She-ra/He-man

This weekend I got to meet my new niece in all her female glory. Can I just say it was a little weird to hold a baby girl? Somehow it just felt different than holding a baby boy. She’s only a couple weeks old and she’s already oozing her own special aura. In other related news, I didn’t need to worry about her peeing in my face! That alone made this a visit of epic proportions.

Before I had my own children, I swore that there was no way I could ever have a boy. Ruffians those boys. I'll tell you what. I grew up with four sisters. I knew nothing about boys. Well, basically nothing. I knew they liked to throw rocks and wipe their snot with their shirt sleeve. So naturally, I felt that my estrogen drenched family background set me up perfectly to be a mother to girls . . . not boys. And then I got pregnant. And I could feel with all of my little preggers body that the baby inside of me was the foreign gender. It was a boy. I just knew it. Even before we got to see him holding his boy parts on the ultrasound. But that sure solidified in my mind what my life was going to be like. Absolute uncharted territory.

And then I got pregnant again a couple years later. As much as I thought in my mind that a girl would be fitting (one of each), and that having two boys would be practically impossible to handle, there was always this little leprechaun in the back of my head saying, “You know it’s the foreign gender again me dear.” But I denied that little rascal, up until I was sitting in the chair waiting for the ultrasound. I told the Husband I wanted to change my guess. Because I reluctantly said GIRL! on the drive there because I just could not bring myself to say BOY! That would have made it too real. But the Husband said it was too late. Once we walked through the doctor’s office door, all votes were final.

Well fine! Except I knew. Even before the ultrasound started, I felt a panic attack coming on because I just knew it was going to be another boy, and he was going to be holding his boy parts again. And how was I, the girl with four sisters, going to handle two boys? Because once you have two boys you might as well have twenty. Right? That’s my philosophy on the matter anyway.

Well two boys later, I can honestly say, well done Universe. I’ve gone from thinking no sons were in my future, to thinking no daughters are in my future. And quite honestly, if a girl ever did come along I wouldn’t have any idea what to do. Hey there girl, uh daughter of mine. Want to um, I don’t know, play with this here wrench. Oh I know! How about you pretend to be a super hero who fixes trucks and talks in a deep voice. Braids? Oh no. You don't want that. How about a baseball hat?  I know that is all very stereotypical. Oh well.

So after spending the weekend with my new little niece, cuddling her, smelling her, hearing her cries, and touching her toes, I can report four things with absolute certainty:

-Girls are not boys.

-I do not miss the postpartum two-month fog.

-I was able to return home without having been bitten by the baby hungry bug.

-Girls are way more fun to dress up. Boys are more fun to watch sleep.

Side note: When I was pregnant with Bosco, a lady once asked me if I felt gross carrying around a boy inside my body, since I was basically two genders at that moment in time and space. Are.you.kidding.me.For.the.love.of.monkeys.are.you.serious? I laughed. Then I threw up. Then I laughed some more. Then I told the baby inside of me to stop being such a barbarian and to get his knee caps out of my rib cage.