Why yes, we do know the gender of the baby (although this might not be the most appropriate post ever for revealing it)

 

So we went for the 19 week scan, the one where you can find out the baby’s gender, and we are total and utter devotees of the ‘know your baby’s gender before it is born’ brigade. If you’ve never been pregnant you might not realise that this is one of the first little controversies of parenthood – whether you’re a ‘that spoils the surprise’ type or a ‘the surprise is now’ type. Anyway, you missed my entire first trimester because I didn’t blog about it, but frankly, you didn’t miss much. I was sick, I was tired, I was freaked out (about whether I’d have a miscarriage), and I was incredibly unmotivated. Although you might have noticed that last part here. All I wanted to do was lie on the couch and watch DVDs. I wasn’t surprised to find myself not feeling like going to work or parenting but to not feel like reading or blogging or hanging out with friends.. that was a little odd for me.

My brother lent me his Oz HBO drama series and once I started watching it that was all I felt like doing. Oz is set in a maximum security men’s prison and is very much not PG and consequently I wasn’t able to watch it whenever Lauca was around and naturally, she was around a lot.. so that meant I felt cranky as well as sick and tired and freaked out and unmotivated. My brother was a big fan of Oz, and in an endearingly heterosexual male way had raved on to me about how gritty and ground-breaking the TV show was, about the social justice debates it explored, about the quality of the acting, and yet had neglected entirely to mention.. wait, does he read this blog anymore?… anyway, neglected to mention that it is also choc full of male nudity. My brother must have assumed I was capable of sophisticated television-viewing and that there was no need to make reference to the sea of penises. And yet, watching Oz I found myself to be not unlike some Baywatch-addicted buffoon mesmerized by the bikini girls, turns out I like watching gritty dramas full of male nudity and in fact am capable of finding the highlight of a very good TV series to be the penises. Yes, yes I’ve heard of p0rn, but this is engaging drama with male nudity thrown in as a bonus. My partner rolled his eyes as occasionally I would rouse myself from a penis-watching, morning-sickness stupor to email my sister and let her know that Dylan’s penis is here too. (Dylan: the character she loved so very much on Beverly Hills 90210).

Aaaanyway. We went for the scan this week and once the grim process of checking the baby for life-threatening problems was over the sonographer went in search of genitalia for us. As anyone who has experienced an ultrasound knows, much of the scan is a dizzying blur which will have you marvelling at your sonographer’s training. Microscopic black smudges will finally be located and your sonographer will nod sagely and tell you that those fetal kidneys look great. Uh-huh, you will think, have you tried cleaning the screen, they look like specs of dirt. So when this amazing sonographer said she wasn’t able to get a clear enough look at the genitals to decide - Oh, it is too difficult to see, it keeps turning and closing its legs - I peered at the screen puzzled, because wasn’t that there..?

Lady, I might not be a sonographer, but believe me, I just watched the entire Oz series and I know penises. Yes, she said, you’re right. It’s a BOY!

So, yes, we’re having a boy and we’re thrilled. All the mothers with little boys that I know have been telling me how sweet little boys are and how much fun we’re going to have and if they’re half as much fun as little girls then we’re sold.