Baby-Baby Gilliland

So this not knowing business is getting a bit old.  Warren says it's the most exciting thing he's ever been though (which I think is just adorable), but it is making me a little bit nervous.  Anxious maybe.  Nervous is a bit too strong.  Maybe if we could just come up with a name for a girl and a name for a boy I'd be more content.  Actually, I can narrow that down even further- just ONE name for either a girl or a boy would be great.  Having to come up with two names at once is proving to be too hard.  My mind starts to wander here and there when I start to sit and think about it.  I've looked at books.  I laughed at people who looked at baby name books when I was pregnant with Benjamin.  I kept thinking don't people just know what they want to name their child?  I mean really.  And now I am one of them.  Oh well, I'll keep reading.  Surely we can agree on a name before I have to be sedated.  Thaddeus is starting to sound good these days.

Smiling, finally.

This being Easter weekend, I thought this post would be truly appropriate. This post is primarily meant for facebook since everybody knows that if it's not posted on fb, it's doesn't mean anything.  haha. 

I am blessed with optimism.  Most situations in my life really are viewed as half-full.  I can't say with all certainty that I've always been this optimistic, but I can't recall a time in my life where I've consistently viewed things as half-empty.  Having known several people the complete opposite, I view this attitude as a blessing indeed.  Maybe there is a verse for optimism that someone would like to share on here. 

Having said above statement, I will be honest and say that I have not been completely thankful or optimistic for this pregnancy.  This might come as a shock to some of you, and maybe not so much of a shock to others.  Today being Easter, the church was packed full of people singing "Hosanna" by Hillsong.  I've heard this song probably 200 times in all seriousness, but the lyric "show me how to love like you have loved me" struck a chord in my heart today.  As the rest of the congregation was singing the remainder of the song, I stood there and thought about what that lyric meant and why I was supposed to hear it and remain still in God at that moment.  I am one of those people who truly believes that everything happens for a reason, so I tend to listen when I get such a calling. 

This line of "show me how to love like you have loved me" is in all actuality a prayer, or in my case, a wake-up call.  I have not loved this unborn child as Christ loved me.  Not even remotely.  I have almost been ambivalent about the whole situation.  (May I just say that Warren, blessed man, has been excited for the both of us since day 1.)  We weren't planning on having another child for at least a few more years, so I think most of this attitude comes from me being a tad bit upset that this happened to Benjamin.  Yes, you read that right, I said to Benjamin.  Part of me was upset that I wouldn't be enough for him and how could I have let this happen?  I almost felt guilty for being able to get pregnant when I didn't even want it to happen. 

So today at approximately 11:00am, God showed me again who was in control and that I deserve to be happy for this baby!  This baby deserves a place in this family that is completely his/her own without my parenting issues hovering around it.  After understanding why I was supposed to hear that verse today, I found myself smiling, finally. 

Very pregnant

So it seems as if I've found myself pregnant.  Now of course I have known this since October, but all of a sudden I look pregnant.  Strangers can now tell, so that makes it a bit more real to me.  My bigger shirts are now getting to be a little too short and I only have one pair of regular pants I can comfortably wear.  I feel as big as a house to be honest and this makes me chuckle because I know I am going to double in size very quickly.  I was telling Warren last night that pregnancy seems short sometimes and he laughed.  Like laughed out loud at that statement.  Not just lol without meaning.   Of course since it's real life there was no actual lol comment.  :) And really what I mean by short is it seems when you get towards the end you really run out of time to get things accomplished.  You don't buy much until you're about my stage or later because of the fear of miscarriage, either substantiated or not.  If you get much past my stage you don't really want to shop and putting together a new stroller seems like brain surgery.  I don't remember being this tired with Benjamin, but I was "only" working then and not chasing around a 3 year old.  Seems like my house was quite a bit messier, too.  I think being a SAHM makes me a tidier person in general.  When I worked full-time I didn't seem to care if things were out of order, but it drives me a little crazy now.... and I do far more work at home than I ever did working.  I remember being able to take breaks at work.  Breaks that were just for me and were uninterrupted... and I remembering being able to pee uninterrupted, too.  Okay, different story for a different time perhaps. :) 

Anyway, so the whole point to this post was that I am showing for sure and I can feel my stance widening, so I'm sure that the waddling will start soon. 

Ultrasound

So the mystery of the baby's gender has been easier to deal with than I had imagined it to be.  I think it is because I am simply too busy to fret about it very much.  Most of you have heard me say that you get what you get, and I truly believe that in that statement.  My life will go this way if we have a girl and that way if we have a boy, but life does continue to go on either way and it will most definitely change regardless if we have pink bedding or blue bedding.  We truly will be blessed either way and it has been fun not knowing.  Maybe I will get a little more anxious towards the end, we'll see.  

Warren thinks that we are having another boy, but I keep telling him that he has rather good odds considering the number of outcomes. :) 

Brain atrophy

Do you ever feel like your brain is slowly wasting away?  As it if had atrophy?  Sometimes I truly believe this is happening to me.  Really!  I can recall times when I felt genuinely smarter than I do right now.  My vocabulary was greater, I remembered how to spell words, and did not second guess myself on diction and sentence structure.  There are people in this world (Warren) who remember most of what they learn and there are people who lose skills from not using them (me).  I can be quite studious when taking classes and score rather well, but I will not remember anything that I've learned unless I use those learned skills.  My sister barely pays attention in any class and still remembers everything.  I'm not sure exactly how that makes any sense.  Sometimes I think the theory of osmosis really works in her case because she falls asleep reading all the time.

And on to reading!  I used to read all the time.  Really.  I know it's strange sounding now.  I read the same books over and over in high school and still enjoyed them.  I read the books that I was supposed to read in college and enjoyed them, too.  No idea where that part of me went, but I rarely read anything for pleasure anymore.  I can't even remember the last book that I read purely for pleasure.  We had a game at church the other day and my question was "What is your favorite book", and the only books that popped into my head were books on autism or child-rearing for special needs children.  Seriously, in what world would those be considered a favorite book?  Those are mainly educational.  Now I could have said the Bible, but honestly, that kind of answer seems trite in church and not really realistic.  I would categorize that as more educational as well.  So much of me seems absorbed by gaining information that I seem to be losing information.  Does that make any sense at all?  It sometimes feels like my brain just can not hold any more information, so it decides to "brain dump" bits and pieces of knowledge along the way in order to make room for more.  If I could just learn to purge my brain of all useless knowledge... that would be fantastic. :)

baby bell pepper

Babycenter is such a wonderful invention to mothers who already have at least one child.  Before Benjamin was born, I used to paw over baby books and knew everything that was happening every week/month.  It was all so interesting!  It is still interesting, but I just don't have the time/energy to devote to reading about babies.  Babycenter will gladly send you an email (or ten) a day if you sign up, and some of them are very informational.  For instance, today I read that my baby is about the size of a bell pepper all tucked up.  Isn't that adorable?  Baby Bell.  We haven't come up with names yet, but I think that Bella is a cute name.  Too bad it's already the name of a pet in our family.  I doubt that Warren would go for that sort of thing anyway for a little boy since he is determined that is what we're having.  Not knowing is sort of fun, really.  

It just isn't the same

I find myself checking my email 8,000 times a day.  8 something or other is usually my big number.  You know, the number that you say when you're stressing a point about how big something is, or how much something costs.  "If that house didn't cost 8 million dollars, I'd buy it."  That of course is just an example because I wouldn't even be allowed in a neighborhood that had houses of that caliber in it.  Not in Virginia anyway.  8 million dollars in California gets you a very nice condo, however.  They might let me at least look at the pictures of it.  Anyway, so email is a nice alternative to actually speaking, but it just isn't the same.


So Benjamin and I were very spoiled in 2009 for a Navy family.  Warren was home nearly every single night- actually, he was home every single night except for the month of January and even then he was only gone for four days.  I wouldn't say that year was an easy year for him work-wise, but he was home at night.  Maybe not home to eat dinner at a reasonable hour every night, but he was home.  I find myself wanting to tell him things all day long lately.  Texting is the joy of modern day technology.  Got something you want to say, but doesn't warrant a telephone call?  Text it!  That should be my new motto in life, I think.  Warren's phone will not receive texts in Haiti.  Oh yeah, he's in Haiti in case you didn't already know.  I find myself picking up my phone wanting to text him when I'm out taking Benjamin to school or running errands and something funny has happened.  Texting is another great alternative to speaking when you have the option, but it just isn't the same. 

So we sit and wait and try not to get sad because there are literally thousands of people in worse situations than what we currently have.  I mean really.  We have a house, we have two cars (paid for, woot woot!), and we have so much food it's probably sinful at times.  It's hard not to get sad though when Benjamin looks at a picture of Warren and says, "Daddy work.".  Benjamin never said that before Warren left because he just expected his Daddy to come home every night. 

It just isn't the same around here.