had the bonnet of a car, New York and poor Mae just got the missionary position, no wonder she's a little reserved, she's embarrassed about her conception."

"Fucking New York, you infested me with your termites. There must have been like millions of them, gnawing their way in." Polly's hand gestures were mildly amusing.

"Can you stop?" He got that she was feeling shit but they were having another baby and that was a beautiful thing. "That completely ruins the miracle you've got going on in there."

"As does spending day after day heaving your guts up."

"True. You look beautiful doing it though." It wasn't helpful and Sam fully expected the next vomit was going firmly in his lap.

"I hope it's another girl, you deserve to spend years dealing with crazy girl hormones, bitchy catfights and beating off cherry popping boys after doing this to me."

"That's harsh Pol, you wound me with your words." He feigned hurt by dramatically clutching his chest. "I guess this means we are saying no to New York?" After they got back the Bronx Zoo had chased Sam pretty hard and had made several offers, each one better than the last and it was starting to get harder to ignore.

"I guess." It was the last thing on Polly's mind right now. "Can you go pick the girls up, I want to go home." They had left the girls with Heidi while he took Polly to the doctors. Heidi did ask him when he picked them up if Polly was okay, he knew she would but Polly was adamant that right now this was their secret alone.

"Something you want to tell me?"

"Polly has a nasty stomach flu, should settle down soon. Ours cleared up in a day or two and hers dragged on a bit and she is dehydrated." Which wasn't a lie. "Apparently it's going around."

"Really?"

"Yes really." He lied smoothly. "Lola is ground zero, she bought this pox into our home. Weren't you Chicken? You spewed big time."

"I did and came out my nose, and then Mae spewed, she spewed in her bed and it was in her hair and she had a runny bottom too and there was poo in the bath and then Daddy spewed and Mommy. We all spewed." Heidi thanked Lola for her graphic description and Sam breathed a sigh of relief, even if Lola's description was a little horrifying, accurate but horrifying all the same.

The Doctor had said nothing much about Polly's vomiting, beyond that it may well be just bad timing and she had the stomach flu with a touch of morning sickness but did give them some OHS to help her through the dehydration over the next couple of days. Considering she had been unwell with Mae, it wasn't surprising that this was a little rough at the start.

Unfortunately for Polly and Sam it didn't get better, it got worse, a hell of a lot worse. The follow up sonagraph and blood test confirmed that she was just over six weeks pregnant and she went downhill pretty quickly from there. The day Sam finally became worried enough was when she stopped keeping even the OHS down and they had been living this hell for two weeks.

"Hi Kim." He had called his mother-in-law. "Can I drop the girls off?"

"Sure. Everything okay?" The stress in Sam's voice was a dead giveaway. He didn't hide things very well.

"Umm, well to be honest no it's not. Look, I need to take Polly into hospital; she's been vomiting all day and she's dehydrated and not keeping anything down. I called her doctor and he told me to bring her in."

"Her Doctor, has Polly been sick? I thought it was just stomach flu."

"It was, but it's gone on for a few weeks now." He sighed. "Polly's pregnant." They had finally realised they would have to tell people if they wanted help and they needed it. "She is eight weeks and things haven't been great, she's been violently ill."

"Oh wow, that's a surprise."

"It is, it was for us too but we are pretty stoked but this isn't going well right now." Sam had been out of his mind with worry all day. He was rushing around trying to look after the girls, keep them entertained and fed while helping Polly. She refused to go to the hospital initially but it got to the point where she didn't have the will to argue anymore and she hated seeing Sam in such a state. He started yelling at the girls over simple little things, and that was unlike him but he couldn't cope with their demands and Polly being so desperately sick. "The baby is fine, it's just this morning sickness, well it's 24hours a day actually and Polly isn't coping well and today has been particularly bad. She was pretty bad with Mae but nothing like this."

"Anything we can do?"

"Just look after the girls right now." That's all Sam needed, he needed not to worry about them. If Kim could take care of them then he could focus on Polly. He knew he wouldn't need to rush home to sort them out or worry about getting back to them at all; Kim would keep them for as long as needed.

Adam heard the gate swing open and the heavy footsteps on the stairs. He barely looked up from his desk until he heard a sweet little voice, one of his favourite little voices in the world. "Prise Pops." Mae came charging through his office door, pretty in pink and pigtails and smiling like Christmas morning. She hadn't seen her Pops for a couple of weeks and had been so excited when Mimi pulled up at the District. She was standing at the gate eagerly waiting for someone to open it up for her because Mimi was taking too long to bring her up. She didn't care about being sociable downstairs when the holy grail was just behind those magical gates. Up there was her Pops.

"Monkey Mae-Bell." He caught the toddler as she flung herself at her grandfather and he swung her up into his lap and planted a big kiss on her nose. "What are you doing here? Where's Lola Bear? Where's your Mom?"

"Mimi." She pointed back out into the bullpen but it was empty except for Jack Bartel, one of his Detectives. Jack had worked in Intelligence for five years now and he was a stand up guy and Adam relied on him a lot.

Mae was clinging to him like a barnacle as he wandered out of his office. "Jack? Where'd you find this little beauty? Is Polly here?" He tickled Mae and made her squirm and giggle.

"Downstairs, Kim's down there with Lola. She's catching up with Sgt Mason, Mae wanted to come up." Just then the gate scraped open and the peace was over as Lola thundered up the stairs.

"Pops." Lola marched in like she owned the place, which everyone was used to by now. She loved it here just like her mother had and they often found her sitting up at a desk drawing and pretending to 'do work'. "We've come for dinner." She wrapped her arms around Adam's legs. "Mimi said we can get pizza."

"Did she?" He ruffled her hair before leaning in and giving Kim a quick kiss. "This is a nice surprise. I didn't know we were babysitting?"

"Neither did I." She asked Lola to take Mae into the break room and get a cookie and Adam indicated to Jack who was happy to follow them while Kim dragged Adam into his office.

"You are freaking me out a little." Kim closed his door. "I know I am not about to get lucky, that seems a little extreme even for you and I know how much you love my desk but…" She shut him up with just a look.

"Sam dropped them off, he's taken Polly to hospital."

"What the hell for? Why didn't you call me?"

"Keep your voice down." Kim squeezed his arm. "The girls don't know, Polly's pregnant…" the smile on Adam's face was short lived. "…she's been violently ill for about three weeks now and today was pretty bad, she's severely dehydrated and is on an IV. They won't be home tonight." He could see the anxiousness on Kim's face.

"What does that mean? Is she okay?"

"No, no she's not. She's eight weeks and it's quite extreme morning sickness that has lasted all day and night apparently for the past three weeks. Sam asked us to take care of the girls."

"Of course. Do they need anything? I can take it in. You should have called me." Rubbing his hand over his face wearily he felt a bubble of tension grip his chest. He hated his baby girl being sick, even with Mae he was concerned for her in those first weeks but it settled down and she'd had a good pregnancy right up until her unexpected arrival. It didn't matter than Polly was an adult; she was always his baby and he always worried.

"No, not right now. I thought I'd go in and see her when the girls are in bed. They want to be the ones to tell them about the baby, they didn't want anyone to know yet but Sam had no choice today." Kim had decided to take the girls out for dinner and since Adam was still at work they'd pick him up on the way. It also took her mind off things with Polly. They needed to go back to their house and grab a few things so the girls could sleep over. Lola didn't sleep without her Leopard and Mae had a Rhino that was her constant bedtime buddy and Sam had left in a hurry and didn't think to pack them anything.

"She wasn't this bad with Mae. What does the Doctor say?"

"I don't know. Sam didn't go into many details. They've known for about two weeks, they had been monitoring her at home but things got bad today and he was told to bring her in. He called me briefly to say she was on an IV, sleeping and staying the night and asked us to take care of the girls. That's all I know." Adam wrapped his arms tightly around his wife and worry oozed from every pore. "I'm so worried about her Adam. I saw her when Sam dropped the girls off and she looks terrible, she burst into tears but she seemed so weak. Sam is beside himself." He pulled her closer.

"I know Darlin', I know. Sam will let us know how she is. Let him focus on Polly and we will distract ourselves with the GD's." He sounded a lot more confident than he felt. Opening his office door the girls came running when they heard his big booming voice. He scooped them both up into his arms. "Right…pizza and Ice-cream for my favourite little ladies."

They had wanted to wait until 12 weeks and hopefully things would have settled by then but it was getting worse, not better. The diagnosis of Hyperemesis Gravidarum or HG was a shock but there was light at the end of the tunnel, most cases settled around 15 weeks and certainly with Mae she was feeling pretty good by the end of her fourth month. Some cases lasted until about the half way mark and for the poor few it was a nine-month battle to the end.

Polly was hooked up to an IV for her severe dehydrated and she was metabolically out of whack. It was too early to contemplate taking medication for the vomiting, that couldn't happen until after 12 weeks because of the risk to the baby. There was no way Polly would even contemplate it although they did warn Polly that she would need to consider it if this didn't settle down in the next month. She had lost weight already and that was starting to become a concern. It was starting to severely impact on their life and if Polly didn't start putting on weight and controlling her dehydration it could be dangerous not only for the baby but her as well. She told Sam to go home but he stayed and every time she woke she was glad he was still there beside her.

He called his Mom quickly and she was excited for them despite her concern for Polly and of course his mother would help out any way she could, she was a godsend to them some days and Mae spent three days a week with her rather than put her in day care when Polly was at work, it worked well for them. It had been a tough decision to tell their parents because Polly had an overwhelming fear that she was going to miscarry, that all this vomiting couldn't be good for the baby when the pregnancy was still vulnerable. The doctor assured her that there was actually a decreased risk of miscarriage with HG but it did little to ease their minds.

There biggest hope was that, like Mae it would be rough for a while and then settle down but it didn't. Polly just had to keep fighting, and she did as she tried her best to stay involved in day-to-day life and always carried a few spew bags with her at all times. Jolene came over everyday Sam was at work and looked after Mae and took Lola to school. Polly tried to make it into work but it was physically draining and Alex did let her work from home most of the time. She could work in short stints and felt better for being in her own home where she could disappear to the bathroom or to lie down if things got bad. They would get out of the house on the weekends and even up to the Summer House if they could so the girls could run riot and Polly had a change of scenery. They'd walk along the beach with a spade so Sam could dig a hole if Polly needed to spew.

Once a day they got out of the house, even if it was just for a walk around the block. Lola would ride her bike and Sam could push Mae on her trike but it was slow going some days. Polly needed it though, she could lie in bed all day some days and they were worried about her wasting away, she had already lost too much weight and she never had a lot to lose in the first place and it also improved her mood. They had a lot of tears and they struggled through every day. It was existing and only barely, they certainly weren't living and they were lucky they had family who stepped in and kept the train on the tracks.

Kim did the housework and Adam took care of the garden so that when Sam wasn't working he could spend his time with Polly and the girls. They would have the girls stay over some nights when Polly was particularly bad or if she was in hospital and they did every thing possible to make sure they were kept busy so they didn't fret. Gus would take them out on his days off and both Rhiannon and Gus would have them sleep over occasionally which they absolutely loved. They'd get spoiled rotten and come home with some new toy or bag of clothes, Heidi was more than happy to have them and Andrew would drop meals in for them a few times a week. The girls ate like queens for a few months and he took the time to make all manner of meals that were high in protein and fat for the few times Polly could actually eat.

Jolene took care of the shopping and washing and picked Lola up from school most days. The delight on Lola's face when Polly did manage to do the school run was a rare treat for both of them and at times it made her feel guiltier for missing out on so much but the baby kept growing. She hated that some days she couldn't even bare the smell of them and Mae didn't understand why she couldn't always have her Mom when she wanted.

Something else they hadn't done before was find out the sex of the baby before the birth but Polly wanted to know 'so I can start loving the little termite.' she had told Sam tearfully one night. It wasn't a surprise that this nickname stuck after her often entertaining rants about how Sam had infested her in New York. He held her hair back and then helped her up off the bathroom floor and for the first time in weeks he was able to hug her.

It was their secret.

By the midway point when it showed no signs of abating Polly finally agreed to a Zofran pump. It at least made her feel a little more human and she would only vomit once or twice a day but the crippling nausea never went away. Having to change pump site everyday however left her bruised and sore and she ditched it at 30 weeks when one of her sites got infected and she panicked about having to take anti-biotics. Sam would often change it for her and he became quite the expert but she felt like a pincushion with red marks and welts all over her stomach and the infection made her feel worse than she already did and they thought that was impossible. They did discuss a PIC line but that seemed so drastic. The oral meds made a little dint in it so she stuck with that and the daily spew or ten.

While she still had the pump Sam was over the moon when he came back to his office one day and found Polly and Mae waiting to have lunch with him. "This is like, the best surprise ever." He threw Mae up in the air when she had screamed 'prise' at him when he opened his door. Everything was a surprise for her and it was her favourite word, that and 'no' and 'don't', and they were generally directed at Lola.

"Hey, what are you doing here?" He was even able to give Polly a kiss.

"I feel okay-ish today and Mae was tearing at the walls. Your Mom had a lunch to go to with her old work friends so I asked her to drop us off here. You don't mind?"

"Mind? This is like a dream come true."

"It is, isn't it?" They even managed a quick walk down to see the giraffes. They were some of Mae's favourites. He'd had a calf born just after Mae turned one and she always loved to go visit them. When he got home that night, they celebrated one good day with an evening cuddled up on the couch watching a movie and that was about as good as it got.

She had to do daily urine tests and if it showed she was dehydrated she would try and up her intake of fluids and if it didn't correct itself it was off to hospital for IV fluids and once a month she had an infusion of vitamins and minerals. Sam called her every morning to check her results so he was always aware of where she was at. He would call her several times a day to see how the day was going and lived for those days where she said she wasn't too bad.

Polly was going to be induced at 37 weeks; she had begged her Doctor to induce her because she just couldn't go on much longer. She would have gone earlier if it wasn't a risk to the baby and even 37 weeks was right on the edge. The vomiting hadn't improved and they could count on one hand the days she hadn't spewed in the last eight months. She'd been admitted to hospital seven times for severe dehydration and for fluids and nutrition, she'd had injections at home to help with the nausea and the pump for a few months along with iron infusions to help with her lethargy and poor appetite and she felt guilty for barely being a mother to her two girls for the last few months.

Throughout the pregnancy Polly only ended up putting on about 9lbs and that had been a struggle. She had dropped a little in the beginning but made it up in the end. The Doctors had set her a target weight gain of 10lbs but she didn't quite make it. They worried about the affect that would have on the baby but all its measurements were tracking well. It was going to be a small baby and they were prepared for that but everything seemed in proportion.

She was also barely a wife. Some days even the smell of Sam made her sick. He started showering before he left the zoo because the smell was hell for Polly and body wash and cologne was a definite no go zone. Jolene did all the washing for them. The day Sam found Polly leaning over the laundry trough vomiting while trying to sort through the clothes was heart breaking and she struggled constantly to even change Mae's diaper. On the odd occasion when Polly's injection had settled her vomiting and she just felt nauseous they tried to have sex. Sam couldn't kiss her and the very motion of it made her feel terrible and Sam had tried to be as gentle as possible.

Sam hated it, he hated that Polly felt awful but was trying to make him happy, he hated that she felt like shit all the time and he hated not being close to her and there were even nights he couldn't sleep in the same bed as her.

She cried when they decided that they weren't going to try and force having sex. If it happened it happened but Sam wasn't going to seek it and he'd wait for Polly to come to him. "Will you take care of yourself?"

"Yes."

"I'm scared." She admitted.

"Of what?"

"That you'll get frustrated and go out and find it elsewhere." She sobbed. "I'd hate it but I'd understand."

"Don't be stupid Polly. I'm not an asshole. I wouldn't cheat on you if you were well so I am certainly not going to do it while you are pregnant. It breaks my heart seeing how sick you are, I hate it. You know it doesn't do a lot for my sex drive either, that faint waft of vomit isn't exactly a turn on." He knew that she seriously didn't mean it. "And I have zero interest in having sex with anyone but you."

"I'm sorry."

"So am I." Polly looked at him curiously and asked what on earth he had to be sorry about. "The termite infestation." That made her laugh, and lately that had been rare.

Right now Polly didn't seem to be repulsed by him so he stayed put, she was resting on him, between his legs with her back on his chest and he kept as still as he could because sudden movements could set Polly off. The girls had gone to bed, Sam listening to Lola read before relenting to Mae's demands for two stories while Polly laid on the couch and tried to keep dinner down. He was pulling double duty, working fulltime and then taking over from his mother when he got home. Not that he minded; it was just tiring and felt relentless as they ticked off the days. Thankfully the zoo had ensured that he had plenty of support so he could take care of Polly or the girls if needed. He would sometimes take them into work with him on the weekends and there was always someone who could watch them while he did his thing.

Whenever they got the chance to be close to each other they took it, and they did try to enjoy the few moments in the evening when they were alone, even if most of the time Sam was sitting on the opposite side of the room. Physically the relationship was barren but they talked a lot and when you took physical contact out of a relationship if you couldn't talk then you had nothing.

Lola, at times was understanding and tried to help her Mom, she would hand her mother a bag when she started to dry retch but it wasn't easy for her and Sam often had to comfort her when she would take herself into her room and cry about her 'mom being sick'. Mae found it harder to cope and wanted Polly's attention a lot more than she was able to give. She'd developed a fiery temper, a little of that temper they saw when she was first born and in hospital was starting to re-appear and she would throw herself on the floor and demand Polly's attention.

It was a horrific but the pregnancy wasn't in any danger and Polly would force down food or nutritious drinks at every opportunity in the hope that the baby would at least get something before her body ejected it again. Some days were better than others but no days were ever what they'd call good. Even when they went to a friends wedding it was a short-lived day out. Polly was determined to go and made it through the ceremony but Sam took her home before the reception when she went downhill. He went back for a few hours at Polly's insistence while her parents stayed with her. They were living from minute to minute.

Polly came down a few hours after getting home and weakly asked her Dad to take her to hospital and virtually collapsed in his arms. She knew she was bordering on dehydrated that morning but had wanted to spend some time feeling normal and with Sam so she pushed through and didn't tell him her urine results because he never would have let her go. She had tried to make up for it when she got home but just vomited every thing back up. Adam scooped her up and Sam met them there and he sat with her the whole night while she was pumped full of IV fluids and electrolytes.

Sam knew as soon as he saw Kim's number on his phone that something was wrong. "What is it?" he sighed, not out of frustration but just the never-ending disappointment that Polly wasn't getting better. Polly wanted him to go out and let his hair down a little. He'd barely had the chance to do anything for himself lately, he was always taking care of her or the girls. She didn't want them to call him but both Kim and Adam knew that Sam would be furious if they didn't and he came home and found out she was in hospital.

"Adam's just taken Polly into Med."

"Okay, I'll meet them there." It was devastating for Sam each and every time.