Welcoming Mia into Our World

Being pregnant with my first child was one of the best periods of my life.

Yes, I am and always have been a dude, but with both of our children, Cindy and I were unabashedly pregnant together. She stopped drinking and started eating for two. So did I. I even quit caffeine, which for me is only slightly less painful than surrendering sunlight.

Our daughter had her name within a few days of us knowing we were pregnant. Like most things between us, it took Cindy and I little more than a minute to agree. We had two names decided; one for a girl and another for a boy.

We did not, however, have any desire to know the sex of our child.

Keeping the gender a mystery was non-negotiable for us. We loved playing pretend and what if?, but that was merely shaking a box beneath the tree. We never truly wished to know what was waiting inside. My grandfather declared Cindy’s swollen belly a girl, approximately sixteen seconds after he saw it for the first time. Most everyone else was certain our first born would be a boy.

Mia Maxwell, as she was instantly called, was our constant companion and we included her in many conversations throughout each day. We sang her songs, read her stories and loved her with every molecule we had. Beyond the constant adoration, we fed our daughter well.

Cindy and I love to share food. We courted one another across many a restaurant table and have always considered breaking bread as one of the best possible ways to strengthen our bond. Pregnancy, for us, was a first class, guilt free ticket to a nine month long buffet.

We were married in Vegas. Even though our daughter attended the wedding, we figured she probably couldn’t hear too well from her side of Mommy’s tummy, so we told her all about it over chocolates later that evening. We also told her how we said “I do!” in a gondola, and about the nice people at the restaurant that afternoon who had given us half of our check, in addition to a rather large and completely free desert. We told her about the Cirque de Soleil performance at the Bellagio, how the dancers took our breath away, and all about the Krispy Kremes we had in lieu of wedding cake.

We became legally one in the final week of summer, a couple of weeks before Cindy would return to school with a new class of students, this time as Mrs. Platt. We would watch the season change just one final time before we would be Mommy and Daddy out loud.

We did all we could to prepare for our baby, both emotionally and with all the necessary and unnecessary things which first time parents do to baby-proof their homes and prepare for their new lives. Yet there is nothing that anyone can truly do to brace themselves for the inevitable seismic shift that comes with being a parent. Not really. No matter how many things you read, hear or see, nothing can truly prepare for the endless fatigue and euphoria which comes with nurturing a new life.

On some level, I believe this is something most every new parent understands. It is not merely the discomfort of the swollen belly which makes it so difficult to truly relax.

Imminent fate followed us like a shadow. We were eager for our new dawn to break, yet every day seemed to harbor more gravity than the one before. Months of preparation had readied us only for uncertainty. Avid enthusiasm coalesced with a slight sliver of melancholy as we marinated in the thought that life as we knew was nearly over; a unique feeling we would not experience again until the weekend before the birth of our son.

That final week drifted by in a fog. We held hands tighter, slept harder, and spoke softer.

Then, one bright winter day when the year was still fresh, we welcomed Mia into our world.

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