Starting 2016

I haven't been much of a blogger lately, but I have been slogging it out for awhile.  I'm entering my seventh year, though it has been much quieter around here since the kids were born.  It says something about my corporate job (and infertility too, I suppose), that the bulk of my nearly 600 posts came in those early years.  This outlet still holds a place for me that my other social media outlets don't and can't.  Facebook is not a blog (repeat after me) and neither is Pinterest or even Instagram.  And since I'm not selling anything over here (or anywhere), I have a little bit of a different take on each.

I'm finally getting around to reading "Quiet", which is amazing so far.  (Introverts unite!)  And looking forward to finishing it, so I can start on "When Breath Becomes Air" (you can read about it more on Cup of Jo and in the NYT) and then "We Should All Be Feminists" and "Between the World and Me".  One of my goals this year is to read more books...and actually finish them.  I've long been the queen of leaving books unfinished, and being on all the time for two busy preschoolers surely doesn't help.

The kids are doing great and we're all keeping busy.  We've done all sorts of classes over the years, but now we are trying to settle into a sport (dance for her since last fall, t-ball for him) and an instrument (piano for them both), though we'll mix it up come summer (tennis, soccer?).  We took a trip to the ENT to have Alistair's tonsils looked at and it turns out they are fine.  We are finally kicking whatever virus(es) have been plaguing us for the last few months.  Round and around it/they went...

If you aren't watching the last season of Downton Abbey, the last episode highlights that (spoiler alert!) having an incompetent cervix/infertility and cerclages are not new things.  And that others have had to move all the way to Boston to find themselves... I'm really going to miss that show (and yes I cheated and already watched the entire UK season online.).  Waiting for new Master of None and House of Cards (thank God for Netflix).

We just marked a decade in our house (and me in the burbs, the same amount of time I spent in Boston and Chicago combined), which means I've just now eclipsed even my childhood home for my longest tenured abode.  And we are finally almost done with the things we wanted to do here.  And in a few short months, it will be our tenth anniversary and my 40th birthday, which is all kind of crazy to think about.  So milestones and goals abound...

I still need to put together a post on our warm and wet holiday roadtrip to Nashville and NW Florida, so stay tuned!

Adventures in cerclage removal

At long last... (I wrote and never posted this just before we had the twins)

The Friday of my scheduled cerclage removal was another interesting day. Our appt. was scheduled for 10:30am @ Prentice, so I couldn't eat or drink anything after 5am (in case I started progressing with the cerc out and needed to go directly to the OR for my epidural and section), and thankfully we got up early and had breakfast before we left. Well, of course things didn't quite go as planned.

We checked into OB triage on time and were sent upstairs to L&D. I should have known from all the people in the waiting room that they were a bit busier than normal. They came by about 11 and told us that they had so many people come in that morning in labor that all the rooms were full, and that they'd have to send us (and other electives) away and let us know later when (that afternoon or on the next Monday) they'd be able to accommodate us. Since we were already there (and my mom was halfway there from WI) we went down to the lobby to hang out.

About a half hour later the OB director, who'd given me her card to call later to check in, called my cell and told us to go back to triage and they would just do the procedure there. So we went back to triage and waited a bit. And then got a room and waited some more. Finally, by early afternoon two of the OB's from my practice attempted to find and remove my cerclage, to no avail. It was apparently difficult surgery, I recently heard from my OB, and it seemed that part of the stitch had since pulled through even with me on strict bed rest for 16 weeks. They could not find it and they could not get it out. All this while, I'm writhing in pain with their attempts. So when they decide that they will not be able to do it there (or without anesthetic, as planned) we have to wait for a room upstairs. They finally gave me an IV at this point, as I was about seven hrs w/o fluids by 2pm.

We finally got a room upstairs and they got me hooked up to the monitors again. I was contracting pretty much all day, though I didn't feel anything.  I'm apparently the queen of silent contractions.  They decided to give me an epidural line, rather than just a spinal like I'd gotten when they gave me the stitch, as everyone wanted to be ready to go right to a section, if I progressed after the cerc was out. Anesthesia took forever and there was yet another change in OB's (I saw four of the eight from my practice over less than eight hrs), so it was 6pm by the time the epi was in and then came the procedure. I couldn't feel a thing, thank goodness, and they finally got it out. Immediately following, I was about 1 1/2 cm dilated, and then an hour later, I was back up to two. They continued to check me until 10pm and I was still two, so they discharged me.  I was then able to eat and drink finally after some 17 hours of neither.
.. 
We spent the night in the city, just in case. But by mid-day Saturday, it seemed that things weren't really changing, so I opted to go home instead of staying in the city.  After that I didn't have any contrax (that I know of), my bleeding subsided, and besides just being in general pain and discomfort, not sure if we are progressing or not.  Go back to OB on Tuesday to see how things are looking...

Off we go! :) (36 weeks!!)

This is the last of the twin gestation pics, as the avg. is 36 weeks...

Well, the time has finally come. We are 36 weeks along and after 16 long weeks on bed rest and nearly 15 with the cerclage, the stitch comes out today. It is difficult to predict now what will happen and when. If they release us from the hospital today, we've decided to stay in the city for the weekend, to see how things play out, and be a bit closer to the hospital. DH is anxious about getting there, even though the weather so far thankfully has been unseasonably mild. I think we've both had visions of having babies on the side of the highway, though thankfully given their positions, they won't just be coming out on their own.

Not surprisingly, I'm getting even more uncomfortable (whether I'm up or down) and honestly am really ready to not be pregnant anymore. We've reached our goals and are not looking to set any records here. I'm now 47" around my middle and up about 45 lbs. My OB is beyond thrilled. I am just excited to meet these babies!! :)

33w3d - another trip to the hospital

I discovered I was bleeding when I got up this morning, which was upsetting since they've always said this is one of the ways I'd know if something was wrong with the cerclage, and we still have a few more weeks to go ideally. I called the answering service and then they called back and told me to go to the office. When I called the office, I spent forever on the phone with the nurse who was trying to fit me in with the OB and u/s. Finally, I just told her that if they couldn't accommodate me, we were just going to the hospital.

So we went in and the babies thankfully are doing fine. I had a few contractions that registered on the monitor, but they looked at and felt my cervix and the stitch seemed to be intact. They couldn't really explain the bleeding, except that it was possible that contractions could cause enough irritation to the cervix w/the cerclage to cause what is basically superficial bleeding without the stitch actually tearing out.

So now we are finally back home, back in bed, and hoping to keep things clean for a few more weeks. Keep cooking babies...

A month on... (& nearly 26 wks)

A month ago today, we had the emergency surgery that saved our babies.  It is still difficult for me to wrap my head around all that has happened.  To say that we feel lucky is a huge understatement, but as my step-mother told me frankly it was actually me that is responsible for them still being around.  By going to the hospital and seeking out an MFM promptly after we learned of the funneling, we made it known that we were not going to follow their passive stance and wait for the inevitable terrible things to happen, we were going to fight my failing body with everything that we had.  If I had waited the two weeks that the not my regular OB had told me to be seen again, it likely would have been too late.  As even on bed rest, 12 days later I quickly began to dilate.  While that should just make me feel good, it was a huge burden that was really overwhelming for me to carry for the several weeks as we waited to get to viability.  It is terrible to feel like you are the only ones who care about what is it stake.  They were not just 20 week not yet viable babies to us, they were/are our babies that we had already fought like hell for and were not just going to sit by and see if maybe we were lucky, they might make it.

We are coming up on 26 weeks, which is again not a major milestone, but is ever closer to the end point.  If the babies were to be born in the coming week, their chance of survival would be at least 85%.  The cerclage, which still appears to be holding, is now ten weeks from coming out.

I actually put real (non-yoga) clothes on today for my big trip to the OB, but don't get too excited I still don't do hair and make-up.  This dress makes me look bigger than anything else I've worn.

Emergent cerclage for incompetent cervix

The title pretty much says it all, but this is what we've been up to for the last few days. 

I had my regular cervical check yesterday and the u/s showed that we had regressed to where we had been a week before (short: ~2.5cm and funnelled to ~1cm), but upon the manual check by the OB, she found that she could get her finger up into my cervix.  She sent me to L&D immediately.  By the time we got to Prentice and got checked again (a few hrs later), I'd dilated to 1cm.  They finally gave us the option to get a cerclage.  We said, yes please.  By the time I got in the OR a few hours after that, I was dilated to 2cm.  They stitched me up tight after giving me a spinal, which was not terribly pleasant and hurts like hell now.

I spent the night in the hospital for the first time ever, with DH and my mom (who just happened to be passing back through town again), and it was a rough one, I'm still exhausted.  My room, ironically, looked out over the MCA, where DH and I had our first date almost seven years ago.  My OB, Dr. Levin, came by this morning to discharge me (she had been on vaca during my recent adventures) and we decided to do not only full bed rest and weekly checks, but also weekly IM progesterone shots, which will be administered in the office.  The compounder is sending it off to them, so I will go in either tomorrow or Friday for the first one.

Still having lots of aches and pains and hoping that time and rest will help me feel a little more normal.  Almost 22 weeks! :)