Little Steps #2

 My mate's face was unreadable. He was cooking when I told him about the news. About the possibility that there will be another life growing inside our lives. 

"Alhamdulillah." He said and continued cooking. 

But later that night after our Maghrib prayers, he fell into prostration for quite sometime, invoking praises and thankfulness to the Mighty Lord who made it all possible. Furthermore in the holy month of Ramadan. 

For several days, I scanned myself at work to get rid of the anxious feeling - to find the sign of life, to find ketulan daging dalam kantung. I saw the sac, but I could not seen anything inside. I told myself that it was too early but that gnawing feeling of fear would not just go away easily. 

We reminded ourselves that no matter what, Allah has arranged it so that it will be the best for us - even it will be seen as a bad thing in the eyes of us, puny human beings. 

But Allah is al-'Alim, the All Knowing - He knows what lurked in our hearts, so he sent a senior of mine with a piece of advice. My senior told me to meet her ObGyn, and let her to have a look. Her ObGyn was in the private sector, which I was not used to. So I kind of procrastinated for a while - and Allah again prodded me gently with reminders from other seniors. 

So I made the appointment. 

And during that time, I did not scan myself even once. 

Photo by Evie S. on Unsplash

H accompanied me to meet the ObGyn, which was not possible if we went to a government hospital, especially during this Covid time. We waited for almost an hour before finally able to meet the doctor (there was an emergency so the doctor had to go out for a while). 

We told her about our worries and she instructed me to lie on the bed for her to perform an ultrasound. At that time I was even preparing myself for a transvaginal ultrasound, which I disliked. 

As she put the probe on my lower abdomen, there it was - the gestational sac - and faintly a lump of meat. 

"Fetal heart tak boleh nampak lagi kan?" I asked. 

She played around with the probe a bit, and I saw flicker of beats. SubhanAllah. Alhamdulillah. 

The doctor had a concerned expression though. She said, "Fetal heart nampak macam slow sikit kalau nak banding dengan normal." She put on Doppler and the reading was around 96 - 110. Normally it would be more than 120 bpm. 

It could meant several things. 

1. It was too early (according to scan, the gestational age was around 7 weeks, barely).

2. Chromosomal abnormalities.

3. The pregnancy will not survive.

We held our breaths. But the doctor came up with a solution, to anticipate the outcome. She ordered for blood BhCG levels 48 hours apart. If the value doubles, InshaAllah the embryo will continue to grow but if its the opposite then most likely it will not. 

She will see us again in few days times after the blood results are out. Me and H walked out of the hospital with indescribable feelings.