{"id":15,"date":"2013-04-05T04:55:00","date_gmt":"2013-04-05T04:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/2013\/04\/on-having-girls\/"},"modified":"2018-04-21T17:22:21","modified_gmt":"2018-04-21T17:22:21","slug":"on-having-girls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/2013\/04\/on-having-girls\/","title":{"rendered":"On Having Girls."},"content":{"rendered":"

Last Monday (which also happened to be our 7 year anniversary) we went to the doctor\u2019s office and had an optional 16 week gender ultrasound.  Optional meaning it\u2019s not covered by insurance \u2013 I guess it\u2019s just for those people who are so impatient they can\u2019t wait another month to find out what they\u2019re having \u2013 aka Me. We decided to do something a little different this time and had the tech write down what the baby\u2019s gender was, to be opened at dinner later on that evening.  The baby was chillin\u2019 and wasn\u2019t super cooperative \u2013 so it took a few tries and I diverted my eyes, even though I had no idea what to even look for. In my mind I had a lot going on that day.  It was surprising to me how many people asked what \u201cI\u201d wanted to have \u2013 also if I had \u201cprepared\u201d myself for either option.  The truth is, you never want to just say you hope you\u2019re having one or the other, right?  Is that generally frowned upon?  Most people say what is the most politically correct thing I guess \u2013 \u201cAs long as the baby is healthy\u2026\u201d Well, it\u2019s no secret that after two girls, yes, I wanted to have a boy desperately.  The biggest thing I hear about little boys from my Mom friends is what little LOVERS they are.  They love their Mamas.  What woman doesn\u2019t freak out over the idea of a little man who is going to worship the ground she walks on?  Who will hopefully grow up to be just like the husband she adores so much?  Sign me up, please! Maybe that need for affection stems from the fact that my girls don\u2019t generally lavish me with their love (in that way) unless they A. want something or B. are sick.  Sure, they say things like \u201cYou\u2019re the best Mommy ever!\u201d \u2013 but it\u2019s usually in response to some type of chocolate offering or a visit to Build-A-Bear for a new stuffed animal.  I honestly think they reach for their Daddy 90% of the time.  And that\u2019s ok, really.  The time will come when they will hate me, I\u2019m sure, but they\u2019ll also need me.  Lord will they need me.  When boys turn into mystical beings with deeper voices and Justin Bieber hair \u2013 when they stop being little guys they \u201cplay dinosaur\u201d with and start being young men \u2013 Oh, they\u2019ll need me.  When they get their periods.  When they have problem skin in high school and need Proactiv.  When they get stood up for a party and just need a shoulder to cry on.  When they get a tattoo and need an ally in the house so their Daddy doesn\u2019t murder them. When they get their heart broken, most likely dozens of times before they find the \u201cOne\u201d.  So yeah \u2013 I longed for a little boy.  A boy I could dress in seersucker and a bow tie on Easter Sunday.  A boy to carry on the Bischoff family name, to potentially name after Vann\u2019s beloved Grandfather P.A.  A boy I could love and cherish and squeeze. Later on that day we stopped at the hospital we hope to deliver at for a quick tour that ended up taking an hour and half.  Needless to say, not having gone through this whole gender reveal thing on social media before (because Gasp, I wasn\u2019t on Facebook when Ella was born!) \u2013 I was a little bit unnerved by the amount of text messages and Facebook updates I was getting.  Unnerved is maybe not the word \u2013 it was making me IMPATIENT.  I wanted to know, even if we had to pull over and look at it in the parking lot of Wendy\u2019s.  Luckily I have a very even-keeled hubby who kept reminding me this was, indeed, the last time we would be doing this \u2013 and pleaded with me to turn my phone off and for goodness sakes, STOP texting!!  That was really hard.  It was so fun, having our friends and family so excited to find out who would be joining our family of five.  But, I knew in the end, it would make for a better memory (and story) if we waited the 30 minutes to the restaurant \u2013 where we could finally stretch out and tear open the envelope for the biggest news we\u2019d have all year. We sat down and looked at each other, and I SWEAR \u2013 my heart was in my throat.  My gut told me it was a girl, but maybe I\u2019d just managed my expectations really, really well.  Vann handed me the envelope across the table, and I ripped that sucker open: \"girl2\"<\/a> My 5 year old, Charlie, had told my husband that he \u201ccould get a boy fish\u201d if we found out that Blueberry (what the girls call the baby) was a girl.  That was the first thing that ran through my mind.  The second thing was, \u201cOh, three sisters.  Sisters.  How wonderful!\u201d And then I started to cry.  For the sweet baby girl I\u2019d be holding in my arms in just 6 short months.  For the bond that I hoped all three of them would have with each other.  And for the little boy I would never have.  The experience of having boys would never be mine.    Of course, that\u2019s ok.  After I mourn it for just a bit, if you don\u2019t mind. And so, the Bischoff girls now far outnumber the Bischoff boys and indeed \u2013 my husband will have to get a male fish (if there is a way to tell such things) or eventually a brutish (with a heart of gold of course) Great Dane \u2013 or something like that.  It\u2019s a beautiful, wonderful thing.  And I\u2019m so, so happy.  I will just have to shower that love and affection on my nephews and friend\u2019s children, and someday \u2013 grandsons?? I\u2019m sure \u2013 scratch that \u2013 I KNOW that when we see her little face, it will be like she was always a part of us.  And we won\u2019t be able to think about what life was like without her.  As a sweet friend so lovingly said, \u201cYou weren\u2019t complete until you had HER!  And all that she will become.\u201d  (Thanks, Meesh.) <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last Monday (which also happened to be our 7 year anniversary) we went to the doctor\u2019s office and had an optional 16 week gender ultrasound.  Optional meaning it\u2019s not covered by insurance \u2013 I guess it\u2019s just for those people who are so impatient they can\u2019t wait another month to find out what they\u2019re having […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1130,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/almostjuliet.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/girl2_thumb255B1255D.jpg?fit=484%2C484&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1129,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15\/revisions\/1129"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1130"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/almostjuliet.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}