January 17, 2006

Okay, yes, I know it's been two weeks since my last post. And apparently, I have a lot of fans of this blog (who knew? I thought I'd be the only one reading it!), so I apologize to all of those who are waiting anxiously for the next installment of "As the Stomache Churns" (a brief nod to my morning sickness).

The reason I haven't done much blogging lately is because there really isn't much to tell. I have been slowly starting to feel better (although nausea still rears its ugly head now and then and fatigue has become as familiar as the back of my hand) and regain my life. I still spend a lot of time sleeping and, thankfully, Todd has been so good about picking up my slack. I'm very lucky.

But now there is news to report! We saw our new doctor (Dr. Harden) yesterday and just fell in love with her. She sat down with us and explained her practice. She does 80% of all of her own deliveries and apologized in advance when she runs behind -- she just wants to be available for all of her patients every chance she can get. I was duly impressed and totally disarmed after spending nearly an hour in the waiting room.

They took all of my vitals and while I seem to have LOST five pounds (why can't I do that when I'm not pregnant?), it may just be a fluctuation in the scale at my first doctor's office and this new scale, so no one seemed to be alarmed. Everything else looked good.

We did a quick sonogram and there they were -- both babies. I have to admit here that I am still in shock from the news of twins and each time we have a sonogram, I wonder if there was a mistake and there's only one in there. Of course, if only one were found, I'd be devastated and probably lose it, but on a daily basis, I am still having a hard time wrapping my mind around twins.

But both were there and I'd better come to terms with this news pretty quickly.

Both babies looked good with strong heartbeats, but again, there was some question as to the presence of a membrane. In my first two sonograms, there was no membrane visible. Yesterday was the same -- Dr. Harden thought she might have seen one, but couldn't really tell. If it was there, it was barely visible and very thin.

So we're off to see Dr. Higby, a high-risk specialist who does Level Two sonograms. Instead of waiting until 18 weeks, we'll go ahead and have one done at 16 weeks (I'm currently 14 weeks) to get a definitive answer on this missing membrane issue.

This is a cause for concern. Only about 1% of all twin pregnancies are sans membrane, meaning that both babies are in one amniotic sac. If such is the case, it's considered a very high-risk pregnancy because the babies could become tangled in one another's umbilical cords. Apparently there are other risks, too, but I can't even bring myself to talk about them. They're too horrible.

While my gut instict says that all is fine, I still can't help but worry. These are my kids and I can't bear the thought of anything happening to them. If you are one to pray, please pray that we find a membrane and that all labs indicate good health.

Thanks for keeping up with my blog and for being interested in my life with twins-to-be.

Peace.