I Wanted a Girl....

From the time I thought about having a baby until the moment I found out what sex this little one would be,  I wanted a girl.  In every imaginary scene that played through my mind, I envisioned a little girl, and our interactions were always wonderful.  I wanted a girl not because I dislike little boys.  In all honesty, I just don't know what to do with certain types of little boys, and I am fearful that there is a genetic propensity on my side of the family for such boys.  I know, I know....I need to remember that nurture often times outweighs nature.  

When I think of my husband, I am often reassured that not all little boys are like my relatives.  When my husband was a child, he was extremely polite and kind to other children.  He didn't like competition, and he wasn't prone to aggressive physical behavior.  I mean, my husband's idea of a good time as a small child was watching Dr. Who episodes or Jeremy Brett's renditions of Sherlock Holmes.  He wasn't exactly a GI Joe fan.  He also didn't suffer from that proto-mysogynism that the other type of little boys seem to suffer from (Think "Ewwww, Girls have cooties!"  And "They like sissy stuff!").  Not that girls also don't suffer from gender hatred at that age.  It's just that little boys seem to do so in such an adament way.  

My relatives and many other little boys I knew, on the other hand, were often physical and coercive.  They seemed to think that in order to achieve their aims, they must force other children into doing things.  They were competitive.  Every game or activity was about winning.  And they lacked inhibition.  I think of the time my little brother caught the mattress on fire trying to melt the face off of one of his toys or the time he and another cousin pushed a younger cousin off the top of a barn roof in order to show the younger cousin that he would "safely" land on the pile of hay below."  But he didn't land where they thought he would.  He broke his leg in the fall.  When I think of little boys like these, I recall the poem by Sharon Olds in which she recounts her son's birthday party.  She depicts the little boys as hardened generals.  Her final lines always haunted me:

We could easily kill a two-year-old,
he [Old's son] says in his clear voice. The other
men agree, they clear their throats
like Generals, they relax and get down to
playing war, celebrating my son's life. (Source) 

It is also not that I couldn't love a physically aggressive little boy who is like my relatives.  It is just that I'm not sure how I would go about trying to tame him, trying to convince him to be considerate and kind to others.  I was and am afraid that I will fail. And, in the off chance that my son is like his father, how will I protect him from such little boys?  How can I help him avoid aggressiveness while also protecting himself from harm and ridicule?  

I guess my point is that I know how to be a little girl.  I don't know how to be a little boy.  I could help a little girl work through any of her dilemmas, but I'm not so sure I'll be able to help this little one thumping away in my stomach right now.  I so dearly want to protect him.  

Surprisingly, when I found out at week 19 that I was having a boy, I wasn't disappointed.  A part of me seemed to know that he was a boy.  And how could I not begin to love or already love the little creature on the Ultrasound Monitor?  I automatically began to love all the propensities and traits he was beginning to show.  I loved him.  

At this point, I must simply resolve to be the best damn Mom I can be.  I must help my future little boy negotiate those influences in society that would prefer he grow up to be overly aggressive and narrow minded.  I must help him protect himself if those influences turn violent towards him.  I must help him become a good man, not for any notion I have about appropriate male behavior but for his own benefit--for his own sanity and comfort in this strange world of ours.  

Discrimination....

I've experienced a few types of discrimination in my life.   I've been sexually harrassed, I've been looked down upon due to my social class, and I've been demeaned simply because I was a female.  Usually, I handled such situations with grace and optimism.  Such discrimination bothered me, but it didn't bother me that much.  However, I recently experienced a different type of discrimination.  This time, it really bothered me.  In fact, it angered me, frustrated me, and filled me with fear because it didn't just affect me.  It affected the quality of life of those closest to me--my unborn child and my husband.  Let me explain.

Since I announced my pregnancy at the college where I teach, I informed my supervisors on numerous occasions that I wished to be full-time.  I also, obviously, wished to maintain my current salary.  However, the overall supervisor, the official determinor of my workload this Fall, emailed me a couple of weeks ago asking me to call her.  She wanted to "discuss" my maternity leave with her.  I called her the very next day.  As I spoke with her on the phone, I was determined to be as polite and conciliatory as I could be. During the call, she began by saying she didn't want me to teach classes in the Fall because she didn't want my leave "to disrupt the students' experience."  I said fine and suggested various alternatives.  She shot down every one of them.  Then, she mentioned as an aside that the only alternative available was part-time.  And did I mention that it was at less than half my salary?  I informed her that I wanted to be full time and that I wanted full pay. She abruptly hung up on me, even though I repeatedly requested to ask just one more question before she did so.  

After she hung up, I sat there in shock.  My first reaction was to find a way to accept the reduced pay, but I couldn't.  There is no way that my husband and I could survive on his graduate assistant's salary and the meager pay she had mentioned in the phone call.  I began to panic.  Then, I started thinking about it.  I had read about pregnancy discrimination, but I wasn't sure if this was actually such a case.  From there, I decided to be proactive.  I visited the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission's website, I looked up lawyer referalls, and I read the 1978 Act on pregnancy discrimination.  This is where I discovered the following language:  "(k) The terms 'because of sex' or 'on the basis of sex' include, but are not limited to, because of or on the basis of pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions; and women affected by pregnancy, childbirth, or related medical conditions shall be treated the same for all employment-related purposes, including receipt of benefits under fringe benefit programs, as other persons not so affected but similar in their ability or inability to work, and nothing in section 703(h) of this title shall be interpreted to permit otherwise." The Act then goes on to say: "It shall be an unlawful employment practice for an employer -...(2) to limit, segregate, or classify his employees or applicants for employment in any way which would deprive or tend to deprive any individual of employment opportunities or otherwise adversely affect his status as an employee, because of such individual’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin" (Source).  Note the underlined and italicized language. Reducing my pay by more than half and cutting my hours in half would definitely be construed as an "adverse effect."

So, I had a case. But I'm not a litigious person. I don't want to go to court. I want to head this problem off, to nip it in the bud before it becomes uncontrollable. After reading the relevant parts of the Act, I thought about what I should do. Should I wait and see if she actually tried to do what she mentioned? She spoke about it in such a way that she was obviously trying to avoid such legal action. I decided it was time to grow a backbone. The best thing to do was to bring it all out in the open through a polite and forceful letter. I sent her an email phone record stating exactly what I heard her say, and I politely mentioned that cutting my wages and forcing me to work part time might warrant legal action on my part. In short, I played the blinking game with her. Who would blink first? She did.

She emailed me back claiming that she only had my best interests at heart by suggesting part time work. Apparently, according to her, a lot of pregnant women want to work part-time during their final trimester. I informed her that I wasn't one of those women. If I really wanted to work part-time due to pregnancy-related issues, I would have asked for it during the first trimester when I was worshiping the porcelain god every day.

My college still hasn't decided what they are going to do with me. At first, I was worried about it. I offered alternatives and I made suggestions. I did everything I could to be as helpful as possible. But after this situation, I fully consider it to be their problem.

Being pregnant is not a disability. I can be just as effective as a professor even if I am pregnant. But this brings up a few questions for me. What do pregnant public school teachers do? And why haven't I met another pregnant college professor in my multiple years in higher education? I don't know. The whole situation still leaves me with uncertainty and doubt, not only for my family's future, but about academia as a whole and its role as a bastion against inequality and discrimination.

Baby Started Moving!

Beginning week 13, people began to ask if I could "feel the baby moving."  I was not terribly worried about it, so I would say, "Who knows.  There's a lot of stuff going on in there.  Who can tell what's what?  Could be bad gas.  Could be the kid...."  When I said this, they would invariably look at me funny.  After a brief pause, they would say, "Well, you should begin feeling it move soon."  I never knew what to do with that.  I already have obsessive fears, and their strange reactions just added to it.  So I worried.  Was it normal not to feel the baby move?  I managed to keep the worries in check, though.  I remembered all the materials that said a first-time mother may not feel movement until week 22.  Baby Center reports that women may begin feeling movement from week 16 to 22.  WebMD reports weeks 16 to 25 as the weeks in which "quickening" begins.  Mayo Clinic reports week 20 as the week mothers "may feel" movement.  In short, I had nothing to worry about.  So I tried to go with the flow.

I had my ultrasound on May 31.  At that time, I found out I'm having a boy.  The doctor reassured me that it might be week 22 before I felt movement.  I told her I had felt "something."  I wasn't sure if it was the baby or not.  If it was the baby, it sure didn't feel like feathers--or butterflies.  It felt like quivering jello.  She laughed and said, "Yes, that's the way it might feel."  The next day, I was sitting at home alone on the sofa.  My husband was at work.  I began feeling this quivering movement again.  Except, this time it was very persistent.  And it was in only one spot--the same spot my OBGYN said my little boy's feet were positioned.  Not really knowing if it was him or not (I still wasn't convinced), I jokingly said aloud, "Okay, okay.  I get it.  You're in there."  As soon as I said it, the movement stopped.  About ten minutes later, it started again.  I decided to conduct an experiment.  I said something aloud again.  It stopped quivering.  This continued on for about an hour and a half.  I would give it a ten minute interval, and it would start up again invariably.  So, that convinced me.  I officially felt the baby moving.  He was reacting to sound, which is amazing.  I instant messaged my husband to tell him the good news.  He asked me how I knew for sure, and I said, "Well, gas doesn't usually stop when I talk to it.  Wish it did, though!"