Introducing the New Alla

June 2, 2009 12:41:12 PM. That is the time when our precious little one was born. I want to share some of my experiences and old wives tales of the wise people in determining the sex and others. I will also try to answer some of the most commonly asked question from friends and folks at work.

We were hoping to have a baby a little later in the year when my wife would be in her last year of residency. The schedule for third year residents tends to be easy. But our baby decided to come a few months early.

To confirm the pregnancy, we tested thrice with pregnancy kits from the Pharmacy stores. The first two were inconclusive. We thought that the cycle was just delayed. A couple weeks later we tried one more time and the kit this time confirmed it. My wife panicked as she was not prepared for all that is going to happen. Most of all she was worried that she had to upset the schedule at work and thereby causing inconvenience to her colleagues. With due persuasion from me, and our first visit with our family physician(who also happens to be her Program Director) her worries subsided and we scheduled our first appointment with our OBGYN doctor. We were confirmed of our expectancy and we were elated.

The First trimester and the first month of the Second Trimester were testing times, especially for my wife. She had severe morning sickness and those mornings lasted 16 hours for her. There were couple days where she was admitted to the emergency due to dehydration from the morning sickness. She was persistent, strong and continued her work. She also managed to reschedule all her overnight calls to the second trimester. That turned out to be very helpful. Having my Mother-in-Law with us is also a positive thing. She was there when my wife needed her support during the tough period. As for me, the only thing I went through was the usual stuff - am I ready for this, can I handle it, were we jumping ahead of ourselves, are we financially stable enough to make this plunge. I did not let my wife know these thoughts then. But all those concerns do not worry me anymore.

The second trimester was relatively easier one for us all. We knew it was a girl on our second scan. We were excited as I always wanted my first baby to be a girl. The good times lasted only a few weeks. She started having severe back pains and other discomforts. We had to get back our Mother-In-Law so we could manage at home. The third trimester was the middle ground, it was better than the first but worse than the second. The baby got heavier and my wife could barely walk. Her work kept her on her feet most of the time which was unlike my job which keeps me on my bottom most of the time. We felt we should have switched jobs just for the few months.

Here are some of old wives tales, we came across, that tried to predict the sex and when the baby was going to be delivered. If the morning sickness last long it's a Girl. Turned out to be true. If you see the back and can tell if the lady is pregnant then it's going to be a girl, otherwise a boy. This prediction turned out false in our case. The story behind this is that the Girls will have a round belly, while boys will have a big front belly. My wife had a front belly and not so round one. Then there is this one. Boys will be less active all along the pregnancy period, not troubling the mom and become very active the last few weeks. They also come out early(< 39 weeks). The girls on the hand provide all sorts of discomfort to the mother and are highly active in their movements during the pregnancy period. But girls feel cozy and not so active during the last few weeks. They also take longer to come out(39+ weeks). Also get this, apparently if the kid is born in the day, they sleep mostly in the day and not so much during the night and vice versa. This means trouble to us as our kid was born almost mid day(12:41:12 PM).

We named our kid Poorvaja Maala. Poorvaja according to Hindu Epic books means 'One who preceded everyone' or 'One who was born before everyone' from whom everyone else came. Maala is the middle name of my kid named after our grandma Maha Lakshmi. Took Ma and La from her name and joined them - Maala means garland.

The week before the delivery, I started reading the book 'Hot, Flat and Crowded' by Thomas L. Friedman. I dropped it after a few chapters into the book, as I could not take the patronizing attitude of the author. I am a beneficiary of the flat world and I was welcoming a new life to this hot world. When my kid is sleeping on my shoulder, when her cheek caresses the cove of my neck, the world doesn't seem crowded at all. Malthusian economics - forget about it.

Photos Here
Video - Work in Progress
FAQs Here

But the amazing part of all this experience is that the transition from a carefree person to a slow going, caring, over sensitive guy happens the moment the kid is placed in your hands. All credit goes to our Sweety(Granmom's nick name)