OB Appointment and NT scan

Today was a much anticipated day here in our house!  Finally! Our first OB appointment!  I went in and had my urine taken, my weight checked (135 – lower than my normal weight of 138) and my blood pressure checked.  Everything looked good so I moved into the room… with no ultrasound machine.  Say whaaaat??  As my husband and I waited the hour (just kidding, but it did feel like an hour) for the doctor to come in, we speculated that the ultrasound machine must be on wheels.  Once the doctor came in, holding nothing but a fetal doppler, I knew that the ultrasound was a no-go again.  I asked, and she said that since we had one at 7 weeks with our RE, that we wouldn’t have one there until 20 and that I had an NT scan later that day so they would be doing one anyway.  I’m pretty sure they are just amazingly lazy and decided to let us do the NT scan in place of the scan they would probably do if we weren’t going to do the NT scan.  Oh well, no big deal, we just had to wait another hour and a half…. ahhhh!!  So, anyway, she goes over all the basic things.  What to eat, what not to eat, get some exercise (I should probably start doing that one day) and that heating pads, allergy medicine and the chiropractor are all good things.  Yay! I can start going back to the chiropractor soon!  My tweaked back will appreciate it.

Then…. it was time…. time to try and locate the heartbeat.  She started off by saying “don’t worry if we can’t find it right away, sometimes it takes a little while.”  So, another hour goes by (jk, you know, probably a full minute) and finally she finds it!… for about a half a second and then squirrel decided to squirm away.  The second time she found it, I decided no breathing until she found out how fast it was.  154! Perfect, she says. 🙂  Finally, some confirmation that there is a little thing growing inside of me still!  Overjoyed, I tell ya!  Now it was time to go grab something to eat and then head to the next appointment for the NT scan!

So, after a yummy Brueggers Bagel, the husband and I ran one quick Christmas present errand and then went over to the hospital.  This is an old hospital, and it shows.  Dingy chairs, dingy bathroom, dingy hallways… but that’s beside the point (update your hospital, people!)  So we are called back to go over the verbal information.  What the test was, what they were looking for, what happens if they find something that may indicate Downs Syndrome, or Trisomy 13 or 18.  Yes, yes, nods nods.  Show us our baby!  We sign all the paperwork and go back to the waiting room.  Soon the ultrasound technician comes and gets us.  Probably the sweetest lady ever born, but I haven’t met all the ladies of the world, so I can’t say for sure.  She has to be top 100 though.  She was just as excited (or seemed to be) to see our baby as we were.  This makes the experience that much better.  Who wants a lazy tech who’s “seen it all”?  Not me!  So, yes, there is squirrel!  Beautiful, beautiful squirrel!  Head, body, arms and legs!  It moves around when you poke at it with an ultrasound wand too! 🙂  So amazing.  I wish I had an ultrasound machine at home so I could just stare at it all day.  That’s probably not healthy though… mentally.  Right?

So today was amazing! Pure satisfaction! And the NT scan didn’t show anything to be worried about.  They are running blood samples to verify, but everything looks good at this moment in time.  By the way, did you know they prick your finger to get your blood sample?  That is just rude.  I’d rather have a blood draw all day long than to have a finger pricked.  All worth it, but ouch!  There has to be a nicer way to retrieve blood when you only need 5 drops.

So now I’m going to go eat some dinner and then upload my picture disc onto my computer with all the NT scan images.  I’m hoping they have the heartbeat part on there too.  I giggled in the middle, so when you look at the heartbeat sound waves, you see three waves for the babies heartbeat, then a bunch of squigglies from me giggling, and then two more heartbeats.  Couldn’t help it, it was amazing.   I am so glad that this is something I am getting to experience, since for a long time it didn’t look like I ever would.  Pure Joy.

 

Here is a little 3D image of squirrel.  He/she was not happy about being woken up from a nap… looks like he/she is trying to cover their ears and go back to sleep.  🙂