The Doody Master

Recipe for baby shower game:

Ingredients
6 diapers, labeled 1-6
6 candy bars, all different brands, assigned to a numbered diaper

Directions:
Put all or part of each kind of candy bar into a labeled diaper, keeping track of which candy bar is in which diaper. Put the diaper in the microwave for 2 minutes, or until candy bar has melted. Have baby shower guests guess the contents of the diaper.

At my second ever baby shower, I correctly identified 4 of 6 doodies. I mistook Rolos for Caramello, and missed Milky Way Midnight Dark (come on! who eats those?), but correctly identified PayDay (sick), Snickers, Butterfinger and 3 Musketeers. Guess I know my doodies - I was the one and only winner of the doody game. For a prize I got a little nauseated and a $5 baby-bottle-shaped gift cart to Target.

This is the first time I've watched a pregnancy from start to finish, the first pregnant belly I've touched, the first experience watching a woman pull her maternity pants up to her armpits. At 16 weeks it was exciting and new. Now that she's at 37, it's clear that the novelty has worn off and she just wants it out of there. She has three outfits she can fit into. The baby occasionally turns into a position that presses on her sciatic nerve, making her limp around the office. She's gained almost 50 pounds, and has adopted the extremely pregnant woman waddle.

I get to watch from the sidelines, asking lots of questions and getting totally grossed out (did you know they pee in there after a few months? Sick!). I get to peruse the gift registry from the boobies section (nursing bra pads and sore nipple "soft shells" and breast cream) to toys and blankets and towels and tiny clothes and shoes that are so soft you wonder why everything isn't made out of that material.

I can't imagine what it's like to be a parent, or a parent-to-be, watching your belly fill up like an hourglass, waiting and waiting, registering for what you think you need and in the end playing it totally blind and deaf and having no idea. I can't know what it's like for them, but I know I can't wait to meet this kid.