Life in a heartbeat
Last week I finally had the appointment that I had been waiting for. I got to meet with the OB/GYN doctor and also got to hear the baby's heartbeat. I had read on-line that typically once you hear the baby's heartbeat that you have a lot less to worry about in terms of chances of a miscarriage.
When I met with the nurse practitioner almost a month ago, she asked me lots of questions trying to gather a health history. One of the things that she said to me was that I could continue to resume normal activities and nothing that I could do would make me have a miscarriage. She said it in such a way that made me think that she had seen many patients in the busy OB/GYN office that end up finding out that they had miscarried a baby.
I knew that this appointment would be the one where I would finally hear the heartbeat. Besides the typical symptoms of fatigue and tiredness and some other symptoms I won't mention, without your stomach being huge and without feeling actual kicking from a baby, you would never know that I was pregnant. I think your mind plays tricks on you and you really don't believe that you are having a baby.
I wasn't sure how I would hear the baby's heartbeat. I knew that there were different ways of hearing the heartbeat. I wasn't sure if it would be a technician or the doctor, but it ended up being the nurse that weighed me and took my blood pressure. She wasn't overly friendly or overly talkative, she said, "Okay, now we are going to hear the heartbeat." She aked me to expose my belly and she put some gel on my belly and put a machine next to my belly and at first there was no sound. After a few seconds (what seemed more like an eternity), she found a heartbeat. I was of course so relieved and it was just the neatest thing to know that there is a baby growing that has a heartbeat. I expected that the moment would be different somehow-that maybe I'd cry or laugh, but all I could say to the nurse was, "Wow, that's really crazy." And she didn't say a word. It was all kind of awkward actually. Now in retrospect, I wonder if there are many patients that she sees and there is no heartbeat detected and she never knows what to expect from time to time so she doesn't want to be overly excited with the patients. Or maybe I'm just thinking too much and that is just her personality.
I went home that day thinking that the heartbeat is 159 (within normal range) and finally glad to know that there is a life developing. I had started talking to the baby weeks ago and would place my hand on my stomach and say little things like, "Hello baby." And it felt differently the first time I talked to the baby after I finally heard the heartbeat, a sort of a bond forming. My old Psychology self wonders if the baby can already sense these early feelings of love and nurturing.
When I met with the nurse practitioner almost a month ago, she asked me lots of questions trying to gather a health history. One of the things that she said to me was that I could continue to resume normal activities and nothing that I could do would make me have a miscarriage. She said it in such a way that made me think that she had seen many patients in the busy OB/GYN office that end up finding out that they had miscarried a baby.
I knew that this appointment would be the one where I would finally hear the heartbeat. Besides the typical symptoms of fatigue and tiredness and some other symptoms I won't mention, without your stomach being huge and without feeling actual kicking from a baby, you would never know that I was pregnant. I think your mind plays tricks on you and you really don't believe that you are having a baby.
I wasn't sure how I would hear the baby's heartbeat. I knew that there were different ways of hearing the heartbeat. I wasn't sure if it would be a technician or the doctor, but it ended up being the nurse that weighed me and took my blood pressure. She wasn't overly friendly or overly talkative, she said, "Okay, now we are going to hear the heartbeat." She aked me to expose my belly and she put some gel on my belly and put a machine next to my belly and at first there was no sound. After a few seconds (what seemed more like an eternity), she found a heartbeat. I was of course so relieved and it was just the neatest thing to know that there is a baby growing that has a heartbeat. I expected that the moment would be different somehow-that maybe I'd cry or laugh, but all I could say to the nurse was, "Wow, that's really crazy." And she didn't say a word. It was all kind of awkward actually. Now in retrospect, I wonder if there are many patients that she sees and there is no heartbeat detected and she never knows what to expect from time to time so she doesn't want to be overly excited with the patients. Or maybe I'm just thinking too much and that is just her personality.
I went home that day thinking that the heartbeat is 159 (within normal range) and finally glad to know that there is a life developing. I had started talking to the baby weeks ago and would place my hand on my stomach and say little things like, "Hello baby." And it felt differently the first time I talked to the baby after I finally heard the heartbeat, a sort of a bond forming. My old Psychology self wonders if the baby can already sense these early feelings of love and nurturing.
posted by Princess at 10:11 AM
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