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On April 6th, just on a whim, I took a pregnancy test for the second time in a week. I was not going to start the medication for the parasite until I was completely sure that we were not pregnant, not that I was expecting it since we tried unsuccessfully for about two and a half years...but I just had an inkling that God was up to something. After I gave the metabolic blood sample on April 3rd, I came home and took a pregnancy test and it came back negative. I didn't really have any symptoms of pregnancy (I had with the previous two) but just had an inkling in the back of my mind, something like wouldn't it be funny if NOW is the time. Three days later I decided to test again since I'd had minor cramps all week but no monthly visitor and low and behold - POSITIVE. It was the Friday before Easter and Paul was getting off work early due to Good Friday. I remember he called and said he had an errand to run before coming home, but I asked that he forgo the errand and come home first. "Everything okay?", he asked. "Yeah, I just need you to come home first," I told him. I didn't want him to suspect anything while he was driving home and I wanted to tell him in person. When he walked in, he asked, "What's going on?" and I said, "Would you care to take a guess?" He didn't suspect a thing so I just handed him the test with the two pink lines. I think he was about as shocked as I was.
Considering our plans to treat me had changed in a matter of minutes to plans to take care of developing baby, we were a bit overwhelmed with emotions and questions and "What will all of this mean?" in regards to my health types of questions. Paul's parents came over for dinner and we had a time of prayer and even though we had a slew of questions about what all of this could mean if we had a successful pregnancy, we still felt a sense of peace. I've never been so certain of God's hand being over me than I was in those first few hours - of course, there's still a sense of worry, especially for me since I like to be in control (which is hilarious...how in control are we of things anyway, but I digress).
We decided since it was late in the day, we'd call the OBG first thing Monday and give her the scoop. In the meantime, I remembered the prescription she'd given me at our first visit just over a year before - she told me that since we had lost two pregnancies (and didn't know why) that as soon as I got a positive next time to immediately begin taking progesterone and a baby aspirin (just in case the previous problems were related to my body having a blot clot disorder or not producing enough hormones on my own to sustain the pregnancy). I took the prescription in to get filled and started that immediately until we could see her on Monday.
Monday morning I called the office and told them I needed to speak with the doctor as soon as possible. They did their usual "Oh, you're pregnant, well let's set you up for the interview and coupons and congratulations and we'll see you in a few weeks", but I was adamant that I needed to be seen that very day. They scheduled me and Paul and I sat down with her and gave her the background of my previous six months, the diagnosis of the parasite, the symptoms of sickness that we were unable to identify, etc. We all agreed that step one was to see if this pregnancy would make it since we had no answers as to why the other two did not. She took some blood from me to see if my hcg levels were rising, asked me to come back a couple of days later and told me to stay on the baby aspirin and progesterone in the meantime. Our first ultrasound was scheduled for a couple of weeks later (at around 6 weeks) since that's when you can first identify baby via ultrasound.
A few days later I was told that the blood work looked good. However, we were taken aback a bit when I experienced some bleeding the weekend before our first ultrasound. It wasn't too heavy and I hadn't lost the pregnancy symptoms I'd developed, so that was encouraging, but any bleeding during pregnancy is cause for worry. I didn't know what to expect when we went in for our first ultrasound - was the bleeding a sign of impending miscarriage? Was it something else?
Our first pregnancy loss we found out the baby had stopped developing at 6 weeks and had no heartbeat; our second pregnancy loss we saw a gestational sac that measure at about 7 1/2 weeks but there was no baby in it, so I wasn't quite sure what to expect this time. But she got me ready, wheeled in the ultrasound machine, and within seconds we were looking at the tiny little bean and a fluttering dot of the heart beating away! I knew I would cry either way, but just the sheer JOY of seeing a heartbeat on that screen was so overwhelming! While looking around at the baby and my uterus, the doctor identified a blood clot in my uterus (which was determined to be the cause of the bleeding). She told us that about 20% of women experience bleeding during pregnancy and of those, 50% will keep and 50% will lose. She said only time would tell if the blood clot would affect the baby or not. We were asked to come back one week later to make sure it looked like baby was growing and that we still had a heartbeat and to check on the clot. One week later, we got to take home our first baby picture:
Baby Z had grown and was measuring close to 8 weeks at the appointment. So far so good! She could still see the blood clot and said we wouldn't know for sure if the pregnancy would be viable until closer to the end of the first trimester, but she said not to worry too much about any bleeding unless it was really heavy. So I tried not to stress - nothing we could do any way but wait and see.
But as we went in for our 10 week appointment, we were able to hear Baby Z's heartbeat via fetal doppler and it was strong! The doctor told us that at that point in time, she was confident that the blood clot was no longer cause for concern. At 12 weeks, we were given the all-clear and congratulations to expect Baby Z mid-December or before!
I haven't had any more bleeding since then and my belly is growing, growing, growing. Nearing 18 weeks, my all-day, everyday morning sickness is dissipating (THANK YOU, LORD) and I'm slowly starting to get my appetite back. We're meeting with a high risk OBG in Greenville, SC next Friday, July 20th to get a look at baby (hopefully we'll find out if it's a he or a she) and we'll get to see if the cyst on my spleen has grown. If it has, we will have to keep a closer eye on how baby pushes my organs -- if too much pressure starts to form against my spleen, Baby Z may be coming earlier than December! If not, though, I think they'll let me carry as long as I'm not in danger. We'll just have to watch and see as baby gets bigger! But regardless, Baby Z should be making his/her debut before 2013! Yippee!
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