The Michals family is growing...by a peanut!

It's official...Baby #3 aka Peanut is due to arrive in August!

In mid December I found out I was pregnant. The week of Christmas I had blood drawn and the numbers were very low. For some reason they asked me to come back the next day to repeat the blood draw which was only about 24 hours later. (HCG levels should double every 48-72 hours) Anyway, the results weren't much better and had only increased by a few. I was told by the nurse/midwife who I was seeing at the time that I should prepare for a miscarriage and then went on to give me details of what to expect. She then said that if nothing happened over Christmas (we were leaving town for about a week) to call after we got back to town.

I kept this all to myself. I didn't want to upset Tim or to have hushed conversations in front of the girls and honestly I didn't want to upset everybody at Christmas. Probably wasn't the best idea I've ever had but it made sense at the time. Over Christmas I prepared myself for what was to come...a miscarriage. I've had a tubal/ectopic pregnancy before but not a miscarriage and that ectopic was horrific. The anticipation was not fun. Knowing what was to come...very sad. I enjoyed Christmas with my family. The knowledge of how blessed I am kept me sane! And in my mind/heart I knew that my sweet unborn baby would go to Heaven to be with my mom...which gave me peace. 

Over the week leading up to Christmas and the week following I continued to expect to start bleeding or cramping...but nothing happened and quite the opposite did...I began to feel more and more pregnant. We came back home on Thursday after Christmas so I went in on Friday for another blood draw. I wanted to know what was going on. I told Tim over the weekend and so we waited for the Tuesday after New Year's to hear the results. He and I laughed and cried. I think he was literally in shock. I'm thinking it was probably a good idea he didn't know over Christmas because all weekend he was in an odd state of shock. The call was funny and the phone nurse said "you are Definitely pregnant and we need to schedule your first appointment" wow...after that i was pretty much in shock. how do you go from "you will probably miscarry" to "let's schedule your first appt" it's not easy to adjust to that.

Fast forward 2 more weeks...first appointment and sonogram. I saw that precious little "thing" and heard a beautiful heartbeat going 169 beats a minute. Estimated due date August 24th. That night I prepared a note "from baby" to big sisters and put it in a box with the sono picture and a pair of little white baby booties.

We shared the good news with Nora and Madelynn...Nora was really excited and Mads had no clue! It was funny! 

Fast forward two more weeks and I started having light pink spotting with awful cramps. Saw a doctor in the practice...she did a sono and said everything looked fine. If it got worse we'd go from there. That was a Wednesday.

On Saturday Feb 4th I was walking into Hobby Lobby with Nora to purchase a child's art kit for a birthday party Nora was attending that afternoon. As we walked in I felt a gush that just didn't feel normal at all. We went to the restroom and I was bleeding A LOT. I had Nora grab an art kit, we checked out and headed for the car. I explained to Nora that something was wrong and I wanted her to understand because I was going to call the doctor and I didn't want her to be scared by what was said. The on-call doctor called within a minute of me leaving my voicemail. She suggested I head to the ER.

I took Nora home and changed clothes. I told Tim to take the girls to the party (instead of going to the ER) and I'd be fine going to the ER on my own. The on-call dr had called ahead so they took me back very quickly. I had a pelvic exam, blood work and a sonogram. As the sonographer was leaving my room, Tim got there to sit with me. Our friends Emily and Nathan had picked up our girls and taken the girls home with them. It was nice to have Tim with me! Although I will say this...everyone at the ER was awesome and super friendly and attentive...but I was reading the first Hunger Games book and it was honestly quite nice to have some quiet time to read! :D 

The results...threatened miscarriage. In other words a possible tear between the sac and uterus. Go home and rest. Call your dr on Monday.

To be perfectly honest with you...at this point I really didn't know what to think about my pregnancy anymore. I had gone from shock to hopeful to miscarriage preparation to joy and shock of pregnancy excitement to pure fear ...an absolute emotional roller coaster. I was beginning to not know how to feel or what to expect. But after three sonograms I had seen a precious baby jumping around with an amazingly strong heartbeat. But that day leaving the ER I realized that I could only be cautiously optimistic and truly I just wanted to be excited!

I rested all weekend. Tim was wonderful. The girls were excellent! On Monday I called the doctor...I requested an appointment with the doctor that had been on call. I mentioned in this POST about my OB/GYN dying. I saw the nurse/midwife after him because we didn't think we'd have anymore babies. But after the messed up "you are going to miscarry" situation with the nurse/midwife then having the next doctor that had no softness and was too brisk for me...I felt like I needed something more from the person who I'll be spending time with over the next 6 months and who would deliver my baby. I liked the way the on-call doctor spoke to me. I decided to take a chance with her and it was a great chance! She was wonderful.

She did a pelvic and said the cervix is all closed up. She listened to the heartbeat and it was beautiful! I'm seeing her again on the 28th. Dr. Auers and I will be in the delivery room together once again only this time I won't be photographing a birth but giving birth!

For Valentine's day today I went to see a perinatologist. It would seem that when you are over 35 (I'm 37) they think you are high risk for all sorts of things! So I had an NTS or nuchal translucency screening. It's a detailed sono in which they measure the baby's neck for a pad or thickness. Those results, in correlation with bloodwork, allow you to know the risk of a chomosonal problem. (i probably didn't explain that well but if you click on NTS it will take you to a website with a real explanation.) 

I loved the perinatologist. She is great. I will be seeing her over the next few months. We will do a full body scan of the baby at 17 weeks, a heart sono at 23 weeks and then a few more throughout to monitor my placenta due to placenta accreta when I had Madelynn. We want to keep track and hopefully that won't happen again or at least be prepared if it does.

Dr. Abbassi asked me if we had seen a twin in the other sonos that I have had...um no. There on the screen today was an obvious empy sac with what she called "old placenta". Without seeing my prior scans, she truly feels that I didn't have a tear when all that bleeding was going on but that I instead lost a twin. Holy crap...can you imagine us having twins? Yeesh. That actually made me feel a bit better about the bleed I had and it really made more sense than the explanations of "threatened miscarriage or tear in the uterus) Although it did make me sad to think we lost a baby.

Dr. Abbassi said the baby looks good and she even gave me an 80% guess as to the sex of the baby...but my lips are sealed. I'm taking the girls over spring break to find out what the baby is and they can share the news at that time. 

So...here we are at 12 weeks and we are beginning to finally accept this pregnancy and enjoying everything about it...you know - bloating, nausea, peeing a lot, fatigue...no those are silly things...Honestly after seeing that sweet baby today I feel absolute joy. I'm truly excited about this baby. God has surprised us and he is blessing us yet again. We are most thankful!!

It's the final installment. The final addition to our family. We don't care whether it is a boy or a girl as long as it is healthy. The girls are calling the baby "peanut". Nora loves when I find the heartbeat with the doppler. Maddie prays for "peanut butter" when she says her prayers each night.

A slight downfall is that the due date is the Friday before Nora returns to school. So I'm pretty certain we'll have the baby a week in advance...so mid to late August.

We've had a rocky start and a scary start to this pregnancy. We are praying for a healthy mama and a healthy baby. I hope you will add us to your prayers! I look forward to sharing our journey over the next 6 months with you!

until next time...
S 

 

 

 

Comments

[Utfox7905]

OMG CONGRATS! I am so super freaking happy for you!!! :)

[www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=609236955]

Congratulations!!!!!!! That's soooo exciting!!!!

[Sharesa E]

So excited for you! Love the pictures!!

[Lisa Simpson]

Congratulations! I loved reading your story and felt so bad for you that it's been such a roller coaster ride. Lots of hugs and great thoughts for you. I cannot wait to find out what you are having!!

[www.google.com/accounts/o8/id?id=AItOawnj_yxVDdbjQ-VpTSpnFxPBixIsR-nhAuU]

Congrats!!!! That is SO exciting. What a scary few weeks you had...praying for a healthy baby in August!

[Soccermel]

Congrats!!!! That is SO exciting. What a scary few weeks you had...praying for a healthy baby in August!