I promise, I’m not going to turn into one of those bloggers who, once they start popping out kids like Pez , they don’t have anything else to talk about except stretch marks, poopy diapers, and cracked nipples. I will say, however, observing the girls and their reactions to my pregnancy has been pretty hilarious.
So, the other day, we were on our way home from school when Coever announced from the backseat that come June, when it’s time for the baby to be born, I will, “go into the bathroom and poop it out.”
Her sister, also known as Fountain of Infinite Knowledge, said, “Uh no! When the baby is ready to be born, the doctor will cut it out of Mom’s tummy.”
If I hadn’t been doing 35 on a twisty road, I’d have banged my head on the steering wheel. Repeatedly. *Le sigh* Where to begin.
I opened with asking the girls what they knew about muscles in the body. What are muscles and how do we make them grow? No problem. They answered that like Ken Jennings on final Jeopardy. I went on to say that men and women have different muscles and that the place where a baby grows is a muscle unique to women called a uterus. I flicked my eyes up to the rear view mirror to see if they were still with me or if I needed to turn back to Absolutely Mindy on Kids Place Live. My girls were hanging on my every word, so I plunged ahead.
A uterus, I went on to explain was a muscle that was like a house for the baby. The muscle grew to accommodate the baby as the baby grew.
“And then they cut you open to take the baby out!” Morgan finished for me. She was delivered via C-section and has heard the story so well, you’d think she actually brought herself forth from the inside out.
“Well, sometimes a doctor has to make an incision to take the baby out because the baby is facing the wrong way or is in trouble and has to come out fast. Most of the time the baby comes out another way.”
“When you poop!” Coever announced! This girl and her poops, what is up with that?
“Not quite,” I went on, wishing that we were at home instead of hitting every single red light between the school yard and house. My brain was whirring and ticking as I thought on how to thoughtfully explain the whole uterus/cervix/vagina extravaganza that is natural childbirth. So, I went back to the uterus and likened it to a house where the baby lives until it’s ready to be born. “In order to get out of the house, what do we go through?” I asked them, pretty certain they’d get it.
“A door!”
“Right,” I said, gaining momentum. “So the uterus is the house and the vagina is the door the baby goes through to come out into the world.
Dead silence.
And then the plaintive exclamation from Morgan, “But it’s SO small!”
Nothing gets past her. Not a thing.
“Well,” I said, trying to wrap this up as quickly as possible, “that’s true, but after the baby is born, everything goes back to the way it was.” If you’re lucky, I added under my breath. Thankfully, we were wheeling up the driveway at that point, so I was able to redirect that conversation to more important things like the collection of backpacks, mittens, snack wrappers and other junk. Later on, when I was retelling this to Craig, I realized, better to have a conversation about how the baby was getting out instead of how the baby got in. We’re going to need more than an after school pick-up to discuss that one.