Whoa!! Don’t jump to conclusions, I am not on my way to a new addition to our family, but just going back the memory lane a bit. It seems like centuries ago when I had my kids. They are 9 and 4 now and it is such a relief to be out of that diaper phase. Now when I see a first time pregnant mom, I find it so cute and adorable to see her bloated tummy or see a mom in her last trimester doing almost a duck walk, I can’t help but reminiscence my preg days.
I was amongst the first to get pregnant amongst my friends and even though I was away from family, I was pampered to the core by my friends and colleagues. I was working then and was based in Bandra and my office was almost 15-20 kms away. Which is not a big deal in Mumbai, especially if you are travelling against traffic. It was a smooth drive from office to home and back. But that particular year, the Rain God decided to be angry and then there were floods. The whole western express highway resembled Bay Of Bengal and Mumbai started looking like flooded Assam on 26/7/2005 . I, luckily, escaped this as I was out of town, but the imagery on television as most of us have witnessed throughout India, still lives in my mind. And the after effects of which a lot of people may not know; my smooth ride became a camel-bumpy ride. I was exposed to an unwanted terrain specially in my first trimester. So those of you who have ever been pregnant would visualise with me, how every time a bump comes we would either squeeze our pelvic region or half stand-up to avoid more impact. Now imagine sitting on the edge of the car seat, trying to avoid every such bump. Every ride to and fro became a roller coaster challenge.
By my second trimester, the W.E. Highway was fixed and my rides improved. I was blessed one to have never faced morning sickness so apart from the initial setback, my preg journey went smoothly. I would happily and trust me happily move around, grab everything under the sun to eat. I remember gorging on twisty bread from a leading pizza chain a lot. I still love it, but that time it was almost once or twice every week. My colleagues, like an extended family would make things that I craved for in their tiffins, people would come and compliment me on how I was glowing and touch my protuding belly. I remember loving the phase and never once feeling upset about putting on weight.
Till then it was just a phase, first time pregnant and apart from a few senses getting stronger and me fitting into some extra size clothing, I didn’t feel any difference. Then during one visit to my gynaecologist, he told me, that I should get a coloured doppler done. Clueless, I asked him what it was? ( You see, I was not amongst the most up-to-date , to-be-moms then). He told me I could see the shape of my baby, some features and see it in action. ‘It’ was still an ‘it’ for me then as I had only felt a heartbeat on the first sonography and the fact that I could see this living being inside me was incredible. I was inquisitive to know what this ‘Bun’ cooking in my oven looked like, was it a boy or a girl, how big was it and million other questions were rising in my head now.
So we took an appointment and my hubby came down, he actually took half day from work, trust me it’s on rarest of rare occasions when does that..lol! The sono looked like a regular sono, but then on the screen we saw a 3-dimensional dancing doll. I was thinking that I will see the baby’s features clearly, I had no idea that it was going to be a hazy orange figure, but once I figured that we got back to checking the baby out. He was a very active baby ( I know it was a ‘he’ now, but not back then, so don’t go suing the doctor or me ). He was moving around in that little space happily and had a huge head. We tried very hard to search for the baby’s ‘main parts’ or ‘private things'( whatever you chose to call it ), to figure out the sex of the baby, but no such luck. We were however enraptured in that tiny little orange coloured doll, moving it’s head and hands all over. I have never felt so amazed at nature’s creativity. A whole human being, a baby growing inside my very own tummy! I was instantly connected! Till then being pregnant was only a phase , but from here on I was on my way to becoming a mom. I had a life inside me and I felt responsible for it. My hubby also was too overwhelmed for words and I have hardly seen him short of words. Of course, he gathered himself later and said that his baby had a huge head like him, ‘sign of a genius’ ! And the rest was history that you might have read in my previous posts.
How many of you have felt this way? Has this been a life defining moment for you as well? Do let me know your experiences, always like to connect with you on motherhood.
Yours Truly,
