Easy Peasy - Week 17

Today I heard Clark's heartbeat and the doctor says my cervix is "long and closed."
One of the interesting things about going to the usual OB instead of the high risk OB are the techs and nurses. At the high risk OB, everyone kind of assumes that disaster or at least something that looks like disaster has brought you there. Questions about the children you have at home are asked in hushed tones or not at all.
At the doctor's office, chipper ladies in colorful scrubs quiz you about gender hopes and nursery themes and if your daughter is ready to be a big sister. They see so many average pregnancies with no complications...it's the norm.
Oh how I wish that was my norm.
But the good news is that the baby is fine with a strong heartbeat. I can't ask for more than that.

Skipping Ahead to Now - Week 17

It looks like I missed my Week 16 post. We have so much going on right now that I often eat my dinner in bed and fall asleep before my husband takes the dishes downstairs to the kitchen for me.
I go Friday for a cervix check. I'm less and less worked up about these appointments because I can feel Clark wiggling in there, especially at night, so I know he's alive. I think I will feel better and better - or at east more confident - when I can really feel him in there every single day without the question of "was that the baby or just digestion?"
My only real pregnancy complaint right now are my poor, poor feet! They are swollen and they HURT so much - the ache is sometimes unbearable. My husband is a dear and often rubs them for me, but they hurt when I am sitting, when I am standing up - really they just hurt all the time.
I have also made the decision to hire a counselor for my daughter. This isn't easy for me, and I'm not sure why. She has lost a lot in the last two years - to both death and divorce. She even had what I can only describe as a panic attack. It scared the crap out of me. Of all the things she can take from my personality, why does panic have to be one of those things?
After a long, teary discussion where she told me she feels responsible for her biological dad abandoning her, I made the call and we go for her first session on Thursday. Cross your fingers that it helps.

Early Anatomy Scan - Week 15

I walked into the doctor's office like I was going to my own hanging.

The mothers of dead babies know what I mean: there is no dread like scan dread, when your heart and your head know that this was the day the last time when you got the bad news. This was the week last time when they found the hygroma. This was the very ultrasound room when the tech said she couldn't find kidneys.

This was the week for me - 14. By 10 weeks we knew "something" might be wrong with Drew. His NT was high - 5 mm. But his growth looked good and though there was some hygroma, that could resolve itself, right?

But all was lost at that 14 week early anatomy scan. There it was - more hygroma than brain, a neural tube defect, an anterior heart, a diaphragmatic hernia, ASD, VSD, a two vessel cord. Any hope that we had, and we had so very little hope at that point, was just gone.

So now it was little Clark's turn on the screen. We were riding a high of a normal NT scan, clear genetics test and safe CVS, but I couldn't shake it...that feeling. That Goddamn feeling of terror and love that makes you want to run out of the room screaming for help. I had learned the hard way, twice, that NOTHING good can come of scans.

Except nothing bad came of this one. No joke. I know far, far, far too much about ultrasounds. I know what the measurements should be and how much white you should see in the brain and what a four-chamber heart doesn't look like. But Laura the Tech showed me Clark's brain and it has two hemispheres. No white line where the "water on the brain" usually is. His stomach was in his belly, his bladder filling with pee pee. His heart has four chambers, his cord has three vessels. He wiggles his toes and sucks on his hand. "Hi mom."

So the headline today is: Had Ultrasound, World Did Not End.

IN FACT, our OB even said, "I think we are at a place where I can say with confidence that this pregnancy is no more high risk than any other 'normal' pregnancy."

What, say what?!

So I post my good news with excitement, barely contained.


This could really happen. Now, we do have the normal anatomy scan (the scan that all the Live Baby Mamas call "the gender scan," as if that is all the doctor is really looking for) in five weeks, with a cervical and Doppler check in three weeks.

Such good news yesterday and I'm still dreading each and every appointment. Ugh.

Telling No Tales - Week 14

The subject has come up more than once: when do we tell our big secret?
My husband is excited. We got the good genetics result. We had a good NT scan. Nothing bad happened because of the CVS. We have our early anatomy scan on Monday.
So why not spill the beans? Why not tell the world about this healthy baby?

Oh, oh, oh. Why? Why not just have a baby and call everyone up and say "Merry Christmas! By the way, you have a grandson."
The problem I have with telling everyone are the expectations. My fears live in the worry of other people. I have embraced, as much as possible and with some success, the notion of living this pregnancy day by day - never looking back at the what-could-have-beens and never looking forward to the what-might-be. Up until a week or so ago, I lived strictly in the day. No baby names, no nursery wall colors, no maternity clothes. Just sun up to sun down and then repeat.
This practice keeps me focused on this pregnancy, less freaked out by this pregnancy, and overall just less stressed.
But once we tell everyone - even just the close, important someones - that closely guarded wall of trust will crumble. I will live in a place of expectation - people who expect the baby to live and those who may expect the baby to die. I don't expect ANYTHING. I go from day to day, looking on to the next appointment, check-up, procedure or test result. There will soon be the people in my life looking to celebrate little Clark and everything he means to our family. They will want to plan baby showers and help chose linens and call to see how I am feeling.
Then there will be the people who expect a death. They will quietly or loudly question our decision to conceive again naturally. They will not want to talk about Clark in case he dies. They will plan for nothing and ignore me because I am Dead Baby Girl and my bad genetic luck could be contagious.
Both someones are equally bad for my emotional health.
There is no winning this battle, yet I fight it every day. I am in between my regular clothes and maternity clothes. Having this new job meant buying new clothes, so I bought maternity stuff under duress - my first move toward the hope of a healthy baby. I bought Clark a striped baby outfit, but put it away so I can't see it.
But there is a part of me that is so stupidly convinced that we will go in on Monday and find out he died, that the little movements I think I feel were the imagination of an overly hopeful, grieving mother.
As excited as I am about Clark, about the possibility of a healthy baby, my brain cannot make the leap forward.
But I can't keep this up much longer, I know. My belly is getting bigger and bigger and soon it will be obvious that I am pregnant. But I can't help but dread the white noise of everyone else's opinions. I need to transition from my comfort zone to a "what may come" attitude. That's still just a really big leap for me right now.

Busy life - Week 14

I started my new job this week and while I like it a lot, so many big life changes are not exactly helping my quest for a low stress pregnancy.
In week 14, my biggest pregnancy fears are normal, everyday fears. Now that we know glycosylation isn't a factor, I'm afraid of everything else. On Wednesday I was convinced Clark was dead. Convinced. I had been working hard all day and falling into bed at night, so I hadn't had time to concentrate on his tiny, fleeting movements. I realized that I had not felt him in days, and I freaked out. It would be my luck to finally have a genetically sound baby and lose it to miscarriage.
I did feel him that night, but it only calmed my fears for a few hours.
Now I am waiting impatiently for Monday for our early anatomy scan, where I will hopefully see a little, wiggly Clark in there, living just fine and proving me wrong.

a miracle - Week 13

Today was the day.
I was in the middle of getting dressed when my genetic counselor called.
"I have good news for you," she said.

Our baby is a carrier for my husband's mutation on ALG12. A healthy carrier BOY.
I'm still stunned. This could happen. This could really happen.

After some chatter, I asked her if the test found anything else? Anything bad?
Turns out...no bad news! Just a healthy baby boy.

I expressed my concern about cystic hygroma and diaphragmatic hernia. Drew had both and John had neither. Both abnormalities are part of many syndromes, but they also can stand alone.

But my genetic counselor said she thinks we would have already seen evidence of a cystic hygroma and so far this pregnancy seems to be perfectly normal, perfectly unaffected.

I called my husband and cried. We are going to have a take home son!

I truly thought this baby was a girl. What are the odds of having three boys in a row?
So I spent some time looking at boy baby clothes at the store today and I even bought a little striped sleeper. I browsed the boy scrapbook papers.

Tonight we looked at boy nursery themes. We named our little one, our little boy.

It looks like we really are expecting Clark Alan on Dec. 29.

It is a miracle.

To Doppler or Not to Doppler - Week 13

I have been astonishingly — ASTONISHINGLY — positive about this pregnancy. Maybe its the good NT scan, maybe its something else...I don’t know! All I know is that while I worry and worry and worry, there is some part of me somewhere down deep inside that feels like this baby is OK.
So with that comes peace.
Until last night. I don’t know what happened. My husband and I were talking about the baby a little bit and I felt fine. We decided to take our daughter to see the new Superman movie (bad idea. Not a film for kids. Not a good film for adults, either.) While we were sitting in the dark theater, somewhere in the middle of Superman’s umpteenth battle, it hit me.
Something might be wrong.
I think something is wrong.
Something is wrong.

I started to think back...when was the last time I felt this baby? (I’m feeling little movements, but not much else, It’s really too early for movement).
Then I started to panic. The baby is dead. I know it. No heartbeat. I KNOW IT.
When we got home from the movies, I asked my husband if I could get a Doppler to keep track of the baby’s heartbeat.
SIDE NOTE: My husband never tells me no. I am spoiled rotten.
He said no!
He said he doesn’t want to deal with the days when I can’t find the heartbeat on my own. He thinks that stress will be too much for me. He thinks it will be too much for him.
“I don’t care if you find one for free,” he said. “I don’t want it.”

So now I have to wait until July 8 to find out if this kid is still kicking in there. That’s two whole weeks!
I was even tempted to go to the local “free clinic” where they charge you $50 per appointment and see if they have a Doppler and could check the baby.
I don’t know if a Doppler would help or hurt this situation. As with everything with this pregnancy, I am without answers.

On another note: still nothing on the target genetic test. I’m hoping for results by Wednesday, but I bet it comes in later than that. Wednesday will be 10 business days since my CVS. I’m just ready for some answers.