Kate Cameron is a 29-year-old mum to be, who starred on the 2016 season of The Bachelor NZ. She’ll be writing an exclusive column for us every fortnight, sharing her journey to new motherhood, and her real – not perfect – take on life.
“The radiographer looked at us with an excited expression: ‘So you would like to know the sex?’
Brandon and I both shout ‘yes’ at the same time, then I blurt out uncontrollably: ‘But we already know it’s a boy. And I can see it up there, the two little balls and the… penis…’
She looked at me blankly and moved her reading glasses to the tip of her nose. She took a deep breath and in an authorative teacher tone told me: ‘Well you should never assume!’
Defensively, I told her we haven’t but that at our 12 week scan we were told there was a 70% chance it was a boy, so we’d kind of been hedging our bets.
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I looked at Brandon who was quiet, staring at the screen. I began thinking about my secret stash of blue baby clothes in the spare room I had neatly folded away. I also had a bottle of bubbles with a blue bow waiting in reception for Brandon, with a card from our unborn baby boy. Suddenly I felt as though I may have overstepped the mark…
The radiographer went quiet and paused. ‘You should never have been told that. Because you’ve got a healthy baby girl.’
I didn’t even notice that she had said ‘girl’ because I was more fixated on the word ‘healthy.’ I lay there feeling relieved that our baby was all in one piece and everything was growing perfectly well.
But fast-forward 12 hours and I find myself in the baby department of David Jones, Wellington, and my excitement levels are at an all time high. I find myself drawn to the different shades of pinks and gold, silver and pink sparkles begin to propel me from rack to rack like I’ve won some shopping spree and I have 60 seconds to grab as many baby girl clothes as possible.
I stop and quickly diagnose myself. I’m experiencing ‘post finding out the baby sex high.’
And believe me, this baby high is still going. I move onto a café and sit next to parents who have a baby girl kitted out in pink. I spark up a conversation with the parents like I’m Slick Rick on a Tinder date. ‘She’s cute! Where’s her outfit from?’ They both smile at me and politely reply.
I wasn’t even listening to the answer, I was patiently waiting for them to finish their reply so I could say, ‘I’m having one too. Due August.’ And from that one sentence I sat there for 20 minutes talking baby jargon with two complete strangers.
Since then, I have found myself trying to share my happy news with pretty much anyone who’ll listen. From the businessman next to me on my plane (I did consider ringing for the stewardess so I could tell her, too), to random parents in the park – I just want to tell the world I’m having a baby girl.
I know finding out the sex of your baby is such a personal decision. However, from my personal experience, I am so glad we did. It’s made for quite an interesting dinner time story and most importantly I can now talk to my baby using ‘her’ name. Not ‘his’ name. For me I’ve even started the process of imagining whether she will be a netball or soccer player. Will she even like pink? Will she snort when she laughs like I do? Will she have a sweet tooth like Brandon?
And God help me, will she come to me one day asking to go on The Bachelor? I think I’ll just start imagining what the next year or so will bring, because if my mind wonders to far forward, I may put myself into an early labour!
I can’t wait to meet you baby girl.”
Read the next installment of Kate’s pregnancy column in two weeks.
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