HCG is Finally Doubling!

April 15, 2017 FOB asks me how come I don’t talk about the baby. Hmmm. What should I say? I am racked with guilt. Guilt that I smoke and drank. Guilt that I didn’t realize I was pregnant sooner. Guilt that I put the baby at risk with x-ray and the colposcopy and almost with the HPV vaccine! Guilt that I didn’t immediately get all warm and fuzzy as soon as I found out I was pregnant. Now I could only hope, pray and wait. I tell him there isn’t much to talk about. I’m super tired most of the time and still in a state of shock.

Dr M's office has emailed the results from latest blood draw. Results show hCG has doubled. Yay! This is hopeful. hCG is the pregnancy hormone. If the baby is growing properly, the HCG will double every 48 hours. Initially it wasn't doubling, but it was increasing. This is really good news! It's doubling. Finally something normal has happened with this pregnancy. This is especially good news in light of the fact that we haven't heard the heartbeat yet. Baby is still growing, so maybe we got the dates wrong? I mean I'm certain of when my last menstrual period (LMP) was, but who knows when I ovulated?

In all my reading, I've found that ovulation can vary from woman to woman and even from cycle to cycle with the same woman. The text books assume ovulation at 14 days, which is how the estimated due date (EDD) is determined for the baby. However that 14 day ovulation is based on an average. Since I wasn't trying to get pregnant, I have no idea when I ovulated. Frankly, I didn't realize it was a thing you could track on your own. I mention this to one of my friends and apparently I've been under a rock. She says she learned about ovulation tracking from watching the Kardashians. Since I'm already knocked up, I don't need to go fishing for that episode.