Heartbeat

The blastocyst that was transferred to my uterus a month ago is now 10mm long. He or she has a heartbeat of 152 beats per minute that was strong enough to be heard by the Doppler ultrasound. I was given a grainy picture depicting an alien floating in a black bubble that looks, I am told, exactly as it should at this stage. It's pretty crazy.

I know that other people have described bursting into tears or otherwise feeling overcome when they heard their baby's heartbeat for the first time, but for me, the big moment was when the first image came on the screen and it looked like the other eleventy billion 7-week ultrasounds I googled in preparation for this visit. I gasped and put my hands over my mouth and my RE said "are you okay?" and I sort of squeaked back "yes" and he continued his measurements. He was totally unfazed and only took about 90 seconds to look around and say "yup, as expected, everything looks normal." The longest part of the appointment was after the scan when I complained about morning sickness and everything he suggested, I had already tried - finally the nurse broke in to say that she has two children, remembers how awful the first trimester was, and to just hang in there. They did say that I can have a prescription for Zofran if it gets really bad, and I'll keep that in mind... I don't want to resort to any kind of drug, even a really safe one, if there's any way to avoid it. Until then, blech.

I won't have another scan for (knock on wood) about 3 weeks. So much suspense! At least it's Friday so I have the next two days to lie on the couch and stare at the ultrasound picture. Wow, a heartbeat, wow wow wow!