I just got back from my appointment with the ultrasound tech and…..it’s a baby Girl! I just have to say that requiring a pregnant woman to consume 32 ounces of water immediately prior to pushing and prodding around her stomach for an hour is pure torture! Yes ma’am I have always dreamed of peeing my pants, please continue jabbing my bladder with that machine!
I have been looking forward to this appointment not just because I was curious if my little “shim” was a she or a he but because I have been plagued for weeks with dreams of my baby being horribly deformed because of me. In one particular dream a haughty ultrasound tech pushes the wand into my swollen stomach to reveal an image of a deformed baby and then declares, “Your baby’s brain is not fully formed because you didn’t drink enough water ma-ma.” Then later on in the ultrasound she yells out, “Look at those deformed feet! That’s because of the ham sandwich you insisted on eating! Didn’t read about listerosis?” Of course I’m horrified exclaiming things like, “But I DID drink a lot of water!” or “It was just ONE sandwich!”
I have no question where these nightmares originated, have you read half the warnings they give pregnant women? Drink lots of water but don’t hold your pee too long, don’t eat anything off this mile long list, do eat these extremely obscure food items like wheat germ (meh?), eat fish it’s good for you, no don’t eat fish there are trace amounts of mercury in it. Do exercise but not too much. These rules as contradictory as they are, are absolutely inarguably inflexible, people don’t mess around! You know you’re pregnant when someone shoots you the evil eye for enjoying a piece of cheese before disgustedly asking if you are SURE that is pasteurized.
My rant aside, I was so hyped up with the tales of all that could go wrong that by the time I got to the ultrasound table I was violently shaking with nerves. Kevin touched my arm to see if I was cold and when he felt my warm skin he just looked at me oddly. So it was an enormous relief to hear, it’s a baby girl, she’s got a strong heart, she has all her bones, her brain is well formed, her pallet is not cleft, her feet are normal….she’s healthy! I’ve never felt such sweet relief, all I could think was I did it! I got her this far and now I feel confident I can get her the rest of the way into this world as a healthy fully functioning human being. We’re already halfway there little baby!
After putting my fears to rest came the fun part, getting to see the 3-d images and 4-d footage of my little girl. I can’t describe the feeling of looking at such a precious little thing drinking, getting the hiccups, sucking her thumb, holding onto her big toe and nuzzling her little face into the comforting walls of the uterus she currently calls home. I got to take home a disc of ultrasound images and footage and I am mesmerized by her little face. Look what we have made, she is beautiful!
The ultrasound was an awesome experience. It completely replaced my doubt and anxiety with love and excitement. Also, it made this baby (who I still can’t feel) come to life for me and my husband. Now I just can’t wait to meet my little baby, but not yet…. not yet.
