"It"

When you're dealing with something that takes 40 weeks, I think it's important to break the time down into mini-goals, things to look forward to and plan for when "B-day" seems both agonizingly far away and terrifyingly close. My current one is: I'm really looking forward to the day we find out our baby's gender.

I find myself referring to our unborn child as "it" a lot... we both do. Not out of cruelty or coldness, but out of basic necessity. "What do you think we should name it?" "What color should we paint its room?" "Do you think it will be cute/smart/funny?"

To listen to us, you'd think we were referring to some sort of abstract idea, rather than the very real baby that's coming our way. I just can't wait until I know what to call him. Or her.

*sigh*

Okay, it.

For now.

My Fair Lentil

Here we are in week 6 and I almost still don't believe I'm pregnant. I mean, nothing's happening that I can *see.* Aside from the sweeping waves of "tired" (progesterone), and the rare but occasional queasies, and the trouble sleeping (progesterone), the odd bouts of shortness of breath (damn progesterone)... You know, I had all those things *before* I was pregnant! I'm daily resisting the urge to take that second pregnancy test *just to make sure.*

So Week 6 means that our offspring is now about the size of a lentil. (For those of you that don't know what a lentil looks like, that's a little bit like a baby pea, or about .2 of an inch.) It's got little dots where the eyes and nostrils are going to be, and little buds for arms and legs. If we had a really sensitive ultrasound done just the right way, we'd be able to hear the heart beating at about 100 to 160 bpm. If we also had a teeny tiny electroencephalogram (EEG) machine we'd even be able to measure brain activity.

I've started an easy walking and exercise program, and though it's hard to fit both that AND nap time into a day, I've been managing, and I haven't gained any weight yet. Craig has been caring and understanding as he always is...

We're having family and friends over for Fourth of July. Mom has cautioned me to not work too hard and to ASK FOR HELP. (Does my mother know me or what?)

No news is good news...

Nothing new to report here... things are going as they should so far. I'm finally starting to get through my days without worrying about the baby 24/7. Every day that something doesn't go wrong seems to set my mind a bit more at ease.

That hasn't stopped me from telling Kathy what she can't do, though. So far, I think I've banned her from cleaning using any chemical products, touching our outdoor pond water, going near the cat litter box, and even thinking about using any of our insecticides in the yard. Yeah, I'm totally turning into "that guy".

Somehow, I have a feeling that before this is over, she's going to get sick of my nagging and hurt me worse than any of those things would do to her, but I can't help myself.

More news when we have it...

From Aaliyah to Zula

Craig and I discussed baby names a little bit yesterday. We did some web browsing and talked about what was stupid (yeah, we know "Nevaeh" is "Heaven" spelled backwards; it's still stupid, unless you're dyslexic) and what wasn't (nice average names like Harry and John, et al.) and what celebrities we have to thank for ruining our baby name choices (like Violet: thanks a lot Ben Affleck, you biter. Watching us get engaged, and then proposing to and marrying your chick before we got married, and then popping out a baby too wasn't enough for you?), and just how cruel it would be to name our child "Collin."

We found this page really interesting graphically, and it allows you to see the interesting trends of when names were popular:

The Baby Name Wizard: Name Voyager

We also didn't realize it, but the Social Security Administration keeps track of popular baby names year by year too! Who says the Government doesn't have a fun, human side?

From that list we noticed that a good number of the top 10 male names last year were all names that could be found on "Lost"! Coincidence? We're looking at you, Widmore!

After that, suitably drained, we decided we could at least wait until we discovered the sex of the baby before trying to narrow it down! (We did briefly consider "gender neutral" names: Leslie, Marion, Jesse, etc. but we couldn't think of one good enough to actually use...)

Welcome to Week 5!

According to babycenter.com, my now sesame seed sized baby looks like this:


The neural tube will make the spinal cord, nerves and brain. (More folic acid, pls!) That's all happening in the top layer, the ectoderm. (The ectoderm will also become skin, hair, nails, mammary and sweat glands, and tooth enamel.)

In the mesoderm, the heart and circulatory system are beginning to form, and in fact, this week, a tiny heart begins to divide into chambers and beat and pump blood.

The innermost layer, or endoderm, is working on making all kinds of other organs.

The most amazing part of all this to me is that I'm not actively DOING anything to make all that happen! There it goes, all by itself. All I have to do is eat and sleep and go about my business. I guess I'm actively *not* doing things like drinking or eating crap foods and that's probably helping to have things come out okay at the end. But really I'm about as active as an oyster making a pearl...

Books for men

So, like most couples who've recently realized they're going to have a baby, we took a trip to the bookstore in search of advice from people who've been through this sort of thing before. Thumbing through pregnancy guidebooks, you start to realize there are two major types written for women, the clinical "Here's What's Going On With Your Body and How to Deal With It" type-books, similar to the one we received for free* from the clinic, and the "OMG DO NOT DO ANYTHING REMOTELY RELATED TO ANYTHING OR YOUR BABY WILL BE BORN WITH TWO HEADS AND A TAIL" cautionary tomes. The latter would probably be good for a laugh were they not so gut-wrenchingly horrible and scary.

There was also a third type of book I noticed: the, "Hey Dad, We Know Your Wife's Pregnant and the Center of Attention, So We Re-Wrote This Women's Pregnancy Book From a Man's Perspective". Frankly, they kind of offended me, what with their insinuation that I was somehow incapable of reading a book written for a woman and parsing that information into what was applicable to me, while gaining more of an understanding what my wife is going through. Like I couldn't take "you may retain more water than usual and your hormone levels will change" and turn it into "your wife may retain more water, yadda yadda..." without buying a second book that did it for me.

Maybe I need to write one myself: "(For Once) This is Not All About You: Stop Whining and Start Helping". Chapter One: Don't worry that your wife's having all the "fun" right now... you get to carry the baby for the second nine months!

In all seriousness, though, if anyone knows a good book for expectant Dads that doesn't patronize or pander, I'd love to check it out. Otherwise, I'll keep getting in touch with my feminine side reading books that, while a bit on the clinical side, don't dumb it down for me.

* oh, I know they'll get their money back for it down the line...

Cleaning house

Time to say goodbye to some old friends for the next nine months:

Goodbye, open bottles of wine in the fridge. I hope you enjoy your new home with whomever I can pawn you off on. Don't look at me like that. I'll find someone to love you!

Goodbye, martinis with olives stuffed with bleu cheese. Goodbye, gin and tonic. Goodbye, whiskey sours. It was certainly fun while it lasted.

Goodbye, lovely tuna steaks that I defrosted before I took that pregnancy test. I hear the landfill is nice this time of year.

Goodbye, litterbox. I hope Craig is as thorough tending you as I have tried to be.

Goodbye, tampons! I'm not going to miss you! The only thing that saves you from the same fate as the tuna steaks is that you cost eight times as much per pound, and you'll be able to last under my bathroom sink until I'm ready to see you again next year.

Goodbye, hair dye. Hello, roots.