Tuesday, February 24, 2009

The Baby? A Boy!



On Monday, we got to see our little baby for the fourth time (more about the inordinate number of U/S maybe in a later post)...but this time, we could actually tell that this "thing" was a baby instead of a blob! I felt like I was meeting somebody so familiar, yet so foreign. It seemed somewhat surreal that I have this life inside of me, even though I've been feeling him move for a few weeks.

I don't know what to say about the ultrasound...I guess I have alot to say, but I don't know where to start. Going into the ultrasound I was nervous and anxious about a number of things. Obviously, being a medical student, I had all of the possible horrors in mind: omphalocele, gastroschisis, diaphragmatic hernia, renal agenesis, anencephaly, spina bifida... and on and on... I've been praying this whole pregnancy that everything is healthy, and it looked like everything was good, praise God!

The other issue was who to have in the ultrasound room. At first, I'd planned on just me and Ryan being there by ourselves--just our little family. But, I started feeling guilty when I could hear the excitement in my Mom's voice regarding the baby. And then, more guilt when I thought about including my Mom, but not having Ryan's Mom there--afterall, this baby is related to them both in the same way. I was mostly afraid that them being there would take away from our experience, and make me feel like the baby was, I don't know, less mine. I arrived at a solution though-- we decided to have Ryan and me (obviously) there for the first few minutes alone, and then to let the proud grandmothers come in and see what was going on. Overall, I think this went well, and I know the grandmothers both really appreciated it.

Ok, so on to more details of the ultrasound--Ryan and I went in and the tech started, and rather quickly went to the "private parts." I think we're in for trouble in the future, cause the baby was showing his goods to everyone! Just hanging out there flapping in amniotic fluid--there was NO QUESTION as to the sex of the baby--boy, boy, boy! Just for the record, I thought the baby was a boy, Ryan thought girl. Ryan actually has had 2 dreams where the baby was a girl, I guess those are for way in the future. My mom thought boy, Ryan's mom didn't know, and most of my friends thought boy. The tech went on to look at other parts, the face, the spine and all of that for a few more minutes. I kept telling Ryan to go and get our mothers--but he didn't want to leave the room (it was so cute!).

When the grandmothers came in, the tech put up a shot of "the goods" to see if they could tell what the sex was, but neither would guess, even though it was evident. The tech finished up looking at all the other parts and measuring. He weighs 13 ounces, and God help me, his head is in the 99th percentile for size! The rest of his measurements were all over the 5oth...ugh, the thought of pushing him out...ouch.

One last comment...I keep thinking that the picture above of him is so funny. He's got his little hand over his face, in what I interpret as a posture of shame. Some theories as to what he's thinking have been as follows:

"Oh great, you're telling me that THESE PEOPLE are going to be my PARENTS?!?"

"Why don't you people just let me go back to sleep?"

"Sheesh, you people don't even knock! You just barge right in without notice..."








Sunday, February 15, 2009

News!

I'M PREGNANT!

I've actually been pregnant for, oh, almost 19 weeks now, but I was waiting to say anything until it was pretty much undeniable that I was carrying my own little parasite :)

I posted a few blog entries that I wrote back in Jan. but didn't post because I didn't want to be "public" yet, so for those few readers out there, you can go and check them out.

Also, I will be finding out the sex of the baby on the 23rd of this month, YAY!

More info...I'm pretty sure that I've been feeling the baby for about 2 weeks now, and it's a weird feeling, almost like muscle twitches, but they are kinda jumpy and sometimes surprise me/catch me off guard. I like feeling the baby moving though, because it almost makes me think he or she is communicating with me, and I'm carrying around my own little friend in my belly.

What about residency? I'm hoping to start in October...more details later if people really wanna hear.