First prenatal

I meant to blog about this right after and I kept forgetting!

So you know how I had decided on a midwife and so when she called me back on Monday and asked when I wanted to come in I said RIGHT AWAY! I was able to see her the next day, so last Tuesday, for our first appointment!

I pulled up to her house and she and her 5 year old son were just getting out of the car - hurray! Someone for Robby to play with! You guys, this is so great, Robby just ran around and played with her son for the whole hour we were meeting. And we scheduled my next appointment to be when her son would be home again so they can play. It's such a relief knowing he's welcome at these appointments and now he even will have FUN!

It was kind of funny because she and her son had just been at McDonald's at the playplace - it was his first day of school. She said, "oh no, Esther! Today we're going to talk about nutrition and now you're not going to listen to a word I say when you see me with my Dr. Pepper and cheeseburger!" Ha! I told her no, now I won't worry about her judging me if I tell her I ate something like that. :)

We did talk a lot about nutrition and I asked her what I ask every doctor, "How bad is it if I have an occasional diet coke?" I am basically asking for it when I ask this question but I need someone to convince me not to drink soda!! She told me a pretty convincing story - when she was pregnant with her 9th baby, at age 40, she decided she'd just drink Dr. Pepper if she felt like it! And all through her pregnancy she kept having bladder infections... and she said, "I know what it was from and I didn't care!" And then when she was in labor her midwife broke her water and all her contractions stopped - she said in a serious voice, "And Esther... I had to have a hospital birth." She went to the hospital and she had a cervical infection. So they gave her antibiotics and an epidural and then the baby came without any other problems but it was not the kind of birth she wanted and she felt like the infections were linked to drinking soda and just not taking as good of care of herself as she should've. She pointed out that it has to go through your kidneys which are right next to where the baby is!

If my goal is to have a healthy baby and to be able to give birth at home then I need to take the best care of my body that I can!! So I am going to do my best to eat healthy foods and exercise and not drink soda.

My favorite part - we heard the heartbeat! I was almost 12 weeks at my apt and my uterus is tipped back so I knew it would be hard to hear the heartbeat but since I'd been having some cramping that weekend I was desperate to hear it!! She was very patient in searching for it and we found it a few times although it was very quiet - her monitor picked it up and it was definitely a baby's heartbeat! It was such a relief! I'm excited for my next appointment where it should be much clearer and easier to hear right away!!

She also took my blood pressure which was a little high which was random for me. She said it could be a fluke and she's not too worried about it but if it's high next time too then we'll start talking about ways to lower that - like eating more garlic apparently. I've read exercising can help as well - trying to get back into that these days!

And just fyi she does urine tests each week like at a regular doctor too. Other labs and ultrasounds are elective and we'll do an ultrasound around 20 weeks to try to find out if it's a boy or a girl and see if everything looks good! So that's just like a month and a half away! Ah! So exciting!

Basically I still feel really good about my choice and my midwife is great and I'm happy. :)