Ultrasound-7 weeks, 6 days

The day finally came and all is well at this point! I'm immensely relieved, but still apprehensive (I know, I'm a dark and twisty one). My hubby wasn't able to meet me there because our little one is sick and at home today, so my sister came so I wouldn't be alone in case of bad news.

My doctor did the scan with the internal probe. He came in and before he even started said "I'm sure it's going to look just fine." Optimism is good. He talked me through the whole thing because he could tell how worried I was. "I'm just getting my bearings, hold on." He found the baby easily and we saw the heartbeat. Even better, he was able to turn on the speakers and we actually heard the heartbeat. Why is that sound so powerful? Seeing it was great, but I actually got tears in my eyes when I heard it, at a beautiful 156 bpm. The baby is measuring 7 weeks, 5 days today. He said one day different from the calendar calculations is perfectly normal. They don't worry unless it's off by more than a week and a half. He even burned me a DVD of the whole ultrasound to take home. All in all, a wonderful experience.

When he was finished and came back in to talk to me, I told him I was concerned that if he didn't bring me back in for a whole month like last time, I'd sit and worry that something was wrong. Last time, we saw the heartbeat at 8 weeks, the baby died between 9 and 10 weeks, and we didn't know anything was wrong until almost 12 weeks. I don't want to repeat that. My awesome doctor said that just to ease my mind, he will bring me back in once a week until the first trimester is over and check an ultrasound each time. I almost hugged him. I'm so glad that I will only have one week intervals of wondering if all is well.

We cautiously told our immediate family and a few close friends the news today. We asked them all to keep it under the radar for now. Everyone is excited and supportive and I'm relieved to have it out in the open a bit. Covering this awful nausea is a challenge for me and at least now, those I'm closest to can know what's really going on (I think a couple of my friends were worried I was developing a serious health problem). I'm trying very hard to just sit back and enjoy this immense blessing we have right now, and praying that this child continues to grow healthily and flourish in a wonderful way. The fear still rests in the back of my mind, but I know I'm rapidly getting more attached to this beautiful little life that's growing inside of me.