Our Salmon Egg

We had a bit of a scare just two days after learning I was pregnant. I had begun bleeding a very little bit and when I called the doctor she told me to come in right away. For those of you who may experience something similar, please know that even though a lot of literature says such bleeding is "common," it is never "normal" or safe. Get in to see your doctor ASAP.

But also try not to freak out quite as much as I did. I can picture how I must have looked to my boss when I barged into her office and told her I had a "medical emergency." It's not pretty: pale-skinned and wild-eyed, something like how Mr. Rochester's wife must have looked standing over him setting fire to his bed. I cried all the way into my doctor's office and once there, surrounded by VERY pregnant women and lots of gurgling babies, cried even harder, squeezing my legs together as if that would stop the bleeding. They ushered me in pretty quickly so I wouldn't frighten the other patients into early labor, I think. (Or maybe they were just afraid I'd smuggled in a pint of gasoline and a lighter.)

Well, imagine my relief when this little blip, pulsating from the force of a heartbeat, showed up on the ultrasound screen:

Not much, I know (my doctor hadn't wanted to see me for another week to get a better ultrasound), but the movement was the thing. Seeing another living thing pulsing inside me was quite surreal (and, unfortunately, rather Alien-esque).

Since then, we've had 3 more ultrasounds--the first coming one month later in order to get more accurate measurements. This time there were no tears and Craig was able to come with me. Of course, we were both looking for a tiny blip and completely missed the (relatively) gigantic baby that had replaced it. Afterwards, we both admitted to staring at the screen in horror, thinking the baby had somehow disintegrated inside me without our knowing it. In hindsight, I don't know how we missed seeing the head and body.

 

Things have progressed smoothly ever since. This next ultrasound (taken Dec. 4, 2009) was done as part of the sequential screening my doctor recommended to determine the possibility that the baby had certain disabilities (we came out with a clean bill of health).

This next one is from the same ultrasound and shows the baby's hand held up against the forehead.

And finally, I have a small confession to make. We were not supposed to have the next (and final) ultrasound until Jan. 26. This is the ultrasound where we'd finally get to know what gender our baby is. Well, we told everyone we'd find out on Jan. 26 and a friend of mine talked me into doing a whole "Celebration of Chromosomes" party to tell our (local) friends what we're having. It's going to be a big deal (and we'll also be celebrating that same friend's birthday at the same time) with two cakes (one pink and one blue) and we'll cut into the "gender-correct" cake to make the announcement and everyone we invited said they could make it (even though some of them had to switch schedules around) and that's when the doctor's office called and told us that the ultrasound technician is going to be on vacation that day and asked if we could come in on Jan. 19 (this past Tuesday). So we did. And Craig and I now know the gender of the little salmon egg growing inside of me and we're keeping it secret because we have a party scheduled. This may indeed be the most superficial reason ever to keep such a large secret, but keep it we shall!

And since you can't tell the gender from the ultrasound photos anyway, I'm posting them here.

And here's one of their lovely foot.