Tuesday, October 23, 2012

Only Good Things

Well, I went to the doctor and it was great.  The medical assistant told me our first round of tests (the ones to tell whether or not you're carrying a mutant baby) were all negative.  My blood pressure was great, still under 120 systolic.  She hid my weight from me, per my usual request.

The doc came in and was super nice.  Totally not mad that I was three weeks late for my appointment (I was trying to get on a jury so I could get a few weeks off work).  He didn't even mention it; when I finally did, he said, "Oh, that's fine."  He answered all the questions off my list, even the one about vaginal tearing, though he murmured, "It's a little early..."  He felt the fundus (top) of my uterus (at 15 weeks it's halfway between my pubic bone and my belly button) and I'm pretty sure I could feel it too.  It was like a muscular sort of shelf, right where he said it'd be.

Then we listened to the baby's heartbeat with the Doppler.  The baby's big enough that we can do that
now.  He put the little thing to my belly, right to the top of the uterus, it looked like.  Right away we heard a nice, rhythmic, "Swish swish swish swish swish swish."

"What's that, 138 beats per minute, did it say?" I asked.
"I can't see the screen, but listening to it, to the rhythm of it, it's more like 150," he said, nodding his head to the beat of the swish.  I smiled, hoping I looked appropriately excited.

"Well," he said, as I sat up.  (I realized halfway up that he was offering me a hand to help me up, which seemed odd enough to me that I missed his gesture.)  "Everything's normal.  Only good things happening inside."

"Only good things happening inside."  What a lovely thing to say, given all the things one can worry about during a pregnancy.  It was like a little blessing.  "Only good things happening inside."  Ashe!