The big debate

Third birthday splendor

Last week I had two ultrasounds. First pelvic, the second abdominal. Lucky for me I missed out on the trans vaginal one. Yes, it's as ultra exciting as it sounds. Apparently my female sonographer objects to such a "prodding" experience if the bladder is full and she can get a "good look", from the pelvic region. Besides she doesn't "like to do them if she doesn't have too". "It's as unpleasant for me as it is for you", she admitted. Thank goodness for a woman who gets it, and for liters of water and tea that morning!

Lying on the hard paper covered table, my mind turned to my friend Jesi who was having her ultrasound that very afternoon. Whether their news was good or bad, it was still the kind of ultrasound where a mother-to-be lies on the table with jelly on her lumped up belly and a grin from ear to ear while she makes out black and white images of her newest creation. The kind where a mother finally gets a glimpse of the heart beating within her; a view of the limbs which continually punch and kick with a will to break free of their shrinking bubble. A picture of perfect health growing within her.

For a moment I wished I were Jesi. If only for the sheer fact she would see something favorable on her screen, or was that all? There was no little vision of bliss on my black and white screen. No "boy" or "girl" words with directional arrows denoting sex organs. Only several black kidney beans, circles, or worms with the words left kidney, left ovary, and liver respectively typed in above them. Insides are fascinating, but much more fascinating when they are all squished together with a second set of little hands and feet below them.

This train of thought begs the question my mother-in-law asked me shortly after Abbie was born. "Mick says you're done?" she whispered as she offered the quilt Grandma Perkins had intended for Mick and I's son. "Should I give this to you now or wait?" I accepted the blue quilt for my baby girl. So confident. So sure.  When did that confidence get so skewed?