Cremation and Ultrasound

The juxtaposition of last Thursday cannot be understated. Less then 8 hours after seeing our beloved dog pass away we were scheduled for an ultrasound of our baby.

After C woke me me to tell me the news, I didn't return to sleep at all that night and spent the time laying awake in bed. This was now my third night with very minimal sleep, one to two hours at the most.

We got up early and took Marv to the vet to say our final goodbyes and have him cremated. And then we drove straight to the ultrasound appointment.

I wasn't hungry, but C made me eat a little something before the appointment. We then waited to be called back and tried not to look like we were utterly depressed in the Maternal Fetal Medicine waiting room.

The ultra-sound technician has just graduated from school a month earlier and was only working there for three weeks. She was very nice, but with a squirmy baby, she was not the most expedient person. The room we were in also had a broken monitor so I spent the entire time trying to strain my neck to see her screen and because of her lack of experience, she didn't angle the screen well for us both being able to look at it. After she was finally finished, her supervisor came in to repeat certain parts that she didn't get a great picture of. Then the doctor came in to get her own look at certain parts. Needless to say, it was a somewhat long and painful experience. C sat in the chair next to me in the dark room and nearly fell asleep several times and I couldn't blame him at all.

I don't want to complain too much, because everyone treated us well and getting to see our little one squirm is never something to balk at. While I couldn't see everything very well, all of the measurements were great and there are no concerns at this point. The baby is measuring in at 10 ounces, which puts it at the 30th percentile. I was very happy about this because it's still in the normal range but on the smaller end, although the doctor later told me that measurements this early on aren't very predictive of actual birth weight. When the ultrasound technician asked if we wanted to know the gender, we of course said yes!

"Three lines," she said. It's a GIRL! Then I immediately began crying. Not loud, but tears were definitely falling. It was just too much emotion at that moment, that day, that week. "It" is a "she" and she is a healthy baby.

There is no doubt in my mind that C and I would have loved both Marv and our little girl and we would have been a very happy family. But there is still this feeling that one chapter of our life is coming to an end and another is just beginning and this is very bittersweet. I sometimes think about how in movies, often when a character dies, they talk about the timing of this coming after this character has served their purpose and has left the other characters changed and in a good place. There was no reason for Marv to die, but he did change us. He did help us so much in our time of sadness. And he did leave us when we are in a better place.