My Sugar House Life: Sex, fear, and generosity

I fear the title of this post may be more provocative than the actual subject matter. It's week 18, and I have an ultrasound scheduled this Friday, which can only mean one thing... Boy or girl! Will our family numbers even out, or will I be outnumbered further? Do I finally get to go crazy with ribbons, tutus, and hairbands, or will it be more clothes with trucks and monkeys? I am going to say here that I will be FINE either way and OF COURSE I'll love either sex equally, but it would be really, really cool to have a boy and a girl.

Which of course means I'm going to have a boy.

The ultrasound, of course, means more than just finding out the sex of the baby. The gender reveal is the fun part we all like to focus on, but the twenty week ultrasound is also the first time I could find out that something is wrong with my baby. The ten week ultrasound confirmed that the baby doesn't have three heads or anything, but this is the ultrasound where they check the heart, the lungs, the brain, the spinal cord, the bones, and just about everything else that could be abnormal. I still haven't had any kind of genetic testing, and I am so afraid that something is going to be wrong with this baby. Especially at night when I wake up to pee and can't fall back asleep.

Stan is staring at me as I write this

On the positive side, every time I look at Aidan lately I'm reminded how lucky I am to have such a healthy, good-looking kid. He may drive me crazy from time to time, but he is pretty much the hardiest kid ever. He barely even gets sick. He's never had so much as an earache. Every once in a while he may be under the weather, but it never lasts more than a day or so. The fear of having a child with Down's syndrome or worse has definitely made me appreciate how lucky we've been with Aidan's good health.

Science fair project last week

Speaking of being overwhelmed with gratitude this week, the people in my life are just awesome. My mom sent me a care package of baby hand me downs (presumably from my sister) freshly washed and folded. My friend Holly gave me two enormous bags of clothes labeled "Ziggy" that are beyond cute and a baby bather that was still in the original packaging. Even Aidan's grandma in LA (who, technically, isn't a blood relation to Ziggy) sent a set of adorable board books in the mail. I've also had five friends volunteer to throw me a shower which is making me feel incredibly loved.