The first ultrasound

I went for my first ultrasound today. This is the earliest I've had any pregnancy ultrasound. Normally my first and only U/S is at 20 weeks. This time around though I've opted for Integrated Prenatal Screening.

I'm still a bit on the fence about it all. I wanted to do it because of my age (I'm 37 and will be 38 by the time the baby is born). But when I read through all the material again I was reminded of why I opted not to do it the first two times. First, you only get a percentage of a chance that there is something amiss with the baby. From there you have to go for further testing to confirm if anything is wrong or not. According to the literature I received, a lot of people who receive warning that something might not be right, go for further testing only to find out that nothing is wrong at all. Ninety percent of people who are told something is wrong, find out through the further testing that everything is fine. It seems like a lot of added stress for nothing.

So basically I'm not sure why I'm doing this and I sort of wish that I'd changed my mind sooner. I guess I was hoping to allay any worries and have the rest of my pregnancy be pretty stress-free. That is if they say everything is a-okay.

Anyway, what's done is done. And I got a very pretty picture out of it (our scanner is way back in Ottawa):


It is amazing how much detail in the face you can see at only 12 weeks. At one point the tiny peanut-shaped alien baby lifted his/her hand and waved at me. It was very nice to say hello. See you in a while, peanut alien.