Baby Stuff

Time is flying by. We basically only have 3 months to go. As we get into warmer clothes, people are commenting on my size - I think mostly because they can see more! As you can see from the picture attached, I am getting as big as the domes of this cathedral! (According to Stephen, that is!)

We are trying to figure out what 'accoutrements' we need. Trying not to buy everything (partly because of knowing we will move, also cost is a factor). Two Saturdays ago we went to a baby shop Stephen had found in France. The number of stroller options is amazing. We have basically figured out that we want a three - in -one: a bassinet/carrycot that straps on to the stroller with the car seat that you can strap on instead and then the stroller finally acting as a stroller for an older kid. These things are really expensive though and there are lots ot brands too. I am part of this e-mail group for moms in Switzerland and sometimes people post things for sale there. But we haven't gotten anything that way and it's hard to tell from pictures if what they are selling is what we want exactly. I don't really want to buy new, but I feel limited here in finding used things.

We do now have one useful item - a baby bathtub! We had gone to dinner at one of Stephen's former co-workers and they passed along their bathtub. So one thing down! (We are also collecting an assortment of clothes....) Pricing diapers has also been interesting...that is certainly a cost outlay. We may look into a more ecological option!

On our visit to Mosocw, I think I really wore myself out one day - we ended up resting most of the afternoon and Stephen did some things on his own. I know I have to take it easy - it's just hard to not be able to do everything you want to do! But Stephen is being very patient with me which I appreciate!

Those elegant French speakers

On Thursday we had another check-up with the baby doctor. Its main purpose was for Sarah to take the screening test for diabetes that one can contract during pregnancy. This involved drinking a sugar powder dissolved in water an hour before the appointment and the drawing of blood. The check-up was also to follow up with us on the major ultrasound we had a few weeks ago. All is normal and well from that, the doctor said. She didn’t do another ultrasound herself because this other one had been done a few weeks ago, and she didn’t feel listening to the baby’s heartbeat was necessary at this visit either because she feels the baby is moving enough. Sarah says the baby is moving a lot. We found out yesterday that the results from the diabetes screening were normal – no further tests are necessary. But with the baby moving a lot, you’d think that Baby is on a sugar high a lot from something, wouldn’t you? I don’t think Sarah has cut back on her chocolate consumption during this pregnancy (we found a good flavor of a favorite brand in Copenhagen last weekend). Spending these nine months in the womb in Switzerland, Baby will be used to Swiss cheese and chocolate before it is born!

While at the doctor’s, she asked Sarah if her assistant had taken a urine sample, using that very word. But then, as the conversation continued, she switched to using the word “pee-pee” and used it several times thereafter, never using “urine” again. I thought this was so funny. Of course, the doctor speaks with a French accent, and French speakers can make anything sound elegant, even talk about “le pee-pee” or “le poo-poo.” (I saw a great commercial in French a few months ago that explained the two flush buttons – one big, one small – on our toilet and many other toilets in Europe: A real-estate agent was showing a couple a house, and in the bathroom he pointed to the two buttons that delivered big and small flushes for – you can guess – either “le pee-pee” or “le poo-poo.”) Sorry, I know some may be disgusted by talk of this, but I think we’ve got the best terminology in French for dealing with a toddler!

There was also talk at the doctor about Sarah’s size. I’ve noticed in the past few weeks that she is looking big, but, you know, I haven’t been around pregnant women a lot before to know how one’s physical growth progresses over the months. The doctor said Sarah has gained a normal amount of weight at this stage, but she also said if one grows large during pregnancy, that means one could have a big baby. If we didn’t have anything to worry about in this pregnancy before, now we’re worried about having a large baby (well, I’m worried for Sarah having to deliver a big baby). But what can we do?

Now the search is on for a pediatrician. The baby doctor recommended a few. There are many things to line up and get in place for the delivery – all the arrangements (including a sort of rendez-vous) at the clinic, making sure all the right doctors will be there, etc. Again, after living in Europe for several years and learning about the Middle Ages so much here, I keep asking how women during that time managed to have babies. They didn’t have regular doctor visits and have to worry about getting everything lined up for the delivery. And all the mail from our insurance company! Luckily Sarah’s in charge of processing all the bills and reimbursements (if you think an insurance company’s bureaucracy and paperwork is hard enough, try doing most of it in French!).

(Almost) Better than anywhere

In one of the books about pregnancy that we have, Sarah was reading the other day a section in which real people (supposedly) had their questions answered by the authors (doctors). One question was from a pregnant woman who wanted to take a long vacation in western Europe but was worried about the medical care available to her in that region should she need it.

Lest this would be you asking this question, lest you also think we are still living in the Middle Ages here, my answer to you, if you have any concerns about the medical care Sarah has received so far or will receive at the hospital/clinic where she will deliver, is in the survey that came out this week by Mercer Human Resource Consulting that puts Geneva - our home for the past 3 1/2 years - at a close number 2 for overall quality of life in the whole world. Geneva was beaten - but only by a hair - by Zurich. If it would make anybody feel better, we could consider Zurich for a delivery location - it's only 3 or so hours away. But then we would - or should - be considering German names for Baby, which is already confused enough by any reference in French to it.

Geneva has consistently ranked high in this annual survey, which has health care as one of its factors. Indeed, if you haven't figured it out yet, Baby's parents have been living high on the hog for the last few years with our European lifestyle and living as tourists in the heart of The Continent with salaries to match the high cost of living here, but still enough to allow us to take countless weekend trips all over the place (I must end this soon so I can prepare for our long weekend in Copenhagen). Bill at church has now started to request a slide show of all of our travels around Europe, which outnumber his, and he's been here a good seven years.

So, to conclude, not only will Baby be well-traveled before he/she is even born, but he/she is receiving adequate medical care and attention in this city of high standards for everything (you know, they even occasionally wipe down the signs with the street names on them so they don't get too dirty). Besides, Mommy is eating well and is also providing lots of in-utero mental nourishment in the form of concerts and cultural events that she and Daddy attend. With several more months of living here for us, why don't you join us for a visit and check out our great standard of living for yourself?

Going Slowly

Don't ask me to walk up hill with you - I will be at least 10 steps behind! I find that I have really slowed down with my regular walking pace, but going up hills or stairs, it's like my energy level is cut in half. I feel a bit frustrated by this as I can't do what I am used to being able to do. Stephen is being accomodating, but sometimes forgets to slow down enough.

I am also sleeping better. I guess I have adjusted to the new position. But my belly is getting in the way when I try to lean over...I am now at 69 kilos which means I have gained between 1/3 and 1/2 of what the doctor expects me to gain over the entire pregnancy.

As Stephen has written, seeing the baby on the ultrasound was a really neat experience. And I certainly couldn't tell the sex of the baby - it really helped that the technician pointed out all of the parts. I wouldn't have know that the dark area was the stomach. She also pointed out the thyroid - I still can't tell you what the throid looks like, but I guess we saw it. One of my co-workers from Finland said that there it is against the law to tell you the sex of the baby before the birth. We couldn't figure out why that was exactly. It would make sense in countries where girls aren't valued, but I don't think the Finns have any ideas like that!

Just some random thoughts

As time passes in this pregnancy, I am getting more used to the idea of parenthood and having to care for a child. On the other hand, the very idea of a living thing - a person - growing inside Sarah becomes more and more strange and harder to comprehend for me. When we had the first ultrasound, Baby was just a "blob with a heart beat," as I called it - an embryo with no shape resembling a human. That's when this concept started to be strange, even creepy - something living inside of you, and I compared it to a tapeworm in one's stomach at the time. With the most recent ultrasound last week, we can now see definite human features (and one of Sarah's coworkers even commented that Baby has my nose when she saw one of the ultrasound pictures), and it's starting to do human things, like move a lot, Sarah reports often. So I feel like this child of ours is already starting to take shape, like we already know it, but because it's not born yet, we really don't - and can't - know it. When we saw with the last ultrasound the baby moving its arm like it was waving at us and even yawning, I really did feel like it was a real human being, and that excites me. But then I have to keep reminding myself that this newborn won't be like most other humans I know and that I won't be able to talk and have conversation with it when it's first born (because that's what my instinct tells me will happen) - that it will be totatally dependent on me and Sarah for everything and will basically be a helpless little thing. So there's quite a paradox here with this unborn child and experiencing the incomprehensible miracle of a new lift being created.

One of the questions I seem to be getting asked a lot lately is, "Does Sarah have any cravings for certain foods?" No, not really, but she is eating quite a bit still, and now, as the "manager" of the household, the one who does most of the food shopping and cooking, I'm more used to the way Sarah is eating us out of house and home.

Last night we had a fondue dinner at the home of one of my former coworkers from ACT. When I told her one of the possible middle names if Baby is a girl (Geneva, so she would know where she was born and have a real connection to this place), the response was, "Oh, no!" Elisabeth is a middle-aged woman originally from France but has lived in Switzerland for more than 30 years, so she's probably just as conservative and staid as the native Swiss. There are rules (whether formal, written ones - laws - or things that are just done a certain way) for everything in Switzerland, including what you can name your baby. And just because you're a foreigner living here, don't think you're exempt from this naming rule and try to name your baby something strange (like a traditional name from your own culture). If you want to do this, then you need to prove that the name is common in your culture (and your embassy apparently can assist you in presenting your case to the Swiss authorities). Don't worry - we won't name Baby something unusual or strange, but it might be something European-sounding because Baby will have roots here!

Baby says "Bonjour!"

This morning we had the second trimester ultrasound. We went to a different clinic that Sarah's normal doctor sent us to for this, where the ultrasound machine is more powerful or where the staff is more specialized in doing ultrasounds. It was basically to check the anatomy of the baby carefully at this stage.

We're happy to report that the baby is "normal." I'm a bit disappointed because, even before our child is born, I expect it to be an above-average child, you know. But I'll take normal and healthy!

The views the machine gave us of the baby were quite detailed. You could see many features of the baby's anatomy - the bladder, kidneys, a strong beating heart, all of its facial features (it's very good looking, I'd say), 10 fingers and 10 toes, the spinal column, etc. Yes, we could have learned the baby's sex, but we chose not to find out. We'll wait for the surprise at the end! The baby at this stage is 20-25 cm long from head to toe and weighs about 400 grams.

What was most exciting, after seeing many of its parts in detail and seeing and hearing the heartbeat, was seeing it move. And boy, does it move! Either we have a young athlete here, or, as I said earlier, Baby has received Mommy's and Daddy's dancing genes. It was moving its hands a lot and kept waving at us (bonjour!) and responding to the technician's "Hello!" At one point we even saw it yawn! It's curled up with its legs way up by its head. Sarah says she is feeling movement more often, but whenever I put my hands on Sarah's stomach, I never feel anything.


Basically, the technician had little to say - no news is good news. "Continue" with the pregnancy is what she sent us off with!

Halfway

Well, depending on which calendar you go by, we are either in week 20 or week 21 - definitely halfway to the baby coming! We have 'the' ultrasound on Friday morning. This seems to be the standard one that everyone, in developing countries at least, has at the mid-point. My understanding is that this is where they check to make sure all the limbs, digits, etc. are there. We could also find out the sex, but we have decided not to. My doctor's ultrasound machine isn't detailed enough (or something like that) so we have to go to a special place that I think only does ultrasounds, but I may be wrong. We will let you know how it goes!

This is last week's picture (we always take them on Thursday!).