20 Weeks!!!!!!!!!

I can't believe this time has come! I'm half way today - when did that happen?! When did 5 months go by?! Seriously...

I've had a rough week with lots of contractions that mess with my head but the 17P shots must be working wonders on my cervix because the contractions don't seem to yet be causing problems - I'm so thankful for that.

I have another appointment on Wednesday and can only hope that my cervix is still behaving. I'm still debating to push for Procardia to help with the contractions but since they aren't doing anything at this point, I'm ok with waiting it out.

We signed the contract for our birth doula today and sent her a check for her deposit. I'm optomistic that we'll make it to full term and have a normal delivery but I also know that at any moment it can change - so we have a doula lined up, for now so that my labor and delivery experience will be better than my first pregnancy. I really felt like a caged animal being poked at and it was really scary and I think it made me ask for the epidural super early and as a result I was tied to a bed with way too much time to obsess about what was happening - it was the worst experience and I hope we don't have to repeat it.

Did you know?

Numerous clinical studies have found that a doula’s presence at birth

• tends to result in shorter labors with fewer complications
• reduces negative feelings about one’s childbirth experience
• reduces the need for pitocin (a labor-inducing drug), forceps or vacuum extraction and cesareans
• reduces the mother’s request for pain medication and/or epidurals

These are all good things in my mind so we're going to try one and see. We met with Tina, our doula, about 3 weeks ago and felt very comfortable with her. She also runs some of the child birth education classes that are given at the hospital we'll deliver, and that made us even more comfortable with the decision.

We've even decided on names now that we're half way: Christopher Michael for a boy and Madelyn for a girl (undecided middle name right now).

Next step is cleaning out the bed room that will serve as his/her bedroom - that's a huge task in and of itself!

19 weeks

I'm nearly at the half way point... Friday marks 20 weeks and its not very fun.

I enjoyed 2 hours of near constant contractions last night - since they didn't hurt, I didn't bother calling my doctor (since I knew I'd waste a trip to the ER anyway) and just drank lots of water and put my feet up. Eventually they stopped. Today started out fine but I was still getting crampy about once an hour or so. I left work after 1 PM to go to the office to get an U/S and see one of the doctors. Everything looks good on U/S - 3.8 cm which is great. If these contractions keep it up I'll be requesting procardia soon as eventually these will thin my cervix and I don't want to wait for that to start happening before we do something.

So ya, my stress level is through the roof right now - but what's new?

#1...

I'm sure this won't be the first time, but it was a shame it had to happen at only 18 weeks 3 days.

I ended up at the Emergency Room on Monday night about 8 PM. After I got home from work my round ligament pain (which has been REALLY bad) was worse than usual. After dinner I decided to lie down for a while.

After laying down for a few minutes the same round ligament pain was occuring, but I wasn't moving - which made me think it wasn't round ligament pain. I haven't felt the baby move much because I have an anterior placenta so even movements confuse me - I didn't get many with my first pregnancy because of the same reason so even, what could be, normal movements confuse me. So I decided to call my doctors office. The OB on call quickly called me back and I was very frank about my situation telling her I didn't think it was something serious and wanted to know what I should do.

She told me to play it safe and come in to the ER to get checked out.

I know, at 18 weeks there is nothing they can or will do and that scares me. We were all sitting in Arianna's room when I took the call and after I hung up the phone I just started bawling - something I haven't done in a long time. Arianna was so confused - she kept yelling 'mama! mama!' and trying to get close to me. I couldn't help but look at her and think of how lucky we are to have her - I picked her up and gave her a big hug when she said 'all done crying?'... and I laughed and said 'yes, all done crying'. She's so precious.

I then tried to call my parents - I wanted someone to come by and stay with her while we left. It was close to her bed time so it would be easy for someone to stay at the house - I was pretty confident we wouldn't be at the ER long. Well... no answer at my parents house, no answer on moms cell, no answer on dads cell, no answer on my brothers cell - but his girlfriend answered so I asked her if she could come down to the house and watch her while I went to the hospital. She was a wreck, even more so than me I think! She ended up calling the VFW post where my brother tends bar and my dad was with him and told them of the situation - my dad was more than just a little rude with her and I felt bad, she was only trying to help.

So a little after 7:30 my parents showed up at my house and took Arianna home with them and Shawn and I drove down to Providence to the ER.

We were very lucky there were only two other parties waiting - both women were obviously very full term and then there was me, who just looks fat rather than pregnant. I got in very quickly and the on call doctor and my nurse were very nice. She gave me a quick exam and said my cerclage looked wonderful and I was still long and closed (music to my ears!) and then we struggled to find bean baby on the doppler - we found him/her after a few tense minutes. I must have a tilted uterus - I didn't know it would STILL be so hard to pick him/her up at this stage but the nurse wasn't surprised.

Then they did a test to see if I had a urinary tract infection (which was negative) and sent us home. I was hoping the UA came back showing an infection so that it was easily explained but instead I got - everything is normal, its just round ligament pain, get a maternity belt.

I don't feel bad about going in but I have found I'm much more anxious now. I stayed home from work on Tuesday and felt really good so I'm hoping that my ultrasound on the 21st shows that my cervix is still behaving (fingers crossed)!

I did something really stupid tonight...

I went to a website for women with incompetent cervix and looked at the pictures of the babies that died due to mom's IC - many of them from 17 - 24 weeks.

I'll stop bawling eventually... really.

Its so horrible that this has to happen. Its so horrible that anyone has to deal with that. I'll be saying an extra prayer for them tonight and kissing my angel baby (now a toddler!) before I go to bed.

Sigh of...

...relief.

Had my 18 week ultrasound today - Bean baby is doing awesome! Currently weighs in at 8 oz and is developing fine.

Best news was my cervical length - 3.6! :) This is still great, they don't worry until you're under 3.0. The only thought still crossing my mind is that this is slightly shorter than when I was pregnant with Arianna - at 20 weeks I was 4.0 with her, but the discrepancy can be for a number of reasons including new ultrasound equipment (I had the same tech this time as with Arianna so I don't want to say it could have been the tech... even though it could have been).

So I can exhale for another 2 weeks... phew.

Rant...

Ok, you get to listen to me rant for a little while - hope you don't mind!

I'm in pain, every freakin' day. They call it normal 'round ligament pain' but I call it torture! Sitting hurts, standing hurts, bending over hurts, getting up from the floor hurts. But mentally it hurts too because I'm in the danger zone now - 18 weeks and every single ache and pain sends my mind racing! Is this a contraction? Is the fullness I'm feeling because I'm funneled to the cerclage?

I knew that this pregnancy wouldn't be 'fun' but I was really hoping to keep my exposure a little bit more. I feel like crying. Monday I was sitting on the floor reading books to Arianna (her favorite thing!) and when we were done I tried getting up and my left hip sort of locked up on me and I couldn't get up. It was so painful, for only a few seconds, that I was too scared to move. I screamed and then just started crying - not because it hurt after the initial pain but because I was so scared. I hate being scared that I could lose this pregnancy at any moment - I have no reason to really be worried, so far everything is fine! I'm doing this to myself!

We have our 'big ultrasound' tomorrow. Will finding out the sex help me bond better with my baby? I really want to be surprised on delivery day but will knowing help me have a more 'normal' pregnancy? I'm starting to feel kicks now (despite my anterior placenta) and its very reassuring but I question even those movements - the baby rolls over, is that minute amount of pressure a contraction?

I don't know what will help my anxiety. Therapy? Drugs? No, I won't be taking any medication to help this. I've been through much worse in my life and didn't need medication - I can get through this without causing potential harm to my baby. But maybe its time for therapy again...

Tocolysis in women with preterm labor between 32 0/7 and 34 6/7 weeks of gestation: a randomized controlled pilot study

Link to article

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to determine whether intravenous magnesium sulfate (MgSO(4)) followed by oral nifidepine tocolysis in women with preterm labor between 32 0/7 and 34 6/7 weeks' gestation reduces neonatal hospital stay.

STUDY DESIGN: Fifty-four women between 32 0/7 and 34 6/7 weeks with preterm labor were randomized to receive either MgSO(4) and oral nifidepine (n = 24) or no tocolysis (n = 30). All women received betamethasone and prophylactic antibiotics. The primary outcome was total neonatal hospital stay. Data were analyzed using Chi-square and Mann Whitney U test.

RESULTS: The 2 groups had similar mean cervical dilation and gestational age at enrollment. There were no statistically significant differences in total neonatal hospital stay (5.8 +/- 7.2 days; median of 3 days in the no tocolysis vs. 7.5 +/- 8.6 days; median of 3 days in the tocolysis group), rate of preterm delivery (57% vs. 75%) or need for oxygen supplementation (7% vs. 21%, p < 0.23). The neonatal complications were similar in each group.

CONCLUSION: Tocolysis after 32 weeks gestation does not reduce neonatal hospital stay.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I am very disheartened to read this. I wouldn't be surprised to learn that some women have not been offered tocolysis because 'it won't do any good anyway'.

Very sad.

17 weeks

I went away on a retreat with some friends this weekend, but before I left I went to my doctors office to get my first 17P injection. I had to see a doctor, which surprised me because I thought all my appointments were supposed to be with the same doctor to avoid mis communication etc. It was Dr. Brodsky who was the admitting doctor the day I went into labor with Arianna - she's not my favorite because of her rather crass bedside manner but she was pleasant and the appointment went well because I got to hear the bean baby on doppler for the first time!! It was a great sound!

The appointment was super quick and then I had to wait around for almost 45 minutes for my shot. I only went to this appointment for the shot so I was really annoyed that I was there for more than an hour - really annoyed because one of my friends was waiting for me to get home so we could drive to our retreat. I'll have to ask at my appointment this week if I really need to see a doctor and then wait around for an available nurse to give me the injection. I was really hoping to avoid weekly appointments this pregnancy!

I'm not going to lie - the shot hurt! My butt was sore all weekend! But if it works I'm not going to complain! I have another shot this week on the other side so now both butt cheeks can be sore, ya!

This week we have our structural ultrasound when they could tell us the gender - but we're not going to find out this time, we'll let it be a surprise. The most important part of this appointment is that I will find out what my current cervical length is - I haven't had a trans-vaginal ultrasound to check its length since before my cerclage was placed; my doctor has just been doing manual exams so I'm anxious to hear that NOTHING has changed. I had no change in my cervical length until after 20 weeks with Arianna (my last ultrasound was at 20 weeks) and I'm hoping for the same here. I'll be talking to my doctor about starting Vitamin C this week to help ward off pPROM which has a high occurrence when cervical funneling is present (as is typical from this point on in IC patients with and without a cerclage)

I'm starting to get more anxious as the time goes by because I feel so much more sore in my hips than I remember being with Arianna. On top of that I'm getting HORRIBLE leg cramps at night
and feel so old! I'm praying really hard for good news this week and would appreciate any good thoughts from my readers!