dreams, literally
It's said that pregnant women have dreams about their babies and often have a bit of intuition as to what their fetus' sex is. I can't say that I've had many dreams about Raspberry (three, that I can recall), nor can I really say what sex I feel it is. Although, in recent months, unsolicited strangers' comments based on the old wives' tales about how I'm carrying, have made me think Raspberry's likely a boy.
Last night, I dreamt I'd forgotten, for almost a day, to feed a newborn Raspberry, who happened to be a tiny little girl in overalls and blond pigtails and could sit up on her own. When I finally remembered to check on her, she was sitting there, arms crossed, scowling at me and insisting, out of spite, that her diaper not be changed. Cut to later in my dream, where my parents and paternal grandparents show up, point out dog-shaped clouds in an aquamarine sky, and at a fancy restaurant, offer Raspberry a little plastic cup filled with broken up chocolate-covered wafers, which she much prefers over breastmilk (I learned this by thrusting an engorged boob into her face and having her remain tight-lipped and scowly). I'm not sure what to think of this dream. I like that Raspberry's a little, pigtailed girl who likes chocolate, but really, the brattish behaviour?
This somewhat reminds me of another dream I had months ago, where, in a Victorian house, I give birth to a little boy who grows up to be a four-year-old in a matter of an hour. In this dream, my aunt and uncle invite us to their home for dinner and we go, with the kid dressed up in this white sweater-and-shorts combination, that makes him look like a pretentious tennis snob (it begs the question of whether Lucas or I picked out his outfit, or if the four-year-old newborn did). Oh, and he's a beady-eyed redhead, with a bowlcut helmetting an oversized head. Of course, during this dinner, he has to end up being a complete terror. I awoke, terrified to have a little boy, especially one that looks like that, and plans on being a terror, if my aunt and uncle ever do invite us for dinner.
But I guess both these dreams are marginally better than the one I had about a month ago, in which I had an extremely easy delivery in the wood-panelled lobby of a hospital that architecturally resembled a 1960s bungalow. Not only did I deliver a twenty foot long placenta that could be decoratively hung off a second-storey balcony, but the baby ended up being an odd hybrid of a snake and a cat. That was just a bizarre, if not, frightening, dream, but at least the cat part of the hybrid looked like Avy, so the underlying concept of the dream wasn't entirely unfounded.
Based on the ultrasound I had on Tuesday, Raspberry seems like it'll be a baby with a smaller head and a larger body. Its head size correlates to an estimated gestational age of thirty-six weeks while its abdominal size is at forty weeks. I'm sure the size difference between the head of a thirty-six week old fetus and that of a forty-week old is only millimetres, but it just sounds amusing to think of a baby with an little head and a large belly. "Maybe it'll look like Buddha," Lucas offers, just before we both crack up at that thought. We'll see soon enough. Raspberry doesn't seem like it wants to come out, despite the fact I'm told that I'm apparently having mild contractions that I don't feel at all, and that my cervix is "nice and ripe" and I'm already two centimetres dilated. If it doesn't show up between today and tomorrow, we're scheduled to have an induction sometime on the weekend, "whenever the delivery rooms are available," the obstetrician tells me. I'd like for Raspberry to be born on Sunday, on the twenty-fourth (exactly a month before my birthday), but I'm pretty sure the hospital will call us in on the Saturday, because I can't imagine all the delivery rooms being busy all day. While it offers us some measure of control, in terms of being prepared for the hospital, I'm not thrilled about having to be induced, because I want Raspberry to come naturally. Induction almost feels like it's on par with scheduled Caesarean-sections, in that the baby's birthday is artificially, rather than naturally, determined. But it seems like this is what needs to be done at this point, since at forty-two weeks (that'd be next Wednesday), it becomes hazardous for the fetus to remain, well, a fetus. At that point, the amniotic fluid starts depleting and the baby comes out, looking all dry and wrinkly and even, greenish. The raisin look is really not befitting of a baby. Induction it is then. Just maybe on the twenty-fourth, if we're going to play god and determine its birthday?