Keela snorted behind me.
“I’m sure you have already taken a test, but I have to ask if you have or not.”
I nodded my head. “Yes, I took one today. It was one of those digital ones; it said I was over three weeks pregnant.”
The nurse wrote that down.
“I’m going to need you to go into the bathroom through the door behind you and urinate into this jar,” she put a little clear jar with a silver twist cap on the desk in front of me, “and then bring it back out to me.”
I did as the nurse asked; peed into the little jar, wrapped it in tissue and returned back to my seat.
“Here you go,” I said and handed her the tissue-wrapped wee jar.
The nurse put on latex gloves, took the jar, and stood up from her seated position. She walked over to the left side of the room, binned my tissue, and removed the cap from the jar. She dipped a little stick into the jar and pulled it back out. The tip of the stick was a bright hot pink.
“Yep, you’re with child,” the nurse said and chuckled to herself.
I wanted to smile at her, but I was so freaked out that I could do nothing more than stare at her. Luckily the nurse didn’t seem to notice my anxiety and gestured me over to the hospital bed next to her.
“As your conception date is a few weeks back I won’t have to perform a vaginal ultrasound. If you would lie down on the bed and pull up your t-shirt, I can check and see how the baby is doing by using a probe on your stomach.”
Oh, fuck.
“Okay,” I whispered.
I did everything the nurse said. I laid down on the hospital bed, pulled up my top until my bare stomach was showing, and then I waited. The nurse stepped closer to me and looked down at me.
“Can you unbutton your jeans and shimmy them, and your underwear, down a little?” she asked. “The baby will be positioned very low right now.”
I began to sweat. “Sure.”
Again, I did as she asked. I unbuttoned my jeans and pulled them down a little, along with my underwear. “Is this enough?” I asked.
“Yep, that’s perfect.”
I looked left when Keela sat on the spare chair that was positioned there. “You okay, boss?” she asked, smiling.
She looked so happy.
I shook my head. “I’m so scared.”
“It’s all goin’ to be okay, you’ll see.”
I nodded my head and looked back to the nurse when she cleared her throat.
“I’m going to squirt some gel on your lower stomach and use this probe.” She held up a device that looked like a microphone. “We’ll take a look at your baby. Okay?”
Okay.
I nodded my head and said nothing. I was afraid I would throw up again if I opened my mouth and spoke.
“This will be a little cold,” the nurse said and squirted the gel.
I flinched when it made contact with my skin. “Shite.”
Keela and the nurse laughed.
“It really is cold,” I murmured to Keela, who was still laughing at me.
“Okay, let’s find the baby,” the nurse chirped and placed the probe on top of the gel and began to swirl it about.
She pulled a monitor closer to us, and stared at the screen as she moved the probe around. I stared at the screen too, but all I could see was black, white, and some grey. It looked like a shitty station on a television that had a poor connection.
I thought it would have taken the nurse awhile to find anything, but less than a minute later I heard a little chirp come from her mouth. I looked at the nurse and saw her smile.
“This little one was hiding from me,” she mused and began to take what I thought was measurements of the baby. I couldn’t really tell though because I still couldn’t see anything but the fuzzy screen.
“Can you see it?” I asked Keela.
She was silent as she stared at the screen so I looked back at the nurse. “I can’t see it.”
The nurse smiled and pointed to the screen. “Do you see this little bean shaped blob right here?”
“Honey, that’s it. That’s your baby. Just the one baby, too.”
It was?
I widened my eyes. “Really?”
I squinted my eyes then gasped when the nurse enlarged the picture.
“I see it!” I whispered.
I could see my baby; the little shape before it was zoomed in looked like a little bean, but now it was definitely a baby.
The nurse pointed at the screen. “That’s the head; the little stumps there are the arms and legs. Still quite small, but forming beautifully.”
“Really? So everythin’ is okay?” I asked then held my breath.
“From what I can see everything is progressing perfectly.”
The relief that filled me was whole.
Thank you, Ma.
The nurse then zoomed in more on the screen and I froze when I saw a little flutter within the centre of the baby.
“The flicker right here is your baby’s heartbeat.” The nurse smiled and leaned over to the machine where she twisted a knob. A loud and quick paced thudding filled the room.
“And that is the sound of your baby’s heartbeat. It’s nice and strong.”