The Verdict is In

So all day I sat, edgy as all get out, wondering and waiting. Waiting and wondering. Pondering my nails and wanting to chew them to bits. Reading e-mails that said, "Think Pink" and hearing "I just know its a girl ... that's what you want, right?"


It's enough to make anyone crazy.


And then the time came. I headed out to the doctor's office, not knowing if my husband was going to be able to leave work to join me. While I was waiting in the office for my name to be called, he rang to tell me he was on his way ... would they start right at 3:30? He might not get there in time.


They called my name, and I headed back for the sono, bladder ready to burst (a necessary evil for the procedure) and still waiting for my husband.


"Do you want to know what you're having?" she asked.


"Yes, but not until my husband gets here. He's on his way," I replied.


So she got started, in gender-neutral terms.


Brain? Check. (No hydrocephalus or anything odd.)


A kick on camera -- did you feel that? Of course not, placenta is in the front, over the belly, kinda like having a mattress in there for the kid to punch. Ah, that's why it seems like such a quiet baby (by no means is this child quiet, believe me, after seeing it on the screen.)


Femur? Check. (Good length; too short is not so good.)


Ooh -- there's a foot. Great shot. All five toes with all their bones.


Heart? Check. (With all the valves pumping as they should.)


Belly? Check. (Round and baby-like.)


Look -- there's some fingers ... baby holding hand over head. Very cute.


I'm in love. Swooning and watching with the greatest of fascinations that mommies feel on these moments. They're intimate, after all -- just you and the kid. Like a secret ... the baby's in there, but they're still all yours ... no one else can touch yet. But all the while I'm still waiting ... for that final piece of information.


Then my husband came in.


We went through the whole thing again. Brain. Femur. Heart. Belly. Fingers. Toes. Kicking the placenta-mattress. Quiet baby? Think again. This one's a tumbler.


"Can I tell you now? Please pretty please? It's been killing me -- I've known since I first put the paddle on you," she says.


Fifteen years and she hasn't been wrong yet. Deep breaths all around.


"Let's take a look between those legs, little one."


Now let me tell you, at this point, I've gotten myself so worked up I can't think straight. It's like the last play of a tie ballgame. Homerun or strikeout?


With a baby it's neither, I know, but after all this stress well ... it's hard not to feel that way. If you read my rambling post from earlier, I think my mental state through the day was pretty clear. Thank goodness I had some meetings that broke the strain and gave me other things to think about!


You see, years ago I resigned myself to having two boys. Realized that there probably wouldn't be a little girl in my life. My husband's family hasn't had a girl in something like 85 years. Got used to worms and mud. Came to understand that I'm really more of a "boy mom" anyway. And then I popped up pregnant ... and the swirl of folks talking about girls and pink got me all swept up. It was hard not to get hopeful and go back to that moment six years ago when they declared the Yarn Sniffer was a boy. And the time two years earlier when Zee was "discovered" and my best friend and I just said to each other, "What are we going to do with a BOY?"


I figured it out then, then re-figured again with the Sniffer.


It's a damn good thing.







'Cause this one's a boy, too.