Surfergeeks

So today was the first ultrasound for Nikki. Maybe she should be making this post but she’s having a nap on the couch right now. We really didn’t know what to expect and actually had no clue where to go. A phone call to the hospital and about four transfers later we knew where we were going and off we went. I really do think that hospitals are designed to confuse. The fact that the Children’s Hospital seems to be perpetually under construction doesn’t help any either. We finally get to the waiting room for the ultrasound. After not too long of a wait Nikki was called to go in. Unfortunately I get to sit outside in the waiting room until right near the end. It was rather boring. The magazine selection consisted of about 4 Maclean’s with the newest one being September 2004. So I wait. And wait. I’m not sure really how long I waited as I don’t know what time she went in but around noon the technician came out to fetch to me. On the way in she comments that “she’s further along that you thought”. I’m sorry, what now? So apparently she believes that Nic’s 19 1/2 weeks pregnant. We believe she’s 17 weeks pregnant. We believe she’s due Aug 26 (40 weeks from Dec 3). She believes Aug 22. Somewhere, math doesn’t add up (hint: it’s not our math that doesn’t work). Regardless, the kid’ll pop out when it’s good and ready. (note the lack of a sexually identifying pronoun)

So it’s time to see the little goober. The tech slaps some goo on the ultrasound wand and starts pushing and prodding around Nikki’s belly, showing us all the things that we, as caring parents, should (and do) care about: two feet, two legs, two eyes, one head, two fists (I was REALLY hoping the kid’d be flipping us the bird). So of course it always come down to the usual question: “What is it?” Unfortunately, LHSC (that’s London Health Sciences Centre for you folks from out of town) seems to have this policy where they do not determine the sex. I won’t get into the semantics about how they are right – they DON’T determine the sex – genetics does that – they should just be reporting the sex. Of course, this probably NEVER flies with the parents-to-be. So our technician gives us the usual schpeil ending in “…Now that said…usually you would would want to look for something sticking out between the legs. Here’s the cord, here’s the one leg, here’s the other” and pretty much does everything short of either saying it or having a big flashing circle in between the legs highlighting where you’re supposed to look. So we look and get to draw our own conclusions. To both of us, it LOOKS like it’s a boy. But who knows. By far the coolest part of the whole ultrasound was seeing the little heart beat.

So that said, the above thumbnail is clickable. If you want to see a bigger picture, click on it and be amazed. That is our little kid. Not a bad picture if I say so myself. I’ve seen many of these ultrasound pictures that don’t really look like much, let alone a baby. What can I say, our kid rocks!