Flicker Flicker Flicker Flicker ...

All systems go. We had the first prenatal appointment today, at 7 weeks exactly, and were rewarded with a beautiful ultrasound. One little embryo, one little yolk sack, both measuring exactly what they're supposed to, positioned exactly where they're supposed to be in the uterus. And, most exciting of all, a little fluttering heartbeat, right on schedule, that we couldn't take our eyes off of.

I know some people talk about feelings of maternal warmth and excitement and utter amazement upon seeing the first fuzzy ultrasound images. I guess I felt those things, too, but mainly, I felt overwhelming relief. I've been feeling sick enough that I knew I wasn't just imagining that I was pregnant, but still... a blood test showing elevated hormone levels seems so abstract, even if it is accompanied by very real nausea and food aversions. Seeing a little heartbeat, though... that seemed to show me something much more concrete. Proof that I'm actually building something in there. (S. and I have been joking for weeks that all my energy is going towards "creating infrastructure," but it's a whole other thing to actually see the infrastructure in black and white.) And for the record, it seems that S. felt many of the same feelings that I felt, in his own muted sort of way, but was mainly fascinated on a technical level. I suppose that's probably normal; people have told us that a woman starts to be a mother the moment she gets a positive pregnancy test, but a man doesn't start to be a father until he actually sees the baby after delivery.

Dr. M. used his little spinny wheel thing to calculate a due date, and came up with September 11. (I had calculated September 9 myself....) I cringed and asked him if he really needed to record the date as 9/11. He offered to write down the 10th instead, but S. actually took the opposite side and asked to keep it as the 11th. ("It's an easy date to remember!" Yeah, but for the wrong reasons....) The ultrasound computer calculated it to be the 8th, plus or minus 2 days, so I think that I'm just going to stick with the 9th. So there it is. 9/9. Our next appointment is in 4 weeks, when I'll be at 11 weeks even.

Also, because of my family history of diabetes, Dr. M. wants me to take the gestational diabetes glucose tolerance test early, as in sometime this week, as opposed to week 24 or so when normal people do it. I'm a bit nervous, because I don't want to give up my beloved anti-nausea saltines.... But overall, I'm just thrilled that things look good. Now, S. and I are actually moving on to a discussion of how long we want to wait before we tell our families!