Pa, Part 2 (the reveal continued).

Last Tuesday, I wrote 16 Weeks = Perfect.  I didn’t know that Bennett Lee Spears was living and growing inside of me at the time.  No, I was pretty sure that Hazel Joe Spears was occupying my belly.  (Yes, it’s the coolest girl’s name ever and has its own little story.  You’re welcome to steal the awesomeness that Hazel Joe is, but that doesn’t mean that I won’t steal it right back.)  That particular post ended with my reasoning as to why we weren’t finding out the gender earlier than the 20 week ultrasound.

My resolve didn’t even last 12 hours.  

The next morning, Wednesday morning, it occurred to me that if I wanted to personally pay for an earlier, gender-revealing ultrasound, it would cost $99 at InfantSee4D.  The pondering continued…

Well, Brian gave me a $100 gift card to Lowes for Mother’s Day.  But we’re going to eventually spend that money at Lowes on stuff we need anyway.  No, what I REALLY want for Mother’s Day is to know the gender of my baby.  Especially since I’ve got three days off next week to work on the house, it seems logical that I should be able to know the gender while I’m working on the nursery.

So being sure to explain my reasoning without diminishing the thought behind Brian’s original Mother’s Day gift to me, I asked him if I could make an exchange.  He was more than happy to oblige!  In fact, once I made the appointment, Brian began punching the air in triumph, excited to have a much shorter countdown.

By Thursday, I thought it’d be a joy to get my Square Piece readers in on the fun.  Naturally this sparked suspicion that I already knew the gender.  At the time, I could still honestly say that I didn’t.  And when Sunday, the BIG DAY, came around, I was sure to write my post first thing in the morning, verifying that I still did not know the gender.  Of course, then I found out later that afternoon.  (Sneaky, sneaky.)

So now that I’ve cleared my conscience and assured you that at no point was I lying (misleading, yes; lying, nope), let’s get to the finding out part…

Besides Brian, there was room for two other friends to join me at the ultrasound.  One rode with us and one drove separately.  Both friends were predicting a boy, while Brian and I were convinced it was a girl.  Filled with anticipation, I believe I talked everyone’s ear off during the entire 30 minute ride to Fairfax.

The faces that knew nothing, but thought they knew everything:

On the way home, I might have said five words.

I.  Was.  Floored.

The faces that knew everything, but felt like they knew nothing:

I was experiencing the exact same sensation that I had described about the morning when first we found out that I was pregnant.

All of my confidence flew right out the window and I realized that, once again, I felt like I knew nothing.  My picture of the future got wiped clean and a big, fat question mark was drawn in its place.

Silently, I began to process the shock.

I don’t know what to do with boys.

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Will he want to color?

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Huh.

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It’s a Bennett.

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Now what?

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What are boys like?

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Blue.

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Nope.  I don’t know a thing about boys.

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So no purple and gray nursery, huh?

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I hope he’s sensitive like Donovan and funny and full of joy like Joey.

…

Considering that I had been up since 5:30 that morning (distracting myself by cleaning the kitchen) and considering how emotional the moment was (though most of it was internalized), by early evening I was wiped out and took a good three hour nap to finish absorbing the news.  Once I awoke, I began drafting my post about Pa.

When I began typing, I was still scared and shocked and bewildered.  But the second that I typed the words “my son,” something snapped inside of me.

This isn’t A boy, as in SOME boy, this is MY boy, MY son.  

And suddenly everything became a lot less intimidating.