The scan was really straightforward, total answer to prayer. There was a 15 minute delay when we arrived which they let us know right away and apologised, because there was a "problem" which would need 15 more minutes to sort out. Immediately we felt so sombre because we thought it was likely that some poor lady having her scan had discovered something wrong. A tear-stained lady came out about 15 minutes later and was showed to the Early Pregnancy Unit by a member of the reception staff. :( We just felt so sad for her, whatever the issue was, and I felt nervous about whether my own little one would be okay.
A few minutes later we were called in, and the lady commented on the enormity of my file, haha! It contains all my records from all my previous pregnancies and births, as they were made at the time. My file is FOUR INCHES thick with paperwork, and is held together with rubber bands. The funniest thing is that on the front cover it says in huge letters, "VOL. 2" hahaha! ;) That's just the second volume! She said she thinks they ought to start volume 3 because the rest of my pregnancy paperwork will never fit into volume 2! ;) I told her we had had a lot of babies, and she asked how many children we had. I said six, and she made impressed noises! Then she started the scan.
I wore - and I want to note it because I want to remember - I wore a DRESS. Never worn a dress to a scan before, because - how impractical?!! I really wanted to wear my denim pinafore (jumper, in the States) maternity dress because I love it, I feel pretty in it because it is a flattering shape to a baby bump, and because it suited the weather well. I wore it over a very pink maternity T-shirt, and I even wore pink underwear. I have my nails glittery, and my toenails glittered with my summer sandals on. On the way out I wanted to tie my hair back, and the first hairband I grabbed from the bowl was hot pink! ;) I felt REALLY silly for my internal thoughts, but in my heart I was thinking, "I'll feel silly if it's a boy, but impractical or not, I'm wearing this in honour of my DAUGHTER." I felt DAFT, seriously, but the feeling was nice and strong, so I went with it and enjoyed it for however long it was going to last! It was fun anyway! :)
So of course I had to hoist up my dress for the scan. I went with unbuttoning a section of it at first, but the sonographer just said, "Probably best to just lift the whole thing up, if that's okay." lol! So I did - I don't mind anyway. They put a ton of paper tucked into your underwear over your lap anyway.
She asked straight away if we wanted to know the sex of the baby, and I said, "Yes please!" She asked what we had already, and I said, "Six boys." She said, "Oh my goodness!" but was very laid-back about it really. We knew from previous scans that they always do all the measurements and checks first, and the gender check last of all. The scan takes at least 20 minutes even if everything is easy to spot and measure, so it's a while to wait to find out! At a couple of points during the scan, I was almost dizzy with anticipation and didn't know how I would bear it another second! Crazy. I am not normally like that at the scans, but then usually I am just waiting for confirmation that it's a boy, and this time is the first time I really thought we might be looking at our first baby girl - definitely exciting and the anticipation was difficult to bear at times!
It was so lovely seeing our little one! Straight away we could see a little heart beating strongly, and the first proper image we got (seconds into the scan) was this profile shot, which was clear enough for the sonographer to take a print of for us straight away:
The baby was so quiet, and as the lady pointed out, chin firmly on the chest! See those little pursed lips with how hard the chin was pressed down! Precious! :) I think the baby was asleep because, right after that the sonographer had to start being a bit more firm with the probey thing to get some head measurements and at that moment, the baby did a huge stretch! Huuuuuuge!! She said, "Baby's stretching its arm riiiight up over its head, can you see?" It was a real proper just-waking-up-from-a-deep-sleep stretch, with the arched spine and twist over to the side with the reaching arm and everything. The other arm was scrunched right in to the chest during that stretch - a proper waking stretch! :) She got a picture of the baby mid-stretch - you can't see the arm over the head though, but it's up there:
After that followed LOTS of very active wiggling, turning over and kicking about! She kept saying, "A right old wiggler!" and started to have a bit of trouble getting the measurements, but thankfully the baby didn't go too crazy for long, and settled down for patches here and there so measurements were easy to get done. The two head measurements (bi-parietal diameter and head circumference) were both dated as 20 weeks and 2 days (I'm 20 weeks and 3 days, so pretty spot on!). We saw the stomach full of fluid, and the baby's little mouth opening and closing sometimes. The baby turned its head this way and that - the lady said it was like the baby was shaking its head in response to her suggestion that we get some head measurements, lol!
She did a close-up on the baby's little face to check the upper lift for a cleft (none there), and OH it was so beautiful! I always love this particular view of my babies in utero. I wish we had a picture, but the alloted number for each person is 2 (cost £5 this time!!! Used to be £3 which was bad enough!), and she was kind enough to give us 3 as it was. The shape of this baby's nose and lips I have seen a LOT of times before. I look at them every day. They are definitely the same nose and lips as some of the big brothers (they look identical to the view of Matthew's which I DID get a picture of, at his scan), and it was lovely and warming to see such visual evidence before birth that this baby is definitely "one of mine"! :)
She showed us the legs and feet, and I was thinking, "I don't want to see any clues, I don't want to see any clues!" I soooo didn't want to accidentally see "something" before it was time to take a proper look. I wanted a full surprise! Then she showed us from underneath, where the umbilical cord joined the baby, and it took only a second to flash through the depth of field from below the baby to a cross-section of the abdomen, higher up. In that second I could have sworn I saw a flash of 3 lines between the legs, and NO protrusion at all, but it was a split second, and I put it out of my head as fast as I could.
Then we went back to an image of the baby, who was back in a relaxing position. The little hand was moving about near the baby's mouth, and she printed out another picture of that for us. I like the slightly open mouth, as though contemplating whether or not to suck those fingers or the thumb! :)
We saw the kidneys, feet (not curly! Yay!), and she measured the abdominal circumference (dated at 20 weeks and 4 days! Great!) and measured the little teeny bones in the arms and legs. The femur length was dated as 20 weeks and FIVE days! This baby is not going to be Arthur/Benjamin-shaped! They have bigger heads than average (2 weeks ahead!) and shorter legs (2 weeks behind!). The other body shape we do (Neil's) is all the measurements pretty much spot on for dates. So this baby seems to be following that pattern. The last baby I birthed with the bigger head pattern (Benjamin) had a FIFTEEN INCH head (I kid you not) at birth - to compare, Elijah's was 12.75 inches, on the small side of average. 15 inches = owch. So that part of the measurements of this particular baby is a nice thing! ;)
Then when all the measurements and things were done, she said, "Right then..." and we knew she was about to check the gender! :) I couldn't really tell what she was doing at first, although I couldn't see the usual evidence of gender that I was used to, so I wasn't sure what I was seeing at first, as she was changing the view quite a bit and I couldn't see the v-shape of the legs either side most of the time, so I wasn't sure if it was the right shot yet. Then she gave a sort of sigh (like a light-hearted one though), and said, "You'll have to have another one after this." I think my heart about stopped and I said slowly, "Whhyyyy?" in a doubtful sort of way, before I realised what she meant - I thought at first that she meant it was a boy and we'd have to have another one if we wanted a chance of a girl! She simply answered, "To keep this one company!" and then I realised what she meant and I went round-eyed and mouthed as she swung the screen that she was looking at around to face me - we were watching the one up just below the ceiling, and hers was right next to my head. She paused the scan at the perfect v-shaped legs shot. I wish I had a picture to show you, it was so clear, I could even draw it from memory, lol! V-shaped legs, NOTHING protruding whatsoever, and a flatness in between, with the classic 3 lines. There was a brief moment of silence and then I said, "It's a GIRL!!!" My voice broke on the word girl - I didn't expect to get tearful, but it suddenly overwhelmed me, all this emotion and joy and excitement. I never thought I would hear my own voice say (of one of my own children!), "It's a girl"!! I didn't cry and cry or anything, though I could have, ohhhhh I could have, lol! I tried not to, and wiped my eyes and blinked a lot and didn't speak for a while because I would have just criiiiieeed. I have been ultra weepy this past week at the slightest thing, so I figured hormones had a lot to do with it too! I didn't want to come out of the room looking all like something was wrong because I had been crying, and I didn't want to look like that when we arrived home either.
I was just flabbergasted, honestly, lost for words for a while as she continued the scan. The first thing I said was, "Are you SURE?!" although it was obvious obvious obvious what I was looking at. She smiled and went back to the live scan (not the paused picture) and we looked again. She changed the angle slightly and zoomed in a bit, and said, "Look, it's really clear - you can even see the labia clearly." Neil was so funny, he sort of went all uncomfortable and averted his eyes a bit, saying, "I don't feel like I should be looking at this!" hehehe! His first disbelieving comment, by the way, was, "How are we going to name her?!" because we've never agreed on girls names easily (or at all!) in the past! I had told him in the waiting area that I wasn't sure about Toby Joseph any more, and I didn't know what to do about it. He just listened and hmmmed and was generally understanding. I guess the wobble about Toby's name was because this baby wasn't a boy! :)
The sonographer had one more check over every part of the baby, while I didn't take much of it in at all from that point, as I felt almost physically giddy with the news we'd just had, and like almost in shock over it, lol! I couldn't concentrate on anything and I just kept saying, "I can't believe it!" if I said anything at all! At the very end of the scan, she said she would let us see again, and showed us the very obvious girly shot for the last time. :) Definitely a girl!
Soooo, since then we have come home, and told the boys and Heather. They all were crowding and jumping up and down, shouting and yelling, "What baby IS it?!!" as we came in the door. Some were at the kitchen table drawing, and Elijah was in the booster seat at the table having a snack and a drink, but Heather got him out straight away so I could give him a cuddle, as he'd got a bit grizzly in the last few minutes before we got home. Other than that, all six boys were fine and well-behaved while we were out, which was a relief! Samuel had seemed upset to see us go when we were about to leave, because he'd just woken from a spontaneous nap, and was a bit groggy, but apparently he was fine. Heather started reading them a story just as we left and they didn't even go to the window to see us leave - very reassuring! And then we weren't long - maybe 90 minutes from leaving the house to getting back there.
Anyway, we waited until we had all the boys around us, and they sat patiently on the sofa to hear the news. Heather sat on the school table, and I held Elijah. I said, "Our baby is.... a... GIRL baby!" and they all started making a lot of squealing and yelling noises (happy ones!) and Heather started whooping and cheering, and came right over to hug me, saying, "I KNEW it!" hehe! I asked her how she knew, and she said because my pregnancy had been different, even if subtly so. Morning sickness starting a bit early, and being a bit worse, etc. It was a happy moment! The boys all seemed thrilled and excited, but quickly went back to their activities they'd been doing before, so that's all good. Nobody was disappointed or anxious-looking. A sister! A sister for my boys! How wonderful! :)
The rest of the day has been filled with usual boy-wrangling, dinner, bedtime, and phoning various family members (and updating Facebook, which has been wonderful fun with all the lovely comments and messages!). I phoned my parents first and they were happy and excited. This baby is their 10th grandchild (they only have two children - never in their wildest dreams would they have expected probably even half the number of grandchildren, haha!), and only their second granddaughter. My brother's eldest, Thea, is six, and she now has two little brothers, ages 3, and 6 months. On Neil's side, his two sisters are the only ones with children. One sister has two daughters, aged nearly 8, and nearly 5. The other has a 2-year-old daughter. It's so nice to have a girl for both sides of the family! :) It's the 10th grandchild for Neil's mum too!
I have already had people saying they'll send their baby girl clothes that they've had in the loft (two lots of girl cousin clothes from different family members, and some offers from friends as well), and I told my mum I thought we might be a bit inundated with girly clothes - which is wonderful because we're on quite a tight budget and it will be a blessing to get nice girly clothes (obviously we have none!) without paying any money for them. She didn't say anything much to that, and I said that of course I still wanted to buy some cute little outfits, to which she said, "Oh YES! Mummy (meaning her) will be going to Monsoon!" lol! I hope she doesn't break the bank! She loves shopping for her granddaughter, and has always said she would love to do the same for a daughter of mine.
Neil's mum was excited, Heather's daughter could be heard squealing for AGES down the phone, which amused the boys no end, lol! And my brother was suitably high-pitched with excitement when I phoned him this evening too! :) This is so. much. lovely fun! I would ABSOLUTELY have been joyful and excited to be having a baby boy as well, and would have enjoyed telling everyone, but I admit (and feel somewhat guilty for doing so) that it's MUCH MORE fun to get to tell everyone that the baby is a girl. I think it's just because we've never done it before though, you know?
So, as far as names go... We didn't have ANY idea. The only name I had in my head up until today was Maisie, and I knew Neil didn't like that one.
This evening we chatted briefly about it and I said that it was going to be really hard to name her! I had no idea, and nor did Neil. I said I would set out to make a shortlist but that he would probably veto everything, and then he'd make a shortlist and I'd veto the lot, lol! That's what we've done in the past! So, while he caught up on his online stuff, I started wading through girl names on various websites. I didn't go through all the letters of the alphabet, but I was able to make a fairly good-sized shortlist of the letters I did look at:
Maisie
Rachel
Rosalie
Sophie
Charlotte
Bella
Elizabeth (Beth)
Isabelle
Johannah
Josie
Lydia
I just wanted something that I found pretty and girly, as well as (preferably) with a nice meaning. I didn't give any of those names much thought, just jotted them down as I saw them. Elizabeth is Neil's mum's middle name and we were not sure what to do about the middle name situation for our baby girl, because we don't want to use two middle names (we just don't), and yet we wanted to name our first baby girl after my mum (Jane) and the second after Neil's mum (Averil) - but what if this is our ONLY baby girl?! We don't want to never use one of our mother's names. I wondered about using Elizabeth as a first name with Jane as the middle one, but we aren't enamoured enough with Elizabeth to do that, I think.
I told Neil my shortlist at the end of the evening, and he listened carefully and then asked me to read them again. He said he liked Sophie, Josie and Lydia, and maybe Elizabeth (we would use a derivative of the name for actual daily use with our little one). He asked me to find and read out the meanings of each of those names, so I did. Sophie means wisdom. Elizabeth is "God is my vow", Josie is listed as the female version of Joseph, which we both lit up to when we read it, and I love that because it means "He will enlarge" (as in, family size - more children). And Lydia means "of noble sort" or it can mean "from Lydia" as in the town.
We talked about girly-ness, and the feel of the various names, and the way they go with our surname and potential middle name choices, and the rest of the children's names when we say them all together, and SUDDENLY we had a certainty about it. One name stood out and we both realised that we loved it! Neil came back in after that decision and said the name again, and then said, "That's the one. It's too pretty." and that is exactly how I feel about it. I feel like we should sleep on it in case we feel differently tomorrow, but for tonight I am SO EXCITED about the name because I love it so much. I am nervous to share in case I change my mind and choose something else, but I'm too excited not to (it's a big deal, choosing and deciding on my first daughter's name!) so I'm going to share here anyway.
Our baby girl is called Lydia Jane. I want to say "for now", lol! It still feels so surreal to think that we have a girl at ALL, so naming a girl feels not real at all. Maybe we will change her name yet, there's plenty of time. But every time I say it out loud or think it in my head, I fall in love with it that little bit more, and something inside me scrunches up with joy and makes me want to squeal a bit! ;)
Lydia. Lydia Jane. It goes with our surname, and the list of boys' names. Neil wondered about Lydia Averil Jane, but then he said, "Lydia Jane.... nah, it's just too pretty like that. Lydia Jane it is!" :) I said, "We'll just have to have some more babies." and he seemed okay with that idea! ;) I said my favourite name to go with Averil is Grace - Grace Averil. I like the idea of calling her Gracie. He likes it too, so maybe God will bless us with another daughter yet and we'll have the opportunity to honour both of our mothers. I hope his mum won't mind, this time... I know mine will be thrilled, but she did say today on the phone that I mustn't feel "required of" to use her name for a middle name, as I'd told her we wanted to years ago. She was worried it would restrict us, and she also didn't want us to leave Neil's mum out.
But I'm so so happy with Lydia Jane. I love the name Lydia, more and more every time I think of it. It's so soft and girly, but simple and short. I immediately know I will end up calling her Lydie a lot. When I put my hand on my bump and whisper, "Lydia", just to get a feel for it, my heart swells so that I might possibly explode. Or implode. Or something pressure-related. It's almost too much to take in, all in one day - one afternoon! Just a few hours. A girl! A name! A million gorgeous happy compliments and messages. Happy family members. The blessing of a healthy baby, growing right on target. The absolute desire of my heart, that God knew I longed for - a daughter. MY daughter. My OWN daughter. I can't comprehend it, this amount of blessing from such a loving and gracious God. I know He is just laughing for joy at my happy disbelieving heart - I can feel it. I love Him so very much! I'm so grateful for my healthy baby girl! I will probably not believe it properly for quite some time to come, and maybe my posts are going to be a bit heavy on the GIRL front for a while as I process it, but oh well! ;)
My head is aching so much, and my cheeks/jaw too, probably from all the overexcitement and smiling a lot (have I been?! I guess I must have!), and it's ridiculously late now, but it's the weekend so it could be worse! ;) I planned to go to bed and update tomorrow, because of my headache, but when it came to it I just COULDN'T without venting the whooooole thing here first! :) I'm glad I did!
I will update again soon! I'm having a GIRL! I just can't believe it! :D