Poke: Hello!

Once I hit the 18th week, I started waiting for that special feeling. That feeling that you can only get from a baby making its presence known by kicking the hell out of you from the inside (or from really bad gas). By all accounts, early kicking - which is typically felt somewhere between weeks 16 and 22 - is pretty light. It's not quite up to ninja standards at this point. A lot of women say it feels like popcorn popping, a fish swimming around, bubbles, fluttering, and being flicked - among other sensations.

Well, this is what I've been longing for. Really it's the one sign I've been missing so far. I've seen the baby (at week 13), I've grown out of most of my clothes and am starting to show, and, as previously discussed, my belly button is making a break for it. But feeling the Weeble has really been the missing piece of me really believing I'm pregnant.

By lunchtime today I was starting to feel pretty discouraged. I have no good reason for getting impatient. After all, some women don't feel the "quickening" until week 20 or even later. But waiting during pregnancy for a sign that doesn't appear right away leads to paranoia. Maybe he/she isn't moving because something is wrong.

Friday night was the first time I thought I felt something. It was brief, and over so fast I couldn't even be sure it had happened. It didn't feel like popcorn or being flicked. It felt like an arm, ending in an elbow, brushing up against me (only inside). But then it was gone, no matter how much I concentrated and willed it to come back.

Then today, the Weeble returned.

Poke: Hello!

Poke, poke: Where's daddy?

Poke: When do we eat again?

Poke, poke, poke: Where's the stinky dog?

Weeble's been pretty quiet since then, but it's clear now that he/she is in there. Most likely doing the mambo or something. Just over a week from now, we'll have the big ultrasound. With any luck, we'll be able to figure out just what part of him/her is poking me.