Laying it all on the changing table

Well here it is. Sixteen blog posts written over the past seventeen weeks documenting our journey to this baby.  Today I would have been 38 weeks pregnant and probably expecting to meet our daughter in the next few days, so it felt like a good day to share this baby girl's story so far.

Start here:

Starting Again

12 week happenings

This week we met with the genetic counselor, had our first level 2 ultrasound with our perinatologist, and decided to make our news facebook official! 

The genetic counselor was under the impression we were going to do some genetic testing on Wednesday, but once we talked through everything, we decided not to. The ultrasound part of the test was going to happen regardless, and we said only in the event of that having worrisome results on that would we consider anything else, because I just don't care to know. This baby has had 4 sonos already and will have 8-10 more, so if there is something BIG wrong, we'll see it. Anything else we get, we'll deal with it when we need to. I told the doc I was more worried about my mental health for the next 6 months than having all the facts right now, and that after losing a baby, there wasn't anything we cared about unless it was life threatening. 

So we did the sono and everything looked great. Perfect. The nucal fold measured at 1 mm (1-3 is normal, 3+ is worrisome) and all the facial bones were present and perfect. We saw the brain, spine, chambers of the heart, umbilical cord and blood supply, stomach, arms, legs, hands, feet, and watched her bounce like her brother. Yes, her. Which I'm still struggling to wrap my mind and my vocabulary around. The stenographer said she was 65% sure it was a girl, and when the doc came in for his exam, he said he was 98% sure. (And he's the director for MFM at Presby so he has a good deal of experience!) We still haven't gotten the blood results back (not helping my impression of Canadians...) but seeing it in black and white made it pretty clear. And this doc measured Carter within a couple ounces the day before he was born so he's kind of a MFM god in my mind ;)

A girl. Well. Ok. Yes that's what I wanted. And Louis too. And both our families for that matter. But for some reason I didn't think it would happen. And don't get me wrong, I'm pumped, there was baby girl shopping done within 6 hours of the news. But I don't think it has sunk in. We need to pick a name and I think that will help give her some sort of concrete identity. Some part of me is still detached, and since I don't know how I did that, I'm struggling to undo it. 

Aunt Macy helped me take a cute picture on Thursday, and I decided to go ahead and put it on facebook. Yes I still have 1-2 weeks in this trimester, but nothing will change between now and then. And this news is exciting, and praise worthy, and share worthy. And having all the information fully public will help this sink in a little more and up the excitement. But, on the flip side, I'm not 100% excited. Above 90% for sure, but there will always be a part of me that is sad and worried. And that may be hard to understand. I've had 3 different conversations in the last week that reminded me just how different our experience has been from the "norm" and just like I can't understand how some people are so flippant about pregnancy, they probably think I'm too consumed with it. And I am. Oh my y'all I am. Even though I'm detached in some way, I still listen to her heartbeat most days. This is the third of the most amazing gifts I have ever been given (Louis isn't a gift, he's a treasure I was sent on a journey to find) (aw) (that took me a while to come up with...). I am consumed with cherishing this tiny life and remembering her sister and loving on her brother. And even if it makes me weird, makes me awkward, and overly emotional. I'm ok with that because I know I have good reasons to be weird, awkward, and emotional!