Two Weeks and Counting

Our baby is due in two weeks (April 4). I'm not overly anxious but I am ready for our little Bean to be out in the world with us. I try to imagine what it will be like and how our lives will be forever changed, but it's too surreal to wrap my head around. Sometimes I find it hard to believe that the baby is actually coming. Part of me fears that something will go wrong (this has been true for most of the pregnancy) and part of me can't believe that this thing inside me is a real person, our child at that, for whom we will be completely, 100% responsible.

Mr. Doodlebug and I were told that it would be close to impossible to have children without fertility drugs as my estrogen levels were too low and I was not ovulating. I was going to give Clomid a try, but at the last minute decided to wait and try for a few more months without the aid of foreign substances. I'm glad I waited to take the drug because we really didn't have that much trouble getting pregnant. The trick for me was alleviating the extreme stresses in my life, namely relocating to Philadelphia where I knew no one and finishing up teaching 7th and 8th graders at a rough middle school. We found a house to buy and the school year ended. Five days after settling on the house and moving in (I do not recommend settling and moving in on the same day -- BIG mistake) I got pregnant, of course we didn't know it until the end of the month.

I was nauseous for the entire 12 weeks of the first trimester, but because of my extreme phobia of vomiting I didn't actually get sick. The nausea was so bad that I would have to keep my head completely still at times until the wave passed. I felt sick until about 2:00 or 3:00 in the afternoon most days, which made going to work much more of a chore. I ate a lot of toast, rice cakes, saltines and eventually egg sandwiches with cheese later in the day. Like clockwork my so-called morning sickness ended at 12 weeks and my second trimester began.

The second trimester was great. My skin got really soft, I felt the baby kicking me and moving its limbs around, my weight gain and that of the baby were minimal making it easy for me to sleep, get around, tie my shoes etc. . . We had the 20 week ultrasound and got to see our little Bean. That is when we named it Bean instead of calling it "it." We chose not to find out the sex and are still waiting to be surprised. Everyone we know, and some we don't think we're having a boy. It's amazing how dedicated people are to their old wives tales of choice about how to determine the gender of one's baby. Some say that if you're carrying high you'll have a girl (I'm carrying high), some say if your weight gain is mostly in your stomach area and no where else that you're having a boy (this is how my weight gain has been). Some swear by the Chinese gender predicting calendar (which says we're having a girl), while others think a circular-swinging ring over my belly means we're having a boy. Even though everyone has their own ideas of how to predict the gender, they all continue to think we're having a boy.

My husband and I think of April 4th as a deadline not an estimate. We might be unhappily surprised to find that I carry this baby until well after April 4th. In fact, I feel no signs that Bean is going to come out any time soon. Bean will be the first grandchild in both of our families. Needless to say my mother is beside herself with excitement about becoming a grandmother. I hope she considers moving closer to us now that she'll have more incentive, but I doubt she'll leave the town she's lived in for 27 years.

And the waiting continues...