Month: December 2005

Karen is having a hard time dealing with the various symptoms of pregnancy. She’s still suffering from morning sickness, and has decided that this means that it will continue for the next six months. I can understand why this worries her – it can’t be very pleasant. However, at least now we’ve told everyone, there’s no need to tiptoe around – if she needs to run off to barf, no-one’s going to hold it against her.

She’s enjoying shopping for maternity clothes and other such nesting activities. If we owned our own palace, I’m sure that I’d be decorating the nursery right about now, but as we are renting a house I find myself twiddling my thumbs trying to think of something productive to do. I draw a blank, and do the washing up instead, irrespective of how small the pile of dirties is.

She’s also a bit hormonal at times, which can be hard work, as I’m never quite sure what her mood is going to do next. It keeps me on my toes, but I can take it.

Telling the families at Christmas was about as much fun as could be expected. We had it all planned out, with champagne corks popping and hurrahs, but inevitably circumstances would leap up and everything would go topsy turvy. I dunno, I’m not really the centre-of-attention sort – I don’t like being asked all sorts of dumb questions. And the inevitable moment where everyone has said “Congratulations” but can’t think of what to say next… gah. Thank God it’s over.

I’ve tried talking to the bump, but I can’t really think of what to say. I can imagine the little foetus in there, tapping its toe, grumbling “Come on, quit it with all the baby talk. Say something worthwhile, or shut the fuck up.” Perhaps I should grab a good book and read it stories.

She continues to struggle on in a similar sort of vein. She’s got about enough energy for one hour of usefulness per day, the rest of the time she spends lying on the sofa or on the bed or in the bed.

We’ve started making certain preparations. An opportunity arose to acquire a rather spiffing pram/buggy device, which she capitalised on, as well as picking up some other guff too under similar circumstances. Though this will save us a lot of money in the long term, it does mean that the house is now full of crap.

She remarks that she can now feel the weight of the little fella, which must be quite peculiar. She’s very apprehensive about the ordeal which she faces in the not-too-distant future, but there’s no turning back now. I suppose I should probably rein in all this cocky swagger, because I doubt that it will all be meadows and flowers for me either, but I consider that it’s my role to be relatively optimistic. I think that this might help her.

Yesterday was our 12-week scan, and I’m very pleased to report that all signs were good, and it was wonderful to watch baby-to-be moving around. The downside of this is that Karen is now extremely conscious of baby-to-be’s existence, and every time we drive over a speed bump, or she goes to the toilet to be sick, she is worried that it is upsetting the foetus.

I’ve told her that the foetus is perfectly used to vomiting and speed bumps by now, but I’m not sure if this is any help. I guess she’s going to try and stay as still as possible for the next six months.

We’ve decided that having made it through the 12-week scan successfully, we are free to get excited and attached. So we’re telling people when the opportunity arises, and also tossing possible names back and forth.

Six months suddenly doesn’t seem like that long. Which is good, because I’m very eager. I’m also hoping that the baby takes on Karen’s tendency to sleep pretty much all the time, and my tendency to spend all waking hours perma-smiling.

As a general rule, babies don’t make me gooey – I think that they are hideous things, with a propensity to defacate into their own clothing and insert anything that isn’t tied down into their mouths. But this one’s mine. Which, quite frankly, makes it the best one, and it’s obviously not going to do any of these disgusting things.