Magic of ultrasounds

After my beta hcg numbers were proven to be great, I was scheduled for my first ultrasound right away to make sure the sac was forming in the correct place in my uterus. We didn't want another ectopic! I was pretty nervous going in, but Chris held my hand as we waited. The tech probed around and we watched as the little round black sac appeared on the screen. Tears sprung to my eyes as I saw the little white smudge of an embryo starting to form in it. "It's a normal intrauterine pregnancy," she declared as I just sat and stared. It was too early to see a heartbeat yet, but a major milestone was achieved: a pregnancy and in the right place at that! I said about a million prayers of thanks that night, and I know it will never be enough.
A few days later, I gush of blood came out of me while I was on the phone with a friend. In a panic, I hung up with her and called the doctor who warned me to lay down and keep my feet up. I was so upset, I just grabbed all my pregnancy books I'd accumulated over the times and threw them out of site into our spare bedroom floor. I thought "if this is ending, I can't bear to look at those." It was Friday and I cried most of the weekend. Come Monday, I was scheduled for an ultrasound at the hospital to check on things. I felt so sick on our way in there, but again, Chris held my hand as we faced what was to come. Happily, the sac and embryo appeared again, but this time there was a tiny squigglng flutter on the screen: the heartbeat. The tech adjusted the machine so that we could hear it. It thumped away at an amazing 108 bpm. Not bad for a 6 week old pregnancy! Hearing that sound was the most amazing feeling. Not to mention relieving! She didn't see a cause for the bleeding and things looked normal. Breathing huge sighs of relief, we went home saying our thanks again and again for this.
The next ultrasound 3 days later was to confirm the increase of the heartbeat: it increased to 118 which was right on track. And a few more days later it was 126. Once this was determined, they felt we had a good viable embryo growing. They did go on to see fluid in my uterus...a bleed that was small and not threatening to the baby but worth being watched each week to check on it. I went on to have ultrasounds every week until week 12! The bleed finally shrunk and mostly has resolved itself now. It has been scary, but I am so grateful my doctors are so careful and concerned. The fun side effect of all these ultrasounds has been getting to see our baby grow from a little smudge of a bean to sprouting arms and legs (the gummie-bear stage) and then to having a full body: torso, flailing arms and legs, and hands and feet. We've witnessed the wee one doing sommersaults, flips, turns, and rolls. I've watched the wee one stretch with the most indulgent movments after a nice nap. I watched the heartbeat grow from 108 in the beginning to top off at 172bpm before it has normalized to around 157bpm. I finally believe this is real. I finally believe this is possible. I still have reservations, but I'm getting more and more confident with each passing week. And now that we've done the 13 week NT scan (where they measure the skin to bone distance in the neck to check for down syndrome risk) I'm feeling almost confident that everything is going to be ok. The measurement came in at 1.3mm by the way, which is supposedly perfect according to the doctor. I will get my official results in another week. One day at a time! Here is the latest photo of the wee one taken just 2 days ago:

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