Freezer Buns

Moving On

2009-01-01T12:26:00.005-07:00

It is the first day of 2009. I find myself in a completely different place than I was when I started this blog. We've finally attained our dream of starting a family. This blog has been a great source of comfort for me. It has allowed me to process my thoughts and emotions while at the same time tapping into an amazing online community of women I never knew existed. Women who don't even know each other and yet support each other with every ounce of their being. Women who let me know I was anything but alone. This blog has also brought us closer to some of our friends and family. Sharing our journey has been incredibly rewarding in so many ways.

Because I know how other blogs have helped me, I hope that this little blog of mine has helped others and will continue to help others. So I will leave it where it is, out there for the world to see. As for me, it is time to move on.

I still want to continue to write as I don't want to leave behind the support and connection we get from blogging. So I've created a new blog to chronicle this next phase of our lives. Because I now have two other little lives to think of and they didn't choose to have the details of their lives out there for the world to see, I feel the need to protect their privacy a bit. Therefore, my new blog will be invite only.

If you wish to continue following our journey, please leave me a comment with your email address and I will send you an invite to the new blog. Please state in the comment whether or not it is okay to publish the comment so that I know if I should publish, or simply get your email address and delete the comment. If you happen to already have my email address, please drop me a line and let me know you would like to be invited. I know some of you have already mentioned that you want an invite and even sent along an email address. However, it would be easiest if these were all in one place, so please leave me a comment here as well.

Until we meet again.

*ETA* If you have requested an invite and have not received one, please refer to this post. If you still feel that I have overlooked you, please post another comment for me (I may have forgotten!).

Happy New Year!

2008-12-31T17:37:00.002-07:00

To all of our family, friends and bloggy friends, wishing you a healthy and happy 2009!

Home At Last

2008-12-30T21:15:00.001-07:00

Let's hope it stays that way for all of us. Now B and my dad have a stomach bug.

One More Night-Hopefully

2008-12-29T20:40:00.006-07:00

All cultures came back negative, so they have started to wean me off of the antibiotics a bit. Apparently it is quite common for them to not get a positive culture with a uterine infection and who knows what else I have. Today was a much better day, although I'm starting to make more frequent bathroom trips again tonight. I think this is just going to take awhile to run its course, which totally sucks. If I don't have a fever through the night and into tomorrow and I'm still relatively good, they will discharge me tomorrow and switch me over from massive IV antibiotics to massive amounts of oral antibiotics. Then I have a follow up appointment with the infectious disease doc on Friday morning. Hopefully that will be the end of it. Oh, did I ever mention that the hospital is requiring anyone who enters my room to wear a hospital gown over their clothing? It is humiliating. The infectious disease doctor said it was their protocol because he never wrote a containment order.

I'm a bit nervous about going home even thought I CAN'T WAIT to get home. I just know myself and it is going to be hard to take things slowly when I feel so guilty about all the extra work B and my parents have put in already. It is going to be hard to tell the difference between normal "new mommy" exhaustion and recovering from massive infection exhaustion. And I worry about B and my parents. Everyone has been running on all cylinders for too long now and I can see the exhaustion in all of them.

Both babies saw the pediatrician again today. Apple's bilirubin went from 17 on Saturday down to 9 something today, so we are back where we started when we left the hospital on Thursday. She is no longer on the bili table and has to go back in tomorrow for another heel stick to get checked again. Banana has been a little congested, but the pediatrician thinks it is still leftover fluid from the womb and birth and isn't a cold or anything like that. Apple is up to a chunky 4 pounds, 13 ounces and Banana is up to 4 pounds 10 ounces, so they are both already above their birth weights. Considering we were told they should be back at birth weight by 10 to 14 days, they are quite a bit ahead of schedule. I've been pumping in the hospital and they've been eating pretty good by bottle taking both my milk and formula. At times, they will each take 60 cc's per feeding, which is really good. I just hope I'm able to get both of them back on the boob a bit when I get home. I'm not ready to give up on breast feeding.

Banana also saw a pediatric orthopedist today. This doctor repeated everything all of the other pediatricians said about the bone just needing time to heal and that it should heal pretty quickly. They took new x-rays and the bone ends had shifted quite a bit since the initial x-rays on Tuesday, but the doc said this is normal. I'm almost glad I wasn't at the appointment because B said there was a bulge in his upper arm where you could tell the bone had shifted. The doc reset the arm straight and wrapped it really gently in some gauzy stuff. It looks like a cast, but isn't hard like one. We are supposed to keep his sleeve pinned across his chest to keep it stable and he will go back to the doc in 3 weeks. They gave us some copies of the x-rays from both today and Tuesday and they are a little hard to look at. But all in all, he is doing just fine.

After the doctor's appointments today, B and my dad brought the babies by the hospital to visit. It was so incredibly great to see all of them. My dad and B looked pretty tired. The babies were a bit sleepy. I held my baby boy for awhile until he woke up a bit. He looks incredibly sad, but incredibly cute and tough at the same time in his pseudo cast. I just can't wait until we can handle him without being careful about the arm and we can see his arm along with the rest of him. At least with the new cast we can see his little hand wiggle around whereas it was covered before. I fed Banana some milk while my dad fed Apple and then we watched them sleep for awhile. I held my baby girl close on my chest while she slept and it was perfect.

I sent my mom to the house tonight with all of them so that B could get some rest and my dad wouldn't be alone with both babies all night. So I'm alone at the hospital tonight, but hopefully it is just for one night. I can't wait to get the hell outta dodge.

The Birth Story

2008-12-28T02:25:00.012-07:00

Rather than bore you with disgusting details of my hospital stay while my body tries to fight off multiple infections, I thought I'd take this opportunity in between potty breaks to write this up.

This post is made easier (and shorter) by the posts that B and my Mom wrote on the 22nd and 23rd. I think you probably got the basic picture of how the induction process went. We were frustrated that things moved so slowly and it seemed that the nurses were being overly conservative on increasing the pito.cin. Regardless, none of that seems important now other than one thought I keep having. The slower the induction, the more cervical checks they do after the water is broken, the greater the chance for uterine infection. I'm trying not to dwell on this as the infection could have been introduced during the actual delivery as well.

If I remember right (I should just have titled this post with these 4 words as it is all a bit blurry), most of my pain during labor was in my lower back. I was pretty uncomfortable once they broke my water (well, Apple's water) and they put an internal heart rate monitor on her head and an internal pressure monitor in my uterus to better track contractions.

I can't remember exactly when I requested the epidural (maybe at 4cm?), but I did so knowing it could take awhile to track down the anesthesiologist and to get it in place. The anesthesiologist showed up pretty quickly and ensured me it took longer to set up the epidural (20 minutes) than it did to actually administer it. I'm not sure if that turned out to be the case. It seemed to take forever. He had trouble getting the catheter in and kept saying that I have "small spaces." Some of that was blamed on me being short, but he seemed to think I had overly small spaces. I kept trying to lengthen my back, while rounding it at the same time. Not all that easy to do when you are contracting. I remember thinking during this process that I might have to resign myself to having no epidural and I was NOT going to be happy with that.

Regardless, he got the epidural in and everything was good for a bit. At some point I began feeling a lot of pressure. The only way I could describe it was that it felt like I really had to poop. Bad. I kept asking the nurses to do cervical checks because it felt like something was going to pop out at any moment (either a baby's head or poop!). They were hesitant to do too many once my water broke because of the risk of infection. I honestly didn't care about that at the time, I could only focus on the present. I was disappointed each time they did a check and it didn't result in confirmation of massive progress. At some point the doctor came in to check and decided I was completed dilated on one side, but still 8-9cm on the other. There was a "lip" of cervix on one side that just didn't want to go away.

Side note: we did have the Bears game on the whole time and, lucky, it ended before I was ready to push. I was even able to focus on it a bit towards the end after I had the epidural.

The doctor decided to let me start pushing even though she could still feel cervix on one side. I think she felt a little bad for me, but also maybe that pushing would get it past that last point. I think her thought was that me pushing might be more effective than relying on the contractions at that point. I pushed for about 50 minutes in the L&D room before they decided to move me to the operating room. The doctor, nurse, B and our doula all coached me through this. It was pretty tiring, but felt good to finally be "there." They were all very encouraging. They all told me I was a "really good pusher." Not really sure what that means as I didn't know what I was doing, but I guess I should give credit to the hundreds of birth shows I watched on tv on bed rest! One thing I found really difficult was pushing for a whole ten count. We usually did three pushes in a row counting to 10 and by the third push, there was no way I could make it to 10. Just never felt like I had enough air for that.

After 50 minutes, we moved to the OR. This was the plan all along. Because of the higher risk of c-sections with twin deliveries, they prefer to deliver in an operating room so that everything is ready if needed. Same theory on the epidural. If you already have an epidural in, they shouldn't need to knock you out if you do need a c-section. They put me on the operating table, added some oxygen and not sure what else they did to get ready. Felt like I was hooked up to a million tubes. The operating room table was VERY narrow and it felt like if I leaned a little too far to one side I would just topple over. I don't remember if it started in the L&D room or in the OR, but I remember my hamstrings kept cramping up and I kept having B and the doula stretch my legs out in between contractions. This was pretty annoying because it was really difficult to relax in between contractions. After about 20 minutes of exhausting pushing in the OR, Apple was born. Wow, that sentence makes it sound so easy! It wasn't. I know that she was pretty small at 4 pounds 11 ounces and I just can't imagine what this process is like with a big baby! Her tiny little head felt like a watermelon! They took her over to the side and started cleaning her off while I listened to her beautiful screaming.

This is where things get a bit blurry for me. The had an extra doctor in the room to help if things got dicey and for us that meant trying to get Banana to turn head down. They had an ultrasound machine out and were trying to guide his head down. From what I understand, he was actually piked so that at one point both his head and feet were down, with his butt up in my belly. I just remember excruciating pain and wishing he would come out and that they could work faster (the extra doses of epidural at this point were doing nothing) and I think I was being pretty vocal about it. My main doc had most of her arm up trying to grab him while the other doc was manipulating from the outside. I remember wondering if I was supposed to be pushing at that point and I'm not sure why I didn't ask. I think I finally just decided to (or did someone tell me to?), and with that push, Banana's feet popped out. That is what decided the breech factor once and for all. So the doc grabbed his feet and started pulling him out.

The details of the rest of the delivery are a little unclear as we heard more details from the nurses in postpardum than we heard from the doctor at the time. All we were told when Banana came out was that he might have a broken arm or separated shoulder as they had heard a pop pulling him out. All of this happened in only 8 minutes time so he was born 8 minutes after his big sister. Each shift of nurses we had in postpardum commented on the difficult delivery and a somewhat benign "broken arm" turned into the fact that the doctor had broken his arm to save his life. I can't remember now who told us this (doctor, nurse?), but it seems my cervix started to clamp down once they got his feet out and they had to act quickly so that it didn't clamp down on his neck or head. I do remember hearing that his arms were above his head when they pulled his body out and they had to reach in and pull his arms down before they could get his head out. This is when his right upper arm bone popped.

At the time, I didn't think twice of any of it. I was just happy to hear him cry once they got him out and of course I was crying the whole time they were cleaning him off. They brought each baby to me one by one and put them on my chest. I told B he had to hold them on me because I was shaking so bad I was afraid I would drop one of them. B got to cut both cords and went with the babies when they took them to the nursery to weigh and measure them and check them out. They did tell me that both babies got 9's with both APGAR's, but we found out later that this was only true for Apple, Banana got a 7 and an 8, so still pretty good. While B was in the nursery with the babies, he went back and forth from one warmer to the other like a ping pong ball. Then they sent Banana up to get x-rays of his arm. It seemed to take forever and we were told one of the elevator banks was down.

They got me cleaned and stitched up. I did have a small episiotomy once the doctor thought I was starting to tear internally and B thought they did it when they were having trouble getting Banana out. From his perspective, he thought he heard them talking quietly about doing a c-section for Banana and that it did sound like there were some tense moments and were extremely close to doing the c-section. He also watched them do the episiotomy and thought it was cool (ewww). From what the doctors have told me, breech extractions are not very common these days and when the baby has its arms above its head and kind of wrapped behind (nuchal arms or something like that), it is quite common to have a broken clavicle and not quite as common for a broken humerus, but it does happen. The OB that I saw this morning (who is my regular OB) said that there was some drama in the OR and that the OB who delivered was not likely to forget the delivery. And she is the one with the most experience in the practice. We were lucky that they got Banana out without more damage, but it is scary to think of what could have happened.

I'm finally at the point where I can think about it and write about it without sobbing and hopefully soon I'll be able to talk about it without crying at all. I just can't believe how close we came to disaster after everything we've been through. But both babies are healthy and managed to escape without any NICU time whatsoever.

Aside from my little side trip back to the hospital, Banana's arm and Apple's jaundice, things are pretty damn good and we are counting our blessings. Thank you so much for everyone's support this week. It has been such a help to us. From simple good wishes to making meals for us, every little gesture has helped. (and thanks to our neighbors for feeding B while I'm in the hospital!)

One Step Back

2008-12-27T16:31:00.005-07:00

Last night after dinner I started feeling crappy. Fast forward a couple of hours and I was in the ER being evaluated for vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain and fever. Really fun symptoms to deal with when you have given birth 4 days earlier and are still very sore (vomiting requires using abdominal and pelvic muscles that I was not prepared to use). It took about 4 hours for the ER to evaluate me including blood work, a CT scan and a pelvic exam. Again, never expected a pelvic exam 4 days after giving birth. They found a slightly elevated white blood cell count indicating possible infection. They also found elevated liver function indicating who knows what. The only thing indicated by the CT scan was constipation. How do you have constipation and diarrhea at the same time? The scan also confirmed the gall stones that I've known about for awhile, but have had no symptoms of a gall stone attack.

By the time they admitted me back to the mother and child unit, they suspected a uterine infection and/or the flu. Apparently uterine infections don't generally present with the exact symptoms I had and for awhile there they were concerned about toxic shock syndrome, which is quite rare post pardum. After seeing an infectious disease doctor this morning, he confirmed the most likely culprit was uterine infection and possibly a touch of the flu on top of it. So I'm back in the hospital and they are giving me a broad course of IV antibiotics along with fluids. If all goes well, I should be released on Monday.

In the meantime, B is home with the babies, taking care of them like a single daddy. My dad is helping him while my mom is here with me in the hospital. What would we do without our parents here?

B and my dad took the babies to the pediatrician today. Apple's bilirubin did go up to 17, so they now want her to use a bili blanket to help her get past the jaundice. Banana is fine. They both weigh about what they did when we were discharged Thursday, so it looks like maybe they've stopped loosing weight. The pediatrician is trying to set up an appointment for Banana for Monday with a pediatric orthopedist to look at his arm. The pediatrician seems happy with our feeding schedule. Although this hospital stay has caused a bit of a bump in the road. I'm not sure either baby will take the boob again after being bottle fed for three days. I am pumping in the hospital and we got confirmation from both my OB and the pediatrician that the medications they have me on shouldn't cause an issue with giving them my milk. At least I can still feed them some breast milk and we'll just have to wait and see if I'm able to introduce nursing to them again when I get home.

So that's where we are. Not the best place to be, but it could be worse. We were prepared for the possibility that we might have to go home without the babies for awhile. We never thought they would be home without me. Just another situation that took us completely off guard. Emotionally, I'm dealing. I'm doing what I need to do and I know getting myself healthy is the best thing for the babies. But it is difficult to be here without them. It almost feels like I never gave birth to them in the first place. B and my dad brought them by the hospital to visit today, so at least I got to see them. I was still too nervous to hold them as I'm still sick and when I have to go, I have no control over it. Part of me keeps repeating infantile phrases to myself like "why me, why did this happen" and "it just isn't fair." But there's nothing I can do about it other than what I'm doing.

Homecoming

2008-12-25T23:00:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to let everyone know that we are all home safe and sound, and together. Everything we were hoping for. It took us a bit longer than expected. We started getting ready to leave the hospital at 3-ish and ended up leaving around 5:15pm. I hope to update sometime tomorrow if I can find the time!

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-25T06:37:00.006-07:00

Banana

Apple

Has it Only Been Two Days?

2008-12-24T17:27:00.008-07:00

Just thought I'd pop in for a quick update. We are all doing fine and we are schedule to be discharged tomorrow (Christmas morning). I'm healing slowly, but surely. I'm quite sore, but I've been told that I'll feel pretty good after about a week. We did manage to accomplish a fully vaginal delivery, although getting Banana out was a bit more difficult than planned and he was pulled out feet first. I do plan on giving you all some more details about the birth, but that can wait until we get home and I have a chance to collect my thoughts a bit. It was a lot to process and I'm still processing. We will also post a picture or two of the babies once we get home.

Speaking of the babies, they are doing just fine. Banana's arm (his right humerus) was broken during his breech extraction, but he really doesn't seem to mind it. I think I'm more upset about it than he is. He is a very calm baby (so far) and makes the funniest faces. He has had a hard time nursing, but is taking a bottle like a pro. We've really only gotten one good latch from him so far, but the nurses have encouraged us to keep trying and that he is completely normal for his weight/gestational age.

Apple is extremely strong and has also been pretty calm. Although she is a voracious eater and she has had more successful nursing sections than Banana, she seems to prefer the bottle lately. I think nursing is going to be an uphill battle with both of them, but we'll see. Apple is definitely a hungry girl. She starts sticking her tongue out to let us know she is hungry and usually a bit before we are scheduled for her next feed. She has the most beautiful skin, but she seems to be getting a little jaundiced now, so we're hoping this doesn't delay her homecoming.

As you all probably guessed, B was awesome during the whole labor and delivery and he has been demonstrating his natural ability as a daddy. He has been taking the best care of all three of us and he even had the foresight to buy me a "push" gift to bring with to the hospital. He gave me a beautiful diamond band Tuesday morning after the delivery that has three stones, one for us and one for each baby. I cried, of course. I cry A LOT these days. But for good reason.

We are anxious to get home and get settled, but for now we are just in awe of our two little miracles.

Thanks to everyone for your comments. B read me all of your comments during labor and it was so cool knowing that all of you were thinking of us and encouraging us with so much positive energy.

I will update when I can. Until then, Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah!

Arrival

2008-12-23T05:37:00.005-07:00

Sorry this is so late in the making. The babies were born at 1:21 and 1:29 am on 12/23. Baby A is now officially xxxxx xxxxxxxx and Baby B is now yyyyyy yyyyy.

Apple weighed in at 4 lbs 11 oz and Banana was 4 lbs 8 ozs. Everyone is doing fine but extremely exhausted. Banana ended up breach and they has some trouble getting him out. they think they may have separated his shoulder and they have taken some x-rays to determine for sure. it sounds a lot worse than it is. both babies are fine and just finished their first feeding. Grandma and Grandpa got to help feed and hold the babies. We have tons of pictures and I will leave it up to denise on what she wants to post.

We will post more information in the morning (which is actually now). Thanks again to all and sorry for the delayed finale.

Almost There!

2008-12-23T01:07:00.004-07:00

An update from Denise's Mom-

They are off to the operating room!!!! That is all I know for now. Once Apple and Banana have finally made their trip into the world, one of us will post again with the baby stats. M.

BEARS WIN!!!! Next, Babies

2008-12-22T22:05:00.004-07:00

Update from B -

Well the BEARS pulled off a big win tonight. As soon as the game was over the doctor (who is also a big BEARS fan) came in and checked Denise. She is just about 9cm dilated. That means we are getting very close. Shouldn't be long before we start to get ready to go into the Operating Room.

We all joked that the kids were just waiting for the game to end.

This is it folks. I think we are getting real close. Hopefully we aren't keeping to many of you up so late. If you need a note to your boss in the morning because you had to sleep in, just let me know and I will write one for you.

I think the next update you all will get will be from Denise's mom. She will let you all know when we were on our way to the operating room. After that, we will try to post the specifics after the birth.

We still have a little while but I think we are getting very close.

Go APPLE, Go BANANA, and go BEARS!!!!!!!

Some good progress

2008-12-22T20:48:00.003-07:00

Hi, its Denise's Mom again. Apple and Banana are making progress! Yippee! Denise's cervix is now dialated to about 6 to 7 cms and 95% effaced. The babies have come down and Apple's head is at zero station. Pit.ocin is now at 12. And, Mom and babies are all doing great. Stay tuned. M

The Only New Thing is That Nothing is New

2008-12-22T20:03:00.002-07:00

Update post from B (husband):

The only problem is, is that there is not much news to update everyone on. They have upped the pitocin. to 10ml but other than that things are still moving along slowly.

The good news is is that Denise is still doing well. She is relatively comfortable after the epidyrl and still seems to be in good spirits. The nurses keep telling us they need to see accelerations in baby "B" before they will increase the pitocin. more and the doctor tells us that the babies are fine. Unfortunately the nurses have their "protocol" before they can increase the pitocin. The doctor did say she will override the nurses "protocol" at some point and just start to move forward with increasing the pitocin.

It's all just a little frustrating. The good thing is that mom and babies are doing well. They babies just don't seem to want to come out into this world right now. Maybe it is because the Bears are losing to the Packers at halftime.

Again, we will try to keep everyone updated as to what is going on.

Bears and Epidural Time

2008-12-22T18:37:00.002-07:00

This is Denise's Mom (also known as M) posting for Denise and Brian. The news at this point is that the contractions began to come more frequently and to hurt. So, as the Chicago Bears were getting ready to start their game, Denise got started with an epidural. She had one of the normal side effects-- a big drop in blood pressure. But the doc and nurses got that under control in no time. So, her bottom half is now very nicely numb. I will try to post again when there is more news. M

Dial 4 for the Operator

2008-12-22T16:28:00.002-07:00

They did a quick check and Denise is now dilated 4cm. Still 80% effaced (spelling???) They upped her pitocin. to 7. Denise's parents are now here and we are all just relaxing (except for Denise) and talking.

Denise has been eating jello, Sprite, juice, basically anything with sugar the get those babies moving.

The doctor is supposed to be back in around 6:00 pm (MST) to check on us so hopefully she will have a plan of attack to speed things up.

Not much else to update at this point.

No News is Good News

2008-12-22T15:38:00.002-07:00

Nothing much to update on. Things are moving along, but slowly. Upped the pitocin. to 6ml but other than that everything else is status quo.

Will post when I have more relevant information. She did just go to the bathroom and getting there was a huge event, All types of cords and wires dangling from places they have no right being.

Maybe I can take this downtime to let everyone know that we appreciate their kind thoughts and wishes. I am normally not this nice of a guy but the whole being a new dad thing has softened me a bit. I am sure once the kids are born that I will turn back into my normal bad-ass self (in case you can't tell, I am being facetious).

Thanks again. I believe she is due to be checked again in about 20 minutes (4:00 MST) so hopefully I will have something better to offer at that time.

GO BEARS !!!!!

H2O Busted

2008-12-22T14:11:00.003-07:00

Update

Doctor came in to check on things. They ended up breaking Baby "A's" bag-o-water. They inserted an internal monitor on Apples's head and also an internal contraction monitor. Now they only need to externally monitor for Banana. They also upped the pitocin. to a whopping 4ml.

We are moving along but obviously we thought we would be farther along. I think Denise is starting to get a bit frustrated but overall she is still in a good mood.

We are now monitoring the contractions internally which can give us an idea of how strong they are. With the external monitor they only measure frequency.

Again, Denise wanted to make sure that everyone knows she is doing well and I have been reading her all comments and that has given her a boost so keep them coming.

I will try to keep up with this but I have also been busy phoning family and friends.

How high will they go????

2008-12-22T12:19:00.002-07:00

Update from B (the husband not baby "B")

They have upped the pitocin. to 3ml. Nothing else new to update on. Denise is still doing well and is in good spirits.

I will add as a side note, that Denise and I have been to Europe a few times and I don't think we ever took as much luggage on those trips as we did today for our trip to the hospital.

On top of all the luggage we also have a mini Best Buy store here. 2 computers, 2 blackberies, 2 cell phones, digital camera, 2 sets of headphones (1 noise cancelling 1 regular) and digital camcorder.

After checking in and being admitted I went back to the car to get our luggage. I needed a bell-hop. As I walked up to the labor and delivery floor all the "dads to be" just gave me that "man-nod" as if to say, been there done that.

more later

Sideways but Okay

2008-12-22T11:17:00.002-07:00

Another update from B -

Doctor came in for a quick check. Baby B is now sideways but natural birth is still viable. We will just have to play it by ear. They upped her pitocin. to 2 ml (she was on 1 ml). They did a quick ultrasound to check to see positioning but that was about it.

The doctor did promise to try and have the babies delivered before the Bears/Packers monday night football game. Before I get a thousand "negative" responses on this, I did NOT bring this up the doctor did. Her family are huge Bears fans and we found out we have this in common.

Denise is in good spirits and has not started yelling obscene phrases at me yet.

More to come later -

B

10:20 MST Update

2008-12-22T10:20:00.002-07:00

Denise has asked me (me being her husband B) to provide periodic updates. Let me start off by saying that I am not a medical professional and I am notorious for completely translating this type of information incorrectly. Remember the game you used to play as a kid when one person would whisper something in your ear and then you would have to go around the room and the last kid would have to say what he "thinks" the original word was? Well that is what is going to happen here. I am the "last kid" and I don't always listen attentively.

They currently have Denise on oxygen to try and get the babies to wake up a bit as they seem a bit sleepy this morning. They have also started her on the pitocin. to get the party started. They will gradually increase the dosage every half hour or so to speed things up when they see fit. She is currently listening to some classical music while reading one of those trashy grocery store magazines. Seems a bit of an oxymoron but who am I to judge. I have come to learn that a happy momma is a happy me.

That's about all for now. Nurse just walked in as they are having trouble keeping the babies monitored (which always seem to be the case so this is nothing to worry about).

Until later - Dad to be.

Sorry but after my editor (Denise) read my post she has asked me to tell everyone that she is 2cm dialated and 80% effaced (told you that I don't always get this stuff correct)

Admitted

2008-12-22T08:57:00.002-07:00

We're all checked in. IV is hooked up and monitors too. They are giving me a bolus of fluid to try to get the kids to wake up as they are looking a little sleepy. Nurse just went to call the doc to see if she will be by anytime soon. They need to check my cervix and will then start the pi.tocin/break my water.

We're Off!

2008-12-22T06:27:00.002-07:00

Leaving in about 15 minutes for the hospital (after a stop at the kennel to drop the dogs off). Let's go meet Apple and Banana!

36w2d (Yesterday)

2008-12-21T18:41:00.007-07:00

Just thought I would take the opportunity tonight while things are still quiet to post some last belly shots. These were taken yesterday before we left for the party. I managed to stay at the party for 4 hours and it felt so good to be in a social situation again.

Had to take a rear shot since I haven't done any of those yet and I don't appear to really look pregnant from behind. Kind of strange to just have a huge belly and not really gain anywhere else. Not that I'm complaining! I did manage to add an extra chin these last couple of weeks.

I also just wanted to put out a blanket "thank you" to all of you for your support throughout our IF treatment and this pregnancy. We are truly lucky to have such supportive family and friends and to have stumbled upon this online community of friends in the computer. This would have been a much longer, harder, lonelier journey without all of you!

Until tomorrow...

Where to Start

2008-12-20T11:48:00.005-07:00

There are so many thoughts swirling around my head these days. I am still having trouble picturing how this is going to work. What will labor be like? Will I be able to push BOTH babies out without needing a c-section? How are the dogs going to react to the babies? What will our lives be like next week? I'm still having trouble believing that we are really here. If you had asked me 7 weeks ago, I never would have believed we'd make it past 36 weeks.

The labor part has been on my mind the most the past couple of days. I've had ample opportunity to watch all of the birthing shows on Disc.overy Health and TLC and not ONE of them has shown a vaginal twin birth. What's up with that? I know they happen. It isn't THAT rare. I have to keep reminding myself every time I watch one of those shows, that I'll have to do the pushing part twice and then worry about two babies when they come out, not one. I know once Apple comes out, it should be easier to get Banana out, but this may not necessarily be the case. The cervix can actually close up. And since Banana is likely bigger, there would still be potential for more pain and tearing, etc.

The time in between the babies' births is actually the most dangerous part for Banana. He can easily go into distress because of the drastic change of pressure in the uterus or he could flip around into some other position that would require a c-section. After. A. Vaginal. Birth. This would be a bad scenario. Not one I want to even contemplate. And I can't even picture what it will be like once Apple is out and I'm focused on her, but still have to push Banana out. Uggh. I know there's no point in worrying about it now. I have no control over it and I know my doctor will do everything she can to get us all through this healthy and happy.

It is also bothering me that we will have to deliver in a sterile, uncomfortable operating room on a table instead of an L&D bed. With about 10 people in the room. I knew this would be the case pretty early on, but I'm just now starting to think about it and I guess I shouldn't. I know it is for the safety of me and the babies, but it just isn't the ideal environment for a "comfortable" birth.

I'm also annoyed that I still have this stupid rash. I'm sure once I'm in labor I'll forget about it, but part of me can't help wondering if I'll just be focused on both pain and itching. Is that possible? Again, something I'm worried about that I have no control over. Sensing a theme here? Then, there's the breast feeding question. Will I be able to nurse two babies and actually manage to not starve them? I am resigned to supplementing with formula, but I hope I'll be able to at least experience nursing and give the babies as much benefit as I can from breast milk.

Other than my mind racing with all of these thoughts, we are pretty much ready. The nursery is set up, for the most part. B hooked up our fancy video monitor with 2 cameras this morning so we can see both cribs. The car seat bases were installed and checked by our local fire department. We have take home outfits for the babies, although we have no idea if they will fit. My hospital bag is packed along with our "media" bag that holds the camera, video camera, and a laptop. My ipod is loaded with tons of music and the headphones just need one last charge. Our doula is on notice.

All that is left is for B to pack a change of clothes and some snacks for himself and a bag for the dogs. The dogs are now going to the kennel on Monday since we will be home tomorrow night. I would like to try to shave my legs tomorrow, but let's face it, that really isn't the most important thing. Oh, and we still have a couple of last minute holiday gifts to take care of before chaos hits.

We are actually going to try to go to a little holiday party with some friends tonight if I feel up to it. We've done this with this same group of friends for a number of years now and I would hate to miss it. Hopefully I'll have enough energy to go-even if it is only for half an hour. Our last hurrah as a childless couple.

Now if only I could wrap my brain around Monday and what will come after!

Like Sands Through the Hourglass...

2008-12-18T18:46:00.005-07:00

There is not a simple answer to the poll I had up earlier, so I can't tell you who won (and really I didn't have any sort of reward available anyway). At my check today, the doc said that the "outside" of the cervix is open, but the "inside" isn't. I asked her to clarify and the way my brain works, it means that the bottom of the cervix is open, but the middle is closed. She did not give me a number and I didn't ask. I don't know why I didn't ask. I guess my brain was too busy trying to picture it. Because, if you recall, the last cervical check they did by ultrasound showed my cervix funneling, meaning it was opening at the top. So, this is how I'm now picturing my cervix:

While the doc was looking through my file today, she mentioned that the doc on Monday had written "fingertip" in my chart, but I didn't ask her to clarify. From what I've read, this can mean either 0 or 1 cm. Some sites I've read say that this means 1 cm, but others say that true dilation means the cervix is open all the way through, in which case, I'm still 0 cm. She also didn't say how effaced I am today. I didn't ask this either. Not sure where my head is today. Oh well. So much for answers.

My cervix is very soft or "ripe." Because of this, the doc today didn't think it made sense to start with the medicine that goes behind the cervix because this generally just helps it soften. So, we are officially reporting to the hospital at 7:30am on Monday morning to start with pito.cin. We have no idea how long labor will take. Usually a first labor takes a long time, but twin labors tend to go quicker because of the extra weight/pressure. I'm hoping it goes quick (of course).

Apple and Banana both passed the BPP today. Apple's heart rate was 138 and Banana's was 148. Although it is a total and complete guesstimate at this point, we asked for estimated weights out of curiosity. The measurements put both babies at 5 pounds 3 ounces, although she had a really difficult time getting a good measurement of Banana's head. We'll see how accurate that is on Monday. Oh, and my belly is now measuring almost 43 cm!

I replaced the poll to the right with a similar one for Monday morning. It refers to how dilated I will be Monday morning when we get to the hospital (before they start the induction).

We do plan on bringing a laptop with to the hospital Monday and I will try to post updates as much as possible. But of course I can't make any promises. Not sure how long I'll be able to "live blog" through labor!

Vote in the Poll to the Right

2008-12-17T18:19:00.000-07:00

I'm hoping for 3 cm, but my guess is 0 cm.

Hedging My Bets

2008-12-16T18:56:00.002-07:00

I just read through my post from yesterday and it struck me that at the end, I found it necessary to hedge my bet and say that "most likely" we will be a family of 4 next week. It was completely unintentional that I worded it that way. It seems I still can't convince my subconscious self that we will have our happy ending. I guess it will hit home on Monday when Apple and Banana are finally in our arms.

In case you were wondering, my cold is worse today and so is the rash. Good times.

Our Hanukkah/Christmas Miracles

2008-12-15T16:39:00.005-07:00

We are officially on the schedule to be induced Sunday night/Monday morning. As of today, I am 70% effaced and my cervix is very soft, but I'm not yet dilated at all. If I'm still not dilated at my appointment on Thursday, then we report to the hospital at 7:30pm Sunday night to start the induction. If I have started to dilate by Thursday, then we will go in Monday morning. The theory is that if I'm not dilating on my own, they start with a medication that goes right behind the cervix (can't remember the name of it). They put the medication in every 4 hours and it should take awhile to cause my cervix to dilate. By Monday morning, I should be somewhat dilated and they would break my water and start me on pit.ocin. If I'm already dilating on my own, they will start by breaking my water and giving me the pito.cin, so we skip the first step. This is why they would have me go in Monday morning instead of Sunday night. Everyone confused yet?

The bottom line is that Apple and Banana should be born Monday, December 22nd! We will have two little miracle Hanukkah babies! That is, if I don't go into labor on my own before then. The dogs are scheduled to go to the kennel Saturday and we will keep them there until next Friday (the 26th). This should give us time to get home (hopefully with the babies) and settle in a little before we turn the dogs' world upside down.

The NST was pretty standard today. Apple very reactive, Banana not so much. They both passed the BPP, but Apple took her time about it, while Banana was quick. They tend to take turns like that. The doctor did an internal exam today to check my cervix and it was pretty uncomfortable. Now I'm really sore. Just wait until Monday, right? Both babies are still head down, so we are on to try for a vaginal birth. Yay! They also did another culture for group B strep as apparently the one I had done in the hospital was too long ago and it could have changed. My blood pressure was normal, but a bit higher than it usually is (120/74). Total weight gain is somewhere around 33 or 34 pounds.

My throat was killing me last night and this morning, but it feels a bit better now. I really expected to wake up to a full fledged head cold this morning, but it hasn't fully hit yet. Maybe I can dodge the bullet and just deal with the sore throat for a bit. I've been stuffed up pretty much for the entire second half of my pregnancy, but it isn't completely congested, so hopefully I can avoid that.

Oh, and Monday night is also the Bears/Packers game. And the doctor on call on Monday (in case you wonder Jen, it is Dr. Abm) is a big Bears fan-we bonded over it while I was in the hospital and we were able to get her some Bears gear from our connection (thanks Staley!). I'm actually happy that we were in the hospital for those 11 days as it allowed me to get comfortable with all of the doctors in the practice (there are 6 of them).

That's all for now. Sorry, this post is kind of rambling. My head is all over the place. Can you believe we will most likely be a family of four this time next week?

Can't I Catch a Break?

2008-12-14T21:21:00.003-07:00

Just as the rash is starting to get better (note "better," not "gone"), I get a cold. Throat hurts, stuffed up and feeling crappy. This thing better go away quickly.

No News

2008-12-13T12:57:00.002-07:00

Just revisiting an old friend today.

35 Weeks

2008-12-11T17:51:00.004-07:00

I can't believe we've made it to 35 weeks. With the exception of the last week or so (since the rash appeared), my 6 weeks on bed rest has gone by pretty quickly. Although I bet B and my parents feel differently. The three of them have traded off waiting on me like a queen for this entire time.

I took my last dose of proc.ardia at 6am this morning and so far I haven't noticed any difference. I have absolutely no gut feeling as to whether something will happen in the next week or not. I know it is probably better for the babies to stay in until 36 weeks, but I wouldn't mind one bit if it happened sooner. I obviously have selfish reasons for feeling this way, but I also just would rather go into labor on my own rather than being induced.

I've posted some belly pix below. I figured I needed to get off my ass (literally) and take some more pictures before it is too late. If you dare, you can click on the picture to see a bigger version and you can see the rash within my stretch marks on my lower abdomen in addition to on my side. But it doesn't really do it justice. I would have to take a picture of my thighs to give you the full effect and I just didn't want to. I don't even like looking at it as it seems to make me itch more!

The End is in Sight

2008-12-10T16:54:00.003-07:00

We had our last appointment with the perinatologist today. It went well, the babies looked fine. They measured Apple at 4 pounds 6 ounces and Banana at 5 pounds 1 ounce, so pretty close to what the OB's sonographer got on Monday. Fluid looked okay too. Apple is coming in at the 17th percentile (was 19% two weeks ago) and Banana at the 27th (was 40% two weeks ago). So Banana slipped down the curve a bit. But the peri said the growth curves are based on singleton averages and that it is common for twins to be behind the curve, so not concerning enough to do anything about it.

Because of where the babies are now (head down, stable and at a late enough gestational age) and because of this hellacious rash I have all over my body, her recommendation is to take me off the pro.cardia tomorrow (contractions be damned) and schedule an induction at 36 weeks (in about a week) if I don't go into labor first. She didn't bother with a cervical check today because it really doesn't matter at this point-if I go into labor, they will let me.

I have mixed feelings about induction, but I really think that my days as a stellar incubator are past. I'm not getting any decent sleep (maybe an average of 2 hours a night) and when I do sleep, I'm scratching myself in my sleep. My appetite is starting to wane. And frankly, I'm starting to lose my sanity. I'm usually in tears at some point every night because I just want the itch to stop. The rash keeps spreading and absolutely nothing is helping. I'm also appalled at the sight of it. I played around with the idea of taking some pictures to post, but I'm afraid I might lose all of you, my dear readers, for posting something so incredibly offensive. I guess one good point is that the itch pretty much takes my mind off of the pelvic pain and makes it less intense.

I can definitely tell that the babies are low now. Lots of pressure going on down there. It will be really interesting to see if anything happens spontaneously after stopping the medication tomorrow. It has been a long 6 weeks since I first went to the hospital and I'm proud of us for making it this far. My goal all along was to get each baby to 5 pounds and to go to 38 weeks. Those goals tend to slip as things start going wrong along the way. I am just relieve to be past the major developmental milestones for the babies and will just hope for the best at this point. I'm trying to get excited that we are so close to the end now, but to be honest, all I feel right now is relief. The itching will stop. It is all I can think about right now.

There's a Tornado in "There"

2008-12-08T16:23:00.002-07:00

Today's NST went fairly well considering we were able to get both babies on the monitor for a long enough period of time. Apple looked great, but this time Banana's strip was a bit flat. Met with the doctor next and everything is normal with me. She looked at my rash (this is a different doc than the one who looked last week) and said she thought the rash on my abdomen is PUPPP, but that she wasn't sure what the rest of it is. She did say it looks pregnancy-related to her and that it should go away after the babies are born. In the meantime, I just have to keep doing what I'm doing and suffer through. This is going to be a long (x) days.

Next was the BPP and both babies passed. It took awhile for Banana to pass this time, but he did eventually. Today Apple measured 4 pounds, 5 ounce and Banana measured an even 5 pounds. The sonographer mentioned that we shouldn't get too caught up in the numbers because the margin of error this far along is up to a pound. But based on these measurements, their growth is different by 14%, so not too bad. Banana still has more fluid than Apple, but she appears to have a good amount of fluid, so I no longer need to keep doing the baths for her fluid. However, the doc said I could take baths if I wanted to and try the A.veeno oatmeal bath treatment to see if it was soothing for the rash.

Both babies are still head down and the sonographer noted that Banana is much lower now than he was last week. I had a sneaking suspicion that he was lower as I've been feeling a bit more pressure. The other notable change is that my cervix has shortened to 2.3cm and has started to funnel. This means that the top portion of the cervix (closest to the uterus and the babies) has started opening. Normally this would be a sign of pre-term labor, but since average gestation for twin pregnancies is 35 weeks and I'll be 35 weeks on Thursday, this isn't a cause for concern at this point. It just means that we are getting close and starting to see some action.

That's about all for now. I can't type for long (or concentrate on anything for long) as the itching just drives me batty. The prescription lotion and the cream don't really seem to help at all, but I'm still using them. The only relief seems to be from using ice packs (thanks Rebecca!), but it is hard to know where to put them since I itch all over. Gotta try out that oatmeal bath tonight and see if it helps.

I'm Getting My Money's Worth

2008-12-06T15:44:00.002-07:00

The rash continues to spread. There are more bumps on my fingers than there were yesterday and it is now showing up on my arms, legs, shoulders and back. I pulled out the leaflet in the steroid cream today just to take a look and noticed that the drug is listed as a Pregnancy Category C drug. From what I understand, this means that the drug has been shown to have adverse effects to a fetus in animal studies, but has not been adequately tested on humans. However, the FDA recommendations state that the potential benefits may still warrant use of the drug despite the risks.

Although I'm sure the PA yesterday knew what he was talking about when he stated it is perfectly safe to use in pregnancy, I started to get nervous. I mean after all we've been through, I just don't want to risk harming Apple and Banana and I had never met this guy before, nor seen anyone in the practice. I know plenty of medications are used in pregnancy, but between my morning sickness, pre-term labor scare and now this, I've just taken way more drugs than I ever imagined or wanted to during pregnancy.

So I called the answering service for my OB's office today and had the doctor on call paged. I might have said this before, but one of the positives that came out of my hospital stay is that I have now met each of the 6 doctor's in my OB's practice more than once and I'm very comfortable with almost all of them. The OB that called me back today confirmed what the PA said and she was happy that he had prescribed the steroid cream. She said they use it for PUPPPs patients all the time. She also suggested we put the immersion therapy on hold for the weekend, so no more baths for me at least until my next appointment on Monday. This is a relief. Last night and this morning I would sit in the bath just wondering if I was making the stupid rash worse. But I didn't want to stop them if the OB thought it was still necessary to help Apple keep her fluid up.

What I love about my OB's practice is that I never feel rushed when talking to them. I feel like they take the time to listen and provide as much information as they can. The PA at the dermatologist's office was not like that at all. He was short with our conversation and seemed in a hurry to be done with me. I don't like this treatment at all, especially in a medical setting. The OB that I spoke with today reassured me that even though the rash is still spreading, it will run its course and will likely clear up as suddenly as it appeared. She also said that unlike PUPPPs, which you are stuck with until delivery, this will likely clear up before then. Of course who knows when delivery will be, but at least I can stop worrying that I now have a skin condition that I'll have to live with the rest of my life since it isn't pregnancy-related.

So now I just need to concentrate on NOT SCRATCHING as much as possible. This is SO much easier said than done.

Itchy and Scratchy

2008-12-05T20:21:00.002-07:00

Someone must come up with a better word for what I'm feeling. Itchy just doesn't cut it. I want to jump out of my skin. Got in to see a PA at the dermatologist today and he didn't think I have any of the pregnancy specific rashes. Simple dermatitis. Dry, inflamed skin aggravated by two 30 minute baths and a shower each day for 6 weeks now. He glanced at my hands and my belly for all of two seconds, announced his conclusion and sent me on my way with a script for some fancy lotion and instructions to use cet.aphil cream. He said it could be gone in a week and if so, continue with the script for another week so it doesn't recur.

Tonight has been the worst night yet. Not sure why, but I just don't feel all that confident that this is going to work.

The 2-3 Week Itch

2008-12-04T18:19:00.002-07:00

Yes! We've made it to 34 weeks. The doctor on Monday said they wouldn't let me go past either 36 or 37 weeks, so only 2-3 weeks left max! Scary thought. But at the same time, I am SO ready. What has started pushing me over the edge is the itchy skin I've had for awhile that has now turned into a rash (or multiple rashes). It is ridiculous. I had an appointment for an NST today, so I asked to see one of the doctors. The rash could be one of two things that are related to pregnancy, or it could be some other type of rash unrelated to pregnancy. The itching started on my abdomen a week or two ago, but the doctor at the time thought it was just dry skin related to the stretching. Now, I've developed red bumps both on my lower abdomen and sides, and on both hands.

One of the most common pregnancy-related rashes is PUPPP. The doctor thought it was possible that I have this, but she didn't seem to think it likely because PUPPP doesn't usually show up on the hands. And the bumps are usually smaller than what I have on my abdomen. There is no definitive way to diagnose PUPPP and they usually just do it by visual exam of the rash. Unfortunately, there isn't much they can do to treat PUPPP.

Another possibility is Cholestasis of Pregnancy. This one involves the liver and usually involves the hands. I asked the doctor if it could harm the babies because I had done some reading ahead of time. She said she thought it was a very low risk. It is possible, but she has never seen it affect the babies and really is just an annoyance (which I think is an understatement). She did say if this is the culprit, it is treatable, although she didn't mention what the treatment would be and I didn't think to ask. They took blood today to check for cholestasis, but results won't be back for a week.

The doctor also suggested I make an appointment with a dermatologist because I could have a rash that is unrelated to pregnancy or not caused by pregnancy, but is being aggravated by it. I will be putting in a call or two tomorrow to beg for a quick appointment. In the meantime, I'm supposed to use hydrocortisone cream twice a day and 50mg of ben.adryl every 6 hours. I've been on the hydrocortisone for a couple of days now and it doesn't seem to be helping. So I'm adding the bena.dryl and hoping for the best.

The good news is that the rash shouldn't affect the babies, but it is driving their mother MAD. The rash on my hands is on the outside of the hand and runs from the last knuckle of the pinky down to the wrist bone. It is also starting to show up between the fingers and my palms itch too. This morning in the shower I was using an exfoliant for my face and I ended up sitting there for a minute or two rubbing it between my hands because it felt so good. The rash on my abdomen just looks gross along with the stretch marks. One of the nurses commented today that my skin looks like it's been through the wringer. Yeah, that's how it feels.

The NST was fine today-for one of the babies at least (we think Banana). We couldn't get the other baby on at all (likely Apple). So it was a big waste of time again and they ended up relying on ultrasound to check fetal well-being. The ultrasound was pretty miserable for me today. It took forever because both babies were pretty sleepy and weren't moving around enough to pass the BPP quickly. Both ended up passing, but I think it took almost the full hour. I was really uncomfortable lying on the table for so long and I'm quite sore tonight. The sonographer did note that both babies now have hair on their heads. Yea! She also noted that Apple emptied her bladder. At the beginning of the scan, it was full and then when she checked back later, it was empty.

We didn't get any good pictures today because the babies were facing each other with both heads facing out. They are now lying like mirror images. Can you tell what is different now from Monday based on this statement? Banana seems to have turned Vertex (head down)! I had a sneaking suspicion that this was the case because Tuesday night there was so much violent movement that it was painful and I actually yelped involuntarily a couple of times. So I think I was feeling Banana struggle to flip himself head down. What a good boy! I'm hoping that at this point there is not enough room left for him to flip back to breech, but you never know. If he does, I'm sure I will feel it. They did not do measurements today, so no estimates for weight.

Next appointment is on Monday. I have to go put some icepacks on my abdomen and hands now or I'm going to claw my skin off the bones.

Pictures From Yesterday

2008-12-02T12:36:00.003-07:00

Here are some profile shots from yesterday's ultrasound.

Information or Misinformation?

2008-12-01T14:11:00.005-07:00

The more monitoring these kids get, the more convinced I am that the tests are really inconclusive or quite possibly, inaccurate. I was originally scheduled only for an NST and a cervical check U/S today, so we didn't expect to see the babies. However, Apple's heart rate looked flat on the strip today. She wasn't having decelerations or anything bad like that, but she wasn't showing accelerations either. Banana had a bunch of accelerations where his heart rate would jump up for short periods of time. This is a sign that he is healthy and happy in my ute.

Because Apple wasn't quite as reactive, the doctor decided we'd better do a BPP (biophysical profile) to check her out. And while we were in there, the sonographer did one for Banana as well. Here's what it showed:

Miss Apple:

Moving around great
Practice breathing
Heart rate fine
Fluid looked pretty good (one pocket at 5cm)
Blood flow through cord okay from what I gathered (although they didn't really say)
Weighs about 4 pounds 7 ounces, at the 18th percentile on the growth chart

Mr. Banana:

Good movement
Practice breathing
Heart rate fine
Fluid looked good (I think I saw a 6cm measurement on the screen when she was measuring a pocket)
Blood flow through cord okay (again, they didn't say otherwise)
Weighs about 4 pounds 9 ounces, at the 25th percentile on growth chart
His testicles have descended! (yes, Daddy is proud)

So if today's measurements AND last Wednesday's measurements are to be believed, Apple grew a whole pound in 5 days and Banana didn't grow at all. Not likely. The doctor said it is possible that Apple could have had a growth spurt and grew about half a pound in that time, but not really a whole pound. It could be that the measurements on Wednesday were a little stingy while today's where on the generous side. They were done by different people using different U/S machines, so it is really difficult to truly know what has happened. It is also possible that Banana didn't grow much as they can grow in spurts and then have short periods where they don't grow much at all. Last Wednesday the babies had a growth difference of 24% and today they are considered to not really have any difference. So who knows what to make of any of it? This is why they don't generally do growth scans any closer than two weeks apart.

Because Apple's BPP looked good, they aren't concerned about her non-reactive NST. They generally look for accelerations on the NST to show that the baby's heart rate increases with activity, so it is an indication that the baby is moving around. Healthy babies move a lot. However, some babies move around a lot, but their heart rate stays steady and doesn't increase. This is just fine too, but when seen only on an NST, there is no reassurance that the baby is active enough. You can't rely on kick counts with twins because it is often difficult to tell which twin is moving. So the BPP is a better indication. We have another NST scheduled for Thursday and if we run into the same problem, they will do another BPP. If that does happen, we might skip the NST's altogether and just do BPP's twice a week. I would much rather have ultrasounds anyway instead of the NST's where I'm hooked up to the monitors.

So what does all of this mean? As of today, they didn't see anything concerning, but who knows how accurate the measurements are. At least they are both moving around a lot and have better fluid levels. The OB did say if the peri wanted to delivery early based on what they are seeing now, she would question the suggestion and argue against it. This is my main concern-that we will be pushed to make a decision based on misinformation. It is just difficult to tell which information is good and which is not. As of today, we are keeping everything the same unless something with me changes (less fetal movement or worse contractions). At the next appointment on Thursday, I'll be 34 weeks, which is another milestone.

The OB said today that they may not want me to go past 36 weeks (or maybe 37) with the fluid and discordant growth issues. December 18 is 36 weeks, so place your bets now!

As far as mom goes (meaning me, of course), everything is going well. Blood pressure is still low and I'm not showing any signs of pre-eclampsia. My weight gain has continued slow and steady (up about 31 or 32 pounds now). My belly now measures 40cm. And I haven't had much swelling. I do have a bit of swelling in my lower abdomen which the OB said was normal. She also commented on how little I complain, which my mom and I both thought was funny. I told the OB she is lucky she isn't at home with me!

My stretch marks continue to itch like mad. I've tried lotion, cocoa butter, medicated lotion and bio oil, none of which seems to do anything for the itch. The OB told me to try hydracortisone cream or bena.dryl cream (or even oral be.nadryl), so we'll see if that does anything. I have my doubts. Here's my take on the scientific equation: Skin stretching to ridiculous dimensions in short period of time + dry climate + winter + little limbs constantly poking out = many loud exclamations of "someonemakethisitchgoawayfortheloveofgod!!!!"

I also have some new pains that have popped up in the last couple of days. The nail on my big right toe somehow seems to be bruised, although I don't remember stubbing it or hitting it on anything (which in no way means that I didn't actually stub it or hit it and just can't recall). The more annoying pain is in a couple of fingers on my left hand. Any type of movement that requires the fingers to bend is painful. The OB said it is likely fluid retention in the joints and that even a tiny amount of fluid can produce pain and stiffness. She said she would assume it is pregnancy related unless it doesn't go away after the pregnancy. If it continues to get worse, I might have to start dictating my posts B or my mom! (just add it to the hundreds of other things they do for me every day). Other than that, I'm just as uncomfortable as ever and getting antsy every so often. Still having trouble getting comfortable on the couch or in bed and still having some lovely pelvic pain every time I move. Nothing new there.

I'm definitely carrying lower now. Baby B was lower on the ultrasound today and one of the nurses commented on how low the babies are. This really isn't any indication of when I'll go into labor, so it doesn't really matter. Although I'm trying not to sit up too much because my belly rests on my thighs which is a really uncomfortable feeling. Weird. I'm not supposed to be sitting up anyway, but sometimes a girl's gotta cheat.

In other household news, B bought a ceiling fan/light fixture for the nursery this week and it will be installed sometime next week. Good thing as there currently isn't a light in the room. We continue to get other little odds and ends done for baby stuff. The christmukah tree is officially up and decorated (with the help of my parents and B, while I sat on the couch and put hooks into ornaments). We got a good 8 inches or so of snow over the weekend, so it really started to feel like winter. Although it is 50 degrees today and melting quickly. We also got a cabinet guy out last weekend to give us an estimate for doing a built in for the tv niche in the family room. We've been wanting to do this for 2 years now (since we moved into this house), and it feels great to have that finally in the works. It should be ready for installation the week of December 15th though, so we might need to postpone a bit depending on what these babies decide to do.

That's all for now. We did get two U/S pictures from today, so I'll post later once we get them scanned.

*ETA*

Forgot to mention, my cervix measured 2.7cm today. On Wed. the peri got two different measurements at 2.5 and 3.0, but she documented the 3.0 in my chart. So, on paper, it has shortened a tad since Wednesday.

33w3d

2008-11-30T12:32:00.006-07:00

If you haven't already, check out this video.

This week's belly shots are below. Does it look like I'm carrying really low now? It feels like it. My belly feels heavier every day. I hope that means the babies are growing, especially Apple. OB appointment and NST tomorrow. Not feeling very chatty today.

The Wiggle Worms

2008-11-29T10:15:00.007-07:00

Periodically, Apple and/or Banana are so active that you can see a ballet of body parts poking through my belly. We caught one of these shows on tape this morning.

Gobble Gobble

2008-11-27T10:24:00.002-07:00

NST's Here I Come

2008-11-26T14:07:00.010-07:00

I'm back home on the couch, which is better than being back in the hospital, right? Today's appointment went relatively well. As seems to be the case with this pregnancy, as soon as we get some level of comfort, things change a bit. The babies are still growing, but Apple is lagging further behind her brother and the growth curve. The good news is that her fluid looks pretty good-still decreased compared to Banana, but it is better than it was. The other worrisome news is that my cervix has shortened a bit, which could mean that the contractions are starting to change my cervix and I could go into labor. But what's new? Here are the details:

Apple now weighs about 3 pounds 7 ounces, so she has only gained about 6 ounces in two weeks. She was around the 31st percentile for growth two weeks ago and has slipped down to the 19th or 20th percentile. The main issue driving the estimates continues to be her small abdomen. She just isn't getting as much nourishment from her placenta as she should be.
Banana weighs about 4 pounds 9 ounces, so they are over a pound different. Doesn't sound that big, but it is significant when they weigh so little to begin with. He gained almost a pound in the last 2 weeks. Today he measured in around the 40th percentile. I had written down that he was at 44% two weeks ago, but today they said he was at 41% two weeks ago and that he really hasn't moved on the curve, which is good.
Both babies had similar doppler measurements (measures blood flow from the placenta through the umbilical cord to the baby).
The sonographer had an easy time finding a 4cm pocket of fluid for each baby, so that is good.
Apple is head down and Banana is breach.
The peri now wants me to have NST's done twice a week. This is the same thing they did in the hospital where we would have to get a good tracing of both babies on the monitor for 20 minutes at a time. But it can be done at my OB's office, so I don't have to go to the hospital.

Given how Apple is lagging further behind, unless she has a massive growth spurt in the next two weeks, it looks like we will be delivering then (unless I go into active labor before then). I will be almost 35 weeks at that point. I'm not quite sure what our chances are for attempting a vaginal delivery at this point. The peri made it sound like it would be up to the OB, but that the OB probably wouldn't be comfortable with a vaginal delivery since Banana weighs a pound more than Apple and is on top of her. I will be asking the OB about this on Monday. I haven't quite resigned myself to having a c-section yet.

So I give this appointment mixed reviews. We are obviously in much better shape than we were at the beginning of the month, but not completely out of the woods. We are still likely looking at some NICU time, but I guess you never know. At least we did the steroid shots to mature the babies' lungs and we are past the 32 week mark.

Below are some pictures from one of the scans we had in the hospital (on the 7th) that I didn't get around to scanning until now. The last two pictures (the 3-d ones are from today). They aren't as good as some of the earlier pictures as the babies are getting a bit big to get really good pictures and they haven't been cooperating all that much. It is starting to get pretty crowded in there! The first picture from today (second to last picture below) is Apple with her hand smushed up against her face. The last picture below is from today and shows Banana's profile pretty much completely hidden by his face. Both babies had an arm up and we wondered if it was a defensive position because each has a foot or two in their face from the other baby. Banana's arm looks chunky to me compared to skinny little Apple. On the screen, it actually looked like Banana was holding his hand to his forehead like he had a headache!

One More Sleep

2008-11-25T18:27:00.004-07:00

Next growth scan and BPP tomorrow. The last two weeks have crawled by so slowly. I wonder every day how they're doing in there. Thinking lots of fluid-y thoughts...

Weekly OB Update

2008-11-24T18:27:00.003-07:00

Had my weekly OB visit today. Nothing new to report. Here are the quick highlights:

Heard babies heart beats
Blood pressure at 120/66
Iron at 13 something (was 11 something before adding supplements weeks ago-should be over 12)
Weight up 1.5 pounds since last week-not sure I really believe this one as last week's appointment was a morning appointment and this one was late afternoon
Belly still measuring 39cm
Got my paperwork back signed by the doctor for my maternity leave
No sign of PUPP, so itching is just from my lovely stretching skin-doctor recommended any kind of butter/cream since thicker than lotion

Wednesday is the next ultrasound with the perinatologist. It can't come fast enough.

32w3d

2008-11-23T11:00:00.006-07:00

No changes to my contractions lately except (dare I say?) they seem to be spread out a bit further. Overall, I feel okay. Pelvic pain has gotten worse and I do have moments of crazy where I feel like I HAVE to move and get off the couch for awhile. My routine is starting to feel very dull. My main annoyance lately is that the skin on my lower abdomen and around the belly button has started to itch like mad. It is so sensitive and tender that if I scratch it very lightly even just for a little bit, it starts to hurt. I must have had a growth spurt in the last day or two that has stretched the skin very thin. Has anyone found anything that helps other than plain old lotion?

B got a lot done this week/weekend. He visited one of the daycare centers on our list, put the changing table together, changed some light bulbs, replaced a battery in a smoke detector (that started beeping at 4am the other night), went grocery shopping, picked up my prescription, got a new tire on his car, put up the Christmas tree and put together the new oil-less turkey frier I got him as an early b-day gift. I sat on the couch yesterday watching him go back and forth like the energizer bunny all day long.

B also made a whole chicken for dinner last night to try out the frier. It cooked a bit unevenly because the chicken was small and a bit difficult to center on the basket, but it was really good. Incredibly tender and moist. We won't be using it for the main bird on Thanksgiving this year, but maybe next year once it is broken in.

Not to be outdone, my mom (with some help from dad) has been running around like crazy helping us to get some things together and taking care of my lunches during the week. She put together a hospital bag for me and I just need to add a couple more things to it. She has also been helping with laundry and all sorts of other odds and ends.

Because of all of this, we are getting very close to having everything ready for these babies! Here's what is still on the list:

1. We still need to decide whether or not to get on a list for a daycare and pay the non-refundable deposit now, or wait and hire a nanny later.
2. B is going to try to install the car seat bases (4 of them!) later this afternoon. Once they are installed, we have to make an appointment with the fire department to get them checked out.
3. We still need to buy a monitor. Ideally, I would like to get a video monitor that has two separate cameras so that we can see both babies. From the online research I've done, there are a couple of video monitors that offer the ability to set up a second camera, although the options are very limited. All the reviews I've read say that hooking up the second camera generates a bunch of static or interference. So I've been stalling on making a decision on this one.
4. We still need to buy some feeding items (bottles, bottle cleaning accessories)
5. I'm still looking for an extra diaper bag. A friend got us one as a gift and it will work great for shorter trips (and it is so incredibly cute). However, I think with twins I need to look for a really big one too to use for overnight visits, and travel etc.
6. Take home outfits for the babies. We'll wait on this one for awhile. I would have no idea at the moment whether to get them something for preemies or just newborn.
7. I started putting together a list of phone calls/emails to make once the babies are born, but I need to finish it.
8. Finish packing hospital bag.
9. We need to look into putting a will together.

Also this week, both my mom and dad got to watch Apple and Banana show off for them with various body parts poking out of my belly, gliding or tumbling across it. They have periods most days where they are very active, although it is usually still difficult for me to tell which baby is moving when.

Hey, when people tell you that you look great when you're pregnant, do they really think so? Or is that just what you say to a pregnant lady? There was a time there that I didn't think I'd get to see what I look like 32 weeks pregnant. This is so cool. Each additional week is a small victory and the next major goal is 34 weeks. Here's what the belly looks like today. I've included a picture with a shirt over the belly this time because I think it looks totally fake, like I stuffed a round beach ball under my shirt!

32 Weeks

2008-11-20T20:09:00.000-07:00

Hell yeah.

Fascinating

2008-11-19T20:56:00.005-07:00

While at home on bedrest, no matter how much you try to do some work, read, be productive, etc., you will stumble upon some amount of daytime tv. I caught the beginning of this gem yesterday and just-could-not-look-away...

Press pause on the music player to the right to get the full effect.

(sorry for the poor quality, the better versions had the embed feature disabled)

I Almost Didn't Even Notice

2008-11-18T20:09:00.003-07:00

My little Freezer Buns blog was born a year ago today. At the time, our first FET had just been cancelled after two postponements and a cancelled fresh IVF cycle. I had an "irregularity" in my lining and was waiting for a D&C to clear it out and make sure it was nothing concerning. It turned out to be nothing. But it was a dark time for me. It was just before the holidays and it cast a shadow for me over all of our holiday celebrations.

Fast forward a year and look where we are. I'm 31 weeks (I'm too superstitious to round up here) pregnant with boy/girl twins. Our family and friends are supportive and excited for us. We have a lot to be thankful for this year. It hasn't been easy getting to this point. If I had any say in the matter, we would have been pregnant with (or even have) our second child by now. But it obviously doesn't work that way. I am happy to be where we are now. And I'm holding my breath that things will go well and these babies will not arrive before they are ready.

Soon I will be creating a new blog. I want to continue to blog once Apple and Banana are born, but it doesn't seem right to continue in this space that was dedicated to getting them here safely. Plus I would like to post pictures as they grow and I don't want to have those pictures floating around in cyberspace without some control over who can view them. So my next blog will be invite only. Family and IRL friends will all get invites if you are interested. For my blogging buddies who I've "known" for awhile now, you will also be invited if you want. And for those lurkers out there (I know you're reading), I won't feel comfortable sending you an invite unless I have a chance to get to know you a bit first, so now is your chance to start commenting, etc. I will let you all know when the time comes to let me know you want an invite. It will likely be sometime shortly after Apple and Banana are born. Hopefully not for a number of weeks to come.

OB Appointment & New Belly Pix!

2008-11-17T18:23:00.006-07:00

Had a regular OB appointment today (every Monday from now on). Nothing exciting. Here are the basics:

Blood pressure 110/60
Still gaining a bit of weight slowly--total weight gain of about 26 pounds
Apple's heart rate at 145 and Banana's at 150
Belly measuring 37cm (yeah, it was 39cm last Thursday)-I guess it is subjective and not all that accurate, or the babies might have moved positions a bit
I saw the same doc today that I saw last Thursday and she asked if I "popped" over the weekend, apparently I look bigger!
Apple's back or butt might be pressed up against the main ligament on the left that holds the uterus up causing the major tenderness I've been feeling
Cervix still feels closed, thick and up high
The OB could feel Apple's head, but she said it isn't pushing down and isn't in the birth canal yet, crazy how low she is
No indication of how much longer we have. I can't remember if I mentioned this before or not, but the doc mentioned that she's had patients who contract consistently for months and they worry about preterm labor and then they end up going full term and having to induce.

And for your viewing pleasure, here are some belly pix of someone close to me. I think he felt left out because my belly was getting all of the attention. Can you guess who it is? Hint: it isn't B.

Can I Complain a Little?

2008-11-16T16:08:00.005-07:00

Our couch never used to be this uncomfortable. It must be me. No matter where I sit/lie or what position I'm in, I just can't get comfortable. My back is not happy. I've tried ice packs, taking baths, distracting myself with tv or a book. I can't focus on anything. The only true relief I'm finding is at night with my tyle.nol pm. And that only lasts for a couple hours.

I also have a very tender spot on my lower left abdomen. It is the spot that has hurt all along from round ligament pain. It is now tender to the touch and hurts with the slightest movement. Plus, Apple (I think) keeps kicking or hitting that spot from the inside and it is like a sharp jab from the inside.

I'm trying really hard to enjoy this time. The last weeks of having my babies inside me. I'm trying to enjoy the calm around me and be happy that I'm home. Really, I am. I'm just so damn uncomfortable. And the stupid bed rest exercises aren't doing anything to relieve the feeling that I just need to MOVE.

31w2d-Belly Pix From This Week

2008-11-15T16:23:00.007-07:00

Not much going on here. Just getting into a routine every day. Get up, take bath, take shower, get dressed, drag huge self down to couch, lie on couch all day, eat periodically, take medicine periodically, drag self back upstairs, take bath, go to bed (insert numerous stops in the bathroom). Still contracting every 5-15 minutes depending on the time of day.

Just thought I would take this opportunity to post some belly pictures. Please don't tell my doctor that I was standing up for these pictures. It really only took like 30 seconds. Plus, I'm starting to go a bit crazy trying to stay comfortable lying down so much. My back and hips really aren't very happy with me.

Beware, some of these pictures show scary stretch marks and might be disturbing due to the sheer size of my belly! Click on them at your own risk.

These pictures were taken today. I took some facing forward so you can see my lovely stretch marks. They started as just faint red lines around the belly button. Then they got darker, crept downward, then upward and now they appear to be creeping to the sides. Lovely. You can also see the lovely red blotch that is the remnant of the top hole that used to contain my navel ring (not to mention my non-existent and slightly outtie belly button).

The other thing I love about the front facing photos are that my belly just looks like a huge, perfectly round ball. But for some reason, it never looks as big to me in the pictures as it does when I'm looking in the mirror. And it is also starting to get really shiny. I think if I stood on the side of the highway at night with my bare belly, it could act as a reflector and I might blind oncoming traffic!

31 Weeks

2008-11-13T18:50:00.002-07:00

One more week until the next milestone-the 32 week mark.

Had my check up with the OB today. She's pretty happy with where we are now after yesterday's scan. Blood pressure still normal at 118/66 (or something like that), and I'm now measuring at 39 weeks! Yikes. I'm huge. She said that my goal should be to keep things as is for 4 more weeks. If I make it to 35 weeks, they might take me off of bed rest and the pro.cardia. Because twins actually develop maturity a bit faster than singletons, a 35-weeker twin is generally about as developed as a 37-weeker singleton. The doctor also said she's had many patients who contract consistently for weeks and weeks who end up having to be induced.

I tried to convince the OB to let me keep my scheduled ultrasound appointment for Monday, but she was having none of it. Between the subjectivity of ultrasound technology and all recent scans being done by the peri, she thought it could cause more harm than good because of misinformation. So I'm stuck waiting for 2 weeks until we can see Apple and Banana again. Boo!!!

I guess I'll live.

Positive Trend

2008-11-12T16:23:00.003-07:00

Today's scan went well. The peri said it looked like both babies had more fluid today than on Monday. She didn't give us specific numbers. When I asked her what they look for in the deepest pocket, she said they really care more that the two babies have similar amounts of fluid and not a specific amount.

They are now estimating Apple's weight at a chunky 3 pounds 1 ounce! Either she packed on a ton of weight in the past 10 days, or the measurement last time was off because they couldn't get a great picture (the less fluid, the more difficult it is to measure them). I'm quite proud of her! Banana's weight is estimated at 3 pounds 10 ounces, so he is growing well also. It became very clear today that the weight estimates are just that, estimates. There is a large margin of error. The sonographer did the measurements first and came up with 3 pounds 1 ounce for Banana. Then the peri came in, had me shift sides and remeasured and got the 3 pounds 10 ounces. So it is quite subjective.

Regardless, both babies are growing and their discordance is now down to 16% from 21% ten days ago. It is now within the normal range. Apple's measurements put her at 30 weeks even, so about a week behind. Banana's measurements put him at 30w5d, right on track, which puts him in the 44th percentile. Can't remember where Apple fell on the growth curve, but she is still small for her gestational age. In some ways it doesn't worry me too much since I was always small for my age as a child (and as an adult). I was only 5 pounds 11 ounces when I was born and I was a singleton.

Anyway, they both seem to be doing much better. The BPP's for both babies looked good (movement and breathing motion). They continued to comment on how active Banana is at every single scan. He is definitely going to be a wild child! He was breech today. Apple is still vertex with her head lodged down in my pelvis just above my cervix. My cervix measured 3.6cm today (up from 3.2 on Monday). The peri kept pushing on my abdomen trying to get Apple's head to move up a bit to get a better measurement, but she wouldn't budge. I think she is determined to come out as soon as my cervix will let her! Good thing it is holding up so far.

The peri was satisfied enough that I'm not supposed to go back for 2 weeks. On Monday she said they would want to see me twice a week and now we're looking at once every other week. Quite a difference. I'm trying not to think about how incredibly far away 2 weeks seems right now since they've been checking me every other day. I do see my OB tomorrow, so we'll see what their plan is going forward.

I'm still on bed rest for now and keeping everything the same (pro.cardia, gelatin, 2 tub sessions, up only when necessary, etc.). Will update after tomorrow's appointment with anything new.

Oh, and since some of you asked, I did get that promotion at work. It was effective and announced November 1st while I was in the hospital. So, when I get back from leave, it will be to a new job (although one I've basically been doing since mid-September anyway). I finally talked to my boss today and got the official letter with my new compensation. Let's just say it will help quite a bit in paying for daycare or a nanny for 2 kids next year!

Quiet Day

2008-11-11T21:08:00.002-07:00

Just a quick post to say I made it through today with no issues and no panicking. The only thing I'm noticing is that I'm really low on energy. I mean, really low. It was all I could do to take a bath, shower, get dressed and pour a bowl of cereal this morning without collapsing. I guess that's what 11 days in bed does to you.

Tomorrow is our growth scan. I really hope our little Apple has put on a little weight. I'm worried about her.

Guess What?

2008-11-10T18:47:00.004-07:00

As I type this, I am lying on the couch in our family room. I'm home!

At the scan today, Apple's fluid level was "much better" than on Friday. Her deepest pocket of fluid measured about 2.5cm (it was 1 something on Friday). It is still low. But she has three discernible pockets of fluid now instead of one and the perinatologist (the conservative one) was comfortable enough to send me home. Banana's deepest pocket of fluid was somewhere above 6cm, but he appears to have plenty of fluid. And his fluid was also higher than it was on Friday.

I had to do a little reading today because I was confusing these numbers with the AFI (amniotic fluid index), where they divide the mother's abdomen into four quadrants, measure a fluid pocket in each quadrant and add them together. They obviously can't do this with twins, so they generally use the single deepest vertical pocket ("SDVP") method. This simply measures the amount of fluid in one pocket of fluid. I suppose when Apple had only one pocket of fluid, the SDVP measure equaled the AFI number. I can't find any guidelines to what is acceptable under the SDVP method, other than it appears a depth of at least 2cm is desired.

Regardless of the technicalities, we aren't in the clear, but things are looking up. The biophysical profiles (BPP) for both babies looked great this morning and their tracing this morning looked great as well. They did measure my cervix again today per my request. The first measurement she did was about 2cm, which is half of what it was last Wednesday. However, she looked around a bit more and got a better angle to measure and it was quite a bit longer than that. I didn't get an exact number (3 something), but they seemed satisfied with it.

The OB and peri seemed to think that the cel.ebrex was the culprit in reducing the fluid, although you don't usually see such a drastic reduction with such a small dose for only 48 hours. They think that pushing fluids and the warm baths are helping. Neither one had heard of the gelatin idea, but they agreed it wouldn't hurt, so might as well try it.

I've been given strict orders to try to mimic exactly what I've been doing in the hospital at home. This entails lying down as much as possible, getting up only when necessary, two baths per day, still taking my medicine every 4 hours, still doing my bed rest exercises, drinking 64-96 ounces of water every 24 hours, etc. I'm also supposed to call with any concerns whatsoever, keep an eye on my contractions for any changes and take notice of fetal movement to see if it seems decreased to me. I have an appointment with the perinatologist on Wednesday for a growth scan for both babies (and they'll check fluid again) and a follow up appointment with my OB on Thursday. What we do from there depends on what we see at the growth scan.

I am going to try really hard not to be paranoid and constantly worried about these babies while I'm home. And I just need to make it to Wednesday until we see how they are doing again. The other challenge is going to be planning well enough for meals, etc. so I don't need to get up constantly. We'll see how it goes. For now, I'm just happy to be home in familiar surroundings with B and the dogs again. And I can't wait to sleep in my own bed and take a bath in my own tub again. It feels G.O.O.D.

I was in the hospital for about a week and a half and it felt like forever. I have to say though, the days when I had visitors went by much more quickly. Thanks to everyone for visiting, calling, emailing, posting comments and generally for your positive thoughts and prayers. I am truly lucky to have so many great friends and family members.

Pictures, Pictures, Pictures

2008-11-09T18:48:00.025-07:00

Thought I'd treat you all to some pictures from my hospital stay so far. Before I get to that, let me just say that today was a great day as far as a day in the hospital goes. We had tons of visitors and for pieces of time I was able to forget where I was and why. Monitoring this morning was a bit frustrating and we couldn't find Apple. The doctor happened to come by on rounds at that time, so they got out the ultrasound to reassure us and figure out where to place the monitor. She was right where we thought the whole time and she was moving around a lot, just like her brother. The doctor thought that it looked like she might have more fluid than Friday, but couldn't measure it, so we'll have to wait until tomorrow to find out. The second monitoring session today went well and I was only on for one hour. The last one tonight took WAY too long (2 1/2 hours). Apple was doing great, but Banana appeared to be asleep for an hour. Once he perked up and started showing some activity, Apple had a late deceleration through one of my contractions. So the nurse decided we needed to watch her through a couple more. She did fine, but then Banana's heart rate was flat again. The nurse sat in here for almost an hour waiting for Banana to have one more acceleration. He finally did and she gave me a bowl of Lu.cky Char.ms out of her personal stash as a reward. Yum.

Now for the pictures.

This first picture is from Halloween day. This was taken in the first room they had me in that had a view of a brick wall. I was still in a hospital gown, but B brought my favorite pillow from home (and so began the slowly moving into the hospital by the bringing in of "stuff"). If you look closely, you can see a bruise on my upper arm. I have no idea how I got it.

This is the latest belly shot taken on Thursday at 30 weeks. It shows off my current wardrobe which now consists of pajama pants and B's white t-shirts. This picture was taken in my current room, in front of the door (I know, exciting).

This picture was taken as I was returning from one of my many bathroom trips. I had to interrupt monitoring for this particular trip. You can see the pink and blue elastic straps across my belly that hold the monitoring units in place. I'm holding the cords that get plugged into the base unit in my left hand. You can also see my lovely leg compression things (I have no idea what they are called). They plug into a unit that hooks onto the end of the bed. If you could see my make-up-less face and disheveled hair in this picture, you would totally think I'm hot.

This next picture is the view right in front of my bed. The flowers were from my niece's first birthday party last weekend that my mom brought by the next day. The picture frame has a picture of B as a little boy holding a cork board with the letter "B." His family sent us a bunch of pictures of him as a kid a couple of years ago and I framed this one because I thought it was so cute. The two angel ornaments hanging on the picture frame were part of a care package a friend brought by today. One for each baby. I can look at these from my bed and I'm reminded of why I'm doing this. The candle to the left of the frame was also in the care package. It is a flameless candle that works off batteries and smells like vanilla. This is one of my favorite things in the care package. It makes my room smell good and gives it a bit more ambiance. Never mind the fact that all of these things are sitting on top of the hazardous waste container. You can also see the "room service" menu in a little holder on the wall.

This picture shows the bigger picture view straight ahead of my bed. The tv up on the wall, the mini fridge with snacks on top, the same stuff shown in the picture above and the linen hamper.

This picture shows the corner with all my stuff on the floor. There really isn't any storage in the room to put anything in because my room is on the labor and delivery wing. They don't expect people to stay here for long as there is a separate post-pardum wing that they move you to once you deliver. The hospital is very proud of the lamps in these rooms because it provides softer lighting than the harsh overhead lights. The wheelie stool in this picture is helpful for extra seating and, as we found out today, is very entertaining for a 6 year old!

This picture shows some of the touches B brought me from home. The green afghan on the chair was made by his grandmother for one of the babies. We have two, but the other one is still at home. And then there's the Bears blanket. It is soft fleece and very cozy. The couch it is on pulls out length-wise and is for the dad's to sleep on. According to B (who spent the first two nights on this couch), it is not comfortable at all.

This picture shows all of the monitoring equipment. I won't bore you with the details, but this machine rules 3-6 hours of my life every day.

This shows my sink/vanity area. My mom brought me a humidifier because hospital air is incredibly dry. You can also see the IV to the left. I haven't had any IV fluids for about a week now and they took the IV out of my arm a couple of days ago. That was a relief. The stack of white blankets to the right of the picture are actually draped across a recliner.

This picture is of my bathroom (it is in my room) and the shower. It is actually a pretty nice bathroom with nice tiling. You can see the chair in the shower that I have to shower in (I'm not allowed to shower standing up). I've spared you a picture of the toilet. it is off to the right.

This picture shows my window with a view of the mountains (past the roof in the foreground). Much better than looking at a brick wall.

A Day in the Life

2008-11-08T22:11:00.003-07:00

8am-Get out of bed, brush teeth, pee
8:15am-Order breakfast and do bed rest exercises, eat breakfast
8:55am-Call nurse and ask to be placed on monitors
9:00am-Nurse arrives with medicine and takes vitals, pee
9:05am-Monitoring Step 1: Nurse thinks she has both babies on monitor and leaves room with confidence, promising to "watch from the desk"
9:06am-Monitoring Step 2: One or both babies moves and monitor loses track of heart beat, attempt to move monitor to find missing baby(ies)
9:25am-Monitoring Step 3: Get annoyed that nurse has not been watching and doesn't come back to find missing baby(ies)
9:26am-Monitoring Step 4: Call nurses station and ask for help getting missing baby(ies) back on monitors
9:27am-Monitoring Step 5: Decide might as well pee while waiting for nurse, unplug three monitors (one for each baby and one for contractions) and pulse-ox, curl into a ring and carry with to the bathroom with goopy gel all over belly hanging out. Try not to let shirt fall into goop.
9:30am-Monitoring Step 6: Nurse is back and spends anywhere from 2 minutes to 20 minutes getting babies back on monitors
9:50am-Monitoring Step 7: Horrible back-ache sets in and decide must absolutely shift sides or will die soon.
9:51am-Monitoring Step 8: Roll over in bed, lose both babies off monitors
Repeat Steps 2 through 8
10:35am-Babies cooperate for 10 continuous minutes. Obsess over tracing because not showing proper accelerations.
10:45am-Notice that it looks like both monitors are tracing the same baby.
10:46am-Call nurses station asking for assistance, that is the same baby on both monitors
10:50am-Nurse comes in and tries to find second baby.
10:55am-Nurse leaves to find other, more experienced nurse for help.
11:00am-Both nurses try to find second baby.
11:10am-Both babies finally cooperate for a bit.
11:11am-Have to pee. Focus really hard to avoid peeing in the bed every time a contraction hits and pushes on the bladder.
11:12am-Doctor shows up on rounds. Asks questions, answers questions.
11:25am-Nurse decides we've gotten enough and arrives to take me off monitors
11:26am-waddle to bathroom as fast as I can
11:30am-Order lunch and sit in warm bath watching tiny body parts poke out of belly
12:05pm-pee, do bed rest exercises, eat lunch
1:00pm-check email, return phone calls, pee, nurse arrives with medicine
2:00pm-nurse asks when I want to go back on monitors
2:01pm-2:30pm- attempt to answer emails, return phone calls, visit with visitors
2:31pm-Nurse comes back. "Ready to monitor?"
2:32pm-4:00 or 4:30 pm-repeat monitoring steps as above
5:00pm-nurse arrives with medicine
5:15pm-call nurses station and ask to go sit in tub
5:35pm-wonder if they've forgotten about me
5:36pm-Call nurses station again and ask if I've been forgotten (whoever took the call forgot to tell my nurse)
5:38pm-Nurse arrives with wheelchair to take me to tub room and apologizes
5:40pm-6:10pm-sit in warm tub and watch earthquake going on in belly
6:02pm-return to room and realize haven't showered yet today, pee
6:10pm-shower
6:30pm-order dinner, do bed rest exercises, pee
7:00pm-eat dinner
8:00pm-night nurse arrives and asks when I want to be monitored again, pee
8:30pm-begin monitoring steps as above
9:00pm-nurse arrives with medicine and takes vitals
10:30pm-pee, go to sleep
12:15am-pee
1:00am-nurse wakes up to give medicine and take vitals, pee, go back to sleep
3:30am-pee
5:00am-nurse wakes up to give medicine and take vitals, pee, pretend to go back to sleep
6:00am-slowly drift off back to sleep
7:00am-wake up to loud noises in the hallway from cleaning or construction crew, pee
8:00am-start all over again

Throw in the random ultrasound, blood draw, weight check, NICU tour, etc. somewhere in there.

Are you exhausted yet? I am.

I Hate When They're Right

2008-11-07T22:45:00.003-07:00

Whenever I told someone we were expecting twins, the most common response I got was "you know you'll be on bedrest!" It irks me that they were right. I honestly never expected to be here. I thought after awhile, I would be on modified activity simply because of how big I would be. I never expected pre-term labor or low fluid and discordant growth. I read about all of these things, but never thought they would apply to me and to this pregnancy. But here we are. Today's scan showed that fluid for both babies is lower than it was on Wednesday. It is not dire enough to require immediately delivery, but they quietly switched over from being happy with 20 minute NST's to full hour long monitoring of the babies heart rates. I know this is the best place for us to be right now, but it didn't make it any easier to hear the news from the perinatologist.

In other news, we got to tour the NICU today. The NP who gave us the tour was very nice and very knowledgeable. The NICU itself seems like the calmest, most serene place in the hospital. It is spacious and not overly crowded (at least not at the moment). The nurse explained the different pieces of equipment and what they are all used for. She let us peek at some of the babies in their isolettes or cribs and told us at what gestational age they were born, how much they weighed, and how far they have come since birth. Seeing the babies in there was not nearly as worrisome as I expected. Instead, it was reassuring to see the place where our babies have a high likelihood of spending their first weeks. I'm sure it will feel different once it is our kids in there, but at least we now know some of what to expect and have met a couple of the nurses.

In addition to continuing the warm baths twice a day, I am now trying to drink gelatin mixed with hot chocolate three times a day. So far this is the best combination we have found because I can't taste the gelatin at all (with just warm water or apple juice, it tastes yeasty). Since our doula recommended this as a possible home remedy for low amniotic fluid and it can't really do any harm, I'm going to give it a try. I'm hopeful that the combination of this, drinking tons of water, resting and taking two baths a day, we have a shot at seeing more fluid on Monday. it is going to be a long weekend. Although we do have visitors planning to stop by, so that should keep me somewhat occupied.

The first two monitoring sessions today were very frustrating. We started the first one late because of my scan at 9:30am this morning. And I ended up on the monitors for 2 hours. I'm convinced the nurse forgot about me. I think in that two hour period, there might have been a total of 10 minutes that the babies were both actually tracing well. Or was that the second session? I'm starting to have trouble remembering specifics on what happened when and who was there. I can't remember which nurse I had on what day or night. It is all just blending together as one big long stretch of time now.

After the second session today, I asked to speak with the doctor. I was worried that the tracing for Banana was so flat. She told me it looked better than the morning session and both babies are doing fine. This is the last of the 6 doctors in my OB's practice for me to meet. So far she is my least favorite. Maybe it's just me, but she made me feel stupid for worrying or questioning things. She would just say a couple of words and just stare at me. I'm really hoping she warms up a bit because she is the doc on call all weekend.

I don't think it is obvious to most people, but hospital bedrest is anything but restful or boring. Most days seem filled with one activity or another and sometimes it feels like a stretch to get everything in that I need to do. More on that in another post. For now, I'm exhausted, so I'm going to try to sleep.

Thanks to everyone for the positive comments, emails, phone calls, visits, etc. They do help. Oh, and I promise I'll post some pictures of the sexy compression things as soon as I get to it.

Crap

2008-11-07T13:46:00.001-07:00

Fluid levels have dropped since Wednesday. I'm staying here and they'll check again on Monday. More later.

30 Weeks

2008-11-06T21:58:00.004-07:00

I feel like I don't have much to say on days where we don't have a scan. But today I am 30 weeks. Two more weeks until the next milestone. We did take a belly shot today, but I haven't gotten around to downloading to the computer yet. Suffice it to say, I am HUGE.

Today was a bit of a down day. i woke up in a bad mood because I had trouble sleeping last night and was dreaming that I was leaking fluid. Turns out I just had to pee. But I think the fear is definitely starting to sink in and I'm trying not to let it get the best of me.

I had another postpardum nurse today, which makes for a really stressful day. The postpardum nurses don't usually work with pregnant women and, therefore, know very little about monitoring. I had to guide her and take responsibility myself (I don't get paid for that!). To make matters worse, this particular nurse is just slow. It took her 30 minutes to take my vitals this morning before she would give me my medication. And she tends to just putz around my room, even when I have company visiting. Our doula was here this morning for our first prenatal visit (we moved it up given the circumstances) and we were still trying to finish up the morning monitoring session (which ended up taking 2 1/2 hours). The doula was laughing at me because every time the nurse would walk into the room, my heart rate would increase and then it would immediately decrease right when she left the room. Telltale sign that she was stressing me out. I'm so transparent!

I did convince her at some point that she needed to grab one of the L&D nurses to help with the monitoring. Once the L&D nurse was in here, I mentioned to her how frustrating it was having a postpardum nurse. She mentioned that they fill in on postpardum too and it is difficult for them to help women breast feed when that isn't what they are trained to do. What is wrong with this system? She did promise to get me an L&D nurse for tonight, which she did. I know that when L&D is short on nurses, the bedrest patients get the fill-in nurses, because they can't really help during deliveries. But still. I'm paying for this care and I shouldn't have to stress because of their administrative issues.

The doula today mentioned that drinking gelatin in water can help increase amniotic fluid. Anyone heard of this? I did a search on this and didn't find a whole lot. I did drink one cup of it this afternoon, but I just wonder if anything additional will go to Banana anyway because his placenta seems to be functioning better. During the monitoring session this morning, it took forever to get Apple to stay on the monitor and then Banana's heart rate was looking flat. A normal, healthy baby will show brief accelerations and decelerations in their heart rate during monitoring. The good news is that the monitoring session tonight went a little smoother and the babies seemed fine.

I had a couple of visitors today (other than my parents and B who visit every day) and one of our friends brought us a little rocking sheep for the babies. it is so incredibly cute and I can't wait to see it in the nursery. It seems like forever since I've been in the nursery. I miss our house and the dogs. Tonight B and I did a quick video chat so I could talk to the dogs. Scout was cocking her head back and forth listening to me and trying to figure out where my voice was coming from. Molly just looked bored. That is until Scout decided I must be home and ran to the garage door barking. One of the nurses told us that we can bring dogs in to visit if we can prove they've had all of their shots. It was a tempting idea, but I think it would just wig them out further. And Scout's barking would disturb the entire hospital.

Let's see, what else? B went to our second HOA meeting last night and apparently things got a bit heated. I hate missing stuff like that-oh the drama!

Not much else going on. I can't believe I've been here a week. I NEVER thought this would happen when we came in last week. Thought I'd be going home that night or maybe the next day. I've gotten to know quite a few of the nurses now and most of them are pretty good and really nice. The food here is actually not bad (since you asked, Jen). There is a menu you order off of like room service and it is actually a pretty varied menu. They have breakfast items, sandwiches and salads, and entrees and you can order any of them at any time 7am to 7pm. I am definitely staying fed. Plus B and my parents (and some friends) keep bringing me outside food so I don't get bored of the food here.

The weather has turned to fall and gotten colder here, but I really don't know the difference. I have a nice view of the mountains out my window, but it would be nice to be able to breathe the fresh air. I do have wheelchair privileges, so I guess I could have someone wheel me outside, but I didn't bring any cold weather clothes here.

Tomorrow is our next scan with the peri. I am nervous, but I can't wait for it to be morning so I can count another day that the babies are safe inside me and I just hope things have improved since Wednesday. They are coming to get me either at 7:30am or 9:30am. If I'm not able to go home tomorrow, they are going to set up a tour of the NICU for us so that we can get a little familiar and more comfortable with the idea of having our babies in there for awhile. And so we can also see some preemies and feel a little better that Apple and Banana won't look like aliens if they are born soon. It is a fine line between trying to stay optimistic and trying to prepare for the worst if we need to.

That's all for now. Time to go hook up my fancy leg compression thingies and try to sleep for 2 hours until they wake me up for my next pr.ocardia. Until tomorrow.

Feels Like Home (note sarcasm)

2008-11-05T17:46:00.004-07:00

Here's the update for today.

Both Apple's and Banana's fluid is a little lower than it was on Monday. The doctors think this could be caused by the Celeb.rex as it can affect the babies' kidney function for a short period of time. Would have been nice to know that this was a side effect. Not that I would have refused to take it, but shouldn't that have been my decision?

Anyway, they are not worried about Banana because he has a lot of fluid anyway. Apple, however, is on the low end of the scale. Her AFI on Monday was 5 and this morning it was 2. She has only one pocket of fluid hanging out by her feet. They did another biophysical profile and her movement, tone and blood flow still looked good. We had to wait awhile for her to take a practice breath, but she eventually did. Banana's biophysical profile was perfect.

Because Apple's fluid level dropped, I am staying in the hospital now at least until Friday. Do I sound like a broken record yet? They will do another ultrasound on Friday to check again. I had my last dose of Celebr.ex, so it should be out of my system by Friday. If Apple's fluid increases to an acceptable level, they will probably let me go home. But, if the fluid is still low (same as today or lower) they will keep me in the hospital and watch Apple's other signs to watch for distress. The bottom line is that if Apple continues with low fluid, and her other signs start to deteriorate, we will need to deliver the babies.

The goal is to get me at least to 32 weeks (2 weeks from tomorrow) as this is a significant milestone in terms of preemies and the types of issues they will have. Of course, anything beyond that is even better.

In the mean time, the doctor has ordered 2 jacuzzi immersion sessions a day for 30 minutes each. The theory is that sitting in the warm water (no jets since that can cause or increase contractions) helps to move some of the body's fluid from tissue to my vascular system and then on to the babies. I'm also drinking a ton of water, but that is nothing new. And I'm still taking the pro.cardia for the contractions.

They had a physical therapist stop by to show me some in-bed exercises to try to avoid some muscle deterioration and now I get to sleep with sexy compression stockings or those funky leg cuff things that plug in and squeeze your legs to avoid clots. They also got me a special gel mattress that is supposed to be more comfortable. I also have wheelchair privileges now if I want to go see the sights of the hospital. So, they are preparing me for a longer stay, just in case. The doctor said to plan on staying long term and if things work out so I can go home it will be a very pleasant surprise. Sure feels like I'm slowly, but surely moving in here.

I'm Boring Today (I Guess That's Good)

2008-11-04T19:23:00.001-07:00

Just thought I should update to say there is no new news today. We've done two out of the three monitoring sessions for the day and both babies heart rates have been good. My contractions were quite spread out this morning, maybe because of the cel.ebrex. They seem to have picked up as the day went on, which is my standard pattern. One more session to go tonight.

Not much else to report. We have another scan scheduled for tomorrow and I'm thinking Apple's fluid level will dictate whether I stay in the hospital longer or go home. I don't think they can detect any growth in 2 days.

I had a lot of visitors today, so that kept me pretty occupied. Now I'm just watching election coverage with my mom while we eat dinner. I slept horribly last night, even in my druggy state. The OB mentioned they could get me a more comfortable mattress, but what's the point if I end up leaving tomorrow?

I did spend some time trying to get caught up on work emails today, but didn't quite finish. Somehow, they seem to be doing just fine without me. Imagine that!

I'll update tomorrow with any news.

Thanks for all the positive energy. it helps, so keep the comments coming!

Short Term Plans

2008-11-03T22:25:00.002-07:00

I did finally talk to the OB this evening. She apparently thought the peri had talked to me and that I knew what the plan was going forward. And the peri evidently told her I wanted to stay in the hospital. I asked the peri her thoughts on hospital versus home bedrest and she asked what type of patient I would be at home (i.e. would I cheat and be getting up to do laundry, etc.). I told her I wasn't worried about forcing myself to lie down, but I would worry about the babies more if i was home and would probably have a difficult time deciding when to come back in should things seem different to me. it is more reassuring being in the hospital knowing that they are watching you and the babies, takes a bit of the pressure off. So apparently, I made the decision to stay, but wasn't aware I had made the decision or that it was even up to me. Go figure. For what it's worth, the OB did say she would prefer I was in the hospital anyway.

Here's the plan. They started me on cel.ebrex tonight and I'll be on that until Wednesday. On Wednesday, they will do another scan to check on the babies again, mainly on Apple's fluid level. i assume they'll check my cervix again too. Then we will reassess the situation. So, at least I know the plan for the next two nights and two days. After that it is all subject to change again.

I can't remember what details I put in the last post and I'm just too lazy to go back and look, so I apologize if I'm repeating anything. Apple weighed in around 2 pounds 7 ounces, while Banana is at 3 pounds 1 ounce. Banana is above the growth curve for a singleton, while Apple is below. Apple is still vertex and her head is so far down in my pelvis they had trouble getting a measurement of her head. Apparently she thinks it is time to go somewhere, but my cervix is holding her in for now. Banana is back to being breech. And he is spreading out taking up a ton of room and squeezing his sister into a smaller space. When they were measuring him today, they said he has a long arm bone. Now I'm picturing some kind of ape growing in there because neither B nor I have long arms (or legs).

Anatomy still looks good for both from what they can tell, but it gets more difficult over time as they grow. Both babies still have good blood flow from the placentas through their cords. Out of the four things they measure on the babies to determine size and weight (arm bone, leg bone, head, abdomen), all of Banana's were right around average or slightly above for a singleton. Apple's measurements were all good too except for her abdomen which is measuring at less than 2% percentile. This is the one measurement that is putting her below the curve and causing concern. Plus the fact that her fluid is a little low. It is actually difficult for them to tell and they said that if she were a singleton, they may not even be concerned. However, since Banana has more fluid and is bigger, they worry that he's getting more of the nourishment and she is suffering because of it.

No one seems concerned enough to talk about inducing soon, but they are concerned enough to watch closer. The other thing that concerned me today is that they sent a nurse from the NICU up to my room to talk to us about what to expect with preemies who are born at different weeks. I wasn't sure whether to listen intently to absorb as much info as possible, or to tune her out and ignore everything hoping that we wouldn't need to know any of it.

But even with this new turn of events, I'm trying to take things in stride. Every morning I wake up, I can mark another day off the calendar that I'm still pregnant and the babies are still benefiting from being in the uterine environment instead of the NICU. Each week will now feel like much more of a significant milestone to me than before. And the more of those milestones we can hit, the better off the babies will be when they come out.

Something New Every Day

2008-11-03T16:36:00.004-07:00

Let's see, what happened today? We saw the perinatologist and had a scan done to check the babies' growth and my cervix. My cervix still looks great. However, Apple is now starting to lag behind her brother in size. She is only about 2 pounds 7 ounces, while Banana is around 3 pounds 1 ounce. Banana is above the 50% mark for the singleton growth curve and Apple is below the mark. They are about 21% different. Apparently they like them to be no more than 20% different and they tend to worry more if they are the same gender with significant differences, because boys tend to be bigger than girls anyway. Apple's fluid is also a little bit low now. It appears her placenta isn't quite as efficient as Banana's.

What does all of this mean? Who knows. The perinatologist said we need to start doing growth scans every 10 days or so, but she didn't seem to think we needed to monitor the babies constantly. However, the OB on call today did her rounds while I was getting scanned, so she missed me. When the nurses came in for afternoon monitoring, I asked why we were still doing this since the babies seemed to be fine every time we did and my contractions weren't changing. They said now that they are seeing a growth difference, we have more reason to monitor the babies.

I asked the nurse to call the OB and ask her to stop by. No one ever officially said today whether I'm going home or not so the nurses are assuming I'm here at least until tomorrow. I really would just like to know if there is a point to staying in the hospital. If the growth scans will only be every 10 days, no need to stay here for that. And if nothing helps my contractions, but my cervix is fine, can't they just check that periodically? No one has said anything about daily cervix checks. The perinatologist did suggest we try cele.brex for 48 hours to see if that helps the contractions. But the OB still hasn't written orders for that. Everything just seems very scattered and uncoordinated today.

To be honest, I would be fine if they want me here long term. I just wish I knew so that we could plan accordingly. Right now B is bringing me fresh clothes every day or two, rather than packing a whole bag. I haven't stocked the mini-fridge with anything thinking that I could be leaving any day now. They have special mattresses you can order if you are here long term. Of course I would rather be home. But being in limbo just sucks. Just tell me one way or the other, please.

I'll update later if the OB ever stops by.

The Dam Broke

2008-11-02T18:55:00.004-07:00

Today was a really good day. It flew by because we had tons of visitors. They moved me to my new room which has a little fridge and a mountain view! I was actually hungry for the first time in days and the shakiness from the terb is pretty much gone. I even got to go outside today. Woo hoo! My family was here visiting for awhile and B was able to go home and do some laundry before coming back to the hospital. Then it got dark and everyone left. And I sat in bed and looked around the empty room. What now?

Oh yeah, did I mention I'm here at least until tomorrow? It really is just day by day.

B had to go pick up the dogs this evening who have been kenneled since Friday. He called me a bit later when everyone had gone too and I just started crying. I felt stupid and I know it made him feel guilty. I just couldn't help it and now I'm tearing up again just thinking about it. Hospital rooms are lonely places at night. Even with the company of the tv, phone and laptop.

B called back a bit later while I was eating dinner and told me he is taking the day off tomorrow and now I feel guilty for making him feel guilty. But he said the dogs are pretty wigged out. Scout, our little schnauzer is running all around the house looking for me and Molly, the big hound/pointer mix, ran right into the house and jumped up onto the coffee table. I'm sure they'll settle down soon though. They should be exhausted after being at the kennel.

As far as Apple and Banana go, they've been moving around like crazy. They actually behaved for this morning's monitoring session, but the second session took a bit longer to get them settled. One more session to go tonight. My contractions were pretty good this morning spaced from 7 to 11 minutes apart. During the second section, they were a bit closer together, back around 6 minutes apart. I'm not really convinced the pr.ocardia is doing anything. I think this is just my pattern now. They are slower in the morning and get closer together as the afternoon wears on. I guess as long as they aren't painful, and my cervix holds up, I could continue like this all the way to 38 weeks.

The doctor did check my cervix today and said it still seems closed, so that's good. She also did a swab for the strep-B test. I guess it is probably a good thing my mom asked about that today (of course I forgot), because the treatment is usually penici.llin, which I'm allergic to. This way, if I have it, the lab has the time to figure out which antibiotic will work and it will be all ready to go whenever the babies are born.

Being on a labor and delivery ward is a little weird. Women are giving birth all around me and we are trying really hard to make sure I don't. Yesterday when my contractions were pretty regular around 4-5 minutes apart, the nurse commented that I had the best labor pattern on the floor. How ironic. When I do hear a baby crying, I get wistful for a minute wishing that Apple and Banana were here, and then I have to push the thought away and give them a strict thought to stay put. Now is not the time.

The good thing about this hospital visit, is that we're now very comfortable here. I know how things work and I've met a lot of the nurses. It has also helped me decide what to pack in my hospital bag, which we are going to do this week-no more putting that off. Oh, and we are going to try to move up our prenatal doula visits too for fearing of not getting the benefit. I'm hoping that this hospital stay just makes it that much easier when we do come back for delivery. Hopefully not for another 8.5 weeks or so.

Morning Update

2008-11-02T07:52:00.003-07:00

Day 3 of my incarceration. Really, that's what it kind of feels like. I've been locked in the same room since Thursday night, not even allowed to roam the halls. Last night seemed to go a bit better than the night before. We discovered before I went to sleep that if they take my blood pressure after I've been up to use the bathroom (which is really the only "up" time I get), it is much better than if I've been lying down for awhile. Duh. So every 4 hours when they came in to give me the pro.cardia, I would get up to pee first and my blood pressure was holding steady around 105/55 (give or take). They also gave me more IV fluids last night and kept me on a drip overnight. Sure is fun sleeping with an IV. They were threatening me with magnes.ium sul.fate last night, but settled for fluids with the proc.ardia as long as the contractions weren't painful. I was happy about that because I've heard and read horrible things about mag.

It's amazing what 3 days of lying in bed does to your body. I don't remember feeling like this with my IVF bed rest sessions. Probably because I was at home, and not pregnant. But it is really taking a toll on my body now. My back is especially difficult to deal with. Last night my whole chest was aching, my legs were aching and cramping. And now my arms and hands ache.

They haven't come in to start monitoring yet this morning, but I expect that soon. Last night I was talking to the nurse (she has been the same nurse on the night shift all three nights), I was talking about how antsy I was feeling. I just need to get out of this room for a little bit and get a little fresh air. Even if it isn't fresh air, just different air. She said that today they could ask the doctor for orders to allow me to be wheeled around in a wheelchair for half an hour or so. She also thought the doctor would write an order so I could sit in the jacuzzi tub they have on the L&D wing. And, they are going to move me to a different room that has a view. A view of what? I have no idea, but it has to be better than a view of a rooftop and the rooms on the other side of the roof. Sounds like heaven, doesn't it? For the past two days, the highlight of my day has been taking a shower (in a chair of course).

The nurse did think it was possible they might want to keep me for another couple of days to watch me further. So, instead of waking up every morning thinking I'm going home today, I think it will be better for me mentally to think I'll be going home in a couple of days. It is getting hard to be told I have to stay each day, even though I saw the signs. I know what needs to happen. My contractions need to be spaced far enough apart so that I'm having no more than 6 per hour, and my blood pressure needs to stay high enough while on the medication. Wish I had some control over that!

Thanks for all of your comments. Each one has helped cheer me up just a bit and is helping to remind me why I'm doing this.

Still Here

2008-11-01T13:50:00.003-06:00

At the hospital that is. Overnight, my heart rate shot up and my blood pressure tanked. I wasn't really aware of much because I had taken two ty.lenol pm, but I remember the nurse taking my pulse and telling me my heart rate was too high to keep me on the terb. I wasn't too concerned in my groggy state and was just grateful to get some sleep. This morning, same scenario. They put me back on the monitor and the contractions were there. Pretty regular at about 6 minutes apart. Once they talked to the doctor they decided to give me the proc.ardia and monitor blood pressure. It didn't drop too much, so we are staying with the pro every 4 hours to see how I do on it.

They spent about an hour (at least) this morning trying to get Apple and Banana on the monitors. The kids were having none of it! They would get one on, strap the monitor onto my belly, find the other one and then the first one would move. At one point the back-up doc (who is actually my primary doc) came in with the ultrasound machine to get a better feel for where best to place the monitors. Both hearts were beating away and they both had a great amount of fluid. They got monitors on both babies for about 2 minutes and then lost them both. They gave up at that point and said we'll try again later. They aren't worried about the babies at all though because they are very active and when they have been monitored, they have plenty of healthy accelerations in their heart rates.

The doc on call came in around noon just to check in. She doesn't seem too worried. But we are definitely staying here overnight again. They want to see how I do on just the one medication. Apparently sometimes combining both medications is just too much for a person's (meaning me) system. If I do well on just the pro, they will send me home tomorrow. It could actually work out better because the pro doesn't give me the jitters nearly as bad as the terb and it would only be every 4 hours instead of alternating and taking something every 2 hours. Maybe I'll actually be able to lie down now without feeling like my heart is going to jump out of my chest. (if this is what meth is like, why would anyone enjoy that?!).

The other bummer in all of this is that we are now missing my niece's 1st birthday party this afternoon. Sucky. However, if the wireless here cooperates, we will try to do a video chat so we can at least say hi to everyone. Maybe B will sing happy birthday into the computer! Overall, we're doing fine. I'm still proud and amazed at myself for not crying at all and for being relatively okay with all of this. I'm really learning to go with the flow of things. And a good night of sleep (even though I was woken up every two hours-I'm used to that anyway) makes all the difference. And B has been great as usual, making trips back to the house for fresh clothes for me, taking the dogs to the kennel, and taking care of various chores.

I don't expect to be here too long, but if anyone feels like stopping by for a visit, you are more than welcome, just give me a call first to make sure we're still here!

What a Difference a Couple of Days Makes

2008-10-31T18:36:00.002-06:00

After the results of Monday's test, we though we were in the clear for the next 2 weeks. Not so much. Last night when I got home from work, I was contracting. A lot. I took a bath. I drank tons of water. I rested on my side. And after counting contractions between 8 and 9pm that ranged from 2 minutes between to 10 minutes between, I called the doctor. The told us to head to the hospital for monitoring.

Once we got to the hospital, I was hooked up to monitors (one for contractions and one for each baby) and watched. The doctor stopped in and we talked. She did another fetal fibron.ectin and manual exam of the cervix (which looked great still). Then they started me on terbu.taline to try to relax the uterus and slow down the contractions. I got two sub-cu shots of terb and then the results of the fetal fibron.ectin came back positive. Very confusing since the one from Monday was negative and supposed to predict very little chance of pre-term labor in the next two weeks. But a positive isn't relied upon as much as a negative because it just means you are at increased risk of pre-term labor, but many people won't experience it. Regardless, because of the positive results, they decided to admit me over night. They started alternating oral terb with oral proc.ardia (another medication to slow down contractions) and gave me the first of two shots of betame.thasone (a steroid shot to help the babies lungs mature in case of premature delivery).

I stayed on the monitors all night last night and because of the jittery, heart racing side effects of the terb, didn't really sleep at all. This morning we were told that the plan was the same until the doctor was able to come see me (around 9am). They did decide that the babies only needed to be monitored 3 times a day since they looked great (good heart rates and lots of movement). I don't think Apple and Banana like having the monitors on as it felt like they kept trying to kick them off. The doc showed up at 4pm. It was a long, long day. They decided to keep me at least one more night to do the second shot of beta.methasone. It is most effective when the mom is given two shots 24 hours apart. This means the second one falls at 1:30am tonight.

The medications did slow down the contractions, but they have started to get a bit more frequent as the afternoon and evening wears on. This is the pattern I've been in for a couple of weeks now. The doc said as long as I'm contracting no more than 6 times an hour, they will send me home tomorrow and keep me on the medications. Once home, I will be on modified bed rest, at least for a couple of weeks. This means I get up really only to go to the bathroom, shower, grab some food, etc. Guidelines are 1 hour up, 2 hours of rest. I can be sitting up if it is more comfortable to rest that way. I can also try to work from home as much as I feel up to. So we'll see how that goes. If a couple of weeks go by smoothly, we might try cutting back on the medications and cutting back on bed rest a bit (maybe go in to work for a couple of hours a couple of days a week). We'll see though. This is a critical point in the pregnancy and the doctor pointed out that we should do everything we can to prevent premature delivery or we will always be stuck with the "what ifs." I whole-heartedly agree.

We are hopeful that things will go well from here. I don't know why or how, but for some reason so far I haven't shed one tear over this situation. Sooooo unlike me. I've gotten permission to take my tyl.enol pm tonight to try to get some sleep and hopefully some relief from the back pain that is now constant. Wish me luck.

Oh, and if anyone out there has stories about pre-term labor (contractions) that have happy endings (term deliveries), please let me know! I want more reassurance of a good outcome!

(sorry if this was rambling post. I'm going on no sleep and jittery side effects from medication right now)

Negativo

2008-10-28T19:52:00.001-06:00

Fetal fibronectin came back negative. Next step is cervical length check on Monday.

Week by Week

2008-10-27T18:30:00.003-06:00

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.

28w3d

2008-10-26T17:35:00.007-06:00

First, if you have an opinion on cord blood banking, please go comment on my last post.

It is still surreal to me to think I'm in my 29th week. It is starting to feel like this will really happen and I can actually see the light at the end of the tunnel. Of course, that doesn't mean I will stop complaining anytime soon!

We had a busy weekend (at least for us these days). Yesterday my mom came over and helped me sort through all of the clothes we've gotten, take tags off and sort. B then washed all of the clothes, sheets and towels and we put everything away in the nursery. It's just amazing how much stuff we've gotten! My mom also lined the cabinet/drawers in the bathroom that separates the nursery from the third bedroom upstairs. It is something I've been meaning to do since we moved in 2 years ago. I lined all of the cabinets/drawers in the kitchen, guest bathroom and master bathroom right away. For some reason I stopped at the other bathroom upstairs. This feels like one more step towards accepting/admitting that we are actually going to USE the nursery soon! Today my mom went shopping with me to buy a couple of bras and pajama pants. Shopping is exhausting for me, so it's nice to have someone to grab different sizes for me (especially since I have no idea what size I am in anything these days). I also got through most of the rest of the thank-you notes for gifts we got at the shower and over the last week.

My one last task for tonight is to finish filling out my mail-in ballot. I've filled out some of it (all of the state and local initiatives), but need to finish.

On the pregnancy front, the BH contractions (if that's what they are) have been steadily increasing. Although the pattern is more sporadic during the day while I'm at work and then almost constant at night once I get home and relax. This pattern really doesn't sound like pre-term labor, but I'm paranoid. I called the OB office on Friday to ask about monitoring. The nurse spoke with the doctor and told me to take a bath at night, push fluids and to come in on Monday for a fetal fibronectin test. This is a test for pre-term labor. From what I've read, it isn't all that reliable. But whatever, I'll take it for now. When I go in on Monday, I'm thinking of requesting to move to weekly appointments because the contractions are just making me really nervous.

One new development this week is that I now have stretch marks. They are around my belly button (or what used to be my belly button) and they are oh so hot. The ultrasound tech last Monday commented on how great my skin was and that it was great that I have no stretch marks. Uh, yeah. She spoke too soon. Other than that, just dealing with the same pelvic and back pain and I'm STILL waiting for the pregnancy acne to go away. I guess the idea that it would go away in the 2nd trimester was wishful thinking.

There was a development on the work front last week, but I can't say anything yet as there are some people who read this who travel in the same work circles and nothing has been announced yet. One more week and I should be able to share. Also, in one more week, our dress code at work changes so that we can wear jeans any day of the week instead of just on Fridays. Not all that exciting for me considering my maternity jeans aren't that comfortable and I can seem to find any that will stay up (even with se.cret fit belly). It will be nice once I'm back to my normal clothes. Five more weeks of work until I can relax and hand over the reigns (actually 4.5 because of Thanksgiving). This week is going to be hard though because it is full of meetings. Plus, the person I rely on the most will be out of the country this week. It is for work and this person is going in my place because I can't travel.

That's it for now. Below are new belly pix from yesterday (I've included one straight on-if you click on it you can probably see the lovely stretch marks) and a couple of ultrasound pix from last Monday. This time Apple was easier to see and Banana was hiding from the camera.

Cord Blood

2008-10-25T11:01:00.002-06:00

I'm just now starting to research the benefits of banking cord blood in a private bank and I'm curious if any of you have thoughts on this. Do the potential benefits outweigh the price? The brochure we were given was for vi.acord. Their pricing is about $2,200 for the first year and then $125 per year for each year after. Their website says they have pricing for twins, but you have to call for details. I wouldn't expect there to be a a huge discount. Thoughts?

ZZZZZZzzzzzzzzz

2008-10-22T22:45:00.002-06:00

Wishful thinking. I'm having trouble falling asleep tonight. I just can't get comfortable and the t.yl.enol pm doesn't seem to be working. Apple's feet must be way up in my ribs because I can't breathe. The round ligament pain that has plagued me on the lower left side of my abdomen is acting up. The house is quiet except for B's snoring in the next room. He has taken to sleeping in the guest bedroom so his snoring doesn't keep me up. Even the dogs are asleep. Can I do this for 10 more weeks?

I'm sure this problem will go away once the babies are born. And then I'll be up every 2 hours for feedings. Oh, the irony.

Week 28 Appointment

2008-10-20T20:15:00.002-06:00

Another appointment with all good news. I could get used to that!

Here are the highlights:

Apple is still vertex (head down) and her head is pretty low in my pelvis. She is pretty much stretched out on my left side with her feet up in my ribs. Yeah, pretty comfy. That explains the shortness of breath. She's weighing in now around 2 pounds 2 ounces and is measuring 27 weeks even. Since I am 27w4d today, this is still in the normal range of a singleton, which is really good for a twin. Her heart rate was 143 and she is still swallowing fluid.
Banana is also vertex, but up higher and on my right side. He was pretty curled up today and wasn't cooperating for pictures. He weighs about 2 pounds 5 ounces and is measuring 27 weeks 2 days. His heart rate was 148 and he is also still swallowing fluid.
Apple and Banana are still close enough in size and weight that their growth is considered concordant, which is good. They are sharing nicely. Both placentas still look healthy and firmly attached.
My cervix is still nice and long (5 something).
Blood pressure really low at 110/60.
Weight gain around 25 pounds. I'm gaining around a pound a week now which puts me at the lower end of what my doctor recommends 10 weeks from now (her recommendation was 35-45 total weight gain).
Speaking of 10 weeks from now, my doc says she doesn't think I'll go past that. If I do, we can discuss pros and cons of inducing. But from what I've been reading, I'm going to do all I can to avoid induction.
My belly is now measuring 37 cm (what would be expected for a woman pregnant with a singleton at 37 weeks). The doctor said this explains why I'm experiencing more frequent BH contractions. Apparently as the uterus approaches the size it would at term with a singleton, it starts to prepare for labor because it doesn't know there are two babies in there that need to grow some more. Silly uterus. So it becomes increasingly more important now to keep a watch out for pre-term labor.

In other news, we have decided on a doula. We met with her last night. She has attended three twin births and I really like her philosophy and answers to all of my questions. I'm actually pretty surprised at how relieved I feel having made that decision. I was feeling like a slacker that we haven't taken any childbirth classes yet and having a doula there takes some of that pressure off. We are taking a multiples class that should cover childbirth, but it isn't for 3 weeks and since it is multiples specific and only for one day, I'm not sure how much they will cover. We are also signed up for a baby care class that same weekend (which will be an exhausting weekend). Then we are going to sign up for a baby safety class (infant cpr, etc.) for the weekend after (if there is still room in the class).

I continued the countdown this morning by reminding myself only 6 more weeks until I can shift some responsibility at work and start working from home. Then I remembered that the last week in November is Thanksgiving, so it is really only 5 1/2 weeks. Yay! Tomorrow also begins my schedule of leaving early to work from home in the evenings. I didn't feel right starting that today since I was out all morning.

I also got temporary tags to park in handicap parking spots today. My doctor thought it was a great idea. Not only can I avoid long walks in parking lots, but now I will be able to park in wider spaces which makes it easier to get in and out of the car. Last Friday I walked to my car after work to go home and could not get into my car on the driver's side. I'm not even sure I could have gotten in if I weren't pregnant, the car next to me was parked so close and so far over the line. After calming down and convincing myself that slashing the car's tires or keying the car would not be productive, I resigned myself to getting into the passenger seat and hauling my huge pregnant ass over the center console. It took me forever and was painful. Thankfully, I should be able to avoid that situation going forward. My temporary tags expire January 18th, two days after my due date.

That's all for now. Sorry for the lack of pictures today. I just don't have the energy to go scan them. I'll get to it next weekend.

Paint Pictures

2008-10-18T11:20:00.009-06:00

Here are pictures of the rooms we had painted this week: the nursery, our master bedroom, the dining room, and the niche above the tv/fireplace in our family room. I think they all turned out great. We tried to use multiple colors especially in the master and the dining room to show off the architectural details. The painter did a great job. I'm especially impressed with the straight lines he was able to do on the rounded drywall corners. I have no idea how he did it-tape doesn't make lines that straight!

Ahhhhh

2008-10-16T19:38:00.003-06:00

Big sigh of relief. I passed the 3-hour glucose test! All levels were within normal ranges. I'm SO relieved.

When the nurse called after my 1-hour test, I hung up the phone and burst into tears. And then I told myself to stop being over dramatic. This time I was really nervous all day waiting for the call. I thought about it and realized that my experiences with nurses calling me with bad news through IF treatments has tainted my expectations on receiving medical news over the phone. I've gotten so used to hearing bad news from nurses on skyrocketing E2 levels, cancelled cycles or negative betas. Now I'm always expecting bad news and all of those feelings of anxiety return. Maybe someday the good news phone calls will start to overshadow the bad news phone calls and I'll be back to expecting the best instead of the worst.

I had a spell of dizziness at lunch today. This is going to sound strange, but I'm convinced it was because I was talking too much and not getting enough oxygen! I relaxed for a bit and went outside for some air and felt better.

The painter started yesterday and is supposed to finish up tomorrow. So far it looks awesome. I'll have to post pictures when it's done and before we clutter the rooms up with furniture again. It is nice to finally have some color on the walls.

The latest at work this week is that my boss has now decided to make a decision on the position by Nov. 1st. This means I'm essentially interviewing for the job that I've been doing now for the past month. I also told my boss that starting next week I was going to be leaving in the afternoons to work from home. I've been dealing with various 6pm phone calls because of time zone differences (across the globe) and it has just become too much for me to get home that late. So I'll be leaving the office in the afternoon early enough to beat traffic and working from home. We'll see how it works

More people are popping up pregnant around me and I just realized that for the first time, I received news of two new pregnancies (one of a close friend and one of a coworkers wife) and I didn't have any feelings of jealousy or hurt whatsoever. Is it possible that I'm starting to move past this?

Happy Birthday to Me...

2008-10-12T12:52:00.007-06:00

Today is my 32nd birthday. I feel old and achy. My ECP is acting up and my back hurts. I'm on my first of 3 days of an increased carb diet to prepare for the 3-hour glucose tolerance test on Wednesday. It has been cloudy, rainy and gloomy all weekend. And this has been the best birthday weekend ever! We had my baby shower yesterday which was just perfect. We got so much great stuff for the babies and I got to hang out with friends and family. Today we are just watching football and eating (a lot).

I've been pretty bad about blogging and reading blogs the last couple of weeks (sorry). This is our second weekend in a row with company, so I've been living in the real world instead. The painter is supposed to start on Tuesday (hopefully he'll show up) and paint the nursery, master bedroom, dining room, and the niche in the family room. Once the painting is done, we can start putting away all of the great baby loot we got at the shower.

My boss informed me last week that he isn't going to make a decision on the position until after I come back. Still not sure how I feel about this. It means I have all the responsibilities of the position until I go on leave, but that is it. Once I'm on leave, a coworker will take over and then we'll see what happens when I get back. I think my boss is worried that I won't want all of the responsibility that the position entails once I have two babies. Ahh, the things men don't ever have to worry about.

My boss also decided that I should hand over the reigns on December 1st, so even if I'm still at work, I'll just be support and my back-up will be in charge at that point. This means that it will probably make sense to start working from home at that point. Seven more weeks. Seven. More. Weeks.

Well, I would expect that my belly shots this week would look much bigger than two weeks ago, but it doesn't look that way to me. Maybe it's just the pictures. Last Monday when they measured me, the belly had grown about 4 cm in 2 weeks. You would think that would be visible in the pictures, but oh well.

Failed

2008-10-07T19:17:00.001-06:00

I failed the glucose screen. Not even borderline, but a solid FAIL. Three hour glucose test, here I come...

26 Week Appointment

2008-10-06T18:31:00.003-06:00

No ultrasound pictures this time and no belly shots this weekend. Although we spent all weekend just hanging out with family, it seemed really busy and I never got around to taking any pictures. I guess you'll all have to wait until next weekend to gasp in shock at my ever-expanding waistline.

At today's appointment, I measured in at 31/31.5 weeks. About 6 weeks ahead. Yikes. If I continue at this rate and make it to 40 weeks (not all that likely), I will be as big as someone who is 6 weeks past due!
Blood pressure nice and low at 110/60.
Iron was low, so I'm now taking iron supplements in addition to my myriad of other pills.
Took the one hour glucose screen (drink syrupy orange liquid and get blood drawn an hour later) to test for gestational diabetes. Results should be back tomorrow. Cross your fingers I pass so I don't have to do the 3 hour test!
Apple's heart rate was at 140 and Banana's was at 150. This is about 10 bpm higher than the last couple of appointments for each of them, but can be attributed to the sugar from the glucose screen drink.
Doc listened to my heart and lungs and everything sounded good. She said we'll just keep an eye on the shortness of breath and to let them know if anything changes.
Weight is up about 25 pounds so far, which I'm happy with.

Other than that, just recovering from a busy weekend. Sorry so quiet on everyone's blogs. Didn't have much time to read this weekend and now I'm just wiped out.

Pregnancy Dreams

2008-10-02T20:02:00.003-06:00

I looked down at my belly and saw the outline of a tiny foot. It slowly pushed harder, stretched the skin and then popped through. I smacked my hands against it and tried to push it back in while a tiny head started to stretch out of the other side of my belly. I panicked as the head popped through the skin. It's too soon. And then I woke up.

The Smell of Memory (and 24w2d)

2008-09-28T10:17:00.007-06:00

You know how smell is so strongly linked to memory? A single whiff of a certain smell can bring back a day 10 years ago with such clarity you feel like you're there. I had one of those moments this morning. Although the memory isn't from nearly that long ago and it isn't one specific memory, but rather an entire section of time in my life.

I woke up this morning fresh from a dream of spotting. In my dream, I was spotting pink and waiting for a call back from the OB. I was worried, close to panic. I was also supposed to go perform a floor routine in a gymnastics meet and my old coach was annoyed with me for delaying. I could see the red starting to creep up his neck. I was trying to explain to him how NOT RIGHT spotting is at 24 weeks into a pregnancy. In the (no) logic of dreams, it didn't seem to matter that I was going to tumble while 24 weeks pregnant. Go figure.

When I woke up, I ran (okay, waddled) to the bathroom and was relieved to find NO spotting whatsoever. I went back to sleep for a couple of minutes and B woke me up with donuts and juice in bed. Do I have the best husband or what? This completely rid my mind of the lingering disturbance of my dream. I ate, showered and got dressed in the slow, clumsy fashion that is my reality these days.

As I put my watch and rings on, I casually grabbed a bottle of scented lotion on the dresser and rubbed the lotion on my hands. And immediately, it felt like I should be doing a shot of Me.nopur, or feeling the stick of a PIO shot. I guess I haven't opened that lotion in at least 4 or 5 months. The smell immediately brought back the FEELING and EMOTION of dealing with all of the shots and disappointments of the past 2.5 years. I looked down at my ever-expanding waistline and my brain tried to meld my realities together. The reality of the past pain and disappointment, the reality of my current fear and excitement, and the reality of these two lives that we are already so attached to and how close they are to joining our family. There must have been a crack in the space-time continuum (yes, I'm a child of the 80's).

Do you ever have a smell or an object bring a rush of memory to the surface? Does that memory linger with you or are you able to brush it off?

I think I'm going to go wash my hands.

*****************************************

Week 24 belly shots below. Sorry for the belly bra, but once it is on for the day, it doesn't come off until the evening.

Latest Glamour Shots

2008-09-24T15:27:00.003-06:00

Here are the latest pix of Apple and Banana. The one of Banana came out great, but they had trouble getting a good shot of Apple's face because she was facing my back and her brother's butt was in the way. At one point we did see one of the babies rubbing their eyes. B thought it was Apple, but I thought it was Banana. Either way, it was really cute!

24 Week Update

2008-09-22T20:56:00.005-06:00

Doctor's appointment today went well. The following info will probably be really boring for a lot of you, but I want to continue to document the details for myself.

Apple (girl) now weighs 1 pound 4 ounces and is measuring around 23w1d. She is still head down and was pretty calm again today, her heart rate at 130. We were told this is typical of Baby A because they are lower and have less room to move around.
Banana (boy) now weighs 1 pound 3 ounces and is measuring around 23w3d. At the beginning of the scan, he was also head down, but by the end had flipped all the way around and was breach, with his butt bumping up against Apple's face again. He was squirmy and really active again, his heart rate at 148. I suspect that is one of his body parts bumping up against my sternum tonight making it difficult to breathe.
Since I'm at 23w4d today, they are happy with where both babies are measuring which is on track even for singletons.
Both placentas still look good and both babies have normal amounts of fluid.
My cervix is holding nice and long at 6.
My blood pressure is still low at 124/64.
My belly is measuring about 27.5 or 28cm now.
No sugar in my urine or any sign of infection.

I now go in to see the OB every 2 weeks, but continue on the every 4 week schedule for ultrasounds. At my next OB appointment in 2 weeks, they'll do the glucose screen (drink icky syrupy liquid and get blood drawn an hour later). If I pass the screen, I'm in the clear for gestational diabetes. If not, they'll have me do the big scary glucose tolerance test at the next appointment (fast, drink much more icky syrupy liquid and get blood drawn one, two and three hours later). If that comes back with bad results, it's off to the dietitian. Hopefully I'll pass the screen with flying colors and be able to mark that milestone off the list.

The OB we met with today mentioned that she prefers that all of her twin patients get epidurals even if attempting a vaginal delivery. Her reasoning was that if they end up having to do an emergency c-section (usually because baby B isn't cooperating), you are all ready for it and they shouldn't have to knock you out for the c-section. If I was on the fence at all (which I kind of was) about wanting to try natural versus getting an epidural, I think she may have just nudged me to one side and convinced me to get one.

The doc confirmed that I should get a flu shot (in case any of you were wondering). She also confirmed that taking Tyl.enol pm EVERY single night is not a problem. This is a good thing because it has really been helping. Even just taking half the normal adult dosage is working for me. I will also stay on the baby aspirin even through delivery as she said the dosage is too low to affect clotting, etc. during delivery.

So, the only real issue I seem to have now are the contractions/cramps I've been having. They aren't real contractions because they are fairly localized (not the entire abdomen) and sometimes just brought on by the babies moving around. But they are still disconcerting. Half the time it will be just on one side. I'll notice the muscle tightening and look down and my belly is all lopsided and rock hard on one side. Freaky. The doc did caution me that if I start noticing a pattern to them or if I notice more than 4 in an hour, to call them.

We also talked about the ECP (evil crotch pain) and back pain and she said if massage doesn't help, we can always try physical therapy. She also mentioned that I might want to start thinking about cutting back my hours at work soon. Given what is going on at work right now, I think I'll likely wait for a couple of weeks and see how I do. I think my first step would be to approach my boss about working from home in the afternoons (maybe after 2pm each day). We'll see.

So all is well on the baby front. We did get some more ultrasound pictures today, but I'm too exhausted to hook my laptop up to the scanner right now, so I'll try to scan and post them later in the week. Sorry to be a tease, but seriously, the scanner is like 10 feet away and my butt is PLANTED on the couch!

23w2d

2008-09-20T11:51:00.000-06:00

This was one long week. We had people from around the world in town for a week-long conference. Monday through Wednesday afternoon were spent in a hotel downtown sitting through presentation after presentation. Some of it was focused on soft skills, other pieces were technical. And because of my current work situation, instead of sitting through all of the presentations and just listening, I also had to present a couple myself (which I just found out about the week before). Others had months to prepare for their presentations and I found myself presenting topics that someone else had prepared the slides for. Not the ideal situation. It was also the first time I've spoken in front of that big of a crowd (70 people) and had to use a microphone. All in all, it went off swimmingly. During the first presentation, I must have been nervous because Apple and Banana were kicking up a storm. It was a little distracting!

We started each morning at 7:30am or 8:00am depending on the day. Monday night was a mandatory dinner. Tuesday night was a Rockies game (which I skipped). I was pretty sore all week and it was difficult to sit in those hotel conference chairs all day long. On Tuesday, they found me a "more comfortable" chair. It was more cushioned, but deep and the back leaned back pretty far. Not the most comfortable thing for a short person to sit in, but I didn't want to complain after they went to the trouble to find something more comfortable for me.

Wednesday afternoon around 3pm, we all headed up to Vail for the rest of the week. I drove myself so I would have total control over when I left Friday and wouldn't have to go back into town since I live on the West side of town. By the time I checked into the hotel Wednesday and got settled, I had about 20 minutes to rest before it was time for dinner. Dinner was just a 5 minute walk (for a normal person) in the village, but it took me about 15 minutes to get there and I was exhausted, huffing and puffing the whole way. I definitely noticed a difference with the change in altitude. Dinner didn't end until about 9:30pm and then I had to walk back to the hotel. The village is all cobblestone and, while it is beautiful, it is pedestrian only, so there was no option to drive or take a cab.

I slept horribly Wednesday night. While everyone else thought the beds were supremely comfortable, it felt like I was sleeping on concrete. I tossed and turned all night and woke up sore. Thursday was another day of presentations and break-out groups until around 3pm. At that point, we met to kick off the team building activity. It was a pseudo amazing race where teams had to complete different challenges around town. I knew I wouldn't be up to running around Vail with a team, so I settled for sitting at one of the stations and watching all of the teams come through. Unfortunately, as soon as I got in the car with the coordinators, my boss called and asked if I could join a conference call. So they dropped me back off at the hotel and I spent the rest of the afternoon in my boss's room on conference calls. Dinner was another lengthy affair that lasted until 9:30pm.

I didn't sleep well again and by yesterday morning, I was ready for the week to be over. We had one more presentation from 8 to 9am and then it was back to my boss's room for another conference call. I was excused from the call 10 minutes early so that I could go get my massage. In the meantime I accidentally locked myself out of my room and had to lug all of my work stuff down to the spa with me. My massage was at 11am and I had to be on another call at 1pm. The massage itself was nice. They had one of those cool pregnancy cushion contraptions with pieces that move around to accommodate lying on your back, side or stomach (with cut outs for the belly and boobs). The cushion was really comfortable. But of course, it was hard to relax and calm my brain down in between phone calls and a hectic day.

Without all of the actual work going on, the idea was that you get your massage and then go eat a leisurely lunch with others in Vail and hang out for a couple of hours enjoying the scenery before heading home. No such luck for me. I didn't want to sit at the hotel for the 1pm call because I didn't know how long it would last and I knew I would have work to do after the call. So after my massage, I rushed to pack up, check out and was on the road by 12:30pm. The call lasted until 2:30pm, 15 minutes past when I got home. I then spent the rest of the day working from home and finally stopped around 5pm.

I slept pretty good last night back in my own bed with the proper configuration of pillows and our 4-inch memory foam pad. I really missed my bed. Today we are trying to make final paint decisions for the dining room, master bedroom, and the niche in the family room. I'm expecting a call from the painter this week to let us know he's ready to start. We also have a vet appointment for Scout today (just normal routine exam and shots). I haven't seen our vet since I got pregnant, so I'm going to go with B today when he takes Scout in. We absolutely love our vet and she's gonna freak when she sees me!

For your viewing pleasure, below are this weeks belly shots in addition to a shot of the stroller and car seats that B put together last weekend. Enjoy.

Bad Blogger

2008-09-16T20:44:00.002-06:00

More like bad blog reader and commenter. I hope to catch up this weekend. Left the house at 7am yesterday and got home at 9pm. Today, I left at 6:45am and was home in time for dinner, but all I could do was lie on the couch. And I need to pack still. Heading up to Vail tomorrow through Friday and I won't even have a computer with me. Hope you are all having a decent week!

Are You Ready for Some Football?

2008-09-14T11:13:00.005-06:00

Football season is now officially in full swing. It is cloudy and cool here today, which makes it feel even more like football season. And B is making chile for dinner. Nothing like curling up on the couch in sweats with no make-up for the day. The only draw back is that I'm uncomfortable in my own skin! Can't sit in one position for longer than 10 minutes to save my life. Oh well. My little occupants are just as squirmy this morning!

We went to dinner last night at this place. It was my first time there after hearing people just rave about the place. Everything we had was really good, but I didn't eat much of my entree. I must have filled up on the bread, appetizers and gazpacho. I'm not usually one for cold soup, but the gazpacho was really tasty.

Did anyone watch SN.L last night? Tin.a Fe.y was hilarious as SP! It is such a perfect fit. I wonder if she has been automatically imitating her since Mc.Cain's announcement? Or if she just had to study her mannerisms this week. Either way, it was great! Even the accent. Is it just me, or does SP sound a bit like she's from Minnesota?

One more week until the next ultrasound. I have this irrational (at least I hope it's irrational) fear that I'm only feeling one move and the other one is in trouble. Why do these thoughts keep creeping into my head? I keep trying to push them away as soon as they pop up, but the thoughts still come back. I wish I had better control of my own brain.

Oh yeah, and my pre.natal crad.le came on Thursday last week. I L.O.V.E. it. It has definitely helped with the soreness and I'm walking much better now. It does kind of look like a weird contraption, but it is mostly hidden under clothes (other than the straps at the top that tend to peek out of my shirts. There is one other version that is *more* supportive, but it looks like a jock strap was added on to the original. It might have helped more with the pelvic pain (or evil crotch pain, as Nancy calls it), but it just freaked me out.

Here is the latest belly shot as of yesterday, which was 22w2d. I've got the cradle on in the pictures and I was sportin my Illini orange yesterday. For some reason the shots are a little fuzzy when I use the timer on the camera and the lighting is funky. Oh well.

What's Next?

2008-09-10T20:33:00.002-06:00

Pelvic pain, I wanna quit you.

I feel bruised all the time from my tailbone to my pubic bone with the hips in between. Was I in a car accident that I don't remember? Depending on the chair I sit in, chairs can either be fine, or really, really uncomfortable. Standing up after sitting for awhile is painful. Walking is getting harder. I'm starting to feel a little ridiculous. Is it really supposed to be like this at 22 weeks? I remember reading in the multiples books that you should expect to stop working at 24 weeks and I thought that was ridiculous! Now, I get it. Unfortunately, I don't think I can do that.

The latest development is a work issue. My immediate boss quit this week and I've been asked to take on his responsibilities "in the interim." Meaning that they might look for outside talent to bring in above me unless I prove in the next month or so that I can handle the position. It is a great opportunity, but talk about bad timing. While I'm confident I can handle the job, it seems that I HAVE to be in the office to prove it. I hate writing here about work because I'm always worried someone will find my blog. Not that I ever say anything bad about it, but it just makes me nervous. But this is really a big issue for me now and I'm worried my body isn't going to hold out physically long enough for me to prove myself in this new position. I've already been in significantly more pain this week than I was last week.

I keep trying to tell myself that all the pelvic pain is a good sign. It means my body is doing what it is supposed to do with all the joints relaxing, right? But the purpose of this is to prepare for birth and I really don't need that to happen for quite awhile (please).

On top of all the changes at work, we have a week long global conference next week where all of the folks from our department around the world will be in town. Pretty much every second of the week is scheduled out for some type of meeting or discussion, so it's going to be exhausting. The only light at the end of the tunnel is that we go up to Vail Wednesday afternoon, stay in a nice resort for the rest of the meetings, and I will be getting another massage on Friday morning at the resort. Yay! I keep thinking about that massage and just hoping I don't collapse from exhaustion before then.

We did order a glider yesterday, so that is a big relief to have another big ticket item out of the way. We also had a meeting with our first pediatrician candidate tonight. We really liked him and he had all the right answers to my questions. We have one other practice picked out to meet with before we make our decision. The other one is really close to the house (5 minutes instead of 15), so if we like that one just as much, we'll probably go with the closer practice for the sake of convenience.

My twin nursing pillow came Monday and hopefully my pren.atal cr.adle will show up by Friday. I hope it fits because I really need to start using it now. Oh, and I had lunch with a woman at work who is a twin, and her twin sister had twins. The woman has a 3 year old herself and has used a nanny since her kid was born. Got some good information from her about nannies, being a working mom specifically at our company, and about raising twins. None of it was earth shattering, but just encouraging.

So we still have two major decisions to take care of. First, finding a doula. Second, deciding on the daycare versus nanny issue. I think I'll feel better after those things are decided.

Two more days until this work week is over. I have never appreciated weekends so much in my life!

21w3d

2008-09-07T16:55:00.003-06:00

I need to take a moment to apologize to my readers who are still in the throes of treatment, or adoption, or living childfree. I can't seem to help myself, but every single post these days is about this pregnancy. Surely there must be something else going on in this head of mine, right? Nope. Other than the election (which I won't discuss in this forum), all I think about these days are Apple and Banana and how to get through the next 15-19 weeks with some kind of semblance of grace.

I was talking to a friend of mine at lunch on Friday (hi C!) and we were talking about the anxiety and fear involved in a pregnancy where it was so difficult to get there or where you've suffered previous losses. I keep thinking that once I hit a certain milestone, I'll be able to relax and just enjoy going forward. But when I reach every one of those milestones, there are more milestones ahead to focus on and I just worry about the next thing.

My latest paranoia is about pre-term labor. I can't help but pause whenever I feel a painless contraction come on. It took me awhile to realize what that tightening was, but I'm convinced they are contractions. Normal contractions. As my doctor said, the uterus is a muscle and it is going to contract whether from activity, dehydration, or just doing nothing. The key is to notice whether there is a pattern, if you have more than 5 in an hour and if it is accompanied by lower back pain, etc. In the multiples book I read, it says starting at 20 weeks you should lay down for 1 hour a day and monitor for contractions. I finally decided to do this today and wouldn't you know, I didn't detect even one contraction for that hour. But, as soon as I got up to get a snack and started moving around a bit more, there it was. Not painful, but still noticeable.

So this will be my new obsession until my next OB appointment in two weeks. Thankfully, I start seeing the OB every two weeks after this appointment, so no more 4 week stretches of wondering if everything is okay. As I was lying in bed last night waiting for the Ty.lenol pm to kick in, I was thinking about how if I'm not careful, I will make myself crazy with anxiety over the next couple of months. Let's face it, the issues I'm having now with shortness of breath, fatigue, and pelvic pain are not going to go away. Most likely they will get worse.

Side note to my family: I don't want you to worry about me. If there were really a reason to worry, you would know. This is just my place to vent my fears and anxieties and I don't want to deprive myself of that freedom because I worry that you will worry.

I was talking to our neighbor that lives behind us today after not having seen her in a long time. I had forgotten that she is a nurse and she told me today that she is a lactation specialist and teaches breastfeeding classes. She offered herself up anytime I have questions. It is really nice to know that there is someone right there if I run into any issues, breastfeeding or otherwise. Yes, I know there are other resources for this, but how convenient to have a nurse living right behind us! And she was really excited to hear we're expecting twins since she is a twin herself (and her twin sister happens to share my name).

Today we picked up the converter rails and toddler guard rails for the cribs as they had finally arrived at the store. We purchased car seats and the s.nap n go stroller. And I ordered a pr.enatal cr.adle online. It is a support belt for pregnant bellies that has straps that go over the shoulders. I had no idea what size to order, so I hope it fits. And the twin nursing pillow I ordered should be here this week. So things are moving along on the gear front.

Here are my 21w3d belly shots for your viewing pleasure. The belly is starting to take up more room in the picture!

In Which I Complain Some More

2008-09-06T17:26:00.005-06:00

Just when I think I'm getting used to my new reality, something new pops up. Yesterday the pelvic pain started. I have nothing to compare it to. It is connected to my hips, but now the pain is around my whole pelvis. The tyl.enol pm is helping me sleep, but I'm starting to move slower now because of this new development. Getting in and out of the car is more difficult. Stairs are more difficult. Getting my legs in and out of pants is more difficult.

I bought a couple of new maternity pants for work last weekend, but of course they need to be shortened (even the short length is too long). I took them to get altered today which meant having to put each pair on to get the pinned. It seemed like it took forever. The other frustrating thing is that I swear they are starting to feel tight already. I bought them A WEEK AGO for fuck's sake. I/the babies must have had a growth spurt this week. That explains the new pain and tight clothes. I seriously don't have the energy to keep buying new clothes every other week. This is ridiculous.

On the plus side, I think we've decided on a glider. No stores around us have this particular one in stock, but they have similar ones from the same brand and they seem comfortable and not too deep (important to short girls who want to be able to reach the floor). It seems like it should be wide enough to cuddle with two babies and has all the bells and whistles I want (swivel, glider, recliner, gliding ottoman with nursing foot rest). So we need to order it. It is pricey, but if it lasts as long as it's supposed to, it will be worth it.

I also ordered a twin nursing pillow this week, but it hasn't come yet. Hopefully I'll get a lot of use out of it.

I can feel Apple and Banana moving each and every day now. They tend to move around more right after I eat. Sometimes I giggle when I feel them moving because it is just so strange! I love it! I'm guessing this will be the one thing I miss about being pregnant after they're born.

That's all for now. New belly pic tomorrow if I can get my pelvis off the couch.

*Edited to Add:*

Just found this link talking about pelvic pain in pregnancy. This does a much better job of describing it:

"The symptoms of SPD vary from person to person, but almost all women who have it experience substantial pubic pain. Tenderness and pain down low in the front is common, but often this pain feels as if it's inside. The pubic area is generally very tender to the touch; many moms find it painful when the doctor or midwife pushes down on the pubic bone while measuring the uterus (fundal height).

Any activity that involves lifting one leg at a time or parting the legs tends to be particularly painful. Lifting the leg to put on clothes, getting out of a car, bending over, sitting down or getting up, walking up stairs, standing on one leg, lifting heavy objects, and walking in general tend to be difficult at times. Many women report that moving or turning over in bed is especially excruciating."

Sweet Druggy Dreams

2008-09-04T21:16:00.002-06:00

Is this shitty week almost over? Turns out I feel like crap when I don't sleep (like my all-nighters in public accounting didn't teach me that lesson years ago). Ty.lenol PM might just be my new best friend.

20w4d

2008-09-01T16:04:00.005-06:00

Latest belly shots below. We've had a busy weekend, although it wasn't all that productive.

On Friday, we opened the front door to 4 matching packages! They were 4, yes 4, of the bouncy chairs we had on our registry. We registered for 2 of them and both my brother and SIL, and B's sisters ordered 2 on the same day! We decided to keep two and take two back for store credit. If Apple and Banana like the chairs, we thought we'd go back after they're born and buy two more so that we have two upstairs and two downstairs. My brother and SIL also gave us a swing to use. The baby gear is slowly starting to appear in the house!

Friday night we had two fantasy football drafts going on at the same time (one with family, one with friends). It was a little crazy with 8 guys sitting at the dining room table dealing with their draft and B running back and forth between the dining room and the kitchen where I was sitting with the other computer to consult on picks for the family draft. But we managed. And we were pleasantly surprised with our wireless high speed internet capabilities since we had 8 computers hooked up at once. We've never had more than 3 in the house at a time and so didn't really know if it could handle a lot more.

Saturday was my mommy-to-be pampering day. I got a haircut and a prenatal massage and it was pure bliss. I feel much freer now with most of my hair chopped off and the massage was great. She started me on one side, with towels propped under my belly for support and a foam block to rest the top leg on. She worked on my back, neck, shoulders, hips and then I flipped over to the other side for more of the same. Then she had me on my back (with a towel under one hip) and worked on my feet and legs. She kind of grabbed each leg and moved it around the loosen up the hip joint. Then she moved on to the hands and arms and finally to the neck and scalp. Ahhh. Wish I could do that every weekend.

On Sunday, we tried to shop for gliders again, but all three stores we tried were either closed for the day, for the holiday, or for good. Looks like we have to wait until next weekend. Sunday night we met some friends for a gluttonous 3-hour fondue meal. I'm still drooling and thinking about the dessert course...

On Thursday, I hit 20 weeks, the half way mark for a full term singleton pregnancy. Given that twins usually come early (I think I read average is 36 weeks), I'm more than halfway there. Yippee!

I continue to feel more and more like time is slipping through my fingers and I can't seem to get much done. We did get an estimate from a painter last week to paint the nursery, our bedroom, and the dining room, which we've been meaning to do for awhile. Now we have a couple of weeks to finalize our paint choices before he starts. We are definitely going with solid walls for the nursery, but not sure if we've decided which colors on which walls and what to do with the ceiling. I'm still leaning towards the green on opposing walls, yellow on opposing walls, and blue on the ceiling, but I'm having trouble picturing it. I'm actually really looking forward to getting our bedroom painted. It has a tray ceiling and some architectural details that a good paint job could really show off. The room has felt unfinished to me since we moved in and I'm anxious to see if my vision looks as good in person as it does in my head.

If I end up delivering at 36 weeks, that puts us at mid-December (3 1/2 months from now). Doesn't seem like much time to get all of our to-do list done. I'm definitely starting to tire more easily. One trip out for the day and I really slow down. It doesn't help that I haven't been sleeping well. I still wake up about every two hours from a throbbing hip and the extra strength tyl.enol doesn't seem to do much. I gave in and took bena.dryl last night. Usually if I need a little allergy help or some extra help sleeping, I'll take a half because a full one just knocks me out. I took a full one before bed last night and it definitely still drugged me up, but I managed to still wake up, notice a throbbing hip, and roll over to the other side every couple of hours. I think I was able to fall back asleep faster though, so it did help a little. I just can't take it every night because it makes me SO groggy in the morning.

On the plus side, I'm feeling Apple and/or Banana move on a daily basis now. Usually if I sit down in a reclining position, one or both of them will start squirming around. I can't tell the difference between them yet and because Banana was so active at our last scan, I keep assuming it's him moving around. But I'm sure it is both of them. It is really weird when it happens when I'm around other people because I get so distracted and can't focus on anything else but what's going on in there. I try to picture what they are doing. Was that a foot? An elbow? A stretch? It is so incredibly cool, but I completely lose track of what is going on around me!

Even with all of this going on, I am still surprised when I see myself in the mirror. My god, I'm PREGNANT! It still seems weird to me and I'm not sure it will ever seem natural. Does it look like there's a basketball in my belly?

Mid-Week Rambling Update

2008-08-27T18:16:00.004-06:00

Tomorrow is my last day working from home. It has been a quiet, but productive week so far. I'm finding that I can get a lot done in a shorter period of time because I don't have the constant interruptions of people stopping by my office. The best part has been not having to commute and not having to get ready to go to work. My drive really isn't all that bad as far as commutes go, but it has been nice to not have to deal with the stress of traffic. I know it sounds weird, but the movement of turning, hitting bumps, and accelerating or stopping in the car is uncomfortable for me. My abdomen is just sore in general and after sitting in my office chair all day, driving home just sucks. And even though my drive is only 30 minutes each way (if I leave at the right times), that is an extra hour I've been able to make use of while at home this week.

Plus, the weather has been so nice here this week that I've been able to work outside on the deck for chunks of time (before I get too hot). I love our wireless internet. I do miss the social interaction I get at work. It isn't the same communicating only through email and phone calls. And it is weird being in the house all day (other than my daily excursion to the mailbox).

Our office closes a bit early on Friday for the holiday weekend and then we have a bunch of B's friends coming over for their fantasy football draft. It happens to coincide with my family fantasy football draft, so it might be a bit crazy here Friday night. And I might be screaming at the computer given that I'm LAST in the draft order two years in a row. Oh, the injustice!

I'm really looking forward to Saturday and my haircut and massage. I'm actually proud of myself for not just taking the kitchen shears and cutting of my hair myself. It has been bugging me that much.

Since my appointment on Monday, I've been trying to cut down on sugar intake. I think it made me a little paranoid that there was sugar in my urine because I thought GD wasn't supposed to happen until later in pregnancy. But maybe like everything else, it can happen sooner with two babies in there. Once I started thinking about it, I realized I was eating and drinking A LOT of sugar. Not that it has all been bad sugar, but sugar nonetheless. I've been eating a TON of fruit this summer and drinking a lot of fruit juice. I'm always so thirsty that anytime I need to eat something I want it to be something juicy to quench my thirst. Plus the ice cream or milkshakes almost every single night probably didn't help. Sugar cereal too. Maybe I went a little nuts once I was able to finally eat (oops). I need to relax about it though because they won't be checking my urine again for 4 weeks.

I'm pretty sure I'm feeling Apple and Banana move now, but it is sporadic and doesn't seem to have any sort of pattern to it. There have been a couple of times where I would feel something and put my hand on my belly and I could swear I was feeling it for the outside too. So of course I would yell at B to come feel and then it would stop or he couldn't feel it. I think that part is just wishful thinking.

So Far, So Good

2008-08-25T19:02:00.000-06:00

Today's appointment went really well. Smooth sailing, so far! Here are the details along with some pictures below.

The ultrasound tech is now 100% sure that Apple is a girl and Banana is a boy. She said she's never been wrong once predicting past 18 weeks and she promised to repaint our nursery if she is wrong (not that we'll need it with our gender neutral selections).
Apple now weighs 10 ounces (which is double from 4 weeks ago). She is measuring pretty much right on target at 19w3d (I'm 19w4d today). Her heart rate was 134 today. She was pretty mellow and just hanging out.
Banana weighs about 11 ounces (more than double from 4 weeks ago). He is measuring a little bit ahead at 19w6d. His heart rate was 153, which wasn't surprising since he was wiggling all over the place for the entire hour.
They counted 10 fingers and 10 toes on each baby. Banana appeared to flip us the bird again at one point, but we didn't get any pictures of it this time. The tech said he's going to be in time out from the minute he's born, the trouble maker.
They counted all 4 chambers of the heart of each baby and looked at the location of the two major vessels going into (or out of?) the hearts to ensure they are perpendicular and not parallel (which apparently is a bad thing).
They looked for fluid again in the stomachs and bladders to be sure both babies are swallowing amniotic fluid and it is going through the whole digestive tract.
They looked at all the facial structures (lips, nostrils, eye sockets) and at both brains.
They looked at both cords again to ensure they each have 3 vessels and checked out the placentas and cord placement again.
Apple is currently head down, which means if she stays that way we could still have a shot of a vaginal delivery. The ultrasound tech said Banana is head up (breach) although the doc referred to him as transverse (sideways).
Basically, they looked at everything they saw last time and didn't see anything to be concerned about. From here on it, they will really just be measuring growth as all the organs and major structures appear to be intact and normal.

Now for my info:

The one fibroid I have that is of note is well out of the way, so still shouldn't be an issue.
There was sugar in my urine this morning. Nothing to be alarmed about, but if they see it again next time (4 weeks from now), I'll need to be tested for gestational diabetes ("GD"). Boo! I'm really hoping to avoid this (please don't take away my sugar!). Apparently my morning routine of a big glass of orange juice may not be the best idea anymore.
My blood pressure is still great at 118/66.
My cervix is still looking good and long, but it is not as long as it was 4 weeks ago. Last time it was 6.5 and today it was around 5 or so (didn't get the exact measurement). They like it to be at least 3, so it is still well within normal range. It is normal for the cervix to shorten as the babies grow, so they'll just keep an eye on it at each appointment. A short cervix is one complication that can lead to bed rest, but so far, so good.
My belly is measuring 26.5 weeks! That means I am as big as a singleton mom would normally be at 26.5 weeks.
I gained 8 pounds since the last appointment. At least I'm consistent. I've gained an average of 2 pounds per week for the past 8 weeks. The doctor was happy with my weight gain.
If any of my male relatives or friends are reading, feel free to skip this bullet. I finally gave in and went bra shopping yesterday. I have gone from a 34 C to a lovely 38 C. Why is it that my rib cage has gotten huge, but my boobs themselves don't appear to be much bigger? No fair.

I am (almost) officially half way done with this pregnancy. And if you consider full term for twins at 38 weeks (I've heard anywhere from 36 to 38 weeks), I'm over half way there!

To answer some questions I've been getting, the furniture is from BRU. It is made by Ba.bi Ital.ia and is from the Pine.hurst collection (espresso stain). Very sturdy pieces. I can't wait to get the rest of the room done!

Yes, we have been thinking about names, but we aren't 100% decided yet. We are close, but we won't be telling ANYONE until it is too late for anyone to argue (when the names are on birth certificates).

I think our clinic usually waits until 22 weeks to do the big anatomy scan with a singleton because insurance usually only covers one ultrasound (unless there is a medical reason to do more) and if they do it earlier, they may not be able to see everything they want to see. Since we are having twins, we have ultrasounds every 4 weeks, so if they can't see something during a particular scan, there is another shot in 4 weeks. One thing insurance actually seems to do right is to cover more ultrasounds for multiples. Lucky for us.

Regarding the convention, I did start noticing more traffic during my commute last week, but it is difficult to tell if it relates to convention traffic or because most schools are now back in session. I did see a ton of cop cars on my drive home Friday and on the way to my appointment this morning (even though we are 30 minutes outside of downtown). I heard from coworkers who did go in today that it was quiet around our building (which is at the east end of downtown), but the 16th street mall (pedestrian mall downtown with lots of restaurants and shops) was completely packed. The fire alarm went off in our building at 6:30am this morning and those who were there had to walk down 35 stories of stairs. Even if I had gone in today, I doubt I would have made it there by 6:30am, but still. I'm GLAD I didn't have to deal with that.

Okay, so here are some pictures from today (yes, Aunt Debbie, Apple is waving to you in the first one). In the 3D pictures of Apple, you can see her cord going across her face. The tech said that they often play with their cords and put them in their mouths, but those suckers are really strong. The last picture is a little hard to see, but it shows Banana's butt right next to Apple's face. The tech had a bit of trouble getting good shots of Apple's face because Banana's butt kept getting in the way!

19w3d

2008-08-24T18:18:00.004-06:00

Tomorrow I will be 19w4d and will have the big, scary anatomy scan. This is the big ultrasound where they take a bunch of measurements and try to identify any obvious problems with Apple and Banana. Although I have no reason to believe anything is wrong, it is still hard to not worry. B has to work, so my mom will be tagging along. Because there are two babies to measure, etc., the ultrasound is scheduled for 90 minutes with the doctor appointment following. I hope I can manage lying on that table for 90 minutes! The last ultrasound took about an hour. I wasn't at all uncomfortable at the time because I was so fixated on watching the screen. But I was definitely stiff getting up.

No major developments lately. Here's the bullet point list of the minor developments:

I continue to get bigger and more sore (duh). It is getting harder to move around and sleeping for more than 2 hours at a time has become almost impossible. I have tried so many different pillows and pads to sleep with/on that we might just go broke before Apple and Banana actually arrive. I've started to notice more strain on my hips, back and neck.
I scheduled my first prenatal massage for next weekend to try to alleviate this and I can't wait!
I'm starting to notice that I tire more quickly these days. Shopping for maternity clothes is the most exhausting thing in the world. Unfortunately it seems like every time I think I'm set for awhile, a week goes by and things are already starting to feel snug.
My appetite has gotten better although my tastes are still not what they were. It is frustrating to not want my favorite foods and to not really want anything in general, but know that I have to eat something. Let's just say I've had a lot of milkshakes and ice cream the last couple of weeks.
My belly button is now a shallow dent in my belly. It is only a matter of time...
It is getting harder to shave my legs. Is it winter yet?
My hair has gotten too long and is driving me crazy, so it's getting chopped off next weekend. (don't worry, it won't be anything too drastic)
B continues to take care of me, the dogs, and the house like a champ doing all of the laundry and grocery shopping among other things.
We continue to work on our registries. It is pretty overwhelming.
The cribs and dressers were delivered this weekend and B already put everything together. Pictures are below. They look black in some of the pictures, but it is a dark brown (espresso) stain on the wood. All of the pieces seem very sturdy and well made and the cribs convert to a toddler bed and then a full size bed (the front and back of the crib become the headboard and footboard) with converter rails. The converter rails still haven't come in yet.
We've been shopping for gliders/rockers/recliners to put in the nursery, but apparently I'm really picky. I want something wide enough with wide enough arms that I might be able to nurse/feed both babies at the same time sitting in it. But I also need to be able to reach the floor to glide/rock the chair without having to slouch down in the chair (common problem for us short folks). So far the only chair that seems to be perfect is a La.z.bo.y and, of course, it is the UGLIEST thing in the world. Why does comfort=ugly?
We are still undecided on the nursery paint. I know the stripes are a lot, so I doubt we will go that route, but it was fun to play with. I do want to somehow use all three colors, but B doesn't seem too excited about doing the two green walls, two yellow and blue ceiling.
Because of the D.N.C. in town this week, I'm working from home. We were encouraged to do so and I thought it would be a good opportunity to practice for bed rest should it become necessary to prove to my boss that I can make it work. I hope I can manage to be productive instead of getting distracted!
Although we seem to be busy every weekend getting ready for these babies, the to-do list just seems to grow. Sigh.

Here are some pictures for this week for your viewing pleasure.

Fun with Colors

2008-08-22T19:10:00.007-06:00

Now that the paint samples have dried on the nursery walls, I feel like it's mocking me to make a decision already. B.ehr has this program on their website where you can upload photos of a room and "paint" the walls using the actual paint colors they offer. I was playing around with it and tried a couple of different ideas.

Option #1 has blue and green stripes with a yellow ceiling. Option #2 has yellow and green stripes with a blue ceiling. Option #3 is just green on two opposing walls (the window wall and door wall) and yellow on the other two opposing walls (the big blank wall that will have the cribs against it and the closet wall that also has the archway leading to the bathroom). Please tell me if you like any of these options. I'm still trying to decide if the stripes or using all three colors is too much.

I've also attached a picture of the pattern we think we've settle on for the nursery decor/crib bedding for your reference. It is a pretty busy pattern, but most of the crib bedding will actually be solid colors. The pattern will just be on accent pieces. Oh, and we don't plan on painting the bathroom, so the bright colors will stop at the archway.

Bring on the opinions, please!

Quack, Quack

2008-08-21T19:46:00.000-06:00

I think I'm starting to waddle.

18w3d

2008-08-17T16:50:00.009-06:00

One more week until the next OB appointment and ultrasound. Four weeks really tends to crawl these days. Being able to listen to Apply and Banana's little heartbeats at home definitely helps, but it isn't the same as seeing them.

Yesterday I went to a lovely brunch at Meg's house with some of the other ColoBloggers. It was good to see everyone as it has been awhile and we've had a few BFP's since the last time we got together. Afterwards, I picked up B and we went to pick out some possible paint colors for the nursery (more on that below). Then B and I went out to dinner with a friend.

Today we had brunch at my grandma's place. This is the first time I've seen her since I started showing, so that was fun. We showed her the latest ultrasound pictures (from 3 weeks ago), the ultrasound dvd and I even brought the doppler along so she could hear the heartbeats. I think she was pretty impressed with how far along technology has come. After brunch, we stopped to pick up a memory foam pad for the bed. My hips have started to hurt pretty bad at night, so I'm hoping a little extra padding will help. Putting the 3 inch pad on top of our plush, pillow top mattress has made it nearly impossible for me to get into our bed. It is ridiculously high off the floor now, so this ought to be interesting. I hope it helps.

Here's my 18w3d belly picture.

Here are some pictures of the nursery and some colors we are considering. The room is connected to the other spare bedroom upstairs through a jack and jill bathroom. We picked out the counters and back splash in the bathroom with kids in mind hoping that one day our kids would stand on stools to reach the sink to brush their teeth. We picked bright colors thinking it would be appropriate from early childhood all the way through the teen years until they leave the house (this is the bathroom that I used to take all of my shots for unsuccessful FET #2) So along those lines, we were thinking bright colors for the nursery as well. These pictures show the nursery as the mostly clean slate it still is right now. B just painted a couple of squares with the samples we picked out on Saturday to see how they would look on the wall. I love the yellow and the green, but I'm still undecided about the blue.

I know for some, it might seem like it is a bit early to be working on the nursery. And I've had multiple people tell me how much further along I am with things than they are or were at this point. But we're having twins and to be honest, I'm just not sure how long my body will hold up this well. I want to get as much done as early as possible while I still have a little bit of energy left.

Word of the Week-Quickening

2008-08-14T18:37:00.003-06:00

The word of the week appears to be "quickening." For those of you not familiar, quickening refers to the initial movement of the fetus in the uterus as it is felt by the pregnant woman. I have been asked multiple times recently, by those IRL and online, whether I've been feeling movement yet. My decisive answer to this question is "most definitely, maybe, possibly, I'm not sure." I feel little twinges, pulls, twitches, and gurgles all the time, but I never know for sure (yet) whether they are Apple and Banana squirming around or just tendons and muscles stretching or things going on in my digestive system.

I've read conflicting reports about whether carrying twins results in feeling movement earlier, but I've decided to stop reading because it is what it is. I'll feel it when I feel it.

But still, I can't wait for the day when I feel something and know with absolutely certainty that I have experienced the coveted quickening!

Random Bullets

2008-08-12T21:13:00.002-06:00

Why do I have to watch 5 continuous hours of the olympics to see a full gymnastics meet? Can't they show it all at once?
Forgot to mention I've been completely off Zo.fran since August 1st and doing pretty good without it. Yay!
Got a recommendation for a good pediatrician this week (thanks KA!) and set up a prospective new patient interview.
The weirdest pregnancy symptom I have is the increase in blood volume and how hard my heart is working to move all that blood. It feels like my heart is racing all the time. You know that feeling you get when you get really nervous and your heart feels like it's in your throat and you can feel every single heartbeat? At first it only happened when I would lay down. Now it happens at random times when I'm sitting, standing or walking and quite frequently. Kinda freaks me out. I keep thinking, "why am I nervous right now," but it has nothing to do with nerves.
Singing in the car at the top of my lungs (by myself of course) loses some of its appeal when I become short of breath so easily. My car must be happy.
I am so glad it is no longer 100 degrees every day. Ahhhhh.
The D.NC is in two weeks and our office is still claiming it will be "business as usual."
Later this year, my work is implementing some new policies including the possibility of working 9/80's (work 8 9-hour days, 1 8-hour day, and take every other Friday off). I might try to work this as every other Monday off instead. Sounds blissful!
There must be some schools back in session this week because my morning commute has just sucked lately. My commute Monday morning was almost 2 hours because of an accident that shut down the highway (it is normally 30 minutes).