I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw the ultrasound at 10 weeks. There, on the blurry, black and white screen, was a perfectly formed, active baby, swimming and twirling. I couldn’t feel her from the inside yet, but when I saw the baby, I thought, “there really is a person in there!”… a person with a rather big head (hey, you looked funny at that age too!), but with perfectly discernable fingers and toes, a huge beating heart, and a little elfin face. All that, and I didn’t even look pregnant!
“It’s only a piece of tissue” was the jargon of the ‘80’s. We’ve all heard it, and perhaps there are people who still believe that the fetus is just a piece of the mother, a growth that develops inconveniently, every so often.
One relatively recent development is the embryoscope, a tiny camera about the size of a pen tip. It is inserted through an incision in the abdomen, and rests against the clear membrane that holds the baby and the amniotic fluid. Using a fiberoptic lens, it is able to take high resolution pictures as early as three weeks after conception. The embryoscope reveals, in splendid detail, the life and growth of the unborn baby.
Right now, at 16 weeks, the baby inside me is into somersaults, kickboxing, punching, swimming gracefully, and thumb-sucking. She (we don’t know whether it’s a boy or a girl, but I’m having “she” feelings. For now, we call her Wee Gillis. Easier than saying “he or she” every time) takes little sips of amniotic fluid, which allows the digestive system to practice functioning, and is developing finger-prints and tiny nails. Nature has provided a special skin cream called vernix, which protects the baby’s skin from the amniotic fluid (Nine months is a long time to be in the bath!). A peach-fuzz called lanugo, which means “wool” even though it’s not very thick, helps keep it on. Vernix stays on the baby for the next five months. After the birth, it can be rubbed in, doubling as a massage oil and a cream to condition the baby’s skin for life in the outside air.
Miracles have been occurring right from the first moment of Wee Gillis’ conception. First, her DNA, which is the unique, unrepeatable identity of a new person, was formed. Within hours, the new cell began dividing and organizing into layers. Within days, they had already begun to form into sections: brain and spinal chord, nerves and skin, digestive system, heart, skeleton, muscles. Before I even knew I was pregnant, a little heart began to beat, a circulatory system with its own blood type had begun to move, little arms began to bud, and a nervous system, fully sensitive to pain, tickling, and other sensations, was functioning.
Before I knew I was pregnant, another person with its own consciousness was experiencing life inside me.
This is the greatest miracle, to me. In the words of the ultrasound pioneer Sir William Liley, MD, “From the moment a baby is conceived, it bears the indelible stamp of a separate distinct personality, an individual different from all other individuals.”
By nine weeks, Wee Gillis showed remarkable flexibility and detail. She could squint, move her tongue, swallow, and, according to a British medical journal, could make a tight fist with her hand if her palm were stroked.
I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw the ultrasound at 10 weeks. There, on the blurry, black and white screen, was a perfectly formed, active baby, swimming and twirling. I couldn’t feel her from the inside yet, but when I saw the baby, I thought, “there really is a person in there!”… a person with a rather big head (hey, you looked funny at that age too!), but with perfectly discernable fingers and toes, a huge beating heart, and a little elfin face. All that, and I didn’t even look pregnant!
I remember being told once that when ultrasounds are used for abortions, the policy is to never show the mother the screen, even if she requests it. Too many women changed their minds when they saw their baby. And who wouldn’t be affected by it?
The pop star Madonna said, after seeing the ultrasound of her daughter Lourdes, "I was stunned when I saw on the ultrasound: a tiny, living creature spinning around in my womb. Tap-dancing, I think. Waving its tiny arms around and trying to suck its thumb. I could have sworn I heard it laughing." (World Magazine, December 1996)
We live in a world that has as much reverence for laboratory rats as the unborn baby. Yet the more we discover about the fetus, the more early it seems that unique human characteristics appear: memory, play, and sensitivity to music showing particular taste in the baby.
Right now, after being alive for only 16 weeks, Wee Gillis has her own tastes, her own personality in the making, her own experiences completely separate from mine. She might be sleeping peacefully while I’m wide awake, or busy with her gymnastics while I sleep. She might be dancing to some background music that I hardly notice, or she might resent listening to rock n’ roll at a high volume, while I’m grooving away. Sometimes I stop and ask, “Who are you?”
