I name inside babies. I don't like calling that unnamed child who is yet to be born "the baby." So I name the kid. Diane's boys were both Bob. But then we decided that if she wanted a girl we had better give up the name Bob. It seemed to have worked, but I'm fairly certain the name had nothing to do with the gender outcome. Gloria, as an inside baby, was George. People kept asking me if we knew it was a boy and if that was what we were going to call the baby. No, but I need to call the baby something. This baby is Phil. Again, no, I don't know if this baby is a boy, and no, I will not name the outside baby Phil if we in fact do have a boy. I need to call the baby something besides "the baby." I also will refer to Phil as "he" simply because I need a pronoun, I don't know if Phil is a he or a she. He will do as a pronoun. It didn't seem to affect Gloria at all.
Anyway, so at the beginning we told Gloria to be gentle with me because Phil is in my tummy and we need to be gentle with Phil. She pretty much ignored that, but figured out that she was heavy for Phil and so doesn't ask me to pick her up (most of the time anyway) and will ask her dad/aunt/grandparent instead. A few weeks ago I introduced her to the fact that Phil moves. I put her hand on my tummy when Phil was having a party and tried to let her feel Phil. Well, Phil is an uncooperative inside baby and seems to know when the person touching him is anyone besides me. Doctor, Nana, Dad, sister, the kid will immediately stop moving. And if it's the doctor with one of those heartbeat listening thingies Phil tries to get out of the way. In a skillful way so that I can't actually feel Phil moving, but still in such a way that it makes it complicated to actually count the heart rate. Where was I, right, Phil moves. So Gloria didn't actually get to feel Phil moving, but she knows that he moves. So the other week when I was putting her to bed she put her head on my belly and said, "Phil moving in there?...Yep, moving." (he wasn't) then she lay down on the bed and made her tummy jump and said, "My Phil moving too." So the Phil in her tummy is apparently active.
Another time I was putting Gloria to bed, which was apparently NOT what she wanted to do. When I ask her to do something as awful as going to bed when she doesn't want to she will start crying, "I want my daddy," and will go on and on. This particular time I told her she could take a nap with Phil, hoping that she would be okay with that. Well, it didn't stop her from calling her daddy. She did though put her face to my belly and cry for her daddy. I told her that I missed her daddy too. "No Mom," she says, "I'm telling Phil." Oh, so apparently she now has conversations with Phil.
Phil eats the cookies and Phil takes naps. Phil goes swimming. We went to the water slides last night. Gloria was having a blast of course and kept wanting to go again. So she asked me if I wanted to go, "No thanks," I say. So then she asks me if Phil would like to do. Phil seems to get around even if Mommy doesn't.
Gloria also thinks everyone has a Phil. Or most people anyway. We told Gloria she has to be gentle with Dawn because Dawn has a Phil in her tummy. And that one is true. But now she asks everyone, as she pats their belly, if Phil is in there. pat, pat, your Phil in there? Her baby sitter says, "nope, just fat."
I'm a bit concerned about what happens when Phil isn't around any more. A baby will come live at our house, and there won't be a Phil anymore. I don't know what she will think happened to him. Maybe she will eventually forget about Phil. We are trying to call Phil "Baby Phil" now hoping that she will realize that Phil is a baby and not just something in Mommy's tummy. But I can see how that doesn't really make any sense to her. Why would a baby live in a tummy? So, we will see the next few months what else Gloria thinks Phil does, and what happens when a baby comes to live at our house. Hopefully the transition from Phil to outside baby with a different name will go smoothly.
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