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!

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;)

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:)

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:)

the hunger is obnoxious

I have NEVER experienced anything like this before. I don't understand, lol! Last night, I got in bed and I realized I was starving. Not the "ohhh, maybe I should get some ice cream or a snack before bed," but outright stomach ROARING. Really? Dan brought me a hard boiled egg, and that curbed the hunger enough. But how could my stomach go from STARVING to satisfied with just one egg?

Today, I had a huge bowl of cereal for breakfast, and at 10:30 I was starving again. I went to Taco Bell, and now (at 3:20) I am starving AGAIN.

I am going to be one of those women rooting through the fridge at 2 in the morning. I always thought the constant eaters during the first tri where the ones that were just using pregancy as an excuse to eat. I am not, I swear. The longer I go without food the sicker I feel. If I eat a big meal, I am hungry an hour later. Where does it go????

Last night, I asked Dan to get me a block of cheddar cheese at the grocery. He asked "for what?" and I had to say, just because I want to eat it! Not a craving really, but it just seems easy for those times that I go from full to starving in a matter of minutes.

horror stories and nosy people...

Dan met a couple with 7 month old twins at the hockey game on Saturday night. He HAD to introduce me, so off we went. I must say these two were cutie-patooties, one each being worn on mom and dad's chest. So sweet. They were originally pregnant with triplets, but the identical twin to the boy didn't make it out of the first trimester.

Enter my first twin horror story...mom said she gave birth at 36w5d, which is SO great. Then, she went on to say that the pregnancy caused her 64 pounds, 3 cracked ribs, HELPP, and the start of liver failure. She was induced the day after they found out about liver failure! There was one other horrible thing that happened to her, but I must have only been able to keep so much of her story in my head, b/c I can't remember it.

Yikes. Nice. Need to hear that!

I was out having lunch with two co-workers today, both of whom are pregnant. One is 18 weeks, the other is 21 weeks. We talked all things pregnancy, and it was fun. One of my co-workers asked to see the dessert tray. The ladies at the table next to us were getting up as the server brought over the tray. The lady at the next table(STRANGER!) looked at me at said "you're having twins, eat whatever dessert you want."

I just looked at her! I mean, I am a nosy nelly, and often quite enjoy listening to other peoples conversations but would NEVER openly admit I was eavesdropping. Seriously???