The one about the boy

First.

My son’s 18th birthday is on Tuesday September 1st.

Here is his story.... short as I can make it...

To make a long story short, YM was supposed to be our last child. Signed, sealed and delivered. The end. As she was still an infant I knew she wouldn’t be the last. We were going to have a boy. I KNEW this as strongly as I know my own name.

My husband on the other hand, did not. Nope. Nada. No way, Jose. Not today, not any day. Now, shew!

I assured him that we were going to have another child and he laid down three demands to even think about it.

1) different job
2) larger home
3) larger vehicle to fit another child.

We moved to Arizona for a job position.
We had a home built with four bedrooms, and a game room All of which was just the upstairs.
We bought a larger vehicle.

So I said.... Ahem..... Baby?

No.

He wasn’t feeling it. Three is a lot. Four is chaos.

Every once in awhile I’d say.... Baby?

Every time he replied, “No thank you. I’ve had plenty”

One Christmas we were walking out of a store with bags of wrapping paper and as I stepped of the curb he muttered, whispered, sputtered.... “Ok”

Wha? Huh? Who? Come again? I said, foot mid air....

“We can have a baby.”

“ seriously? A baby?”

“Yes”

And!!!

Anticlimactically......I could NOT conceive. I’d always been a baby making machine. 14th day if my cycle... pregnant. No questions asked.

Not this time. No baby. No baby. Ten more times.

I started charting my cycles. Obsessing over my Basal Temperature was my newest pastime. Inputting the results every morning into the pregnancy program became the thing I jumped out of bed to do before I even peed.

There you go... temp is up... still up... still up...please stay up....

Congratulations 🎉🎊 You Are Pregnant!!

Flashed onto my screen!!

It took a year.

I had:

Hypermesis Graviderum which sounds like a Harry Potter spell but actually means, in Latin, you get to be hospitalized because your can’t stop throwing up... EVER. I did get released, I did not stop throwing up and in fact, I LOST, 35 lbs. I was a stick with a belly which is why it’s so weird that I also got

Gestational Diabetes. That basically took any food that I could eat a tablespoon of, off the table. Not even bananas. I lived on broth in tablespoons, bits of turkey and small amounts of milk.

symphysis pubis dysfunction. This means, and this is an actual quote “ wrenching pain (as though your pelvis is tearing apart“ It is a blast!

And round two of Pre-eclampsia.......

I spent two weeks in a bathtub at the end and I couldn’t walk up my stairs or put on pants/shorts.  

Oh, and I needed a blood transfusion because of me being too anemic.

And guess what?

I never. Ever. Not even one time complained. THAT is how much I adore being pregnant.

The birth story isn’t good and sent me spiraling into depression but the baby. My Mr Mouse. Well, he is smart, curious, thoughtful, funny, an asshole on occasion, determined, young man. 

I am blessed.

Happy Birthday, Cub. It’s been awesome knowing you!