Pregnancy Notes

I'm stuck somewhere between reality and denial that this pregnancy is so close to the end.  It's definitely been an interesting ride and I'm sure that part's not over, not by a long shot.

This pregnancy has felt so much more personal and for that reason I haven't been as inclined to talk about it.  Of course, it's also my 3rd and so maybe just naturally 3rd pregnancies don't get that much attention.  It's probably a bit of both.  But for us, this pregnancy has definitely been different than our first two.

In terms of the easy to measure ways, the nausea has been different this time around.  With the boys I remember being sick in the evenings, but this time around there were days where I was just sick all.day.long.  And instead of ending a few weeks after the first trimester, I have continued to experience that throughout the entire pregnancy.  Thankfully most of it was confined to the first trimester but even now I still have the occasional nausea episodes....and that's no fun.

I have also gained more weight with this pregnancy than I have with any other pregnancy before.  And I feel HUGE!  This little girl looks like she's working on being my biggest baby yet.  At my 36/37 week ultrasound she weighed 6 pounds 10 oz (of course, they could be off by up to a pound and a half, and so I'm hoping they are overestimating).  If she stays put until her due date that could put her at an 8 pound baby!  Compared to my boys, that's a big baby!

This time around I have also dealt with more skin issues.  Never fun to be itchy and scratchy.  I think it probably has something to do with the winter weather and the pregnancy combined, but it's been hard to stay on top of it.  I find myself putting on lotion multiple times a day.  I'm so glad we just got a humidifier!  Not only should it be helping my skin, but it should also help the stuffy nose.  I know it's a common side effect of pregnancy, but I've never experienced it until now.  I can't wait to wake up and not have a stuffed up nose!  It'll be nice to be able to breath!

Those are all of the physical differences (as if you really cared!  That's more for me.)  But there's also the emotional difference.  It's a weird feeling to not be so "innocent" anymore.  I can't imagine how women felt 200 years ago when a pregnancy often resulted in death of either the mother or the baby.  But I now know the feeling of uncertainty during a pregnancy.  And while I feel confident that baby girl is completely healthy, there's no guarantee at all in that respect.  

Another CF mom, whose family is nearly identical to ours, expresses it so much more clearly in her blog.  In one of her posts she talks about "a baby at 23 weeks, that I am struggling to fully embrace for fears I will lose her too."  What a great way to put it!  It's fear that things won't be perfect and ideal to talk about and so I often avoid talking about it.  (To read her full post, go here.)

Anyway, no matter how you look at it, in two weeks or less this pregnancy will be over and we'll start a new adventure.  For those who would like to know what will happen once she arrives, I thought I'd share with you what we have set-up with our doctors. 

As soon as we're up for it after the arrival of baby girl we have been asked to contact our doctor at Colorado Children's.  She will then contact the state lab that processes newborn screens and ask them to expedite our screen.  The state of Colorado requires two newborn screens and two positive results before sending samples off for DNA testing.  Because of our family history, if baby girl's first screen comes back as a possible positive (indicating high IRT levels) they will proceed straight to DNA testing without waiting for the second test.  Because Finn has one copy of the most common CF mutation and one rare mutation, they will be looking for that common mutation.  The state lab does not test for the more rare mutation, so we will not get a definitive answer from this, but we will know if she carries that common mutation.  If she does carry the one common mutation and has the high IRT levels on her newborn screen, then we will proceed to Children's for a sweat test.  If the sweat test were to come back positive, her blood work would be sent out for a full genetic test to confirm the presence of the second mutation.  Our doctor believes it will take about two weeks for the state lab testing before we find out if we need a sweat test.  My guess is that we will probably end up with a sweat test, as both of our boys have had high IRT levels on their first newborn screen and then there's a 50% chance that she has inherited the most common CF mutation.  So, we'll see what happens.

(To see a better explanation of IRT and the process when Finn was diagnosed, see this post here.)

Well, that's about it for the rambling.  I was hoping to include some cute pictures from our ultrasound last week, but the pictures the tech gave me are AWFUL!  Maybe baby girl is just too big to get a good picture of......?  I don't know, but I'll show you what I mean by awful.  

Behold!  The World's worst ultrasound picture.  I wish I could claim that it was all because our scanner was down and so it's just a bad camera shot.  It is a bad camera shot, but really no camera could make this better.  The tech claims there's a forehead, nose, etc. in this picture.

Exhibit B--I'm glad she only gave me two of these because I have no idea if I'm supposed to save them or what??