Another ultrasound today

And yes, it is still good!!!!!! I am still in disbelief that this can and will possibly go well. The heart rate is really good at 167 bpm. We saw little arms and legs or nubs as the tech called them. I actually pointed to the spot where the legs were and asked if that was the head and Curt said "no, that's the legs". How the heck does he know what he's looking at? I guess sometimes it isn't always mothers that know best-lol. To the left of the picture is the legs and the top right is an arm. I swear I see eye sockets, but who knows!

I'm going to go off on a whim here and go against my own self-wishes of not getting in too deep this early, and say that if I had to guess the gender, for some reason boy just sticks in my head. I wouldn't go as far as saying a "gut instinct", but it's a small feeling. In seven months from today we should know.

But some not so great news-I have a low lying placenta. It just that my placenta is about 2 inches from the bottom of my cervix, instead of at the top by my ribs like usual. This usually corrects itself this early on, but if not I will automatically have a c-section at 37 weeks. I absolutely do not want one, but whatever it takes. There are other complications of bleeding and pre-term labor, but we'll cross that bridge when we get there. It's not a big issue, but it seems as if there is always something.

Saw HB again! And our testing on FX decision

I went and saw my doctor per my RE request to go in a week to two after my appointment w/ her. This was Wednesday 1/16. It was a total waste of time and he had the worst "bedside" manor. This was a different doctor cause I didn't want to wait to see my usual. I asked when I could have my next U/S and he said in about three weeks-Are you kidding me???? You're asking a woman w/ 4 m/c's to wait until she can pretty much hear the HB on a doppler for her u/s. After a lot of convincing on my part, I got him to allow one for the following week. He said around the 24th which would be Thursday. So of course, they had no available appt's that week so I got in for Monday the 28th. That was just too long for me. So I called my high risk OB the next morning and left a message asking if I could get in earlier by chance. I hop in the shower about 10:20, just put the soap in my hair and she calls. "Can you get here at 10:40?" Sure, no problem. SO I wash and rinse like a mad woman and get out us out of the house. SO the lady comes down to get us, I am so hurrying to get Laila down there, she asks if the other nurse can watch Laila and I say she probably won't allow it and she's like okay, well hurry we have to get you in. Lady, I can only fly so fast. I get in the room and tech starts the U/S and asks "how much spotting are you having". I said I wasn't having any and she rolls her eyes and gets huffy and asks then why are we doing a u/s. I flat out said, I asked for one for reassurance and the nurse said I could come today. So she says so we are just doing one for just because and I just said "yep" and looked away. Whatever. That is the second time I've had an U/S done and she's acted like I'm such a burden. Umm... do you even have kids, cause I can sure bet you've never had a m/c or any complications for that matter. And, to know she was so hurry up w/ me and she thought I was having issues. Well, she turns the screen my way and there is my precious baby, heart beating away. And of course, I was hoping to be 8 weeks 1 day (one week up form last week appt), but I wasn't so that freaked me out. I just tried to be relaxed and know that different machines and techs can get different measurements. Curt and decided once things are good w/ this baby and we have it, we are going to turn them into the better business bureau for poor professional skills. I've also had 3 appointments that have never been on the books that I've made. But, they know my history and I really love the midwife and frankly I'm tired of switching doctors. I've seen 5 different ones since I got PG w/ Laila. I'm done shopping around. Besides once I relax and things are for sure going good, I'm not going to need their support as much.

So on top of me being worried about measurements, my morning sickness left me a little. I woke up Thursday morning and dry heaved. And then Friday morning, I felt great. Some tummy ache son and off all day, but nothing I have been feeling. Same went for most the rest of the weekend. I am trying so hard to figure out a reason I need to come in again for a U/S without lying. So pathetic, but i even allowed some fun stuff to happen between Curt and I for two reason-one cause it's been forever and two-I thought it might make me spot, but wouldn't worry me so much cause of it being after sex, but then I could exaggerate it a little and get into another U/S. You know what. It is not pathetic. It is one mother who desperately wants this baby to keep on doing so well. Any woman in my shoes would understand.

Now for the fragile X stuff. We decided we will not do any testing on the baby pre-birth. It is less than .05% chance of a m/c, but not worth it in our eyes. We'll test the baby at birth and look into getting a physical therapist to test the baby as well to let us know if there should be any specifics we could work on until we know for sure. Now that we've got a plan, I feel much more relaxed about things.

Universe...we have a heartbeat!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Thank the almighty Lord above!!!!!! I am so praying this is our sticky baby we've been waiting what seems like forever for.

So, I decided to delete my blog link off myspace and share this journey with whomever shall find it. SO please, if this is someone reading who knows me well, respect our wishes to keep this secret still. We are still scared to death and I want to tell someone when we feel comfortable that this will be successful. Umm...when the baby is born? Maybe!!

Thursday 1/10/08 was our appointment. We were scared to death and of course it took them a long time to bring us into the ultrasound room. There were two other women in there cause it was a new machine so they were showing the tech how to fix things, etc. Which was so beyond frustrating cause it was so hard to be patient. Curt could see the screen from where he sat and I could see him watching it intently w/ a small grin. SO I said "stop looking and trying to analyze what you think you see". I didn't want him to think he saw something good and turn out it wasn't. SO then the tech, turns the screen towards us and says "sorry, you guys can look. Here's the heartbeat and that's the baby", well she couldn't even finish it cause I just said "there's a heartbeat!?!?!" and I started bawling. She was surprised and said "you guys haven't got this far before?" and we explained our short version of our story. SO then it was a emotional, but funny moment cause of all the people and they all seemed excited and happy and I'm still holding back tears and stretching my head as far as it can go just to stare at my little baby's heartbeat. I kept fighting back tears of joy. The beat was strong and everything looked good. She said I had a small implantation bleed I may pass so not to freak automatically if I start bleeding or spotting. Then we met w/ the doctor and she sent us back to my regular OBGYN. I think I'll be considered high risk till 12 weeks then hopefully I'll have a normal pregnancy. I am still on the progesterone suppositories twice a day and my injections of lovenox once/day. I may be on those until the third trimester. SO hopefully I can perfect them to minimize my bruising so I can get at least one decent belly shot since I have to give the shot in my belly. Whatever it takes though.

On a less happy note, we found out I am a carrier of the fragile X syndrome. I am not affected by it, but I carry it. This is a big concern for us cause it gets worst w/ each generation, so if I should pass it on as "active" per say to the baby and he/she is affected his/her children may be worst than my child is. But all we can do is one day at a time w/ this. Curt and I aren't sure we want to look too far into what it entails cause what can we do about it now. We'd just feel guilty for our grandchildren and so what should we have a child affected by fragile X. We'd love him/heras much as Laila and that's that. I do not want to do any fetal testing that doesn't involve taking urine or blood form me. I was against that w/ Laila and after our hard road I sure as hell am not going to go poking around at the poor baby or his/her environment. And the doctor gave us the option to terminate should it have fragile X and I about lost it. That is not an option for me for ANY reason at all and certainly not something as workable as fragile X is. This is our miracle baby for sure. God really wanted it to be with us, whatever His reason may be and we're keeping it, ugly, sassy or fragile X affected ;-)

So thank you God for this opportunity. PLease keep this baby gorwing healthy and strong!!

12/22/07; 12/28/07; 1/5/08

12-22-07

No fu**ing way!! Those were the words I said when I saw that line show up on my pregnancy test 12-20-07. I had 3 digitals in the house so I said what the heck, better make sure although I swore the internet cheapie must be wrong. The word “pregnant” popped up in a minute. I hate to be blunt here, but the whole doctors office, my sis and friends and my regular doctor know this so why not?? The last time we had sex was 5 days before I ovulated. Things just don’t happen like that. Yes, fertility books say sperm can live in fertile environment for up to 5 days. But it is just crazy that it was the max. I think Curt is a little proud of his super man powers in that sense ;-) But quite bummed at the lack of crazy TTC duties he usually gets. It boggles my mind that two people can be so extremely fertile in the way of getting pregnant, but have more bad luck carrying a baby to term than good luck. Life is truly weird.

So after staring at my digital about 20 more times and using the F word about equally so, I really freaked. Within a week of my positive test I had: drank, took Nyquil, took Claritin, took benadryl, took antibiotics, and got a steroid shot to reverse the allergic reaction to the antibiotics that I got. How on earth could things ever be fine w/ all that I shoved into my body. Someone told me to think crack whores. If they can do it, I may have a chance. So I repeated my mantra all day “crack whores can” “crack whores can”. I went in for a beta-all was good. Actually a fairly high number for where I was. Told Curt who flipped out just like I had. After we got a hold of ourselves, we came to terms with the fact that we can only take things one day at a time.

I also began lovenox (blood thinner) injections. Those are insane. I am great w/ shots and giving blood, but injecting your self is a whole different story. The first couple were okay then I had one that bruised me the size of an egg. I’ve never seen such a pretty color of purple and red mix ;-)

12/28/07

So far so good. My betas (blood work) are doubling great. I’ve had some nausea spells and I’m really tired. As long as my blood work goes well tomorrow, we’ll probably schedule an ultrasound and then go from there. I’m nervous about it all and still in shock. We weren’t ready to be pregnant yet, let alone go through another m/c. Which for starters, who ever is ready for one and I just pray that this is our second miracle baby that I will meet in August. I almost feel like at the rate I’m going, I’m going to have a due date or a m/c anniversary in every month.

01/05/08 Happy 2 ½ Birthday to Laila!!!!

Well, today marks 6 weeks. We have never made it past 6 weeks 1 day. I am so trying not to freak out, but it’s too damn hard not to. Our heart and soul are already so invested into this baby. I have an ultrasound on Thursday 1/10. Sometimes I feel like everything has to be okay cause how can someone have 5 losses in 13 months, but then I think there may be something wrong w/ us and we’ll keep having them until we get “fixed”. I’m just dreading the thought of another and thinking about how I will react this time if it happens again. I will survive as I have through the first 4, but I really don’t know how much more my heart can take. There is one more thing we can do to rule out any issues so that may be the next step and then should it happen again, I think it would be time for a major discussion about adoption. I haven’t told anyone when my ultrasound is because I just don’t want to deal w/ phone calls or knowing people are waiting to hear the results. If it’s good, we want to live in that moment as long as we can and if it’s bad we need our time to grasp it all.

So hopefully, my life does not take that route. I am praying hard and trying to focus on other events in my life. I’m really tired all the time so I don’t feel like doing much to keep myself busy. And Laila doesn’t like to share the TV so cartoons don’t really do much at keeping my mind off things ;-) Curt has been great. All the pregnancies we don’t talk about so we tend to kind of forget that I’m pregnant and still have mood swings and emotions on top of the stress our history brings us anyway. But he’s been very understanding and remembering that things may not turn out well, but for now I am still pregnant w/ hormones and symptoms.