Who could have ever imagined that these would be some of the worst and become the most dreaded words we would ever hear? To understand you have to go back to three weeks ago when we went for our "gender reveal ultrasound." I am thirty-three, most all of my friends, people I grew up with and people I went to college with have all already had babies. Therefor, I have seen, I feel like, more than my fair share of things go wrong in pregnancy. Because of this and some very specific things that have happened I knew that a lot of people find out things are wrong in pregnancy around twenty weeks. At twenty weeks most insurances pay for an ultrasound and unlike the 8-10 week ultrasound (most people's first) a lot of the body parts are developed, the baby is bigger and you can just see a lot more. All that to say, I was a nervous wreck. Of course, I was super interested in the gender but I just was on the brink of crazy to hear that everything was good.
We went in the sonogram room and had a tech that we hadn't had before (she isn't new, we just hadn't had her yet...we had only had two up to this point) and when we got in there, bless her heart, I had about a million questions. The thing with medical stuff is, I know just enough to be a giant pain in the butt and what I don't know I will write down and research the crap out of. So we started and she started looking, I noticed she was definitely a she, the tech searched a little more to make sure and then we went into the question portion of the sonogram (while M studied the sonogram pictures in disbelief...he was "100% sure it was a boy").
I started with the brain, and asked if it was measuring correctly. Can you see the brain stem, does it look like it's supposed to? What about the heart? Can you see all four chambers? Do they all look right? Does she have two kidneys? What about her lungs, are they forming correctly? Does her spine look right? Do you see any deformities of any kind? What about her little liver, can you see it? Does it look good?
To every single question she was so patient and not only answered me but showed me. Finally I said, "So everything looks good?" And she said, "This baby looks perfect." I loved hearing that but I wanted her to actually say, "Everything looks good." So she kept looking and at this point I am thinking we have been in there way too long and is it because something is wrong or is it because this girl just takes longer than the other one? So, I ask again, "So EVERYTHING looks good?" She answered with, "I have never seen a baby move around as much as this one does!" Um.... ok, glad to hear it but NOT the answer I was looking for. So then we go to the point where I KNOW we have been in there too long and she is just real happy, real calm but studying that screen and taking lots of images. Naturally, I ask her one more time, "So everything looks good???" This time she starts talking about how the baby's mouth has not stopped moving and how funny that is that she seems to be just talking away in there. Now I am officially in quiet panic mode.
She printed off a TON (like 20) pictures of her and handed them to Matt and then she printed off eight for my chart. E I G H T. I KNEW eight was too many. At that point it was like a scene in a movie where people are still talking regularly, other things seemed to be normal but the room was spinning and everyone sounded like Charlie Brown's teacher to me.
It's not a long walk to the room to wait for the Dr and I don't think the wait for the Dr was long. Usually we go over all Dr. L has to say and then she asks me about my list of questions (I always have a running list). Today she came in, greeted us and stared with, "Why don't we go over your list first?" Ummmmmm, because all the sudden I don't care about what's on my list????? That's what I thought but what I said was, "Ok." and went over the list as quick as possible.
Then she said, "Well, we found something on your ultrasound." The. World. Stopped. I mean really, I am fairly confident the Earth stopped spinning for a minute and I am absolutely positive that my heart stopped. She QUICKLY (she must have felt the Earth stop....or seen the sheer panic in my eyes) got into that the baby was wonderful and that what they saw was an Amniotic Band. Such terrible words. She started to explain what it was "
strands of amniotic tissue that are formed by
premature rupture of the amnion and that can become entangled especially in
the extremities of the developing fetus often limiting growth and
resulting in various physical abnormalities (as limb or digit distortion
or amputation)" HUH? She said it is VERY rare and this was VERY early but that the two cases she has dealt with (in over 1500 births) one baby was missing a couple of toes and one was missing a few fingers.
OH! Well, that's not ideal but it's just something cosmetic? Not something affecting a major organ or her life?? I don't care if she has ten fingers and ten toes any more than I cared what the gender was. As long as she is HEALTHY! Yay! I was relieved, she was visibly relieved that I was taking it so well and she just went on to explain a little more about it and ask if we had any questions. Nope. If she's good we're good! She ended with I would probably have some questions later and just to call and let them know I was coming and she would make time to see me any time but I had to promise NOT to get on the Internet. Of course! WHO would do that?!?
So, we left the Dr and went to Panera to eat. I would say doubts started creeping in my mind about the time I was getting in my car at the Dr office parking lot. By the time we got the two miles to Panera I was a little consumed about it and even though I stayed real busy getting everything ready for the Gender Reveal party I was still pretty distracted thinking about it. It was sometime in that time frame that I was looking at the sonogram pictures and we had four different pictures that were all very clearly each hand and each foot. It was looking at those that I realized she has ten fingers, ten toes and all her arms and legs....meaning that if the band got them they would be amputated and she would feel all of it. And then I was devastated. What kind of mom would I be, walking around selling office supplies, going to church, church league softball games, hanging out with our friends and family all the while my sweet baby girl, my child, a person who knows nothing but the inside of my body is in immense pain. So, when I do finally get the post up from the Gender Reveal just know that, that is exactly where my mind was the whole time.
When we finally got to go to bed that night M fell RIGHT asleep. I, on the other hand, was dealing with a mind wondering a mile a minute down a terrible path. I picked up my phone and decided I was going to just find out some statistics, some hard facts about how often if you have a band it actually affects the baby. There are no statistics like that anywhere on the Internet but there is A LOT of other stuff and before I knew it, it was five in the morning and I had been sobbing for about six hours. The next morning was kind of rough but it was a combination of what we had found out, what I had learned in my research, lack of sleep and just plain old hormones from pregnancy. I got my emotions in check but the facts very rarely left my mind even for a second. I prayed and I prayed and I prayed and then I prayed some more. In fact, I JUST prayed all day long I would pray, taking little intervals to have a phone conversation or have a meeting or anything and then just went back to praying.
On Mondays Dr L is at the Prattville office but, when I called Monday her nurse told me to come first thing Tuesday morning. I got there a little early and, five minutes before they officially "open" Dr L herself came and got me from the waiting room. Bless. Her. Heart. She just THOUGHT she had seen a list before. She sat and just TALKED to me for almost an hour! She gave me her number and told me to text her if I started to freak out again and let her talk me down but the most important thing she told me was that the band CAN heal itself! So, the only thing I could do was pray, pray specifically that it would heal itself and not even be there at my next sonogram. YES! I CAN do that! And I did! My goodness I prayed like I have never prayed before! She also told me she was going to send me on to UAB to see a maternal fetal specialist and to have a targeted ultrasound. Then three VERY LONG, kind of miserable weeks passed. The days were ok but at night the devil showed exactly how low he could go and would take all those things I had read, heard and SEEN and would torment me at night. He would attack a mother about her child in her dreams and I would never sleep more than about two hours at a time and would usually wake up crying.
Yesterday M and I drove to Birmingham and I just sobbed on the way there. The build up was too much. I told him I have NEVER wanted, NEEDED something like I NEEDED that band to be gone. I almost threw up in the waiting room because my body was just completely tense... I NEEDED to know. The Dr started out in the room and said amniotic bands are so, so rare and let's just look. Then the tech started and she left.
I was laying on the table, M was sitting in a chair to my left and on that left wall was a huge tv screen with everything from the sonogram machine (on my right with the tech) and the tech went to work while we watched. I'm pretty sure the tech was the only one breathing. Right after she started she said, "That's a synechia, not an amniotic band." OK?!? Is that better or worse??? So after she has said it a few times I ask exactly what IS a synechia?? "A uterine synechiae are adhesion's or scar tissue that form inside the cavity of the uterus. They usually cover a small part of the uterine cavity and do not
interfere with fertility or the normal development of the pregnancy." I would really love to describe the feeling I had here. But, after 24 hours of searching I am quite convinced there are no words to adequately do so. Relief doesn't even BEGIN to fully explain how I felt! I felt like a balloon that was popped?? I didn't even realize how physically tense my body was. She went on and on but she was so happy and the tears in my eyes blurred out everything except M looking up at the screen wiping his own tears away. It might actually be the best moment of my life so far. After about forty minutes the Dr came in and did her own version of the ultrasound and the measured EVERYTHING, every bone, her brain, different things in her heart and even talked about how good the cord looked! She really is PERFECT!
I have spent so much of the last 24 hours still in prayer but prayer of sheer thankfulness! I KNOW how many babies and moms don't get the best news ever when they go and I wanted to chronicle all of this for my own memory so I NEVER forget to be so thankful! And I can't wait until I can kiss every single one of her ten fingers and ten toes! And I HOPE I never forget how surreal it was laying on that table WATCHING her move AND FEELING it at the same time. Being pregnant is so weird. So amazingly, wonderfully, terrifyingly, ridiculously weird.
Here are a few of the amazing pictures of our amazing little one who I am, unapologetically, crazy over.
.JPG) |
| Long, perfect little legs! |
.JPG) |
| Side profile. |
.JPG) |
| She is almost always sucking her thumb like this or talking like in this one :) |
|
.JPG)
.JPG)
.JPG)
