The Pregnancy Diaries #9 – The 20 Week Scan

Tuesday 31st January 2017

We saw our baby again this afternoon. In one breath, it was incredible. I had been counting down the days to see my little one again. To check in, check how much baby had grown… to see the little life growing in my tummy move around and be. Words can’t describe the feeling that I get in my heart when I see my baby on the screen above me. It feels like it’s just me and my baby in the room. Everything going on around me becomes a blur. I can’t properly hear the medical jargon that the Sonographer mumbles under his breath. The silence that hangs in the air around his concentration is irrelevant. I just lay there on the bed, gripping Matt’s hand and watching the screen in amazement and complete awe. I feel like I have to remind myself to breathe in these moments. It’s almost like I don’t want to waste any time because as much as having these scans can tell you, they go fast…And I never want to miss a single second of the experience.

This time was different though.

It didn’t go fast. It took me a while to notice in all of the excitement. It took me a bit of time to realise that the Sonographer was prodding my tummy that little bit harder, more aggressively. It took me a bit of time to realise that he was repeating two measurements in particular, over and over again. Once I did, I removed myself from my happy bubble and joined Matt in the room where I was met with more mumbling and the words cleft palate being thrown around, abnormalities and incomplete heart measurements. And, suddenly I felt numb.

I tried to read the Sonographer’s face, I tried to pick apart every facial expression.

I didn’t understand what he was saying. I didn’t understand his cold tone. I didn’t understand why he wasn’t being a little more kind to us. I didn’t understand what all of this was going to mean for our baby, for our baby’s life. I didn’t want him to tell me to come back in a few weeks time because he isn’t sure if our baby has a cleft palate and / or something wrong with the heart. I didn’t want him to take one final look before marching us out of the door, to then tell us that just because he can’t see any other abnormalities, it doesn’t mean that they are not there.

And worse still, I didn’t understand why I was justifying what he said on the way home. I didn’t understand why I was saying that he probably has to give a ‘disclaimer’ like that to all parents-to-be. I didn’t understand why I felt so calm.

Was it because deep down, I believed with my whole, maternal heart that everything was fine? Was it because I believed with everything that I am, that we would get through anything? Was it because I felt that after everything that me and my baby had already been through together, this wasn’t going to distance us from each other? I don’t know!

I told myself that everything was fine and threw myself in to sharing the news about the sex of our baby with our nearest and dearest. I launched myself into all of the things about the scan that we could celebrate… and would! I let the love and excitement from those around us envelop me and conceal any doubt in the back of my mind. I let them take away the ‘what-if’s’ and the questions that I was pushing down in to the pit of my body.

But tonight, as my exhausted body tries with all of its might to fall asleep in the dark, I am praying that my little human is okay… And I will, every night until ‘a few weeks time’… And then again, until my baby is nestled in my arms, safe and sound and surrounded by so much love.

With Love,

Ria x