VIABILITY!! 24 weeks!

How far along? 24 glorious and amazing weeks!

 Total weight gain/loss: Up 3 lbs now from my prepregnancy weight. Thats not horrible, right? 3lbs in 24 weeks?

Maternity clothes?: All maternity all the time.

Stretch marks? Yes. And now there are a ton more appearing…

Cervical Length?: 3.0-3.6cm and cerclage intact.

Labor signs: No THANK GAWD! But I have begun to experience Braxton Hicks.

Medications?: Prenatals and Zantac. Nothing else for now!

Sleep: Im exhausted. I barely sleep because every time I lay down the baby decides its time to go and play hacky sac!

Best moment this week: Going to ANOTHER appointment and getting great news! Bed rest and the cerclage are working like a charm!

Worst Moment this week: The sporadic spotting…it freaks me out. After spending every day of the first trimester worrying about seeing blood and then now seeing it I sobbed. (**TURNED out to be nothing but irritation to the cervix from the cerclage placement)

Movement: Lots of movement, especially when I am trying to sleep. My Mom, Dad and sister have all gotten to feel the baby kick now!

Food cravings/aversions: String Cheese, cant get enough! (Two bags in since last Wednesday!)

Belly Button in or out?: Still an innie, but its getting even shallower!

Gender: All boy!

What I miss: Being able to see my feet, being able to bend and pick things up, and going to the pool.

What I am looking forward to: Every single day that I get to be this amazing little persons Mama.

Weekly Wisdom: As lame as it sounds….Everything happens for a reason.

Milestones:  VIABILITY!! Only 12 weeks until the cerclage can be removed. Good news at the doctors office. Braxton hicks contractions starting, and baby kicks being able to be felt from the outside!

Symptoms: Sore muscles, achy belly butto, cramping, lots of movement and heart burn.

The power of prayer, and modern medicine!

Appt this morning was fabulous!! Dr.amazing did a quick speculum exam and my cervix and cerclage look great. He also did a vaginal ultrasound.

Now Ive had quite a few run ins with the dildocam during this pregnancy, but this time was different.

I was holding my breath, waiting for some bad news. Since I always seem to be up in stirrups when I get the bad news. And…Dr. Amazing smiled and announced that my cervix is now sitting at a beautiful 3.0-3.6cm!!

Nolan is head down, heart rate of 130 (he was sleeping) and looks beautiful. Fluid levels are normal.

Im still on “couch rest” and although this is excellent news, it is all because of the cerclage. If the cerclage was to be removed or fail my cervix would still be around 0.4-0.6cm. But its holding and doing great now!!

I blurted out (while in stirrups with dildocam still inside) “Dr. Amazing I could Kiss you!” lol

He looked at me like I was nuts!! And said “you could but in this position its a little inappropriate, and my wife wouldnt approve!”

We all laughed!

Im so happy I could do a jig! (but wont!)

Thank you everyone!!

Appointment update

Cervix now 2.2cm! Almost double whats its been in 3 weeks.

Cerclage is intact and holding strong! Nolan is still very much a boy with a heart rate of 152bpm and is now feet down.

What a wonderful appointment. The only tears shed were tears of joy. Im gonna stop off for some ice cream on our way home to celebrate.

My prayers are answered and I feel a little sigh of relief. I know that I am by no way out of the woods, but it feels so good to know that this intervention has so far been effective. Now if it will just hold up for another 14-16 weeks!

Thank you everyone! Praise God!

Appointment update

Cervix now 2.2cm! Almost double whats its been in 3 weeks.

Cerclage is intact and holding strong! Nolan is still very much a boy with a heart rate of 152bpm and is now feet down.

What a wonderful appointment. The only tears shed were tears of joy. Im gonna stop off for some ice cream on our way home to celebrate.

My prayers are answered and I feel a little sigh of relief. I know that I am by no way out of the woods, but it feels so good to know that this intervention has so far been effective. Now if it will just hold up for another 14-16 weeks!

Thank you everyone! Praise God!

Hospital stay night three

After my procedure yesterday I was in ALOT of pain. The docs rushed in worried that I was having contractions and they stood around watching me on the Toco monitor. After a couple minutes the tension in the room relaxed because they saw no contractions. I was given a percocet for the pain and left to “rest” on the monitor for a while.

2 hours later the doc came back and explained that I was not having any contractions but I was having some uterine irritability. The Percocet never touched the pain and I told her so, she offered another pill and I declined because I was only really worried about contractions and I can handle being uncomfortable.

As the spinal block wore off I started to be able to move my legs, by the time I left the post op area the only area that was still numb was my groin and butt. I got back to my room and the Nurse helped me to the bathroom. Holy cow!! I couldnt feel my ass on the toilet, nor could I feel the urge to pee but as soon as I sat down I peed for a really long time! 500mLs later and all my pain was gone.

A kinda funny note: its really hard to wipe when your girlie parts are numb!

The rest of yesterday left nothing to be recorded. The doctors came in and explained that if I am still feeling good in the morning (today) then they might discharge me back home to “couch” rest.

Im thrilled that everything went by the text book. It was so much easier than they had explained. And I am so glad that Nolan is doing well. I know that we arent out of the woods yet, but my attitude is so much more positive.

For the rest of this pregnancy, which will hopefully be at least another 15 weeks, I am going to avoid negativity and stress. Im going to try to keep calm and for Nolans sake I am going to follow ALL the doctors orders to the letter.

I got to see him briefly on the ultrasound again yesterday and I have to say that we have a beautiful baby!!

Again, huge thanks to everyone! The postivity and support helped me so
Much! Our prayers were answered!

Thank you all!

Done!

Real quick, cerclage placed. Procedure went well. Nolan looks fabulous! Now we wait and see for the next 24 hrs.

Im having alot of cramping, they just gave me a percocet.

The spinal block went well, but not a huge fan.

Will post more later tonight.

Thank you everyone for the thoughts and prayers. I love
You guys!

Waiting…

Dear Nolan,

I love you my sweet boy. There is nothing more amazing than feeling you grow inside me. I smile at every nudge, poke and flip.

Your Daddy and I are so proud to get to be your parents.

Ok Lil Man, I need you to be strong now. I need you to hang on and have faith. I need this to be the right choice and I want this to allow me to bring you home (many many weeks from now).

Stay snuggled down, stay put.

We love you so much. And people around the world are praying for you and cheering you on.

Love,
Your Mama

McDonald Cerclage

We made a tough decision this evening. The Doctors presented two options to me, one was to do nothing but bedrest but if my cervix gets shorter (which it has proven it does) then Nolan has no chance of survival. Or option two was a cerclage which has a 50% chance of helping me or a 50% chance of causing me to go into full blown labor (in ehich case Nolan has no chance to survive).

What a horrible choice to have to make. After consulting with the Hubby, my family, and with God we decided that we would rather do everything and possibly risk everything then do nothing and still risk everything. So cerclage it is.

Tomorrow morning I will be wheeled down to the preop area, given a catheter and an epidural. Then they will
Give me a little sedative and do the procedure. Hopefully there will be no horrible complications like rupture menbranes, bowel or bladder trauma or extreme uterine irritation. If all goes well I will be observed for the minimum of the weekend and then sent home to be on full bedrest with only bathroom priveledges.

So how am I doing with all this? Im fucking terrified. Am I making the right choice? Will Nolan be ok? I just dont know why this has to happen. And it scares the piss outta me.

Im also selfishly terrified of any type of spinal procedure and not looking forward to the epidural.

Thank you again everyone for the overwhelming amount of support. I dont know what I would
Do without it, you all are
Carrying me through this. And it soothes me to know that Nolan’s name is on your hearts and in your minds.

Pray for Baby Nolan. Stay Baby Stay!!

A change in the due date…

I had been posting the change of week on either Sundays or Mondays as that was originally when my week counter for Baby Bean would change over. At todays appointment the Maternal Fetal Medicine doctor re-evaluated my earliest ultrasound, and agreed with my dates of ovulation. This puts our new due date at 09/15/10.

The benefit to this, in my situation, is that it puts me a little closer to viability. It also lets them know when I am no longer a candidate for a cerclage. (More on the cerclage towards the end.) So….on Wednesdays I will now be posting (starting this week!) the weekly meme.

Todays appointment was nice. I love the Army Doc, he is just the sweetest and most personable doctor I have EVER met. And I love that he is on the ball when it comes to follow up, planning, and information. I got weighed, and my vitals taken and everything looked fabulous and stable there. Then he came in and we talked about changing medications from the Ibuprophen to Procardia as a tocolytic (contraction stopper). We both agreed that Procardia was less dangerous than the Ibuprophen and since I am still having cramping with the Ibuprophen that it probably wasnt working. (Ibuprophen in pregnancy can cause the baby to have a decreased amount of urination thereby decreasing the amount of amniotic fluid and overloading the babies system, it can also cause the ductus (part of the circulatory system) to close.) So now I am taking Procardia every 6 hours.

My cervix is stable and measuring at about 1.4cm with fundal pressure and 1.6cm without any pressure. So it hasnt really changed much since last week, and that is good news! From the outside I am not dialated and the Doc stated that my cervix looks beautiful (Never gotten that complement before!), again this is fabulous news!

Now about the cerclage (a stitch in the cervix that helps to prevent or decrease the amount of dialation), the doctors are hesitant to perform this procedure  because I am having a lot of cramping and some intermittent contractions. This is not ideal territory for a cerclage because if I start to contract more regularly I can wind up hurting myself (cerclage can tear). So for now, we are just going to continue on modified bedrest and weekly appointments with ultrasound to monitor.

On a side note, baby is still head down and the doctor said he/she is really super cute!