Little Duckling

The rumours are true. Expect another little face plastered all over this blog come early summer. Samson is hoping for a duck to come out of Mumma’s tummy. He was not too happy with the first image of the little duckling.

And now to important issues. How do you feel about finding out the sex of the baby? We found out with Samson, and I have to admit, I had a moment of – I won’t call it disappointment. Perhaps it was just a readjustment of my thinking? No, if I’m going to be totally honest, the actual moment my midwifery student told me I was having a boy, I sank a bit in my seat. Oh. Even though I had had a feeling—the ultrasound picture looked like a boy. And I didn’t really care. I know that we just hope for what we know. But I let out a brave OH! like I was excited. My midwife feigned excitement and moved on. I think she’s generally against the finding out of gender. She doesn’t say what the baby is at birth, but rather lets the parents check when they are ready. She told a story in our prenatal class that has stuck with me. A couple were told they were having a boy. When the baby was born, she was a girl. The father was making all the necessary calls telling family and friends the baby had been born, but he would constantly edit their excitement saying, “–BUT it’s a girl.” The little girl was in the room and could feel that negative energy, claims my midwife.

After I got the news I was having a boy, I worried – about what to knit for a boy, about how to deal with a penis. Then I made my peace. I bought little boy clothes. I decorated his room how I wanted, not worrying about how a boy’s room is supposed to look. Then Samson was born and it was all fine and (of course) I fell instantly in love. And now I kind of want to be a champion for these little boys who seem to be left behind in today’s society. I want to make sure they thrive and become healthy, happy gentlemen. For goodness sake—I can tell you the difference between a hopper car and a tender. Girls scare me a bit. Obviously girls don’t have to be whiney or screechy or cry the minute they fall down, and some might be into trains too, and to some extent their attitude reflects how they’re raised, but I believe there is a part of our nature that is inherent to our sex. Samson was brought up neutrally—he had access to dolls and stuffed animals, but trains and trucks were always much more interesting.

So am I hoping for a particular sex? No. I have pleasant associations with each sex that may come out. But after Samson I said I wouldn’t find out for the second child. First, because I figure this is how we’ve been doing this for centuries and it’s the greatest surprise you’ll ever get, so why not? Second, I wanted to avoid that moment of “disappointment”. I figured after labour I’ll be so happy to have the little bugger out I won’t have time to really dwell on whether it’s a he or a she. And third, for a purely monetary reason I don’t want to be tempted to buy stuff for a girl. If I don’t know, I won’t spend. But you know—then you start your second pregnancy and you feel like crap and your skin breaks out when it never does, and suddenly people start telling you you’re having a girl. And you don’t start to hope exactly, but you start to live with the thought–what if this is a girl?

As luck would have it, a good friend of mine is pregnant with her second at the same time as me, and we’ve been discussing this issue. She claims three things: 1. “Disappointment” can only get worse after nine months of thinking and guessing and waiting. Fair enough. 2. If you know you’re only going to have two kids (as she and I are probably going to do), it’s natural and even healthy to “mourn” the loss of a girl (in our case, since we both have boys). Our childbearing time is passing, as is our chance for an experience with a girl. Once we have that period of mourning, we can move on, and love the little fellow that’s actually in our womb. Point taken. 3. You can save a lot of energy if you only have to think about names for one gender. I hear that.

I still can’t decide what to do. What do you think?