Pre-Gender Feelings

Well, for those of you who've I've talked to recently, or if you've talked to our enthusiastic families, you know that tomorrow is our big 20 week ultrasound when we found out our baby's gender. For those of you who don't know...now you do!

I've taken the old wives tale tests. For those of you who believe strongly in any of them, stop it. They all came out with the results that there is a 50% chance I'm having a boy  and a 50% chance it's a girl! Go figure. I could've told you that. If you subscribe to the chinese conception calendar, I'm having a boy. Whichever your method of deciding for yourself, go ahead and make a guess because I have absolutely no idea.

I got to thinking today about how I feel about finding out a little about what our child will inherently be like. As is stated in The Family: A Proclamation to the World it says "Gender is an essential characteristic of individual pre-mortal, mortal, and eternal identity and purpose." This baby's gender is a huge part of who it is! 

Another thought I had was about how things would change with even the way we talk about it. My family fondly refers to the baby as "buckwheat" and Ian and I usually just say "it" or "the baby." Tomorrow provides us the opportunity the apply a specific pronoun when we refer to...it. (I hesitate to say it every time because it's not just an it. It's our baby.)

I remember a while back a mother told me that as I approach the time when I get to find out my baby's gender, I'll wonder if I really want to know. Well, believe it or not, no matter how badly I needed to know before I really am having second thoughts.

As I already mentioned, this will change the relationship that I have with this child who I've seen once and who I feel only periodically (which by the way, is probably the weirdest feeling ever). Now I will have seen it again and it will look totally different. That's only supposed to happen with nieces and nephews that live really far away. Your own child isn't supposed to grow without your witness. Especially when it's right under your nose (or more literally my intestines).

Tomorrow, despite my slight reservations, we will know our baby's gender (unless it doesn't want us to know). Just as a note, I believe we've decided to wait a little while to share the news, so we can have some time to picture our little family. But don't be too disappointed. Who knows? I'm a moody pregnant lady and reserve the right to change my mind at any time. Besides, back in the old days we'd all still have to wait 20ish more weeks to find out, right?