Monday 8th February 2021

Dear Dino,

For the first time in my life, Monday mornings are my favourite time of the week. That’s because overnight the pregnancy app updates and there’s a whole load of new information about YOU! This morning, we hit 16 weeks and apparently, head to bum, you are the size of a big gherkin! You can sense light and hear sounds, and you have elbows and knees that bend which means that you can punch and kick!

On Monday mornings, we lie in bed, I read the new info to Daddy and then we watch our favourite pregnancy videos on youtube which also give us a whole new load of information. Today, we got up and set about different bits of work. I decided to sort out the washing and afterwards I nipped to the loo. Then, I had a very nasty surprise. I saw something that I did not want to see.

I left Daddy to his jobs, not wanting to bother him until I knew what to do next. I called 111 and they told me I needed to speak to the doctor. Within the hour, the doctor called and told me to contact the hospital. I tried to get through for an hour and a half and in the end, it was Daddy who managed to speak to somebody. They told us to come straight in and so we set off for the hospital.

On the way, we talked about your name. We don’t know what it is, and we won’t know until you are born. We have decided to keep you a ‘surprise’ but we have two names picked out, and we talked about how lovely they sound to us already. We talked about how much we love each other and how we don’t need a baby to make us complete, but that it would be the most beautiful, wonderful and amazing blessing. We also talked about the traffic lights, the other cars and the speed bumps which we hope to navigate with great difficulty when you make your appearance in the summer.

When we got there, daddy wasn’t allowed into the hospital. Hopefully Covid will be a distant memory by the time you are old enough to comprehend it, but it basically made life difficult for everybody for a while, and it meant that Daddy wasn’t allowed in to see the nurses and the doctors unless it was an emergency. I hoped that he wouldn’t be able to come in.

I sat down and daddy and me sent messages to each other for over three hours. He told me what was going on in the car park. It started to snow. People were coming and going. Somebody forgot to pay and so they caused a jam of cars trying to get out. I told Daddy what was going on inside. I told him about the lady wearing PJs and flipflops, about the nurses coming and calling names and about weeing in a paper bowl, having my blood pressure taken and the nurse checking my temperature.

Eventually, I saw the doctor. They checked me over. She said I was ‘nice and slim’ which wasn’t something I had heard in a while! She told me that the problem was with me and not you. It was just a little mark on me that was causing the issues, and it was nothing to do with you at all.

To reassure me, the doctor got a machine out to listen to your heart beat. I hadn’t heard it until that point. She moved the machine to one side of my tummy. She thought she could hear it briefly but then you moved! Then she tried the other side and the same thing happened! After a few tries, I said ‘cheeky monkey!’ because you didn’t want to be disturbed and you kept wriggling around! In the end though, I did hear it for a few seconds. Much faster than mine, and a bit quieter, but there. The doctor said those two beautiful words: ‘all fine’.

I wonder if, somehow, Daddy and I have got a shy child who doesn’t like the be seen or heard, because, as you will already have noticed, we both like to talk!

So that, my sweetheart, is the story of the day when I first heard your heartbeat.

Stay warm and safe in there for a while please, Dino.

All my love,

Mum x