IT'S A . . . (read to find out)

I know I haven't been very good about updating the blog, but things have been a little crazy lately. Well the belly is getting bigger every week and I am starting to look more pregnant than fat. Here is a photo of the belly at 16 weeks:

I know I missed the 12 week photo, but as I said things have been crazy.

A week ago I went in to see my doctor and she found the baby's heartbeat right away. Whew!! No stress this visit. The heart was beating strong and baby did not want to stay still. Everytime the Dr found the heartbeat, the baby would move and she would lose it. Those are good signs to me.

Yesterday, I went in for my 18 week ultrasound. This is the ultrasound where they check out the organs, bones, gender, etc. It was still up for debate whether we were going to find out the gender of our baby or not. I wanted to wait and be surprised, but Bill wanted to find out. When the ultrasound tech asked if we were going to find out the sex of the baby, Bill proudly claimed "YES". I had finally given into his "pleading". She began the ultrasound and it was obvious that we have a very active baby on our hands. It kept moving around; hands and arms flying everywhere, the heart was strong, legs moving like crazy, just plain active. From what our naive and unexperienced eyes could tell, all looked good. Here are a couple of pictures she provided us with:

That's right, we are having a BOY!!!!! Bill was so excited, I knew he was doing a happy dance in his head. I was just happy the baby had a strong heart and all body parts. Until next time...

Dr.'s Appointment #2

So I had another Dr's appointment yesterday. This was number 2 of many to come at the Ob/Gyn. I went in not knowing what they do at these follow up visits. They weighed me (I have only gained 2 lbs), took my blood pressure, asked me how I was doing and if I had any questions, measured my uterus (just over 12 weeks), then proceeded to listen to the baby's heartbeat. Now I was seeing the Dr's nurse and she was all excited that we were going to hear the baby's heartbeat for the first time. We had to burst her bubble and let her know we had heard it twice already. Anyway she was using their little handheld device to find the heartbeat. After tracing over my stomach for a few minutes and mistaking my heartbeat for the baby's once, she came to the conclusion that she couldn't find it. Panic was beginning to start. The nurse then decided to squeeze me in for an ultrasound to see if we could find it that way. There wasn't an ultrasound tech available so another RN volunteered to do it. As she began to do the ultrasound, she could find my uterus, but could not find a baby. Panic was really beginning to sink in. I was freaking out that we had lost the baby, but she was finally able to find it and get a good view to see it's heart beating. We couldn't hear it because she didn't know how to turn that feature on. We were able to see it wave its arms around and see its fingers. At one point it looked like it was sucking on its hand. The ultrasound tech finally slipped into the room and got us a good heartbeat; 162 bpm, right where it is supposed to be. That was not a good visit, I freaked out one too many times. I hope the next one goes better. Until next time...

Update

So I went to the MFM (Maternal Fetal Medicine) specialist yesterday. I thought I was going to have my cervix messured, but didn't. I was informed they really can't tell the difference between the cervix and uterus until around the 18th week. Now I am not sure if I go back at that time or not, they really weren't clear. I did get another ultrasound done though. According to the MFM doctor, what my Ob thought was a gestational sac, was not. He said it was just fluid in my uterus. He said it was most likely my uterus lining being sluffed off, like when preparing to get pregnant or have a period. Good news, it was not a miscarriage. Good/bad news, it is not another baby. Another thing I found out, you can have kidney problems when you have a bicornuate uterus. I did not know this. Now I'm not sure if it is something that develops during fetal growth or comes on with age. So we looked at my kidneys as well. They looked good and in working order. Overall, it was not a very productive visit, but I did get another ultrasound and got to see my baby wave at me. Well wave with what little of a hand it has. This picture is zoomed in, the fetus is not that big yet.

FYI- The baby's head is on the left with the body to the right. The little white (detached looking) spot kinda in the middle of the "kidney bean" (baby), is its hand. If you look close, you can see the beginning of the fingers.

Until next time...