Update and Confessions

It was probably obvious to some of you what I was rooting for when I outlined the scenarios last week, the one option that I didn’t mention: both of them still being there.  I outlined the miscarriage and the singleton, but I didn’t actually mention the twin.  Confession: that’s because it’s what I was rooting for.  Perhaps even secretly from myself.  Because it’s crazy.  Crazy.  Three living kids in a year and a half and four born.  Crazy.  But from the moment I saw the two sacs on the ultrasound, I somehow was already attached to both of them.

Random side note, I’ve noticed that this propensity to fall in love with a sac on a black and white screen is more of a female trait.

So, what did we see?

Yup, two.  Both with confirmed cardiac activity recorded.  A is measuring 6 weeks, 2 day and B is measuring 6 weeks, 1 day, so much closer together in gestational age than last time, which is a good thing. The sacs are actually pretty similar in size, it's just the angle that makes it look different here.

No obvious names like heart and eggplant.  One friend saw panda eyes and that's all I can see now as well. 

So, the nitty gritty details, the dark and the just interesting.

First off, the experience still did a bit of a fight or flight number on me.  My blood pressure wasn't as bad, but was still 140/80.  I'm supposed to check it sometime during the two week break before my next appointment just to confirm that it is a physiological reaction to the stress of the situation.

And yes, that's a scary thought.  My mind is making my body respond physiologically to the situation.

I've apparently made a mark on even the doctor's memory.  She estimated that my risk was about 1 in 300 to get pregnant on the Mirena and then the risk of back to back twins even with the fraternal propensity is about 1 in 100.  Or 1 in around 30,000.

I'm finding some of the math and numbers as the interesting things.  Having four separate people in my body in one calendar year.  Potentially having four children born/removed within a year and a half period. 

Related to numbers, we're throwing out August 7-9 as a due date with July 26 or so as the latest allowed likely.  Didn't get too much into delivery details, but apparently having both had a successful vaginal birth and a c-section, they will let me delivery vaginally if they're both heads down but they won't induce with a previous c-section or something like that.  I really didn't push this detail since it's so far out and so much has to happen between now and then.

Speaking of which, she says the miscarriage rate with having had the Mirena is about double that of normal.

I also am contemplating that perhaps I think I'm the Easter Bunny and am not aware of it and so just toss eggs around like crazy.

Other happy news is the hormone that was in the Mirena is the same as they give to women with luteal cycle defects and so it having been in the uterus with them was not a big issue.

The doctor brought up the question of what I will do to feed these children if they do end up here alive given that I've essentially slowly killed both of my living children with breastmilk while causing my body to systematically attack and shut down my parathyroids.  My theory at the moment is to run it by the boys' gastroenterologist and see what he thinks and then just approach things cautiously.  And also maybe recognize that there's a lot of value in the first few weeks of breastmilk versus longer term.

Going to try to avoid contemplating logistics too much for now.  Like three rear-facing car seats in a safe fashion with an additional forward-facer.

We will check cervix length in two weeks because of the preterm delivery history.  I'll do the preterm labor clinic again starting at 20 weeks.  And we will just keep following.  The future's not ours to see, "Que Sera, Sera, Whatever will be, will be. The future's not ours, to see..."

Very good news to me.  She thinks that the neonatal nurse practitioner told me Aurelia's death was because of a cord compression in order to make me feel better and give me an explanation more than really thinking that it was so.  Reviewed the delivery report and there wasn't a clear knot or anything.  All it said was that there was a moderate amount of spiralling with the central hypertwisted area that was measured 0.5 cm or something like that.  This makes me feel better about the cord compression issues. So, the NNP was trying to make me feel better and instead ended up making me crazier.  So, I feel better being back to an unexplained cause of death.

Having had an interuterine demise, there is an increased risk, even if it was a singleton and so they'll just follow more closely.

So, summary version.  They both look great.  They match up on size, have changed appropriate to what we'd expect over a week, and everything looks good.  And there are definitely two of them.  Big thing right now is taking it one step at a time.  Not getting ahead of ourselves and just taking things as they come with a next appointment in two weeks to check both their progress and get a baseline on my cervix.

Thanks to all of you for your support, thoughts, prayers, encouragement and sharing of your experiences.  It really helps. And sorry this is a ramble, it was an over three hour appointment and I need to go pick up the boys, but I felt I should get something up.