The longest three hours of my life just came to an end about half an hour ago.  I write this while still on an adrenaline high and still a little teary.  I will try to make this story short.  No promises.

Today I had my first appointment with the regular OB.  I was really excited to be able to see what life is like on the other end of the fertility spectrum.  A waiting room full of pregnant ladies.  People actually talking in the waiting room instead of staring straight forward in complete silence and refusing to make eye contact with anyone.  A husband and wife sitting in the corner bitching about their 3 kids at home and now the 4th one is on the way, how miserable.  It was fun, I felt a little like a spy.

After a long wait I get back to the exam room and my Dr does a complete work up on me.  This is when I get my first little tinge of "I don't like you" towards this man.  Reason - he keeps commenting on how my cervix bleeds every time he pokes it!  WTF?  Then stop poking it!  What are you doing?!?  But he then crawls back out of my vagina and says everything is fine and it's nothing to worry about.  Then why were you poking it?  I don't think I like you.

Then he breaks out the ultrasound machine.  Now, I realize that I am a little spoiled by the fancy equipment they have at Shady Grove Fertility.  And I didn't expect them to have the newest of the brightest machines.  However, the man pulled out what looked like an Apple IIe with a dirty yellow stick that is the internal ultrasound wand.  This thing was straight out of the 80's.  How is this possible?  This is the most commonly recommended OB office in all of Frederick and THIS is their ultrasound machine?  Oh Shit.

During the ultrasound I kept hearing a lot of "Hmmmm. . . . yeah."  A lot of unhappy face was up in my vagina.  He didn't say a word.  He just kept sighing and shaking his head.  I went into worry mode.  "I don't see a heartbeat."  And with that horrifying statement he pulled the ultrasound wand out and turned the machine off.  He then started going into the speech of what we do next. 

"No heartbeat means miscarriage.  I am very sorry.  I know this is hard."

NOT what I was prepared to hear today.

"Now I am going to send you to a specialist just to make sure they don't see a heartbeat either.  And then we can discuss if you wish to loose the baby naturally or have another D&C"

I FEEL like I am going to pass out.

"You can get dressed now and my assistant will get your referral prepared for you.  Have a nice day."

As I am sure you can imagine panic the likes of which no one should ever have to experience filled my body and I am amazed I was able to function enough to put clothes on, let alone drive to a different Dr office.  And please keep in mind that I am alone.  Morgan is at work.  I told him there was no point to coming to this appointment when he just saw an ultrasound on Thursday.  I am alone and in total and utter panic.

This is where I will fast forward almost 2 hours.  This specialist office is more like what I am used to.  Everything is shiny and new and all the equipment is state of the art.  I am led to an exam room with the biggest ultrasound machine I have ever seen in my life.  It looks like a control panel from Star Trek.  And there is a HUGE flat screen Tv mounted on the wall so you can watch the ultrasound image up there and larger than life.  It's all kinds of awesome.  That beautiful ultrasound tech was in my coot for all of 3 seconds before she showed me the biggest and most amazing heartbeat you have ever seen!  Strong.  Loud.  Regular.  Healthy.  This is when the flood gate broke and I cried like someone just shot my puppy.  Big ugly cry.  Crying while trying soooo hard to stop so I could see the baby without the blur of tears in the way.  The tech must be used to this sort of thing.  She calmly explained to me that the machines my OB uses are very outdated (already knew that!) and that it's not surprising they could not pick up a heartbeat at 7 weeks.  She keeps the image of the baby and the audio of the heartbeat up till I finally stop crying.  Bless her.



And thus ends the longest three hours of my life.  I'm not sure I want to go back to that OB office.  I know I don't want to see that man again.  There are 3 Dr's at this practice and I don't think I would have the option of not seeing this man in particular.  From what I was told they take turns with the patients.  I called out from work when I was on my way to see the specialist.  So at least I have the rest of the day to calm my ass down and perhaps consult the internets on different OB practices in my area.  I'm exhausted.

Happy Monday, everyone!