November
2006
Is ultrasound safe? (click here to leave a comment)
I had a miscarriage a few years before my daughter was born. It was a "late miscarriage" and I was completely devastated.
When I was pregnant with my daughter, I was terrified that I would lose her too, and requested an ultrasound. My midwife doesn't normally send her patients to get ultrasounds, but understood my need to "see" my baby alive and kicking.
I talked to my unborn baby beforehand…told her that she would hear a high pitched sound, and when she heard that daddy and I would be able to see her. During the ultrasound, the baby we saw raised her hand up to her head and opened and closed her fingers. Even the tech was startled at how she seemed to be waving at us. We waved back of course!
I haven't noticed any "problems" with Sidra's brain development in the last decade, but I am very aware that not all is understood with sonagrams. I have heard and read about language delays, neurons being "derailed" and have pretty much decided we don't know enough about this technology to use it without medical concerns being the reason.
There is so much we don't know about our current technology. There is a lot we don't know about the early brain development of babies. But there is a lot we do know, and much we are learning daily, about how they are sentient even before birth, how they can be included in what is happening to them and around them, and how talking to our babies helps them orient to the world they are in.
Talking to our babies, and listening to them can occur even before birth, and most definitly after. Maybe we unintentionally put them in harms way when we subject them to technology we believe is safe when it's not, but we can help them cope with the emotional distress of confusing and upsetting experiences by honoring their experiences, empathizing, and supporting them to heal.
I believe it is possible. The field of prenatal and perinatal psychology is showing this too, in many ways. Care to explore it with me?
Any thoughts on this?