Tuesday 19 April 2011

A brilliantly average scan.

During the scan we saw so much of the baby that it was
the next best thing to actually holding him/ her, but
as soon as it was time to take a photo
he/ she got stage fright again.
Today we had our twenty week scan, and after sitting around listening to the local tin pot radio station in the waiting we were ushered into the special darkened room for another gawp at our youngling.

The baby is HUGE!  I think I saw it from almost every angle as the scanner-lady (I would learn her job title but this is probably our last scan so it's already too late) probed my lovely wife's bump.  The biggest (and therefore campest) gasp from my end of the bed was when I saw the baby's face: after a few fleeting glimpses when it looked like the eye of Sauron I saw a perfectly clear view of the front of a face, and it was the most pure thing I've ever seen.  It may sound daft calling an unborn child pure but that's how it looked; totally disconnected from the pressures of the real world, and yet by its very presence is massively simplifying and hugely enriching my existence on this lump of rock as it hurtles through space.

Measurements were taken by the scanner-lady and reported in a neutral tone to an assistant with a pen, the tone was in fact so neutral that I didn't relax until the whole experience was over and we had both been assured that all is well, in fact our baby is better than 'well'; it's 'average'.

I've spent my whole life rejecting the average and seeking out the unconventional in everything I do, being anything other than average is at the very core of my being, and yet today while I was looking at baby's chart (and wondering what it all meant) knowing that our child was average was the best news I've ever had.



P.S we still don't know if it's a boy or girl, the scanner lady offered to tell us but we said no.

P.P.S although I think I've got a fair idea...

Tuesday 12 April 2011

Surprising privacy.

This blog was intended to be a way that Em and I could share our feelings, hopes and anxieties during our pregnancy, but I've the further we get into this adventure the more private a lot of it feels, and I guess that's part of the reason that I haven't been posting quite as often as I thought I might.

Another reason that I haven't been terribly verbose is that I think a lot of the little things I'm noticing only mean such a great deal to me because I've been with Em for fifteen years - I can spot the subtle changes in her daily behaviour that are making me fall in love with her more than ever.  I'll give you a brief example - I noticed a couple of days ago that Em walks around the house with one hand gently laying on her (still quite small) bump.  It means the world to me, but does it really have 'mass appeal?'.

We're not having this baby as an audience participation event, and I will share some of the more significant events with you, but for (possibly the first time in my entire life) I feel the need to keep some things private.  This is by no means a negative thing, in fact it's quite the opposite; it's confirmation that this baby is now the most important thing in my universe, and not something that belongs to the public arena.

I hope you understand, and knowing myself I'm sure I'll get over-excited again soon and want to share something like the exact shape of Em's belly button, but for now I'm going to enjoy the subtlety of pregnancy, and keep it to myself.