Andrea’s Weblog

144 pounds - the eating is paying off!

These appointments are getting rather routine: I show up and wait for
20 minutes to be called back by the nurse who immediately shoves a
plastic cup at me. (I hope I don’t develop a conditioned reflex like
one of Pavlov’s dogs and pee every time I see one of those clear
plastic cups.) Next she gets my weight and blood pressure. Then the
nurse escorts me back to the exam room where I wait, staring at the
awful sunflower painting on the wall till Dr. Bridges enters the room.

It’s funny how doctors always knock before they enter an exam room.
What are they afraid I might be doing? Changing into a paper gown for
the fun of it? Rearranging the pap smear swabs?

When the doctor enters she always asks how I’m doing and I always
respond “fine.” I can never tell if that is the moment at which I am to
launch into detail of any minor ailment I may have [dry skin,
bloating...gas ( I won't elaborate on the gas issue here).] Seems like
a little too much detail to share before she even has a chance to sit
down.

Dr. Bridges will usually go down a sheet of questions to ask me like
“are you nauseous? any bleeding? any cramping?” Then she’ll ask if she
can listen to the baby’s heartbeat. Like I would say no? I may even
grow to like the sensation of cold KY Jelly oozing into my belly
button.

This visit we didn’t get a good listen to the heartbeat because the
baby was too busy with her/his morning aerobics. All we could hear was
a swoosh noise, couple heartbeats, swoosh, heartbeat… Can you
imagine a large banana turning summersaults inside you and not knowing?
I mean, the baby is supposed to be over 6 inches long at this point.
Well, the doctor assures me that it will be more noticeable in the
coming weeks, but who knows what else the baby is getting away with
without the knowledge of his parents.

After setting up my next appointment (March 2 ultrasound!) I had to go
give some blood so they can do the triple screen test to make sure
there aren’t any neural problems or down syndrome. Hopefully the tests
will all come back clean. Then there are stories like this one that you
read about:
http://cnn.netscape.cnn.com/news/story.jsp?floc=FF-APO-1102&idq=/ff/
story/0001%2F20040206%2F1338058817.htm&sc=1102&photoid=20040204XWA104

Parasitic twins? Yikes!