Oh God. Multiples. I hadn’t even thought of that. I swallowed hard, a wave of nausea coming over me. Just then a door opened and a younger woman with colorful scrubs on called my name, leading Porter and me back to an exam room. She made me pee in a cup, which I learned would happen every visit. Great. Just one more thing to not look forward to. She left me to change into a gown and then came back to take my vitals and was very chipper. Eventually she left us to peruse the graphic pictures that hung on the walls of the exam room.
One poster in particular caught my attention; it showed the progression of a dilating cervix, from closed to 10 centimeters. My eyes grew wide and my heart rate picked up. How in the holy hell was that supposed to happen? Porter must have noticed my panicked expression because his hand was on my arm, rubbing gently.
“Ella, what is it?”
I pointed to the poster and looked at him, my mouth agape. “Do you see this?” I swallowed and tried to tamp down the fear running through me. “I don’t think I can handle this.” I sat down on the exam bed, my hand running over my forehead. I felt him at my side and leaned into him.
“It’ll all be ok. Women have been doing this since the beginning of time.”
“Yeah, but I’ve never done this. I guess it just never occurred to me that now, since it’s already in there,” I said, gesturing to my stomach, “it has to come out.” I started to feel ill just thinking about it. “I can’t do this.”
“Babe, I hate to break it to you, but it’s too late to back out now. Everything will be ok, I promise. I’m sure this little freak out is totally normal.”
I kind of wanted to smack him. It was not normal to stretch out one’s vagina that big, not at all. Before I could tell him how I felt about it, the door opened. A woman of about fifty walked in, all smiles, and moved to shake my hand. I took hers, but immediately felt bad that mine was all clammy from my panic.
“Hi, I’m Dr. Bronson. You must be Ella Masters.”
“Hi, nice to meet you,” I said softly as we shook hands.
“And is this Daddy?” Dr. Bronson asked, looking in Porter’s direction.
“Yes. This is my husband, Porter.” They shook hands, exchanging smiles.
“Ok, well, let’s get this party started,” she said with way too much enthusiasm for my current mental state. “Go ahead and lay down and place your feet in the stirrups.”
As I followed her instructions she wheeled over a machine with a screen attached to it.
“I’m going to use this machine to take a look at baby,” she said as she removed something that looked like a wand with a cord attached to it. She produced a condom, as if from nowhere, and after opening it, started rolling it down the wand.
“Wait a minute, where’s that going to go?” Porter said, speaking my words for me. The doctor didn’t even bat an eyelash as she replied.
“Ella is not far enough along to do a regular ultrasound. I wouldn’t be able to see the baby yet. So, we are going to do a vaginal ultrasound. Don’t worry. It’s virtually painless and over very quickly. It’s important that we check on the baby and the pregnancy to make sure everything is progressing well.” Porter looked as though he wanted to protest or argue with her, but she’d so soundly put him in his place that he looked a little dumbfounded. I couldn’t come up with anything to say, either, but the wand looked intimidating. “Don’t worry, Ella. It will be over before you know it, and in just a few seconds we can see the baby. Trust me. Now lie back and open up your knees for me nice and wide.”
Well, ok, since she asked nicely. I tried to act like I didn’t feel violated as the wand was inserted, but all my uncomfortableness was forgotten when my eyes found a little round blob on the screen. The doctor stilled the wand and used some buttons on the machine to zoom in and she tapped away on some keys. I was lost though, eyes glued to the fuzzy, quarter-sized, picture on the screen.
“There we are. That’s your baby right there,” she said, pointing to the area of the screen that I already knew was my child. I felt Porter take my hand, but my eyes could not leave the screen. “It looks like you are at eight weeks and three days, putting conception around the last week of November.” That information was enough to bring my eyes to Porter, thinking that he was right, a honeymoon baby. But my breath caught when my eyes landed on him. He looked at the screen, looked at the first sight of our baby, tears welling around his red eyes, in total awe of everything. I fell in love with him a little more in that moment.
“Are you ready to hear the heartbeat?” The doctor asked, as if we weren’t having the most wonderful and intimate moment we’ve ever had. Before I had a chance to look at the screen the room was filled with the weirdest and most wonderful sound I had ever heard. It was a rhythmical swoosh swoosh, which sounded a lot like water. The doctor pointed to the screen and right above her finger there was a little fluttering. “That’s the baby’s heart, and it’s working perfectly, a steady 160 beats per minute.”
“That’s so fast,” Porter said, his voice sounding thick with emotion.