Today I went to see my midwife. I just couldn't live with the anxiety anymore. I'd been spotting for 11 days, light spotting, but spotting nonetheless.
It was a very reassuring visit. First, she listened to the heartbeat. I cannot ever hear that whoosh-whoosh-whoosh without crying. I am still in such disbelief that it's really me, sitting in an ob/gyn office, not the infertility clinic. One interesting side note: I always had high blood pressure at the infertility doctor's. Sometimes, I wouldn't even let them take it, because it would just stress me out. But the last two visits at my midwife's have been 128/80, and today, a perfect 119/80.
Anyway, the heartbeat was fine, and then she did a quick pelvic exam. She said my cervix looks "very pregnant" (huh?) and that her strong feeling is that it's my cervix bleeding, not anything in the uterus. She dabbed away a lot of blood- all brown- and told me it's going to be okay. For some reason, my cervix is very sensitive and irritated. She said this will likely stop soon.
Tomorrow is my big hospital ultrasound, for the nuchal translucency screening (and also marks 13 weeks). Even though our donor was only 23 years old, I want the extra reassurance. I also want to see the baby again! I am really looking forward to this.
So, I guess I can relax again. I'm not sure if I will ever fully relax until the bleeding stops, but I will try. She said most women really feel better at around 20 weeks, when you can start to feel the baby move on a regular basis. I cannot wait.
I'm so glad you could get in and receive the reassurance that everything is ok. I can relate to high blood pressure in the RE's office! Mine is always way higher than it is normally. I hope that tomorrow goes swimmingly and you get a nice clear picture of your baby! So exciting. There are varying thoughts on it, but some people get a doppler thingie to hear the heartbeat at home whenever. My best friend did this for all three of her pregnancies and it was very reassuring. The naysayers are because sometimes you may have trouble finding the heartbeat and that can cause undue stress and trauma, and, if god forbid something happened and there was no heartbeat to be found you probably wouldn't want to discover that on your couch. She found it very reassuring until she could feel the baby move and do all those kick counts. You're getting so close to that moving around part! I'm glad you got a good answer on the bleeding and everything is marching along! :)
ReplyDeleteThanks for the comment. I am bleeding even more now, but in a way that's reassuring too, because she did wipe my cervix with one of those swab things, so now I have perhaps even more evidence that it's my cervix misbehaving.
DeleteIt just feels really like bad luck- to have had such trouble conceiving, to be in the less than 4% of women my age do IVF who even need to use donor eggs and then on top of that, to fall in the 25% of women who experience bleeding. But I know- I am pregnant and chances are it will work out, so I am working on being grateful for that.
Nothing's ever easy, it just feels like!