The Truth

From the beginning of 7x7xMommy, I've been nothing but honest.  And that's why I'm going to tell you something that I feel like most people wouldn't. 

As I mentioned on Friday, I believed with all my heart that our baby girl was going to be a baby boy. And truthfully, I was shocked when I heard the news...

You see, when my mind and heart are set on something, I truly believe that whatever I've conjured up in my mind to be true will be true. It's kind of like when my dog used to stare at my Dad when he had steak on his plate...my Dad would always say that she was visualizing what she wanted to happen. She thought that if she sat there long enough and stared hard enough, she'd convince my Dad that she too should be eating the steak (and in her mind she was probably sitting at the dinner table with us, fork and knife in paw). And being that my Dad is a softy when it comes to sharing food with our dogs, her visualization would come true. 

On the same token, my Dad would tell me that before a basketball game, he would prepare by visualizing what would happen in the game.  He'd visualize his shots going in, rebounding every ball that came off the rim, and he'd visualize his team winning.  And most of the time, it worked. 

And in listening to my Dad's stories and in watching my dog (yes, I learned from my dog), I picked up the same skill...I became a visualizer. And the majority of the time, it has worked. 

I visualized myself making my high school basketball team's Varsity squad as a Freshman (and I did); I visualized myself going to Cal Poly and therefore only applied to that school...which is foolish in retrospect, but it worked (I made it in); I visualized my interviews going well post-college and finding a great job (and I did); I visualized myself falling in love with an amazing man (and after kissing a lot of frogs, it happened); and I visualized myself being a young Mom (and I will be). 

It's the times that I visualize something that doesn't end up happening that knocks me sideways and I'm either shocked or in disbelief because all I can think is, "that's not how I visualized it to happen - what's wrong with this picture?!?"

And while I feel like visualizing events in my life has been helpful with setting goals and with being an optimistic person, it has also forced me to deal with both change and the unexpected.  And when my mind gets SO set on something, I'm admittedly horrible at dealing with both...

But in getting back to the point of this post, I have to be honest - I visualized having a boy first.  My brother is 18 months older than me...my best friend's brother is older than her...my husband is the oldest of three kids...it's really all I know.  An older brother followed by a younger sibling...so in my mind, that's what I thought I'd have. I visualized it to be true...and therefore I believed it would happen. 

And it didn't. And I was knocked sideways on Friday. And admittedly, I shed a few tears with Travis in the doctor's office because as I said, I don't deal with change very well. And let me be extremely clear and say that it has nothing to do with being disappointed...because that's not it at all...I simply believed that the doctor would say "it's a boy"...

But the truth is this: I could not be more incredibly thrilled to have baby Abigail on the way...sure, it's not what I visualized, but it's going to be even BETTER than what I visualized.  Boy or girl, our lives were going to be filled with SO much love...now it'll just be filled with so much love topped with tutus and bows...and adorable clothes like these...

Here's to the best unexpected moment in my life: learning that Abigail Cunningham James will be our baby girl!