Am I a bad mommy already?

Because my doctor only allows one ultrasound, I have no physical evidence of my child, other than my ever-so-slightly bulging belly. This last doctor's visit, I thought it'd be a great idea to bring a digital recorder to capture the heartbeat as something neat to share with family.

Everything worked out perfectly -- and when I left St. John's, I had my very own recording of about 40 seconds of precious little beating. I played it on my car ride home, played it to my sister over the phone, and played it for Stephen, who'd been traveling and missed the appointment.

Then, things headed south. When I went to transfer the audio file to my PC, I tried to be more efficient by deleting the dozen or so conference calls, interviews and other old files -- and you can probably guess what happened after that.

Yep, I deleted my baby's heartbeat. Not an hour in my posession, and I destroyed my first and only record of our child's existence.

If you've ever deleted an e-mail or file for work and then felt your stomach sink to your toes -- imagine that feeling x 1,000...and you've got my despair yesterday evening. Next visit in mid-June, we'll get pictures of the little one (who tomorrow is about the size of an apple or large pear, I'm told), so be on the lookout for photos to be posted soon.