The wait was finally over and on Monday 11th June my husband and I set off for the shiny new Pembury hospital for our 12 week scan leaving our other two children with their beloved Grandad at home. I admit I was excited but nervous. I had already been warned that at the age of 39 my chances of having a high risk pregnancy were much higher than had been previously. I remember my midwife reeling off some very daunting looking statistics at my 9 week appointment whilst I sat quietly and listened with a knitted brow asking myself if I should be worried. I tried to push it to the back of my mind and did what I imagined most of us Mummies-to-be do and simply hoped for the best.
When we arrived at the hospital we signed in and entered the large polished waiting room and sat quietly awaiting our turn. I glanced at some of the other couples sat around the room and wondered as I tried to work out their poker faces whether they felt a little nervous too.
The sonographer called out my name after a fortunately short wait. I couldn’t help but notice though her somewhat serious expression combined with an absence of lighthearted small talk and as I followed her into the darkened room I felt like I was about to sit some sort of exam and she was about to tell me whether I’d passed or not. I laid down on the bench and and gripped my husband’s hand as he sat on the chair next to me. The sonographer squirted warm gel onto my tummy and I couldn’t help but turn my head away from the screen for a moment until I knew things were okay.
When I heard Brett comment in a relaxed voice on the ghostly image of the baby I swung my head back round and stared at the screen. There it was my third little jellybean, heart beating, happily bouncing about and what looked like a smile on it’s face. I relaxed my grip on Brett’s hand and despite this being my third experience of this kind couldn’t help but marvel yet again at this little life in the making. The nuchal fold measured at a pleasing 1.7 mm. I was told that an accurate reading would not be reached until I’d received my blood results but I wasn’t going to worry about this too much.
So there he or she was, 10 fingers, 10 toes and all looking good so far. I felt a wave of relief and then my thoughts quickly turned to Joshua and Grace and my excitement at finally being able to tell them that they were going to get a rather special Christmas present this year although preferably not on Christmas Day itself! My due date is the 17th December so anything’s possible but here’s hoping for prompt arrival, after all, I want to eat my turkey on Christmas Day, not give birth to it!
We arrived home and as luck would have it Joshua was off due to an inset day at school so I didn’t have to wait all day to tell them both. I got them to sit on the sofa together and told them we had some exciting news….”Mummy is going to have another baby!” I squealed. Joshua looked at me quizzically and said “But how do YOU know?” Brett, Dad and I all burst out laughing and said “Cos we just do!”.
The realisation that they were going to have another partner in crime quickly turned their momentary confusion into excitement. Grace simply beamed with delight and Joshua threw his arms around me and pressed his head to my tummy asking if he could cuddle the baby.
Now the good news was of course that I could now tell the world and finally start rocking the bump look which I’d so far been desperately trying to hide under shapeless clothes, the baggier the better. That combined with my teenage like skin problems, weight gain and nausea did not for a hot mama make! Bye bye first trimester, HELLO second trimester – I think we’re going to get on!
