Not Enough Thanks in the World

Every time I need a boost to get off the couch or floor, I say: "This is why it takes two people to make a baby!"

Every night I'm too tired/sore to make dinner (which is, uh, every night), I say: "This is why it takes two people to make a baby!"

Several times during the three hours we spent writing thank you cards one Saturday (three hours!), I said: "This is why it takes two people to make a baby!"

I wrote last week at my other blog about some of the little things that have made this pregnancy easier for me, but one of the big things I left off that list was Simon. Not "loving spouse" or "supportive partner" but Simon, specifically, because he is singularly amazing when it comes to caring for at least this particular pregnant woman. I left him off the list because I figured it would be irresponsible to suggest other people arrange to have him on hand during their pregnancies when there's no way in hell I'm loaning him out anytime soon, if ever. Plus, he'd come in waaaay more expensive than even a name-brand BellaBand, and with the economy how it is, most people just couldn't swing it anyway. Best not to tempt.

He makes me dinner and massages my feet with lavender lotion and agrees to watch whatever stupid movie I'm into that night. He skips the champagne so we can split a bottle of Martinelli's. He promises that when we show up at the hospital to have this baby he will drop me off at the front door and immediately go park quickly and efficiently in the hospital garage, resisting the urge to drive around the neighborhood looking for free street parking that will require he go out and move the car to a new spot every two hours, labor and delivery of his firstborn be damned. And a few weekends ago he not only came shopping for nursing bras with me but sat outside the dressing room, in a rocking chair covered in who knows what dried-on cocktail of special mom-'n'-baby fluids, holding my purse. When I stepped out of the room modeling my new size-38 rack, he grabbed my stomach in admiration, which caused the shop owner to tell me how lucky I was because a lot of dads won't do that--not just touch the belly in public but touch the belly at all. I am lucky, and I know it, and I'm thankful.

Simon has had some sort of low-grade sickness for almost two whole weeks now (symptoms vary by the day), and try as I did to take care of him in what little ways I could, I was an utter failure on most accounts, like when I couldn't even make him a bowl of Cream o' Wheat, letting it mushroom-cloud all over the microwave because I couldn't force myself to stand in front of the microwave for a whole two minutes and thirty seconds because waaaaaaah, my hips hurt. It's a damn good thing I'm the pregnant one and he's the caretaker rather than the other way around.

Simon is not a whiner, and even though he's indulged in the occasional "I'm siiiiiiick" this week, most of what he says is "Haaaave hiiiiiim! Have him nooooooooow." He wants the baby NOW--wants to see him NOW, hold him NOW, dress him up and parade him around the world NOW. I'm honored that I get to make a father out of someone so ripe for the position, and that's what I'll be thinking of this Thanksgiving weekend.

wrote Leah at 6:37 AM | Comments (13)