Today was my first real prenatal appointment. The first one I had was just talking to a nurse there, and so today I had everything done. I'm assuming that my lab work came back normal since she didn't mention anything to me, but I had to have some more stuff done as well.
I really really really like my nurse-midwife. She's a lieutenant commander, which is slightly intimidating because the only other O-4 I've known is my dad, but she's really down to earth. She explained everything she was doing and WHY she was doing it as she did it, and that made me feel very comfortable with her. She answered my questions very directly and thoroughly, and I didn't feel as though she was trying to avoid answering them. She was really quite friendly, and we just took to each other quite well. I think I will keep her -- there are four to choose from, but I like her.
So first I had the whole nine yards with the typical annual woman's exam. Oh joy of joys. Man, those things can hurt!! Anyhow. But then she told me she was going to do an ultrasound, which surprised me since I'm just ten and a half weeks pregnant.
She started the ultrasound and took some stills before letting me see the screen. As she did that, she had Kurt brought into the exam room, and right as he came in, we got to see the baby moving around and waving its arms and legs. It was so cool!! Then the nurse-midwife pointed out the heartbeat, just a small fluttering of the image. I was so enthralled.
Not the world's greatest photo, but it's my baby's first! The head is down to the left, and s/he's 4.5cm, or just 2 inches, long.
After the appointment, I had to go to the lab to have a glucose test done to see if I have gestational diabetes. Since I had to wait an hour to have my blood drawn to see what effect it had on me, we went wandering around the hospital. We found the labor & delivery area, and Kurt was hankering to see the little babies. We walked in to say that we'd like to look around since I'm pregnant, and a very nice lady at the nurse's station gave us a tour.
They have rooms for you to rest in while you're in labor that have beds and whatnot, and she also showed me the OR where they perform the C-sections. It was nice to see that the OR is on the same ward in case something goes wrong and they need to do an emergency one. Then we went across the hall to see the delivery rooms.
The delivery rooms are pretty cool. They're small and intimate, and all but one of the rooms have a tub installed! That made me really excited because the Navy is notorious for having the oldest of anything, but here they have something to help the woman labor. Also, I asked if the baby would be taken away from me right away, like some hospitals do, but she told me that I could keep the baby as long as I wanted to. I also found out that there isn't a nursery in this hospital -- which annoyed Kurt only in that he couldn't look at tiny babies today. What's cool about not having a nursery is that the baby stays with you as long as you're in the hospital. And they don't try to shove you out of the hospital. The lady told me if you need more time, you can stay a little longer. That's cool.
So I feel a lot better about everything having seen the L&D deck. Hopefully, everything goes well and I won't need a C-section, but I feel pretty confident right now about everything. Ask me in September and I may think otherwise!!! :o)