22 Weeks

Well, don't you just have tons of room in there?
You're having like a party or something nightly.  I'm not exactly sure what it is that you're up to but it's starting to hurt.
I never thought I'd say it but I'm kind of looking forward to you being a bit more squashed.
And least then you can only wriggle.
Right now you're just really enjoying your roomy little apartment.

If I said a  few days ago that you were thudding, now you're thwacking.
And you're strong.
I had to get up off the couch last night and change positions in the hopes that it would throw you off a little so you'd stop pelting me with wild kicks.
It didn't work.
You waited just a bit, re-adjusted yourself then picked up right where you'd left off!

Daddy says that I'm in trouble.
I'm going to have to agree.

Plus, you're freaking me out a bit.
Guess who else was a super dynamo in utero?
Your brothers Rhyse and Creux, my two fireballs.
Gar.
Are you my third?
Now I'm really starting to get worried.
If you're a boy and if you're like anything like Creux, I'm...out of words.

Five and a half months today, we are! 
And I'm really no closer to being ready! :)
Plus, I'm an emotional wreck right now, I can't even see a newborn on tv without bursting into tears.
So tiny and precious. 
Every time I see a flash on one, I'm a disaster.
I just can't wait to hold you.

At the beginning of this pregnancy, as with others, I was just hostile!
It didn't matter if I was dealing with my family or with a stranger, if it wasn't going my way, everyone in the immediate vicinity knew about it.
I was just snappy and mouthy and grouchy in general.
That is gone, I'm happy to report.
(And surely, so is everyone else.)

And I remember too at the beginning, I had those awful emotional breakdowns, ones that I can't ever remember having so intensely before.
There was that stretch where I was just so sick and so tired and so tired of being sick and tired and I couldn't cope any longer.
It makes me sort of sad to think back to that period of anguish because it really was a horrible place to be in such a happy time.
I truly wanted out of my own skin.

I don't think I've ever heard myself so distraught before, that wild keening, so full of despair and grief, literally inconsolable, stopping only due to exhaustion.
I think now that it must have been something akin to what women go through with post-partum depression but there isn't quite a name for it during pregnancy.
Other than "pregnancy."
Personally, I've never had any post-partum issues with any of my babies so I was completely unfamiliar with how to manage that.
I'm not a breaker. 
That's just not who I am.
I might flip out for a moment or two but I recover quickly and move on.

I could not.

Luckily that has gone away as well.
I don't miss any bit of that early pregnancy stuff; in fact, it's hard for me to revisit even now.
I can't read my early posts.
The very early ones, yes, those are already fun to poke through.
But when I realize that I'm heading into those dark days, I stop reading.
I'm still glad I wrote them though.
Part of why I wanted to document your beginning was that so some day, you could look back on this, or your spouse could, or one of your siblings and feel...not alone...in what is happening.
Pregnancy is most definitely a time of joy, perhaps life's sweetest gift, but it can be fraught with other feelings and emotions too and when you're in it, you can feel like you're the only one going through it, who has ever gone through it.

I hope you'll never feel that way.

My emotions are still funky but now I cry because I'm just touched easily.
I'm able to feel more right now in general--for my kids and for others.
I see the Littles comforting one another and I start crying.
I see a baby on tv and I start crying.
I hear an upsetting story about someone, I start crying.
Dreams make me cry, memories make me cry, love makes me cry.

Basket. Case.  :)

And it's not a heartbroken cry, not one of despair, not like before.
It's just me...dealing with me. 
And you.
There's just so much undiscussed preparation that goes along with a family expansion, or maybe it really is just me.
But I don't think it is.

I always get a little weird and almost possessive of my time with my existing children before another one comes along.
It's never far from my mind that things are going to change very soon and that they will never be the same as they are right now. 
As exciting as that is, it's also a bit anguishing.

When babies arrive, I feel like a bomb goes off and once the dust settles, a week or two or three later, we're all kind of wandering around shell-shocked, asking, "Are you okay?", "Are you okay?", "Am I okay???" to each other. 
My kids will all lose me a bit and I'll notice it and so will they, pretty immediately.
Our house is like most others where it's very Mama-centric and my Littles especially still really need lots of my time and attention and love and sometimes, lots of times, most times, no one else will do.
But you will need me, too.
And I will be almost completely focused on you for awhile.
I'll do my best to juggle but in the end, I know everyone will feel my pulling away a bit in order to care for you the way I want to and know that you need me to.

It's hard to walk into that situation and not feel a little bit of loss beforehand.
I'm so unbelievably excited for your arrival and this whole family will happily shift to welcome you but as a mother, it's hard to know that while I'll gain, I'll lose too. 
We'll recover and we'll find a new normal but right now, I'm trying hard to give what I can while I still can until you call for me.

I have some...news...for you.
I tested those waters, those what-to-do-with-your-Maybe-boyhoodedness waters and they were HOT.
I dipped my toe in and retreated pretty quickly.
So now I need to decide if it's worth a more...prepared touch-test.

I broached the topic and was rather surprised at the intensity of opinion that your father has regarding your wee little boy bits.
He asked a question that I didn't have the answer for which was why I backed off so quickly.
(Mama does not tend to back off quickly, for the record.  Sometimes I need things to have a bit of soak time is all.)

This is what he asked me:  "So you want to have one son who is different in that way from all the others?"

Well, no, not really.
But will it really matter to you? 
This I don't know.
I can't ask you, hey, what are your thoughts on this?  Do you want to wait and see how you feel when you're a man and can make your own decisions?
 (Because at that point, I'm guessing your answer to that "surgery" would be a resounding, "HELL NO.")
Do I put that issue, you "matching", in front of how I feel right now which is...that it's not the right decision to make?
Or maybe I should just stick with, "It's not sitting well with me." 
Because this is how I describe the idea of a Maybe circumcision.

I don't know what to do here.
Your daddy, he never balks at my suggestions.
When I said, "I think I want to homeschool," he said, "I think you'll be great at it."
When I said, "I want to completely overhaul our diets," he was on-board immediately.
When I said, "I don't think I want to blindly vaccinate our babies anymore," he cheered my cause and applauded my exhaustive research on the matter.
And when I said, "I want to have a homebirth," he was nothing but supportive.

These are all...not ordinary...things. 
Some would say they're a little bit whacked :)
I don't care much what some would say though.

But I've always appreciated not having to convince, sway, badger, argue points with your daddy in order to care for my family the way that feels right to me.
So I'm hesitant to push back this one time he really feels strongly about something.

I need to think yet I'm very, very hesitant to dig around for information regarding a circumcision for you.
I know I won't like what I find.
And I know that if I research NOT doing it, it'll have me circling his wagon.
We need that soak time.

And this will all be a non-issue if you come out missing that boy bit!
I always say I don't care one way or another who you are but jeeeeez, that would solve one very pesky problem for me.
And for you :)

Loving you already,
Mama