Thursday, April 7, 2011

Amazing

We had a lull at work the other night, and during it, we decided that it would be a good idea to ultrasound the baby. It's weird to be at this stage. I am now 14 weeks along. I've gained weight, and I'm showing - but I can' feel the baby. Every day, I wonder if he/she is ok. The last ultrasound I had was at 6.5 weeks, and the baby looked like a tadpole and/or gummi bear. Thus, I didn't expect much this time. Boy, did I get a shock! Our baby has hands and feet and is moving! We watched him move around for 5 minutes on the ultrasound. He was very active. At one point, it looked like he was contentedly sucking his thumb. (I have no idea why I've taken to referring to the baby as a he...I'm no ultrasonographer, so I certainly couldn't tell.)

Seeing that for the first time caused indescribable feelings - fierce protectiveness, love, awe, and excitement would be some words that might come close. Really, it was a feeling of being full till near bursting. The techs commented on my chipper mood for the rest of the night.

Incidentally, we've picked out names: for a girl, Evaline Catherine (with plans to call her Eva after my husband's grandmother), and for a boy, Lane Russell (after my grandfather, and my husband's mother's maiden name). We're pretty happy with those, and likely to stick with them...but things could always change.

6 comments:

Life in vet school said...

Awesome job perk! :) I thought MM would be able to scan me whenever we wanted, but he said the resolution on his clinic's machine is so crappy that we wouldn't be able to see much. And my OB only does U/S at 8 weeks (viability), 13 weeks (NT scan), 20 weeks (anatomy scan), and 34 weeks (position and amniotic fluid level) so it's been a long time since I got to see him! I'm jealous. :)

Elizabeth said...

Evaline is a lovely name and Eva is an excellent nickname. Both Evaline and Lane are great because they're not terribly common but not so rare that people will be confused.

Outrider said...

Ha ha ha ha ha

My best friend (also a veterinarian) got pretty good at scanning herself by the time she gave birth, and was even more skilled by the time the second pup was cooking. You'll be able to figure out if it's a boy, BTW. There are certain, uh, outstanding features when it's a boy.

We scanned one of my classmates during our therio rotation in veterinary school (we were on-call and bored). Definitely extracurricular, but educational.

The Homeless Parrot said...

Life: you might be surprised. We've been crabbing at work about how the crystals in our small probe are broken. We need a new machine desperately. Amazingly, the sonogram of the baby looked great. Maybe the lack of fur? You should try MM's machine, you might be pleasantly surprised!

Outrider: I did not see any outstanding features...but I'm not sure how I would tell for sure...

Outrider said...

Check again in a week or two...

As you know, even trained human ultrasonographer will tell you: if you see it, it's a boy; if not, it's probably (but not definitely) a girl.

elizabeth said...

I'm so impressed you waited this long to ultrasound yourself!! Impressive restraint. :) Gorgeous names, too!