Hyperfertile Infertile

The end

2010-11-01T17:26:00.000-07:00

Now that the babies are home with us, it's time for this blog to come to an end. I've been neglecting my family blog (http://homesteadingandthecity.blogspot.com/) in order to try to keep up with this one, but it's time to switch over to that blog exclusively.

Rather than write out some long, dramatic post to end this blog, I'll just end it simply, with a couple of pictures of our newest additions.

Sophia

Lydia

Home!

2010-10-27T18:58:00.000-07:00

Both of the girls came home yesterday! We went into the hospital feeling a bit nervous that something would have changed and someone would've changed their mind, but when we got there a nurse was in their room working on various items for discharge. It was such a relief to know that they were basically home at that point! We hung out for a bit to do their next feeding there and so that I could pump, but then we loaded them up (and all of their stuff!) and came home.

It was funny when we got home because both of them were asleep in their carseats. I had to pump again, so I sat there staring at them and almost felt like I didn't know what to do. Somehow, it's like I was stuck in NICU mode and wasn't sure what to do with them! But, they soon were ready to eat and we were off in the newborn cycle of changing diapers, feeding, pumping and it all came back to me.

I think that these are my first babies who actually slept in their crib at night in between feedings at this age (even once!), but even so by the time you feed and change them and I pump and fall asleep, there is only about 1-1.5 hours left before the next feed. Last night, I made the big mistake of not even trying to go to sleep until after the 11 pm feed, which meant that my only possible sleep was from about midnight until 6 am when Alice and Charlotte get up. This resulted in my sleeping for a sum total of 2.5 hours. I let Robert sleep in the morning for a couple of hours with the plan that we'd then trade off so I could get some sleep, but I got caught up in the feeding/pumping/time with A&C cycle and didn't end up getting a nap at all until 4 pm (and only for just under an hour). Tonight, I'm going to go to bed after the 8 pm feeding and I'm going to try harder to get a nap tomorrow, too. I can't function on 2 hours of sleep for very long!

We tried to keep things light and loud during the day, but the babies pretty much slept all day anyway. Still, they pretty much sleep all the time so it probably isn't a big deal. Hopefully, they let us get a little sleep tonight. I'm really feeling the whole c-section recovery thing today and have been having some issues that I'm not sure whether are related to lack of sleep or just a coincidence. But, it will be what it will be. So far, it's been really peaceful and easy enough. I mean, there are two adults here full-time (Robert and I both have 3 months of parental leave from work), plus our nanny during the work day to help with the other kids. There are plenty of people to care for these two little loves! I just need to figure out a good approach to pumping and feeding to get myself a bit more sleep until they start to space out their feedings more at night.

In other news, the XS Fuzzi Bunz we bought are way too wide around the legs so we're stuck using sposies for now. It's weird because A&C wore this same brand at about 5 lbs, but I think that they redesigned the sizes since then and it looks like they got a lot wider through the legs. Hopefully, they can start wearing them soon! Luckily, the hospital sent us home with a small pack of diapers or we literally wouldn't have had anything here that fit!

Pumping is still going pretty well. It looks like I will hit about 900 ccs today (a little over 30 ounces), and it's still continung to increase, albeit more slowly now. I am starting to build up a nice little freezer stash, too. I think that there are about 10 bags in the freezer already! It's still extremely painful, so I'm really looking forward to my body getting used to it. Because, well, ow. We have the babies' first pedi appointment tomorrow and I'm especially looking forward to the weigh in. As soon as we left the hospital, we stopped fortifying their EBM with formula. They also immediately went from taking 35-40 ccs every 3 hours to taking 45-60 ccs every 3 hours, so it seems like they are regulating their own intake. Hopefully, they are gaining weight well! A&C did just fine on EBM without the supplementing so I assume that these girls will as well.

I haven't had a chance to take many pictures yet, but here's one cute one of them tucked into bed together last night.

Oh, and the obligatory going home shot!

Day 11

2010-10-25T23:44:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow is the big day! Our babies are coming home! Well, assuming that there are no issues in the meantime, that is. But, they have been doing great for days now, so hopefully all goes well tonight and we can take them home tomorrow morning! (I'm afraid to jinx it by even writing this... eek!)

At any rate, they have been taking full feeds by bottle since 8 am Saturday morning. They have been gaining steadily, and Lydia is now up to 4 lbs 9 oz and Sophia (my little piggy!) is now up to 4 lbs 8 oz! No issues, events, or anything to be concerned about. In fact, I'm honestly not even sure why they are still there today other than that they needed to do all of the testing, consents, various visits and such prior to discharge so we did all of that today. They are ready to come home and we are so excited!

I'm incredibly excited to begin our real lives with these little loves. Of course, we are their parents now, but so much is dictated to us in the NICU. My babies are given iron because "preemies need iron," even though they aren't anemic. They add Neosure to their breastmilk because "it will help them gain weight faster." And so on. Very little is left up to us, really. Even little things like when to feed, pouring bottles, and so on. We spend a lot of time there, and do a lot of the care, but we are told what to do and when. Finally, tomorrow, we will be able to make actual decisions and really be parents to these little girls. I just can't wait.

My heart is so full tonight.

Oh, and about the pumping. I won't even go into the agony that is pumping lately, but I'm hanging in there and getting into a routine with it. Still pumping 10 times per day, and trying to hit every 2 hours during the day and every 2-3 hours at night. My supply is still increasing, and today I pumped 880 ccs (29.7 ounces). I have a few bags in the freezer now, so I'm getting enough ahead to start to build a small stockpile for the future. However, I need to produce WAY more milk to keep up with them as they grow, so I'm going to order Reglan this week. I actually still have refills left from 2008! Hopefully, it will give me enough of a supply boost to get a really good freezer stash now to tide me over for the time when I can't pump enough for both. And, even more hopefully, maybe I'll be able to get them to nurse so that I don't have to pump all the time for the next year, too. Fingers crossed!

Day 9

2010-10-23T21:12:00.000-07:00

Because we don't have our nanny on weekends, it's a lot more challenging for us to visit the babies. We actually were able to have her come for a couple of hours this morning, though, so we headed out after breakfast and got there in time to hang out and cuddle for a bit and then do the 11 am feeding. They were gavaged at 8 am, but they both took their full bottles at 11. We had to leave right after that feeding, but the nurse told us later that they took the entire bottles at 2 pm as well. And we came back, with all of the kiddos in tow, and fed them their 5 pm feed and they both finished that one, too! They tend to be pretty sleepy and less interested in eating at night, so we'll see how it goes. But, it definitely seems like they are making progress.

Since Sophia has never really had any As or Bs, they took her off the oxygen monitor today. Lydia last had one on the 20th so she will come off of it on the 25th. They are still eating 37 and 38 ccs every 3 hours, and they are both gaining weight regularly each night now. They were just shy of their birthweights yesterday, so we'll see if they regained them tonight when they weigh them. Otherwise, everything is same ol same ol while we just wait for them to eat well enough to come home.

Now that the babies are totally stable, all of the kids wanted to hold them. I was holding Lydia, so I helped get them settled with her one by one. They all loved it. It was really cute! Well, except Charlotte, who was too scared to try to hold her. But, Alice said that she wanted to hold her sister and she did. She sat there perfectly and held her, it was absolutely adorable! Sadly, I keep forgetting my camera, but at least I had my phone!

Charlotte didn't want to hold Lydia, but did really like to sit on the footstool, leaning against my leg, and reading a book while I fed Lydia. It was way too cute!

In other news, the pumping is killing me, but it's going pretty well. I pumped 731 ccs yesterday and the girls only eat around 610 ccs, so I'm even providing a little more than they need right now! It's really nice because this allows them to get all BM even when we're not able to come drop it off in the middle of the night or something. My supply is still increasing every day, so hopefully I'll manage to freeze some before they start to outpace me! I'm pumping 10 times per day and drinking a ton of water, but haven't started any supplements yet. I'm going to re-assess at the two-week mark and see whether I think that I need them. Reglan was a miracle worker last time, so I might just go straight to that. The herbal stuff is really expensive and didn't work at all last time so I'm disinclined to try it again.

Robert is heading back to the NICU now and I think that I am going to go to bed. I've been a total zombie all day. Hopefully some sleep will help!

One week old!

2010-10-21T22:46:00.000-07:00

Today was not a very awesome day. It was one of those days where you go in expecting nothing but awesome news and it turns out that there isn't always awesome news to be had. There was no bad news or anything, it just wasn't awesome.

After the seriously amazing feeds yesterday, I was really hoping for great ones today, too. Sadly, that wasn't the case. They were just super tired today. They took a couple of partial feeds, but no full feeds. After the feeding rollercoaster that we were on with Alice and Charlotte, it just completely deflated me to realize that even so much further along we may end up on it again. Granted, I'm jumping the gun here and they may very well have an awesome feeding day tomorrow, but it's just impossible to predict and that is hard.

In happier news, Robert is at the hospital now and emailed to tell me that the girls were moved into one of the lower level of care rooms tonight! I don't remember exactly when we moved into those rooms with the girls last time, but it was definitely once we were on the going home track. Fingers crossed that we're not there long.

Last but not least, today I pumped 658 ccs, which is exactly 50 ccs more than the girls eat in a day. I finally caught up AND exceeded their needs! It was what I needed today, too, since I'm currently a complete and utter zombie from lack of sleep. Pumping every 2 hours at night means I sleep in 1 hour chunks. If I had babies at home, I would just nap when they do, but I can't do that at the hospital, really. So, I'm tired as heck, and needed a little sign today that what I'm doing even matters. This is a great one!

Day 6

2010-10-20T21:42:00.000-07:00

There is so much good news to report tonight that I barely even know where to begin! First of all, last night Robert went to see the babies (he goes every night) and Lydia was off her canula when he arrived! She's done beautifully ever since and I didn't see her have even a single desat today. It seems like she was just ready to go off the oxygen literally in a single moment, and that was that! Then, this morning, I walked in the room and saw two babies in bassinets! No more isolettes! That alone is such a huge deal and makes such a difference because it is easy to get them in/out and you're encouraged to hold them whenever you want (which, granted, we've been doing anyway). As if that wasn't enough, the nurse told us that Sophia had taken three out of four feeds by bottle the prior night and Lydia took her first couple of bottle feeds, too! Sophia was finishing about 3/4 of her bottles, whereas Lydia was finishing about 12 ccs (which is not bad for her first attempts at all!).

As the day went on, even more good stuff happened! We attended family rounds, which is where parents are encouraged to come and meet the entire care team, hear the care plan, and ask any questions. We didn't really have any questions since they are doing so well, other than the ever present one of when they will be home. The neonatologist said that we should bring carseats in soon and that he doesn't expect them to be in past 37 weeks, so it looks like they are definitely on the fast track at this point! He's been super positive all along, and just keeps telling us how great they are doing every day, which is so nice to hear. It's really been nothing but up thus far, which is rare in my NICU experience. I do expect to potentially have more ups/downs with feeding, but we'll see. Maybe they will just get the idea and come home!

Speaking of feeding, at their 11 am feeding, they were both zonked so they gavaged them. Considering that they had taken a bunch of bottles in a row, that wasn't surprising at all. At their 2 pm feeding, they were rooting and wild children. I tried to nurse Sophia, and she latched right on, but then did approximately nothing other than look around very cutely and suck once every 30 seconds. Needless to say, after 15 minutes of that, I decided to try a bottle. She took the ENTIRE bottle! I was stunned. Seriously, I can't believe that she took 38 cc by bottle! Wow! Lydia did super well, too, and took 26 out of 38 cc by bottle before falling asleep. Considering that Lydia has only been nippling at all since last night, that was amazing progress. Robert is at the hospital now, so I am looking forward to hearing how they did at their later feedings!

As for me, I had my follow up appointment with Dr. Wall today and my incision is not infected! It's goopy and yucky, but healing, so I just have to keep it clean and dry (by stuffing a pad into it every day, which is pretty gross in and of itself) and it should continue to heal ok. I have to go back in a week just to make sure, but I'm feeling pretty hopeful after talking to him that it will continue to heal well. He also assured me that the FIFTH c-section is the easiest one, but I told him that he should give it a try instead and let me know how it goes for him.

On the pumping front, I'm making a lot of progress! The babies are currently taking in 608 ccs per day combined. I have one more pumping session that counts for today and I expect to hit about 500 ccs total. That's an increase of about 100 ccs since yesterday, so I'm hopeful that I'll start to provide 100% of their milk by tomorrow. Even now, I'm coming mighty close, but I really want to hit 100% and then get ahead of them since their needs are only going to increase (and quickly!). I've been pumping 10+ times per day, plus still trying to nurse when possible, and drinking tons of water, and eating periodically throughout the day so I'm doing what I need to do... now it's up to my body. I do still plan to pick up some More Milk Plus tomorrow, though.

I forgot my camera today (figures!), so I just have a few iPhone pics today. Still, there are some good ones!

No more isolettes!

My first time bottlefeeding Sophia AND her first full feed

Sophia wide awake after her bottle

Holding both for the first time! (Yes, I'm a little tired)

Awww

Day 5

2010-10-19T21:04:00.000-07:00

Lydia is doing awesome today! She is down to room air entirely and never had to be turned up at all in response to a desat. She also only had maybe 3 or 4 desats all day and recovered from them quickly. This afternoon, the nurse started turning down the flow of her oxygen, which is really what needs to happen before she can come off, and her sats remained stable. I am very hopeful now that she will be off the canula quickly since she seems to have really turned that corner!

In other news, both girls are still tolerating feeds well. Lydia was up to 38 ccs per feed today and Sophia remained at 33 ccs (it's based on weight). Neither had anything other than a small residual here or there, and mostly it was all clear. In fact, they think that they are starving and we had to feed them early multiple times! They tend to wake up 30 minutes early, hungry and rooting around like starving babies. It's so cute! Sophia took one feed by bottle while we were there and inhaled 12 ccs in a minute or two, and then got too tired to keep going. It's a good sign, though, that she can take that much that quickly. As soon as she gets more stamina, she is going to suck down those bottles like whoa. I nursed Lydia one feed and she has an awesome suck! It's really strong and, while she is a little harder to latch then Sophia, she is great about not popping off. It seems like both of them are very interested in nursing and food in general, which is such a relief after Alice and Charlotte, who are still often challenging to feed and certainly were back in their NICU days!

Today ended up being a little crazy. We spent the morning home with the kids and then headed to the NICU at 9:30, which was good timing since the girls were heading to preschool in just a few minutes. We hung out there feeding and soothing babies (which is becoming a full-time job now that they are much more awake and actually want to be held/entertained!) until 3:30, when the postpartum care lady came by to check on my incision. Incidentally, I thought that it was awesome that she came to the NICU instead of making me go there! Anyway, she took one look at it and said that I needed to go see my MFM because it is open in a few spots, oozing stinky yellow gunk, and generally isn't healing well. She called them and, since it was the end of the day, they literally wanted me to go over right then... which happened to be right as our nanny and the girls got there to see me and the babies AND right as the babies were going nuts with starvation (very early, again!). Robert had to take Emilia to ice skating, so I ended up having to just get the nurse to come feed both of the babies, and pack up my stuff really quickly, and then take our nanny and the girls to my appt. Phew.

One of the MFMs looked at my incision and said that she can't tell whether it is infected but she wants me to come back tomorrow when Dr. Wall will be there so that he can check it out. She cleaned it out (which was not comfortable at all since she took the steri strips off and really dug around in there), and got tons of blood and gunk out, and then put new strips on. Gross. Just... gross.

I also saw a LC today who told me that it's ok to go ahead and try herbal supplements to increase my supply now, but to keep waiting for another 5-7 days to start things like Reglan. Honestly, it seems like my supply is doing pretty well on its own right now, but with two babies to provide for, I guess that pretty well isn't enough. I went form pumping 186 ccs Sunday to 260 ccs yesterday to 362 ccs (12+ ounces) thus far today and that is with one more pumping session left before midnight. My supply is definitely increasing pretty steadily, but I'm going to try More Milk Plus since Fenugreek alone didn't work for me at all last time.

Proud Daddy

Multitasking... (even if the iPhone was actually just for the pic!)

Day 4

2010-10-18T21:16:00.000-07:00

Another good day for the girls in the NICU! They were off the bili lights when we got there and came off the IVs early in the morning, too. The doctor has written the order for Lydia to come off her canula, but she just isn't ready yet. Hopefully, it'll happen in the next few days. She definitely makes progress every day (today was down to 1 liter/low 20s most of the day), but she still just randomly desats. It's funny because her desats are almost never linked to As or Bs, they are just desats. The nurse said it's actually better of an issue to have, though, because it just means that she works a little hard to breathe sometimes and is pretty normal for a 34-35 weeker. Everyone seems to think that she'll just suddenly turn a corner and no longer need the oxygen (hence the orders to remove the canula), so hopefully that happens soon.

It was also a big day for Sophia, who had her very first bottle feed today! I decided to go ahead and let them use bottles to try to get her home faster. Right now, the plan is to try the bottle 1-2 times per day, try BF'ing 1-2 times per day, and do the rest of the feeds through her tube. She seemed totally stunned by the bottle and choked at first, but then suddenly got the idea and managed to take in 8 ccs before getting too tired. It's nowhere near her full feed amount of 33 ccs, but it was still great to see her do so well on her first try!

Meanwhile, we also worked with a LC to get her on the boob once today and she did SO well. She has about the same stamina whether breast or bottle (they use very slow flow nipples on their bottles, so it probably takes about the same amount of effort either way), but she is really great at latching on! She also definitely got milk for at least 10 minutes or so of fairly sustained sucking. The LC said that she thinks that she will be a really good BF'er! Considering all of the issues that we've had before, I was very excited to hear that. My supply is nowhere near what they are eating right now, but hopefully it will catch up by the time that she has the stamina to really eat. I am so excited at even the prospect of getting her to actually BF! When she finished this afternoon, she popped off, flung her head backwards and just laid there with milk running down her chin. Talk about cuteness.

I was planning to try Lydia at the breast this afternoon, too, but she was completely zonked out at her 3 pm feeding, so I just held her for a couple of hours. I was bummed, but there is no point in trying to get a sound asleep preemie to BF, that's for sure.

Pumping is still improving, albeit slower than the babies' feeds. I pumped about 6 ounces yesterday and they each took about 8 ounces. Clearly, that's not enough to feed both of them. However, today, I have pumped 9 times and have 1 more session left, and I'm up to just shy of 8 ounces of milk! That's a big increase over yesterday, so hopefully it will keep improving quickly. The babies are on full feeds now, which will continue to go up, but probably not as quickly anymore, so I'm hopeful that my supply will catch up in a week or so. For now, they are getting as much EBM as I can produce and the rest is Neosure.

Robert and I headed to the NICU this morning around 9:20 am and hung out there until nearly 5 pm. It was nice because the girls have ballet on Mondays and then they took a HUGE nap from 11:50-3:30, so the only real time that I missed with them was ballet and lunch. Our nanny brought them to the hospital at 4 and we hung out there for a bit, which was great, and then we all went home for the night. We got home in time to supervise homework, have dinner, etc with the older kids, too. It felt like a good balance, which is hard to achieve with kids at home and kids in the NICU. I had a very rough night last night after going home without my babies, so it was nice to get to spend so much time with them today and still feel like I was getting in good time with the other kids. Even though we prepared ourselves for NICU time and preemies, it is still hard to leave the hospital without your babies.

I've been bad about posting pictures, largely because it's hard to take them! I'm either holding a baby, which makes it tough to take a picture with my big camera, or they are in their isolettes. I did manage to snap a few, though.

Under the bili lights yesterday

Visiting the babies

Sophia

Just a little bigger than when she was in this very room, in the same bed behind her, almost three years ago!

Day 3

2010-10-17T14:59:00.000-07:00

The girls are doing very well today. Lydia is off the high-flow canula and is just on a regular flow canula now. She's been alternating between room air and a little higher percentage of oxygen (around 28% vs. room air, which is 21%), partially because she keeps pulling the canula out and it takes her a little while to recover from that. They are both under the bili lights today for some mild jaundice, but it sounds like they are likely to be out from under them tomorrow.

I talked to the neonatologist here today and he said that they are probably going to be off their IVs tomorrow since they are eating so much now that they are barely getting anything via IV. He also said that they should be out of the isolettes within 1-2 days since they are both keeping their temps up. At this point, Lydia still has to work on her breathing a little bit, but the real task at hand is learning how to eat.

I was stuck in my room all morning trying to get myself discharged, so I didn't make it to the NICU until just after 11. I held Lydia during her noon feeding and also let her try to breastfeed. It's a little hard for Lydia since she has the canula in her nose and her feeding tube in her mouth, but she still managed to latch on and suck for a solid 15 minutes! I was really proud of her for that. I'm going to do the same thing with Sophia at the next feeding at 3 pm. I've been nursing with Sophia about twice per day so far, and she's definitely very interested. She just lacks some stamina. Still, for now, we've opted to have them tube fed to try not to introduce bottles to give them a chance to learn how to nurse. If it becomes an issue that is keeping them here, we will introduce bottles, but it's definitely not to that point yet.

I had an issue earlier with one of the nurses. I came by the NICU at 8 to drop off some breastmilk for their 9 am feeding. I dropped off 49 cc, and the two of them combined drink 50 cc per feed today. When I got here at 11, the entire 49 cc was still here. I asked about it and the nurse told me that she was waiting until I had 90 cc so she could make up the recipe of BM/Neosure to add calories. Uh. No. The first priority is getting them breastmilk NOT following some stupid recipe. I must've said something that got to her because at noon she fed them all BM except for that 1 cc of formula that we needed. It was so strange because this hospital is generally very breastfeeding-friendly.

As for me, I'm discharged now, albeit still here. I got my staples out this morning, and steri strips on, and apparently my incision has gaps in it and is oozy and gross so I have to go to the doctor in a week for a follow up to check on it. Otherwise, I'm hanging in there. I'm pretty much completely exhausted and starving all of the time, but I guess that's par for the course. I keep falling asleep sitting up in the middle of doing something. I remember that from being here with A&C.

Pumping is still a real challenge. I pumped 2.1 ounces all day yesterday, after pumping 8 times plus 2 nursing sessions. Thus far today, I'm at about 3.5 ounces. While it's a big improvement, I still have a long way to go. But, I got my pump rented out so at least I'll have that. I'm pumping a ton, so hopefully my supply starts to kick in soon.

Man, I am so tired that I can barely sit upright. Maybe it's time for a quick catnap on the couch in their room.

Day 2

2010-10-16T11:25:00.000-07:00

It's only 11 am and we already have lots of good news! When I got to the NICU this morning, the nurse told me that Lydia was coming off the CPAP. Sure enough, about 5 minutes later, the respiratory therapist came in and unhooked her! She's on a nasal canula now with just a bit of oxygen. Her vitals have been great since making the switch. I'm thrilled! It's so wonderful to be able to see her little face!

Both girls are now down to room temp in their isolettes, so they should be in open cribs in about 24 hours (that's the rule - they have to maintain at room temp for 24 hours before switching to open cribs). They are also off most of their IVs, so now they are just getting dextrose and a little sodium, but the nurse said that they will likely be off those very soon as well based on their levels today. They are tolerating feeds very well, with little to no residuals, so their per feed amount was increased today.

Meanwhile, right as I was beginning to despair that I was never going to get any colostrum, much less any milk, I started pumping a little bit at every session. Thus far today, in three sessions, I've pumped 4.3 ccs. While that's still pretty much nothing, it sure beats pumping 2 ccs after 8 pumping sessions and 2 nursing sessions yesterday! I finally had enough last session for it to drop down into the bottles, which felt so good. I know that pumping and/or BF'ing will be a long road for me again, but at least it's starting to work a little bit. The babies will have about 5 ccs worth of colostrum at their next feed, and should have at least a little at every feed from here on out. Now for my milk to come in!

In other news, my recovery was a bit rougher yesterday but still ridiculously easy for a c-section. I just overdid it, I think. I've been taking the Percocet again, and it's definitely helping. I'm walking so much that I think that I just probably need the Percocet for a few more days.

Robert stayed with the babies until nearly 4 am last night and then went home to sleep a bit. I've been in here with them since 9 am and now Robert is on his way. Thank goodness that we have my dad and our nanny to help out with the other kids! They are all at the children's museum right now, and will be home for lunch and toddler naptime soon, and then will come and visit later today. I am missing them like crazy, but I'm glad that I've been able to spend time with them every day... and that my hospital stay ended up only being for delivery this time around!

Little Miss Lydia without her CPAP! Her poor little face is still smooshed from the bands they use to hold the CPAP on, but she was trying to open her eyes and look around. This was right after the CPAP comes off, so I'm sure she'll be less smooshed very soon!

Day 1 and pictures

2010-10-16T00:27:00.000-07:00

So far, things are going really well for my girls!

Sophia is just plain a rockstar. Her vitals have been totally stable, she's clearly able to keep her temp up, and she just started eating today and is loving it. I was given the choice between tube or bottle feeding and opted for tube to try to get her on the breast. She has a strong rooting instinct and will latch on and suck, so we worked on that twice today.

Lydia is still on CPAP, but is definitely controlling her breathing and such better for longer periods of time today than yesterday. I think that she'll be on it for another day or two, but hopefully not longer than that. She is also maintaining her body temp well and took to the feeds like a champ. I'm not able to try to breastfeed her at all because of the CPAP, but we are able to hold her and Robert alone held her for a 2-hour stretch earlier, so she is getting lots of love between the two of us. They took her CPAP off to weigh her tonight, and it was so nice to see her little face. She's such a doll! She looks chunky because she weighs 4 oz more than Sophia, but is two full inches shorter!

My recovery is still going amazingly well, but I definitely felt more sore by this afternoon. I crashed out and took a nap because I was just in too much pain and too tired to keep going. I have been walking to/from the NICU and around my room, and showered/shaved/got dressed today, and I think that it was just a little too much. I'm going to try to pace myself a little better tomorrow.

My big issue right now is that pumping isn't going well at all. I know that it's only one day after they were born, but I pumped 4 times in a row today and got literally not one drop of anything. I've gotten a small amount of milk the other times, but really small... as in, my entire pumping total after 8 pumps and 2 attempts at the breast with Sophia was less than 2 ccs. Meanwhile, the babies are taking 15 ccs every 3 hours. I'm already behind and it's really bumming me out. I really hope that my milk comes in soon. This total lack of much of anything is really discouraging.

On a happier note, all of the kids, my dad, and my friend Nina visited today, so that was nice! It's fun to get to show off my beautiful little ones! Speaking of which, I'm tired as heck, so I'll leave you with pictures.

About to start!

Sophia getting weighed

Meeting Sophia for the first time!

Holding Sophia for the first time, about 5 hours after she was born!

Alice meeting Sophia

Charlotte meeting Lydia

The big kids meeting Sophia

Sophia

Lydia

Proud Daddy!

Hello, pumpkin

Birth story

2010-10-14T23:42:00.000-07:00

Since I'm alone in my room for now, it is probably a good time to write out our birth story!

Robert and I had our nanny come super early this morning so that we could be at the hospital for the c/s by 7:30 am. When we got here, we signed a few consents and a nurse took us up to the antepartum floor and got us settled into our room. I was put on monitors, had some vitals done, got my IV in, they took some blood, and so on. We also met with the anesthesiologist briefly just to touch base. Dr. Wall came by to get stuff going, too. Although it doesn't seem like that much was going on, somehow it took so long to do all of that stuff that we ended up being late to the c/s! A nurse actually held the elevator for us while our nurse rushed us downstairs so that we could get down there faster! It was pretty funny, really.

As soon as we got to the OR, Robert put on the silly looking jumpsuit they use here, and I got into position for the spinal. I was worried about the spinal because I've had issues almost every time and, last time, it took 45 minutes of trying to get the dang thing in. This time, we had the exact same issue at first. He tried multiple times to get it in and kept rooting around during each try. One time, he hit a nerve and this AWFUL electric shock feeling went down my leg. My foot is actually still painful, which seems nuts. But, after taking a breather and then having the nurse push my feet into a very tight ball, he got it right in. PHEW!

After that, things moved quickly. I hate the feel of the tinglying and numbing process, and I also felt very pukey. In fact, I was already pukey from no food and had to get Phenergen as I walked into the room! I felt pretty awful for the first bit of the c/s, but started to feel better (after more Phenergen and some Reglan) right about as the babies were ready to come out. I had a great view of their actual birth through the little window in the curtain, and it was just awesome to see.

Sophia was born first and came out feet first! They took her right over to work on her, but she was crying and had good color, so it was obvious that she was doing well very quickly. Robert was able to hold her, bring her over to introduce her to me, and even carry her up to the NICU!

Lydia was born second and came out head first. They also worked on her right away, and while she was a little dusky, she also looked pretty good. She was having a bit of retraction when she breathed, so they brought her up to the NICU in an incubator, but I was also able to meet her before they left. I didn't get to have Alice or Charlotte brought to me in the OR, so that was a great experience for me!

Robert went with the babies to the NICU, and I just laid on the table with my eyes closed and tried to relax while they closed me up. I felt pretty tired from the drugs, so it was nice to just lay there and think about my little ones for a bit! Once they got me all closed up, they took me back to my room and got me into my bed. Robert came and showed me pictures of them before going back to be with them, I was subjected to various pokes and prods on my poor belly, and I just hung out in the room until I was able to get up and go to the NICU.

I had a very hard c/s recovery last time, so I've been worried about this one. However, it's been a breeze so far! I got up 4.5 hours after the babies were actually born and wasn't even really in much pain at all. I'm in almost no pain just sitting in bed, too. I hope it continues this way, that's for sure!

When I first got to the NICU, I was able to hold both babies. I held Sophia first, and she is such a doll! She just cuddles right in and I swear that you could cuddle her forever! She is also showing off a good suck, so hopefully that will translate to actual BF'ing. She gets to start eating tomorrow! I've pumped five times already, but there are only a few drops of colostrum so far, so hopefully that picks up soon. Lydia feels way heavier than Sophia, which is funny since they are so close in weight! She seems much chunkier, too. I still don't know their exact heights, so I think that maybe Lydia is just shorter.

Earlier, we had our nanny bring Alice and Charlotte by to meet their new sisters. They were so darn cute with them, and so interested! It was adorable! The older kids came by tonight since they had afterschool activities this afternoon. Robert and my dad took them out to dinner as a celebration, and then they came and saw me and then went to see their sisters. They made a really cute sign for their door, but they left out the "h" in Sophia, so we need to get that fixed before we hang it!

I just got back from another trip to the NICU. They are both maintaining their temps, Sophia is still just chilling with no oxygen or anything. She looks totally perfect. Lydia has room air in the CPAP, with no extra oxygen. She breathes quickly, so this helps her to breathe easier. I wish that I could just hang out there all the time, but I can only sit up for so long at this point. I really look forward to having a bit more stamina tomorrow. But, I did walk back alone so I'm doing mighty well already! Sophia got her first sponge bath while I was there, which was super cute. She, however, was not a fan!

All told, I feel so grateful that we have two beautiful girls joining our family and that they are doing so well. I have a bunch of pictures, but I'm super tired now so I'll just post those tomorrow. I have to be up to pump in 1.5 hours, so it's sleep time!

Happy birthday, Lydia and Sophia!

2010-10-14T14:34:00.000-07:00

Sophia David Knight was born this morning at 10:20 am. She weighed in at 4 lbs 4 oz. She had Apgars of 8, 9 and is on room air and rocking it! She is little, but doing perfectly.

Lydia Jane Knight was born this morning at 10:21 am. She weighed in at 4 lbs 8 oz. She also had Apgars of 8, 9 and was on room air until a little while ago when they decided to use CPAP because she was grunting a little. She's doing great, though.

I'll write out my birth story later, but here are my precious little ones. We're so blessed!

34w3d

2010-10-13T16:00:00.000-07:00

It's probably a good thing that I don't make predictions for a living because all of mine seem to be WRONG! Dr. Wall, however, was right on the money.

I had my growth scan/BPP/NST today. It was pretty clear from the start that growth was not awesome. Exactly two weeks ago, the girls were 3 lbs 12 oz and 4 lbs 2 oz. Today, they were only 4 lbs 9 oz and 4 lbs 6 oz. For Baby B, that means that she only gained 4 oz in two weeks, which caused her to drop down to the 14th percentile (and that's the good percentile scale that they have to go calculate themselves, the one on the u/s machine was even lower). Considering that, up until a few weeks ago, they were 40-50th percentile babies, it's been a pretty significant drop in growth. Add to that an elevated mid cord doppler and the same cord insertion doppler elevation that we've been seeing for 4 weeks and Dr. Wall thought it best that we just deliver. His rationale for that is basically that it is highly unlikely that these girls will gain much weight from here on out no matter how long I remain pregnant. He also thinks that issues like the placenta and growth can fall off a cliff all of a sudden, resulting in major issues. By 34.5 weeks, he thinks that the babies are just better off outside than in. It's not an OMG emergency type of situation, it's just sort of a balancing act between risk of staying in versus risk of being born pre-term. He said that he only expects them to stay in the NICU for about 7-10 days, and mostly just to learn to eat and gain weight. Hopefully, they will follow in Alice's footsteps, since she never had any issues whatsoever and was out of the NICU at a 35 week gestational age!

So, tomorrow is the big day! We're scheduled for a 9:30 am c-section, although we have to get to the hospital 2 hours early. I am really excited to meet these girls, and very hopeful that making it this far will lead to a good outcome for them. I'm really happy to have made it two weeks and one day further than I did with the girls! I would've loved to have made it further, but if it isn't going to help them, then I'm glad that tomorrow is going to be their birthday!

34w1d

2010-10-11T19:10:00.000-07:00

Today's news was all good. Both babies looked good on the BPP and NST. Baby B's doppler is still elevated at cord insertion, but looked normal at mid cord. I was right that mid cord was elevated last week, so it was good that it looked good today. That said, they are both breathing and moving so much now that it is getting hard for them to get an accurate reading on the dopplers. However, as the doctor we saw today pointed out, babies moving and breathing too much to get good dopplers is a great sign!

In other news, I got my flu shot and refused the Group B strep test (I'm having a c-section and have almost zero chance of going into labor... no real need for it). I've found that, lately, I'm a bad patient. I refuse to undress at the Bellevue office because I KNOW that they aren't going to be checking my cervix and it's a waste of time to undress. And, now, I'm turning down routine medical testing. I'm just too old, too cranky, and too pregnant to waste my time on stupid crap.

I have the growth scan/BPP/NST on Wednesday. I have to say that I don't think we're going to be delivering this week, despite Dr. Wall's relative certainty that we will. I could be wrong, but the dopplers have been stable enough that I don't think that we're going to see dramatically reduced growth. I still will fast and go off the Heparin/baby aspirin like he asked me to, just in case, but I don't really expect to have babies this week. In fact, I'm beginning to think that Baby B is just toying with us and that I'm going to be pregnant until the end of time!

Last but not least, I think that we're going to change Sophia's middle name. I've been up one side and down the other of this in my head, and I talked to Robert about it today, so we'll see. But, I want to go with a middle name for her that is more meaningful and honors someone I miss very much.

34w0d

2010-10-10T14:09:00.000-07:00

34 weeks!! Holy crap. I can't even really quite wrap my mind around the idea that I made it to 34 weeks without bedrest, hospitalization, an abruption, or anything else.

At the end of the day, I think it's mostly just luck with twins. Perfectly healthy people with no reason to suspect an issue have complications with twins all the time. We had reason to suspect issues (albeit not ones that my MFM thought were insurmountable) and we've made it this far without any real problems. We may not make it much further, but to have even made it this far this well is a huge accomplishment. While we somewhat made our own luck with the quality of the medical care that I have, the reality is that you just never know. We are lucky, and I'm so thankful for that fact.

Hopefully, we'll make it another week or two. Hitting 36 weeks would be amazing. But, it's such a relief to know that, even if they are born tomorrow, they will be okay. We've made it to that magical 34-week mark.

Robert likes to take credit for all of the goodness that has seemed to come into my life since we got together. I always laugh at him, but maybe there is something to the idea that, when things are right in your world and your foundation is solid, more goodness just accrues. For eight years, I largely felt like I was swimming upstream, and now I don't. I'm not sure how much of a real impact that has on things like placental abruptions and other medical issues, but maybe he is right. At any rate, it sure can't hurt. I am so blessed to have the husband that I do, not to mention my amazing children. I don't write much about any of them on this blog, since it's really just about IVF and pregnancy, but I have been very, very blessed.

And, well, it's a big week so here's a belly pic! Excuse my silly face, I was trying to express my shock and awe at my huge tummy...

33w5d

2010-10-08T18:46:00.000-07:00

I forgot to mention that during our u/s yesterday, the tech pointed out hair on one of the babies! It's this funky little fuzzy aura looking thing, but it's actually hair floating in the fluid. How cute is that?!

Also, I've decided that things will be fine on Wednesday. I mean, sure, we had a big scare but nothing ACTUALLY really changed. It was just a scare. So, really, there is no legitimate NEW reason to think that Wednesday will require delivery. I'm still shooting for 35 weeks plus!

The funny thing is that, if things are borderline on Wednesday, Dr. Wall may make me come in on Friday for another BPP/NST that would ultimately lead to delivery. My best friend of 15 years died last summer and his birthday was October 16, which is that Saturday. If we have an issue on Friday, we could very well end up delivering on Saturday. Although that's still one day shy of 35 weeks, I have to say that I wouldn't mind if my girls ended up sharing his birthday. Had we had boys, we were going to use a middle name in his honor, but with girls we didn't really have that option. That said, I still want to get to 35+ weeks. It'd just be comforting to me to have them share his birthday if it turns out that way.

My gallbladder reminded me that it was there with a truly terrible attack earlier, after I'd had a lunch of incredibly non-spicy chicken and rice. There is no justice in this world.

33w4d

2010-10-07T16:32:00.000-07:00

Well, this afternoon's MFM appointment pretty much shaved a year off my life.

It started out really well, actually. My lab work came back and I don't have choleostasis, so apparently I just itch. That's fine. My BP was 104/63. I lost a pound, but I think it's just normal fluctuation now that I'm going in twice a week (putting me at 28 lbs gained total). I had no protein, and only trace ketones in my urine. My NST also went well. TONS of movement and reactive babies. Baby A did have a few decels, but because her baseline is so low, they don't actually count as decels even though they were in the upper 90s. So, I went into the BPP thinking that all was well.

Both babies were practicing their breathing and moving around. It was difficult to get a good fluid measurement on Baby A, but eventually they got one and it was totally normal. Then, we moved on to the dopplers. Baby A was fine. Baby B showed absent flow from the cord insertion. Absent flow is one of the potential delivery triggers, so we started to freak out. A lot. The tech took measurement after measurement after measurement and every single one showed absent flow except one (she literally did it about 8 times). I thought that meant that the flow was categorically absent. Robert and I (and Jared, who was with us because he had an ENT appt right before mine) sat there waiting for Dr. Wall pretty much sure that we were about to hear that it was delivery time. But, nope. Apparently, it is easy to get a reading that there is absent flow based on the angle of the wand, but it is impossible to get a reading that there IS flow unless there actually is flow. So, even though only 1 measurement showed flow, it meant that there IS flow. And, the flow that it showed was elevated more than Monday, but still in a stable range (if stable means not ready for delivery). So, basically, it was this huge, stressful, OMG we're about to deliver moment... for no reason. Awesome.

That said, we're not really in the clear. The doppler is elevated more at cord insertion and I think that it was also a bit elevated at mid cord for the first time (but, frankly, I was too worried about the absent flow at the time to really know for sure). It definitely looks like we're headed in the wrong direction now. As to how quickly we get there, no one really knows. But, Dr. Wall is having me stop the baby aspirin/Heparin the night before my Wednesday growth scan, and come in to the office on a completely empty stomach so that, if it's time to deliver, we're totally ready to do so. I think that is pretty darn serious. I mean, seriously, by the time that your doctor is having you come in on an empty stomach, it seems like he is pretty sure that we're nearing delivery. He also said that he is fairly certain that we're looking at a late next week delivery.

However, all of this still depends on what we see. I have another NST/BPP on Monday that could trigger delivery (or be reassuring). And, well, it's still possible that Wednesday's growth scan and BPP will look ok and we'll keep going. No one really knows what we're going to see, but at 34w3d (next Wednesday), I suspect that Dr. Wall will err on the side of delivery if the placental issue looks any worse at all. That said, we were completely stable for 3 weeks before, so maybe we'll remain stable for another week or two.

I swear, this is what I get for making crazy 36 week predictions.

33w3d

2010-10-06T11:32:00.000-07:00

I'm going to go out on a limb here and make a crazy prediction. My prediction is that I'm going to deliver sometime in the 36th week. That's right, folks. I think that I'm finally going to hit that elusive 36-week mark with twins. In fact, I'll be a bit surprised if I don't. And, here's why: 1) The dopplers have been completely stable to improved for 3 weeks now, 2) My cervix is still over 4 cm and I have literally zero contractions, 3) The Lovenox/Heparin clearly worked to prevent an abruption, and 4) My BP was 110/69 at my last appointment. None of that really makes me think that I'm anywhere near needing delivery in the next week or two.

Granted, Dr. Wall is sure that the growth scan next Wednesday will show reduced enough growth that he'll want to deliver sometime in that week (34.5 weeks) or the following week. But, I can feel these babies and it is very obvious to me that they are growing a LOT lately. My stomach is getting totally ginormous. I can't lean over in a sitting position anymore because I have babies filling up my entire abdomen. While it's true that length doesn't necessarily correlate to weight gain, I am pretty sure that they are growing well. I really do not think that we're going to need to deliver next week or the week after. And, well, that gets us to 36 weeks. Who would've thought it?! Of course, all of the standard caveats apply, but we'll see. That's my prediction for now.

In other news, I am beyond miserable. I've come to accept misery as my lot in twin pregnancy life, though, so I'm not too riled up about it. I am sleeping so poorly that using the word sleep seems inaccurate. The worst part is that anytime I eat a normal-sized dinner, I wake up 2-3 times gagging and choking on vomit. It's really disconcerting. I have GERD, but it's well-controlled with meds. I think this has more to do with a sheer lack of room for food in my stomach. My other complaints are same ol, same ol: continuing nausea, back aches, sciatica, hip pain, exhaustion, itching, etc. Twin pregnancy is no walk in the park. But, the end is clearly in sight, and I love making it further every day, so I stay focused on that to get through it.

I've been thinking lately about donating our embryos. We've planned all along to donate our remaining embryos to other couples through our RE, but we wanted to wait until these babies were born. I used to think that it would be hard to imagine our embryos growing into children that we'll never know. But, as time has gone on, I'm honestly just excited about it. I've met so many truly wonderful people struggling with infertility that I love the idea of being able to help someone else to become a parent or add to their family. And, well, I categorically have no desire to have anymore children. I'm thrilled that we're able to both ensure that our embryos are given a chance at life AND help others in the process. It's a really great feeling, and I can't wait to sign the papers and get the ball rolling on that process.

33w1d

2010-10-04T22:29:00.000-07:00

Just a quick post to basically report that nothing has changed. Doppler was essentially the same as before, so Miss Lydia is holding completely steady at this point. Yay! All of the other measurements and such on the BPP were perfect, and we had a completely perfect NST as well.

Dr. Wall took some blood to test for choleostasis, but said that it probably wouldn't change our delivery timeline even if that's what it is (and my symptoms aren't quite right, so it may very well just be something else more benign). That was a relief since I would've been so annoyed if my gallbladder issues ultimately ended up causing us to have to deliver early! Talk about random.

So, we're still just plodding along. I have another BPP/NST on Thursday (don't expect a change), followed by another one next Monday (same), and then the big growth scan next Wednesday. Dr. Wall is still sure that we're going to see reduced growth next Wednesday and that it will be enough to push us toward delivery, but I'm not sure. These girls really seem to be growing to me. I thought so last time and their growth was fine. Considering that next week's growth scan will be 34w3d, I think that we might make it close to 36 weeks at this point. If the dopplers are holding and growth is still ok, there really doesn't seem to be a reason to deliver, even at 35 weeks.

A lot can happen between now and then, but we're definitely moving into a pretty safe area. It feels wonderful.

33w0d

2010-10-03T19:06:00.000-07:00

Another week and we're holding steady! No real news to report other than that I'm continuing in my twin pregnancy misery. But, really, it's hard to get too upset about that when I'm feeling so grateful to just keep making it further and further along.

I'm feeling lots and lots of movement still, so I don't expect much excitement from my BPP/NST/MFM appt tomorrow. Or Thursday, for that matter. I am definitely starting to think that we'll hit 34+ weeks for sure. Granted, there is never a "for sure" with twins, but I guess I feel about as sure as it is possible to feel at this point!

The only potential issue right now is that I'm itching like a mofo. It could be choleostasis, which does require delivery, but I don't have itching on the palms of my hands and feet, so I'm hoping that it's just a pregnancy-related rash of some sort that doesn't have any delivery implications. I'm going to talk to Dr. Wall about it tomorrow, but I know that they just tested my kidney and liver function and it was totally fine, so that makes me think that it's way more likely to just be an unpleasant rash rather than choleostasis. It gets really freaking itchy by night-time, but it's not too bad during the rest of the day, thank goodness.

The one thing that is starting to scare me is the delivery. I don't usually get too worked up about medical procedures, but I had a pretty rough c-section last time. It took a VERY long time to get the spinal in, which was incredibly uncomfortable. Plus, I could feel tons of pressure and movement, and threw up through most of it. Even after the girls were born, it took 45 minutes for them to put me back together due to the amount of scar tissue and such, and all of that was pretty unpleasant. And, my recovery? Dear god, it was not good. My kidneys just plain didn't work and I swelled up to a massive degree and the pain was horrible. And, well, this will be my fourth c-section. It's not going to get any better this time around. I'm not exactly obsessing over it, but as we get closer, I am starting to dread it a bit. I know that it will be fine, albeit unpleasant. I think that the anticipation is worse than the reality, though. Especially since I'll be too busy with two new baby girls to be worrying much about my recovery!

I'm starting to get pretty excited about meeting these two little ones. All of my kids are such characters, and so completely different, that it makes me really wonder what these two will be like. And, there is such a variety of coloring in both of our families, that even their coloring will be a surprise. I can't wait to meet them! (Except I can, babies. Hear that? Stay put!)

32w3d

2010-09-29T19:56:00.000-07:00

Today is a big day for me. Today marks exactly how far along I was when I delivered Alice and Charlotte. And, it doesn't look like I'm going to be delivering these babies anytime soon!

I had my big, long appointment today. They did a growth scan, anatomy scan, cervix check, and BPP. I'm pleased to report that their growth was good (Baby A is 3 lbs 12 oz and Baby B is 4 lbs 2 oz), Baby B's doppler flow was still elevated at the cord insertion but the elevation is stable to slightly improved from last time, and my cervix was 4.2 cm. Even Dr. Wall said that he was surprised. He had, apparently, been pretty sure that we were going to see a decline in the dopplers and a big drop off in fetal growth this week, but we didn't at all! The babies were moving, practicing breathing, and generally having a fine old time in there! In fact, as twins go, we seem to be rocking this pregnancy thing right now. I'm so thrilled!

That said, it isn't all fun and games. I mean, at some point, Baby B's placenta will start to crap out and we'll have to deliver. But, because it's now been completely stable for two weeks, Dr. Wall is pretty sure that we'll make it at LEAST another two weeks before facing a potential delivery. I have BPPs and NSTs twice each next week, so it's certainly possible that something will change and we'll have to deliver, but he doesn't think it is probable. Instead, he thinks that if anything major is going to happen, it is more likely to happen in two weeks at the next growth scan. He told us that delivery is a possibility before then, but that we should go into that scan with the idea that we may be delivering that day or the following day. In fact, he wanted my appointment to be early in the day to give him as much prep time as possible, if need be. However, even that would put us at 34w3d, which is pretty darn good for me. And, he was wrong about this scan... and he may very well be wrong about that one. It's just a lot of guesswork right now, really. If things are good at that growth scan at 34w3d, then he won't even do another u/s until 35w1d, so all told, I think that we have a REALLY high chance of making it to 35 weeks! I don't think that he'll let me go much past that due to the increasing risk of issues/balanced against the likely positive outcome for the babies born at that gestation, but still. 35 weeks!! I'm so excited.

Before my appointment today, we had a tour of the NICU and met with a neonatologist briefly to talk about the impact of my myasthenia gravis on the babies (which is, apparently, pretty much nothing since I'm serum-negative). It was so strange to be back in the NICU again. I haven't set foot in there since the girls were discharged and it was a little surreal. It seems exactly the same, although they have made a lot of procedural type changes and are now certified to care for 24 weekers (it was 26 weekers in 2007). I'm glad that we did it for Robert's sake, but it is beginning to look like we won't need much NICU time. I can't say that I'm sorry about that. I loved everyone at the NICU, but I definitely don't need to spend much more time there.

In other news, I'm up 28 lbs total now, my BP was 128/75, I have very minor proteinuria (420, but he said it's not really concerning until it hits like 5,000), and my urine was fine today. I got my first steroid shot today and Robert is giving me the second one tomorrow, but it's mostly just a precaution at this point. Nothing exciting to report whatsoever. I'll take that!

32w0d

2010-09-26T13:22:00.000-07:00

32 weeks! Yay! I can't believe that I'm 32 weeks along with no bedrest, no abruptions, no contractions (well, none other than a very occasional Braxton Hicks), no hospitalization, no nothing! This is so awesome.

It makes me kind of want to go back in time and force the Lovenox issue with the girls. I wanted to be on Lovenox, but Dr. Wall said I didn't need it... He conceded later that he might have been wrong, and obviously decided to try it this time, but I wish I'd pushed it. I felt pretty strongly that Lovenox was the right thing to do last time and I think that he would've done it if I'd really talked to him about it. Sigh. Hindsight is 20/20, I guess, but this has really reinforced in my mind how important it is to follow my instincts. I adjusted my own IVF protocol the second cycle, and it worked, and then the REs used a VERY similar protocol the third IVF that resulted in our best results ever. And, now, here I am at 32 weeks with no losses and no abruptions. I need to be a better advocate for myself and my babies, despite my dislike of confrontation.

Speaking of advocacy, I've been thinking about it and if we're still hanging in there at 34 weeks with the same very minor doppler flow elevation, I'm not sure that I think that we should deliver. I understand that Dr. Wall considers the risk of a placental issue to be higher than the risk to the babies of being born at 34 weeks, but with intensive monitoring it seems possible to get another week in. 34 weekers are great, but I had C&E at 35 weeks last time and Emilia was completely and utterly fine (Camden was not a typical 35 weekers due to having had the placenta that abrupted 10 weeks prior and struggled quite a bit although he was fine by the time he was 3 weeks old). In fact, Emilia was only briefly monitored by the NICU and roomed in with me and went home with me. If we can possibly make it to 35 weeks, I think it would be best for all concerned. I don't think it makes sense to keep pushing from there, but I do think that 35 weeks is reasonable if we haven't seen any further deterioration of Baby B's placenta.

That said, I understand that I am not a doctor. I trust Dr. Wall's judgment. If he believes that we're better off delivering at 34 weeks, then ultimately I will follow his recommendation. But, if we're still hanging in there two weeks from now, I'm definitely going to be asking a lot of questions and advocating for making it one more week.

I've felt so incredibly betrayed by my body for so long. I deal with many chronic health issues on a daily basis that impact my life intensely. I don't have faith in my body's ability to do much of anything. It's such a wonderful change to feel like maybe, after all, my body can be trusted just a little bit. Sure, it needed a lot of help, but we've made it this far and maybe we'll make it another 3 weeks. Maybe it will give me two healthy babies right from the get-go. Maybe, maybe, maybe.

For now, all I know is that we've made it to 32 weeks, and it feels GREAT!

31w3d

2010-09-22T16:42:00.000-07:00

I had an appointment with Dr. Wall today. They did a BPP, which is amazingly quick after so many growth/anatomy scans this pregnancy! Both babies looked good. LOTS of movement, both practiced their breathing, the amount of fluid around both was normal, and so on. Baby A's dopplers were all completely normal, and all of Baby B's were normal except for the cord insertion, which was still elevated. However, it was basically exactly the same, to even slightly improved, from last week. So, really, that's about the best we can hope for... she's still not in any sort of distress at this point whatosever, so that was really good news!

We talked to Dr. Wall more about the delivery timeline today. He said that he is thinking around 34 weeks, but it really depends on how things look. If things keep being stable/to improved, we'll keep chugging along, but it didn't sound like he would have much tolerance for even minimal changes in the dopplers once we hit 34 weeks. I think that, because placental issues can worsen so suddenly, it just isn't worth the risk to keep going once the babies are 34+ weeks. For now, however, it's absolutely worth continuing forward, albeit with some increased monitoring.

Starting this week, I have an NST on Friday and I will have them twice a week from here on out, along with either a growth/anatomy scan or a BPP (alternating by the week although any issues in the NST will likely require a BPP). He's also switching me to Heparin on Friday, although largely only because I'm about to run out of Lovenox and it makes no sense to refill a $1,000 per month prescription to take it for a week (he was originally going to have me switch next week). I'm glad that he is switching me now because we met with an anesthesiologist briefly today to discuss my various ailments, and he told me that they can only do a general while on Lovenox. God knows I don't want that. No one seems to think that I'm going to be delivering in the next week or so, but it's still good to be on a med that will enable me to actually be awake for the birth.

In other news, my BP is still completely normal (116/65), but my protein to creatinine ratio was just high enough to require a 24 urine. I don't think it's pre-e at all, though, particularly since I have kidney issues at the best of times. I think my kidneys are just not working quite right. Dr. Wall didn't seem concerned about it at all, either. I had some ketones today, and I lost a pound, but I was kind of puffy last week when I gained so much weight, so I think it's more that I lost some puff than that I lost real weight. As for the ketones... well, I'm trying. I've been struggling with massive nausea over the past week and have been taking three Zofran per day just to survive. It's hard to eat a lot in that situation. I'm eating three meals or more per day (and a big ass ice cream sundae every night!), but I think that the babies are just sucking it all up at this point. We'll find out what their weights are next week, so hopefully they are still growing well.

Lastly, here is my belly pic for this week. I had to walk across the street to the hospital to meet with the anesthesiologist and used the restroom before I left. All of my belly pics from this far along last time were in the hospital, so I took a quick one with my phone. It looks like this is as close as I'll be to the hospital while pregnant this time around!

31w2d

2010-09-21T11:30:00.000-07:00

No news is good news, I think. Or hope.

I've just been chilling out as much as possible and things are same ol, same ol. The babies are actually moving a TON lately, which is a good sign because Dr. Wall said that babies experiencing distress due to placental problems tend to stop moving. So, clearly, we haven't progressed to distress. They have also both had the hiccups multiple times per day lately, which counts as practicing breathing, which is another thing that babies in distress don't tend to do. So, I'm hopeful that we'll go in tomorrow and hear that things are at least stable.

It's crazy to think that, in one week from tomorrow, I'll be exactly as far along as I was when I had the girls! I don't feel even remotely ready for these two to be born, so they better not have any crazy ideas about having a birthday any time soon. If we can hit 34 weeks, we can start considering the idea, but I'm going to do every last thing that I can to get to at least 34 weeks. While I know that they will be ok if they are born next week, I want to get them every day inside that I can.

At this point, we're pretty much prepared for their arrival, even if we'd like them to hold off for awhile! Their carseats arrived, Jared put together the swing and bouncer (he loves to assemble things!), their clothes and diapers are folded/hanging up, we have the basic safety stuff, some bottles, and so on. I'll be renting a hospital grade pump when we leave the hospital (and buying a Medela Freestyle at some point as well), so that will be taken care of. I ordered new monitors (I'm totally amazed by the concept of four cameras on one video screen and can't wait to try it out!), the stroller should be here in less than a week (we went with the Baby Jogger City Select, and I am DYING to get it!), and we even moved the girls into Sunshine Radians in order to allow them to go back to RF'ing (we had to turn them at 27 months or so due to their height but the Radians allow RF'ing FAR longer) so we have their convertible carseats set aside as well. The nursery is done other than the roman shades, which we're STILL waiting for, but we can use the blinds in the nursery if we have to. Anything that we don't have now, we'll figure out once they are home, I guess!

Hopefully, this isn't false positivity, but I really feel like things are going pretty well. I am nervous about tomorrow's appointment, but will be SO relieved if it turns out that we're at least treading water. If Dr. Wall thinks that we even have 3-4 weeks left tomorrow, that will get us to 34w3d-35w3d! I'd be thrilled to make it that far!

On a housekeeping note, you may have noticed that comments are now moderated. I have zero interest in drama, so don't bother. They won't be posted. I keep this blog for my friends and family, and also to share the details of my IVFs/pregnancies with people who come across it via searches. I got SO much useful information that way and this is my attempt to do the same for others. If you don't like me, feel free. Just keep it off my blog.

30w5d

2010-09-17T15:28:00.000-07:00

After my appointment on Wednesday, I think that I was just sort of sitting around waiting for something bad to happen. After an afternoon/evening of that, I realized that such an approach is probably not the best call. Especially since something bad might not happen at all. So, my goal for now is to just relax and try to enjoy the rest of my pregnancy.

A couple of things dawned on me once the initial shock wore off. First of all, I'm almost 31 weeks. Even if I only have 3 weeks left, that's 34 weeks. The average twin pregnancy only goes to 35 weeks, so I think 34 weeks would be pretty darn good, really. Second of all, Dr. Wall told me that he will switch me from Lovenox to Heparin in preparation for delivery, but he opted not to do it yet. I think that you're supposed to switch about 2 weeks in advance, so I don't think that he thinks that I'm going to deliver within the next two weeks. So, by my doctor's own reckoning, it seems like we're likely to make it past 32+ weeks. In reality, a potential delivery timeline of 33-34 weeks isn't that bad. In fact, considering that I was just praying to get to 32 weeks last time, I should probably just be grateful for every day that gets us closer to term instead of focusing on some magical ideal.

I think that this hit me so hard because it was so unexpected. I know that I'm prone to abruptions, of course, but we met with Dr. Wall and did a preconception consult prior to doing IVF. He thought that Lovenox had a strong chance of preventing another abruption and that we were safe to transfer two. The fear the entire time was an abruption, and here I am at 30w5d without a single sign of one! That's pretty amazing, really. Clearly, the Lovenox is working and he was right about that much. I've never had a placental problem that wasn't an abruption before, so this really shocked me. I thought that, as long as we prevented an abruption, we were home free; after all, I don't contract, my cervix doesn't shorten, I don't have pre-term labor, and I have made it through two twin pregnancies with completely normal blood pressure. Abruptions were supposed to be my downfall, not random bizarre placental issues.

So, now we know, I guess. I may not always abrupt, but clearly my placentas suck. That said, I do feel like some of this is just guesswork. The one thing we DO know is that Baby B is working slightly harder than she should to get nutrients. Dr. Wall was still happy with her growth, she isn't shunting blood flow to her brain (a sign of lack of proper nutrients coming from the placenta), and she isn't in distress. She is just working a little too hard. This can be a sign that her placenta has peaked, but we don't really know that. And, even if it HAS peaked, we don't know how long she'll have proper nutrients. If it's another 3-5 weeks, we're golden. While this news was shocking, it really is a little information and a whole lot of guesswork. So, I'm going to take it for what it's worth, but try not to panic quite yet.

Meanwhile, everything is progressing smoothly. No signs of any issues whatsoever and my pre-e panel came back completely normal. And, well, since my BP is usually around 95/55, that's not a shocker. Now to just keep baking these babies for a few more weeks!

30w3d

2010-09-15T15:07:00.000-07:00

So, yeah. Today was not an awesome appointment. It wasn't terrible, but it definitely pretty much sucked.

The long and the short of it is that the doppler flows indicate that Baby B is working harder than she should to get nutrients from her placenta. This probably indicates that her placenta has peaked. Normally, a placenta peaks around 36-37 weeks with a singleton and there are enough reserves for the baby to make it to 40+ weeks. Placentas tend to peak earlier with twins, but closer to 33-34 weeks. At 30.5 weeks, with a placenta that is already peaked, we're looking at a potential of only 2-3 weeks left before her placenta begins to give out and she exhibits signs of distress. Obviously, if she starts to exhibit distress, the only option is delivery.

The goal right now is to make it to 32 weeks. If we hit that, we'll try for 34 weeks. But, Dr. Wall is going to talk to anesthesiology and the NICU soon to let them know our situation, and I've also been bumped up to weekly BPPs with the potential for adding in NSTs in between as well, depending on how the BPPs go. I guess the good news is that, even though they are only measuring at the 21st and 27th percentiles, they are still basically holding steady as medium-sized babies (at 3 lbs 4 oz and 3 lbs 5 oz), and they both have good fluid levels. Baby B's dopplers are basically a red flag right now, but aren't actually a sign of distress yet. It's just a waiting game.

Dr. Wall is also concerned that I might develop pre-e. My BP was 120/64, which is fine of course, but placenta problems like this can cause pre-e and I'm starting to swell so he did a pre-e panel today to see whether there are any indications of something beginning on that front.

All told, it's kind of a slap in the face. Everything seemed to be going pretty well. I did my part and gained 5 lbs in 2 weeks and it didn't help the babies at all. I was hoping it was just my own lack of weight gain causing their small sizes but, of course, it's my freaking placenta again. My stupid cervix was 3.4, which Dr. Wall said is the longest one he's seen at this gestation with twins in a very long time, and I have zero signs of pre-term labor, yet it's always the placentas. WHY do I make such crappy placentas? I am still happy not to have had an abruption, of course, but if the placenta is just going to give out anyway we're not exactly making big progress. It's just so disappointing. Especially since I'd just started to let myself think that maybe, just maybe, we'd have big, healthy, take-home babies this time.

Don't get me wrong, though. This isn't the end of the world. We've made it to 30.5 weeks. We may very well make it to 34 weeks or even longer. No one knows what will happen with Baby B's placenta. But, we're definitely all on notice now in a way that we were not before.

For now, we just keep chugging along. There is nothing that I can do to improve the placental flow, and he said bedrest or eating tons of food wouldn't help. So, I'm just supposed to continue taking it easy and eating a bit more, but no real change from what I've been doing already.

Thank god this is my last pregnancy. I think we've more than pushed the limits of luck/grace/whatever at this point. We just need to get through this one and thank our lucky stars that we've been as lucky as we have.

30w2d

2010-09-14T20:16:00.000-07:00

Well, here I am in my 30th week of pregnancy! I'm not hospitalized, I'm not on bedrest, I have zero signs of pre-e or pre-term labor, and not an abruption in sight. It's kind of surreal, really. Like, whose pregnancy IS this?! Surely it can't be mine!

Except, it is mine, of course. And, with my poor pregnancy buddies dropping like flies, I'm more and more thankful every day not to have had any major complications. I'm so relieved to have made it this far already, and look forward to hanging in there as long as I can. Robert is sure that we're going to make it to 37 weeks, and maybe he is right. Who knows! If there's one thing that's sure about a twin pregnancy, it's that it will be unpredictable.

I have another MFM appt and growth scan tomorrow. Frankly, I'm dreading it. With a lot of dedication, I think that I've managed to gain a couple of pounds over the past two weeks but I'm afraid that it's not enough. I'm terrified that my babies are going to continue falling down on the growth charts. I definitely can't eat any more than I'm eating already, so I won't really know what to do if they aren't gaining better. As it is, I keep waking up with vomit in my mouth because being even remotely full leads to that. I'm also having to take Zofran 2-3 times per day again. There is just plain no way for me to eat MORE and I'm already doing my best to make sure that what I do eat is higher in calories. Fingers crossed that we get a good report tomorrow and I can stop worrying so much about it.

In other news, there isn't much to report other than continuing normal twin pregnancy misery. I wake up about every 30 minutes at night, everything hurts, and I feel like I'm going to puke 24/7. While it's awesome not being hospitalized, I'm also finding it challenging to figure out HOW to be this pregnant with twins without being hospitalized or on bedrest. How much is too much? When should I push myself? It's all a lot more complicated at home. That said, it's also so wonderful to be home with my family rather than stuck in a hospital room. I hope that, this time, I manage to spend only a few days of recovery time in the hospital rather than weeks!

And, of course, the obligatory 30 week belly pic!

29w0d

2010-09-05T12:30:00.000-07:00

We're still waiting on the roman shades I ordered to arrive in another 2-3 weeks, and I need to finally order a couple of changing pad covers, but otherwise... the nursery is DONE! I love it so much. It's not really my usual style, and I wasn't sure at times whether it was all going to come together, but I'm so happy that I stuck with it. I hope my little ones love their room, too!

In other news, I took advantage of Target's baby sale plus my 10% off through work and ordered a bunch of baby stuff today: car seats, swing, bouncer, bottles, milk storage bags, towels/washcloths, infant bath tub, first aid kit, etc. Once all of that arrives, we'll really only need our stroller (ordering this week!), replacement hand sets for our video monitors, and a breast pump (mostly covered by insurance if they are in the NICU). We're definitely on the home stretch where organization/prep is concerned, and I am so relieved. It makes me feel so much better knowing that we're getting things totally ready!

I've never made it to 29 weeks before without being hospitalized or on bedrest... even with my singleton. It's pretty exciting to be so far along with no major issues. I'm going to be THRILLED to hit 30 weeks next weekend. Who knows, maybe I'll make it all the way to 36 weeks without any real problems after all!

28w3d

2010-09-01T19:10:00.000-07:00

Well, today was not awesome. I had my MFM appt this afternoon and it lasted for almost 3 hours, which is never a good sign.

First, I got weighed and weighed exactly the same. I'm still up 21 lbs and have been there for a month (and, I think I only gained like 2 lbs the prior month, so it's been stuck right about here for a very long time). I wasn't really concerned about that, though, since the babies have been fine all along. However, then the nurse came in and told me that I had a ton of ketones in my urine. Ketones occur when your body starts burning fat for energy. In this case, it probably means that I'm not eating enough to sustain my nutritional needs.

That alone was somewhat alarming. But, then, they did the u/s and the girls only measured 2 lbs 9 oz and 2 lbs 10 oz. That is 24th and 26th percentile. The girls have been in the mid-upper 40s the entire pregnancy. They also did full doppler flows and, apparently, one of the measurements wasn't good. So, they re-did it two more times. I was scanned over and over again by both the tech and my MFM. It was a little nerve-wracking, honestly.

The end result was that I'm probably not eating enough and it's probably causing the babies not to grow enough. And, that sure sounds simple to fix. But, the problem is that I still struggle with nausea and take Zofran almost daily. Food makes me nauseated, sounds disgusting, and fills me up really quickly. If I stuff myself, it then makes me start choking on vomit every time I lie down. I'm currently eating the best that I can and that generally consists of a bagel with cream cheese for breakfast, a bowl of cereal for lunch, and a small dinner. That's probably less than I would eat to maintain my normal weight, much less pregnant with twins, but it's seriously been the best that I can do. I eat absolutely whatever I want. And then some more. I really don't know how I'm going to be able to stuff in more food and more calories.

Dr. Wall said that, for now, he is just going to keep an eye on it. It sounds like my next appt (two weeks from today) will really tell us what is going on. He ordered a full growth scan again, rather than waiting four weeks for that, so we'll be able to track their progress. He seemed to think that, if there is a problem, they will continue to move down in the next two weeks. Although he didn't seem overly concerned, he did tell me that it's more important to get calories than it is to even worry about gallbladder attacks... and to eat more fat (I've been avoiding it for fear of that). I'd say that he seemed sober about it, but certainly not panicking or anything. He did also say that nutritional issues in the babies could be caused by placental problems, but seemed to think that it was more likely related to my nutrition.

So. Yeah. Time for me to gain some goddamn weight.

27w4d

2010-08-26T20:17:00.000-07:00

I don't have much of an update tonight except to share my vastness with the world. I've definitely expanded quite a bit lately. I still weigh the same (up 21 pounds, where I've been for over a month now), so I guess it's not fat... just some big 'ol babies!

In other news, our nursery is about 95% complete and will be even closer on Sunday when my stepdad installs the new chandelier. All we're waiting on now is the roman shades! I also need to buy four white frames for the prints and a few changing pad covers, but all of the big stuff is done. I am totally in love with how it is turning out, too. The orange was kind of crazy, but it's all come together so well. I just love their room!

27w0d

2010-08-22T20:14:00.000-07:00

Another week. I'm pretty excited to be so close to 28 weeks, which seems like a milestone. But, really, the big one is hitting the 30s. I can't WAIT to do that! Just a few more weeks...

This week is kind of a big one, too, because it's when I had my abruption last time. Robert seems to think that it means something if we make it through this week ok. Personally, I don't think that I'm really any more likely to have an abruption in week 27 just because I did last time. After all, with C&E, I had an abruption at 25 weeks. I figure that I'll either have one whenever it happens or I won't (presumably because the Lovenox did its job). But, I don't have a lot invested in the idea of making it through this week. Still, every week without an abruption is an accomplishment, so I'll take whatever I can get!

I'm still stable crap, as Dr. Wall would say. Nothing is happening, really, I just feel SO awful. I think that being unable to sleep more than a few broken hours per night is having a big impact on me. Even my normal health issues get worse from that and I doubt it helps the pregnancy stuff. I'm just big, achy, exhausted, and sick most of the time. Still dealing with nausea, too, which has gotten worse as the sleep issues have gotten worse. Today, I've had 3/4 of a bagel with cream cheese, a bowl of granola with milk, and one bite of a cupcake. I just can't eat much at all, even with the help of Zofran. My entire belly aches and I wake up in the middle of the night with vomit coming up into my throat. It's not a pretty sight over here.

Still, I'm stable and I thank whatever higher power is out there for that every day. I'll take all of my pregnancy pains if it gets me two healthy babies in the end. But, believe you me, this is categorically the END of my baby-making endeavors. I mean, we have enough kids anyway, but I can't even conceive of doing this again. I'm done, done, done. Or will be, soon enough!

In other news, Robert and I hung the bookshelf, wall pegs, and the tree decal last night. It took us awhile to do, but we both felt so productive and happy when we were done. It's so fun to have such tangible results. I LOVE how the nursery is coming out. It just feels so warm and happy to me.

Still to come are the chandelier, roman shades, a few more decals, a few framed prints, and a changing pad cover. But, we're definitely nearing completion at this point! Yay!

As an aside, I've been thinking about the future of this blog. While I'm certainly going to continue it through the remainder of my pregnancy and any NICU time, I think that I'm going to retire it when these babies come home. As I found with Alice & Charlotte, it eventually becomes difficult to separate out baby stuff vs. family stuff. So, I'm going to focus on my family blog rather than this one once that time comes. If you'd like to continue to read about our family, you'll want to make sure that you read my family blog: http://homesteadingandthecity.blogspot.com/. It's still a relatively new blog, but I plan to expand it quite a bit as time goes on.... and especially when it's my only real blog to maintain!

26w3d

2010-08-18T21:33:00.000-07:00

I had the most boring MFM appointment ever this morning. Dr. Wall is off climbing mountains in Switzerland, so I had a substitute MFM. She was pretty lame. She walked in, asked me how I felt, told me that all of my levels/babies looked good, and then told me that I am a twin pregnancy pro. I sort of blinked at her, and then made a comment about it being true that I do not suffer from pre-term labor but, really?! Has she not read my chart?! I have a cervix of steel, but I sure as HECK am not very good at twin pregnancy! At any rate, after that awkward exchange, I asked about my gallbladder. She seemed disinterested and told me that someone will probably take it out after the babies are born. And that was that. She was in and out in under 2 minutes. Oh, Dr. Wall, how I miss you.

Other than that, I had a brief u/s and cervix check today. Both babies were moving, looked good, had heartrates of 131 and 148 bpm, had plenty of fluid, and were breech with their little heads together. My cervix is still over 4 cm, so no excitement there. BP was totally normal, nothing weird in my urine, or anything else to report, really. They also made me take the 1 hour glucose tolerance test, which came back normal.

For now, I'm officially a boring pregnant woman. I definitely hope that it stays that way. If I can make it through next week, I'll have made it further without an abruption than I've ever made it before. Fingers crossed that the Lovenox lets me make it all the way to a normal delivery!

In other news, we got a TON of nursery stuff in the mail the other day. It all arrived the same day as the furniture delivery, so that was fun. We all had fun setting it up. We still haven't hung up the bookshelf or wall pegs, but we're getting there (albeit slowly). I'm still waiting on the chandelier, two sets of wall decals, shelves/frames for the "family tree" I'm making, a changing pad cover, the custom roman shades, and frames for the prints that I bought. But, the room is definitely coming together! I love looking at it. It makes me so happy!

25w4d

2010-08-12T19:22:00.000-07:00

I have good news and bad news.

The good news is that a bunch of our nursery stuff shipped and is arriving tomorrow! Including our long-awaited dresser/nightstand/bookshelf. I can't wait to see it in the room! It seems like I've been waiting for this stuff forever. I also ordered everything else for the nursery that we need except a couple of wall decals, so it's going to really come together as a lot of this stuff arrives over the next few weeks. I can't wait!

The bad news is that, after having two attacks of TERRIBLE upper abdominal pain, I went in for an u/s today and it turns out that my gallbladder is full of gallstones. I won't know for sure what the plan is until my MFM gets the report on Monday and we talk, but it sounds like they pretty much won't do anything until after these babies are born, at which time they will have to remove my gallbladder. I have to say that this was an unexpected development. This is also by far the worst pain that I've ever experienced. I really, really hope that I don't have any more attacks before they can get my gallbladder out! It feels kind of like I have a ticking timebomb inside me at this point.

And, finally a new belly pic! Taken a few days ago at 25w2d. I'm up 21 pounds so far this pregnancy and, other than my fat face of pregnancy, I think that I look about the same as pre-pg (well, besides the belly!).

24w5d

2010-08-06T19:48:00.000-07:00

Still here, still sick, still failing miserably at getting any new belly pics. Part of the reason for that is that I am constantly in yoga pants and tank tops due to being at home. I meant to take a pic on Wednesday since I had to wear real clothes to go to my MFM appointment, but I forgot. So, maybe this weekend. I have to leave the house eventually... right?

Anyway, all was well at my MFM appt. Both babies look great. They are 1 lb 9 oz and 1 lb 10 oz right now, which is 43rd and 53rd percentile respectively. The marginal previa is no more, and both placentas are nicely away from my cervix. My cervix is still measuring over 4. So, basically, the babies are doing awesome! I'm still a mess, but at least it's not impacting them. A lot of girls on my twins board are dealing with preterm labor issues right now, so I'm especially thankful not to be having any contractions or cervical issues.

One super exciting thing that happened on Wednesday was that the bedding and mobiles we ordered from Etsy finally arrived! So, as soon as we walked in the door, we started setting those up. I LOVE how everything turned out and it's made me super excited to finish the room. I ordered the dresser, nightstand, and bookshelf from PBK awhile ago but they messed up my address so hopefully that stuff will be delivered soon. Right now, we don't have anywhere to put anything, so it doesn't really inspire me to start buying stuff!

That said, I did find a great deal on 40 XS Fuzzi Bunz. I got them in their new bright, fun colors so I'm excited to receive those. I got them WAY cheaper than retail, too, so that was awesome. Yay for DiaperSwappers! 40 isn't really a ton of diapers for two newborns, so we'll have to wash a lot, but I don't want to spend a fortune buying diapers that they'll only be in for a couple of months. Hopefully, by the time that they outgrow the XS FB, the girls will be potty trained and they can inherit their diapers. But, even if we have to buy new diapers for them, I got such a good deal on the XS FB that they actually usually sell for more used so we'll be able to get our money back at least. I love cloth!

I've also been ordering some finishing touches for the nursery. Today, I ordered custom pink damask roman shades for their windows. The fabric is from the same line as their bedding and I'm really excited about these. I think that they'll look really cute in the windows while also being really practical since they are lined with black out fabric and will act as blinds, too. It's going to be 4-6 weeks until they arrive, so more waiting, but it was totally worth it to get the pink damask as opposed to plain pink elsewhere! I also ordered a wall decal for over the dresser/changer that I'm excited to receive. I will probably get a couple more for other parts of the room, but we'll see. I originally planned to have a large tree decal behind the cribs but now I'm afraid it might be too much. I need to wait and see what the room looks like once everything else is in it.

The last few details to choose are the rug and chandelier. I think that I've settled on a bright striped rug from Land of Nod, but the chandelier is still up in the air (ha!). I remember seeing a cool one awhile back, but now I can't find it. Doh.

Here are a few pictures we took after getting the bedding and mobiles. Imagine the mobiles further down... I was too excited to wait to hang them until we got more wire and they came with very short wires!

24w2d

2010-08-03T21:15:00.000-07:00

We hit 24 weeks on Sunday, which was pretty exciting. Don't get me wrong, I'm well aware that I do not want to have 24 weekers, but the very fact that they have reached the edge of viability is pretty exciting to me. It's also a little overwhelming to think that we could easily have newborns in 10 weeks or less. EEK!!

In other news, my next appointment and u/s with my MFM is tomorrow. This one will be the full growth/anatomy scan along with the cervix check. I'm really hoping to see nice big babies since I never have very big babies. Maybe these two will be different! I'm also hoping for a clean bill of health where my BP, cervix, and placentas are concerned.

As for me, it's been rough the past few days. I caught Robert's cold and cough yesterday so I'm pretty miserable because of that. Plus, I ran out of my reflux meds and my mail order pharmacy sent me all of my refills except that one (for reasons no one can explain), so that was EXTREMELY painful until I gave in and just had Robert buy me a few pills to tide me over. I'm also having a lot of back pain, sciatica, and sharp shooting pains in my belly. The pains freak me out a little except that I get them on both sides and it seems like any placental type issues would only be on one side. It's probably just a really pissed off muscle or two. Still, I'll feel better after seeing healthy, happy babies on the u/s tomorrow.

Mostly, I think that I'm just scared these days. I've had abruptions at 25 and 27 weeks in prior pregnancies. I'm coming right up to that danger zone. I desperately hope that the Lovenox works and we don't end up with yet another abruption, but it's really scary as we get closer and closer to those weeks. I'm also worried because we have almost nothing for these babies so far, and even the stuff we've already ordered is taking forever to arrive. I feel completely unprepared, and I'm so scared of ending up hospitalized away from my family and unable to prepare for these babies.

But, I'm also paranoid. For now, things are good. The babies look great. My cervix isn't budging. There is no sign of any abruptions. I may be living on borrowed time, but maybe I'm not. For now, all I can try to do is rest, relax, and not obsess about what might or might not happen.

Last day of voting!

2010-07-29T21:32:00.000-07:00

Tomorrow is the last day of voting, so if you haven't already, please take a minute to vote for us to win the FREE Baby Planet double stroller and video monitor. This is especially awesome timing since the double stroller that we use for Alice & Charlotte just decided to stop folding up AND our video monitor is on its last legs. We're going to need both of them for the new babies, too! Since we're buying every single baby item ourselves, times two, getting ANYTHING for free would be awesome.

So, if you have a minute, please oh please vote for us! All you have to do is go to this link: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Mindful-Mama/109104709107402?ref=ts&v=wall

Once you're there, just like the page so that it will allow you to comment, click on the Just Others tab, and scroll down until you find the nomination for Jody, posted by Lani (around July 15, I think... you'll need to scroll a bit). All you have to do is either comment on it or like it and you will have voted for us! I know that it takes a minute or two, but I'd really, really appreciate it if anyone out there would add their votes. I never EVER win anything, but if I could start now, boy could we use this stuff!

23w3d

2010-07-28T10:52:00.000-07:00

For some reason, I like to make up arbitrary rules in my head. Like, I decided that I wouldn't post again until I hit 23 weeks, and I decided to post my next belly pic at 24 weeks. Why? I couldn't tell you! But, I'm over 23 weeks now, so here I am!

I had another MFM appt. last Wednesday with Dr. Wall. It was the first one that Robert couldn't attend (he even went to all of the IVF monitoring appts), and Dr. Wall told me to tell him that he missed him and that men need playdates, too. I think that Dr. Wall likes Robert more than me! At any rate, we talked a bit about how I've been feeling and he decided that I was done working. Honestly, it was a relief. Work has been SO hard on me lately, even if only for a few hours, and it's difficult even from home because I'm so wiped out and need to try to rest so much. Dr. Luke's book says that moms-to-be of twins should stop working at 24 weeks and start resting 6 hours per day. That might be overkill for some women, but it seems about right for me. I have very little tolerance for much of anything except hanging out on the couch or sleeping these days!

Otherwise, all looked good with the babies. As Dr. Wall put it, I'm "stable crappy" these days. Babies look good, placentas look fine, BP is normal, and the uterine debris has been re-absorbed. The babies are hanging in there just fine... it's really just me that's struggling.

Anyway, I filed for my leave last week and scheduled it to begin today. I wanted to finish a bunch of work that was on my plate that was due yesterday, which I did, so starting today was good timing. I was able to leave feeling like my stuff was pretty much wrapped up. I've also been in communication with my manager for a long time, so we had someone prepared to take over for me. It'll be hard for me to go back, though, because this is a role where I am the one who generally knows all of the answers. But, after being off until Feb-March of next year, I'll be the one playing catch up. It's kind of scary to think about, actually. But, I know that it's the right thing to do for me and the babies, so we're doing it.

In other news, I went in for a single fiber EMG on Monday to finally determine whether I have myasthenia gravis. I was diagnosed with it about 7-8 months ago but then my neuro said that he wasn't sure that I had it after all and pulled me off my meds about 6 weeks ago. It's been VERY rough ever since being pulled off those meds, so I was both eager to take the test and a little scared of it. The test itself is where they basically stick needles into your muscles and shock them repeatedly for an hour or so. Because my worst symptoms are in my eyes, they decided to insert the needles into the muscles around my eyes. They then shocked me in pairs, where each pair was about 30 spaced out shocks followed by 30-50 shocks with no spaces in between. Simply put, it wasn't pleasant. At all. But, the good (?) news is that the test confirmed that I very obviously have ocular MG. Because they didn't test any other muscle, we don't know whether it's actually generalized or not, but I have symptoms of generalized, so I'm pretty sure that's what it is. Finally having a solid diagnosis will hopefully make my treatment plan much more aggressive. I hope that, eventually, I'm able to actually feel good. My goal until now was really just not to feel terrible.

My next appt. with Dr. Wall is next Wednesday. I'm sure that we'll talk about the MG and how to manage it for the duration of the pregnancy. I've already gone back on my meds, so hopefully they will begin to help soon.

Lastly, our mobiles shipped Saturday and I heard from the Etsy seller who is making our bedding that she is nearly finished. I also ordered our dresser, nightstand, and book shelf on a great sale from PBK last week. I can't wait until that all gets here and I can see how it looks! I'm not ordering any finishing touches like curtains/rug/wall decals until it all gets here and I can see the room together, so we're stalled for now. I am really looking forward to having a finished nursery. Sometimes, I go in there at night and rock in the rocking chair and try to imagine what it will be like to have two new babies. I'm still feeling pretty overwhelmed by the thought, but the more we get done to prepare, the more excited that I become!

22w2d

2010-07-20T17:11:00.000-07:00

Much like 24 weeks is a magical week for viability, I feel like 22 weeks is a magical week... except for feeling like crap. It's like, all of a sudden, everything has gotten harder. I mean, it's been hard for me to do much for awhile now, but it has gotten SO much worse over the past few days. I used to be able to at least sit outside, or at the beach, or at the park, or at the children's museum, or at the mall while the girls played. Now? Now, I get exhausted and feel terrible if I sit upright for even an hour. An hour sitting upright pretty much requires an hour of laying down to recover. It seems to have sort of come out of nowhere, and I'm having a hard time balancing my needs (or that of these new babies) with the needs of my kiddos.

With the older kids, it's pretty easy. First of all, they don't WANT to spend all day with me. They have activities and each other and parks/fields within walking distance and so on. Right now, for instance, they are having a water balloon fight in the front yard. That's what summer as a kid is about. Secondly, they understand that I can't do as much because of how I'm feeling. So, they come and sit with me, and we talk, and I know that they are doing just fine. Sure, they'd be thrilled if we hadn't postponed our planned trip to Disneyland until the new year, but we've had a super fun summer and have done lots of fun stuff together. But, above all, they are old enough to get it, just a little, and that makes a huge difference.

Where the girls are concerned, lately I feel like a terrible mother. Sure, I'm physically here day in and day out, but I can't get down on the floor and play anymore, really, and I spend most of my time on the couch. They come and cuddle with me, or bring me books, or even just come sit with me and jabber about things, but they also want to play. So, they play with their siblings or their nanny, while I watch and talk to them about it. I also can't go with them on outings very often anymore, so there is 1-2 hours every day where they are out doing fun things and I'm here. I hate that, and it makes me feel like I'm missing out on SO much. I still do certain things that my girls really, really want me to do (like sit with them at meal times and always sing/put them down for nap and bed times), but as time goes on, I'm able to do less and less of the other stuff. While it's a lifesaver that we have our nanny full-time right now, I miss the days when it was just me and the kids primarily. I love being with my kids, taking care of my kids, and feeling like I'm right there at the center of their lives. Right now, even though I know that they love me, I feel like I'm on the periphery. And it breaks my heart.

Over the past few weeks, I've probably pushed myself much more than I should've to avoid exactly that. But, now, things have gotten so much harder that it's just not that possible anymore. I know that it will only get worse as time goes on, and it makes me feel so sad and like such a failure as a mom. I knew that being pregnant again would have an impact on all of us, of course, but I guess I didn't realize how hard it would be for me to sit on the sidelines. I'm always here with them, and they seem to be doing just fine, but I miss them so much.

Tonight, Robert asked me if I wanted to take the older kids to a movie... and I said no. I feel terrible, and I just can't do it. I know that I've got to start listening to my body more, but it's still hard.

21w3d

2010-07-14T21:20:00.000-07:00

I overdid it yesterday. There are no ifs, ands, or buts about it. I felt cruddy on Monday and still felt cruddy yesterday. But, for reasons I can't explain, I went to the mall play area with the kids in the morning anyway. Then, I bought a bunch of stuff and had to lug that around, and THEN I decided to take the kids out to lunch. Everyone was very well behaved, and it was super fun, but I was pretty darn fried by the time I got home and got the girls down for nap (late). Then, just in case that wasn't enough, I pretty much turned around and headed out to my salon appointment.

Now, it might not sound like a big deal to have a pedi/wax/hair cut and color. And, it shouldn't be. I used to do all of them regularly. But, ever since the girls came along, I've found that something had to give. And, well, it's been my time for things like that. I'm always so focused on spending time at home with the kids that I never seem to make appointments for myself. I have two gift cards for desperately needed massages and haven't even booked those yet! I keep vowing to do better, and take some time for myself, but I never do. This led to my hair growing out about 8-10 inches, becoming like half grey, and my eyebrows resembling caterpillars. Talk about a few blows to my self esteem. However, with my formal wedding coming up on Saturday, I was finally horrified by what I saw in the mirror enough to get my butt to the salon. So, I got a pedi, my eyebrows done, and a hair cut and color. And, boy was it needed. Still, it took 3.5 hours. I took Emilia with me, so we decided to get a snack at a restaurant by the salon. All I wanted was this goat cheese appetizer... and they forgot to enter it in so her food came and mine took forever. Then, it took us 30 minutes to find the car in the parking garage. And THEN I tried to pay for parking and realized my card was still at the restaurant. I seriously just wanted to sit in the garage and cry by that point. By the time that I got home, I'd been going pretty much all day. I felt truly AWFUL. I checked email and such and then went to bed. I haven't been that done in quite awhile.

Today has been a much better day. I've spent most of it on the couch, resting and drinking water (albeit working, emailing, phone calling, playing with the kids, reading books to the girls, cuddling, etc). Still, I have the worst cramping that I've had in a long time. It's pretty much going nuts in there. I took three Ibuprofen, since that's my MFM's first step, and am drinking still more water (I am now working on my 8th liter today so, clearly, I'm hydrated). I don't think it's preterm labor at this point, but it sure seems like I have a touchy uterus. I guess it wants me to chill the heck out.

In other news, I heard from the woman on Etsy who is making our bedding and all of our fabrics are in and she is starting on them! I'm so excited to see the finished product! I decided to hold off on buying anything else for the room until the bedding is here and I can see it, so everything is pretty much halted for now. I can't wait to receive them! I think it will only be another 2-3 weeks now. Yay!

My legit 21 weeks belly pic... taken last night right before I collapsed in bed!

21w1d

2010-07-12T21:00:00.000-07:00

I think that I have officially hit the point in pregnancy where I feel very pregnant. My MFM never does a fundal height, so I don't know where I'm measuring compared to a woman pregnant with a singleton, but I do know that I'm pretty darn large. I'm slowing down. Sometimes, after getting up from a seated position, I even waddle a little bit.

I don't really mind any of that, though. For the most part, I just try to listen to my body and not overdo it. That's hard for me to do, since I always have a plan, and an idea, and somewhere to be, and something to do. But, I'm learning to take a step back sometimes, or even just find less intense ways of doing things. For instance, on Saturday, we had the plan to take the kids to the aquarium and then walk around the pier/waterfront for a bit. We got everyone ready to go and then realized that our nanny had the girls' carseats. Doh! So, then we came up with the plan of just taking the lightrail from the stop right by our house to downtown and then walking from downtown to the waterfront. It's about 6 blocks each way, and it was sunny and in the low 80s. I really wanted to go on the lightrail with the girls since they had never been on it before, but Robert eventually convinced me that it wasn't a good idea. Well, ok, he accused me of being selfish and putting my own desires ahead of the health and well-being of our babies, which is pretty much a conversation ender. But, still, he was right. It wasn't a good idea for me to take the lightrail. So, I drove the boys and he took the lightrail with the girls, and we all met up there and had a great time. We saw fish in the aquarium and then had fish for dinner on the pier, which is actually pretty wrong if you think about it. But, it was a great afternoon! By the time that we got home and got the girls to bed, I was so sore that I could barely move and spent the evening in bed... clearly, he was right not to let me walk!

Anyway, being big and sore isn't all that is going on. I'm also feeling lots and lots of movement these days. The movements are getting much stronger now, and I'm also starting to feel rolls and wiggles and other types of movements like that. I love feeling them and it really helps me to stay sane in between my appointments. I still worry about these girls every day, and it's nice to know that at least they are still hanging out in there, doing just fine.

Speaking of worry, now that I'm in the 20s, I feel like I'm living on borrowed time, just waiting for the other shoe to drop. I had that debris at my last appointment, and I feel like it's just the beginning of yet another abruption nightmare. I worry that my abruption luck has run out and that we won't make it to even 32 weeks this time. I also worry what it would be like to be hospitalized and to be away from the girls. I spend SO much time with them on a daily basis due to working at home that I just can't conceive of only getting to see them an hour a day or something. It just breaks my heart. The older kids would know why I was there, and that it was only temporary, but the girls wouldn't understand. Ugh. It kills me.

Here's hoping for a boring, uneventful pregnancy.

Us at the aquarium (aka trying to get good pics of all of us is like herding cats!)

20w4d

2010-07-08T18:31:00.000-07:00

One of the awesome ladies on my MoMs board nominated us to win a cool double stroller and video monitor in a Facebook contest! This is especially awesome timing since the double stroller that we use for Alice & Charlotte just decided to stop folding up AND our video monitor is on its last legs. We're going to need both of them for the new babies, too! Since we're buying every single baby item ourselves, times two, getting ANYTHING for free would be awesome.

So, if you have a minute, please oh please vote for us! All you have to do is go to this link: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Mindful-Mama/109104709107402?ref=ts&v=wall

Once you're there, just like the page so that it will allow you to comment, click on the Just Others tab, and scroll down until you find the nomination for Jody, posted by Lani. All you have to do is either comment on it or like it and you will have voted for us! I know that it takes a minute or two, but I'd really, really appreciate it if anyone out there would add their votes. I never win anything, but if I could start now, boy could we use this stuff!

In other news, I'm huge, it's hot, and I'm beginning to resemble the Goodyear Blimp. Doh.

20w3d

2010-07-07T21:11:00.000-07:00

For some reason, 20 weeks feels like a milestone to me. I guess for normal pregnancies it IS a milestone since it's halfway there, but for me it's just another week. Still, I love watching the weeks go by, so I guess it can be a milestone just for that reason. It's a new week, in a new decade! Slowly but surely I'm making it through this pregnancy.

I had my regular MFM appointment and u/s today. Today was the anatomy/growth scan and cervix check. The anatomy scan took forever. Like, seriously, the u/s itself lasted about two hours. In fact, it went on for so long that Dr. Wall came in, sat down, and totally BS'd with us for about half of it! We were talking about all sorts of random stuff, some of which should probably never be discussed with your doctor. My favorite quote from him today was that his goal next appointment is to work a certain brand of alcohol into every paragraph he speaks! Good times.

Anyway, the babies look great! They are both measuring right on track and weigh 12 and 13 ounces. Somehow, that is 43rd and 56th percentile, which is sort of funny. At any rate, they are medium-sized, which is how all of my kids are. I don't have big babies no matter how hard I try! My weight was up a whopping FIVE pounds in two weeks, but I was pretty puffy so I think it's probably about half fluid. Still. Yowza. I'm only up 19 total for the pregnancy, though, which is 1 pound behind Dr. Luke's rec, so I'm still right where I should be.

The cervical u/s was a little less awesome. My cervix is still over 4 cm and doing nothing, as it should be, but they saw some "uterine debris" on the scan that is presumably old blood. To recap, I don't get preterm labor but I have abruptions. And here I am at 20 weeks with random blood in my uterus (presumably also causing last week's bout of uterine bitchiness). The good news is that there is no sign of any actual bleeding, and it was a VERY small amount of blood. The bad news is that we know I am prone to placental issues and there is goddamn blood in my uterus. Still, my MFM wasn't worried, and said we'll just watch it and keep doing what we're doing, so I'm not going to worry for now. I'm definitely on alert a bit, though. Oh, and just for fun, Dr. Wall said today that he would consider me to have a 50% chance of having another abruption this pregnancy. Now, I know that abruptions often re-occur, and I've had three spread over two pregnancies, but 50%?! Yowza. Dr. Wall also told me that, if I'd had triplets this time, he would've thrown a temper tantrum. Me too!

Anyway, it is what it is. It sure isn't blood gushing everywhere like before, so that's good news. They thought they saw some old blood once before and it was gone by the next u/s. So, perhaps all is well after all, and I'll actually make it through this pregnancy without an abruption. God knows we're doing everything we can to make that be true.

19w1d

2010-06-28T19:09:00.000-07:00

It's been an eventful few days around here. First, I had an u/s and MFM visit on Wednesday, where we confirmed, without a doubt, that we're definitely going to be welcoming Lydia Jane and Sophia Scarlett Knight in a few months!

Then, I ended up in L&D (alone, in the middle of the night, because Robert had to stay home with the kids... doh) on Saturday night. I was woken up around 1 am by cramping/tightening that felt an awful lot like contractions. After about two hours of trying to decide whether it was worth going in, I finally decided to just go in since clearly I wasn't going to get any sleep otherwise! So, I went in around 3 am and they hooked me up to a monitor, checked my urine for a UTI, and listened to both babies on a doppler.

The long and the short of it is that I was not having contractions, since contractions are over 1 minute long, but I had lots of minor uterine irritability. My uterus is pissed, basically. They gave me a sleeping pill that has a side effect of relaxing the uterus and sent me home. I took it when I got home at 5 am, which pretty much meant that I was in bed all day Sunday. And, that sucked since we had super fun plans for Sunday! Anyway, it kept up all day Sunday so I finally called my MFM and he told me to take 2 Ibuprofen 4 times a day for the next few days and then call to touchbase around the middle of the week. Thus far, the Ibuprofen is definitely helping to chill things out, but it kicks back in pretty much anytime I stand up and do anything. I made the kids french bread pizzas for lunch today, using sauce Robert made this weekend and cheese he shredded, and just doing that plus putting the girls down kicked up a bunch of cramping. I pretty much feel minorly crampy all the time now, with bouts of more severe cramping/tightening.

I have to say that this has really thrown me for a loop. Of all of the pregnancy problems I have, I don't do preterm labor. Ever. My cervix has never gone below a 4 during even a twin pregnancy. I don't have contractions. That's supposed to be the one thing I can count on for sure! Now, that said, I did have about a week of uterine irritability with the girls right around this time that just disappeared and never came back. While this has been much more intense, I'm hoping it is just as random as that was!

In other news, my neuro and MFM have been coordinating and, apparently, there is some doubt over whether I really do have myasthenia gravis. My neuro diagnosed me without antibodies based on an extreme positive response to a medication for MG. However, apparently, whether I have MG could be REALLY important during pregnancy (they can't use some common PTL or pre-e meds, for instance, if I have it), so now they are going to run more tests to try to confirm that diagnosis for sure. I have to have a single fiber EMG at the UW soon, which sounds awful because they shock your optic nerve. Gross! Still, it will be good to get a firmer diagnosis or know that I probably do not have MG. Of course, if I don't, it will mean back to the autoimmune drawing board, and that was one hell of a long, awful road. In the meantime, they took me off my MG med, so I'm dragging like whoa and everything hurts. It's better to do the test fully off the meds, though.

In other news, we've been making some nursery progress by ordering our mobiles and crib bedding. I'm so excited about these! I ordered them off Etsy, so it will be a little while until they are made and shipped out, but it's still fun to know that they are in the works.
I ordered two of these mobiles, but in colors to match our bedding, and espresso wood instead of the white.

For bedding, I ordered two bumpers in this fabric:

Two crib skirts in this fabric:

And 2 sheets in each of these fabrics:

This is our nursery right now, waiting for more stuff!

17w5d

2010-06-18T18:05:00.000-07:00

This pregnancy thing is rough. I'm clearly far too old for this gig these days! I'm seriously amazed by how much easier this was in my 20s. I don't think of 31 as exactly "old," but it's SO much harder to be pregnant this time around.

I'm really struggling with work. I made it a whopping 2.5 hours in the office today before going home, and my ankles were huge by the time I got home. I'm just so exhausted most of the time that I'm not sure that I'm very useful at home, either. Meanwhile, I have pregnancy brain of doom, so I feel like everything I once knew is locked away in my brain right outside of reach. I hope to make it through July at work, but we'll see.

I didn't have an appointment with Dr. Wall this week. Apparently, I was scheduled to see a different doctor on Thursday, but Dr. Wall saw my appointment and asked the nurses to reschedule me for a day he'd be in the office. So, my new appointment is on Wednesday. I'm looking forward to seeing the babies again as well as talking to Dr. Wall about some of my recent issues. I'm just SO sore and worn out and puffy and nauseated. I'm not sure that there is any reason for any of it other than being pregnant with twins, but it's still comforting to touch base with my doctor regularly.

I've been worrying lately about how my girls are going to react to new babies. They are very possessive of me and will even push away the older kids and get upset when they try to hug me! Plus, they are used to being able to climb onto my lap at any moment of the day, knowing that I'll stop whatever I'm doing and pay attention to them. I just don't know how it's all going to work with two new babies, but I'm really committed to not allowing my girls to be neglected by me. Things will have to change to some degree, but I hope that we're able to figure something out that still preserves the relationship that I have right now with my little ones. In many ways, it's a lot easier with the big kids because they are old enough to understand that the baby phase is rough, but then it gets easier, and there is much more time to spend with them. Plus, they have so many of their own activities/interests that they just don't WANT to be around me as much as the girls. I worry about my little bugs.

I left work early today and planned to rest but, instead, we went to the park with the girls since it was sunny out. I love that I'm able to be home the vast majority of the time with them.

16w6d

2010-06-12T11:49:00.000-07:00

I've been neglecting this poor blog, mostly because there just isn't that much to say these days! I'm pregnant. Yup. That's about all I've got!

Seriously, though, things are better and things are worse. The nausea is finally getting better, so that's been wonderful! I still get nauseated 2-3 times a day, and still have to take 1-2 Zofran most days, but it's bouts of severe nausea instead of 24/7 queasiness so it's far easier to deal with than it was before. That's made me more able to eat, which has also been nice. I can't eat much at any one time, but to be able to eat food and actually enjoy it sometimes has been such a wonderful change after the last few months!

On the other end of the spectrum, I'm still dealing with a lot of swelling and headaches when I try to do much of anything. So, mostly, I try to just NOT do a lot. That approach seems to be working pretty well thus far. I'm also noticing a lot more myasthenia gravis symptoms lately. My meds don't seem to be working much anymore, and all of my muscles are very weak lately. If I even lift one leg in the shower to shave my legs, the other one starts trembling within a few seconds, and then I get out of breath and my heart starts racing. I'm also have a lot of hand pain/numbness again, which makes it harder to type and do basic things around the house. I have an appointment with my neurologist on the 21st, though, so hopefully he can do something to my meds to help those symptoms ease up. My meds normally work very well, so this is clearly a pregnancy thing.

Lastly, I'm having really, really severe back pain. It goes from mid-back all the way through my lower back, groin, and down my left leg. Ouch, ouch, ouch! I'm not sure whether this is part of the MG, or just pregnancy pains, or both. Either way, it hurts!

Still, I'm so happy not to feel pukey all the time that, overall, I'm pretty pleased with my lot in life right now. I'm also optimistic that at least some of this will improve after the 21st. Meanwhile, I feel lots more movement now, and I LOVE that! So, all in all, I'll take it.

Here's a belly pic that I took yesterday to show off my expanding girth. Robert and I are in Hawaii right now, for our last getaway before babies, so this was taken in our hotel bathroom. The trip has been great so far, and it's nice to get a little R&R in. Still, I miss the heck out of my girls. The older kids are having a great time with their grandparents, so it's easier to leave them (especially since they understand exactly when we'll be home and where we are), but I worry about my girls.

15w3d

2010-06-02T19:54:00.000-07:00

This afternoon, I had my very long-awaited MFM appointment and u/s. And, it was pretty darn awesome! The tech ended up doing a growth and anatomy scan for the first time this pregnancy, so we pretty much got to look at and measure every single bone and organ in those babies' bodies! The entire u/s took almost two hours, which might have been a little longer than we really needed to look at our babies, but it was still so cool to see them. They are SO much larger than our last u/s. Robert and I were both amazed!

All of the measurements, organs, etc. looked completely normal. We could see all four chambers of both hearts, and their heartrates were both right around 140 bpm. They both measured at 4 ounces, and were in the 44th and 45th percentiles. Dr. Wall said, though, that their ability to really predict size is pretty crappy this early, so it's mostly just a guess. Still, there was nothing concerning whatsoever about either baby. My favorite part of the u/s was when baby B spent a good 5 minutes kicking baby A in the face, who responded by punching baby B! Good times.

So, other than verifying that everyone was healthy, we were really eager for today's appointment to find out the sexes. And, both babies cooperated and showed off the goods multiple times during the u/s. In fact, the pictures I have are actually quick ones that the tech took for me at the end. The first round of pictures were much better, and it was SO clear. We are having TWO GIRLS! Their names will be Lydia Jane (baby B) and Sophia Scarlett (baby A). I'm really excited about having two girls again, especially considering how much fun I have with Alice and Charlotte. Now, if only I'd kept some of their baby stuff...

After the u/s excitement, we met briefly with Dr. Wall. One of my concerns recently has been my blood pressure. I think it's normal most of the time, but I have definitely started to feel periodic spikes. I am also having a lot of swelling. Lo and behold, today I weighed TEN pounds more than I did two weeks ago. I don't eat even pre-pregnancy amounts, much less enough to gain that kind of weight, so clearly I'm retaining a metric assload of water. My BP was 127/68 today, which is normal, but also much higher than pre-pg (tended to be 90s over 50s). Dr. Wall said that he thinks that my BP will continue to rise and that my meds will have to be adjusted, and my BP may end up being an issue for this pregnancy.

Otherwise, we talked about how I'm feeling generally. It's hard to describe, but I feel like my body is struggling. Like, I go to work and sit in an office for three hours and can barely move, have pitting edema, and get a headache with floaters. If I sit at home and chill on the couch with the girls most of the day, I get through the day ok. Dr. Wall said that I should think about next steps over the next two weeks, but that I may need to reduce work and/or possibly go out of work entirely around 18 weeks. That's earlier than I was hoping for, but it's also better than 10 weeks like last time. Really I'll do whatever I need to do in order to have healthy babies, but I think we'll try to phase the hours down and then see how I react. I doubt I'll be working much into my 20s, if at all, but it's nice if only for the adult interaction to get out of the house now and then! He did say, though, that it's still ok to go to Hawaii on the 10th, but we just need to be mindful of getting enough rest, etc.

So, that's that. Hanging in there for now, having two beautiful girls, and couldn't be happier!

15 weeks

2010-05-30T12:32:00.000-07:00

I haven't been posting much lately because, well, even I can only whine so much about not feeling well before it gets old. I try to focus on the positive most of the time, but it gets hard sometimes. Not that I'm not thrilled to be pregnant, but just because feeling so poorly for so long really wears you down.

My current state is pretty bad. I'm still taking 2-3 anti-nausea meds per day (a mix of Zofran and Phenergan depending on the situation). I'm still getting frequent headaches. The pelvic pain is pretty bad, although it definitely eases up when I take it easier, so I've been trying to do that. My new thing is lower back pain that travels down my left leg. I wake up to pee 2-3 times per night and then am usually unable to sleep past 7, so I've been extra tired lately. I'm definitely ready and waiting for the second tri energy! Please!

But, it's not all bad. I can feel movement a few times a day most days, which is awesome. I also finally found both babies on the doppler a few days ago. It was so nice to hear their little heartbeats for the first time! It was also comforting to be able to hear that in between u/s. Sometimes, I feel sick more than pregnant so it's nice to have a reminder that there really are two babies in there!

I ordered the cribs and crib mattresses last week on Amazon and, since they were prime-eligible, they came two days later! They are in the nursery right now waiting to be assembled. Robert says that he will put them together tonight, and I can't wait. I know it's super early, but I want to be able to visualize things. After an ethical battle with myself over whether to sell my soul for two cheap, cute cribs from Wal-Mart, I was extra happy to find these cribs! They were a little more expensive, but still very reasonable, and I was able to keep my soul! I want to go much more modern with this room, and I soon found that modern cribs are not cheap. Add in looking for hardwoods, sustainable manufacturing, and non-toxic finishes and I was VERY lucky to find these for well under $500 each. I sucked it up on the crib mattresses and bought two organic mattresses, but I did go with one of the lower end models. It had good reviews, though, which is one of my big requirements. Anyway, I can't wait to get these set up! And, I'm especially hopeful that we'll find out the sexes on Wednesday so that we can buy the bedding and start decorating in earnest!

These are the cribs we got... Babyletto Modo in white/espresso!

Since this will probably be my last post prior to my u/s on Wednesday, I'll go on record with my official guess. Except my guess is sort of a mess. I have been leaning toward one of each for awhile now, but lately I can't shake the idea that maybe it's two girls. We'll find out soon enough!

Lastly, here I was at 14w5d!

13w4d (cont.)

2010-05-20T21:02:00.000-07:00

I just realized that I forgot to update about my appt. and u/s yesterday. It ended up being a 2 hr appointment, partly due to chatting with Dr. Wall about iPads, Facebook, and all sorts of random things! Also, my little ones are partly to blame for taking forever to show their goods!

So, Dr. Wall had said that they'd be able to guess at the sexes at that appt. And, he was right, sort of. They did guess but both he and the tech said that they were TOTAL guesses. Personally, I don't think they are right, either. So, for now, the sexes remain just as much a mystery as they were before my appointment. I do have to really applaud the tech because she literally spent 20 minutes making sure to get good shots between their legs. But, even with all of her trying, and great pictures, it's just too early to tell. However, both Dr. Wall and the tech said that they should be able to tell at my next u/s, at 15w3d, so I'm SUPER excited about that appointment!

Otherwise, all was well. The babies both measured right on track with heartbeats of 151 and 153. There was no evidence of a bleed so either there never was one or it went away (I suspect the former). Absolutely everything looked good with the little ones, who were super wiggly and gave us something of a show!

As for me, I had a small amount of protein in my urine for the first time. Dr. Wall said that it could be from a UTI. I haven't had any symptoms of one but I do get them chronically, so I am hoping that is all it is. I can't even imagine starting to go down the pre-e path this early, so I'm sticking with UTI until proven otherwise. My BP is completely normal (112/75, I think), but I have been swelling anytime that I'm on my feet. Still, I have funky kidneys... I swell. It could all be nothing. We're going with nothing.

Otherwise, it's just still more of the same thing. I'm still taking Zofran and Phenergan daily. Back on the Diflucan to try to get rid of the dang yeast once and for all. Lots of rest for some of the other stuff.

My favorite moment of the appointment was when Dr. Wall was talking about the pelvic pain (I think that he suspects that I might be developing SPD) and I told him that the nurse has said that it was caused by an "old uterus." His response? "I wouldn't say that. Now, high mileage uterus, maybe..." Ah, Dr. Wall. I couldn't survive a pregnancy without him!

For the record, I'm up 4 lbs from pre-pg now. I got a DVD with video of the entire u/s so I'll try to cut it down to a few good moments soon. It's EXTRA long due to all of that searching for sex clues!

13w4d

2010-05-20T17:22:00.000-07:00

This afternoon, the son of a woman I met online passed away at just over 1.5 years old. It hit me even harder than these terrible losses usually do (and, believe me, I have cried more than a few times for those I've met online).

This little boy was born at 27 weeks. But, he seemed to have made it through the prematurity. A cold, a few weeks in the hospital, and now this? It seems so incredibly unfair. I look at my daughters and I try to imagine what his mother must be feeling, and I know that I can't. No matter how much I try to imagine myself in her shoes, I have no idea what her pain is like. I feel so badly for her, but it's a drop in the bucket compared to how she must feel right now.

At any rate, it's scared me, too. I've had abruptions at 25 and 27 weeks. I was very lucky to make it to 35 and 32 weeks. But, what if it happens again? What if I've used up all of my luck?

It's not like this is a new concern for me. I met with my MFM before doing IVF. He thought it was safe for me to get pregnant again, even with twins. We're using Lovenox for the first time. I'm resting as much as possible from the get-go. We're taking a lot of precautions. But, still. What if it's not enough? There is no simple explanation for why I've suffered multiple abruptions. I don't even fall into the usual categories for risk factors. I guess that we just hope and pray that the things we're doing work, and that if an abruption does happen, it happens later, and we get lucky... again.

But, for now? For now, I'm shaken. And feeling very much aware of just how blessed I have been.

13w2d

2010-05-18T19:34:00.000-07:00

From what I can tell, tomorrow will mark the beginning of the second trimester for me. Sure, there is all sorts of debate, and it ranges from 12-14 weeks, but most sources seem to say 13w3d these days. At any rate, tomorrow, I'm going to call the first tri quits. I won't miss it, either. It's so dang stressful in the early days, fearing a loss, or a vanishing twin, or any number of other complications. For me, I feel like I can relax a bit in the second tri. Until 24-25 weeks, at least. At that point, all bets are off.

My next appointment with Dr. Wall is tomorrow. This is the appointment where he said that they would be able to give us our first guess at the sexes. I'm SUPER excited about that and can't wait until the ultrasound. I also want that peace of mind that we really did make it out of the first tri unscathed.

As for me, things are mostly the same. Still battling a lot of nausea and difficulty eating. I do tend to have a few good hours in the afternoons where I can eat, though, so I've been able to eat a bit more food. I'm up 4 lbs from pre-pregnancy now, too, although I'm not sure 2 of them are real since they literally came on overnight. Still, it takes 2-4 anti-nausea meds to make it through the day with no sign of letting up anytime soon. My other real big issue is still that crushing pelvis pain. I hope Dr. Wall has some ideas there. It's really, really painful. My yeast infection went away for a week and is now back, so that's a good time. I look forward to the day when my crotch is no longer in pain.

On the plus side, I can feel movement much more now. It's very distinct. I don't feel it more than maybe 1-2 times a day, but it's consistent enough that it gives me a lot of peace of mind. Especially since I STILL can't find the heartbeats on my doppler! It's crazy because I found them both at 10w5d and never had another problem finding them last time. I'm wondering whether the placentas are in front or something. At any rate, I can hear lots of movement, so clearly they are alive and well in there, but it would be great to hear the heartbeats one of these days!

Over the weekend, all seven of us participated in the March of Dimes March for Babies. It was a PERFECT sunny Seattle day for it, and it was held in a great location this year. I didn't do the walk itself, but the rest of the family did. Afterwards, we wandered around to all of the booths, ate hot dogs, and the kids went in the bouncy houses. It was a very fun morning and I was glad that we were all able to participate to some extent this year. The girls definitely had a great time this year, so that made it extra fun!

A big thank you goes out to those of you who donated to our walk. We matched what the big kids raised, so our total ended up being close to $400! That's the best we've done yet, I think. Thank you so much from the bottom of my heart! It's SUCH a worthy cause, and it's one I'm proud to be associated with. Thank you for helping me to be a part of it!

12w5d

2010-05-14T19:48:00.000-07:00

Earlier today, I was consoling a girl who is also pregnant with twins who was freaked out after reading about another girl who lost her twins to pre-term labor at 19 weeks. I told her that, often, women won't realize that they are in labor that early because it doesn't always present the way that you might expect, but that the best thing you can do is to check in with your doctor whenever you're in doubt. After saying all of that, I realized that I should probably take my own advice and call my MFM about my pelvic pain of doom.

I got a new nurse on the phone. Admittedly, I felt a little silly calling about pelvic pain that clearly isn't contractions or cervical. However, this nurse took the cake. She told me that, basically, since I've had prior pregnancies, I now have an "old uterus" and that things will just hurt earlier on in pregnancy than they used to. She also said something about sagging, but I'd tuned her out by then so I'm not sure what she thinks is sagging. Let's hope it's not my crotch.

At any rate, she talked to one of the MFMs and called me back later, and the verdict is that this is normal pain. There is nothing that can be done for it, either, except to stay off my feet. For the duration of my pregnancy? Oy.

Unfortunately, it's gotten really bad over the past few days. It's pretty excrutiating to walk right now. I'm wondering whether something is going on with my joints or something. I'm going to bring it up again at my appointment on Wednesday and see what Dr. Wall has to say.

In other news, today is my weekly belly pic day! Here I am as of this morning (with my fancy new camera that I really need to learn how to use!).

12w3d

2010-05-12T19:54:00.000-07:00

The good news is that I'm now feeling incredibly distinct movement. There is nothing else it could be, and it's much more forceful than the little flutters before. Now, it's little taps. I've mainly felt them on the right side but I felt one on the left today, too. Yay for strong, wiggly babies!

The bad news is that I have been absurdly sick. Nauseated all the time still. Headaches getting worse. Food aversions like whoa. Yesterday, I made it to work and out to dinner and ended up feeling awful all day as a result. I spent half the day in bed just recovering. My new symptom of doom is that every time I stand up my pelvis feels like it is being crushed. It seems WAY to early for that, so I don't know what is going on. All I know is that it hurts. A lot. I've also been weighing 5-8 lbs more every night than in the morning due to lovely swelling all over the place. My rings are too big and I can barely get them off right now.

I officially fail at pregnancy.

Edit: Since I'm getting comments about my last statement in this post, I'll clarify. Clearly, I don't fail at getting pregnant. I'm thrilled to be pregnant! As anyone who has done IVF knows, it's one heck of a process both emotionally and physically. I feel fortunate to have been able to do IVF again, and also very fortunate that the dang thing actually worked! That said, I don't think I'm very good at being pregnant. My body does its best to make me miserable and to lose as many babies as it can along the way. In fact, I feel like having healthy babies at the end is akin to having conquered my body's failure at gestating babies through daily injections, taking approximately 20 pills per day for various medical conditions, resting more than normal pregnant women should, bedrest, and usually hospitalization. If my pregnancies are successful, it is because I have wonderful medical care and work very hard at it. It's not because it is easy for me or because my body is naturally good at being pregnant.

Perhaps this is hard to understand, but it has nothing to do with how I feel about getting pregnant, and it doesn't mean that I'm not grateful to be pregnant. It certainly has nothing to do with anyone else's struggles to get pregnant. It's just part of being pregnant for me.

Furthermore, I talk a lot about how grateful I am to be where I am. It doesn't mean that being sick for 6+ weeks non-stop is easy or fun and I'm not going to pretend that it is. My family and friends don't need to listen to me complain, so this is where those thoughts and feelings are going to go.

12w1d

2010-05-10T17:20:00.000-07:00

I had a very nice Mother's Day yesterday! James has the girls on Sundays but there was some confusion over whether he was taking them, so he ended up not picking them up until 10:30. That was nice for me since I had gotten up with them at 7, so I got to spend lots of good time with them! We opened presents while they were here, and they were super into the whole present concept. In fact, both of them helped me open my gifts! I was VERY excited that Robert got me a new camera since mine died awhile ago. It's a Canon Rebel, which is my first DSLR, so I have lots of learning to do! I also got some Lush bath bombs from the kiddos, which will be heavenly for my baths.

In the afternoon, we went out for Thai food (the big kids completely demolished an order of stir-fry ginger beef and an order of cashew chicken, along with most of my spring rolls!) and then went to see the movie Babies. It was great, I definitely would recommend it. That evening, Robert and I went out to dinner at a cafe/wine bar, which was delicious (albeit non-alcoholic!), and then we went to see David Sedaris. I ended up really enjoying the show, so it was a great end to a wonderful day!

I was lucky that, other than some very dicey moments at lunch/the movie, my nausea wasn't too bad yesterday. Granted, it took two Phenergan and one Zofran to keep it that way, but it was still better than most of my days lately.

In other news, Robert and I are definitely not in agreement on baby girl #2's name if he/she ends up being a girl. I'm pretty sure it's NOT two girls, so it's probably a moot point, but I just can't get behind Sophia. If you add up the spellings, it is number 2 on the list for 2009, and I just do not want a name that popular. At all. I prefer to avoid the top 100. Robert thinks that is silly, and that we should use the name if we like it, regardless of popularity. I'd agree with that except that when a name is THAT popular, it loses its appeal to me. At any rate, one other name we both like is Eliza. I REALLY like Lydia Jane and Eliza Anne together. I think Robert is still holding out for Sophia Claire, though. Let's hope it is NOT two girls, since we have everything locked down otherwise!

Now that the nursery is painted, I've been looking at baby bedding and such in earnest. I'm not 100% decided on the Baby Gap bedding anymore. I ran across one on Etsy that I really like for two boys or one of each, and one at Land of Nod that I love for two girls. I don't think I'm having two girls, though. It's my only gender intuition whatsoever. Here are the two bedding options I like right now. The top one would be the animals on the outside of the bumper/minky brown on the inside/orange piping, green polka dot crib sheet, and striped crib skirt.

Here's the girl option...

I'm pretty much in love with this rug and will probably get it for the floor.

Anyway, since I'm posting pictures like whoa, here is one of the newly-painted nursery. I'm SO in love with the color. Orange was tricky but this was exactly what I had in my head. Phew!

Lastly, here I was at 11w5d... wowza! In fact, I'm apparently so large that a woman glanced at me at the show last night and then offered to let me go in front of her in the restroom. I wasn't sure whether to be thankful for her kindness or alarmed that she thought I couldn't hold it at 12 weeks! Needless to say, I thanked her and turned her down :)

11w5d

2010-05-07T21:45:00.000-07:00

I'm beginning to think that I should probably just settle in and figure that this nausea isn't going to go away anytime soon. After all, I'm just shy of 12 weeks with absolutely zero relief and, in my prior pregnancies with nausea, it didn't go away until 6-7 months. I didn't see this coming after having so little nausea with my last pregnancy, but it seems likely now that it's going to be here for the long haul. If I stop hoping it will go away, maybe it will be easier to deal with.

Today was a two Phenergan, one Zofran kind of day. As a result, my eating was all over the map. I've really been trying to stick to Dr. Luke's servings as much as possible, but when I'm this nauseated it just doesn't go well. I did manage to choke down two protein shakes (Robert makes them for me and they taste a lot better than the nasty premade ones I drank last time!), though, and had some meat with both breakfast and lunch, so at least I probably hit my protein requirements. I was lucky that my nausea was in check at lunch time so I was able to go out for Thai with co-workers and enjoy my meal. However, the Phenergan kicked in after lunch and made me SO tired that I had to go home and nap. I've been nauseated and exhausted ever since. Hoping for at least a slightly better day tomorrow.

The only other real news is that I'm starting to experience a few of the other, later pregnancy symptoms. For instance, when I stand up after sitting in one place for awhile, my groin muscles hurt. Walking is already exhausting and somewhat painful. My back hurts. All of that will get much worse as I get bigger, but in a way it's nice to start up that phase of my pregnancy... at least it means that I'm nearing the second tri and getting to more of the safe zone.

I've been talking to the girls about my pregnancy from day one. Alice will tell me that there are babies in my tummy, and will even say how many, but she is clearly a little confused since she often then goes on to tell me that Alice and Charlotte are in my tummy! Oh well, it's a work in progress. We got a board book about a new baby, and they like that. I'll have to look and see if there are any books about having twins. Not that twins are a new or even interesting concept to my girls. Twins are normal to them, of course! I think they think that all babies come in pairs.

This weekend is Mother's Day. But, because of how I'm feeling, I haven't really wanted to plan anything. I got Robert tickets to David Sedaris for some holiday awhile back and it happens to be on Sunday night, so we'll be doing that. One event per day tends to be my max, so that might be it for me. I'm kind of bummed that his show ended up being on Mother's Day, but I'm sure it will be fun. I'd like to go see that new Babies movie at some point. We'll see how it goes.

11w3d

2010-05-05T19:51:00.000-07:00

I had another appointment with Dr. Wall today. When we made the appointment, he said that they'd be able to do the NT scan today but the techs said it was too early. Lo and behold, both babies measured large enough to do it today, so we got to have an extra long u/s this afternoon (partially because baby A didn't feel like showing us his/her neck!).

At any rate, the babies measured at 11w4d and 11w5d, with heartbeats of 167 and 168. Like I said, it took awhile to get the NT measurement, but it was 1.08 and 1.12, which Dr. Wall said is really good. There were no issues, just big, wiggly babies who finally look like babies! Well, they did find an area by A's sac that looked like bleeding but I haven't HAD any bleeding (the spotting stopped almost two weeks ago when I stopped the Prometrium), so he said he isn't worried about it for now. I have to say, though, that I AM a little worried about that and will take it easier the next two weeks to try to let it heal up. Considering that I'm Miss Abruption, the last thing I need is detaching sacs or something.

Other than the ultrasound, he took a bunch of blood (CBC, thyroid panel, and a PIH panel just as a baseline). Dr. Wall always thinks that I'm going to get pre-e since I have high blood pressure, twins, etc., but I never do. Let's keep our fingers crossed that this will make my third twin pregnancy sans any blood pressure issues whatsoever! They also did a swab to try to figure out what on Earth is going on with my poor crotch. It doesn't seem to match any of the normal stuff (yeast, BV, whatever), but it's insanely inflammed and painful. I'd definitely love an answer to that problem, pronto.

I'm supposed to go see my neuro about my myasthenia gravis to see what he wants to do about that. Otherwise, no real changes. Just keep plodding along. Dr. Wall seeing me every 2 weeks for at least 3 more appointments since he had me make those today, and I'll have a quick u/s at the next one, the full anatomy scan at the one in 4 weeks, and we will start cervix checks at the one in 6 weeks. He said they'll be able to guess at gender in 2 weeks and know for sure in 4 weeks. HOORAY!!

We got decent face shots today. It was cool to see little babies that look like babies. It was also cool that I've finally graduated from the transvag u/s and can just do abdominal now. I haven't looked at the video yet, but baby B was actually walking UP the sac at one point, it was so weird. I've never seen a baby do that before! I don't have strong feelings about the sexes, but I am starting to lean toward boy/girl. We'll see if I'm right in a couple of weeks.

As for the nursery, we've made some progress. Emilia's room is painted and she's moved in. The painter keeps rescheduling on us, but the nursery is empty and ready to be painted (and better be done by the end of the week or I won't be amused with him at all!). Although we don't NEED it painted/ready quite yet, it makes me feel good to know it's there ready and waiting. Just one more thing ticked off my list. It's starting to feel more settled now that we're all in our correct bedrooms. It's great to know we're done moving around! My next project is to finish the girls' big girl room. I've been going back and forth and I think that we might go with toddler beds after all. Once I decide for sure, I'll order those and get their big girl room going.

In other news, today was by far the worst day I've had in awhile. I was nauseated, exhausted, unable to eat, etc. all day. I stayed up until 11:30 talking to Robert last night and I've found that anything past about 10:30 leads to a horrible day the next day. From here on out, I'm officially boring as heck.

10w4d

2010-04-29T18:40:00.000-07:00

So, as it turns out, there is a lot that goes into preparing for twins. I think that's pretty much the case whether they are your first or your fifteenth kids. However, in our case, I'm finding that it's all much more complicated than it used to be! For example, we recently finished our basement, so we now have six bedrooms. However, while that construction was going on, we had the boys sharing a small bedroom on the main floor. The idea was that the small room would ultimately be the nursery and only the boys would have to move bedrooms (into their new bedrooms in the basement). So, thinking we were all smart and prepared, we painted all of the bedrooms the colors that we wanted them, including the future nursery. Luckily, it was orange, so it was fine for the boys during their brief tenure in there.

Well, when we found out it was twins again, we realized that the small bedroom just wasn't going to work. Two cribs would fit in there, but just barely. Babies have lots of stuff, and it would've been a ridiculously tight squeeze. So, the room sat vacant for a bit while we decided what to do. Ultimately, because there are two bedrooms on the main floor, we decided to move US into the small bedroom and the new babies into Emilia's room. That meant that Emilia got to move into our larger bedroom upstairs (with the pretty windows, sigh) next to Alice and Charlotte's room. Well, that was all well and good except that it meant that we now had three bedrooms to shuffle around AND re-paint! Robert doesn't really have much free time to paint these days, so we eventually hired a painter. But, we can't just paint all of the rooms at once because it's so much easier to paint an empty room, so we've been painting a room, moving into it, painting the next, and so on. As of today, we've moved into the small room and Emilia is in the process of moving into her freshly-painted new room. Hopefully, by early next week, we'll have an empty, painted nursery. But, goodness, it's been quite the process!

The same thing goes for the cribs. We're going to use the same cribs for these babies that the girls are currently in. So, that means that we need to get twin beds for the girls (toddler beds seem like a waste of time). However, they sleep terribly at James's house in toddler beds (and wonderfully at home in cribs, Alice with a crib tent, Charlotte without), so I've also been looking into a variety of bed tents and various other products that might actually keep them IN their beds. Until we can figure that out, I don't want to transition them out of their cribs. I've been looking at Peapods lately, but I'm afraid that they'll be able to unzip them. There actually is a bed tent that can't be unzipped from the inside that is designed for kids with autism, but that sounds like a bit of overkill. I normally wait until my kids are 3'ish to transition out of cribs (and haven't ever had a real issue with them not staying in their beds), so this is uncharted territory for me. All I really know is that I do NOT want to start a similar cycle to the lack of sleep/overtired/cranky mess that happens when they spend all night playing with their toys at their Dad's house instead of sleeping!

Up until this week, I hadn't really looked at any of the "stuff" we'll be buying for these babies. No carseats, strollers, crib bedding, clothes, or other gear. So much of it is so gendered that I just don't have as much fun shopping for baby stuff before we know the sexes. However, some ladies on my twins board have been talking about strollers lately, so I finally started to look into them. And, frankly, I'm completely and utterly in LOVE with the Baby Jogger City Select. It's pretty much everything wonderful that a stroller could be. A basic double Snap n' Go, a tandem with all the possible seating configurations, the footprint of a single stroller, AND the ability to convert to a single stroller when I only have one baby with me. It's heaven in a stroller. No, really. Granted, it costs about a bajillion dollars, but I don't care. Stroller perfection!

I ran across the bedding I want awhile back, and have sort of modeled my ideas for the nursery on it. It's from Baby Gap and it's cute. Low key, but cute. I went all pink and girly with the girls, so I want to do something more bright and fun this time.

We're going to paint the room orange, get some cute animal wall decals from Etsy, another big Best Chairs rocker/ottoman, the white cribs we have now, a matching white dresser/changer, and a few more modernish accents. I'm especially looking for some kind of fun lighting fixture for the ceiling. Oh, and a rug, since there are hardwoods in there. All told, it will be a super fun room for these little ones!

In other news, I haven't noticed any real changes since stopping the Prometrium on Sunday other than no more spotting. I did have less nausea yesterday morning, but it hit with a vengeance yesterday afternoon. Today has been less nauseated thus far, so hopefully this means a change for the better. Headaches are still constant. My next appointment is Wednesday. I can't wait to see these little guys. I'm really feeling like maybe, just maybe, I can relax if all is well this time. 11 weeks means something... right?

9w6d

2010-04-24T20:16:00.000-07:00

I'm almost 10 weeks, and I was going to wait until then to post again, but I have things to say (albeit not very interesting things), so here I am.

Nausea sucks. Gagging at the sheer thought of food sucks. Gagging for no reason whatsoever sucks. Ugh. Just... ugh. Thus far, I've found that Zofran works very fast and stops the gagging for awhile but never takes away the nausea itself. Phenergan takes roughly 2.5 years to work but stops quite a bit of the nausea. I've been taking Zofran when I need a quick fix and Phenergan when I feel something coming on, but have time to wait for it to kick it (but never overlapping). Today, I took a Zofran at 2 pm and was gagging again at 3:30. The car and I do not get along at all anymore. Even 15 minutes is pushing it. At any rate, I called the MFM's office and talked to Dr. Wall and he said that it is ok to take the two together but not ideal. He told me to just start taking the Phenergan twice a day and then use Zofran for urgent situations in between. However, he also told me that taking the two together frequently can lead to psychosis. So, I think I'll try to avoid mixing them very often. Meanwhile, it's been 4 hours'ish since my last Phenergan and the nausea is getting worse, so I don't know that taking it twice a day is really going to cut it. Maybe every 4 hours. Maybe.

Oh, Dr. Wall's other helpful piece of advice was to stop going places in the car. Largely, I have been avoiding the car as much as possible but, geez, sometimes I do have to leave my house. Thanks a lot, Dr. Wall, really. Thanks a lot.

In other news, I look more and more like I ate a few too many doughnuts. It'll be nice when I actually look pregnant. For now, I look like a blob. I faithfully documented my blobishness last night with a belly pic, at 9w5d.

9w3d

2010-04-21T18:57:00.000-07:00

I had another appointment and u/s with Dr. Wall today. I had a new nurse today and she was awesome. I really liked her a lot! Really sweet, smart, efficient, etc. I usually get the same super sweet nurse who is also very, uh, slow. It was nice to just blow through some of the basics today.

So, weight... down 3 lbs from 2 weeks ago. I was 1.5 lbs higher 2 weeks ago than my initial appointment, so today was only 1.5 lbs less than my first OB appt. at 5 weeks. Clearly, I won't be hitting 10 lbs gained by 10 weeks. All I can do is all I can do, I guess.

As for the nausea, they told me that I can try Phenergen. Dr. Wall said it's like turning down a Rolls Royce (Zofran) for a Hugo (Phenergen), but Zofran just doesn't touch the queasiness for me. It has really been helping with the gagging and retching, but it would be nice to avoid both. I've taken one Phenergen so far and it seemed to help more, so we'll see. I do know that Zofran doesn't work for me during a c/s, but Phenergen does. Hopefully, this provides some real relief.

Migraines-wise, Dr. Wall wants me to take 3 Ibuprofen every 4 hours (while awake, not all night) for 72 hours and then stop. We're hoping that the 3 Ibuprofen will knock down the migraines enough that we're able to break the cycle. If not, I don't know. I did take some Ibuprofen (2 pills at a time) yesterday for my migraine of doom and it only dulled it a bit and then it came back full force every 3.5-4 hours or so. We'll see if adding in one more pill helps. Ibuprofen is usually pretty effective for my migraines, but only if I take 4 of them, and only for awhile. Eventually, it stops working entirely. My fingers are VERY tightly crossed that this course of Ibuprofen stops the cycle and gives me some relief. If not, well, I don't know where we'll go. I am having a very hard time working, or even just being online, because the laptop makes the migraine so much worse and my vision is so bad. I'm also not driving at all anymore. Oy.

In happy news, I get to stop the Prometrium at 10 weeks, which is Sunday. That stuff is evil, so that's exciting. We're hoping that finally stops the spotting. We shall see, I guess.

My favorite moments from today were when Robert suggested electroshock therapy for the migraines and Dr. Wall told me to just lick my fingers and stick them in an outlet. Or maybe when he likened my immune system to GW, out to deomocratize the Middle East. Like, it starts out all good, responding to a real virus/threat, and then BAM it's causing collateral damage right, left, and center. Good times, good times.

Speaking of my immune system, he's going to run all sorts of tests soon to check my antibodies to see what my immune system feels like doing these days. Maybe he'll find something new and exciting. Or, maybe it will just be the same old stuff, just a bit fired up in response to pregnancy. He wants me to see my neurologist to talk through some of this as well. I wish I could find a good rheumatologist, but I lack the energy to give that a whirl again. Besides, I have faith in Dr. Wall's ability to treat all of this crap for now.

I think the worst part was that Dr. Wall said that he has no specific stop work date for women pregnant with multiples. I'm already struggling to make it through a partial day, from home, on my couch. The two days per week that I go into the office are a nightmare, and I've been lucky to last from like 9:30-2. God help me if I hit like 28 weeks and the man still thinks I should be working. Granted, given my past history, I've never really made it long enough to have a set date, but I was kind of hoping he'd give me one to hold onto. But, no such luck. Oh well.

Anyway, enough of all of that. The u/s went great! I had a lot of fear and superstition tied up in this u/s, since we lost baby B at 9w5d last time, but all was well. Both babies are measuring right on track and their heart rates were 164 and 171 bpm. We got lots of nice pictures, video, and even a couple of 3-D shots. Today was also the first time that we clearly saw movement! It was really exciting, and I feel blessed that the upside of my medical history is frequent u/s. I'd lose my mind without them, I think.

I go back in two weeks. Dr. Wall wanted to do the NT scan then, but the techs said it's too early, so it looks like it'll end up just being a regular appointment and u/s and then we'll have the NT scan the following week. The tech I had today was awesome, and said she'll try to guess at gender at the NT scan, so I hope I get her again then! Last time, they refused to even try. No fun at all!

Baby A

Baby B

Two babies!

Baby B in 3-D (on top)

Video! (It's about 2 mins but the first 20 seconds or so are just random ovaries and such, so ignore those... there is baby wiggling goodness after!)

9w1d

2010-04-19T12:55:00.000-07:00

I feel like crap on a stick. This cold has gotten quite bad. I'm SO congested that I have had the worst migraines for days. Plus the yucky runny nose. And, now, I'm coughing up yucky gunk. All told, this is not a good time. I've mostly lost my voice from the coughing, so I'm going around croaking like a frog. Oy. Every time I cough, Charlotte says "bless you," which cracks me up.

Saturday night, despite my lofty goals of dinner and a movie, I made it through the movie (barely), and then had to go home. No dinner for me. Well, I think I might have had cheese and a pear for dinner, but certainly no Indian food. Sunday, I did manage to meet up with the fam and some friends at the park for a couple of hours in the morning, but then I pretty much collapsed on the couch for a few hours to recover. We took the kids out for ice cream late that afternoon, and by then I was done, done, done. I was in bed a little after 9, with one hell of a headache.

I'm finding that Benedryl is just clogging up my sinuses and making my migraines worse, so for now I am not taking anything. I seem to do slightly better this way. I still have a migraine, but it's not as bad as it has been the past two days. Fingers crossed.

I took my first Zofran this morning. The girls were eating lunch and the smell of their spaghetti was making me gag. The Zofran stopped the gagging almost immediately, but didn't touch the nausea. Sigh. I had such high hopes for that stuff! I have 39 more pills, so I'll keep trying it, but if it isn't going to make a substantial difference, then to heck with it. I do like the flavor of the Zofran as it dissolves, though. It tastes like candy.

I have sort of a funny pregnancy-related story from yesterday. All was peaceful... Alice was asleep, Charlotte had just gotten up from her nap and was playing with toys in the corner of the room. Robert had just gone for a run and was just getting into the shower. Right as he left, Charlotte came to me and said she had "yucky poo poo." Ok, fine, diaper change, no big deal, right? Well, then she lifted up her foot and said "yucky." There was something squished between her toes. I pulled it out and then realized it resembled poop. Smelled it (WHY, I do not know!), and sure enough, it was poop. I laid her down on the floor to change her and realized she had poop on one foot, but no poop coming out of her diaper or down her leg. Then, I looked over and saw two little clumps of poop on the hardwood floor. It was surreal. Where did this poop come from?! How did she get it out of her diaper without making a bigger mess? While I was pondering that, I opened her diaper and the smell instantly made me start retching. I realized that I could NOT change her or I'd throw up. I started yelling for Emilia to come help, so she ran in and got Charlotte cleaned up while I got a bath started. By then, Alice was up, so they both went in. Emilia wiped up the poop on the floor, too, so everything was clean and fine by the time the girls came out. Right up until Charlotte toddled off and immediately pooped on the floor. For goodness sake! Robert said that it was the best shower he ever took and I think he's probably right!

8w6d

2010-04-17T16:46:00.000-07:00

Well, I've found something of a solution to my morning sickness, migraines, and general poor health lately... it's called sitting on my ass doing absolutely nothing. I've done exactly that all day and this is the best I've felt in WEEKS. Unfortunately, I'm afraid that my family and employer might have a problem with this as a long-term plan.

Yesterday, was the worst day yet. I was nauseated/sick all day. I had the worst migraine I've had in weeks. And, I caught a cold from the girls. I was pretty much a pile of misery. Fridays I work in the office, and I was struggling to even sit upright by about 10 am, so I got lucky because my manager let us all leave early. I took advantage of that and went home to see the girls, and then ended up crashing out by 8 pm. I was really bummed because I was supposed to go to dinner with friends, but there was just no way. I ate half a granola bar and half of an orange for dinner because that's all that I could choke down. Sigh.

I finally broke down and called my MFM's office yesterday. They told me to take Percocet for the migraine (took the edge off, a bit, didn't come close to getting rid of it) and called in a prescription for Zofran for the nausea. I'm afraid to take the Zofran, but I think that I probably need to get over my fear of anti-nausea meds during pregnancy and just take it. I know a ton of women who have taken it with no problems and it's rated category B. Still, if I can avoid it, I'd like to. But, at a certain point, being unable to eat for weeks on end might be more damaging to these poor babies than a few Zofran pills.

In a little while, we're going to take the kids to a movie and then out for Indian food. It sounds good to me right now, and I really hope that I can eat more than a few bites. We'll see, I guess. Fingers crossed! Movies are my friend right now since they demand almost no exertion on my part.

Last but not least, here is my first belly shot. I'm sure it's more bloat/fat/old baby belly than real belly at this early stage, but there is definitely belly that didn't used to be there! I made the switch to maternity clothes this week, largely because I was sick of my jeans pushing on the Lovenox bruising on my tummy, so currently my pants fall down a lot. It will be nice when I have enough baby belly to hold up my pants, since I have too much to wear my normal pants. Current weight: Exactly the same as pre-IVF, down 5 lbs from post-IVF. I'm supposed to be up 10 lbs by 10 weeks, so something miraculous better happen between now and then. Dr. Luke, I'm a failure.

(Excuse my horribleness, but this cold is making me pretty miserable and this was the best pic I could get)

March for Babies

2010-04-14T13:12:00.000-07:00

It's that time of year again. In just a couple of weeks, all of the kids and I will be walking in the annual March for Babies in order to raise money for the March of Dimes. We've done this walk for quite a few years now, and I think that it's been good for the kids to have a more tangible way of feeling like they contributed to an important cause. Giving money is great, and we do that as well, to a variety of causes, but it's good to get out and really show your support, too.

At any rate, since this year I'm nauseated and miserable, and walking three miles will be no picnic, I could use your help even more! We love donations here, and I'm not afraid to beg for them. Right now, we have a very sad little donations balance. If each of you who reads this could donate even $1, we'd more than exceed our goal. Please, if you can, spare a little bit to sponsor us. It's a great cause, and one that is very near and dear to my heart.

If you'd like to donate, there is a little widget on the left sidebar. Just click it and it will take you to our personal page. If you're local, we'd love for you to sign up to walk with us, too! The more the merrier!

8w2d

2010-04-13T18:09:00.000-07:00

Today was graduation day! That is, today was our last appointment with the RE. It was kind of an anti-climactic graduation day, though, because we went to the Seattle clinic (where we never go), so it was all people we don't really know. Except that Dr. Letterie, the RE who did my u/s today, has done every single ER I've ever had done. So, he and my ovaries are BFFs, I guess.

Anyway, I was a little bummed that we went to the Seattle clinic because it turns out that they don't give out the cool DVDs full of pictures and videos like the Kirkland clinic does! Had I known that, I would've waited the extra few days to be seen in Kirkland! But, despite the sad fact that we only got two pictures, it was still a good u/s. Both babies looked good. I think they both measured 8w3d, but he did it all very quickly and didn't share much with us. The heartbeats were in the 180s and 190s. Baby A looks like a cute little gummi bear, but Baby B looks like a blob! The RE said that it's just because of Baby B's angle, though! The only noteworthy thing was that the RE mentioned that Baby B's sac is slightly smaller than Baby A's. However, it looked like Baby A's sac was measuring 9w4d when I looked at the screen so it sure seems fine to me for Baby B's to be smaller. Regardless, he said it was normal, so I'm trying not to obsess.

As for me, the Benedryl is helping a bit, but it's definitely not a cure-all. I went to lunch today with Robert, craving chicken pot pie. I took two bites and had to stop eating it. Ugh. However, the improvement is that I COULD eat mozzarella sticks and a small sundae, which is better than usual. So... baby steps.

I wore my first maternity outfit today and felt a little silly. And, my pants kept sliding down. However, it's either that or pants that are skin tight around my waist and push against my Lovenox bruising, so maternity clothes it is! During IVF, I gained about 5 lbs. As of today, I'm 1 lb above my pre-IVF #3 weight. I am definitely not going in the right direction. Dr. Luke says 10 lbs by 10 weeks... meanwhile, I'm lucky if I can choke down one full meal a day.

Here are my little gummi bears. Baby B is on top, Baby A is on the bottom.

8w1d

2010-04-12T18:48:00.000-07:00

In light of my goal to keep this blog at least a mixture of the good and the bad, this blog entry will be challenging. Largely because, other than the fact that I'm thrilled to be pregnant, there isn't a lot of good to report. Well, okay, that's not true. As far as I know, both babies are just fine. So, that's good!

Everything else is pretty bad. The nausea and food aversions are awful. I feel like I am on the verge of vomiting nearly 24 hours a day. Absolutely nothing sounds good to eat, ever, and I have to force myself to eat to avoid getting more nauseated...except that, then, the food I eat makes me more nauseated anyway. In addition to the nausea, I am completely and utterly wiped out and exhausted all the time. Maybe because of the nausea and difficulty eating? It's hard to really function feeling this poorly and having eaten, say, 1 granola bar, some chips, and half of a pb&j all day. That's what I've eaten thus far today and it was pretty much all choked down.

I've doubled the Mestinon like Dr. Wall suggested but I'm not noticing a difference in how I feel. That doesn't surprise me because it's clear to me, at least, that I'm exhausted and dragging because I feel so poorly and am having trouble sleeping well at night, not because of my MG. I'll keep it doubled through the end of the month but will go back to once a day if it hasn't helped by then. Today, I broke down and took some Benedryl to try to combat the nausea. I can't take much Benedryl or it will completely knock me out, so I just took half of a 25 mg tablet. So far, I'm a little more tired and maybe slightly less nauseated. I may have to try the full tablet, and just deal with the exhaustion. I don't know. I'm feeling at the end of my rope and, at only 8 weeks, there may be many more weeks of feeling like this ahead of me.

To end on a more positive note, I have another u/s tomorrow with the RE. I think that this will be my last one before they send me on my way. Other than when we do the paperwork for donating our embryos, I will never see them again. Strange. But, since I've already been seen by Dr. Wall for weeks, it's clearly time for me to graduate. I'll miss their extra snazzy u/s, though. It's so clear! I can't wait to see our little gummi bears tomorrow.

7w3d

2010-04-07T17:33:00.000-07:00

I had my second appointment with Dr. Wall today (and fifth u/s of this pregnancy). I've been very eager for this appointment because I've been spotting since Saturday. Always a small amount, always brown, always only when I wipe, but I've never been a spotter so it's been completely freaking me out.

The good news is that both babies are fine. They both measured exactly 7w3d with h/bs of 150 bpm! Baby A looked like a cute little seahorse on the screen, exactly like all of the illustrations of the 7th week look. Baby B was really low in the sac and looked like a blob until she switched the angle and then it looked just like Baby A.

I was all excited because we got a DVD to record the u/s, but the tech selected the abdominal probe and then used the transvaginal probe, so the entire video is blank. Dang it! Luckily, she gave us a couple of pictures, too, or we wouldn't have anything!

As for my appointment itself, Dr. Wall isn't happy with the spotting. He thinks it's something to keep an eye on. The good news, though, is that there is no evidence of bleeding in my uterus. He also thinks that I'm experiencing an autoimmune flare, so he is having me increase my myasthenia gravis med, take Ibuprofen for 4 days to help my back pain from the accident (Ibuprofen is safe in small doses in the first trimester), take B6/Benedryl for the nausea, and try to generally get me to a little more stable level. Not that I'm super ill right now or anything, but things do seem to be flaring so it's good to cut that off before it goes to the bad place.

My next appt. is with the RE for an u/s on the 13th, and then I have another appt. and u/s with Dr. Wall on the 21st. Dr. Wall also wants me to call in next week just to touch base. I really love Dr. Wall... I don't think I could survive another pregnancy without him!

Baby A

Baby B

7w1d

2010-04-05T20:37:00.000-07:00

First of all, my ticker has gone nuts and decided that I am one day more pregnant than I really am. I'm curious to see whether it just periodically makes me more and more pregnant! If only it were that easy...

At any rate, I don't have much to report other than still more nausea, more headaches, worsening exhaustion, and periodic brown spotting. The spotting freaks me the heck out every time it happens, which appears to be pretty much every time I lift up one of the girls. Well, maybe not EVERY time since I do that multiple times per day, but definitely whenever I've been doing a lot of it. It worries me greatly, but I'm managing to hang on to sanity because of the fact that it's brown. Very brown. Brown means old. Old is okay. Still, it's clear to me that hauling around 30-40 lb toddlers is not the best call right now... except that, often, there is no one BUT me to do so. So, for now, the hauling continues, as carefully as possible.

My first completely random craving hit yesterday. I was driving the big kids to the store to buy some stuff for their new bedrooms (hooray for completing the basement remodel!) when I heard an ad for Taco Bell's new Fruitista Freeze. It's basically blended frozen lemonade. I desperately wanted one and was right by a Taco Bell, so I pulled in and got one. It was the best thing EVER. Today, however, I desperately wanted spaghetti while making the girls' dinner, so I tried to have some and it made me sick after three bites. The same thing happened with different food at dinner. Clearly, my cravings are trumped by the non-stop nausea. I have been eating whatever I want, but I find that mostly I end up eating just to avoid throwing up. I get VERY ill if my stomach gets empty so I have to eat at least a little something pretty often. It leaves me feeling very sick of eating and not wanting to eat at all. That's no fun!

I haven't gained anything yet, which is probably normal for only 7 weeks... not to mention with the difficulty eating. Last time, I followed Dr. Luke's diet plan and gained a million pounds, but I want to talk to Dr. Wall about whether I should do that again. I started this pregnancy about 15 pounds heavier than I started my pregnancy with the girls (10 lbs I never lost plus 5 pounds that I gained at the very end of the IVF cycle, presumably from bloating and my giant ovaries... except it never went away), so the idea of gaining 50 lbs or more again doesn't sound like a good time. And, clearly, I'd gain about a million pounds if I started drinking the protein shakes this time since I can barely eat now and haven't lost an ounce. For now, I'd really like to just see how it goes and take a much more conservative approach to pregnancy weight gain... but, if Dr. Wall wants me to pile on the weight in case I have more preemies, that's what I'll do. Even with all of the weight gain and protein shakes, I only had decent sized babies for their ages, not hefty ones. It just may be that I need to do that to give them the best shot.

My next u/s is Wednesday. It will be a very big relief to go in and see two beating hearts after all of the spotting. Not to mention my paranoia.

6w5d

2010-04-02T09:57:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was quite a day. I wasn't feeling well at all, so Robert offered to come home and take me out to lunch. On our way to lunch, we were stopped, waiting to turn left at an intersection, and a car rammed into us from the back. It didn't seem like he even tried to stop, and he was going pretty fast for a residential street... maybe 25-30 mph? At any rate, I've been rear-ended before but this was quite the thud. Robert got out to talk to the guy, and they agreed to pull over and exchange insurance information. We pulled over, only to see the guy take off so fast there was literally smoke coming off of his tires! What a jerk. We didn't get his plate number, so sadly he'll get away with it.

After the accident, my neck hurt a bit, and my minor migraine went straight to the bad place, but otherwise we were both ok. Still, I called my MFM's office just to be on the safe side. The nurse there told me to go ahead and go to the ER for a viability scan and to get my neck checked out just in case. I was a little dubious about that, since things seemed ok, but when I got home there was a tiny amount of spotting mixed in with the Prometrium yuck, so I decided it was a good call.

I had to refuse a pelvic three times (seriously?! What is that going to do at 6 weeks?!), but they finally did an u/s. I decided that I've been spoiled by the awesome u/s machines at the RE and MFM because this thing was so blurry. We could see the babies, and their h/bs, but it was nothing like two days prior at the RE. Still, it was one heck of a relief to see those little hearts beating. They measured their h/bs at 112 and 113 bpm, but I'm not sure that I trust that due to the crappy machine they were using. Anyway, there was no bleeding in my uterus or any other sign of a problem, so that was wonderful news! My ovaries are still huge, and covered in cysts, so some of my pain recently has probably been caused by them. Dang ovaries. You'd think they'd be shrinking back to normal size by now, but they are currently 78 and 84cc in volume (normal according to Google is 5-15cc... ACK!!). No wonder my pants are tight.

Poor Robert was super worried, but I sent him out to go grocery shopping while I was in the ER (I figured that I'd be just sitting there for hours, so he might as well get something done). We order most of our fruits/veggies from a CSA but for some reason this week the ones I ordered didn't come and we get a weird mix of stuff we don't tend to eat, and none of the stuff that the girls love. So, we were in dire need of some fruits/veggies. He came back to the ER with a bottle of water, a bottle of caffeine-free Diet Coke, a bottle of Gatorade, the Reese's peanut butter eggs I'd mentioned wanting earlier, and a little stuffed lion (Leo!). How sweet is that?

Anyway, long story short, we're all fine. I've got one hell of a migraine today and a few aches and pains, so I'm taking the day off and will probably nap when the girls do. But, definitely no long-term issues. Thank goodness!

P.S. They gave me a print out with all of my lab results to give to my MFM. One of the tests they ran was a beta HCG. Well, the sheet has a list of reference ranges by gestational age. And, next to my HCG (107,425), it has it marked as high. Apparently, my HCG is too high for 6 weeks :)

6w3d

2010-03-31T22:34:00.000-07:00

One thing that is important to me with this blog is that it be real. No whitewashing or sugarcoating here. Just IVF and pregnancy in all its glory. However, when I re-read some of my entries during my pregnancy with the girls, I feel like my joy and gratitude didn't really come through. I remember how I felt back then, and I was SO thrilled and thankful to be pregnant, but all I did here was whine about feeling yucky. This time, I hope to do a better job of accurately capturing how I'm feeling - good and bad.

First, for the good. I can't begin to tell you how relieved I am that both of those little sacs ended up being babies with heartbeats. A singleton was always our preference, but we went into this knowing that twins were, of course, a possibility. Granted, since it took SEVEN embryos transferred over multiple IVF cycles before to get two live babies, I didn't really think we'd end up going 2/2 this time. Still, knowing it was possible, we did our due diligence and met with Dr. Wall back in October to get his recommendation on whether we should avoid multiples (he said no), and talked to our RE about the number to transfer (and ultimately took his recommendation to transfer two based on them not being excellent quality). Because we did all of that, I feel like we pretty much did our best to achieve a good outcome and then left it up to god, fate, whatever. And, god, fate, whatever decided it was twins for us, and I couldn't be happier. Once you see that little sac, you want it to stick around. Even if this does mean that we have to buy a new car! (Secretly, I love to buy new cars, so I'm pretty excited about that part... even if driving a Yukon is pretty much guaranteed to result in me scraping it all up since I can't even park my minivan).

Now, on to the less-than-good. I've been having some pretty serious nausea this go around. This has come as something of a surprise to me since I had almost none with the girls. However, it's pretty much 24/7 these days. I've found that Sour Patch Kids and deviled eggs take the edge off, and prevent me from actually throwing up, but I am pretty much nauseated 24/7 lately. I'm also starting to get migraines. This is my third day in a row with one. Thus far, they aren't overly severe, and my head hurts less than it usually does. What I really notice is the other symptoms... the vision issues, difficulty enunciating, etc. I mean, the headache is there but, for now, it's something I can work through. Here's hoping that they are just from hormonal fluctuations and won't stick around the entire pregnancy again.

My last symptom is a bit more concerning. Or maybe not. At any rate, I've been having bouts of irregular heartbeat. It will basically be like beat, beat, beat, pause, twitch in my chest, beat, beat. Sometimes it just does that for a minute or two, other times it lasts for like 20 minutes. It will also slow down to around 50-60 sometimes when it does that, but other times my resting pulse is over 100 (abnormal for me). I'm hoping that it's just a reaction to the increased blood flow during pregnancy, particularly since I've never had heart problems and have no known issues that would cause this, but I'm going to mention it to Dr. Wall on the 7th.

One thing that is kind of fun about this pregnancy is that I am due in an entirely different time of year than I was with all of my other kids. All of my other kids were due in February, March, and April. It seems really fun to have fall babies! Since I doubt I'll make it past 35 weeks, if I'm lucky, that puts me at delivering around October 17. October seems like a nice month for a birthday. Let's just not make it September. Are you listening in there, babies?

In other news, I think that we've finalized our names! With twins, it's a little complicated, but here they are...

Boy/boy:
Miles Edward
Leo David

Boy/girl:
Miles David
Lydia Jane

Girl/girl:
Lydia Jane
Sophia Claire

Now to wait another 8 weeks or so to find out what combo I've got chilling in there! I can't wait!

6w2d

2010-03-30T17:29:00.000-07:00

I had my first u/s with the RE today, and my third u/s total. And, well, I was nervous. Really nervous. I was even super productive at work just to try to distract myself from the seemingly never-ending wait until my 3 pm appointment! I was just so afraid that we were going to get bad news about our second little sac.

Instead, we got nothing but good news! Two babies, one measuring 6w2d and the other measuring 6w1d. Baby A had a h/b of 119 and Baby B had a h/b of 108. Everything looked absolutely normal... or as normal as twins can be! We're still very early, and a lot can happen, but for now it's definitely two in there!

Baby A

Baby B

Both!

Baby B's little heart beating away

P.S. There is some weird thing at the top of Baby B's sac. The RE said it didn't look like another baby, so maybe it was one of my organs overlaying the image. Let's hope it stays that way in future u/s! My next u/s is April 7 with Dr. Wall, and then I go back to the RE on April 13 for another one.

6w0d

2010-03-28T20:44:00.000-07:00

First of all, yay, it's a new week! 6 weeks always seems so much more pregnant than 4 or 5 weeks (or even 3 weeks, when I first found out this time). Granted, it's still about a minute and a half pregnant in the scheme of things, but it's the week when you can see the heart beat! That's pretty darn exciting.

Second of all, I'm still periodically going to the crazy place. However, I am pleased to report that I have stuck to my ban on Google'ing anything pregnancy-related. It's been hard, but I've managed to overcome the temptation! Today's drama was when I noticed in the shower that I had bruises on my legs, presumably from the Lovenox. I thought that, maybe, it was making me bleed too much. Then, I thought that maybe the second sac wasn't a baby at all, just blood pooling in my uterus, and that the Lovenox would make that worse, eventually causing me to miscarry the one real baby. So, yeah. Crazy place. I did manage to talk myself down from that particular ledge before I was finished with my shower, so at least it was short-lived.

On a symptoms front, I'm still battling pretty intense nausea. It comes and goes, but is firmly in place most of the day, every day. I've learned to eat quickly when I feel well because I never know how long it will last. I'm also VERY tired, all the time. I feel ready for bed around 6-7 pm lately, although I've made it to 8-9 pm most nights (or even later). I am also feeling all sorts of sharp pulling and tugging types of pains, which I think is a mixture of my ovaries beginning to go back down and perhaps a bit of uterine stretching. I'm still dealing with some of the OHSS symptoms, too, so I definitely don't feel like myself. It's both strange so early and comforting.

My next u/s is Tuesday. My fingers and toes are crossed for a good outcome. I think that I'll be able to really, finally take a deep breath if all goes well then. Sure, a million things can still go wrong, but it would provide some reassurance that, for now, things are fully on track.

5w5d

2010-03-26T21:21:00.000-07:00

I'd like to say that I've been relaxed since my first u/s. However, that would be a complete and utter lie. Instead, I've spent countless hours Google'ing everything under the sun in relation to early u/s, what you should see at 5w3d, what the potential lack of a yolk sac at 5w3d might mean, miscarriage risks, etc. Simply put, I've been making myself crazy.

Yesterday was really the high (low?) point. I drove myself completely insane, and had myself convinced that neither baby was viable and it was all some sick cosmic joke. I worked myself into a frenzy at the idea of another loss. Something about being in that ultrasound room again, while they looked and looked at a sac, brought back a lot of memories of the day that we lost Baby B last time. I didn't expect that since I've had a ton of u/s there since, and it shook me. It led me to go to the bad place, the place where I was convinced that one or both of my babies would die. And the idea of that... well, I felt like I couldn't do it. Not again.

This morning, I woke up with a little more perspective and have done my best to avoid anymore rampant Google'ing.

There are a few things that I know:
1. The position of my uterus due to the OHSS made it very difficult for them to see anything, so it's very possible that there IS a clear yolk sac that they just didn't find (particularly since it took so long to find the first one and that was clear as day once they found it).
2. Dr. Wall said that he saw a yolk sac, anyway, so this might all be a moot point.
3. Even if there was no clear yolk sac, there isn't always one at 5w3d and that can be completely normal.
4. Even if everything is normal at 5 weeks, I can still have a miscarriage. A perfect gestational sac and yolk sac, and even a heartbeat, are no guarantees. Everything is tenuous and driving myself insane won't change that.

So, I've been trying to calm down today. Just take it one step at a time. BFP? Check. Strong betas? Check. Gestational sacs on u/s? Check. Tuesday, I will hopefully see h/bs. If something happens, it happens. I will deal with it because I always deal, and there are no other choices but to play the hand we are given. But, for now, I'm going to try to be positive and avoid the vast, scary realms of the Internet and hope that we'll get good news on Tuesday that will put my fears to rest... for at least an hour.

5w3d - first u/s

2010-03-24T11:38:00.000-07:00

This morning, I had my first appointment with Dr. Wall. It lasted for two hours, which surprised me until I remembered that the first appointment always takes forever. Especially when I'm such a unique and beautiful snowflake.

They started by doing a history. My 5 pregnancies, 5 kids, 2 sets of twins, and 3 losses confused everyone and took about 15 minutes to get straight in my chart and on the u/s record. Everything is fine right now with my BP and such, but they took some blood today just to establish a baseline for various things.

After the basics were done, I had my u/s. They started out by looking at my ovaries. My ovaries are, simply put, ugly. They are ginormous and covered in big yucky follicles full of fluid. There is also a fair amount of fluid just floating around in there. Dr. Wall said that it's like a Mickey Mouse head with huge ears and a teeny tiny face (my ovaries being the ears, and my uterus being the face). In fact, my ovaries are so huge that they are making it hard to see my uterus on the transvaginal u/s. The tech actually got a better picture initially using an abdominal u/s, which is pretty crazy for being as early as I am. My uterus must be up REALLY high!

Anyway, the news everyone is waiting for is that we're having... twins?! Maybe?! Basically, we don't know much more than we did before my u/s. There are definitely two gestational sacs. One of them definitely has a yolk sac. Dr. Wall said he saw a yolk sac on the other one, but the tech wasn't sure. Still, at 5w3d, I think it's not surprising not to see a yolk sac at all, so I'm not sure that means much. So, for now, Dr. Wall says twins, with the standard vanishing twin syndrome mention, although I will not really believe it until we see h/bs. My next u/s is on Tuesday with my RE.

I thought that I wouldn't see Dr. Wall again for a month or so, but he wants me back in two weeks. And, I think it's only that long since I have an u/s with the REs next week! He switching me onto Atenolol, 25 mg twice a day, and I will also start taking Lovenox tomorrow morning. Otherwise, all of my meds are pregnancy-safe, which is a big relief particularly about my myasthenia gravis med. I pretty much can't function without that med, so I was worried that it wouldn't be pregnancy-safe. But, thankfully, it is and I'll be able to keep taking it! Dr. Wall also said that the MG is something to watch for, but is unlikely to be a big issue in my pregnancy. Phew.

My favorite moment from today was when I asked what I should do next (referring to when to come back in) and Dr. Wall said: "Just keep living the dream." Thank god he is my MFM!

I love this particular picture... it looks like one of them in a heart! That's the one with the yolk sac, right there in the center. You can just barely see the hint of one on the bottom of the other one.

5w0d

2010-03-21T18:00:00.000-07:00

Not much to report around here. Still in Maui, still queasy, still waiting for my u/s on the 24th! I have to say, though, that the timing of this trip has made the wait for my first u/s a lot easier. I remember saying after my first cycle failed that I wanted to go on vacation during any future 2ww to distract me. While there was some merit in that idea, I think that my obsession probably would've trumped vacation. Vacationing during the NEXT 2ww has turned out to be perfect.

Thus far, I've done two pregnancy bad things. The first was eating a turkey sandwich at the airport, completely forgetting about the whole deli meat thing. Oh well. The second was driving over quite possibly the world's bumpiest road yesterday. It was dirt in parts, and totally jacked up pavement in other parts, and we had to drive reaaaaaally slowly to try to minimize the bouncing. Even so, it reminded me of a ride at Disneyland or something. Hopefully, whatever is hanging out in my uterus is well and truly stuck in there!

If it wasn't for missing my girls so, so, SO much, I could stay here forever. Vacation has been wonderful. I wasn't sure how it would all go with the big kids, but it's been awesome.

4w3d

2010-03-17T23:53:00.000-07:00

It's 8:30 pm here in Maui and, sadly, I'm the only one still awake! Everyone else conked out a little while ago. It's reasonable, really, since we were up at 3:30 am to make our flight, and Maui is 3 hours behind Seattle time, but still... it strikes me as funny that the only one left awake is the pregnant woman!

We had very smooth flights with no issues whatsoever. However, flying always seems a bit hard on me physically. I puff up like a balloon at the best of time. So, I was not surprised to see my feet/ankles swelling up halfway to San Francisco. It also turned out that today was the day that morning sickness started to kick in. I don't tend to throw up very often at all, so I just battled nausea off and on all day. The good news is that eating a couple of Sour Patch Kids really seems to help. I had 6 or 7 today and it made a very big difference. I'm going to carry them with me at all times!

The other surprise was that the OHSS seems to be getting worse. I'm not sure whether it's just from the flying, or the increased activity because of travel, or what, but it's almost as bad right now as it was Sunday night when I went to the ER. The sharp upper abdominal pain is back, and my abdomen is huge again. We swung by Safeway and picked up some Gatorade, which I'm drinking now, and I plan to take it VERY easy tomorrow. We have a few somewhat active things planned while we're here, but tomorrow is going to be a pool/beach lounge day for me.

Although it's been very challenging physically for me today, I have been feeling so grateful. When we boarded the plane from SFO to Maui, we were sandwiched between two rows with infants. And, bad person that I am, I was like DEAR LORD. But, those little guys were such angels. I was smiling at one of them later in the flight and he was such a cutie pie. I suddenly felt so excited at the prospect of having another little one around the house. Granted, the newborn phase is not my favorite (I'm not sure that any part of the baby phase is, actually... todders may take that prize!), but there is so much goodness there. I hope to enjoy as much of it as possible.

Oh, and if you're pregnant, or have had preemies, or worst yet, both, do NOT read The Girl Next Door by Elizabeth Noble. I literally cried for about 15 minutes straight on the plane while reading it. Doh.

4w2d - beta #2

2010-03-16T14:29:00.000-07:00

I went in for my second (third?) beta this morning. Usually, bloodwork posts online around noon. Sometimes, it will even post a bit early. But, today? Today, it posted at almost 2 pm! I was going nuts refreshing the website.

Beta #1 (14dpo): 264
Beta #2 (16dpo): 669

That's a doubling time of 35.78 hours. I'll definitely take that! A few minutes after my results posted online, my favorite nurse called to tell me. She told me to pretty much keep doing whatever it is that I'm doing since it sure seems to be working! She also scheduled my first u/s with my RE. I will actually have my first u/s with my MFM the week prior, but this is my official first u/s, I guess. Anyway, it will be March 30. My RE is out of town so it will be with a different RE, which is kind of too bad. Sarah, the nurse, said that Dr. Opsahl will be so bummed not to get to do it. But, I'm sure that they'll have me come back for one or two more u/s so he'll be able to do one before I'm officially released to Dr. Wall.

So, that's it for now. First appointment and u/s with Dr. Wall on the 24th, and first RE u/s on the 30th. Until then, I'll be in Maui! We leave tomorrow, bright and early, and will be back on the 23rd. Great timing for this trip, I have to say! This will be our first big trip with the big kids, so we're all very excited!

4w1d - OHSS

2010-03-15T03:52:00.000-07:00

This afternoon, I started to feel really bloated. I mean, I've been talking about the bloat for awhile now, but this was a whole new level. I could literally feel my upper abdomen expanding. It continued through the late afternoon and early evening, getting worse and worse. By the time the kids were all in bed at 9, it was just plain awful. I was feeling incredibly full and uncomfortable. I'd try to lay down periodically, but I couldn't lay flat without pain and even more discomfort. As the night wore on, I started to feel like I was having trouble breathing, too.

After a bit of hemming and hawing over whether it could wait until morning, I called and spoke to one of the REs. She pretty much blew me off from the get-go. I got about three words out and she told me that I was fine and that the Progesterone was just causing gas. Uh... no. I tried to explain what was going on a few times, but she seemed completely disinterested so I finally gave up and decided to just go to bed and insist on being seen if it was still bad in the morning. Except, I absolutely could not lay down without extreme discomfort, so I finally decided at midnight to go to the ER to get things checked out.

I went to Swedish since it's close and it was a pretty good experience. They got me in and out in three hours, which isn't bad for an ER. Plus, the ER doc knew something about pregnancy, which is always helpful. The last ER doc I saw while pregnant told me that full term for twins is 31 weeks, so this doctor was a vast improvement. At any rate, they took some vitals and blood, and then sent me in for an u/s.

The long and the short of it is that I have moderate OHSS. Barely. I'm just over the line for moderate, so it's the mildest of the moderate. Knowing that, I have a newfound respect for women with severe OHSS. I am SO uncomfortable that I can't even conceive of it being much worse than this. At any rate, the gist is that OHSS is when the follicles that once held eggs fill up with fluid, causing cysts, which can then cause fluid in your abdomen, which ultimately pushes on all sorts of organs. My right ovary is currently squishing into my uterus, which is causing some of my discomfort. And, my intestines are being pushed up towards my lungs. Not a good time.

On the plus side, while it's too early to see any sacs, they did see a very nice uterine lining (24 mm) and not a hint of bleeding, so whatever caused the spotting earlier it was not any sort of visible issue. Also, they did another beta, which was 364 (at 1 am). It's a different lab, so it's not quite apples to apples, but it's still a very nice rise from 264 at 9 am. So, regardless of what is happening to my poor ovaries and abdomen, whatever is growing in my uterus appears to be just fine.

I'm not allowed to do anything but pretty much sit and chill for now. No picking up babies, even. I'm supposed to drink tons of Gatorade, eat salty foods, and rest. Easier said than done when it feels like there is a lead weight right under my lungs.

Honestly, I'm just relieved that it isn't serious AND that everything seemed fine pregnancy-wise. I've been far more concerned about that spotting than the OHSS, so it came as a big relief to learn that there is no cause for concern on that front. I can handle discomfort, especially once I know what's going on. I have to say, though... I didn't see this one coming. When the bloating seemed to subside after ER, I pretty much figured I was out of the woods where OHSS was concerned. Doh!

I just downed two big glasses of Gatorade, so I think it's time for bed now. 4 am is definitely not my preferred bed time.

4w0d - beta day!

2010-03-14T12:03:00.000-07:00

I had my first beta today. It was funny because the same woman who has taken my blood throughout this IVF cycle was there today but, for the first time, it took multiple tries to get a vein! I was pretty much going to stay there until she got my blood, one way or another. She finally did get a vein and then I just had to go home and wait for the results. Luckily for my sanity, they posted online before noon, which is rare for them.

14dpo: 254.7

I'm definitely pregnant!

It was a good day for a beta, too. I woke up this morning with a very small amount of brown spotting. It's been off/on thus far today, never more than a tiny amount, but it's still upsetting. Even though I know that it can be caused by pregnancy, Prometrium, etc. and be totally normal, it still scares me. Here's hoping that it really is just the normal pregnancy spotting and that it goes away soon.

My second beta will be Tuesday morning. My fingers and toes are very tightly crossed for 500+.

3w5d

2010-03-12T23:57:00.000-08:00

I don't have much to report these days. I'm pretty much in a holding pattern until my first beta on Sunday. I'm really eager to get that number so that I can start playing "guess how many babies are in there" with more data. I mean, sure, I can play that game now, but it's more fun to do it with beta numbers... even if I'm well aware that betas are a mediocre predictor at best.

Because it gives me some strange satisfaction, I have still been POAS almost as much as before. It's comforting to watch the line get darker. I was hoping to pass on my unused HPTs with my unused meds, but I'm afraid that my lack of self control is going to lead me to run out of them before that happens.

I've been feeling pretty good so far. Really tired, some nausea after meals, certain smells make me queasy, a small amount of boob tenderness, and very weepy. Everything even slightly sad or touching makes me cry. But, really, it's not much of anything otherwise. I feel like that half the time when I'm not pregnant, so it's not that big of a change! I'm actually now 2 lbs under my pre-IVF weight and I do appreciate that. I always drop a bit of weight in early pregnancy despite eating nothing but badness, but I'm surprised that I've lost any this time since I'm incredibly bloated. Like, more bloated than it seems possible to be.

Only one more full day and then beta! In the meantime, I have these lovely HPTs to console me. From top to bottom, they are 4.5dp5dt, 5dp5dt, 6dp5dt, and 7dp5dt. My camera broke and the only one we have is Robert's, which is horrible for anything other than non-up close shots in perfect natural light, but you can still tell that the line today is pretty darn dark at this point!

3w3d (how crazy is that?!)

2010-03-10T23:52:00.000-08:00

One of the perks of being high-risk (ok, the only perk) is that I get a lot of MFM appointments. For example, I had 32 ultrasounds with my last pregnancy! However, I have to say that even I was surprised when Dr. Wall's office called me this afternoon and asked me to come in for an ultrasound/appointment a week from today!

I had called Dr. Wall's office today because he wanted me to switch to Atenolol (a blood pressure med that is more pregnancy safe than the one I usually take) as soon as I got a positive test. However, between that, the Lovenox issue, and the question of just how pregnancy safe some of my other meds are, he decided that he wanted to see me, do his own viability scan (even if we were looking at pretty much nothing), and talk through some of this stuff rather than just prescribe it over the phone. Considering that I have a few questions myself, I'm very happy to get to have an early appointment. I love Dr. Wall!

Unfortunately for me, we'll be on a plane to Maui next Wednesday (I know, woe is me, right?), so I can't come in then. Instead, I'll be seeing Dr. Wall two weeks from today, on the 24th. All told, I think that's better because I'll be 5w3d by then so we should be able to see a sac/yolk sac by then. There wouldn't be much of anything to see at 4w3d. Although, even at 5w3d, we won't be able to see a heartbeat that early, we can least get an early peak at how many are in there! My real first u/s will be at around 6 weeks at my RE's office, and that will be the official word since they schedule it late enough to see the h/b in most cases.

I ran to Target today to buy new prenatals. We ordered these frou frou'ish ones online and they taste and smell SO bad that they made me sick even before I started IVF, much less while queasy. The Target ones may not be the best, but I'm able to stomach them, so that's got to be better in the end. I also picked up some sort of prenatal DHA supplement, which seemed like a good call. And two more digitals. Because you can never see "Pregnant" on a test too many times (or so I think... Robert thinks I should stop buying new tests and pee on the ones I have!). I did pee on one of my Internet cheapies tonight and the line is getting darker and pinker, despite the fact that I didn't hold my pee at all. Hooray!

Everyone around here is very excited by the idea of a new baby! The big kids are all desperately hoping for a boy (or little Miles, as Emilia has begun to refer to my tiny clump of cells), probably because the girls outnumber the boys as it is and we have two girl babies/toddlers already. I told Alice today that I have a teeeeeny tiny baby in my tummy that will grow big and be born in a few months. She lifted up my shirt, touched my tummy, and told me that there is a baby, and then told me that SHE has a baby in her tummy, too. It was adorable! Of course, Alice tells me that she has owies wherever I have owies, and otherwise mimics almost everything I do/say, but hopefully she'll hold off on the baby growing for another 25+ years! Charlotte's reaction was more succinct. She walked away, grabbed a copy of "Welcome Home New Baby," and handed it to me to read to her. I suspect that we'll be reading that book a whole lot over the next few months!

Now that our basement remodel is almost done, we can free up the bedroom that will be the nursery. I can't wait to start planning that room. It's always fun to decorate! If we have twins, I may bite the bullet and switch the girls to toddler beds to avoid buying two more cribs, so I guess I may end up doing a nursery and a big girl room. I'll definitely be on the look out for some cute, cost-effective ideas, if that is the case!

It's funny that, last time, I felt so nervous after my BFP. I was terrified that something was going to go wrong. And, it did. This time, as soon as I saw that line, I felt at peace. I'm not even worried about my beta numbers or my first u/s. Me! Not worried! It's a great feeling.

I'm going to be passing some of my unused medications on to another IVF'er. Here's hoping they bring her the same luck they brought me. In a couple of years, we'll likely be donating our frozen embryos to other couples through our clinic, as well. After going through three rounds of IVF, I feel strongly that anything I can do to help another couple succeed at IVF is something I need to do. My children bring so much joy to my life. I know how lucky I am. I want the same for others... especially those who want it so badly, have tried so hard, and gone through so much to get there.

5dp5dt

2010-03-10T07:35:00.000-08:00

I think that picture pretty much says it all!

I peed on two more sticks last night and both were positive, and they were noticeably darker each time. This morning's is also darker, but it wouldn't come up well in a picture. And, besides, screw those faint tests. The digital is the one that really makes me feel pregnant. Holy crap. This actually worked! I'm pregnant!

Robert and I stayed up until 12:30 last night because we were too excited to sleep. Every time there was a new stick to look at, we'd get so giddy! In fact, I think I was giddy in my sleep, even!

I feel so incredibly blessed to be able to begin this journey again.

I'm now taking bets on how many are in there. With the early BFP, our guess is twins. Eek!

4dp5dt (cont.)

2010-03-09T20:15:00.000-08:00

After my insane freak out this morning (really, it was impressive), I just sort of chilled out and calmed down. It helped that I was at work today so I just focused on that throughout the morning.

By the time that the afternoon rolled around, Robert and I went to lunch, and I felt a little bit better about life. I mean, it's too early. Getting BFNs right now isn't the end of the world. There's still time.

After lunch, I felt queasy. I initially attributed this to the fact that I had fried mac and cheese balls and fried zucchini for lunch and, while it was delicious, it seemed likely to result in queasiness. But, it came and went all afternoon, and I started to wonder. Plus, I kept getting SUPER overheated. I started to think that, maybe, if these were real symptoms, I'd have enough HCG in my system to get a BFP.

I raced home, POAS, and got... nothing. Except I thought that maybe I saw the faintest hint of a line. But, the more I looked, the more I thought I was hallucinating. So, that went in the trash. But, I was encouraged that perhaps my levels were starting to rise and I might see something in a few hours. I didn't pee for another few hours and POAS this evening. And got this.

It's really, really faint. But, I asked each of the big kids to point to every line they saw on the test strip and they pointed to the positive line! It's SUPER faint, but it's there, it appeared within 10 minutes, it's faintly pink, and it's the right width.

I think this cycle might not be a bust after all! Now excuse me while I go pee on another 10 sticks.

4dp5dt

2010-03-09T07:57:00.000-08:00

Because I have fully and completely gone to the crazy place, I peed on three sticks yesterday. They were all negative. And, then, because I've gone insane, I pulled the last one out of the trash an hour later just to make sure I hadn't missed a line. Except that you can't read HPTs an HOUR later without risking evap lines. So, I pulled the test out of the trash, saw a line, and knew it was probably an evap line, but had some hope that maybe, just maybe, it was a real BFP.

I went to sleep, POAS this morning, and it was still so starkly white that I can't even examine it from all angles trying to find a hint of a line. Fuck. Just...fuck.

Reasonable response: The earliest BFP I could find online last night after feverish Google'ing was 6dp5dt. I'm still two days shy of that. I have plenty of time to get my real BFP.

My actual response: I'm not pregnant. I don't feel pregnant. Any minor symptoms I'm experiencing are just from the Prometrium. This fucking cycle didn't work, and I know it, so why can't my beta just come and put me out of my misery. And, also, WTF?! Two GREAT blasts, good lining, no issues, and a BFN? Falling into the crappy side of the odds TWICE?! WTF. Just... WTF.

I'm trying to periodically interject the reasonable response into my internal thought process, but thus far it hasn't been working too well. I keep just trying to tell myself that it didn't work, so that I can stop obsessing and start moving on, but then part of me says that I don't know that, and back to the crazy place I go.

Fuck the two week wait.

3dp5dt

2010-03-08T13:14:00.000-08:00

BFN this morning. It's too early for anything else, which is comforting. Takes the pressure off, really. Tomorrow, I will be 9dpo, which is when I got my BFP last time. With triplets. So, while I think it's possible to get a BFP tomorrow, I will still be ok with a BFN. Wednesday, though? Wednesday will be 5dp5dt/10dpo. Wednesday will be the beginning of the freak out period if I'm still staring at a big ugly stark white test strip.

Because I've always documented my symptoms before, I'll document them now, but frankly, it seems silly. I know, and everyone else knows, that Prometrium causes every last pregnancy symptom in the book. But, for the record, I have blue veins starting on my chest as of yesterday, a bit of AF-like cramping and a few tugging/pulling feelings yesterday and this morning, and I'm tired.

I was feeling pretty positive yesterday, which was a nice change from my previous despair. Today, I'm just sort of riding it out. I still have a few days of waiting, and it's too early to know anything, so I'm trying not to go insane and/or become too attached to the idea of being pregnant. Except I already am. Sigh.

On the morning of ET, I was thinking about the upcoming transfer. I kept thinking about how many we might have to transfer, and hoping for one baby. Finally, I stopped myself. We approached this process as intelligently as possible. We did everything that we could to help us achieve a good outcome. We knew that we would only transfer the number of embryos that made sense for us to transfer, based on quality and our RE's recommendation, along with my own experiences. While ONE healthy baby might be our goal, it felt wrong to me to put that out there, into the universe, like it was the only outcome that we desired. I decided that, from the moment that we decided how many to transfer, I would try to let go of that, and just wait and see, and hope for a positive outcome without dictating, in my own mind, what a positive outcome had to look like.

If the past couple of years has taught me anything, it's that some of the best things in my life bare little resemblence to what I thought they'd look like. So, little blastobabies, let's just hope for a positive.

2dp5dt AND Q&A!

2010-03-07T11:38:00.000-08:00

I have to confess that I POAS this morning. Stark white, as expected. I'm only 7dpo, and the earliest I've ever gotten a BFP was 9dpo (with TRIPLETS!), so that's not a shocker. Still, I hope that I stop seeing stark, ugly, white test strips in a few days.

I was busy laying on the couch watching Sex and the City DVDs this morning and forgot to call the RE to ask about our embies. But, I just checked my voicemail and it turns out that we have SIX frozen blasts! Six! That pretty much blows my mind. Out of my two prior cycles, we ended up with one lone frozen embie, and I swear that was a pity freeze. But, six?! Six is a real, solid number. It's comforting to know that, if this cycle doesn't work, we can do 2-3 frozen cycles. Phew. It takes a lot of the pressure off!

On a totally unrelated note, periodically I get questions posted in the comments but I can't really answer them directly. So, I thought it would be fun to do another Q&A. If you have any questions about IVF or anything else I post about, leave a comment on this post and I'll do an answer post in a few days. It'll help me pass the time until D-Day next Sunday. So, ask away!

1dp5dt

2010-03-06T19:20:00.000-08:00

I was hoping to post today with news of our frozen embryos (assuming we had some). However, the RE never called today. I'm not sure whether that means that we don't have any that made it to freeze or just whether they forgot to call me. I'm definitely hoping for the latter. Not one embryo frozen out of 27 eggs would be just plain depressing.

I POAS today for the first time in a few years. I expected to see a BFP from the HCG trigger, but it was as stark white as it is possible for it to be, so the trigger is already out of my system. That's good, I guess, except that I figured I'd have a day or two of seeing fake BFPs. The idea of seeing four or five days of stark white HPTs is a little demoralizing. And that's best case scenario. I may be looking at them for a lot longer than that. Granted, no one is forcing me to POAS every day. So, maybe, now that I know that the trigger is out of my system, I'll wait a few days to do it again. If I can stand it!

Symptoms wise, I have none. Then again, it's unlikely that my embryos would've even implanted yet. The only symptom to report at all is fullness and AF-like cramping, both of which are caused by the Prometrium.

I've spent as much time resting as I can, but it's a mixed bag with two toddlers who demand mama more often than not. Last night, Alice wanted me during the night so often that I had to go up the stairs three times! Oy. Today, I mostly hung out on the couch, but we did take the kids to the park this afternoon. I sat on a bench, mostly.

I'm feeling pretty down this cycle. I don't know why. I felt pretty good about it after our awesome ER, and being pushed to day 5. And, even the day of ET. But, after my acupuncture session ended, I just felt hopeless and like this cycle had no chance. I've been feeling like that ever since, too. I don't know whether it means anything, or is just my own paranoia coming through, or what. But, it's hard. I think that doing the day 5 ET, and seeing pics of blasts again, just brought up a lot of memories of my first failed cycle. Or, at least I hope that's all it is.

I have two embryos inside of me, but I'm not pregnant. That fucks with my head.

Embryo Transfer

2010-03-05T17:14:00.000-08:00

Robert and I left for our embryo transfer just shy of noon. We got to the clinic and checked in, and found out that the REs were running behind. My acupuncturist suggested that I not drink too much more water, and definitely not too quickly, because she was afraid that I'd pop before I got in there, and that ended up being a VERY good call.

At any rate, we went right back into the room, and I had my first acupuncture treatment. I tried to lay there and focus on breathing like she told me to, but 30 minutes is a long time to do that, so I ended up chatting with Robert instead. Then, when that was done, we changed into our gown/scrubs, silly hats, and shoe cover thingies. We thought we'd have a bit of a wait before getting our embryo information, but Dr. Opsahl actually came in almost immediately.

Our clinic grades embryos on a scale of 1-5, with 5 being the highest grade. He said that pretty much no one gets a 5, 4/3 are considered good, and then it declines sharply, with 2/1 not being very good at all. Out of the 27 eggs retrieved, 24 were mature, 20 fertilized normally, 19 were still growing on day 3, and 12 were viable today. Of those 12, we had two grade 3 expanded blasts that Dr. Opsahl said were above average quality (HOORAY!), and 10 more in various states. He said that he can't guarantee us anything to freeze, but that they think that we will have some frozen. However, the remaining embies are a bit behind the other two, so they are growing them out to see. We'll find out what, if anything, made it to freeze tomorrow.

When it came to number to transfer, Dr. Opsahl said that he is a big proponent of single ET. If we'd had two perfect embryos today, plus a good amount already frozen, he would have recommended single ET. However, because we don't know for sure that we'll have anything to freeze, and our embryos weren't perfect, he recommended that we transfer the two expanded blasts. He stepped us through the overall pregnancy rates, and said that, at this point, he gives us about a 70% chance of pregnancy and a 50% chance of twins.

We had to wait fairly long after that before the transfer. I thought I might die from having to pee so badly. But, finally, they called us back and we went into the room, got prepped, and then they spent some time getting the catheter in the right place. They finally decided it was just right, and then they showed us the embryos on the screen, got them loaded up, and did the transfer. We saw the little flash on the screen as they were transferred, and that was that. As always, it's a very strange moment, knowing that two little lives have taken up residence inside of you... with no idea whether they will stick around. It's hard not to swing wildly between faith in that 70% and the memory of hitting the bad side of those odds before (aka melodramatic, hormonal despair).

After the procedure, I had another acupuncture treatment, and then we headed home. Now I am home, on the couch, with a pillow between me and the laptop, where I'll spend most of my time until Monday morning. I'll also start eating my pineapple today and continue for the next five days. Theoretically, I am resting, but it's about as easy to rest with two toddlers as you'd expect. My goal is to avoid being kicked in the stomach more than once or twice, to spend as much time as possible sitting, and to climb the stairs once or twice a day instead of five or six.

So, now, my 2ww officially begins. My beta is on March 14th at 9 am. Granted, I should know whether I am pregnant long before that point, but it's still good to have that goal in sight. Now, excuse me while I go overanalyze every last twinge!

Thing 1 and Thing 2

Day 4

2010-03-04T19:13:00.000-08:00

I realized a few very important things today.

1. PIO is a pain in the ass. Literally. My ass is killing me. Especially the left side. What is with me and my left side always hurting me?

2. PIO also seems to be making me REALLY tired. I also have to pee all the time. It's good to note these side effects now before I decide that they are pregnancy symptoms.

3. Waiting five full days for an embryo transfer is a really, really long time. Especially with no news after day 3.

4. The good thing about a day 5 ET is that you spend half of your 2ww waiting for the freaking ET. By the time these embryos are actually IN me, I'll only have a few days to obsess like an insane person before an HPT might actually give me a positive.

In case you're wondering, I am armed and ready with 20 pee sticks and I'm not afraid to use them. Oh no! I'm going to start testing tomorrow to test out the HCG trigger so that I'll know that any positives I get are real. And, for confirmation? I have three digitals. I'm ready to obsess. Bring on the 2ww!

In other news, this morning Alice was watching Robert give me my shot. The girls are used to the idea of "mama's medicine," both IVF-related and otherwise, but they have been particularly interested in the ginormous needle that Robert uses for the PIO. As Alice watched him inject me, she came up, put her hand on his arm and said: "Mama needs a shot. Mama needs her medicine." She didn't seem troubled, she was just stating a fact. She wandered off, but came back a minute later to proclaim, with gusto: "Alice doesn't need medicine!" She wanted to make DAMN sure no one came at her with that giant needle!

I took this picture of Robert last night right after he gave me my PIO. I told him to look diabolical. I'm not sure that he succeeded, but I still like it!

Day 3

2010-03-03T14:04:00.000-08:00

I went into this morning feel confident that the RE's office would call and push us to a day 5 ET. I mean, we had TWENTY embryos growing. How could we NOT get pushed out? But, because James and I had such serious embryo quality issues, I was afraid that maybe the quality issues hadn't all been his MFI. Maybe, instead, there was some hidden egg quality problem with me. I was really afraid that we'd have the same sort of quality issues this time, and that we'd end up doing a day 3 ET.

At 7:30 am, I was fairly calm. By 9 am with no call, I was starting to panic. By 10:25 am without a word from the RE's office, I'd given in to despair. I had it in my head that our embryos were dying right and left, that we'd go in today for ET and get terrible news, and have to transfer 3-4 due to the quality, and then end up with no baby and nothing to freeze. Or quadruplets. I wasn't entirely sure which was worse. I think it's no baby, but Robert says it's a toss up.

At any rate, the RE's office called me at, I kid you not, the moment that my clock turned from 10:29 to 10:30 am. I seriously could have kissed that nurse, right through the phone! She said that we're on for a Friday ET, at 2 pm, and that 19 out of our 20 embryos are still growing! They want to see 5 or more embryos at grade 3 or higher, and we have 7. You go, little embryos!

I changed my acupuncture appointment to Friday, and will need to stock up on pineapple before Friday. I was so unprepared for the idea of ET today that I didn't even wear loose, comfy clothes! I had no pineapple! I just plain wasn't ready! I'm so glad that we got pushed out.

I was reading more studies this morning, because that's what I do when I stress out (knowledge is power, right), and I came across a big one that showed that medium to high responders (defined as patients with 10 or more follies over 12 mm and 4 or more follies over 16 mm at the time of HCG trigger) have an implantation rate of 50% on day 5, and an overall pregnancy rate of 71%. By contrast, patients who meet the same criteria have an implantation rate of 33% on day 3, and an overall pregnancy rate of 66%. Now, the pregnancy rates themselves are pretty close, but the difference in implantation rate is fairly meaningful, I think. For me, it would appear that a day 5 ET gives me the best chance of getting pregnant with the lowest number of embryos transferred. And that's what we like to hear.

That said, I may have shaved a year or two off my life this morning with all of the stress. Phew.

Day 2

2010-03-02T21:15:00.000-08:00

I don't have much to report today except that I'm still in a surprising amount of pain. I definitely didn't expect to still be THIS sore two days after my ER. But, my left side especially is killing me. My left ovary is the one that always hides, so I suspect that might have something to do with it. I've also been struggling with constant nausea. I went off the Vicodin this afternoon to see if that helped with the nausea, which it did, but then the pain from my ovaries was so bad that I couldn't stand it after a few hours. So, for now, I'm in a pain-Vicodin-nausea-Phenergen-exhaustion cycle that I can't seem to break. Hopefully, things will be better tomorrow.

As for tomorrow, our tentative ET is scheduled for 2:15 pm. However, I'm feeling pretty positive about our odds of being pushed out to a day 5 ET on Friday. If they are going to push us out, they will call us before 10:30 am to let us know. My fingers and toes are all crossed that we get pushed out to Friday!

Fert report

2010-03-01T10:02:00.000-08:00

Well, I almost missed the fert report call! My phone was on vibrate but I just happened to walk into the kitchen for a soda right as they called. PHEW! I'm sure that they would've left the info on my voicemail, but I'm still really glad that I got to talk to them myself.

At any rate, here is the info:
27 eggs retrieved
24 eggs were mature
20 eggs fertilized normally with ICSI

That's right, we have 20 embies growing in the lab right now! HOLY COW! I was sure that we'd have a lot of immature eggs because so many were retrieved. I'm in complete and utter shock that so many were mature and that so many fertilized. Seriously, stunned.

I've been tentatively scheduled for ET on Wednesday afternoon, but I think that we have a very good chance of being pushed out to Friday with so many embies. This cycle has been so smooth, it's hard for me to wrap my mind around it. Dr. Opsahl always said that he thought I was someone who should have 20+ eggs, and I never have until this time. And, then, to actually GET that many eggs without sacrificing quality? I'm just amazed.

If we transfer on day 3, with perfect quality embies, we will probably transfer 3. If we transfer on day 5 with perfect quality embies, we will probably transfer 2. Let's hope one of them decides to stick around.

Egg Retrieval

2010-02-28T12:54:00.000-08:00

Robert and I went in bright and early this morning for my ER. I was nervous... more than I was even expecting, I guess. I was worried that there would be an issue with Robert giving his sample, worried that I wouldn't have any eggs, worried about who knows what. And, of course, they had us get there at 8:30 and then did absolutely nothing except get us into the back until 9:15, so I had plenty of time to wait and worry!

At any rate, the anesthesiologist came in, walked me through the anesthesia that he'd be using, and went over my medical history stuff. Then, he put in my IV (painlessly and on the first try!) and they took me back to the procedure room. He put me to sleep and then they did their thing, I guess.

After I woke up, I had an acupuncture treatment, some pain meds, they gave me a big PIO shot in the ass, and we got our final egg count. They got... 27 eggs!! 27! That's exactly how many we retrieved in my prior two cycles combined! Holy cow! I asked if they are planning to do ICSI, and they are, which makes me feel safer since we had good luck with that previously.

Tomorrow, they will call with how many eggs were mature and how many embryos we have growing. I think that we might be on for a 5dt, but we'll see what happens. TWENTY SEVEN eggs!! Jesus Christ.

CD11

2010-02-27T09:54:00.000-08:00

Last night, I had to do my trigger at 9:30 pm. Robert and I had a date night planned, so we literally chose a movie based on what movie would be getting out right about trigger time! We ended up seeing When in Rome, which was cute, and then I headed into the movie theater restroom to do the trigger.

After speaking to the nurse yesterday, she called in the sub-Q powdered version of the HCG trigger for me. So, there I was in a bathroom stall, playing chemist and mixing up HCG! It was quite the juggling act. Plus, for some reason, the pharmacy gave me a HUGE needle to mix it with even though that made it really hard to get the 1 cc out of the vial (because, hello, the needle was longer than the vial itself, which was barely full!). Then, after it was mixed and I started to inject myself, I knocked the needle and it almost bent/broke off while it was stuck in my tummy. That pretty much gave me a panic attack since I HAD to take that HCG last night and if it had leaked out because of a broken needle or something I would've been SOL. But, luckily, that didn't happen and, other than a heart-stopping moment, I was able to give myself the injection without any major mishaps. In the bathroom. Like a junkie.

We went out to dinner after the movie, and hopefully I drank my last cocktail for quite some time. While we were there, we talked about how both of us are feeling at this point. It's funny because Robert is a huge worry wart. He's a total helicopter parent, too. Meanwhile, by and large, I just try to do what I think is right parenting-wise and not stress out over it. So, going into this process, it seemed like I'd be the more relaxed one (especially since this is IVF #3 for me) and he'd be the one worrying about everything. But, thus far, I've been the one stressing out over follies and E2 and the entire concept of throwing huge amounts of money at something that has no guarantees whatsoever, and he has been the one talking me down. I couldn't understand how he could be so calm about the entire thing when I KNOW that he deeply wants to have a baby. I kept talking about how zen he is being, and finally he told me that he worries all the time but doesn't share it with me. But, the funny thing is that he worries about totally different things than I do. I'm so focused on worrying about each individual stage of IVF, and the idea of it ultimately failing, whereas he worries more about getting pregnant and having medical issues with a baby, me, etc. Even though we both worry about different things, I felt better just knowing that he does worry about this stuff, too. Although the nature of suffering may be attachment, sometimes I still find myself thinking that we only REALLY care about the stuff that we're attached to. Robert tries very hard not to be attached to outcome, and I know that he's right in that, but I still take comfort in the idea that maybe he is... at least a little. I know that I am, for all of my efforts not to be.

On the plus side, when I was ranting like a crazy woman about how horrible it will have been to have thrown away so much money if this doesn't work, Robert told me that if it doesn't work, we'll be rich... kids, after all, cost a whole lot more than one IVF cycle. I am still sick inside at the idea of potentially throwing away so much money, but that did make me laugh.

At any rate, tomorrow is my ER. I have to be there at 8:30 am for my 9:30 ER. Here's hoping for a nice mature crop of eggs. I currently have about 40 follies measuring over 10 mm, which is the most I've ever had, but I still think only 15-20 will likely be mature tomorrow. I'm really hoping for frosties this time, so we need all the help we can get. I'm in a lot of pain, and really bloated and uncomfortable, so I'm very much looking forward to ER tomorrow.

Edit: My blood work is in.

E2: 3095
P4: 9.16

The nurse called and said that the numbers looked good and ER is still on for tomorrow. The P4 is almost exactly the same as it was last cycle. But, the E2 didn't increase very much after trigger. Last time, it was a pretty big increase (went from around 3500 to over 5k!). I'm not sure whether the rate of increase matters or just that there is an increase, but that's my current thing to obsess over.

CD10 (on stims) - Trigger!

2010-02-26T09:52:00.000-08:00

I went in for my blood work and u/s today, and Dr. Opsahl told me that I will be triggering tonight! THANK GOD! I'm so ready to get these eggs out! I almost wore yoga pants to work today because my jeans are so tight over my stomach. Ugh. I feel like the Goodyear blimp!

Anyway, here were the follies today:
Left ovary: 18(3), 17(2), 16, 15, 14(2), 13
Right ovary: 20, 17(2), 15, 14(4), 11(2)

All told, I think that there are probably about 17-20 follies in play right now that might end up giving us mature eggs. I'm a little concerned that they are triggering me with smaller follies this time (last time they waited until pretty much everything was 18-23), but I had pretty much identical ERs when they triggered me like this the first time vs. with larger follies the second time. Here's hoping for a really good retrieval!

Tonight, I will take the HCG trigger. I'm a little concerned about that, though, because the HCG I have is pre-mixed and says it is for IM injection but the instructions talk about powdered HCG that needs to be mixed for sub-Q injection. I do NOT want to mess up this injection, so I need to talk to the nurse when she calls about whether this pre-mixed HCG can be injected sub-Q or whether we need to run out and get powdered HCG this afternoon. I'll have bloodwork tomorrow morning, and then my ER will be on Sunday! That means that transfer will be either Wednesday or Friday. Wow!

CD9 (on stims)

2010-02-25T11:01:00.000-08:00

I have officially reached the point of massive discomfort. My ovaries feel like lead weights or something in there. My pants don't fit. I have a constant headache (dear god, I hope this doesn't mean I'll have non-stop migraines again if I get pregnant). I feel like I'm going to puke most of the time. I want these eggs OUT!

Unfortunately for me, these godforsaken eggs aren't ready to come out. I had another blood work and follie check u/s this morning and, while things all look good, they do not look ready for trigger. However, we're at the point of daily checks now, and he did offer the possibility that I MIGHT trigger tomorrow. Personally, though, I think that Saturday will be trigger day. My follies just aren't quite there yet today. I was happy to see that my lining held steady at 9 mm this time, though!

Because god hates me, my left ovary was hiding this morning so he had to jab me really hard with the wand while simultaneously pushing down on my stomach to try to pop it into view. That hurt. A lot. I mean... A LOT. Plus, even after all of his efforts, the left side never really came into view well for the bottom half of the ovary, so I feel like we're guessing a bit.

In the past, I've always used the "mean" measurement that posts online for my follies. But, today, I noticed that he was pointing to the larger number (they do two measurements for each follie) and using that. So, now, I'm not sure what the real measurement is. However, for consistency's sake, this is what the mean measurements were for my follies. The website only lists 10 on each side, though, and I had 15-20 that he measured on each side, so I guess this is about half of the picture.

Left: 17, 15, 14(2), 13(3), 12(2), 8 (he did the bottom half first, so these are largely the follies we had trouble seeing/measuring... there were some larger ones on the top)
Right: 18, 17, 16, 15, 14(2), 13(2), 12, 11

All told, I think that I'll end up with a pretty good number of eggs. Because there were more that don't show up online, and I think that anything at 13 mm right now is likely to be mature by the time I trigger, I'm going to predict somewhere between 15-20 eggs. That would be my highest number ever, so we'll see. For now, I just wait for my E2 results and med instructions for tonight, but no matter what he wants me back in tomorrow morning, bright and early. Here's hoping for a more cooperative left ovary!

Edit: I just got my blood work results online.

E2: 1686
LH: 3.78
P4: 0.92

I can't remember the ins and outs of LH and P4 at this stage, but those numbers seem fine. And, thank god, my E2 is finally over 1000. FINALLY! God knows that is quite a jump since day 7, so maybe my eggs really are nearing maturity.

IVF 101

2010-02-24T21:20:00.000-08:00

One of the most overwhelming things about IVF, I think, is just how strange it all is. Most of us have heard about a wonderful thing called sex, so the "normal" process doesn't seem very strange. But, most people don't wander around talking about follies and E2 and stims. It's pretty much its own little world that ultimately becomes the new normal as you progress through the process. So, to help those of you who DON'T inhabit the world of IVF, here is my version of IVF 101 (aka everything you never wanted to know about IVF)!

In my mind, IVF has three distinct phases: suppression, stimulation, retrieval/transfer.

Suppression:
Suppression is the first phase of IVF. The goal is essentially to shut down your body's own hormones/reproductive system so that your RE can go on to hyperstimulate it during the stimulation phase. If your body is vying for control during the stimulation phase, it can mess with what the RE is attempting to do. Hence, suppression. Generally, women take birth control pills (BCP) first. After a few days to a month or more on BCP, most women then add daily Lupron injections (in one common protocol, antagonist is another). Lupron suppresses your body's own hormones even more and pretty much puts you into something resembling menopause. For me, Lupron means headaches, nightmares, night sweats, and a generally lovely demeanor.

Stimulation:
Stimulation is the second phase of IVF. Once your body is properly suppressed, you can move on to stimulation. Generally, REs use a mix of drugs during the stimulation phase (and I'll spare you more technical details about why). My RE has me use Menopur for the first 5 days (this can improve egg quality) and Gonal-f the entire time. These drugs are in the form of injections twice a day. The goal during the stimulation phase is to get a lot of follicles (which house eggs) to grow and ultimately mature at about the same time. This is because, as my RE once said, humans make crappy embryos. In order to give birth to one live baby, it might take transferring 2 embryos, that were the only good embryos after initially growing out 10 embryos, that were all that resulted from 15 mature eggs, which were harvested from 22 follicles. During the stimulation phase, REs monitor E2 levels, which can indicate whether eggs are mature (150-200 units of E2 roughly correspond to one mature egg), and follicle size. Once the follicles and E2 indicate that the eggs are nearing maturation, patients are instructed to "trigger," generally with HCG. The trigger signals to the body that it is time to ovulate, in preparation for the egg retrieval.

Retrieval/transfer:
The third and final phase of the IVF process is the retrieval and transfer. Egg retrieval (ER) takes place about 36 hours after trigger. At that point, the RE goes in through the woman's vaginal wall and pops each follicle and sucks out the egg inside. Once all of the eggs have been retrieved, they are combined with the man's sperm (either naturally or through ICSI, which is a process wherein a sperm is injected into each individual egg) and fertilization hopefully occurs. The day after ER, patients are given their fert report, which tells them how many embryos they have growing. Embryo transfer generally occurs on either day 3 or day 5 after ER. At that time, the RE uses an u/s to guide a catheter into the uterus and then pretty much squirts the selected embryos into the uterus. Generally, you do not receive any information about how many embryos you have or their quality until the day of ET, which makes it particularly stressful. ETs are performed while the woman has a VERY full bladder, so the only other real excitement at ET is trying not to either pee on the exam table OR pee out your embryos after you're finished. After ET, most REs recommend a day or two of bed rest.

Once those three phases are complete, the IVF process itself is finished and patients begin the dreaded two week wait (2ww) for their beta (pregnancy test).

Currently, I am on day 8 of stimulation. I'm crampy and uncomfortable and ready to get these eggs OUT!

CD7 (on stims), cont.

2010-02-23T18:06:00.000-08:00

My E2 came back at 680. E2 (estradiol) roughly correlates to 150-200 units per mature follicle. And, well, we're tracking 16-20 follicles. So, if my follies were ready to go, we could expect my E2 to be somewhere between 1600-2000. Clearly, nothing is even close to mature in there. No trigger anytime soon, that's for sure.

For now, I'm continuing on 150 of Gonal-f each morning and evening, plus 5 units of Lupron in the morning until Thursday morning, when they want me to DECREASE to 75 units and go back in for blood work and an u/s. I know that I promised not to mess with my protocol this time, but why would I decrease to such a low dose when my E2 is such crap? I'm having trouble following along with that logic.

The good news is that I reviewed my u/s results online and my follies were a little smaller than I was thinking they were. Most were 11-13 mm and the largest was 16 mm, not 18 mm. That's probably a lot more in line with my E2 level. The bad news is that I'm in a LOT of pain, particularly from my left ovary, and there is no end in sight. At this point, I doubt I'll trigger before Friday, at the earliest, which means that the earliest possible ER would be Sunday. I want these eggs OUT!!

Since I won't have anything interesting to post until Thursday, tomorrow I am going to write up the intro to IVF for those of you following along who have no idea what any of this means. I promise to keep it as short and sweet as possible... think all you need to know about IVF in under 500 words!

CD7 (on stims)

2010-02-23T10:19:00.000-08:00

I had another appointment with the wand this morning, but this time it was a whole new thing. See, my RE has three offices: one in Kirkland (where I go), one in Seattle, and one little one in Renton. I've never been to any of them except Kirkland, but when I called to make my appointment for my blood work and u/s, the only appointment they had available in Kirkland this morning was at 7:15 am. And, well, that's not cool. So, I ended up in Seattle at 8:15 am, which isn't cool either, but isn't as painful as getting all the way to Kirkland by 7:15! The Seattle office is kind of funky, and took forever, so I think that I still prefer Kirkland. But, at least now we know where it is, in case we have to go there again. And there is a Starbucks in the building. Priorities, and all that.

Dr. Letterie did my follie check today. He's the fancy schmancy RE who gets awards and write ups in magazines for being so awesome. The only times I've seen him before were for my prior two ERs. The first ER, he got more eggs than they saw follies, so I thought he was a god. The second ER, he got fewer eggs than they saw follies, so I thought he sucked. Today, he showed me ovaries that are rocking and rolling, so he is back on my good side.

The last two cycles, day 7 on stims was the first time that I even really had any follies doing much of anything. My lazy ovaries don't usually kick into gear into day 9 or so on stims. But, today? Today, I had 8-10 follies on each side, measuring from 13-16 mm for the most part, with 1-2 follies at 18 mm! In fact, there's so much going on in there that Dr. Letterie said that he thinks I'll trigger tomorrow or Thursday! WOW! I don't think that it will be tomorrow, since those little guys at 13 mm have a ways to go, but I guess it's possible since my follies went from 9-10 mm to 13-16 mm between day 5 and day 7. Still, I think that Thursday is much more likely, and maybe even Friday. But, that would still put me at triggering on day 9, which is uncharted territory for me.

Meanwhile, my lining was 9-10'ish mm and had the appropriate three stripes. Last time, it kept getting thicker and thicker, and was at 14 mm by ER, so I hope it chills out. I mean, clearly, I managed to get knocked up even with that absurd lining, but it would be nice if it was a little less thick.

I expect that my doses will probably stay the same, but I'll know more this afternoon when I get my E2 levels. I'm very interested in those to get an idea of how mature my follies are at this point. I think that the highest E2 I've had on day 7 was still only around 700-1000, but I've never had follies this size at this point before, either. If I trigger Thursday, ER would be Saturday, which would be really nice timing for me.... except that it would put my ET on either Tuesday or Thursday, which is less than ideal with work (although might actually be good since we could have the nanny come early in the day to help out so I could laze around and try to get embryos to stick. It's sort of insane to think that I may have embryos floating around in my uterus this time next week!

I called Dr. Wall this morning, finally, to ask about the BP meds and Lovenox. He, of course, is out all week so they are having another one of the MFMs look over my chart and get back to me. I wish I'd called earlier now so that Dr. Wall could weigh in on this, but it's not the end of the world since I've worked with all of their MFMs. I'm pretty sure that I'm supposed to be on a pregnancy safe BP med at this point, so I really need to get that switched over, pronto. I'm also hoping that someone will decide that I should start on the Lovenox beginning the day of ET instead of at a positive u/s. But, we'll see.

CD5 (on stims)

2010-02-21T09:12:00.000-08:00

I had my u/s and blood work bright and early this morning. The plus side of crazy early monitoring appointments is that it is hard to beat a clear, sunny Seattle morning driving across Lake Washington, with Mt. Rainier in the distance. It really was beautiful this morning!

At any rate, my u/s went well. I had about 10 active follies on each side, a bunch of which were just over 10 mm, which is where the RE said she wants to see them on day 5. My lining was 8-9 mm, which is a lot thicker than it was on CD5 during previous cycles, so hopefully it doesn't get too thick. It was like 14 mm last time at trigger! For now, though, it looks like everything is going well and is pretty much text book. We'll see what happens with my E2 levels when those come in, though.

Since it's day 5 on stims, tonight should be my last dose of Menopur. I'm curious to see what dose of Gonal-f they'll put me on from here on out. It seems that my old tired ovaries do better on these higher doses, so hopefully they keep me at about the same levels.

I was thinking last night about how much the bloating and discomfort of stims feels like early pregnancy for me, and it made me think about being pregnant. Not just in theory, or about timing, but the actuality of what it would be like. It's always strange to me how little that comes into play during the IVF process. Maybe just out of a sense of self-preservation, I tend to focus almost exclusively on the next step. Day 7 check, day 9 check, trigger, ER, ET, beta, etc. It all seems too tenuous to really allow myself to believe that there will be a pregnancy, much less a baby, at the end of this road. I know that the odds are in my favor, but I've fallen into the crappy side of those odds before. For now, I'll just keep focusing on the next shot, the next blood draw, the next step. And maybe play with baby names in my head, just a little.

Edit: Here's the info! My E2 was 203, which is good because I know that it should at least double from day 3 to day 5 and it did that plus a little more. My meds for now are:

Tonight: 75 of Gonal-f and 150 of Menopur
Monday am: Continue 5 units of Lupron, 150 of Gonal-f
Monday pm: 150 of Gonal-f
Tuesday am: Continue 5 units of Lupron and 150 of Gonal-f

I go back in on Tuesday morning for my day 7 u/s and blood work. I'm a little concerned that they are backing off my meds to 300 total whereas I've been on 225 of Gonal-f AND 150 of Menopur and seem to be stimming well... it doesn't seem like they should reduce me at this point. But, I'm trusting in their judgment. For now. If there isn't good response on day 7 and they still want to keep me at the same dose, we may have to have a chat.

CD3 (on stims)

2010-02-19T13:49:00.000-08:00

Because my RE clearly lives to fuck with me, today they actually only wanted a blood draw (despite calling me back and telling me yesterday that I needed an u/s, too) and THEN the blood draw results never posted online, even though they are always up by noon. Argh! I've been going nuts waiting!

On the plus side, I just got a call from one of the nurses who put me out of my misery. My E2 was 90, which is officially my highest day 3 on stims E2 yet (IVF #1 was 30, when they asked me if I was even taking the stims, and IVF #2 was 64). So, clearly, I'm not responding like whoa, but I am responding quicker than my prior two cycles. And that's something. Especially since I am apparently a huge wuss because my pants are tight and I swear that it's hard to eat because I feel full. And it's only day 3.

At any rate, here's the plan for now:
Tonight: Continue with 150 of Menopur
Saturday am: Continue with 5 units of Lupron, 225 of Gonal-f
Saturday pm: Continue with 150 of Menopur
Sunday am: Continue with 5 units of Lupron, drop to 150 of Gonal-f

I go in for my next blood draw (and u/s this time, for real) on Sunday morning. At the lovely hour of 7:30 am because it was all they had available. Good lord.

I really, really want this to work. I'll put it out there. I know that I am blessed, and VERY lucky to have the kids that I do. And I'm grateful for them in ways that no one else can understand. But, I'm investing a lot of myself in this process. I'm making big decisions about what to focus on and where to put my energies. I hope that, in the end, the little person that we're making so many plans for and putting so much of our hope into actually comes into being. I hope that this doesn't just end up being a very expensive detour. I hope. I hope. I hope.

CD2 (on stims)

2010-02-18T16:15:00.000-08:00

I swear to god that I can feel my ovaries expanding by the minute. It's only day 2, so maybe this is in my head, but seriously. I can feel them.

I called this morning to schedule my blood draw for tomorrow morning, and they called me back later and said that I actually need bloodwork and an u/s. On day 3! So, maybe they expect something to be going on with my ovaries already, too. I'm SO curious what is going on in there. I can't wait until my appt. tomorrow (at 8:30 am, just to ruin me).

In other news, I feel like a chemist mixing up the freaking Menopur. It was bad enough with one vial, but now that I'm taking two vials, it is quite the ordeal. Dang powder. I also ended up with Gonal-f in the multidose vials rather than the pen, so even that requires some effort. I'm spending a lot of time mixing and injecting drugs these days! My stomach looks like it belongs to a junkie... a confused junkie who injects her stomach.

Oof. I'm going to be wearing my fat pants from here on out. That's all there is to it!