Baby Roulette!

According to some sources, we’re nearly to the third trimester.  Though, I’m not sure I believe any one source since the actual definition of trimester is three months.  By my math (and assuming the first trimester ends at 13 weeks), 26 weeks is the end of the second trimester.  But that leaves more than 14 weeks at the end.  So I suspect that they’re sneaking extra weeks into the second act, making the end of halftime week 28.

Regardless, it’s late enough to start employing highly sophisticated tests to guess the sex of the baby.  I’ll be you’re as excited as I am, particularly since you’ve never seen anyone do this before.  EVER.  I’ve got about 50 predictors (way more than one per week) so I’ll drop a few on you here and there.  Feel free to play along at home!

Baby Roulette Question 1: Heartbeat

Fetal heart rate above 140: Girl.  Below?  Boy. Vegas’ heart rate dropped from the 150s down to 138 at the last visit.  That nets us a baby boy.  Given the fact that the heart rate has been falling, when do you expect they mean you to apply this tricky tale?  A month ago, we could have claimed girl.  Now we’ll have to turn in the lacy bloomers for a sailor’s cap.

Birds and Bees

Overheard in the car:

Me: What will you tell Vegas when he tells you the kid at school told him it takes a penis to make a baby?
Her: “All it takes is beer and tequila.”
Me: I think I’ll take care of that talk.

Land Mines

Did I mention I used to be a diplomat?  It’s something that seems so far away even though there are signifiers in the house that remind me of exotic places and people, lunches with rock stars and prestigious neighbors (I still have the latter two – my wife is an excellent lunch companion and my neighbor always returns my shovel).   The major difference now that I’ve given up world travel for libraries is that I’m less likely to choose pretty language over fact.

Most of the time, this elicits either uncomfortable sidling away or “Ooh, I love that you’re so frank!” Here is a picture of that ratio.

To be clear, I still adhere to some social grace.  I’m not cruel and I don’t believe in telling the whole truth or, sometimes, even most of it.  I spend a lot of time at “refreshingly blunt” (actual words once actually said to me by an actual person) and next to no time at “telling you what you want to hear” (Never actually said by anyone because hearing me do this is like spotting a unicorn.  A UNICORN BEING RIDDEN BY A MERMAID.)

This parenting thing is fraught with lingual land mines.  Breastfeed or bottle.  Cloth or disposable.  I don’t even have to say any more do I?  You completely understand.  It seems that no matter what your decision is, someone has very strong opinions about it.  Furthermore, they’d like to tell you all about it.  Often, they’re another parent, someone who should know better.

Recently we had dinner with due-at-the-same-time work colleagues.  It was a lovely evening but one in which I spent prepared to launch diplomacy initiatives at any moment.  Sure, we’re doing some things similarly (D is digging stumps occasionally while her counterpart tries to shovel snow).  But we’re also doing things differently (finding out the sex of the baby, etc.)  Just like circumcision, this is one of those sticky wickets.  For those of you that don’t plan to find out, how many times have you heard BEST SURPRISE EVER?  And often, the speaker’s tone implies that anything else is a half as good decision.  I’m sure for those of you that didn’t find out, you had an equal number of folks proclaim your choice THE BEST DECISION EVER.

I spend more time than I’d like couching my parenting decisions in a diplomatic cloud of mediocrity.  It’s amazing that people who wouldn’t dream of telling you that fuchsia is not your best color don’t hold their tongue when it comes to parenting choices.  So in case it isn’t clear – I totally support your choices.  I think you are the BEST PARENT EVER and I’ll bet you think the same of me.  We’re super terrific.  Yay us!

Maybe Just Skip to the Last Sentence

I just noticed a section in What to Expect for the roadies.  I suddenly need this as the second trimester clears out and all the activity is happening within, out of reach of my ability to help.  Until now we’ve been referring to books somewhat haphazardly and browsing the internet in a vague, listless way and I’ve felt pretty confident that we’re doing okay on our own.  Let’s chalk it up to late winter blues, but I suddenly feel absolutely unqualified to be in a relationship, let alone a family.

I’m looking forward to seeing if there’s a section on making aches and pains suck less (both hers and mine from hauling our life around).  Maybe there’s a paragraph or two on budgeting nothingness dollars, cause that’s pretty much what we have left after doing everything we need to get done.  There had better be more than one chapter on communication, because I clearly need lessons.  To that end, maybe there’s a little fill-in-the-blank note to leave that simultaneously pleads for some physical indication that I’m still desirable and apologizes for asking.  It would be nice if I could just let that go, so hopefully, the author has plastered on some advice about getting over it and moving on.  I need a little suck-it-up nudging, obviously.

Finally, I need a list of remedies for pregnant women that don’t include frequent visits to the bathroom or sitz baths (because what is that, actually, and how does one keep from getting cold or spilling the water?  Let me tell you, a jackass devised that, because so self-respecting person would voluntarily sit in a small pool of lukewarm water, especially not if they had to haul themselves back up out of a tub while negotiating a giant baby.)  I’m going to need remedies that focus on 14 more weeks of jabbing, numb spots, exhaustion and ongoing nausea.  I’m also going to need a homeopathic solution for patience for all the well-meaning mothers who remind me of either of the following a) “the sight of your darling baby will wipe away the past nine months” (PS I think it’s actually ten) and/or b) “you think it’s bad now… ”  By the way, if it’s my well-meaning mother, I’ll just skip the homeopathy and go right to a large stick.

Even better, telling you this didn’t even make me feel better.  So that’s awesome.  How was YOUR weekend?

The Second Trimester is a Lying Devil

The second trimester does deliver on its promises.  Sort of.  D has more energy, is eating more regularly, and even, for one hot second, considered turning a kiss into something else.  That was a short second.  But let’s be honest.  All these second trimester promises?  Lies.  Like a pagent mom, the second trimester promises bubbles and bunnies and then delivers the toys you already had at home.  That’s right.  All she got from the second trimester was a tiny bit of what she’d lost.  She didn’t even get all of it.  Just a fragment.  A hint of what was.  A glimpse of what life was like before she started growing a bowling ball.

So I don’t think the second trimester is all moonbeams and light.  She feels better, yes, but she hasn’t turned in to Utera, Supreme Goddess of Pregnancy.

At 22 weeks, we are looking forward to the ultrasound on tomorrow.  I’m half terrified that something won’t be right and half terrified that he’ll flash us his bits and ruin the 4 more months (oh my god, you’ve got to be kidding me… Four?! did I count that right?) I have left to wish he’s a girl.  Let me just apologize for his womb-based gender identity problems right now, in advance.  So really, I’m just terrified and I’ll be happy to have that done with so I can go back to assuming everything is peachy.

I haven’t been this nervous since we showed up in Best Of’s office and he said, “Let’s make a baby.” And then we did.