Musings of a Multi-Cultural Mind

So as I've mentioned before, I come from a mixed background of Persian, Hawaiian, & Italian (and I think a little Irish, Dutch, & German mixed in there from my maternal grandma.)  But I grew up in a completely English speaking household (if you still count ghetto slang and pidgin as English).  See, my grandma never learned to speak Italian from her immigrant father because like many old school immigrants, they really wanted their children to be fully American.  Funny thing is - my grandma learned a lot of Hawaiian from her mother-in-law and she did pass that along to me when I took an interest in languages later.  My grandparents separated and divorced when I was very young, but memories I do have of my grandfather from a young age were of him teaching me to count in Hawaiian and Japanese.  He had been in the navy for many years and sometimes even now in his mid-80s, he surprises me with phrases in Japanese, Vietnamese, and Korean that he still remembers...

So the other day we got to have our anatomy scan ultrasound and I gotta say, it was the coolest thing we've seen in our pregnancy so far.  Its the one where they spend about an hour on your ultrasound doing all the measurements and checking all the major organs for proper development, and usually the one where most people find out the baby's sex.  Of course I had already found out via blood test at around week 12 since they do that for us old as f* moms over 35 (haha.)  But no doubt about it, in between his constant leg pumps and tendencies to moon the screen, we could see clearly we are having a boy. Already this kid has got so much energy and personality.  And rhythm!  The way he was pumping his legs and fists, we wonder if he's destined to be a drummer.  And the way he'd move his mouth in reaction to the technician prodding my belly to try to get him to turn over.... was that attitude I detected?  We're gonna have a character on our hands, just ...

Now I'm almost at 19 weeks in my pregnancy and finally starting to feel a bit better.  I lost 15 lbs and still a bit nauseous, but I have been eating well and even doing a little cooking.  I have to laugh a bit because just doing little chores around the house or cooking makes me so happy these days you'd think I accomplished something big like building the damn house or something.   But that is just the reality sometimes with a chronic illness - when you've been down for awhile, the simplest, silliest things can feel great. And those times I get down, I just try to remember -- I'm a freaking warrior!  I got off of my dangerous Fibromyalgia meds, and at that point in my illness, doctors were going to put me on just as dangerous narcotics & opiates (the same kinds that killed Prince and Michael Jackson!) but I refused and powered through.  And every time the pain gets tough or I struggle, I think of that and think of how I have to be strong for my son and f...