Baby Worries Us

My wife mentioned yesterday afternoon (a Sunday) that it seemed like Baby hadn't been moving as much the last few days. I recalled that we hadn't seen any stomach punching like the famous scene from Alien, but obviously I’m not as in tune with Baby as she is. Usually when I talk to Baby (up close and personal) I’ll get some poking or movement. So last night, when she was getting nervous, she called me over to talk to Baby. Which I gladly did.

I got a squirmy response (along with a tiny heartbeat, I think), but that wasn't easing her fears. She drank some OJ (per the instructions we’d gotten in class) and called the doctor’s office and they told us an on-call doctor would call us back. Then she laid there for a few minutes while I googled ‘reduced fetal movement’.  One of the results I got discussed how in the beginning of pregnancy, baby movements feel like ‘flutters’. Then they transition into ‘thumps’. But around 28 weeks, the feeling goes back to ‘flutters’. Baby is just running out of room to get a good kick.

Finally they called back and told us to come in and get hooked up to a monitor.

A short, 5 minute car ride later, we were in an observation room. The nurse was pleasant but had hell figuring out where to position the sensors to hear Baby’s heartbeat. She said Baby was moving away from her the more she tried to find the heartbeat. She poked and pushed on my wife’s belly and tried again. Finally she found a nice steady heartbeat. Nothing to worry about. She left the room and told my wife to push a button every time Baby moved. She was clicking pretty regularly. Apparently all the fuss had awakened Baby.

30 minutes later she returned and said how great Baby was. Though we were only 27 weeks along, she said Baby was doing amazing. More like a 32 week old. That’s my baby!

We finally got home and had dinner around 11:00 and watched Big Brother.