The Karate Kid

So I’ve been feeling the baby move for about a month and a half now. The moves have gone from the sensation best described as a “fishtail without the fin” to fullblown kicks and punches. This baby knows karate! Sometimes it feels like Neo and Mr. Smith are having a little practice bout in between my bladder and my lungs. (Oh yeah, and the bladder punching bag thing Baby does at 2AM is just adorable. Not!)

The other movement I feel a lot is the Squirm. This consists of Baby jamming hands or feet (depending on whether this is a headstand or not) against my spine and pushing. Sometimes I think Baby is seriously going to pop right out my abdomen! The cool part about this, though, is that I can often discern body parts. Feet feel different from hands. The spine has little bumps the size of peas. And what a bony little behind!

In ancient times people believed the first movements (“quickening”) signaled the advent of the baby’s soul. While I believe the baby has a soul from the moment of conception, I understand now why that belief was held. In one incredible day the baby goes from a strange bump inside you to a squiggling, moving, alive child. In one lifechanging moment you go from an ordinary woman to a Mother. It’s…well. It’s not very easy to put that into words.

(The writer in me likes the term “quickening” btw, because it literally means “coming to life”. The term “quick” was used interchangeably with “life” or “soul”. Hence the term “to cut someone to the quick.”)

The baby’s quickening has been a diamond in a sandbox indeed. After the first three months of not knowing from one day to the next if the baby was even alive – to get reassurance every day that baby is very much alive and kickin’ – that’s finding the Kohinoor in the sandbox!

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Oh yeah. Bad news. Apparently the Mom Syndrome (safety first at expense of fun), that awful disease I swore never to fall prey to, leaves no one untouched. I’ve gone from being a reckless daredevil to someone who actually pauses at the edge of the cliff and contemplates the risks. Now that is a disturbing development!