Peanut with a heartbeat...

First of all, I want to thank everyone for the positive responses about this blog. Since I didn't get any "this sucks" comments, I decided to continue on. So, now you get to take the blame for the rest of these blogs. On to our show...

Well, we had our first real doctor's appointment on January 11th. Going in I was really nervous, because we were coming up on week 11 and it was going to be our first attempt at hearing a heartbeat. You see, ever since we found out we were pregnant, I feel like I've been walking on egg shells. We wanted to wait until the first trimester was over before we started telling people, but we were just so excited, we told everybody the next day. So now I feel like Joe Namath guaranteeing a win at the Super Bowl, this thing better happen!

The visit itself went kind of strange. They got Cristy into the room and ready for the exam, then I came in to wait with her for the doctor. From what I can gather, nine months ago, someone had a great party with lots of booze and bad decisions happening, because this place was busy! We waited about an hour for the doctor, who she said she had to hurry because she had to "catch a baby!" The doctor quickly put the device on Cristy's belly and found the heartbeat. Once I confirmed with the doc it was the heartbeat, I felt a huge sense of relief. It was the greatest thing in the world to hear it for the first time and to see the joy on Cristy's face. For both of us, I think it made everything real and confirmed to us that "we're parents"!

Just as I started feeling all these emotions, the doc moved on. She finished the exam, answered a few questions and took off. Why is it I'm already pissed that other babies are getting special treatment. Just because they are fully developed and ready to enter the world, doesn't mean my peanut gets shafted doctor time! In all seriousness, our doctor is great and spent as much time with us as we needed. She could have sat there all day with the heartbeat-listening device and it still wouldn't have been enough.

Obviously, we're still not out of the woods yet, but hearing the heartbeat was another hurdle to get over and certainly eased my neurosis just a little bit more. All I can say is, the doctor better pack a lunch when it comes time to bust out the ultrasound...