Week 15- OB Appointment

So, I've been saying for awhile that I had this doctor's appointment coming up. It's finally come and gone and I thought I should update everyone (or the 2-3 people who read this blog) on how it went.

As normal, I had to get weighed when I first went in. I've only gained 1 lb in the past 5 weeks (since my last appointment). This adds up to a total of 3 lbs that I've gained since being pregnant. Not too bad considering that my pre-pregnancy weight dictates that I should only gain 10-15 lbs throughout this entire pregnancy. Furthermore, it also means that the 5 inches I've gained in my waistline is almost all baby and not added fat.

From there, I had to pee in the cup like normal. Most of the time they tell me that my levels are still looking good (remember that the purpose of it is to make sure I don't have bacteria which would lead to a UTI and that I don't have any hints of gestational diabetes). They didn't tell me anything this time, but my doctor's office usually goes on the policy that no news equals good news.

Then, we had to wait a STINKIN' long time to see Dr. York (my OB). The nurse said she was running late, but it was well over 30 minutes of waiting in the little doctor's office before she came in. We read (by "read", I mean looked at the pictures of) an entire Architectural Digest magazine, pointing out the things that we liked and didn't, and still had time to kill before she came in. Jesse's theory is that they shouldn't leave you sitting there that long if they don't want you to mess with stuff. So, he's always playing with the lights and stirrup covers and anything he can get his hands on. I swear that one day the doctor is going to walk in and he'll have a big latex glove blown up on his head or something.

When Dr. York finally came in, she said that she knew I had some questions about the quad screen. So I explained the research I had done and asked what her opinion on it was. In short, according to my research, only 0.5%-5% of all people get any kind of positive result on their screen (the variance is according to which defect you are looking at). Out of all of those people, the mass majority of them go on to have a perfectly normal baby. Furthermore, even if you got a negative result, it doesn't mean you are in the clear because it is just a screening test NOT a diagnostic test. If you do get a positive result, the only thing you can do from there is more tests to determine more accurately what is wrong with your baby. One test is just having a high tech ultrasound to examine the baby more clearly. The other test is the amniocentesis in which they poke a needle through your belly into the amniotic sac and remove some fluid to test. Both give VERY clear results as to the condition of your baby, but I have very strong feelings against the amniocentesis (for my own personal pregnancy). Infection can be caused by the needle or the sac can fail to heal properly causing it to leak fluid. It can cause pre-term labor and delivery and fetal trauma among other things. The long-quoted statistics say that there is a 1 in 200 chance of miscarriage, although more recent studies say it may be as low as 1 in 1600. However, the risk, no matter how low, is too high for me. I don't like the idea of a needle being poked through my belly within millimeters of my baby. I went through too much to get pregnant and couldn't bear the thought that something I chose to do caused my baby to die. Furthermore, once you found out that something WAS wrong with your baby, the only thing you can do is either to terminate the pregnancy or to wait until the baby is born and deal with the defect (either in surgery or in learning to parent a child with a retardation).

So, my question boiled down to: Considering that I am only 24 (well below the high-risk age) and have no history of defects in my family, and considering that the chances of a positive result are so low and that I refuse to abort or have an amnio done if I did get a positive, is it even worth it to have the test done?

My doctor's response was that she is an advocate for having the screen done. She said that if I were to get a positive, the high tech ultrasound is nearly equivalent to the amnio in accuracy of diagnosing the problem. She said that no one should ever tell you to get an amnio done. In her words, it's not a medical choice at that point; it's a personal choice. Some people are very against it, while others feel like they need to know. So, she said that it would be my personal choice to proceed with an amnio if we got to that point. And, finally, while neither of us has any reason to believe that my results will yield anything but low negative numbers, if I did discover a defect, knowing would allow me to consult the doctors who would need to help me with it after the birth. That made sense to me, and considering that all I had to endure was a poke in the arm to draw some blood (which poses no risk to my baby), I figured I should go ahead and do it.

She asked me if I had any more questions so I asked her about my "morning sickness". By that, I am referring to my morning routine of throwing up almost immediately from waking up. I hadn't really ever thought about it as morning sickness because when I DID have morning sickness (for a few brief weeks), I felt kinda queezy all morning and needed to eat something to settle my stomach. That sounds normal to me. However (turn away if you don't want to hear this), my morning routine consists of throwing up stomach acid and mucus, not food or drink, and it's only once in the morning and then I am totally fine the whole rest of the day. It didn't even start until I was almost 11 weeks along and has happened nearly everyday for the past 5 weeks. (Now you can look back.) So, my question was, should I expect this to last the rest of my pregnancy, and is there anything I can do to remedy it.

She said that she does consider it to be morning sickness because I never did it before I got pregnant, so it's obviously related to my pregnancy. She said that I could try to eat some crackers before getting out of bed to see if that helps. The only problem with this suggestion is that sometimes it happens just when I get out of bed at 3am to go to the bathroom. I'm not going to eat something every time I need to get up to pee. She added that there's no way to know how long it'll last. Most people do see relief later on in their pregnancy. And, in the meanwhile, I could just assume it's going to happen and determine to just get it over with and move on. I agreed saying that I am already at that point. So, I guess my routine probably won't be changing any time soon. It's okay, though. As gross as it is, it's so minimal compared to what other people go through. Every bit of it is worth it to have a healthy baby at the end of this. So, I'll put up with throwing up everyday for the next 6 months.

Finally, she had me jump up on the table to listen to the baby's heartbeat. She found it beating steadily at 150 bpm. We never get to hear it for more than a few seconds, but I treasure hearing it and knowing that my baby is doing well.

Afterwards, I left for the blood-draw and then stopped by the business office. Here, we made our very first payment. I think of all of the infertility tests we had, which added up to about $600, we only owe about $80. However, I've only gotten statements, no actual bills yet. And then, for my OB appointments, they took the basics of a standard pregnancy, factoring in one ultrasound and the exams and genetic tests and add it all up. Then they divided it by 7 (what was the remaining number of months in my pregnancy) and that's what I owe each month in order to be paid off by the time the baby's born. The only thing this doesn't include are the separate fees that the hospital will charge for delivery expenses. So, for us, this amounts to $139 a month, which is totally affordable. What I learned, though, is that they still bill this amount to our insurance and we pay what the insurance doesn't cover. So, since we hadn't gotten a statement yet, she pulled it up online and said that we only owed $30 so far that the insurance company didn't cover. So I asked, "Does that mean that we pay the $139 plus the $30?" She said no. Instead, we pay the $139 which covers the $30, and the extra $100 goes into a savings account (kinda) which will cover our future expenses. I suppose we'll get a refund if we don't end up using all of it, or if I needed any extra ultrasound for emergency reasons, etc., then the money would cover that. I thought that was a pretty good deal for us.

And, in the very end, we set up our appointment for my ultrasound. It will be April 2nd at 2:15pm. I should be able to find out if we're having a boy or a girl!!! I'm beyond stoked for that. I really have no clue what the baby is and I think that finding out makes it more real. I can refer to the baby by name and start buying clothes and accessories which I know will be gender specific. I asked my mom to be there with Jesse and me at the ultrasound. This is her first grandchild and she's really excited. She put in for the day off to make sure she can be there. The doctor's office won't allow more than 2 people with you, so everyone will find out afterwards. I've been trying to think of creative ways to announce the gender to everyone- ideas like having a cake that's pink or blue on the inside and everyone finds out when you cut into it or throwing a party/BBQ where the surprise is announced. I'm not sure what to do yet, but I'm excited about it. Only 25 more days!

So, while there is still time, you should enter in your guesses on my poll in my sidebar. The top one is just to guess if we're having a boy or girl. The one underneath that is to guess the specifics of our baby's birth. Let me know what you think!