Baby's Heartbeats

Monday, June 8th, 2009






We went for 12 weeks check up at Oakwood women's clinic. Today we had 'combine screening test' or popular with "nuchal translucent test'. This test combine mother's blood test and baby's usg to check the possibility of down syndrome. The usg measure the thickness of baby's neck nerve and match it with my blood test. The result will be available in about 2 weeks. If they found something wrong, then we need to discuss about more accurate test called amniocentesis, or even worse CVS (chorionic villi sample) which I prayed so hard to be avoided.

During usg, we could see what then was a little tiny jelly bean now is growing bigger. The head looks unproportionally big (bigger than the body), we could see the nose, ears (more like holes on both sides of the head), lips, little tiny fingers, and the limbs. Nurse said the arms and fingers develop earlier than the legs and feet. If you see the pictures in this page, our baby looked like a little alien. A cute one! And for the first time, we could hear the baby heartbeats. 154 beats per minute! It was like magic to be able to hear our baby's heartbeats banging so fast. It brought tears to my eyes.






I'm still doing fine. No morning sickness, no strange food craving, no fatigue. Well, I don't know if you can call it craving, but I'm more into fruits now than I was before. Any kind of fruit, but especially grapes and oranges. I also started doing prenatal yoga to keep me energized.

Oh, and I love to see how my baby belly grows. I took pictures every few weeks. The one above was taken at 15 weeks. It's a bit bulky...he..he..

10 days later I got a call from doctor office. The combine screening test result was good, meaning there is nothing to worry about. Oh, Thank God!

First Doctor Check Up

Tuesday, May 4th, 2009



Today I'm officially 7 weeks and 2 days pregnant. So far, I feel perfectly fine, no morning sickness, no nausea, no vommit, no exessively fatigue, no food craving, nothing! It's been being a really easy pregnancy to me. Thanks to all the supplement regiment I took before I got pregnant and a healthy diet. I do feel that my palate is slightly change that made certain foods taste like metal. But it doesn't really bother my appetite. Oh, and I don't know if this is considered food craving, but I eat more fruits than ever before. Especially grapes, berries and oranges!

We're getting ready for our first obgyn checkup. Few days after those positive pregnancy tests, I was still not fully convinced and wanted to have more accurate test done in the clinic. I called Planned Parenthood and general clinics. But all they can do is urine test. None of obgyn clinic want to see me untill I'm 7 weeks pregnant. So, I went through Aetna website, my insurance company, to find obgyn nearby that has good review and ratings. I found this clinic "Oakwood Women Center", located next to Round Rock St. David hospital. I registered under Dr. Susan Orth. Meanwhile, I stopped taking supplement regimen for my alkaline diet and started to take prenatal supplements. I ordered Rainbow Light One a Day Prenatal and Spectrum DHA (made from algal oil, instead of fish oil), Calcium, vitamin B, and vitamin C. I read lots about pregnancy diet and vegetarian baby.

At 1.30pm we arrived at the clinic. After filling out the registration form, we waited in the lovely waiting room. Half an hour later, a nurse came and called out my name. She took my urine sample then lead us to USG room and told me to undress waist down and lay down on the examining table. We waited in that dimly lit room until next staff came in and explained procedure to us. Since I'm only 7 weeks pregnant the best way to confirm pregnancy is with transvaginal USG, where the probe called transducer inserted into my vagina.

I laid there, my feet on stirrups, the nurse lubricated the probe with gel and and placed it inside of me, then we all nervously watched the screen and waited and....there it is...a hollow sac filled with little tiny thing that looked like a jelly bean! She said, "That's your baby! Congratulation!" She magnified that jelly bean and we could see something inside throbbing. "That's the tiny baby's heart pounding" She turned on the speaker and we could listen to the baby's heartbeats. Oh My God! It was amazing! My eyes were wet while I told her how long we've been waiting for this baby, how hard we tried, all the challenges with cyst and cancer, and just when we were less expected, it suddenly happened. It's a miracle! She congrated us.

The nurse worked around my abdomen with the USG probe to check if everything else is fine. Then she found another white sac in my right ovary. The size is about 2cm. It's a cyst! I can't believe the cyst came back. But, nurse told me as the baby grows and my hormon changes, the cyst ussualy will shrivel. I'm so relieved. So, nothing to worry about. Everything else is perfectly normal. There's no sign of ectopic pregnancy, baby's heartbeat is normal (146 bpm), my blood pressure and urine test is normal. I'm healthy and I'm having a healthy baby. Thank you Lord Jesus!

Nurse gave us copies of USG fotos and video (in DVD) and she congrated us again. Then we waited to see our doctor. Dr. Orth is friendly and warm. She estimated my due date will be on December 20th, based on my LMP (Last day of my Menstrual Period). Close to Christmas! She explained briefly what to expect during the next 8 months, what kind of tests will be performed and some of them are optionals, the risks of having baby in my age for first time (I'll be 38 yo this August), etc. When we were done, the nurse gave me a bag full with magazines, pregnancy guide book, booklets, and samples of prenatal supplement. Wow!

When we got home, I went straight to my laptop and wrote emails about this great news to my best buddies: Jolanda, Esther, Veyke, and Rini. Also to my sister-in-law Indah. Loel couldn't wait and called Britt already and broke this news. Britt was excited and wrote in his facebook,"I'm gonna be a big brother". OMG! That was so, so, sweet of him! I then browsed Craigslist for baby gears. The thought of being pregnant become more real and I was a bit overwhelmed with excitements. After all, this is my first pregnancy, and I'm entering a new phase in women's life: motherhood...