The Home Stretch

This pregnancy has felt like it's lasted forever.  I joked at work last week that everyone in the office might think that I've only been pregnant for 9 months, but in reality, I've been pregnant for 2 years. And it really does feel that way.  It's been hard to believe there's ever going to be an end in sight.  Except that delivery is now less than two weeks away.  My last day of work is a week from tomorrow.  In one week, I'll be on maternity leave.

I have been so focused on all that I've had going on this pregnancy that I've not really focused on the baby that's growing in me.  That's not to say that I haven't reveled in the fact that he's so active (he moves 3-4 times more than Finn ever did on a pretty constant basis) or not spent a lot of time rubbing my belly. No, I've definitely enjoyed those parts of pregnancy.  But what I haven't done is spent much time really thinking about what this baby is going to be like, and what life is going to be like with two.

Last week I finally got around to getting some books for Finn about a new baby in the house, and those books are what I thought about when I woke up in the middle of the night last night with my regularly scheduled pregnancy insomnia.  And it occurred to me that in less than two weeks I'll be awake in the middle of the night again, but this time because there's a baby that needs to be fed.

And that's when it finally seemed real. We're about to become a family of three.  And I'm so excited and nervous and thankful all at the same time.  And a little overwhelmed, too.

I have no idea what Chimi is going to be like.  I know as an occupant of my uterus, he's very opinionated, and will let me know if I'm in a position he doesn't like.  He gets the hiccups quite frequently, likes it when I have dark chocolate, and loves to ram his butt into my rib cage (when he isn't trying to wedge a foot between it and my liver, that is).  But unlike when I was pregnant with Finn, I really have no sense of what his personality will be like once he's born.  At first that bothered me, but now I'm looking forward to getting to know this new little boy.

A new perspective about having a child conceived from donor eggs hit me a few weeks ago, and I've worried much less about that since then, too.  I've spent a lot of time worrying about how he'll feel when he's 10 or 20, knowing he's not genetically related to me.  But until recently, I hadn't thought about how he'd feel it when he's 6 months, or 2 years, or 3 years old.  Because of course, at that age he won't understand.  Which means that he won't care.  For the formative years of his young life, all he'll know is that I'm his mommy and that I love him unconditionally, with all of my heart.  And once he is old enough to understand what it means to have come from donor eggs, I hope that the foundation of security in his place in my heart and our family will be so strong that it will never be something that makes him feel sad or angry.  I know that the closer delivery comes, the less important the details of his conception have become to me.  He's my son, and that's all that really matters.  I really hope that he truly understands that, and never questions his place in my heart.


Holy shit.  Ten days from now, I'll have two kids!