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Wednesday, March 30, 2011

NT scan and other updates

Sorry to those of you calling/e-mailing me for updates. I feel like a big piece of poo. Who would have guessed that I could get through 12 weeks of a twin pregnancy, only to start puking my guts up at 12 weeks exactly. I threw up SIX times on Sunday. The worst part is the vomiting is so violent that I pee on myself at the same time.

Sexy.

Monday I didn't feel great but didn't puke. Last night, 5 hours after I ate my dinner, it all came up. And I peed on myself again:(

I haven't taken my Prozac or PNV since Sunday, which is what I took that stimulated the morning puke session.

I am exhausted. I've been sick on and off for about a month with cold-like symptoms. I just can't shake it, I assume because my immune system is not what it used to be. My head pounds daily. I take at least 4 Tylenol a day, but they don't do much to ease the head pounding.

We had our NT scan yesterday so I took 1/2 day of vacation. I went home after the appt and slept for 2 hours and was STILL exhausted. Dan looks at me like I am lying. Oh, if ONLY I was lying about how tired I am. I don't understand how I am supposed to keep up like this? I guess I should be happy that it hasn't really kicked in until now?

Onto the NT scan. All went well and both babies were very cooperative. The tech said all measurements were within normal range and I should get a call from the genetic counselor tomorrow to let me know our risk of Downs and whatever else they test for. After seeing babies on u/s again, Dan and I both think Baby A is a girl and Baby B is a boy.

Baby A was just chillin' and let the tech get the cutsie profile shots. It took her 5 tries to even get a heart rate on Baby B, not b/c there was an issue but b/c it (he??) was moving all over the place. At one point she got an "aerial" shot looking down on its head and you can see the arms going crazy, like it was karate chopping or something. Apparently, we have very stereotypical views of boys/girls, b/c this is what we are basing our very unscientific theory on:)

I saw Baby A swallowing, which was very cute. The tech was SO close to the "money shot." She showed us a view of the upper legs, from knees to hip, and I asked her to guess but she wouldn't:( So, we have 6 more weeks to find out the sexes.

Baby A's heartrate was 157. Not sure what we got on Baby B.

Oh, and I found out that Baby A is sitting toward my right, posterior placenta and Baby B is camped out on the back of my ute, anterior placenta. Sophie had an anterior placenta and I swear this is why 1) I didn't feel her moving until much later and 2) that I never looked that "big."

I will post u/s pics soon, I swear, as well as some new ones of Sophie.

Monday, March 28, 2011

12 weeks!

I'm stealing the template below from other blogs I have seen:) I think it's a good way to keep track of the important things (like weight and stretch marks;))

Also, I should say I started this on Monday, and today is Wednesday, so it's already a bit out of date but you get the point.

How far along: 12 weeks, 1 day
Total weight gain/loss: 5 pounds, give or take
Maternity clothes: Most pants are maternity at this point. I can still wear some of my regular pants, but the maternity are just SO much more comfy. No tops yet...way huge on me.
Stretch marks: Nope. And none with Sophie. Hoping I can get out alive this time, but I doubt it.
Sleep: Major insomnia. I can fall asleep, but will wake between 2 and 4 and canNOT go back to sleep. It's horrible.
Best moment this week: Last night was my last PIO shot!!!
Movement: I swear I felt something last week. ANd no, it wasn't gas, but really I know it probably wasn't baby either.
Food cravings: Sweets. Last Thursday, I had two donuts for breakfast, and two candy bars later in the day.
Gender: ??? I guess a boy and girl.
Labor Signs: None
Belly Button in or out: In
What I miss: A full nights sleep.
What I am looking forward to: NT scan tomorrow!!!

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

15 months

I am SO late in posting about Sophie's 15 months stats, but better late than never. Officially, she weighed 24.5 pounds (80th percentile), head was also 80th and height was 20-25th percentile. She's definately inherited my vertical challenges. The appt itself went fine. We talked about when to reduce/cut out her pacifer use. Dr. R said as soon as possible. She asked how many words Sophie is saying and we had to say none, but she didn't seem concerned.

Unofficial stats are below...and I found this great template on someone else's blog that I am borrowing!

Size 18 months and some 24 months, although she still fits in some 12 month clothes also.

Hair: Leaning towards strawberry blonde. No haircuts recently since I'm trying to grow her bangs out long enough to tuck behind her ears. I had bangs growing up and hated them, plus they are so much more maintainance.

Teeth: We think she has 12 teeth, 8 front top and bottom, plus one molar top and bottom each side. Dr. R couldn't even get in there to see!

Sleeping: 12 hours, typically 7-7. One-two names during the day.

Eating: all the time. She is constantly signed "more" which in her world ONLY means food. She will bring an empty plastic ware bowl to us to fill up with something (anything). She still eats about anything, but loves the finger foods she can serve herself. Loves fruit of any kind, veggies have been pushed to the side lately. CHicken tenders are another definate winner.

Movement: Walking every where; no more crawling. Not running yet though.

Milestones: Hmmm...first cold?! It was horrible. She was up almost the entire night because she couldn't sleep/breath:( She can roll on to her belly and scoot off of our bed feet-first.

Favorite toys/activities: She loves her plastic stackable rings, and has started bringing books to us, although she doesn't necessarily want us to read them:) She loves the tupperware drawer and will play with the plastic ware for HOURS.

Dislikes: Getting her face/hands wiped after a meal, bathtime STILL.

Words/sounds: No definate words yet. SHe says something that sounds like "ish." I think she's trying to say "this." She sort of says daddy but in all one sylable.

It's real

So, it hit me today, as we were leaving my first OB appt. We are having twins. Twins. TWINS. This is not a "normal" pregnancy. I was SO sure my normally laid back DR would just congratulate me and send me on my way. Of course, I had a lot of questions for her, but I thought she'd answer them more to humor me than anything. Not so much.

The first question was from Dan. "What about a C-Section?" I didn't even know he'd been THINKING about it. For all those anti-section readers, I must preface this by saying that Dr. S is normally very PRO vagingal birth. Her response was "A C-Section is a very real possibity." I listened to them chat back and forth for a minute and then jumped in and said "for the record, I'd really like to try vaginal." Of course Dr. S was fine with that, but did tell me it's a distinct possibility that I could have the first one vaginally, but the 2nd would have to be taken via C-Section. For those reasons, even a vaginal birth is going to take place in the OR. OR=SCARY. This was my first slap in the face of reality.

Next up "what about bed rest?" Dr S said "I normally have my twin moms cut down to part time at 28 weeks." WHAT??? Really? "Can I work from home?" "Maybe. It depends." I have a JOB people, that pays the MAJORITY of our bills! Obviously, I'd use my sick/vacation time if need be, but then that is less time to be home after babies are born. We can NOT afford for me to be on un-paid leave.

"We're going out of town when I'll be 25 weeks pregnant. That's fine, right?" She just looked at me, and finally put me in my place (for lack of a better term). "This is not a singleton pregnancy. Of course I hope that it doesn't have complications, but I cannot guarentee you that you'll be able to travel." "Well, how about driving instead of flying?" Once I told her it was a 9 hour drive she just looked at me and said "you are NOT going to be comfortable being in a car that long." So now, that's on hold. She said if we want a vacation, we need to take it before 20 weeks.

Otherwise, what I learned is:
1) monitoring every 4 weeks until 20 weeks, then down to every 2 weeks.
2) u/s (with the GOOD machine, I think!!!) at every appt. YAY!!
3) NT scan is being scheduled.
4) she was wishy-washy about weight gain, saying that I needed an extra 600 calories a day (not 300). She told me to weigh myself every few days and evaluate my eating habits if I noticed a significant increase. For the record, I've gained 5 pounds in 10 weeks.
5) Anatomy scan scheduled for May 10!!!!!!
6) She is writing a note so that I can get a disabled tag for my car, when at work.
7) I can pick up Sophie, but nothing else that weighs more than 25 pounds.
8) I should NOT start any new excercise/increase walking, etc.

Oh, and the best news is that we got to see babies again:) I really LOVE Dr. S, even though you might not be able to tell it from this post. I've just never had her be so strict before!

Friday, March 11, 2011

peaceful oblivion no more

In my bout with insomnia last night, I got a bit paranoid. Funny how night-time waking can do funny things to your brain. I started thinking that maybe something was wrong with one/both babies, maybe a heartbeat (or two) stopped.

So, I called Dr. S office this morning and they were able to get me in for an u/s. I had actualaly only requested a heartbeat check, which they usually just do with the doppler. But, they told me that 1) at this early stage the doppler might not pick up the heartbeat, and 2) even if the doppler could pick up the hb, it would be hard at this point to determine if we were hearing both heartbeats. I forgot about the crappy u/s machine they use for situations like this. They have the new, high-tech one like Dr. K's office, but they also have a smaller, antiquated one that they wheel from room to room.

Anyhoo...both babies are still there, both hearts still beating. She was able to differentiate one lying down and one sitting up (as much as you can at this stage I guess??). Their feet were facing each other so it looked like my sweet little fuzzy blobs were playing footsie;)

Thursday, March 10, 2011

We bought a house!!!!

The news of the day (so far!) is that we officially sealed the deal on a house yesterday at 5 pm. I've had my eye on it for several weeks, but kept passing it up b/c I wasn't a fan of the outside. It's a ranch style house, which honestly, I find boring. I grew up in a ranch, and have just always envisioned (and loved) charming little A Frame 1 1/2 or 2 story houses. They have personality, lol:)

But, once our first house slipped away we knew we needed to kick it into high gear. Dan opened up his thoughts to other areas, and I opened up mine to other styles. We drove by the house a few weeks ago, and walked around and peeked in the windows. It definately drew us in, so we finally made an appt to go see it this past Saturday. It was the 3rd house we saw that day. The first two were FULL of charm and personality, but they needed some fixes, some pretty major. When we finally got to this appt though, we walked in and I fell in love:) The inside is PERFECT for us. 3 bedrooms, 2 baths upstairs, along with living room, dining room, family room and large open kitchen (that looks into living and dining rooms). Downstairs is TONS of storage, although the majority of the basement is finished, with a 4th bedroom, and potentially 5th if we put up some drywall.

It's on 1/3 of an acre, which for the burbs (and this one in particular) is really decent. There's a deck, patio and decent size backyard. Also, one car garage.

I'm really happy with it, even more so now that the negotiations are over.We don't close until June 23, which gives us over 3 months to sell our condo, which has already been on the market about 6 weeks. We continue to get showing requests, but so far (with the exception of one), all of the "negative" feedback has been nothing we can fix. A few people said 2nd bedroom was too small, one didn't like that there were lots of renters, etc.

So, that's the deal! I'm feeling much better now that ONE thing is set in stone. I was feeing really frazzled and scattered with some many balls up in the air.

In other news, my first OB appt is today. For a brief second this morning, I wondered if we'd get bad news today, like one's heart stopped beating or something. I quickly dismissed it. With all of this other stuff going on, I (thankfully) have been in peaceful oblivion of what's going on in ute-ville.

Sophie is officially 15 months! I'll make a separate post with her official and un-official stats:)

Tuesday, March 1, 2011

Wanna hear the McBabies???

Finally got the video working. And, I was wrong about the heartbeats, Baby A was 174 and Baby B was 182. The video starts in the middle of Baby A heart beating:)

You also get some Sophia babbling in the background:)

still have two heartbeats:)

Yesterday was our 8w1d ultrasound. Both babies were measuring on track, the same length actually. One had a heartrate of 177 and the other 184. We saw arm/leg buds on both, and the spine (very cool!) of one. I took a video, primarily of the heartbeats, but of course I'm having trouble uploading here.

Baby A was doing some wiggling, but B was superchill. It's amazing how much they've grown in just 13 days. The sacs seem supersized, lol. I'm beginning to wonder how my body is going to handle this.

After the u/s we met with Dr. K one last time. The consult room we used was the same one that saw MANY tears once upon a time. Several rooms have seen my tears, but this particular cryfest stood out to me. I'm fairly certain it was my WTF appt post failed FET #1, and my attempts to convince Dr. K that she needed to cut me open and look for endo. So, it was bittersweet that this was the last place we met with her.

She said babies looked great, vanishing twin syndrome should not be an issue at this point, and the chance of miscarriage is a bit more than 5%. She confirmed due dates, played with Sophie, and chatted with us about our plans.

I didn't expect to cry. I really didn't. But when we stood up, I hugged her and the waterworks started as I tried to say "thank you." It came out more of a blubbering mess. Then, Dan started crying. Poor Dr. K;) She ordered us to keep her posted, and to bring the babies in next fall.

So that's that. All done with the RE. Forever. Even if something happens with this pregancy, I really think I'm done. I'm done with the emotions and anxiety of it all.
And the guilt that I am still dealing with towards Sophie and feeling like I've ruined her life has really put in perspective for me that she is all I really need. Anything else is just a bonus:)