A New Chapter

Rarely in life can we look back and say this specific day or even week was the end of one chapter and the beginning of a new one but that's what this week is for our little family.

Today, I had my last 3D/4D ultrasound of baby girl. I'll probably have another 2D in a week or two but if you've ever had a 3D/4D you know the difference. Between the boy and baby girl, I've had well over a dozen of these types of ultrasounds and it's a bit surreal to think that I'll probably never have another. Our little princess is measuring about a week ahead of schedule and is showing none of the signs of distress we saw in the first and second trimester. Equally reassuring is the fact that the cardiac medication I'm on doesn't appear to be affecting her growth (a possible side effect) whatsoever and the best news, at least for me, came when the perinatalogist took a few extra images and video of our baby's heart. Not because he was concerned but because he said it was the perfect example of what a strong fetal heart should look like. The four different chambers were clearly visible and apparently text book in shape and activity. He told me he plans to use the images and video to help teach proper sonograph reading. Of course it was a proud Mommy moment but for me it was more than that. My biggest fear with both of my children has been that I would somehow pass on my own cardiac complications or that the medications that I take to stay healthy while pregnant will affect their little hearts. The only downside to the ultrasound was that baby girl is a bit smooshed at this point and getting a decent image was a bit tough. Here's the only mostly clear image we were able to get this time around...

Our last 3D/4D ultrasound wasn't the only major event today. Joshua (still on his mini-leave in Florida) took the boy to the ocean for the first time. It was also the first time they got to really fish together and I'm proud to say that my son is apparently a natural fisherman. On more than one occasion he reeled in TWO fish on one line! I didn't even know you could do that. And from what I understand, the boy did it all...cast the line, waited and then wound it back up to the pier they were fishing off of. I really couldn't care less about fishing but I was impressed. Our little guy is growing up, Joshua's about to leave the country and our baby girl will be here in just a couple weeks...new chapters all around.

(the boy was trying to hold up two fingers to indicate that he caught two fish but apparently Nana wasn't fast enough with the camera)

(learning about catch and release)

(my two favorite people)

(swimming in the ocean for the first time)

I need to give props to my wonderful husband for not only covering our little blondy's pale head but doing so with a Cars hat which matches the Cars swim trunks I sent...I was very impressed with Joshua.

***For the record, if you're not high risk and already scheduled to have a 3D/4D ultrasound but are considering purchasing one...I personally recommend going around the 24-28 week mark because they look less alien-esque, they have some meat on their little bones but mostly they're still small enough that they aren't going to be smooshed against the uterine wall (which is why today's images were a bit blurry). My favorite ultrasound of baby girl was around the 22 week mark (she measured ahead from the beginning)...here it is...

Leave Update

This might be a bit long because we've done so much over this mini-leave. Joshua's on his way to the furniture store to pick up our new kitchen table set (yay!) so I have a couple hours to catch up on the week's activities because we live in the middle of nowhere so it'll be at least two hours before he's home again.

First of all, I'm home blogging instead of with Joshua to pick up the table set because the boy is still asleep...it's 2:00 in the afternoon. Yesterday morning, we drove about 3 hours to my parent's house because my Aunt came into town for her annual "beef pickup." Basically, my family lives in the middle of nowhere and has a couple cows slaughtered every year at which time my Aunt makes the 12 hour drive to fill her freezer with organic beef in various forms. This is the same Aunt who has in many ways adopted Joshua...I say that partly because she's more like a mother-in-law than an Aunt to me now-she always agrees with my husband and they enjoy ganging up to make fun of me and because she's now officially seen the boy more times than my real mother-in-law but that's a post for another day. We had a great day planning our next family vacation, holiday plans (requires a bit more planning when everyone is spread so far out) and getting excited about the new babies that are about to join the family (4 infants in about 3 months). After dinner with the family and the boy's Godparents, we went back to my parent's and played games until about midnight at which time we had to leave because we hadn't brought the dog with us. To our surprise, the boy stayed awake the ENTIRE three hours back to the house. Oh joy. So today I see him waking up, hopefully soon, and we'll obviously skip any nap and hope to get him back on track tomorrow.

Going back to this week though, I had two OB appointments. My high risk perinatology appointment on Tuesday (which went GREAT!) and my regular OB on Thursday which also went well.

Tuesday's appointment showed that the echogeneticity of baby girl's bowel is significantly less although not totally gone which is actually the best of both worlds because although it's barely present, I will (oh darn) have to have another 3D ultrasound next month....for free. Insurance rocks. Also, the ultrasound showed that the bleeding I was experiencing has pretty much gone away totally and so certain pelvic restrictions were lifted...8 hours before Joshua came home. Woohoo. That is all I'll say about that.

Here's a couple of my favorite shots from the ultrasound Tuesday.

I think she really looks like her brother and I can't wait to see what the next ultrasound will show because she'll have some more meat on her. For the record, I'm not offended  if you think 3D ultrasounds are a little creepy. A lot of people do...I've noticed it's especially true of men who don't yet have kids of their own. It's a strange fluid environment but as my little girl, I think it's awesome. I loved getting video of our son in utero sucking his thumb and now battling the same bad habit almost three years later.

Serious moment: it struck me, watching my daughter get annoyed with the poking and proding of the ultrasound that legally, because I have a heart condition which with pregnancy can be life-threatening, I have the legal standing for another week (almost two weeks after these pictures were taken) to request an abortion. It's unspeakable. I can't really imagine how anyone could look at those pictures and still tell me that she doesn't have the right to continue living. That somehow my rights outweigh her rights because she's not yet real? not developed enough to have rights?

Ok I need to stop. Serious moment over.

Wednesday we did the swim lesson thing with the boy and just hung out at the house.

Thursday was my 2nd OB appointment of the week and I found out that baby girl is in the 46th percentile for size which is pretty good because I've had a really hard time gaining weight. In fact, in a weird twist, I'm still not gaining enough pounds in general but my stomach is now measuring larger than the normal pregnant belly at this stage. For the record, I wasn't overweight to start with so it's not like the weight is just relocating. My OB said it's most likely because I only have about two inches from my ribs to my hips so what little there is of her, is sticking out, a lot.

That's about it for the leave update...lots of running around and having fun in between OB appointments. Good times.

Where's the pen!s?

I'm a bit embarrassed to admit that the crass title of this post is the very first thing I said yesterday when the ultrasound tech gave us our first peek between our new little one's legs. Apparently, there wasn't one. We're having a girl. I seem to have a filter problem when it comes to big moments with my children. Don't get me wrong, I already love this little girl like crazy just as I love our son but like I said, I have a filter problem. The first thing I said when the boy was born (after confirming he was healthy and had all ten fingers and ten toes) was to my husband..."baby, I'm not pregnant anymore!"

Once I got over the momentary shock of "it's a girl," I was able to focus on what the perinatologist had to say. Most of it was good but not great. She's alive and she's thriving. I don't have placenta previa which was a concern but she has what's called echogenic bowel. Basically, her kidneys were showing up brighter on the ultrasound than they should. The most likely reason  is that at some point I spotted and she swallowed the blood (kinda gross but that's actually what we're hoping for) and her kidneys should clear up with time. Unfortunately, echogenic bowel is also a "soft-marker" for a chromosomal condition like Down's Syndrom or Cystic Fibrosis. As a result, the chance that she has something like that, given my age and our ethnicity goes from about 1 in 800 to about 4%. Since the chance is still very small, we've decided against getting the more invasive amnio tests to know for sure. We'll continue to monitor her with ultrasounds and hope and pray that everything clears up with time. In the meantime, I'm having fun buying stuff. I don't think my husband fully appreciated my love of shopping until about two hours after we were told it's a girl...his exact words were "I need to make more money." In all fairness, I did warn him that girls are expensive and it's exponential as they age.

Tomorrow, Tomorrow...

You're only a day away!

Ok, so it's a bit corny but it's how I feel today because tomorrow we'll go to my perinatologist and see our first 3D images of the baby. We've already had SEVERAL 2D ultrasounds (the only benefit of being labeled "high risk"). But tomorrow, we fully expect to walk away knowing the gender and it's so exciting. With our son the very first 3D image we saw was him "in all his glory." We moved on and got to see some amazing video  of him actually sucking his thumb...something he unfortunately still does. It's a work in progress.

I have a few friends who for various reasons have opted not to find out the gender and although I think that's awesome, I can't do it. At least not with this pregnancy because Joshua's deploying. He's going to miss the birth (I'm not quite ready to blog about that yet) and if it's a girl...oh the plans I have...much of which, Joshua will be required to do in the minuscule time he has before he leaves.

Back to more pleasant things: The first time I had to go to the perinatologist, I was so intimidated because he's that guy...the guy who takes care of the highest of high risks. I'm blessed that I expect to only see him a few times during my pregnancy and otherwise I'm able to see my "normal" OB. The office waiting room is different than any other I've been in. OB's are usually happy and bouncy rooms, my cardiologist's waiting rooms have generally been professional but sober but the perinatologist is some sort of weird mix of the two atmospheres. The wait times can exceed the appointment by hours because even with multiple doctors on hand, they have emergencies and you just wait. Nobody complains because everyone there is there for the same reason...something is wrong and they have to fight to have children. I'll never forget my first visit...although there's one aspect I wish I could. I wore a shirt which ended up making me feel worse than I have ever felt...like bottom of the barrel, scum of the Earth, bad just really, really bad. I wore a maternity shirt, surrounded by high risk pregnant women, many of whom have suffered multiple miscarriages and are at that office hoping desperately not to have another. The shirt read: I Can Grow People. It's a super cute maternity shirt from my favorite maternity boutique but it was the worst thing I could have possibly worn in that office. I spent the two hours waiting to be seen with my arms crossed high above my chest, hoping and praying that the wrong woman wouldn't read it and have her heart broken into a million pieces.

So, tomorrow, I will be wearing a much more boring, plain t-shirt and jeans and I'll get to see my little peanut. Eeek!