15 Week Appointment

August 12 was our 15 week appointment for Baby O. I was greeted by a lab tech who identified herself as a student.

Her: "Hello, Angela. My name is Angela. I'm a student. Is it alright if I draw your blood?"

Me (only half joking): "I don't know, are you good at it?"

Her (shrugging): "Well, it's my first week. But I have practiced on a few of my classmates before."

Me (fake smiling and internally panicking): "Oh sure, why not? You have to learn somehow."

I watched as she entered my information into the computer, and then turned to me with the needle. She looked very nervous, and kept dropping things on the floor. I put on my big girl pants and tried to be brave. She did the draw without incident, but had a hard time screwing the top onto the vial. She finally got it to click, but not before her hand jerked to the side, spilling some of the blood onto her glove. Then she used that hand to hold the vial about 4 inches from my face and ask if my name was correctly written on the label (in blood). Just kidding, sort of.

It gets better. Remember how I mentioned she kept dropping things? Fast forward a couple days and I am digging through my purse looking for my chapstick. I pulled out what I thought was chapstick, but no. It was an empty blood vial. At this point I had to laugh. I felt bad for her, and I couldn't help but feel some empathy for a fellow Angela. 

The rest of the appointment went much more smoothly. We met with the doctor again, and this time we were able to hear Baby O's heartbeat on the Doppler. It was so reassuring, and made us feel even closer to him. His heartrate was 153 beats per minute, which was lower than last time. After the first trimester, it actually slows down, which I didn't know. The doctor said that we don't need to come back again until it's time for our 20 week ultrasound, when we will get to see Baby O in 3D!! We can't wait. He also said that I will likely begin to feel the baby move in the next month. Let the kickboxing begin!