Dreaming of Hairbows

Every Sunday morning I gaze across at a sea of patent leather mary-janes, hair bows, pigtails, and cute little dresses. Several little polo shirts paired with the same khaki pants are freckled in along with them…a few try to mix it up a bit with a sweater vest, but it’s still the same outfit.

I can’t help but feel a little pang of jealousy and longing.

It’s Easter time and I walk through various children’s clothing aisles. Every store has the same set-up. Row after row of sweet little girl things that taunt me with their cuteness…dresses, shoes, purses, hair bows, tights, jewelry. Then off to the side, there’s one sad little boy rack who stands in the corner. He’s whispering “injustice” with all of his identical little mini-vest outfits that come in a choice of 3 predictable color combinations.

I can’t help but feel a little pang of jealousy and longing.

Don’t get me wrong, I love my boys. I love having boys period. If I had two girls, I’d feel a jealous longing for a boy.

When my husband and I first got engaged, we decided on our future children’s names…yeah, we like to be prepared like that I guess. We were sure we would have two children -a girl and a boy- called Corinne and Samson. We both had a dream about Corinne shortly after we were married. She was about 2, had dark curly hair…and was the firstborn in both of our dreams. We were sure those dreams would someday come into fruition.

I imagined myself with Corinne many times before I got pregnant. Funny thing happened though…once I found out I was pregnant, I got an internal sense immediately that it was a boy. My husband started talking about “her” and about the dreams, and it hit me. Of course it’s a girl! How was that not my first instinct?

My mom called the baby “she” in the beginning too, and when I reminded her that it might be a boy, she said “oh it has to be a girl!”

My sister had 3 bags of pink dresses before the pee dried on the pregnancy test.

I tried to warn everyone before the ultrasound that I really thought it was a boy. Although no one seemed disappointed, I apologized at the words “it’s a boy” as if I were comforting a friend who just got some bad news.

But everyone was excited to imagine meeting this baby boy, and we loved calling him Sam. My focus turned toward designing the “Sam I Am” nursery (that I had been planning for the past 5 years), and my sister’s focus went toward organizing the baby shower with the same Suess-y theme.

I assumed the little girl from our mutual dream would come in the form of baby #2. In fact, I was going to make sure of it.

I met someone when I was pregnant with Sam who told me about the Chinese Birth Chart. He told me that it was an amazingly accurate gender predictor that works by corresponding the age of the mother at the time of conception with the month of conception. He said that his brother and sister in law’s ultrasound tech was wrong about the gender of both their children, but that the Chinese Birth Chart correctly predicted the sex both times. I ran home and googled it and checked what it predicted for myself and a few of my pregnant and recently post-partum friends. It was right for all of us. Over the next couple years, I became obsessed with its accuracy. I checked it for every pregnant woman I encountered. It was only wrong once out of the twelve or more pregnancies I tested it on before I got pregnant the second time.

I was so convinced of it’s accurate gender predicting capabilities, that I used it to plan the timing of our next child’s conception. It said that at age 31, a conception that occurred in Oct, Nov, or Dec would result in a baby girl. So, naturally I made it a plan to start trying for our second in October. That way, if it didn’t work, we would have two more “girl months” to try.

I got pregnant immediately. But a funny thing happened. I got the exact same internal feeling that I was carrying a boy that I had gotten when I found out I was pregnant with Sam. But I just shook it off and assumed it was just an inclination reminiscent of my last pregnancy. The Chinese Birth Chart wasn’t wrong.

Again, my husband prayed for “her” health and my sister bought another 3 bags of girl clothes. Even my mother-in-law was sure it was a girl, and my sister-in-law, and most everyone who had an opinion on the matter. Only one friend guessed it would be a boy (but that’s another blog for another time).

I continued to test the CBC on every pregnant woman I could find. Ironically, as soon as I got pregnant, it started reversing its accuracy every time. If it read “boy,” the woman would have a girl and vice versa. Every. Time. It got to the point that I could accurately predict the gender of a woman’s baby by telling her she would have the opposite of what the CBC predicted.

Sure enough, the Chinese Birth Chart was wrong for me too. And I am so glad it was. I have learned so much about God’s mercy and wisdom through this experience, and I feel so guilty and ashamed for trying to control what a beautiful, fun loving gift He had for me.

My little Max is so awesome. I worried that I wouldn’t have a close relationship with a boy like I would with a girl. My mom was always my best friend, and I’ve always wanted a close relationship like that with my children. It just seemed like it would be more likely…and more familiar…to have a deep bond with a daughter. But, as Anne Shirley might say, Max is a “kindred spirit.” He lights up with the biggest, happiest little grin every time he sees me, and I, him. He’s my little buddy, and has so much of my personality already (which might work against us someday, I know). Not to demean my love for, or my relationship with, my older son. It’s just that I love how I tried to make sure Max would be a girl, and it turned out that I couldn’t have planned a more awesome baby if I could have designed him myself. God, You Rock!

Even if Max would have been a girl, I know that we would still try for a third. Some people just know when they’re pregnant that they want it to their last child. I never got that sense. I felt through my pregnancy and Max’s infancy that “this just can’t be the last time I do this.” So, if it is in God’s will, we will hopefully have another. And I would be lying if I said I wasn’t hoping for a girl next time.

But even if I never get to buy a little dress or twist a little pigtail of dark curls, at least I can take advantage of the stores that sell a couple little extra boy accessories during holidays. And who could not delight just as much in the adorableness of this…