We were three days too early.
Because at 19.5 weeks, it's too early to tell us. At twenty weeks, they said, we can tell you. But oh no, not at 19.5.
[insert eye rolling here]
Nah, screw the eye rolling. I don't get how I am allowed to see my kid's brain and kidneys, but OH NO, don't tell them the SEX!! I mean, it's MY BODY. and MY BABY. and to tell me that I'm not .... what, responsible enough? ... to know the sex? Is just plain insulting.
But that's not what I wanted to mention.
This baby, like the last one, was very uncooperative for photos. Shy, like his / her mama. He / she is also sitting WAAAAYYY down low, which meant getting the required photos and shots was hard enough; there was no way we were getting a good peek between the kid's legs. The sonographer told us that she was writing down a guess on the report for the midwives, and they could tell us the following (this) week. And then we asked her how sure she was.
"Oh, about 70%," she said.
Huh. That doesn't sound that much better than the 50/50 we had two minutes before.
So we (and by we I mean me and The Boy, who was pretty much uninterested in everything but the heartbeat; but I guess that's the important part) went to the midwives yesterday -- chatted a lot, weighed myself (only ten pounds so far! I might not gain the 60 that I did last time!). And then she said -- do you want to know what they said about the sex?
The Man was unfortunately unable to come to this appointment -- first one he's missed, ever, in two kids -- and so instructed me to ask her to write it down on a paper and fold it up, and we'd decide together. So I dutifully did so. "Are you sure you're going to be able not to look?" she asked with a smile. I took the paper, shoved it in my pocket, and drove home.
But here's the thing: I'm just not sure there's any point in looking. I don't know about you, but I am not going to buy a wardrobe for 70% chance. (Not that we need a wardrobe anyway; we have enough boy clothes to clothe boy triplets, and if it's a girl I'm certainly not standing on ceremony to not use boy / unisex sleepers for my infant. Oh, I'll augment her wardrobe when she's older, sure, but for those early months / years? It's hand me downs all the way, baby!)
So I'm not going to buy anything. Or not pick names for the other gender. Or tell anyone, so they can buy anything. Nothing would change if we looked, not at 70%. (If we'd had an amnio and were 100% sure, well, then, that's a whole 'nother story.)
What's more, as much as my logical brain knows that there's a 30% chance that it wouldn't be what the paper said, I know my emotional side would start thinking of the baby as X. I would think of it of he or she; I would call it the name we were thinking of for a boy or a girl. I would talk to it as that. I would think of it as that. I would start thinking about my children, with their names. I'd start wondering how they would get along. I'd talk to people about the child, using the correct pronoun. People would begin to guess. I'd probably not be able to keep it a secret for long.
The little person would be real to me, in that particular sex.
And I can't think what would happen if he / she were born, and he / she wasn't that little person. I'd give birth to a stranger. I might be ... gasp! ... disappointed. And I can't think of anything worse than giving birth to a healthy, wonderful (God willing!) baby, and being disappointed.
So we haven't looked. The baby is still a mystery. Oh, I have an intuition of what it is, and my intuition was right last time. I'm inclined to trust it again. But I know deep down that while my intuition says one thing, we still don't know. And at the end, we'll be surprised. And delighted. And be blessed, God willing, with a beautiful healthy child.
Because in the end, this child's sex is only one part of who he or she is, of who he or she will become. And that person, whoever it is and whatever sex it is, is the most important thing.
Not his hair colour, her eye colour, or what's between his legs.
1 comment:
See, you articulate here exactly why we didn't (and, I think, wouldn't) want to know: we've known too many people who thought they knew, and were wrong, to take the risk of becoming psychologically invested in one or the other, because I can't imagine a worse feeling to have, on first meeting one's brand-new miraculous wonderful baby, than "Oh, no! I thought s/he was going to be a girl/boy!" (Plus, of course, there's the problem that DH's family is addicted to buying über-pink, über-frilly, princess-bedecked items for little girls, and there was no way I was going to give them that opportunity any earlier than I had to. And, also, we just plain wanted to be surprised ;^).)
As it was, I heard "It's a girl!" (or whatever the precise wording was...) and thought, "Oh, how wonderful! I was hoping for a girl!" -- having never articulated that thought before. I don't know what I'd have thought if SP had turned out to be a boy, but I hope my reaction would have been exactly the same (but in the opposite direction. You know what I mean ...).
It's still asinine that they won't tell you at 19.5 weeks, mind you :P.
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