Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Never Lie to your Mother...








Boy or Girl













Yesterday I learned an important lesson: Never lie to your mother. Or your mother-in-law, etc. It's sure to backfire.

Here's the situation: I am 20 weeks + pregnant with my second child. Yesterday was our doctor's appointment, the one where we were supposed to find out the gender of the baby. Now, I suppose if we'd already made the decision to be surprised at the birth, then I wouldn't have left the doctor with the supreme disappointment we did yesterday when the doctor could not say 100% whether it is a girl or boy growing in my stomach. (apparently the hand was down there - hmmm, makes me think boy - and we were on an OLD machine - argh, more on this later...) But when you are planning on finding out a significant piece of information, then get denied, and are told, well, you can find out in a month, it can feel as disappointing as the day you learned the truth about the tooth fairy.

To make matters worse, my hub leaves for more military training in just under two weeks, meaning he will not be able to attend the next appointment. He might have been more disappointed than I was, proclaiming with a serious expression, "I really don't want to find out what my baby is over Skype."

Okay, let's digress for one minute to acknowledge that no actual tragedy occurred yesterday. We are very blessed that we have healthy baby, and for the most part, it's been a pleasant pregnancy. But we have a small house and lots of things to plan and want to know if Joaquin is having a little brother or sister, damn it!

It was also one of those situations where the more I thought about it, the more it irked me. Our OB's regular nurse, Linda (whom we love), was on vacation, so we got the new girl. New girl not only scared me about my blood pressure, (it's fine), but also apparently took us in the wrong room, so as our doctor is trying to check out the baby's goods, she is saying to us, "Well, I can't tell because we are on the old ultra sound machine and it's not a good picture."

Excuse me! OLD machine! Well, take us to the good ultra sound machine. I can walk. I don't even mind if you have to squirt more of that gross clear jelly on my tummy again, I just want to find out TODAY what we're having...It's not OUR fault your machine sucks and makes our baby look like a grainy jelly bean on an old black and white Zenith TV from the 50s. We want the good stuff!

We have a great tradition from our first baby, thanks to a friend's recommendation. At the doctor's office, we looked away when she zoomed in on the goods, and then she wrote it down on the ultrasound, tucked it into an envelope, and we left with the information burning a hole in our hot, sweaty hands. Then, we went to our favorite restaurant. Husband had a margarita and I had a Coke, and we opened up the envelope. It felt like the anticipation of Christmas when you're 8. Few moments in life have been that memorable, other then maybe dancing at our wedding, and when Joaquin was born. We loved it so much, it was our plan again.

Only yesterday, we were going to the doctor at 3:30, taking Joaquin to music class at 5:00, then going to our favorite dining spot to open up the exciting information sometime around 6:00. Here's where the lying to your mother comes into play. I deceptively told my mom (and other family members) that we weren't finding out until today, because I knew if she knew our appointment was yesterday, my cell phone would be buzzing incessantly for the rest of the afternoon and I would not be able to relax until I talked to her. We wanted to do something clever and cute to share the news, so at the time telling a little white lie didn't seem harmful. Then of course, my lie set off a karmic chain of events that left us still in the dark yesterday.

Enter the Glendale 3d Ultrasound Store to the rescue. Sounds totally cheesy, I know, but we have made an appointment, and are planning to shell out $50 for the Gender Notification package so that we can find out while husband is still in California. Yes, we are paying for something that we should have found out for free, and it is on the day that I lied to my mom about finding out in the first place. Who says your mother doesn't control your universe?

So this whole thing has taught me 2 important lessons:

1. Don't lie to your mother about important stuff. (Little things like when your baby went to bed, how much you spent on that dress, and if you liked the pot roast she made are still in the approved-lie- zone.)
2. Put up more of a fight at the doctor about demanding you get the best machines, the best care, etc. After all, she may deliver dozens of babies every week, and share the good news of "boy" or "girl," all the time, but to us, it was a really big deal...and we should have been more vocal about what we wanted.

1 comment:

ScienceOfficerSmith said...

I don't know...sometimes a little fibbing can save everybody a world of stress. You don't have to become the Father of Lies or anything- a.k.a. Satan, but you can make your life move along a bit more smoothly.

Keep putting that clear goop on your gut until you get ANSWERS, dammit!

Mazeltov!