"ready for my close-up"

sweaty and nervous. well, sweaty is nothing new to me because of my hyperhidrosis, but nervous? who knew waiting to have a little sneak peak of your baby could be so nerve-racking?! but there i was in that dark room staring up at a monitor, hoping the little one's got "ARM 1" and "ARM 2" as well as "LEG 1" and "LEG 2."

of course tiny dancer didn't make it any easier on the tech. it took a while for the label "ARM 2" to come on-screen and by that time my palms were literally dripping! paging dr. drysol, you are needed in OB Rm 3...

so what if i left that visit a little dehydrated, it was worth it. baby d is a groover. plus i see crystal's nose made an appearance, which admittedly is way cuter than mine.

cat's out the bag

i guess our families are trustworthy people. no one spilled the beans. crystal's coming up on her 12th week in a couple of days and i guess now's as good a time as any to let the book of face know... 

but how do we break the news? so many people do this nowadays and i've seen my fair share of creative ones. but i'm coming off a 24hr shift at the hospital and the last thing i wanted to do was try to "top" other people's baby announcement. we figured a simple throwback to our save-the-date would do, except this time, hit you over the head with hints about the arrival of baby d

as you can probably tell from the side by side, i've been doing my best to have sympathy weight gain (i believe they call this couvade syndrome) hahaha.

shhh... it's a secret

so we're pregnant. i gathered my buddies on g+ hangout just last week to share the news. but before then, crystal and i were still wondering who should know and when's the right time.

first things first - family. since crystal and i found out just before Christmas, we thought what better way to tell them than during Christmas time (plus, it saves us from buying "big" gifts for our parents since we're counting the news as a "present" huzzah!). however, we wanted to be careful since we certainly didn't want to dominate the whole Christmas scene with our baby bomb.

up first was the dometita family. we bought a card for my parents that read: you've been promoted to lolo and lola status. lolo and lola in filipino means grandpa and grandma. at the same time, we gave my grandma some bibs just so the hint sinks in quicker. mama d and gramma d were both elated. i think my dad was either in shock or just didn't get the hint quick enough, hahaa. men...

then we travelled to NC just before our honeymoon and got to share the excellent news with the kane family. we waited until everyone received their gifts and saved ours for last. we wrote a little poem in the card and gave them a baby's hug-a-bible, something the new grandparents can read to the baby while babysitting.

after family, we kept it on the dl for a while. i guess crystal's baby books suggested to wait until around week 12 (when the baby is the size of a plum.. yes they have weird fetal size to food charts) to share the news. though i don't think plums have anything to do with it, it's just that the rates of miscarriages tend to drop significantly after the first trimester.

so for now.. only family, my best men, and crystal's bestie. well, them and this blog, which for now is still set to private

how i found out

2013 has been one hell of a year. i survived intern year, married my one and only, and found out i'm about to be a dad... just before the turn of the new year. i will likely never forget the moment when crystal sat me down to tell me she was pregnant.

she had just gotten home after driving for hours, coming back from her lab course in maryland. usually after not seeing each other for a couple of days, she can't stop talking about her day and asking me about mine. but this time, she was extremely quiet. too quiet. then she started bawling as she handed me 2 pee sticks bearing the news. i guffawed (yes, i believe that would be a good description of my reaction). poor crystal, she knew she was pregnant all day but had to sit on it the entire day. to make matters worse, she was afraid i would be upset about the news as we weren't necessarily trying for a baby. but as i recall telling my best man, we're not not trying either. and boy was crystal worried about nothing, i couldn't be happier.

of note, she ended up buying 2 more pee sticks of different brands for confirmation... as if the first 2 plastic messengers were incompetent. fortunately, results confirmed.