Week by Week

Just wanted to update after my doctor's appointment today. They did the fetal fibronectin and we should have results tomorrow. But, for instant gratification, the doctor also did an internal and noted that my cervix still looks closed and long and doesn't appear to be thinning out. This is very reassuring as it means my cervix is holding up well even with all of the uterine activity and Apple's head sitting right up against it. If the test comes back negative, it means they are 99.9% sure I will not go into pre-term labor in the next two weeks. If it comes back positive, it means I'm at an increased 30-40% risk of pre-term labor in the next two weeks and we need to revisit the plan. Given the status of my cervix, we are fully expecting a negative.

So, all good news so far. We are also moving to weekly appointments. Yippee! Since the fetal fibronectin is good for 2 weeks, we'll do this test every two weeks. On the alternating weeks, they'll do a vaginal ultrasound to check cervical length. Ah, my old friend, the dildo cam. It's been awhile! So now I go in every Monday. Full ultrasounds will still be every 4 weeks, although we'll see if I can convince the sonographer to take a peek at Apple and Banana during the cervical length checks! I went ahead and made all of my appointments through December 15th. Hopefully I'll still be pregnant by then and able to keep all of these appointments.

The doctor is also still comfortable with me working for now, but agreed cutting back would be a good idea. She did say that if any of the fetal fibronectin tests come back positive or if my cervix starts shortening at any point in time, all bets are off. So for now, I continue just plugging away, but we will revisit plan once a week.