21 weeks!

I'm 21 weeks today, yay! Isn't that awesome? Well, I think it is. Baker woke me up this morning by saying "Happy 21 weeks". He always tells me "Happy ___ weeks" and I think it is way too cute. And so sweet. It makes me so happy to see how happy he is about meeting this little man. It really warms my heart. This is probably the most excited I have ever seen him about anything and it's really great. I hope that it makes getting through his days a little bit easier because I know that med school has been rough.

Anyway, I took belly pictures yesterday because I was a little better dressed than I will be today, considering that the highlight of my day will be my grocery shopping trip to Wal-Mart, so I cheated a bit on the 21 week belly pic :) But, here it is! I think I finally might look a little bit pregnant!

BIG u/s

So I had my big u/s today, I guess they still consider it the "big" one because it's 20 weeks, anatomy scan, etc. even though I found out the sex about 4 weeks ago. "Patches" looks great and he is SO cute, moving around and kicking away. He's actually flipped since I saw him last and his head is on the opposite side than it was before. It was so great to see him, he is just precious.

So the u/s tech found that one of the ureters leading to one of the kidneys was enlarged, not by much, just less than one millimeter bigger than their cutoff. Cool, no problem. She mentioned it to me, said how common it is in boys, and was very non alarmist about it. She was like, our cutoff for normal is 4mm, this is measuring 4.8mm. Cool. She had a hard time looking at a lot of structures because Patches was curled up, so she had me try to move around, poked at him, etc. and he wouldn't budge.

So she finishes and goes to get the doctor. My favorite doctor wasn't there yet so I had to see my LEAST favorite doctor, the one that said my baby without a heartbeat at 6 weeks wouldn't survive. Ugh. Fine, I'm thinking whatever, maybe that was a one time incident and I better make friends with her cuz she could be delivering my baby when the time comes.

She comes in to the u/s room and takes her own look at the baby and voila, he is in a great position! She finds all the things she needs to find, and takes a look at the kidneys. She tells me that BOTH ureters are enlarged and it doesn't look good to her. She says that Patches has a 1% chance of having Down's and asked if I had declined genetic testing - UMMM, NO, I had NT scan and quad screen (hello, read my chart before you say stupid crap???). Both came back with extremely low risk. She gives me the speech about what I can do, amnio, etc. So she leaves the room, I clean up and go for my office visit.

I talked to her during the office visit and had her explain it further. She was less abrupt but still not reassuring at all. She was obviously trying to be nicer but I guess it's just not in her nature. After talking with her, we totally ruled out an amnio, she basically said not to do it unless we'd terminate (which just isn't in the cards for us).

Baker was with me and he really seems to not be concerned. And maybe my instincts are terrible, but my gut is telling me that it is not a genetic/chromosomal issue. There are a few reasons for that, first being that my quad screen was so very normal, and the fact that there are literally no other markers for it present in his little body. In addition to all of this, the ureters were measured no less than 2 WEEKS AGO and they were totally normal. I remember that distinctly.

So, we're facing one of 4 outcomes:

1) Patches has Down's.

2) Patches has hydronephrosis and will require surgery after he's born

3) Patches has hydronephrosis due to reflux and will require monitoring after he's born

4) Patches has hydronephrosis but it will resolve itself when he's born - this is simply an in-utero condition.

The wonderful nesties have suggested this one:

5) Nothing is wrong with Patches, he's fine and the doc is full of crap.

My gut tells me that it is not #1, but to brace myself for either 2, 3 or 4, but hopefully 5.

Sorry this is so long, thanks for listening. I am really feeling okay - I really have this whole "whatever happens, he's my baby and I'll deal with it" attitude about it all.

20 weeks 1 day!

I made it halfway! I'm very excited about that. But, I am not very big :( Lots of comments about how small I am. Starting to freak me out a bit so I am going to ask the doc about it tomorrow. I'll post a pic!

BIG u/s tomorrow - I know, we already know it's a boy, but still, it's the BIG u/s anyway :) Big anatomy scan to check the little boy out! He's kicking the hec out of me so I am hoping all is well.

Snow on the ground today, about 3-4 inches. Messy out there so I am not leaving the house today! Here's some pictures of Roxy romping in the snow as well. She actually likes it, strangely enough, but she isn't enjoying the cold!

I'll post tomorrow after the u/s!

It's a BOY!

Okay, it's been way too long since I posted. So, I'll post a few pictures here including BELLY PICS!

So I went in last Wednesday (10/22) for an appointment, and Baker came with me! I immediately noticed that they didn't plan on doing an u/s because they had the doppler out and everything... so I basically had to talk the doc into doing an u/s because a) the doc last time told me I was going to have an u/s in 2 weeks and b) they said they wanted to check the size of the cerebellum - they couldn't get a good measurement on it last time. So, I had about a 30 minute u/s and they discovered it was a BOY! Suddenly, the tech asked if we were going to find out the sex of the baby, to which we replied, yes! And she said, well, good, because I just got a great shot. She moved the wand over the pelvis of the baby and voila, there was a little penis! She said, see that? That's not going to fall off... you're having a boy! We're thrilled to say the least :)

Took me awhile to post on here because I went to Maryland to visit Robyn and Andrew - WAY too much fun. I was there from my birthday until Wednesday. So nice to visit with them - they took me out for my birthday to dinner at a nice Italian restaurant. Then, we had a b-day party for Andrew, his 30th! They had lots of people over and the theme was Beer Olympics - they had lots of drinking games. Robyn named me the judge, which was actually a lot of fun and I got to participate even though I couldn't drink :)

So, it's back to the real world here in Ravenna - when I arrived back, it was SNOWING. Seriously? Yeah, seriuosly. I couldn't believe it. Last night I had a little Halloween get together - cooked Spinach Dip, Pumpkin Dip, Chili and Pumpkin cheesecake. I am so proud! It was great. Stacy, Wes and his girlfriend, Russia came. I had no trick or treaters, though - they trick or treated early. I didn't get the memo, haha. I thought for sure we'd still have SOME trick or treaters, but I seriously didn't get ONE! So, now I have a ton of candy if anyone wants any. Baker wasn't home last night and when Stacy was getting ready to leave, we noticed 3 COP CARS in my driveway. I was totally scared. We went out there and asked what was going on, and one of the cops took us aside and said there was a domestic disturbance across the street. They had the lady in the back of one of the cars trying to calm her down, poor thing. Totally scary to happen when Baker was on call, and I feel awful for the lady. But, they eventually left, Stacy left, and I stayed up super late. Must have been the little bit of Coke I had, haha!

Anyway, I thought I should post some u/s pics and some belly pics, so here we go!

First one is baby at 16 weeks 2 days.

Second one is a belly pic I took this week - I know it doesn't look like much, but believe me, it is!

Third one is the phenomenon from this morning... that bulge is from me laying on my back and my uterus sticking up. The left side was ROCK HARD! Weird... and cool! It moved, too!!