It might not be a bad idea for me, but because he might change his mind and he has some time to do so, I think I should wait, too, being that we are a couple.

His whole reasoning was what made it so terribly sweet. He said,"It just seems like you've had to go through a lot with this pregnancy and I don't want you to have to go through that again." I was so touched! But I really don't mind...I mean, it's his baby I'm having, so that's like this beautiful wonderful thing, I'd willingly endure again. The problem I guess for my viewpoint is that it would be a matter of endurance at this point.

I guess asking a woman about having another kid in her third trimester is particularly bad timing though.

I thought after Russell that that would be it. I didn't think I could go through coping with another sick baby because that's all he was for 3 years solid. And then it's been another three years of him recovering from that and that's sucked, too. Poor kid with his allergies and his miserable ears. And he comes by those plugged ears honestly because I have them, too.

At any rate, Mike knew his Mom and Dad had both had permanent birth control measures taken, so we decided to call his mom because I couldn't deter him from his stance that we should do something permanent.

His mom agreed with me that maybe I should consider it, but that Mike is way too young and that probably no doctor would actually do it at his young age. And she cited her two youngest sons as proof that we could change our minds in 5 years. I doubt it though. We will have one of each and when Mike and I talked he said,"How many kids did you ever imagine you'd have?" It was an easy answer,"Two -- one of each." He smiled,"Me, too."

I am willing to keep my reproductivity so if Mike does change his mind we can have another one. Mike agreed after it was all over with that that was probably the most prudent thing right now, even if it might mean condoms.

It's still pretty cool that he's so concerned about me.

We also talked to his mom about when she was coming and there's a good chance it will be the same week as my folks. She won't be staying much though.

I was trying to find out what she had in mind and I did it ass backwards and of course, she got all offended and by the time I got off the phone, I collapsed into a heap of tears in Mike's arms.

I couldn't leave it lie like that, so I called her back.

And from nowhere came all this grief. I was so sad! I told her that I'm scared to death of dying and leaving Mike with the kids by himself and that I'm just so frightened about not having everything in order before I have this baby that I'm just really freaked out and hormonal. She said, she was sorry she made me cry. I told her it wasn't anything she did, but that I'm scared of this thing the doctors are calling a high-risk pregnancy. I'm having to go through a lot for this and it is hard, as Mike pointed out.

Then she admitted she'd spent the whole weekend crying because she's butt broke. She's trying to get her car repaired and told the guy it couldn't come over $500 and it's up to $700. She really wants to come see this baby no matter what and she said she's really feeling homesick lately. I told her that we were going to try to come down in August and if she couldn't make it that we would do our darnedest to make sure we did so she could have some time with her granddaughter. Then I said, I knew she'd probably be really annoyed, but that Mike and I might ditch her with the baby and take Russell to Disneyland. She laughed and said,"Oh, yeah, I'd be hatin' that."

I mentioned the shower. Big mistake, because she said something about how she wished she could do more because she knew my parents had the money to do stuff she couldn't and that's the reason she was making the quilt because she couldn't do anything else. Mind you this quilt is something that she's planning on having Grammy and Great Grandma Billy stitch in, so it's a 5 generation quilt, so it's very very special. The other thing is that she doesn't have the use of her right arm particularly, so her sewing a quilt is particularly painful for her but an act of total love and devotion. I was so shocked. I told her, "Geesh, you've given us the bassinet, the crib, the clothes, I think it's enough." My folks are giving us the stroller-infant seat combo and maybe a dresser for the baby, but as Mike said, it's not a competition. They're able to help on the big ticket items, so they are.

My mom made a quilt, too, but frankly, it won't mean nearly as much as this one Mike's mom is making to Mike or me. For the shower, I told her that we registered at Target for a combination of items -- some expensive and most not -- that the point of the shower was not the expense. We just want people to celebrate with us because we are so very excited about having the baby.

His mom is complicated, but by the time we got done with the second phone call, we both felt a lot better. We'd found the words we needed to untangle us from whatever hurt we'd caused each other and gotten to the underlying things that we were really sad about.