11 Weeks and Counting...

Ok, so once again my expectations for my most recent doctor's appointment were not met. Dammit! I think I've learned the lesson though, which is simply not to have expectations. Everyone's doctor is different and everyone's pregnancy is different, and I'll know better next time around I suppose, blah blah blah. Still, at this stage in the game when I really don't 'feel pregnant' yet, I'm totally reliant on the pictures of what in heck is going on inside of my body. And while pictures of strangers' uteruses (uteri?) are helpful from a logical standpoint, they're just not doing it for the illogical side of me (which, these days, is approximately 99.8% of myself). Hence the stock photo of some strange fetus in some strange womb in the 11th week, which is where Lil' B is now. It somehow reminds me of the Japanese flag. Cute, but not as cute as ours. This week you are to note the very well developed joints, which allow the baby to do somersaults and bounce around off the walls of the sac (no, I am not making this up), the budding fingernail beds (nails come next week), and that the eyes are moving around to the front of the head and the spine is straightening. Woohoo! Now that's progress. And it seems to be a little more than two inches long, or about the size of my engagement ring (just kidding). I'm looking around trying to find something comparable and I don't seem to own anything that's two inches long. How odd. Oh wait! My thumb is a little more than two inches from just above the first joint. Cool. Thumb Baby.

I'm exaggerating about the level of disappointment with my doctor's appointment. While it's true that I was hoping for an ultrasound and didn't get one (hmph!), otherwise it went really well. I wish Sean had been there to meet the doctor, who this time was Dr. Pat Robinson (she works with Dr. Weinstein and I'll see both docs throughout the pregnancy). Dr. Robinson said that they deliver more than 200 babies a year and only about two are delivered by the stand-by docs ("both boys," she said) when she and Dr. Weinstein are off for the Jewish holidays. Are doctors really allowed to take holidays? Aside from this apparent slacker mentality, she was really great--fabulous bedside manner, really took time with me to talk about concerns and take my history, and seemed otherwise like a perfectly normal person, which is always good.

The reason I didn't get an ultrasound this visit has something to do with the fact that the FNT (Fetal Nuchal Translucency test) has to be done at the hospital...I'm not sure why. The con of that is that it required making yet another appointment which won't be for another week and a half (optimal timing for the test is 13 weeks), but the pro is that we get to check out Hackensack University Medical Center, where we'll be having the kid.

Also disappointing this week is that we weren't able to go down the shore with Sean's family after all. When he returned from AZ he had hours and hours of preparation for the Dallas trip (where he is now), so there was just no way. More disappointing than not being at the beach though is the fact that we now have to wait another week to tell Eva, Courtney and Derek. We'll go down to New Hope next weekend for a cookout though, and tell them then. Can't wait till Sean is home tonight--should be the last trip for a while!

Oh--and in other news, Sadie is taking her role of preparing us for parenthood very seriously. Yesterday she ate half of a cake and a loaf of very expensive organic flax seed bread. Right off the counter. Better her than me, but still. She then proceeded to lose most of the cake right ON the new silk drapes in the office/baby's room. That will teach me.