We go in for our little check-up with the midwife today. I love our midwife. We wanted to do a homebirth this time around, especially since the birthing center at Long Island College Hospital (which, logically, is in Brooklyn Heights) closed down, meaning my bride will have to birth in the delivery room (heaven forefend!). But our midwife isn't covered for home births. And we love her. So delivery room (and all the necessary evils that come with it), it is.

At the check-up today, the midwife measured the belly. My wife is a thin woman, narrow. She's well proportioned. And she's a gorgeous pregnant knockout--skinny all over and one big bump. Weirdly, people have been asking her for the past month if she's either A) due any day now or B) having twins. People are idiots. If her belly were any smaller, people would be asking her whether the baby was OK. Or if she was eating enough. Like I said, people are idiots.

So we grease up the belly, and listen to the thwack-thwack heartbeat. Bless. Aama gets weighed and measured. Like a steer. I ask the midwife if there's any way to tell how big the kid is. She says she guesses five, five-and-a-quarter pounds. Totally normal for 32 weeks. Good.

Then she tells us to come back every two weeks and adds, offhand, that the baby will probably increase in weight by a half-pound a week from here on out. We nod as we put on our coats. Then pause. We do the math.

That's four pounds in eight weeks.

That adds up to a nine pound baby. At least.

Remember how I mentioned that the wife is a narrow little lady? First Born clocked in at 6 pounds, 11 ounces. That's south of seven pounds ... of blazing crotchfire agony and bloody torn crotchflesh. Three more pounds will split the poor woman open.

Which made us pause again. This frickin' baby. She's going to come early, isn't she? Eep.

We've mentioned 'round these parts before: the bride, she is all gestational once again. As usually happens when the womenfolk start makin' babies, the conversation has been known to turn toward the topic of names. As in: What in Tarnation are We Gonna Call the Unborn? Now, more or less, we have come to an agreement (thank goodness we aren't having a boy because there was No Agreeing on the topic of appellations for the phallically endowed). We have chosen a name. I should amend that: my babymama has strongly recommended that I accept her preferred choice of name. As she reminded me, with serrated blades shooting from her fiery eyeballs, the child will be getting my last name, after all. Indeed. And so, we have chosen a name. It is a good name. 

I am not going to tell you what it is. But I have it on good authority that in some regional Tlingit dialects it translates roughly to "Daughter of the Great One. And His Wife."

For those of you in the position of having to come up with a name, let me please be of assistance. I live to help. I am here for you, body and soul, but mostly body. This site is waaay better than the baby name voyager in that it trolls the 1990 census. It randomly selects first names and pairs them with randomly selected last names. Just keep hitting refresh. I found some girls' names that I really liked, and I e-mailed them to my lady:

So this morning we're going in for the 20-week sonogram. Technically,  I guess El Preggo is at week 23. But we're both late bloomers, so we figured why not do this thing after our own fashion.

We've decided to go in and find out what the sex of our unborn spawn is. Last time around we opted to be surprised. The 10 months of my bridebird's first pregnancy constituted a delicious exercise in suspense, terror, thrills and baited breath. This culminated in a fairly hilarious birth story that we'll be dining out on until our daughter herself gives birth. I'm too lazy to go through it all now, but suffice it to say, it involved in an cathartically joyous blood-spilling release of anxiety.

Anyway, we're too tired for all that BS this time around. We want to know. We want to know if we have enough hand-me-downs. We want to know what stripe of sibling to tell our first born she should be prepared to torture for the next 80 years. We want as few surprises this time around as our fragile, addled psyches can take.

Also, neither of us can agree on a name, so we want to narrow the field of options by half (or, I guess given that we live in Park Slope, by one-eighth).

So in a few short hours, I'll know the sex of the sea turtle floating in my spouse's belly. I'll know the flavor of our soup dumpling. I'll know if I'll be spending the rest of my life coming home to a household of lovely ladies ... or son who must ultimately annihilate me (hey Dutch, congrats). 

I do have some ambivalence about finding out. It just doesn't feel natural. but we are both too tired to resist the ineluctable. We submit. Bring it on.

So the kid has been weirding us out lately.

Clearly, she's processing the fact that mama has a little tiny baby inside her tummy. This has got to be tough news to digest when you've only been around for 2.6 years. Throws your whole worldview for a loop, I'd imagine. Indeed she's starting to short circuit a bit. Our child has taken to alternating from pretending to be a tiny little baby herself to pretending to be pregnant herself to, my personal favorite, pretending to be both a tiny little baby and pregnant at the same time! Babies making babies, indeed. Not even 3 and already she is making allusions to my main man Sly Almighty.

Some examples of this sublime weirdness: she crawls around. A lot. This is something she didn't even do when it was age-appropriate--she was never a crawler. But now, she's crawling the skin on her knees down to bone. And, on top of that, now she refuses to answer us unless we address her as "tiny baby." So, for example, we say "come here and eat your oatmeal." She, if she actually deigns to answer at all, says "have to say tiny little baby!" So we say "come here and eat your oatmeal, tiny baby." And then she crawls over. And then she refuses to eat unless we spoonfeed her "like a baby."

This, you might imagine, while initially quite charming becomes eye-gougingly annoying with a quickness. An eye-gouging that is, rest assured, performed with baby-safe rubber-tipped spoons that change color if--GOD FORBID--the oatmeal you are about to stuff down your "tiny baby's" broken-record gullet is two degrees too warm.

Ahem. Sorry about that. I, Breeder does not endorse stuffing anything down anyone's gullet, broken record or otherwise. Of course.

Now, the other night, as Ma Breeder was giving le bebe a bath, the kid started rubbing her tummy. She said, "I have a tiny baby, like you. So you have to be careful." And then she pretended to pull the baby out of her navel and show it to mama. "See?" Mama, being the trooper that she is, said "are you a tiny baby or do you have a tiny baby inside you?" The answer, naturally, was "I'm a tiny baby. Yeah. And I have a tiny baby in my tummy." Mama: "Oh, well let me give your tiny baby a bath too." To which the kid replied, in a voice that echoed off our tiled walls for seven hours, "NO MAMA. I AM ONLY PRETENDING TO HAVE A BABY."

Anyway, it goes on like this. When she's being a tiny baby (and we want to avoid The Shrieking) we have to rock her, give her milk in a sippy cup as if it's a tiny bottle, carry her everywhere. When the child is feeling pregnant, we have to be careful with her tummy because there's a baby in there and she's going to throw up. Like mama. In conclusion, we are living with a schizophrenic dwarf with a hair-trigger scream reflex.

The weirdest and, I'll be honest, most gradually irritating thing about the child right now: whenever she's in "tiny baby" mode, she crawls around, yes. But she does so with her mouth wide open. She largely refuses to speak. She crawls right up to you and grabs your leg. She looks up at you, mouth all agape and ... begins panting. Like a winded puppy.

You say: "Hi, kid. Why are you grabbing my jeans and breathing like a demented obscene caller?" She pants, HRUUH HURRGGH GHHR. "Uh. Why are you breathing like that?" More hyperventilating. "Sorry, why are you breathing like that, tiny little baby?" more heavy respiration. "Babies don't do that in real life, you know." Pant-Pant-Pant. "Where's your mother? Go grab her leg and breathe on her." Huff-puff-heave-gasp. "STOP IT OR I'LL START WEEPING!"

This has gone on for weeks now. Lots of heavy breathing at our place. Both my bride and I have consulted each other: "Do you know why she's breathing like that?" "No, do you?" "No, I only pant like that when you're wearing your lederhosen."

Finally, I had my eureka moment. Framed on the wall of our child's room is the birth announcement we sent out on the occasion of her, well, birth. Included with the announcement was an excellent snapshot my wife took of the baby yawning or possibly passing some excellent gas -- but it looks like she's laughing ... or, i guess, panting. Here it is. This is the image the child apparently associates with being a baby; it is, at least, the exact face she makes when she's being a "tiny baby":

 

This officially being the second trimester--the pregnancy's golden age--my wife is finally feeling much better. Gone are the days of power puking eight, nine times. Gone is the weight loss. Gone is the scary cancer-ward vibe of our conjugal chamber. Better yet: gone are the disgusting chewable meds. No more drugs. Don't get me wrong, the nausea is still there. She does barf, sometimes daily. She'll wake up with an empty stomach, ralph and get on with the morning. It's impressive how thoroughly she's insinuated reverse peristalsis into her daily routine: wake, boot, rally, break fast. Feels like college again! Even our daughter has gotten into the groove: every time mama goes to the bathroom she asks "she gonna throw up? I wanna see!" Little angel! More worrisome: I was giving said angel a bath the other night. As the water was draining down the tub she leaned over its edge and said "now you have to dry me off. AND NOW I HAVE TO THROW UP! BLLOOUURRGH!!!" Then she spat and wiped her mouth with her forearm! It's so adorable the way they imitate us, isn't it?

Anyway. Nineteen weeks. Twenty-one (or so) to go. Here are some things I've learned about week 19 of pregnancy. From pregnancy.org:

Your baby has the same awake and sleep patterns of a newborn. So, basically, mama has an albino lizardfish in her belly that's waking up every two hours and screaming its head off. I'd be a little queasy too.
Scalp hair becomes apparent this week. No word on back hair. Or, more importantly if it's a boy: moustache-ability.
The milk teeth buds have already developed. Apparently babies have two rows of teeth: there are milk teeth and, behind them, the permanent teeth grow in. So mama's actually carrying a little shark. A hairy little albino lizardshark with two rows of teeth. You know, like in "Alien." I know I'll sleep well tonight!
Your baby is swallowing amniotic fluid and his or her kidneys are making urine. Let's take this to the next logical step, shall we: it's swallowing amniotic fluid. It's urinating. Presumably it's urinating into its amniotic sac. Which means its swallowing its urine. Which means my fuzzy little sleep-shrieking albino lizardshark Alien spawn, not even born yet, has a bizarre urine-drinking ritual it practices before ... oh I don't know, it goes on its cannibalistic murdering sprees.
It's around 6.02 inches (15.3cm) and 8.47 ounces (240gm). That's 6 inches and 8.5 ounces of PURE MAYHEM!

So pregnancy.org is creeping me out a little. Let's see what the parenting channel at ivillage has to say (aside, of course, from the pop-up congratulating me on being the first-ever male to visit the parenting channel at ivillage).

At 15 centimeters crown to rump, and weighing eight ounces, your baby is getting big! "Crown to rump?" Is this a baby or a pony? I can't wait to send out our birth announcement: "Meet our new child. Sixteen inches from whithers to brisket!"
Organs of reproduction are developing rapidly, getting ready to sustain future generations. Not even born and already you're giving him a massive guilt trip for not yet giving us grandchildren! That's just great, ivillage.
If your baby is positioned just right on an ultrasound scan, the tiny penis is easily identifiable. Awesome. I hope it is a boy, so his whole life I can be all "hey, son, why don't you and your tiny penis get ready for dinner?" "Yo, junior, don't you and your tiny penis have homework to do?" "Son, on this your wedding day, you have made me very proud of you. Now go forth and sustain future generations with your tiny penis."

OK, so this is rad. I'm probably the only person alive who hasn't seen this yet, but I'm going to relay this information in case you live an even more sheltered life than I: Matthew McConaughey has a blog! You have to poke around on his Website a bit to find it, but it's there. (Incidentally, on the welcome page of his site you are invited either to "enter easy" or "enter real easy"--entering McConaughey? Mmmmm.)

 Anyway, this is ostensibly a parenting blog, so let me try to keep it relevant. Here's his latest post:

"my girlfriend Camila and I made a baby together ... its [sic] 3 months growin [sic] in her womb [sick] and all looks healthy and lively so far ... we are stoked and wowed by this miracle of creation and this gift from God, and so excited for the adventure that will come in raising this child, being mother and a father, and shepherding him or her through this life ... wish us the best, keep us in your prayers, and God bless evolution."

First of all: "evolution?" Is the McConaughspawn some advanced lifeform new to our earth? Second of all: "3 months growin in her womb?" Ew. Third of all: "Camila and I made a baby together?" Why does that sound like he's boasting about, I don't know, some complicated lanyard he made at special kids camp?

Oh well. Good for you, Matt. You're happy. I'm happy you're happy. At least you're not this guy.  

 

In case "Knocked Up" and "Juno" left you wanting more wacky odd couple hi-jinx with pregnant ladies/girls and inappropriate partners/ages/life decisions, you're in luck. From the brain of Tina Fey comes "Baby Mama!" Chances are this was green-lit before the writer's strike—and yet it all sounds so ... familiar. Things can only go downhill from here. What's next? A knockoff of Pixar's "Ratatouille" called "Ratatoing"? Oh, good Lord.

Sorry for the lag between posts, folks. Been slammed at work, wrapping up all the tasty year-end goodness that Newsweek serves up so deliciously piping hot.

Ahem, yes. Well, it's already here: the end of the first trimester. Amazing. If the last pregnancy is anything to go on, my bride should be finished with the round-the-clock barfage in about ... oh .... two more months.

Today we go in for the first sonogram of Spawn Deux. Very exciting. Lots of suspense. Like: will El Preggo puke on the subway? Or at the doctor's office? Or both? Last time around we didn't find out the sex of our child. We just wanted her to be human, healthy and strong, with all her fingers and toes. She didn't need to be as sassy and willful as she turned out, but then we all know where she gets that. (For those of you keeping score at home, she gets her beauty and brains from me). Not knowing what we were having, I figured, was to invite some element of surprise in an experience that had become hyper-managed and medicalized. Mama ended up ditching her OBGYN on week 34 (insanity!) because the practice, to use the medical term, sucked like an open chest wound. We went with a lovely midwife who was lovely and wonderful and also lovely. And my bride went all-natural. Which is amazing to me.

Not knowing the sex was a thrill and, it turned out, resulted in an excellent birth story: when mama was in labor, which was mercifully straightforward following months of sickness, the midwife told us "I want you to be the first person to see the baby and to know if it's a boy or a girl. All you need is one more push and then I want you to tell us what it is." Mama was sitting in my lap, essentially, and she pushed one last push. The midwife took the baby and handed it to us. We both grabbed the wailing lizard-monkey and hoisted it up in the air and shouted in unison "it's a girl!" The midwife didn't hear us because as we were busy hoisting the babe up in the air, the umbilical cord snapped, spraying blood all over the delivery room. All over the midwife. All over everywhere. Blood. It was as if someone had filmed the most gruesome scene from "Saw XVIII" in there. The cord was tied while we were busy marveling over the beautiful strangeness of our new little person. And the mess, I imagine, was eventually cleaned up.

So that was fun. This time around, I don't feel as strongly about not knowing the sex. For one thing, we'd only have to choose one name--which is a huge bonus for us, a couple who has only agreed on one name ever and that's the name we already named our first born. Which means, unless we turn into George Foreman, it's taken. And speaking of the First Born, the benefit to knowing the sex of Version 2.0 is that we'd be able to tell her "hey you're going to have a baby brother (or sister). Fun!" As it is we've all taken to calling it Brothersister. Very creative, I know. We had all sorts of groovy nicknames for our daughter when she was a fetus: Guppy, Squidkid, Fishbaby--sort of a marine theme. So far all we've got for this one is Brothersister and New Person. Already getting shafted, Second Born is. Would finding out the sex mean we cared more the first time around? Then again, everything worked out so well the first time; would we be jinxing ourselves? Or would it be this person's special story, just like First Born has her own special blood-soaked gory story? Hard to know!

We have somehow managed to keep our daughter alive for just a tad longer than two-and-a-half years. As you have seen, her cognitive powers, while formidable, are not yet fully matured. So it isn't surprising that she does not yet fully grasp all the implications of the fact that mama done got knocked up again. Hell, I haven't fully grasped them myself yet and I've got 30 years on her. Oh, sure, she'll tell you her mommy's going to have a baby if you press her on the matter. But does she really understand what that means? That she'll have a new, smaller person in the house who SHE gets to boss around for a change? I don't think she's got it. I suspect it won't take long for her to figure it out.

She knows that "mommy is sick" because we, unfortunately, have to remind her of this fact almost every time she wants to be picked up by, play with, go outside in the company of, have her diaper changed by, or otherwise look at mommy. When mommy was lying on the couch the other day, something that mommy has gotten very good at indeed lately (not that daddy isn't thoroughly exhausted from doing everything around here all the time I mean can a brother get a break once in a while, or does he have to start puking too to get some time to himself ... ahem, yes I really am this impossibly small and tiny), the daughter walked up to her. "Mommy sick?"

"Yes, sweetie," replied my long-suffering bride. "Mommy is sick."
"That's OK because mommy gonna have a baby!"
"That's right! Can you pat mommy's stomach? ... GENTLY!"

Even the coldest of cold, cold hearts--a species of frosty souls hitherto known only to Hank Williams and his spiritual brethren--would melt at the sight of mother and daughter, bonding over a budding belly. My child patted her mother. She looked up, touchingly, at mama. She asked "Baby's in there?"

"Yes, sweetie. The baby is my tummy."
Lifting mama's shirt: "I WANT TO SEE IT!!!!!" 
"No, honey, the baby is inside mama."
"I WANNA GO IN!"
"Ah. You already had your turn."
"Why?"

Cute, right? A little bitty Thomas Wolfe learning that you can't go home to the uterus again, no matter how compelling its siren song. Anyway, lesson learned: there is a baby inside mommy. It's in her tummy. This much has been retained. How do I know?

Well.

The other morning--very, very early in the morning--the child awoke yelling, as is her want (and, increasingly, mine). We hear lots of "mommy" and "daddy" and "I'm awake" and "I got a booger!" After a few minutes we go into her room together and she's on her back, rubbing her little 2-year-old tum.

"Hi mommydaddy! I have a baby in my tummy!"
"Oh, really? Who put it there?"
Hoisting up her little stuffed sheep: "Lammie!"
"Your toy lamb put a baby inside you?"
"Yeah! I'm sick now!"

So apparently my daughter is having unprotected encounters with stuffed farm animals. They grow up so fast, don't they? Clearly daddy needs to have a chat with Lammie.