skipping through a minefield

This Florida company, Ultrababies, will bring an ultrasound system to your house so you can throw a party featuring images of your precious unborn bundle.

Wow--baby worship now has to start before birth? Let me give moms-to-be a little tip: You probably shouldn’t invite friends who are childless by choice to this soiree. Their eyes will roll so far back in their heads, they may freeze that way and you’ll be responsible for blinding them. (Friends who have trouble conceiving might have different problems with the festivities.)

This same company also offers belly casting, because, “Although pregnancy seems never-ending while it is occurring, years later the memory will fade.” A belly cast—belly only or torso, hands and belly, will become "a priceless, personal piece of art that fits beautifully into any part of your home.”

So tell me, friends who have had babies—do you wish you had a belly cast hanging in your living room “as a lasting reminder of the precious time of your pregnancy”?

And if you have more than one child, would you have more than one belly cast, so nobody would feel left out? Or would this be just one more honor the first child would receive while subsequent kids are popped out with decreasing fanfare?

I’m kinda glad I’m past the age of having to attend baby showers. I've ooed and ahed over enough adorable itty-bitty garments.

Of course, I find grandparenting takes nearly as much of my friends’ time and attention as parenting did so that rebirth of old friendships I expected isn't exactly happening. As with parents, I have to work around the kids.

That’s why we selfish, cold-hearted childfree couples tend to hang together.

While we’re on the subject, here’s an essay I published a couple of years ago:

Don't forget the grown-ups

Look at all those shiny happy children’s faces beaming from my refrigerator door! I get photos in the mail all the time from friends and family -- school photos, holiday cards, graduation photos. The children all are beautiful and I love seeing how my friends’ offspring are growing up.

But few of the people I care about most turn up in my mailbox because only rarely do the photos include mom and dad.

What about the grown-ups?

In every case, the grown-ups in the families represented by these photographs are the point of connection for me. But where are they?

Why is it that once children enter the picture, grown-ups seem to fade out?

I like kids. Though I have none of my own, I enjoy visiting with other people’s children, especially when they are old enough to converse.

But I’m mostly a grown-ups’ grown-up. Given the choice between spending time with friends with or without their small children, I often choose adult-time.

When I’m invited to a baby shower, I usually bring a gift for the mom-to-be, whose body has been taken over and who will spend at least the next 18 years catering to the little need machine. As friends cross this important threshold, I want to honor the women they are as well as the moms they are about to become. Many of my friends seem to give up a lot when they become parents – things like careers, exercising, time for dreams beyond those they have for their children. I try to remind them of all they are along with being parents.

Sometimes it seems our culture treats us like new cars -- the moment you’re driven off the lot, you lose half your value. At holidays, charities are flooded with teddy bears and Barbie dolls but many fewer items for teens. Textbooks about developmental psychology peter out after young adulthood. Current research shows that despite the advice of financial experts, parents are putting money away for their children’s college education instead of their own retirement, even though scholarship money is far more readily available than retirement funds.

Children clearly are valued more highly than grown ups. But aren’t grown-ups just children a bunch of years down the road? Can’t we be as tender with adults as we are with children?

Growing up doesn’t automatically put an end to the need for affirmation and affection. It doesn’t automatically make you secure or confident. It doesn’t mean you don’t need a “there, there” now and then, or an “atta girl,” or a band-aid for a psychic wound. But grown-ups don’t get that stuff often, especially not mommies -- bottomless giving pits who learn to expect no thanks from their miniature masters. I try to be the atta-girl girl for my friends, parents and not.

Being friends with parents can be tough for those of us on the other side of the decision divide. I know my needs will always come second to my friends’ children’s, as it should be. I respect that and don’t count on my parent friends for much time, since they usually have birthday parties, soccer games, piano recitals and car pools running them in circles.

I have been unable to maintain friendships with a couple of people after they became parents. One woman informed me that “life is nothing without a child” – a red flag that our priorities were irredeemably at odds . But other friendships have withstood the addition of children because we both make a concerted effort to appreciate each other as valuable individuals separate from our choices in the children department.

I sincerely care about my friends’ kids. Children are swell. But their parents are even more important to me. I like grown-ups.