Week 14: With a whoosh and a gallop...

Today I am officially 14 weeks pregnant, solidly in the second trimester! It's hard to believe Ziggy has been inside me for 12 weeks now, making his/her home in there :) In honor of my 14 weeks, I decided to give the doppler another try this morning after reading some suggestions online. Other women recommended trying first thing in the morning before going to the bathroom, so the bladder would be full, which would push the uterus up. Supposedly raising the hips with pillows can also help. So, I did both, and something must have worked because amazingly I heard Ziggy's little heartbeat right away! Sometimes it sounded more like a whooshing sound, and sometimes like the clippoty-clop of a galloping horse's hooves. Either way, very cool!

I didn't have a stop watch, so I loosely tried to measure the heart rate using a digital clock. It was somewhere between 130 and 140 bpm, which is in the normal range of 120-160. Next time I listen I'll use AC's stopwatch to try to get a more accurate result. Luckily AC hadn't left for work yet so he got to listen as well. At some point, we should also try to record the heartbeat, so we can send it out to the rest of the family.

Anyway, it was such a huge relief to hear the heartbeat and know that Ziggy is still alive and well in there. I know I'm just being paranoid, but sometimes I really worry that something has happened to Ziggy. Even though it's been weeks and weeks since my single episode of bleeding, every time I go to the bathroom and wipe, I still expect to see blood on the paper, and breathe a sigh of relief when there's none. I wonder if all pregnant women feel this way.

In my case, I have always been extremely aware of the fragility of life before birth. Starting around the age of six, I saw my mother go through five miscarriages, the last one being a set of twins (first she lost one, and then the other). Well, I never literally see her miscarry, thank goodness, but I saw the aftermath. I distinctly remember her crawling into the closet and lying there crying while my step-dad stood by not knowing what to do. At the time I didn't understand what was going on, just that my mother was in pain. Later someone must have explained what had happened to me.

I figure that must be why I have such a fear of miscarriage. That and having to deal with the infertility, knowing that if we lose Ziggy, we can't just wait to get pregnant the old-fashioned way in a few months. Having another baby will mean going back to New York, back to Dr. M, back to another IVF cycle. It would be easier this time, since we already have the frozen embryos, but still, not something I want to have to do. Anyway, I didn't mean to turn this post into a downer, so I think I'll stop here. In the meantime, I am going to try to put aside my fears of losing Ziggy and just focus on this miracle of life that is happening inside me.