halfway

Tomorrow is the 20-week mark; halfway through this pregnancy. Wow. How did that happen?

The pharmaceutical industry continues to receive my love and praise, given that I have hardly thrown up since I started the zo.fran (and some over-the-counter stuff is taking care of the side effects). I still seem to have, shall we say, an overactive gag reflex. Not sure what's up with that. Did you know it is possible to throw up without actually being nauseous? Yeah. Me neither. Surprises abound.

Monday we had our ultrasound, which was tremendously reassuring. All the parts are there; two hands, two feet, cute bones, four-chambered heart, good-looking brain, chewing jaw, bladder, kidneys - it's amazing what they can see. And what they can decipher; half the time the tech said, "you'll just have to take my word for it...that's a _______." "Okay," we said, in a daze.

We got a great look at one of the baby's feet - our favorite moment. So crystal clear, the five toes and the little foot shape, like a tiny bigfoot in my belly. I laid there, thinking, "someone else's heart is beating inside my body. Someone else's foot is kicking inside my body. SOMEONE ELSE IS PEEING INSIDE MY BODY." Beautiful, and strange, and surrealistically wonderful.

We didn't find out the gender. People have very definite opinions on this, I've noticed. I get a lot of, "WHAT? You're not going to find out? Why on earth not?" interspersed with a fair amount of, "oh, good; you're not going to find out. That's how it should be." I don't think this is really a moral question, but it's as if you have to make a choice between good and evil. We just want to be surprised, that's all. Chill out, people.

I can feel the baby moving on a regular basis. The room is painted, a darling cream and light green combination. The crib has been ordered. It's all so...normal. Normal is hard to get used to, sometimes.

But I can work on it. I think all I say to God these days is, "thank you." It's a nice change.