First trimester. Five weeks into my pregnancy we attend a cousin´s wedding in the US. A good occasion to share the great news with my family, we think. The tickets were purchased well in advance, when the stork hadn´t been on our horizon. A ball, I must say, especially after having heard so many opinions in Finland about how I shouldn´t tell anybody I´m pregnant before it´s safe–after week 12, that is, because “statistics say…”
On a certain level, I appreciate people trying to protect me from being hurt by getting too muchinto having a baby (too much into? I think it´s all or nothing: you´re either pregnant or not. I’ve never heard of anyone just a little bit pregnant).
Then again, I'm one of those persons who have to share news, especially good news, with loved ones immediately. And so I did. Everybody was delighted, and since my parents, my brother, and my sister-in-law had all travelled to New Jersey from Europe for the same occasion (God bless the weak dollar!), my husband and I had the best Thanksgiving Dinner ever, bathing in attention and stealing everyone else´s show.Baby In A Foreign Culture
Settling back into Oulu after ten days holiday was emotionally easy, since my work demanded most of my energy just at that time; no time for longing for family and the feeling of home. It was the fatigue and the feeling of nausea that got to me. Between two and four p.m. every day, I had a hard time not falling asleep in front of the computer in my Tuira office. Meetings dragged on endlessly, as I was torn back and forth between drifting off to sleep and having to run to the toilet to re-examine my lunch.
Looking back, I must say it´s not one of the best ideas to change time zones in early pregnancy. Not only did it take me two weeks to get to a proper nighttime rhythm after arriving back, the so-called 'morning sickness' manifested itself in afternoon nausea sessions, as I’m sure my growing baby was following Eastern Daylight Time.
Luckily, after about two weeks, my body and the little peanut inside decided to quit trying to get back to the Land of Freedom, and adjusted to Finnish time. This also meant that I didn´t feel nauseous anymore, not at all. For the next couple of weeks some smells still gave me the creeps. I still couldn’t eat spinach, my all-time favorite before pregnancy, but otherwise I was doing great–apart from the reoccurring pangs of insecurity and doubtfulness, which my husband dispelled in the best possible way. Whenever I started worrying about how-will-we-manage-with-a-baby-when-I-still-feel-like-a-kid-myself or how-will-I-be-able-to-cope-with-the responsibility-and-the-heaps-of-laundry, my husband took me in his arms and said, “We can do this; this is meant to be; and it will be great.”
This always shut me up and made the bond between us grow stronger. I realized again and again that I had made the right choice by saying “I do” to this representative of a culture so different to mine.
The Baby's Heartbeat Mid-December, we had our first appointment at the maternity health care centre. We were very well taken care of: the friendly nurse sacrificed two hours to answering all our questions and giving us heaps of material to read. Since, in Finland, husbands are encouraged to come along to maternity centre visits, my husband also had the occasion to investigate things thoroughly.
Just before leaving to Hungary for the Christmas holidays, I had the most amazing experience. I had read that a baby´s heartbeat can be detected with the Doppler machine at about twelve weeks into pregnancy. Impatient, I galloped down to the maternity centre from my office, and begged the nurse to try and find the heartbeat before I go off to Hungary. Thus far–aside from nausea, fatigue, dizziness, and the two lines on the test–I had no proof of a little person growing inside me. I hadn´t had a life sign yet. When I heard the heartbeat of this little creature, I was overwhelmed with emotion. Lying there, cold gel on my belly, listening to the fast palpitation of my child´s heart, I felt that every woman in the world should be allowed to listen to such a sweet sound. Baby communicates
Since Oulu grants its mothers only one ultrasound around week sixteen, I decided to visit a private clinic in Hungary to find out whether there were one, two, or more babies growing in there. One it was; and amazing to me how you could make out little limbs and even movements on the screen.
Impatiently waiting to become aware of my baby´s movements in my belly, I became aware of certain signs that I was sure came from the baby. After my swimming and water-gym session every Thursday, I usually go to the sauna. “No problem,” the nurse had told me, “you can continue sauna visits if you were used to them before pregnancy!” I had just gotten into an interesting conversation with a lady in the sauna, when I distinctly felt someone pinching me from inside as if to say, “Stop talking and get out of the heat!” My baby had communicated with me! I complied, of course, since I was learning the joys of early motherhood: eating right, exercising enough, and listening towards your inside. Not to forget the constant super-mix of elation and bad consciousness.
Read next week: Pregnant up North, Part III: Ildikó Hámos-Sohlo´s experiences with doctors and a baby mulling about in your belly.
