A New Life

One evening early August, Joe and I came back home from a delicious happy hour -the place is called Bottle House, in Madrona, and their wine/cheese combo is the cheapest and most delicious I have tasted. I thought that one glass of wine was nice, but come on now, another one at home (free!) would be an excellent idea. Just then the image of a baby inside a womb popped into my mind. Seriously! Needless to say, I was freaked out enough that I didn’t get that second glass of wine. Just because you never know. I didn’t think much about it until Joe was away on a weekend at his parents’ and I poured myself a glass of wine. The same image of an fetus came to me. Er… oookay, now that was spooky. So I took a pregnancy test (you know where I’m going with that story, don’t ya?) and sure enough, it was positive.

HOLY CRAP! You’re lucky I’m polite.

Joe and I were just thinking that this life without kid was awesome, that we could wait a few more long months to try to conceive as he would start school in the fall and I wanted to spend a month somewhere in the field. Ha. Haha. Hahaha. Guess who had other plans? MY BODY! So here we were, a few weeks later, expecting a baby.

I was quite ambivalent for the first couple of weeks. Once the shock had passed –no more wine, no more suchi, no more brie, no more spending a whole month in the field, thoughts of labor and stretch marks and no sleep, waaah- I felt elated about the sesame seed growing inside me. Weird how you go from reasoning to falling for someone you haven’t met yet but who suddenly means the world to you and whom you would do anything to protect.

And then the sesame seed started acting up. Nausea, exhaustion, more nausea. I mean, it was not that bad, but I’m a huge wuss, so feeling a little nauseous is really uncomfortable (what? Wait ‘til labor? Hahaha. Shut up). In the morning I didn’t have anything in my stomach and felt like throwing up, but then any kind of food disgusted me and I couldn’t eat anything, which upset my stomach even more. And then there were the headaches and the bloating. Aaah, Heaven. I wrote it all down so that one day I can prove to that screaming teenager that I suffered injustly, too, now go to your room and do your homework. Oh, the good thing is that I was so disgusted by food that I was not craving brie or wine or sushi. I seriously thought that I would not really handle the no drinking game very well, but it has been really easy. Well, my appetite is coming back now, and with it the sweet craving for wine. Oh well.

And of course, there is nothing like the prospect of gaining 30+ pounds to make you realize that, um, these past 8 months not working out are certainly not doing you any favors. So I started eating right and will start working out. Next week, my friend Jen and I (she’s also pregnant and due a month before me) will start yoga.

So that’s it. We’re super excited. I can’t wait to start feeling him/her move inside my belly. I can’t wait to see my belly grow. I can wait to see my butt grow, though. I can’t wait to start teaching him/her French cuss words. I kid, I kid. Kinda.

Here is the baby, at 12 weeks and 5 days (this morning). S/he is due mid-April. Let the countdown begin!