Anticipation

My darling daughter,

I know that in as many as three weeks or as few as three days, you will be here. As I sit here now, watching you squirm below the surface of my belly, my skin rolling and stretching with your every movement - I am in awe.

Last night I had a dream that I was getting ready to go out and when I looked in the mirror, my right front tooth looked funny. I touched it and it wiggled, then fell out completely. Horrified, I opened the bathroom door a crack and called for your Nana, who was over at the time. There were a lot of family around, but I wanted your Nana. She came in and I was crying as I showed her the tooth. She calmed me and told me to look in the mirror. Magically, I was not missing a tooth any longer. When I awoke, I looked up the possible meaning of this dream and found that when you have such a dream it means you are about to have a huge change in your life and are doubting your abilities. Calling for your Nana to come was likely my way of looking for reassurance from my own mother - that I would be able to be a good mother to you.

Over these last few weeks, your daddy and I have been taking a lot of trips down memory lane. We've talked about the circumstances that led us to find each other, to fall in love, to get a dog, get married, and now - create you. We talk about how far we've come and what a miracle it all is. And it is a miracle. We talked about you, sweetheart, long before you came to be. We called you by name and had conversations with you until we were ready for you to come into our world. And your precious soul waited patiently for us to be ready. And you came. And soon we will meet and you will be part of our family. We are so grateful that you chose us to be your parents and that God chose you to be our daughter.

You probably could do without the mush, but let me just say that your daddy is an incredible man and you are the luckiest little girl to have him. He is the most loving and generous husband and I am the luckiest woman. You won't remember this, but he talks to you and rubs the spot that we think is your bottom (hard to tell). He tells you how hard he is going to try to be a good daddy and how much he will love you. He cooks fantastic and nourishing dinners for us and takes enormous pride in feeding us and helping you to grow healthy and strong. He has also taken on a lot of the household chores and the care of Duncan - things I'm not able to do anymore, as you have grown so much.

I talk to you and sing to you. All the time. And I play "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" - a snowglobe/music box that I received as a gift when I choreographed 'The Wizard of Oz' 10 years ago. I place it firmly against the low part of my belly where your head is and hope that it soothes you. You often wiggle - just a little bit - before listening attentively until the tune runs out.

You have been a blissful sleeper lately and I so appreciate that. Aside from the one time your daddy made spicy pasta and it had you kicking my insides until the wee hours - and the other time I had some late night Ben and Jerry's Peanut Butter Cup ice cream (which made you twist and stretch and squirm and hiccup all night long) - you've been great. I wonder if your current sleep habits will be any indication of how you will sleep when you are here?

There is so much I wonder about you. Who will you look like? Will you have your daddy's round butt, or my own flat 'no-butt'? What color will your eyes be? Will you be into sports or the arts? Cooking or climbing the corporate ladder? What will your voice sound like?

And bigger wonders and I suppose fears - will you love me? Will you be proud of me? Will I be able to raise you to be a caring, loving and thoughtful citizen of the world? Will I be a good mother to you, so that I will earn the right to have you call me 'friend' when you are a grown woman?

I love you so much already and you aren't even here. I'm so looking forward to holding you, my baby girl. I do not like to hold other people's babies, as they always seem to cry when placed in my arms. Sometimes the baby will cry before I even touch it. I'm hoping this unsettling and upsetting trend will end when I hold you.

Until that day comes, I will continue to rub your 'bump' of a butt, talk to you and soothe you.

I'll see you soon, baby girl.

Love,
Mommy

How you came to be

It is September of 2007 and I am the happiest woman on the planet, I am convinced. My fiance, (God, how I love that word!) and I are basking in our recent engagement by taking an impromptu trip to Marco Island, a place we have visited many times during our courtship. After landing in Ft. Myers, we pick up our rental car, pick up groceries and dump our bags at the condo before finding our way to the beach, both of us anxious to put our toes in the sand. It is late afternoon and many of the beach goers are packing up their umbrellas, shaking out their towels, brushing sand off of bright plastic beach toys. My fiance and I walk hand in hand, carrying our shoes in our other free hand. We talk about our first date, first kiss, about how far we've come and all that lies before us. We are just about to reenact that first kiss, when we are interrupted by a giggle and a flash of pink. We look down to see an adorable little girl who couldn't be older than 2 or 3, toddle past us, curly dark hair bouncing under a yellow sunhat; white pampers peeking out of a ruffled pink polka dot bathing suit. Just behind her is her father. "Suzie!" he calls. And then he calls her by her full name "Susannah! Come here!" (The name has been changed so as not ruin the surprise)

My fiance and I turn to each other. "Wow. I really like that name," I say.

"I love it." He agrees.

And we lock that name away as a keeper for hopeful future use.

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It is December of 2008, our first Christmas as newlyweds. My husband (God, how I love that word!) and I are attempting to ice skate for the first time in years. We are downtown at Millennium Park in Chicago. The speakers are blaring Christmas music, and the rink is filled with families. Kids are seemingly everywhere, whizzing by us at high speeds, falling down and getting back up again without care or concern. I suppose when we made these plans to come downtown and ice skate, I had an overly romantic idea of how it would be: Snow softly falling, my husband and I holding hands, gently skating around the rink, stopping to kiss or make a snow angel or take a smiling and rosy-cheeked photo to put on our Christmas cards.

Unfortunately, this is not the reality. My husband will not even hold my hand for fear of falling. "Don't touch me!" he yells as he gingerly makes his way around the rink, jerking his body every now and then so that anyone who sees him probably thinks he has Turrets. I don't fare much better, practically clinging to the railing, cringing whenever a pint sized Michelle Kwan double axles too near to me. After about fifteen minutes of this torture, we turn in our skates and settle in for some well deserved hot chocolate.

As we sip and warm up, we notice a couple sitting near us, with their little girl, about 4 or 5 years old. Her mother removes the child's purple fleece hat to reveal a mop of brown hair that is standing on end from static electricity. The little girl, however, does not seem to care or notice and instead is concentrating on blowing on her hot chocolate so she can drink it.

My husband looks at me and smiles wistfully. "Whaaaat?" I ask, though I already know what.

"I'm ready for Suzie to be here. I want Susannah here with us now."

My husband and I both want to have children, but while he wants to start yesterday, I want to wait until we've been married one year. This is our plan and we're sticking to it.

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It is July of 2009 and I am nearly finished training for my first ever marathon. It is early on a Saturday morning and I am preparing for a 12 mile run. We have just learned that my cousin gave birth to a baby girl the day before, in Paris. The news is exciting and wonderful and has caused my husband and I to wonder about our own future children. When we start *trying* will we be able to conceive right away? What if it takes us a year or more? What if we can't? I push these thoughts away for the moment, for I need to focus on my training. I am running this marathon for my other cousin who is battling Lymphoma. My husband comes up behind me and wraps his arms around me, one of my favorite gestures in the whole world. He seems to know what I'm thinking. Aloud, he says, "Hang on, Suzie girl. Your mommy has to run a marathon for her cousin, but when she's done, you can come right on into our world." I turn to him and hug him, then look up and echo his words. "That's right, Susannah. Mommy just needs to do this one thing and then we will be ready for you!"

The marathon was on October 19th.

We got pregnant on or around October 6th.

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It is Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010 and I am beside myself with nerves and anticipation. It is the day of the big ultrasound. After making it past the first trimester, and getting a normal 2nd trimester screen for certain birth defects, this is the final hurdle before I can finally breathe.

My husband is holding my hand as the ultrasound tech slathers my belly with cold gel. She places the wand on my abdomen and almost immediately we see our baby, whom we haven't seen since week 8 when he or she looked more like a gummy bear than a baby. But now we see the head and the outline of a precious little nose and mouth. The tech tells us that she needs to take measurements of the anatomy and would we like to know the gender?

"Yes!" My husband and I both nod.

We see an amazing and incredible series of images that I will never forget. We see the spine, the four chambers of the heart pumping blood through a tiny body. We see fingers and toes, knees and elbows. We see kidneys and spleen and the umbilical cord with the red blood feeding our baby and the blue being carried away. I am mesmerized by what I'm seeing and find it incredibly surreal to feel my baby move within me and see it on the screen at the same time.

Suddenly, the tech focuses in on an image that I can't quite make out. I am about to ask what we are looking at, when she starts to type words onto the screen. "It's....a....girl." she writes.

I cannot stop the tears and the laughter that are filling me, exploding into the small white room. My husband in his suit and tie is squeezing my hand and covering my face with kisses. "It's Susannah!" he beams. "It's her! She's coming! We talked to her, we called her into being and now she is here!"

Now she is here. And she is ours. We remember a time when we were first dating and talking about how we both wanted a dog - lab. A chocolate lab. "I've always wanted a chocolate lab and I would name him Duncan," Dave had said. Four weeks later he received an email about a litter of lab puppies, among them - one chocolate. It was our Duncan. We had talked about him and he came into our lives. And now the same was happening with our Susannah.

Later, we are back in the waiting room. In several minutes we will be seeing the doctor to go over the ultrasound (which will show that everything is normal and looks good). Both of us are on our phones, calling our parents to share the good news: It's a girl! Dave is on the phone with his mother and he tells her the name that we've chosen for our baby girl. His mother is surprised. "You're naming her after my mother?" She asks.

Dave and I look at each other. We are stunned. Dave's grandmother passed away when he was a toddler, and he never knew her. Everyone called his grandmother by a nickname and he never knew that her actual given name was Susannah.

This instantly makes our choice that much more perfect. The original Susannah was a strong, brave woman who raised a daughter on her own. What an honor. And because we are naming her after Dave's grandmother, her middle name will be after my own Nana - my mother's mother, Mary. She was also a strong, independent woman, working hard to provide for her daughter, without the help of a husband.

The two women have a lot in common. So much so, that it's hard for me not to picture them in heaven, friends for eternity, now bonded together by their precious great grandchild, named after them both.

Bad Mommy?

Once the reality hits that my husband's sperm has joined with one of my eggs and created a life (profound, isn't it?) and that this life is fast dividing and multiplying and growing inside me- I have a bit of a panic attack.

About what, you ask? You name it. I think of my behavior over the past four weeks when I was pregnant and did not know it. I ran a marathon. I drank my way through California's wine country. I returned home and upped my workout regime, running sprints and hills to break a weight-loss plateau. I took an Imitrex once to get rid of a migraine. I drank a froufrou martini and three beers with coworkers one night. I feel like a terrible, horrible person. Did I hurt my baby?

I vow then that I will read up on everything and not let one morsel of food cross my lips or move one muscle without first making sure it's ok and I won't hurt the baby. I buy a handy little book called "Pregnancy Do's and Don'ts" by Elizabeth Aron, M.D. I carry it around with me like a girlscout would her handbook. And aside from having another panic attack over our dog's flea and tick medicine (I never handled it, or touched it, but was near our dog and thought that would hurt the baby), I find it to be a very useful tool.

Still...I arrive at my first pre-natal appointment armed with a barrage of questions for my doctor. Can I drink coffee? Can I dye my hair? I hear that lunch meat and sausage are off limits. Is this true? Can I still run? What about abdominal workouts? Can I take lozenges? What about soft cheeses? I drank a lot of wine, some beer and took an Imitrex before I knew I was pregnant...did I hurt my baby? (the answer to that one was NO, thank God!) Oh, and I ran a marathon at 11 days pregnant. Is my baby ok? (my doctor is impressed with this and says the extra blood flow was likely good for the baby).

Whew.

We schedule an appointment to have my first ultrasound in a couple weeks, which will put me at 7 weeks pregnant.

I leave the doctor's office feeling relieved but even more determined to protect this baby growing inside me. This baby that is now only the size of a sesame seed. I walk carefully on the sidewalks of Chicago covered in freshly fallen snow and steer clear of the tall buildings that have 'Danger: Falling Ice' signs in front.

On my way to meet my husband and some friends for happy hour drinks (none for me, of course!) I am nearly side-swiped by a business man in a rush to catch his train. He nearly knocks me over and before I know what I'm doing I turn and scream at him, "HEY! I'm pregnant!" He neither hears nor cares, but I find that I have to take a moment to calm myself down.

I feel like I am carrying a precious pearl inside me - rather, a pearl submerged in a glass of water and I must balance myself so as not to spill the water glass and upset the pearl. I marvel at how fiercely protective and noble I feel - and can't imagine how the Virgin Mary must have felt.

I arrive to meet my husband and his male friends who have all enjoyed one round of martinis by the time I arrive. They pull up a chair for me and there is much doting, congratulating and making sure I am comfortable. Of course I eat it up. The server arrives and I order a cranberry spritzer. Minutes later, I am sipping my spritzer and enjoying the lively conversation of business men after hours - loosened ties, cocktails and camaraderie.

I suddenly have the feeling that something isn't right. My stomach is feeling all warm and I look at my drink. It is awfully dark for being a cranberry spritzer. I don't normally drink vodka, but I have the distinct feeling there is vodka in my drink. I have my husband try it and he assures me there is no vodka. I take a couple more tentative sips before stopping our server, a young blond.

"Excuse me, is there vodka in this?"

She looks at me like I have two heads. "Of course! It's a vodka cranberry."

I feel as though I have just been told that I drank poison and will be meeting my maker in minutes. "What?! VODKA?! Noooo!! I ordered a cranberry spritzer. Non-alcoholic! I'M PREGNANT!!!"

She is mortified and apologetic. I am panic-stricken and tears have begun to fall involuntarily down my cheeks. "Just...just give me a water, please."

I turn to my husband and cannot even speak. He assures me that it's fine and I didn't drink that much (truthfully I only had a few small sips). But I cannot believe what I have done. After all of my efforts to protect and guard this life inside me, I give her alcohol.

I really am on track to be mother of the year.

It's Good.

So, there I was. On my last Miller High Life with my friends from Undergrad on a Friday.

It was 230 a.m.

This was highly unusual for me. Not back in the day, but now, for sure. These days, 230 a.m. was a strange environment as Fridays were most often ushered out with whatever member of the Nightline tripartite cast was hosting (don't check, it's usually Terry Moran), followed by letting Duncan (our chocolate lab) out for his "quick pee" at the end of the evening.

It was Guys' Night. A group of undergrad friends who finally got together for some time in which shots get swilled and talk is generally restricted to: a) funny, and/or, b) inappropriate. We began at a lounge-y bar, followed by a lounge-y Italian restaurant and thereafter with a distinctly unlounge-y visit to the local Country and Western bar, Carol's Pub. Staying out late was extremely compelling due to the rarity of these evenings (never) and a visit from a friend who works for our US Government in Afghanistan; read, you have to soak this stuff in.

Soak we did. At the reckoning hour, the siren call of a burrito lured me next door and I cabbed it home. A lovely sight I would be for my awaiting wife.

But this was not my awaiting wife, it was my awaiting pregnant wife. And I knew it.

It is hard to say when a confident feeling comes over you about something you know has happened or is happening actually happens (the feeling, that is). But for some reason, I felt all evening that I was not in a relationship only anymore, I felt something deeper. I suppose it began with looking at my wallet twice before buying rounds for everyone; there was just a slight tone of reluctance in my doing so. That lasted a second. What lasted longer was a weird warmth and it wasn't the slaps in the face and body by my friends Jim, Jack and Jose'. It was a visual. I was actually kind of seeing but more kind of feeling like I could see my wife feeding our child.

This visual had no Hallmark movie overtones. There was no light film of fog, my wife was not dressed in anything angelic, and by no means was "Dream Weaver" playing. It was just kind of a seeing and feeling combination, like when you feel like you have eyes in the back of your head and you can see the bourbon bottle that an ex-girlfriend wings at your head even though you didn't actually see it, so you can get out of the way (yes, that happened).

I just knew my wife was pregnant. Sure she was late, but not very. I just knew. Right then.

So I came home and saw my wife asleep, and she awoke briefly as I looked at her. She said, lovingly, "you smell like a bar." And I did. But I ate my first burrito as a dad and enjoyed the quiet of Chicago at 300 a.m., a time I really love because when I am up (almost never) it is just my burrito and our neighborhood crack dealers. We share a reluctant truce bound and consecrated by late night food.

And then I went to bed. I was asleep very briefly. I awoke to hear the combination of laughing and crying. It was my wife, who had just peed on a stick that told her something good. We were expecting.

She ran in with the stick in hand to roust me and tell me what I already knew. Our lives would never be the same, all for the better. Just like when we met, when we walked down the aisle, when we bought our first home, and when we shared our first family holidays. Progression. I rolled over, my face as wrinkled and contorted as that of a shar-pei and kissed her. We shared some moments that I will keep in my head up to and until the point I hear the last blip of whatever monitor is keeping me alive in my old age and I see our nineteen grandchildren for the last time.

For some reason I also envisioned the start of a ride. That point where they tell you to strap in and keep your hands inside the car; well this was it. It was and is going to get interesting.

Positive

It is very early on the morning of Saturday, November 7th, 2009. I awake in my warm bed with a sense of urgency - I have to pee. My husband is beside me on his back with his arms over his head, elbows bent, mouth wide open, dead to the world. On any other Saturday, I would've made my way to the bathroom, taken care of business and returned to my warm bed to rejoin my husband in nappy land and snag a couple more hours of lazy Saturday slumber. But this is not any other Saturday because I am late. Six days late.

"Honey, you're totally pregnant." My drunk husband said this to me as he collapsed into bed only four hours earlier. (I will later learn that alcohol induces moments of psychic clarity). He had been out with friends and stayed uncharacteristically late for any sensible married man and I awoke at 2:30am to find him singing Johnny Cash in the middle of the kitchen, wielding a burrito.

I, on the other hand, enjoyed a much tamer evening, meeting my marathon running buddy for dinner and splitting a bottle of red before returning home by 9pm. It was a pleasant dinner and we enjoyed re-hashing every glorious and painful moment of our 5 months of training and eventual completion of the Nike Women's Marathon in San Francisco. Neither one of us had ever completed a marathon and we did it for different reasons: she wanted to prove that she could do it, and I wanted to do something for my cousin Diana who had been diagnosed in March with Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma. It was, to date, the hardest and most exhilarating thing I have ever done.

Back in bed, I lie there and wonder if I should take the test. More than a week earlier, I had purchased a home pregnancy test and peed on one of the sticks prior to popping an Imitrex to thwart off an impending migraine. I did not want to take an Imitrex if I was pregnant. The test was negative. I think of our fridge that holds a bottle of Moet Chandon Champagne, an anniversary gift from one of Dave's clients. We were planning to pop it open that night over appetizers, before moving on to one of the bottles of Cakebread that we purchased in Napa, pairing it with a home cooked steak dinner. I think about all of this and then I wonder...well, what if I am pregnant? I will feel terrible in retrospect after all that imbibing.

Screw it. I'm taking the test.

I rip open the remaining EPT home pregnancy stick, pee and wait. As I sit there, I say a prayer. I ask God to help me to be ok with whatever outcome. I ask that I not be disappointed if it's negative and I ask that I be granted confidence and strength if it's positive. I think of my parents who have watched all of their friends welcome grandchildren and who have waited so patiently for their 30 plus year old daughter to find herself, find a husband, find a home. I think how happy this will make them. And lastly - but not least - I think of my husband. The man has been wanting babies since before we said our "I do's", more than a year ago. And in the four and a half years that I have known him, I have spent enough time watching him interact with nieces and nephews, friends' children and even our dog to know that he will be a remarkable father.

I reach down to pick the stick up off the bathroom floor and take a look. It is the sort of test that gives you a "-" sign or a "+" sign. I can feel my heart rate accelerate immediately and my hand starts to shake. There, in the window, is an unmistakable "+" sign. No dangling chads here. This result means I am positively pregnant. I jump up off the toilet seat before realizing my underwear is still around my ankles and I need to wash my hands - both tasks seeming alternately impossible and never ending. Finally, I am sprinting back to the bedroom, life-changing instrument in hand. I look at my sleeping husband and pause in this moment, knowing that when I wake him up, his life will never be the same. I crawl across the bed and my movement causes him to stir.

"Davey?" I call to him, and I am already crying.

He opens his eyes and lifts up his head. His eyes are bloodshot and his cheeks are embedded with the seams from his pillowcase. He squints at me, then his eyes open wide.

"What's wrong baby? What is it?"

I begin babbling and saying something like, "I know we wanted to wait to enjoy our Cakebread but I really had to pee and I didn't want to wait so I took the test and.... we're pregnant!"

I thrust the stick into his face and begin bawling unabashedly. He takes me in his arms and we lie there for a bit, both of us crying and happy and in shock. After awhile he falls back asleep (after all, he has had only 3 hours of post-guys-night-out slumber) whilst I couldn't go back to sleep if I tried.

Later that day, I drive to CVS Pharmacy to pick up two more pregnancy tests - the more accurate 'digital' variety. One says Pregnant / Not pregnant and the other simply: Yes /No. After both of these tests come back "Pregnant" and "Yes" respectively, and we are 'three for three', my husband remarks, "If you take another test the stick is likely to get annoyed and say 'Stop asking me!! You're pregnant, alright? What do you want from me?'" Too true.

And even though this scene has played out millions of times with countless couples over thousands of years, it is so exquisitely new and miraculous for 'this' couple, that we can't help but feel very blessed and special and humbled and grateful.

Oh, and terrified.