March 30, 2006

Yesterday was the day o' doctor's appointments: Dr. Higby at 8:15 and Dr. Harden at 10:15. Todd went with me to both and we ended up getting to spend half a day together -- ALONE! What a treat, even if I did spend a lot of it sitting on a table with the hubby in a chair next to me...

Both appointments went well. Dr. Higby appointments are always more exciting in that we get the details on both girls. We did a quick measurement of my belly and I am measuring at about 35 weeks. Remember: my 6 lb, 14 oz, 19 inch single-birth son was born at 38 weeks. That ought to give you an idea of my size. If the word "Whale" came to mind, you're right on target.

Again, the girls are looking great. Good movement (we got to see Grace yawn, which is no big deal in real life, but when you see it from inside your uterus, it's pretty cool!), good blood flow, good sizes and weights.

Faith: 1 lb, 7 oz, measuring at 24 weeks and 1 day
Grace: 1 lb, 8 oz, measuring at 24 weeks and 2 days

(At the time of the appointment, I was 24 weeks and 3 days)

We talked with Dr. Higby about the hospital and the probability of an "urgent" c-section (where they will do one quickly, but I'll have enough time to call Todd, have an epidural and be awake for the whole thing) vs. an "emergent" c-section (where I'll be knocked cold and Todd will get a phone call that says, "Congratulations, Dad!"). According to Dr. H, either can happen and it will more likely be one of the above vs. scheduled. There's just no way to know, but at least there is a chance that Todd will be there. It stresses me out to think he may not be there...

We left Dr. Higby's office and had some time to kill, so we decided to go over to the Lactation Place and buy the support girdle that Dr. Higby had been hounding me to wear.

Oh my Lord...I am actually wearing the thing pictured at the top of this page.

Todd and I were nearly in hysterics as I was tying it on! It's made from just about the strongest elastic you can imagine and I nearly sling-shot myself across the room trying to get it on. I managed to get it on backwards and inside out before I ever actually got it on correctly.

But, lo and behold, if the darn thing doesn't actually work! My back aches significantly less and I have a lot less strain on my hips! Thankfully, the thing is pretty well concealed beneath my clothing and if I weren't such a self-deprecating person, no one would ever know it was present. But since I can't keep my mouth shut, you all get the joys of knowing about my supportive undergarments.

After we bought "the contraption" (as it has come to be known in our house), we headed over to Dr. Harden's office. The last time I had an appointment, I saw the nurse practitioner, so we had four weeks of catching up to do.

We talked about the visit we had with the neonatologist at Methodist Hospital and told Dr. Harden that we'd decided on April 17 as our admit date.

We discussed the very bizarre Braxton-Hicks contractions I've been having (BH contractions are contractions that don't dilate your cervix, but that do cause a lot of pressure on your uterus from time to time. They are basically harmless.) that are localized to only one quadrant of my belly! She didn't seem alarmed by the whole thing, but did check my cervix to make sure I wasn't dilating. Nope -- I'm still as closed up as Fort Knox, which is good news.

I also had a Fetal Nectin test done. I had never heard this combination of words in my entire pregnancy (or last pregnancy), but apparently it's an indicator of whether or not you'll go into labor in the next two weeks. It's a pretty unreliable indicator, though. Check out the statistics...

If negative: 96% chance that you WON'T go into labor in the next 14 days
If positive: 50/50% chance that you WILL go into labor in the next 14 days

WHAT? Does this make sense to anyone? If it does, will you explain it to me? I realize that this is just something to rule out pre-term labor, but it seems that it's pretty ridiculous if it comes back positive. Anyway, it had me laughing, but I guess it means something to Dr. Harden...otherwise she wouldn't test for it. I guess. :)

We also talked about our 27-week decision. She asked, "Does this mean that if you go into pre-term labor or we sense some distress in the babies during one of your visits, you don't want to intervene?"

Boy, am I glad she asked that question, because she's got it all wrong.

"No," we told her, "We would want to intervene if there was any sort of indication of distress or pre-term labor. We just don't want to do intensive, 24/7 monitoring until we hit 27 weeks on April 17."

I am so glad we have that cleared up. I can't imagine sitting there in either Dr. Higby or Dr. Harden's offices and seeing my girls struggling to live, but not doing anything about it. It makes me shudder...

Anyway, that's the long and the short of my two appointments. I see Dr. Harden again next week, so I'll have more to say then, if not sooner.

Until then, thanks for reading.

Blessings,
E