Kanye...last name West

The baby kicked me! Four times...like he was beating on a drum. I was sitting in my Mum's kitchen in Okotoks, having a cup of tea when it happened. Thump. I just stopped because I knew right away what it was.

Wow.

Also, as a side note, we have decided to temporarily name the baby Kanye until we can find a real name. We thought it was funny. Apparently, so far, nobody else does. Let's hope Kanye inherits our sense of humour, otherwise this is going to be a very long 18 years.

Great Expectations

We went to our 18 week ultrasound today and I'm happy to say that everything looked healthy and exactly as it should. It's always a funny feeling to lie on the bed , looking up at the fancy monitor, and see this wriggling alien think looking back at you from behind your abdominal wall. It's actually really weird.

Originally I really didn't want to find out what sex the baby was because I thought it would be nice to keep it a surprise. Brian wanted to know because he thought it would help him get his head around the whole idea and so, after discussing it we decided to find out. And I'm so glad I did. So, do you want to know? Well, either way you;re probably going to find out if you read my blog, so here it goes....it's a BOY!!

Don't let the all-caps and exclamation points confuse you - that is not how I felt when I first found out. I went in there telling myself that no matter what is was, I just wanted it to be healthy. I was leaning towards a girl but I thought I would be fine either way. Or so I thought. As soon as the nurse told us it was a boy my heart dropped into my chest and I felt my eyes fill up with tears. I managed to hold it in until the technician left the room and then I started to cry. Maybe it was hormones, maybe it was some deep-seeded psychological desire to see myself in miniature but either way, I was crushed. I was surprised at the strength of my disappointment which of course, then led to guilt about how I was feeling. This was my baby! How could I feel this way!? More tears ensued, followed my an inner monologue, held in warp speed that went something like this:

It's a boy. Not, it can't be a boy...it's supposed to be a girl. I wanted to do its hair and name it after my Grandma. What if I never have a girl and every single video, diary, letter and song I've ever written with the intention of passing onto my daughter is wasted. A son won't care about how I felt when I was 16! Oh my god, a son! What do you do with a son? He's going to grow and I'll have spent my whole life trying to protect him only to receive a midnight phone call that he's been in an accident and was killed going 150 km/hour with his best friend on the roof rack! Calm down, calm down...think about your brothers. They weren't driving like maniacs with their friends on the roof - you were! How could you feel this way - you are a horrible person. Why don't you just wish him into a club foot while you're at it. Names - oh my god! You don't have any names! You have a ton of girl names and no boy names...this kid is going to end up like the Pheonix brothers and have to name themselves and end up as a Rainbow or Superman or worse, as a Warren! Why did you think it was a girl in the first place, you should know better than that. You know about genetics, you knew it was a fifty-fifty shot all along. And Brian, at least biologically, is the one who determined the sex anyway. That's right it's HIS fault! He wanted a boy and he got one. When do I get what I want!?!? Oh right, I wanted a baby, I guess this is what I want. See, look how selfish you are. A healthy, active baby and all you can think about is pink tights and hair ribbons. It's okay, it will be okay, you're going to love this baby more than anything in the whole world and by tomorrow you won't even mind it's a boy. Okay, maybe by next week. Definitely by the time it's born. This will all be okay. I can't believe it's a boy. And I'm going to be a MOM.

And I was right...I am okay with it and it only took a day or so. I bought a little blue sleeper last night and as I held it in my hands and put it away in what will soon become the baby's room I sat on the bed and allowed myself to imagine. A tiny baby, completely dependent on us for food, protection and love. A part of myself and a part of Brian, joined into a new person who I would get to know and watch grow and be there to cheer on. Who will call me (gulp) Mom and reach for me when he falls and who will go to school and draw me pictures and go on dates and borrow my car and I started to cry for an entirely different reason. This baby, whether it's a boy or a girl, will be a person and best of all, he will be our little person. And as I sat there looking at the booties and the sleepers and the mobile I fell head over heels in love, and I haven't even met him yet.

There's a Disco Jive Superstar sleeping in the spare room!

Justin came to stay with us this weekend and I have to say that although it was pretty uneventful, I really enjoyed it. I knew I would, Justin is a very easy guy to be around and just sitting and talking with him is bound to both make you think and keep you entertained. We met up with Suzanne, an old friend from j-schoool (funny how j-school has been relegated to the "old" category even though I finished in 2004...so geographically distant and less relevant I suppose. The school that is, not the people.) I realized how much I missed sitting and talking with intelligent people about books and religion and current events. I've never been one to really get off on the whole mental masturbation thing but I appreciate a nimble mind and always feel enlightened and energized when I've had a particularly interesting conversation.

Justin makes me laugh in the best way possible. He is genuinely funny and I don't know that he even knows it. It's nice when people who you grow to really care about, through distance, time and internet connections, ends up being even better in real life.

Vancouver...and assorted ramblings

Vancouver, as always, was wonderful. We ate every type of Asian food you can think of (best Korean food since Korea), walked until our bodies ached and managed to squeeze in the art gallery, the aquarium, Granville Island, Stanley Park and Robson Street into a handful of days. Not too shabby. We stayed with my Aunt and Uncle (who are two of the most relaxed, fun and wonderful people in the world) at their B&B. It's pretty neat to be able to fly to Vancouver and stay with great people in a beautiful place and put it all on the "family" tab.

While walking the many streets we walked this weekend, Brian and I got to talking about living in Vancouver. I'm pretty finished with Calgary, I have to be honest but I've been leaning towards Victoria as opposed to Vancouver. I love Vancouver - but I don't like the rain or the crazy house prices. Having said that, I was able to get my head around it this past weekend and it seemed like a more viable option that it has in the past. It wouldn't be for awhile either way but it's good to have plans in the back of your mind.

We told my Aunt and Uncle about baby and they were pretty excited. It's fun that our families are so into this because it makes it so much bigger than just us. Sure, we're going to be parents but my brothers will be first time Uncles, my parents first time Grandparents and this is the first baby of this generation in my whole extended family. It's pretty neat.

Anti-anti

Have you ever caught yourself having a thought that contrasted drastically with what you think you should think or with what you have thought about the same thought before? I realize that due to my horrible sentence structure, you might need an example:

I have always been a big believer in Canadian human rights. I think gay-bashers and anti-Semites and racist white supremacist groups, well, suck. I've thought that they pretty much have no right to breathe let alone spread their crap to other people and today, without any warning, I think I changed my mind.

I mean, they still suck. But I was listening to the CBC (that thing will make you think I tell you) and they had a lawyer on who makes his living defending the rights of these sucky people to say what they think in a public way. The counter argument to why they should not be allowed to do that is that we (as in the Canadian federation of peoples) must stop them before their rhetoric evolves/mutates into violence. Hmmm. That was sort of weak. And the whole thing started me thinking about the freedom of speech.

Even if the speech is appalling, it remains speech...or HTML depending on the specifics of the case. And speech shouldn't be silenced just because it's socially subversive. Now, it's not that I think any of these people are going to change the course of history or actually have anything convincing to say, but just imagine all the people who would have been muzzled over the last 100 years. Martin Luther King, Kevorkian, Malcolm X, Atheist groups, right to die advocates...Dave Rutherford. (One can only hope.) Who gets to determine what is hateful and what is not? What is socially acceptable and what needs to be hidden from the arena of social discourse.

The idea that advocating these beliefs is illegal because of human rights laws made me a little uncomfortable. (As uncomfortable as the recent proposal to ban smoking on film...Jesus, next thing you know, we'll be wearing knee highs and sharing a Thanksgiving turkey with the Indians.) At the same time, the ideas of these crazy people also make me uncomfortable...the question is, which one is most concerning? Do we truly have a democratic country if the social outliers do not have the liberty to say what they think?

In the end, I would rather hear a thousand stupid ideas voiced than witness a single valuable one silenced.

Operation Baby...target in sight

I'm pregnant! I'm actually going to be a Mom...still can't really get my head around the idea but I suppose I have plenty of time. Let's get the questions out of the way (in the order they have been most commonly asked):

1. Due March 1st but because I'm diabetic they'll definitely induce me early (or so they tell me) so we're looking at mid to late February.
2. We don't know what the sex is. Brian wants to find out but I don't so we have three weeks until our next ultrasound to fight it out.
3. Yes, we are incredibly excited.
4. Yes, it was hard to keep it a secret for so long. After having three previous miscarriages and the complicating factor of diabetes thrown into the mix we decided to not make anything public until we were 100% sure that this would be successful. After I passed 12 weeks and saw the ultrasound with the little heart beat and the baby kicking and jumping all over the place I knew this was very, very real.
5. We don't have any names yet. And we aren't really looking for suggestions.

So there we go. I really do think that the hardest part of this was not being able to write about it. I felt like a liar every time I signed into blogger and wrote about something that wasn't related to the animal growing in my abdomen. It was sort of all-consuming and to ignore it here seemed so wrong. Anyway, now we have it.

I was very nervous throughout and we found out very early (about 4-5 weeks) which meant we have a veeeerrrryyy long wait until we were in the clear. Every week felt like a month and since I was spotting throughout I honestly thought I was about to miscarry at least 3 or 4 times. It was a roller coaster of hopes and fear and disappointment and elation and I'm glad it's behind me. When we saw that 12 week ultrasound I kept it together long enough to thank the doctor and act like a normal person until we left the clinic. As soon as we were outside the sterile glass doors, I collapsed into Brian's arms and cried. I felt a sense of relief and wonder and like a thousand pound weight had been lifted from my shoulders. Inside, despite every week that passed, there was a part of me that never thought this would happen. But it did.

Here is a picture from that day:



Can you believe it!? Arms and a head and legs...all tiny and real and working? It truly is an amazing thing, and even if it happens a billion times a month across a million species, I still feel pretty lucky.