I'm Pretty Sure Those Are Flippers

Just so you all know, I looked. I looked everywhere I could think of as a matter of fact. Acoustics R Us, Doppler World, Best Buy, and even Ebay did not have it. I did find one on Absolute Medical's website, but I thought that $112,000 was a little out of my budget. Plus they did not have 12 months same as cash. If ya'll are lost; I am talking about an ultrasound machine. Figure it's about time to upgrade from the doppler since we are getting further into the pregnancy.

Since I failed so miserably, Emilee has taken matters into her own hands. She simply has someone at work shoot the pics. I normally just shake my head and mutter something about warping the kid's brain from all of the sound waves bouncing off of it. So when we had to run out to her work to pick up some jeans that one of the past pregnant was loaning her she vanished. I lost her for about 10 minutes, and then she came flying around the corner to tell me to follow her. PRONTO! When I asked where we were going I got look #17 (do what your told, no questions asked) and promptly followed.

I was lead into a dark room with a TV screen as its only light. One of the other nurses was in there and I realized I was in for a lesson. I was going to get schooled in the art of the underground ultrasound. Underground because I am sure I will be advised to lie to the midwife/doc next time we go in for an ultrasound. I mean I can't just shout out "last week when we were looking at it the head looked more like ET than it does today". So Emilee lay onto the table and the show started. At least there was no wand needed for this one.

I will admit that it is getting easier to identify the parts, well the uterus and the fetus anyway. It still looks like organized static for the most part, but the other nurse was able to point some things out. We now have an easily defined head, back, arms, and legs. Although I am not too sure they are arms, but more on that in a minute. She even made the remark that everything looked well proportioned and that she could make out the ear holes. Ear lobes don't totally develop for another few weeks. It was really neat to see the baby and how peaceful it looked in utero. Then the most awesome thing I have seen yet happened; it moved!

It started doing flips, dips, bends, and stretches. It even started to "swim" across the screen. It looked like the arms were fluttering up and down to propel the kid all over the place. And then I had a strange thought. Those stubs really don't look like arms, in fact I'm pretty sure those are flippers. The image on the screen looked nothing like a kid. It looked more like...a manatee!

Now I am a lover of animals, marine life in particular, but I don't know how well I would handle having to shop at Inland Seafood for our baby formula. You want to think that love conquers all, but I am not sure I could learn the click and posture language of the sea cow. I am sure I could learn how to measure the proper salinity for the pool, but where would we keep the fresh sardines. Pretty standard concerns I thought. I looked away from the screen and at Emilee and I realized immediately that I had actually been thinking out loud. She just shook her head and said "you will love our baby whatever kind of mammal it is."

Fortunately we had someone with us who could interpret the images and my fears were allayed. The arms were perfectly normal for this stage of development and everything else looks human too!

Stay Safe,

Rob

*I have kept names out of this to protect the guilty/innocent. Please remember that everything in this blog is fabricated if it can get anyone into trouble.