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The early stages of pregnancy are exciting.
They can also be scary and anxiety-inducing.
And if you had a long, hard road with trying to conceive, the early weeks of being pregnant can leave you feeling extra concerned or worried about how things are coming along.
You hope everything is going okay on the inside, but you don't really know until you have your first appointment with your doctor, which usually takes place around eight or nine weeks of pregnancy (assuming you find out you're pregnant by this point; some people don't know they're expecting until they're later into their pregnancies).
At that appointment, your physician will try to locate your little one's heartbeat (or heartbeats, if those cells divided and implanted to surprise you with multiple babies) using a fetal doppler.
Dopplers are little handheld devices that have a small screen and a wand (AKA a transducer) that gets moved over your abdomen to find your babies' heartbeats. It reflects high-frequency sound waves to locate the sound of blood flowing through your baby's veins and through their heart.
Hearing the whoosh, whoosh, whoosh of your little one's heart for the first time and confirming that you do, in fact, have one (or two, or more!) babies growing inside of you or your partner is incredible.
And once you actually confirm you've got a baby on board, you'll constantly be wondering how they're doing in there, hoping everything is going as it should.
At-home fetal dopplers, like the Sonoline B Baby Doppler, are audio devices that allow you to hear their teeny tiny heartbeats in between your regular appointments with your OB-GYN and / or maternal fetal medicine appointments.
They offer a way for both parents to bond with their babies, even if they're not the ones with babies blossoming in their burgeoning belly, because they both get to experience the awe that comes with listening to their little ones' sweet heartbeats.
To be clear, a doppler cannot diagnose medical issues and should never be used to skip a regular OB visit because regular monitoring with your doctor is necessary to ensure your pregnancy is progressing as it should, especially if you have multiple babies in there.
Obstetricians and maternal-fetal medicine specialists are qualified and well-trained in using dopplers to locate, pick-up, and differentiate heartbeats almost instantly (though, it can be difficult to find heartbeats during very early stages of pregnancy, so it's important to keep in mind that even if you can't find a heartbeat using an at-home fetal doppler, especially in the early days), it doesn't automatically mean something is wrong.
With at-home dopplers, it can sometimes be difficult to know exactly where to look or how to angle the doppler to pick up the heartbeat, which can potentially make parents nervous if they're unable to find one or both heartbeats.
Once you've turned on the machine, you put some ultrasound gel on the transducer, and then press and move it firmly around your abdomen. You want to try to angle it from the top of your pubic bone down into your pelvis, but if you're not a trained professional, it can be tough to locate the heartbeat or know that what you're picking up with the machine is actually their heartbeat.
Sometimes, your babies could be curled up in a position that makes their heart hard to locate, or the uterus could be turned in a certain way that makes it hard to pick up anything definitive. What sounds like a baby's heartbeat could actually be the mother's, or it could be a different blood vessel, or it could be the sound of their amniotic fluids flowing around.
This is why it's crucial to keep your regular medical appointments, even if you have an at-home fetal heartbeat monitor.
This is why it's crucial to keep your regular medical appointments, even if you have an at-home fetal heartbeat monitor.
But if you're using at at-home doppler just for fun, with the understanding that you might not always be able to find your babies' heartbeats because they may have shifted position since your last ultrasound appointment...and that even if you can't find them, it doesn't necessarily mean something is wrong, then a doppler can be a fun way for you, your partner, your family, or other loved ones to connect with your babies, since they can't feel the familiar flutters from the inside that their mother can, once they're bigger and more mobile.
An at-home doppler can allow them to experience the magic that comes with hearing your babies' heartbeats as they grow. If you do decide to get one to use simply for fun at home, you can even get a hard-shell case for your doppler to keep it pristine and protected if you want to take it with you on-the-go.
Did you use an at-home fetal doppler during your pregnancy? What did you think of the experience? Let us know in the Comments section below or connect with us on Instagram to share your thoughts!
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