I just returned home from a two week work assignment in Switzerland. The setting was about as utopic as it gets - the countryside set along crystal clear lakes against a backdrop of snow capped mountains. I stayed in a small tourist village that looked right out of a The Sound of Music. The weather was unseasonably warm and, of course, everything was pristine and organized. My husband flew out for the weekend and we visited some close friends currently living near Zurich. I couldn't have hoped for a better time, but it is still great to be home.I keep waiting for it to really sink in that I am pregnant. People have told me that it is impossible to fully comprehend and that it may even be a natural defense mechanism that your mind doesn't try to fully grasp what will be happening to you during labor. We saw our little girl moving around during the 20 week sonogram and I feel her kicking and punching throughout the day, but I just have a mental disconnect. It just feels like I am mysteriously gaining weight and that there is this hard ball in my stomach.
My shirts are really starting to get tight. I have become one of those women constantly pulling their tee shirt down to cover my mid-section. I went into a baby store today that also carries maternity clothes. Walking through the baby clothes section on my way back to the maternity section, I felt the strangest sensation...nothing. I just cannot bring myself to get interested in buying baby clothes. For starters, I don't have the foggiest idea how big the baby is going to be nor do I have any clue how fast she will grow. I am so bad with proportions. I can't look at a woman in the street and tell her age more less guess the size of a 3 month old.
I didn't find any tee shirts in the end at that store or four others. I will rant about the lack of maternity clothes in The Netherlands in another post, though. As I was leaving the store, I forced myself to pause and try to form an opinion about the baby toys in the store. Then it dawned on me. Who is going to tell me what to buy and when? How am I going to figure all this stuff out? Sure toys have tags on them suggesting the age appropriateness and there is more literature out there than I could read in a lifetime, but who is going to teach me how to be a parent? When I am going to feel like a parent?
