So, I announce that I’m pregnant and promptly disappear for weeks. That right there says quite enough about “How’s the pregnancy going?”

I’m just now at week 12 able to do things like “go to the grocery store” without needing to immediately come home and lie down. I’ve been so, SO much sicker this pregnancy than last time around. I’m also admittedly a big baby about feeling nauseated. I can’t deal with it. Can’t cope. I begged for Zofran during my VERY LONG labor with Paulo before I begged for the epidural. Can. Not. Deal. Morning sickness is 100% the reason why it took me three years to be ready to be pregnant again.

And it wasn’t even “that bad!” With Paulo, it would wax and wane throughout the day and was generally made better or worse by certain foods. Proud to say I never threw up, though I was constantly feeling like maybe if I felt bad enough to barf, I might feel better *after.* This time… I also didn’t throw up. But the level of nausea was constant and the only, ONLY thing that made me feel like maybe I could stand to keep being alive was to lie down.

So, there was a month of my life right there. Lying on the bed. On the couch. On the floor while Paulo played with his trucks. Back on the couch. I lamented many times that our bathtub isn’t fit for adult use as standing up in the shower was too rough. I am the biggest, whiniest, whiny baby about being queasy. I know. Some ladies have hyperemesis and I don’t even know what would have happened to me in that situation. Probably would have had some kind of nervous breakdown, no exaggeration.

ANYHOW. Now that I’ve explained exactly how awful my experience of this relatively-bad-to-me-but-really-garden-variety morning sickness was…

The one thing that I heard over and over again when I would comment that this pregnancy was more difficult than Paulo’s was “Oh, it’s probably a girl then.” Not just because it was *different* but because girls… evidently want to suck their mothers’ life forces. Especially mothers who had both boy and girl children would comment “I was SO MUCH sicker with my daughter!” It’s amazing just how many times I heard this. Infinity times. Infinity infinity times.

This time around, I elected to do non-invasive fetal genetic testing (the Maternit21 test, if you’re familiar). Basically, via a sample of *MY* blood taken just out of my arm like a normal blood draw, it’s possible to extract fetal DNA. And so it’s possible to effectively screen for various trisomies and other chromosomal abnormalities. And because it’s looking at the chromosomes, it’s possible to definitively sex the fetus (HA.) at a mere 10wks gestation. SCIENCE IS CRAZY. I so would have done this test with Paulo, but it wasn’t available a mere three years ago. Right now, it’s elective and not standard and there are various hoops to jump through w/r/t insurance coverage, but my OB is willing to bet that it will be routine within five years. It’s just completely bonkers to me that this is even POSSIBLE.

And so. We were able to find out at 11wks which variety of fetus I’m baking.

And lo. Those old wives. They had a fifty/fifty shot and they called it. This little one who has been beaching me on various pieces of furniture for the past month is indeed a girl-fetus. And she is sucking my life force.

She also seems to be German. Her favorite meal is an open faced salami and cheese sandwich on toast. Fitting that her name, which we had decided on long before I was pregnant the first time, is German. I imagine her being born with little braids and wearing a dirndl. (Note: This is not *entirely* random. I am half German. It’s not like Nuno and I ended up with a seemingly Russian fetus, which would be just flat out bizarre.)

Anyhow. I can’t express in words how EXCITED!!!! I am to have a girl. I will admit that pragmatically, it would have been incrementally *easier* to have a second boy and that I honestly didn’t have a preference. Having a boy already, I think there’s an expectation that I wanted a girl… and I didn’t feel that way at all until I found out that I’m having one because HOLY COW YOU GUYS I’M GONNA HAVE A BABY GIRL I CAN’T EVEN BELIEVE IT. It’s really surprising to me how amazing I’m finding this. A GIRL!!!

Now that I’m off the couch, perhaps next time there will be some kind of photos. It’s very hard to take photos when doing so properly really requires sitting up, which results in wanting to die. So very, very glad that my own personal 24/7 boat ride is over.

If you’ll excuse me, I must go and make myself an open faced sandwich…

[ Also, I should have mentioned this a squabillion weeks ago, but I’m a bad person. I wrote this thing and it’s up on What to Expect Dot Com. It’s about my little urban baby and it’s a pretty good thing! You should read it! ]