Last week's midwife appointment . . .

So today I just set up my next midwife appointment and it made me realize that I'd meant to post about last week's appointment. 

Last week was my 14 week appointment. I'd been in the week before because I'd fainted and so I'd gone in to get checked out. At that appointment was the first time that we heard the heartbeat with the regular doppler (as opposed to with the ultrasound). 

The heartbeat had sounded really far away and quiet, so a week later when the midwife tried it, I was concerned when it was taking a little while to find it. 

Then she said, "I'm having a hard time finding it . . ." I tried not to freak out, but I was worried until she finished her sentence with, "because there's so much movement." 

Me: (chuckling with relief) Really? How can you tell? 

Midwife: Hear that sound? (She pointed out a few sudden, high-pitched static sounds that reminded me of the sound that cats make in movies when they're startled by something thrown in their direction.) Everytime you hear that noise, that's the baby moving around. 

I listened to the weird "wirr! wirr!" noise a few more times, totally content with the fact that I wasn't hearing my baby's heartbeat. A moving baby has to have a good heartbeat, right? 

And then all of a sudden, she found it. It was loud. And it felt closer and more thrilling to hear than I'd expected. I wanted to just keep the doppler on my belly all afternoon -- until the "wirr!" noise returned to signal that our bambin@ was no longer interested in sitting still for me. 

But the midwife had other appointments. Sigh.