Sunday, January 3, 2010

Fancy ultrasound! Maybe.

Ultrasound tomorrow! Woo!

2.0 had better cooperate, unlike someone else we know who refused to show her face but was all LOOK AT ME LOOK AT ME when it came to the girlie bits.

Last time, I was so excited for the 32-week ultrasound. They do the *4D or 3D or whatever it's called, and you get a nice little DVD of your precious wee squid's little face, blah de blah de blah. Well, The Child decided that day was a good day to hide behind the placenta, so the fancy ultrasound didn't happen. Feh. I'm still excited about this one, but no more than the others. I don't want to get all disappointed again.

(*4D? I do not understand how you can have an ultrasound in four dimensions. I mean, no matter how nice it is, it will always be two-dimensional. At best, it's faux 3D, since yes, the eye can translate a 2D image into three dimensions, but I refuse to believe that a photograph can capture both time and space, or am I missing something here? Do we have new technology?)

Now, I think this baby is smaller. All my clothes fit better now than they did at this time with Grace. And **last I checked, I was way behind on weight gain compared to my first. Finally, my fundal height is measuring normal, and with Grace it was consistently 3-4 cm ahead after about 24 weeks or so.

(**This would be before Christmas, I admit. I have not had the guts to weigh myself since I spent a week at my grandma-in-law's house eating fabulous cookies and all kinds of good comfort food, and then, of course, there was the road food on the way there and back, and the food-you-eat-when-you-are-totally-exhausted-and-get-home-from-a-trip-and-there's-nothing-in-the-refrigerator kind of food, and oh, I do not want to have to worry about 40 pounds of baby weight yet again. Especially if I have another C-section and everything's a struggle for six months anyway.)

But then yesterday I looked at myself sideways in the mirror, and either that mirror is bent in the middle, or somebody was doing a headstand on my spine, like this:

My spine
|
|o>-< <--"somebody"
|

or this baby just got huuuuge. She doesn't seem huge, really. But now I'm starting to think that's just wishful thinking. We kind of find out tomorrow, I guess (only kind of because ultrasounds are not terribly accurate).

Grace was measured at 6.5 pounds by this point. Six. Point. Five. Pounds. I remember getting these weekly emails from What to Expect, and right around the time I got my 32-week ultrasound, they sent me one that said something like, "Your baby is now about 3 pounds!" and then I snorted coffee through my nose onto my laptop screen.

So, here's to Emmeline being a wee little thing. Or at least wee enough that she can exit in the normal way (please oh please oh please).

5 comments:

  1. 1. My doctor says moms have a great feel for how big their kid is, the second+ time(s) around. Having said that, I was oblivious, but everyone who saw me pregnant both times was like LORD HAVE MERCY, WOMAN, YOU'RE GOING TO BIRTH A RHINO! and I was like 'whatever, i seem to remember it sucking pretty bad last time with the ...omg i'm a whale... thing and he was teeny.' and expected a seven pounder or something. (she was 8 lb 9 oz) so yeah.

    2. 4D = video. They put it on a DVD for us when we had that with J and I made everyone sit and watch it. We couldn't afford it with R
    :( :( :(

    ReplyDelete
  2. Yeah, it's 4D because it's video instead of a still picture. So you *are* capturing both time and space, because you're looking at a 3-dimensional image of the baby, but you're looking at it through time (i.e. video, so you can see the baby move). Hence, 4-D.

    I thought that ultrasound weight estimates weren't all that accurate, so I don't know. I was always given a, "your baby is between 5 and 8 pounds" by the doctor, very useful there. My babies always measured "ahead," as in they gave a due date about a week sooner than my due date... but then I still give birth late and only then when I'm induced. But to big babies! 9 pounds 4 ounces for a first baby is nothing to sneeze at.

    I hope you get some nice fancy ultrasound shots, though! It sounds like fun! And it's really neat to see your baby that way before he/she's born, isn't it? I like it when they're sucking their thumbs or something like that.

    I actually just got an ultrasound scheduled for tomorrow. My new ob apparently does ultrasounds at 7 weeks for dating purposes. Since I just switched insurance, I'm already 8 weeks along, oops. It'll be neat. I've never had one done so early. I hope they do another one later, though, as I'm sure you can't tell the sex this soon.

    ReplyDelete
  3. But you don't want Emmeline to be too much smaller than her sister. She needs to be able to defend herself when Grace starts picking on her.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Celeste, I have a feeling this one is going to be scrappy. She's ALWAYS moving. I'm just hoping it's not an Ella. :P (I think Ella's great, but if I had her as my own, it would definitely be a learning experience for me)

    But I still don't get it. We don't call 3D movies 4D. And it's not *really* a 3D image. It's a 2D image that tricks the brain into thinking it's 3D. So, a 4D ultrasound is, at best, 3D, with an x-, a y- and a time-axis. Oh my head. I don't know why I'm so stupidly hung up on this.

    ReplyDelete
  5. How'd it go? Did you get a nice view of little Emmeline?

    Are you going to use the full name Emmeline, or nickname her Emmy or Emma or something? Just curious (we use our oldest daughter's full name, but nickname the younger sometimes).

    And 3D movies aren't really 3D either, same thing, they just trick the viewer. I think they use 3D for those because it's a term that the general public understands. Apparently you go a bit beyond the general public. :)

    ReplyDelete