Specialty Clinic Graduation

I was so excited for this appointment today that I couldn't sleep at all last night. Lady woke me up for a potty trip at 3:30 and I basically never went back to sleep. All I could think about was today's ultrasound and what would we learn. Would her heart be okay? Would I get to see the fancy 3D image of her? Is she REALLY a she?? Will she even hold still long enough to be checked out? When I got to work at 8am I had this feeling it was going to be the longest work day, knowing that after I was off I'd be heading up to Springfield for our final appointment at the Maternal Fetal Medicine clinic. What I didn't expect was a phone call around 9am telling me my appointment would need to be rescheduled. I was so disappointed. How long would it take to get me in I wondered. Well to my surprise I was bumped up and had an 11:30 appointment instead of 2:30! So an emergency call was made to Man Friend to pick me up so we could get ourselves up to the doctor!

After check-in I hardly had to wait long before being taken back for my weight, pulse and blood pressure check. This is when I was unintentionally paid a lovely complement. The nurse commented about my pulse and blood pressure.... "your numbers are so great, you seem like a runner!" Hahaha, yes, ma'am, I AM a runner -- and I'm happy my stats still reflect it since my belly and Garmin data do not reflect that right now! Next we were taken to our ultrasound room where we would get to see a very in depth look at our daughter.

When the echo-cardio specialist came in the room the first thing I told her was that I wanted to make sure SHE is still a SHE and that my shopping for adorable little girl outfits wasn't wasted. Sure enough, our little girl was more than happy to rub it in her dad's face that she is very clearly a little GIRL! Sorry, Daddy! We also asked if we could see her in 3D, and our specialist in charge was more than happy to oblige.

Her face is actually a little distorted here .... because the umbilical cord was going right in front of her. Technology is fascinating, and the tech was able to remove it from the photo and let us get a little better view of that face ..... aww, that nose!

So to explain WHY we had this appointment .... during the In Vitro Fertilization process I couldn't just go through it in the "easier" way. Oh, no, of course not. Basically the only way I would be pregnant was through IVF, and using the ICSI process. That basically means that the embryologists manually took a single sperm and put it into a single egg. For other people they can sometimes just put a batch of sperm into the dish with the egg and let nature take its course. That was not an option for us, and that leads us to today. Babies that go through the ICSI process tend to have more developmental problems with their hearts. We were scheduled for this final ultrasound so her heart could get thoroughly inspected and make sure all is well developmentally.

Come on Mom, leave me alone, I'm thinking here!

I am VERY happy to report that her heart is looking great! There were no concerns on anyone's part, which brought me great relief. We saw very detailed images of every aspect of her heart and learned way more about how the human heart operates than we could have ever expected. We were even able to see the flow of the blood going in and out. Her heart was beating great at the 138/140s bmp range, and we heard it many times ... beats from each little area of her tiny heart. 

Just like last time, she was determined to rest herself right on my cervix, which resulted in me being reclined way back with my head low and my feet raised up, in an attempt to get our girl to move up a little. It did work, and we all had to laugh when we paused to take a look at what was on the screen and what was on the table. Who happened to be laying exactly like her mom? Yeah, our girl. I have a mini-me! And could she have some dramatic flair in the works? She does go to Broadway a lot and she comes from a talented, musical, artistic family ... so perhaps that's why we have this shot?? For reference, that would be an exasperated arm up with a hand resting on her forehead. Oh what a girl we are making here!

So all in all everything was perfect! We graduated and were sent on our way back to normal OBGYN appointments. The only thing not as standard with us is that we will have another more in depth ultrasound at the 32/33 week mark to check on her progress. OH, I asked how big she was and she's about 1.25 pounds now, and getting very tall at 13 to 14 inches! No wonder I can always see my tummy moving now... even during this appointment we all had to giggle occasionally as we'd see her make a big movement, including possibly some hiccups at one point. I just can't get enough of her, what a great day!

OCTOBER 2015
Sunday		Monday		Tuesday		Wednesday		Thursday		Friday		Saturday
								1		2		3
								UCC				20 Weeks
4		5		6		7		8		9		10
										Obama's Visit		21 Weeks
11		12		13		14		15		16		17
												22 Weeks
18		19		20		21		22		23		24
												23 Weeks
		OBGYN										**We saw the kicks!!!
25		26		27		28		29		30		31
				Maternal Fetal Med.								24 Weeks