Tears, tears, and more tears

It started last week when B brought me a sweet surprise. It's been really hot here, at least for me, and I've been feeling miserable. He knows how much I love the iced green tea from Pan*era, so when he went there for lunch, he bought me one. When he gave it to me later, I don't think he was prepared for me to start getting teary. It was very hard for me not to burst into tears and I had to assure him that it was because of how sweet he was, not because of anything he did wrong. He kept repeating "I just brought you some tea...it's no big deal...why are you crying?" with a surprised look on his face. He continues to tease me about my reaction.

The next episode happened at our 33 week appointment when they did an ultrasound to check on the size and position of the baby. As soon as his image came up on the screen, I choked up. I couldn't say anything at all. We saw him wiggle his toes, swallow, and blink. And we got some good news - he's head down! Based on where I feel his movements, I was pretty sure that was the case, but it was nice to be assured. He's also almost completely curled up on my right side, giving me an interesting lopsided look. They think he weighs about 4.5 pounds and will be 6-7 at birth. They also showed us that he has enough hair to show up clearly on the ultrasound. It looked like a sea anemone surrounding the back of his head. I guess the old wives tale about heartburn and hair holds true for us.

Then last weekend we were on the subway. It was a crowded car and a woman immediately stood up to give me her seat. I protested because we only had a few stops and I didn't mind standing. She announced loudly that she was NOT going to sit down while a pregnant person stood, so I gratefully accepted her offer. And promptly started tearing up again...it's hard at this stage to forget that I'm pregnant, but when I think about how much I wanted to be the pregnant person on the subway and what it took for that to happen, I am really humbled. Sometimes it's hard to believe how much things have changed in such a short amount of time.

And finally there was the hospital tour. It started when we parked. The parking lot was right next to our fertility clinic since they're a part of our hospital. As we walked down the hill to the main building, I remembered clearly walking down that same hill, ovaries painfully swollen, watching the slate gray sky give way to some snow flurries and hoping that all of this was going to be worth it. Please, please, please, I thought with each step. Once we were in the hospital and they took us into a labor room, there were more tears. If everything keeps going well, I realized, I will be in a room like this next month having a baby. Again, I never forget that I'm pregnant, but this overwhelming sense of gratitude just hits so hard. We drove around to the clinic before we left and I remembered all the time I spent in that building and sent some good thoughts to the embryos still waiting for us there.

Nothing much to report other than my hormonal teary episodes. I'm 35 weeks today. I've been pretty uncomfortable, especially with the heat and humidity. I'm ready to have this baby, but hope that he waits until August 11 when my Mom gets here from California. My Dad is arriving on August 15, my official due date. Until then, we continue to wait and get things ready for our new arrival.