Journal
Sign guestbook
Arthur's Mummy's Diary
Matthew's Belly Gallery
Nathan's Belly Gallery
Benjamin's Belly Gallery
My Fertility Friend Chart
2003-02-05 - 3.45pm��previous entry��next entry
The Pre-Conception Appointment!
I had a pregnant dream last night. In the dream I was at the stage I'm at now, getting ready to conceive, and I was lying in bed looking at my belly, wondering about how it must feel to have a baby in there. Then it was like I'd just blinked and I was lying there again with a hugely pregnant belly. I knew it was months and months later, but all the same I was amazed at how quickly the time had passed. I just had so much joy looking at the shape of my belly and thinking about my baby, and I remembered how I'd learnt to feel how the baby is lying and what parts of the bump are head and feet, etc. So I felt the head - the baby was head down. And then it got reeeally unrealistic - heh. My skin was suddenly sooo thin that I could feel the shape of the baby's face underneath it. I could stroke it's little nose and wonder whether it was shaped more like Neil's nose or like mine. I felt sooo much love and tenderness when I was stroking the baby through my tummy, it was like nothing I've experienced in reality yet. It was an awesome dream :)
I had my pre-conception appointment with the doctor this morning and it went really well!!! I loved it to bits, because it just makes me feel more.... I don't know, like it's REALLY going to happen! Which of course it is, but still, anything that is part of the process makes me so thrilled! :)
So here's my entry about how it went. Yes, it was probably dull to anyone else but me, but I thought it was great. I love my doctor, he is so lovely and so good (except he didn't really know the right advice to give when I had M.E.). He has always supported me well. And I'm gonna have to change doctors in the next month or two :( I am so sad about this, but we moved house ages ago now, and I STILL haven't told the surgery I'm not in their area anymore (naughty!), and haven't got round to registering with a new surgery closer to home yet. Poo. But oh well, today was still good.
When he asked me what he could do for me today (isn't he polite?!), I said that me and my husband want to have a baby and I was there for a pre-road trip service!!! Or something like that! Hehe! So he asked how long we'd been trying - whereupon of course I had to tell him we hadn't started yet, but that we were thinking of doing so in the summer.
Then it was really cool. He told me all the "info" that I already knew but it was good to listen anyway. He knows I already know, because he was my doctor when I was training to be a midwife and a nurse, so he apologised but said it's always good to just hear the "stuff" and then ask questions afterwards. He mentioned the folic acid and why it was important (I'm already taking 600iu a day), avoiding soft cheeses (boo-hoo) when I'm pregnant in case of listeriosis, and also toxoplasmosis, which I had a question about. I am pretty sure I've already had it because I have cleaned the cat litter for 10 years (!!) while I lived at home with my parents. But there's no need to check my blood or anything, because I don't have a cat at home and even if I did, I would just have to NEVER clean the litter, and always wash my hands after handling a cat. So yeah, I might handle one of my parents' cats if I visit them in France during pregnancy, but I'll have to be careful about hygiene in that case.
Avoiding soft cheeses is okay, although it will be hard in France! But I don't have to worry about that till I get pregnant - I'll probably avoid them from when we start trying just incase. Even so, I went straight from the doctor's and bought some French soft cheese, hehe! Just making up for when I can't, y'know!
There's no point in checking if I'm immune to rubella apparantly (phew!) because I defffinitely had the jab when I was 12 at school, and the doctor said you never need a top up. Once vaccinated, always immune. Yay!
He looked at my notes a lot to see how much investigation I've had done in the last couple of years. Thankfully (!) I've had - as the doctor put it this morning, "every blood test known to man" (!!!) while I had M.E, as they were trying to figure out what was wrong with me (not having a clue about M.E!). It certainly felt like it at the time! Well there's one thing M.E. has done for me - I am soooo glad I do not need all the bloodwork done now for checking my health, etc before pregnancy, because my other bloodwork was recent enough apparantly! I've had the blood test to get my thyroid checked and all SORTS of other bloodwork. I am far from anaemic. My blood count is normal. I do not have a heart murmur. My blood pressure is fine. I have had a recent enough smear and that was fine. I don't need to worry about another smear until after I have had the baby. I am a blessed girlie!
The other thing I asked about was medication. I am not on any, but if my IBS gets really bad I need Buscopan, and if my "hay"fever gets really bad I need Benadryl (not that it makes much difference), and steroid nasal sprays. Also I wanted to know about general stuff like antacids and paracetamol. Well apparantly doctors recommend NO drugs at all in early pregnancy, except for paracetamol. He said if you have a condition that requires medication then you need to talk about it or something, but I don't which is good. I would not be allowed to take Buscopan even if my IBS got bad. Oh well, never mind. I REALLY hope my IBS will be hugely improved by the time I get pregnant, but even if it's not, I am so used to awful symptoms of it alllll the time, so I guess I can put up with it. If I get hayfever badly then I can't take Benadryl but I CAN take the nasal sprays. He said if I can manage without them I should try not to. So that's what I'll do. I am already decided that I won't use them. I can't help imagining those steroids somehow getting transfused to my baby somewhere along the line. I mean, if I'm breathing them in, surely they can get across the placenta somehow? Hmmm. I'll just live in an airtight house with my head over a steaming bowl of menthol. How thrilling. But it will probably be okay. I don't use those medications often, and hopefully I won't get aggravated by whatever it is (still don't know!) that I'm allergic to.
I asked about exercise, because I said that my periods make me tired and weaker for a week after and a few days before, and I'm so unfit that if I start an exercise programme, I just have to stop for 2 weeks around my period. Then I am back to square one when I start again, and so on. But I had a much better period this month so maybe the diet is helping? Anyway, the doctor just said to do gentle exercise like swimming, which should be easier to maintain even when I'm tired. I know this is a good idea but I just neeever go swimming, and I feel a bit unmotivated to go on my own for like, 10 minutes (which is about how long my stamina lasts for these days!). Especially if I'm tired. Still 10 minutes and a healthy recovery is GREAT compared to when I was ill with M.E. I know I am getting fitter, it's just slow because I have no fixed programme to improve, and I want to sort it out to get FIT in time for pregnancy. So maybe I'll pluck up the courage to try swimming. It sounds silly that I need courage to do this, but pfthth, I just do.
The doctor asked about my menstrual cycle, which is happily normal - 28 days, give or take a day every so often, and normal in every other way. He told me about when I am most fertile, which I already knew but it was still SO much fun to be sitting there listening to somebody professional help me plan for pregnancy!! :) I am so excited. And silly.
He said if I hadn't conceived after 6-9 months of trying I should go back and have another "chat" with him. I asked if that was likely to happen. Don't know why, it just got me nervous at the time. He said, "I'm sorry, but why on earth SHOULD it?!!" He said you should never go into trying to conceive thinking that you might not conceive - he said a person is always fertile until proven otherwise, or something! I know lots of people try for a long time with no success, and I know the stats for the likelihood of conception, for age and time spent trying, etc. But on some of the TTC message boards I go to, I see some messages that worry me. People who've been trying for months talk about how stupid or foolish they have been to assume they'd just get pregnant when they tried. That bothers me, because although it's true that many don't conceive first time, it is wrong to say it's foolish or stupid to assume you'll conceive. My doctor is right - why not? It's unfortunate that they don't, but it wasn't foolish to have presumed you'd get pregnant! And such messages give an awkward feeling to those of us who are taking the positive attitude and assuming we WILL conceive when we try to, because it makes us think, "Maybe I won't. Maybe *I'm* being stupid?" - which is awful! Nope, whether I conceive straight away or not, I am going into it fully expecting to conceive without problems. There's no point in doing otherwise surely? That's just worrying before there's a need (something I'm normally an expert at!).
Well anyway, getting a bit ranty so I'll get back to what I was saying! My doctor finished off by saying, "What are you waiting for?! I'd get on with it if I were you!" Hehe! And he said he hoped to see me again in a couple of months - maybe even next month! Bless. I guess he forgot that I said we weren't going to try till the summer. But it was such a lovely appointment, it filled me with joy and confidence. I feel like I got the ultimate medical "green light", the confirmation to go ahead and get pregnant and not have things to worry about. Everything in my body is normal and healthy (isn't that wonderful?!) and ready to grow a baby. I don't need to see a doctor again until I am pregnant.
I left the surgery so high and happy. It was much earlier than I'm normally out - 8.30am - and I decided to go to the butcher's and the supermarket before going home. The sky was blue and gorgeous and the world looked perfect from where I was standing. I know it's not perfect in the world, but right here at that moment it was. I got in my car and switched the radio on and it was set to the Christian radio station - there was an absolutely beautiful song playing about Jesus and his love for us, and as I drove and listened I passed a mother in the street with her two small children. She had a little boy who looked about 3 years old, and a little girl who was just about walking. The boy was earnestly helping the little one to walk, holding her hand and watching her feet as they went along. My heart just about melted away. I just had one of those straight-out-of-the-movies moments where I saw the perfect picture and thought - "Oh! I'm going to have a baby!" Hehe! It was lovely. The shops were only just opened and full of jam-packed rows of fresh produce, everybody I gave way to on the roads signalled a thank you (very rare here!), and over the whoooole thing I was constantly thinking how my doctor said I can go ahead and have a baby. God is so good to me. I'm going to have a baby.
Wheeeeee!!
Recent entries.....
Babies 7 and 8! :) - 2016-01-10
Babies 6 and 7! - 2013-02-17
Baby #5 !! - 2010-04-03
Nearly 3 months postpartum! - 2009-10-05
6 weeks old already! - 2009-08-25