Monday, April 27, 2009

Heartbeat of 146!!!

I had my first prenatal appointment this afternoon and prior to arriving I went to the bathroom. Then when I arrived at the appointment, they handed me a small cup for a urine sample (whoops, forgot about that), so I attempted to give them a sample... yeah, right.

After the attempted evacuation of my bladder, I was called into my room. I've gained 1.5 lbs. (up to 89.5), still measure 5'0" tall, and my blood pressure was surprisingly low at 88 over 60 (usually I'm more like 100 over 80). Do you want to know why it was so low? Because when I walked into the room, the nurse told me I would have a pap smear, a breast exam and A SCAN. Without. My. Husband. (Who wasn't there because I thought this would be a boring exam and who wants to watch someone else get a pap smear?) *Heart attack ensues.* Note to self: husband comes to every appointment from now on.

Once the nurse had left and I had changed into my lovely "open in front" gown, my midwife didn't come in for about 30 minutes... *Second heart attack ensues.* I decided to try to take a nap while I was waiting. (Yeah, right.) Eventually she came in, and told me that she figured that I would want to do the scan first, rather than waiting until the very end to do it. You betcha!

She tried abdominal first, but their scanner was about 25 years old and my bladder was *E-M-P-T-Y*. I don't think she's ever seen a pregnant woman with a more empty bladder. We could see the baby, but it was very far away and small and I don't think their scanner has a zoom function (yikes).

Of course the next step was the vaginal scan. I don't know why everyone always apologizes when they have to resort to this, because I don't mind it a bit and I don't think it feels all that uncomfortable... But maybe that's just me. My midwife found the baby easily on the vaginal scan, but she couldn't see the heartbeat (she was kind of older and probably doesn't have great eyes) even though I was pretty sure I could see it. *Commence breathing again.* She wanted to get one of the doctors to double check for her, since she said wasn't very good at using the scanner.

I waited a few more minutes and then an older Chinese woman doctor came in. She tried to let me move the wand, but I was useless at this, so she had to do it for me. She found the baby quickly and the heartbeat looked super slow, but then she moved it just a tad and voila! the heartbeat was quick! She thought it looked a bit slow, still, so she measured it, and it came out to 146, which she said was actually great (she was used to seeing heartbeats around 175-180, so compared to that, it looked slow to her). The baby looked much more formed than last Wednesday, with the head being clearly defined and much larger and a cute little tail at the other end. The picture that printed wasn't very good, so I didn't ask for a copy - they kept one, so I can always ask for one later if I really want it.

This is about what the baby looked like, but in black and white and a bit fuzzier:

After that was just the pap and the breast exam, which both were fine. I'm going back in 2.5 weeks for another scan (Thursday, May 14 at 4:15 pm), when I will be 9 weeks. This will reduce my chances of miscarriage, if there is a heartbeat then, down to 5%, and then my First Look is being scheduled for June 3 in the morning, and if the baby is doing well then, my miscarriage chances will be down to about null!

Hooray for God taking care of Thumper!

8 comments:

Candace said...

Great news! I had the same thing happen at one of my first visits. I just told my husband not to worry about it and they did an ultrasound and whoops...! He hasn't missed one since either! LOL! Isn't it just amazing how much those little precious babies grow in just a few weeks? I am amazed every time I go! Thank you for sharing!

Crysi said...

Awesome news! You'll be amazed at how different the baby will look in just a couple weeks. We get scans every few weeks and it was crazy to watch the change in those early weeks. Now they just seem to be gaining weight in leaps and bounds.

Jessie said...

Yay for a thumpin' heart for Thumper.

Brooke said...

So glad to see your little thumper is doing so well I hope that the next couple weeks gos by quickly so that you can stop worrying so much.

Perfectly Imperfect said...

Aww yay!! Look at lil Thumper just a growin'!!! Prayin' for you girl...

Charity said...

Wonderful news!!

Staci said...

Yeah!!! So glad everything went so well and you got to see "Thumper" again :) I had to laugh about the peeing in the cup thing. Wait until you have a big belly in the way and have to try to maneuver the cup down there "blind".

Lydia said...

beautiful :) still praying <3
Dia