From the Beginning

So I decided to start this blog in order to keep friends and family up to date on how things are progressing with our pregnancy. I suppose I should provide some background for those that are unfamiliar with our story up to this point.

Well how far back do I go? haha KC and I met in February of 2002. After a few months of just being "friends" we finally realized we were being silly and started dating. In July of 2004 KC asked me to marry him and I of course said yes. Now that story is actually quite funny and I suppose I will write about that another day. Anywho, on September 9th, 2006 we said our I-Do's. We bought our first house in 2008 which is where we currently reside- for now. Amden- our first born, was born on October 7th 2009. He was completely planned and an extremely uneventful pregnancy. I gained 7 pounds total and the boy was born, without intervention- well besides the numbing drugs of course, on his due date. We, well I (lol) decided it was time for our last addition to our family in April of this year and in June we found out we were expecting. A few weeks later I started experiencing some spotting and was terrified I was miscarrying. I waited through the extremely long weekend and on Monday went in to have my blood work checked. The nurse called me back later that day and explained that my levels were good, in fact too good and had me come in for an ultrasound. this is when I learned we were expecting twins.

Now twins do not run in my family and this was the last thing I expected! We were shocked, scared, no wait- terrified and immediately started trying to figure out how we were going to make this work. I continued to have issues with bleeding for the next 3 weeks. I was in and out of the ER and doctor's office and I just knew something was wrong but they never found any reason for all the complications.

At 11 weeks I went in for a nuchal translucency scan. This is a pretty standard scan that they do where they check for extra fluid on the back of the baby's neck which can point to chromosomal issues. Since I am relatively young and had one healthy pregnancy, I just figured it would be a chance to see my babies on the ultrasound screen. They started with Baby A who looked great and was growing wonderfully. When they moved to baby B I could tell there was something wrong. The ultrasound tech finished what she was doing and explained she was going to go get the doctor. A painful 45 minutes later, the doctor came in and explained that it appears the fluid on baby B was higher than it should be and they wanted to see if they could get a better look. They did a vaginal ultrasound and the finding just got worse. Now they also were able to see Adrian's omphalocele. This is when the intestines do not transfer from the umbilical chord to the baby's belly. They sent me home with some information and explained that I would be coming back around 16 weeks to confirm their findings and possibly do an amnio.

At the 16 week appointment they also noticed his hands were clenched and his head was abnormally shaped. All these findings pointed them to a diagnosis of T-18 or Edward's syndrome. "Not compatible with life", "won't make it to term", "selective reduction" and other hurtful terms were tossed around and I was just in a daze.  I ultimately decided against doing the amnio at this point and also decided against the selective reduction. In both cases the risks were high to me and I wanted to do whatever I could to protect Audrina who is still expected to be completely healthy.

At my 25 week appointment we had a bit of a scare. My doctor noticed I had gone from completely closed to 1+ almost 2 cm dilated and 50% effaced. Luckily we have not had any more changes so far and I am currently a prisoner to my home on bed rest.

So fast forward to now. .. Adrian is quite the little fighter. They did find a small VSD (heart defect) but other than being 2 weeks behind his sister in growth, he is doing great. I just started doing non stress tests twice a week where they check their heart rates to make sure they are getting plenty of oxygen and that their fluid levels are good. Adrian's is about twice that of his sisters but they sort of expected that due to his issues and are watching it to make sure it doesn't cause any problems. At 26 weeks Adrian weighed in at 1 pound 4 ounces and Audrina weighed in at 1 pound 15 ounces. Again Adrian is not expected to live long after birth but I still don't regret my decision to carry him to term and I am enjoying the time I have with my twins for now.