Week 17: The week we were excited to have another Dr. Appt!
This was a pretty quiet week overall – mostly I was just looking forward to our scheduled midwife visit at the end of the week, along with massage and acupuncture appointments.
I realized that I’d gotten so used to monitoring of some kind (ultrasounds or fetal heart rate monitoring) over the first 3 months of the pregnancy that suddenly going a whole month with no monitoring was a lot harder than I expected. While I had no reason to suspect anything was wrong, I had some anxiety over the last week or two just wanting reassurance that the baby is still doing okay!
Thankfully when we went in for the midwife appointment we got to hear the fetal heartbeat and everything sounded great! The heartrate was around 140 which is perfectly normal. My uterus can be felt coming up to a little below my belly button, which is also a good measurement for this point in the pregnancy.
My next regular appointment will be in 4 more weeks, but we have the 20-week ultrasound scheduled in 3 weeks, so we don’t have to wait quite as long between visits this time.
We scheduled our follow-up doula session on Saturday, July 27th – we have already met with one of the doulas but will meet with her doula partner and then sign the contract if we all feel good about moving forward together.
My massage appointment was nice – they do the massages differently when you’re pregnant. They don’t want you lying on your tummy at all, or on your right side for an extended time. So, I was on my back propped up with 2 pillows for most of the massage, then on my left side with a pillow between my legs and one under my head for the other part of the massage. It’s still definitely worthwhile, but I do miss the really deep tissue massages I was used to getting pre-pregnancy!
Baby Stats:
Size: about 4.5 inches , 4 oz, pickle-sized!
Major Developments: Eyes can detect light. Ears have been migrating to final spot.
Dad Info:
Dr Visits: Prenatal visit with midwife. Good blood pressure. Had AFP test done (for spinal defects) – result = negative.
Symptoms: Not as much abdominal muscle pain. Headaches (but not too bad), bladder control issues.