Can you guess whose baby pictures these are?

So, I didn't want my blog to be all gloom and doom, so I'm posting the children's baby pics. Can you guess who is who? It seems so obvious to me!

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Picture #5

We are assumming my water has broken.

Went to the hospital last night to labor and delivery after having a little gushing of something suspicious. Tests were positive for amniotic fluid, although any blood in it would have given a false positive too. So the doctor said we are just going to assume that they have broken and go from there. Really not much more they are going to do right now. Now I take my temp at least four times a day. He's still kicking in there. Have a friend who delivered her baby at 27 weeks and she is doing great, expect for being small. Imagine me having a small baby. The last four were chunks, some chunkier than others.

Where has all the fluid gone?

Well, I will probably call some of you and tell you about this, but if I don't, just know I'm still trying to digest it all and make sense of it. Today I saw the perinatologist. Definately have low fluid. Very low. Today they were only measuring me at 1 cm. I mentioned previously that at 5 cm they get concerned about it. So, the reasons for low fluid could be one of three things, none of which they can confirm is causing it at this point. It could be that the membranes have ruptured. It could be a poor functioning placenta (as is with placenta previa). The other thing it could be is something being wrong with the baby. Very hard to see anything in the ultrasound, but the parinatologist could make out things obviously being well trained. The baby does have a stomach, bladder, kidneys, and ureters, which is very good in the sense that hopefully the low amniotic fluid is not due to something being wrong with the baby. Is it the placenta? No way to tell. The umbilical cord looked good and it's placement. The placenta is covering about half of the cervix and may never move since it hasn't yet. (But there's alwasy still a chance.) This will guarantee a c-section delivery. No big surprise there, already planning on one. I don't know if my water has broken. The doc did do a test yesterday to see if they had, and it was negative, but that doesn't mean it hasn't. There has to be fluid present to get a positive result. There just may not have been any leaking at the time. With me bleeding off and on for the past five weeks, I have no clue what I'm leaking when I'm leaking! Well, you know. So, anyways. The good news about ruptured membranes is that it can heal on it's own. Not always, but it could. The bad news is that it can lead to infection. If they have broken and all goes well up to 23 weeks, they will admit me to the hospital then and keep an eye on me. The earliest they want to deliver the baby would be 24 weeks. I will be 22 weeks on Friday. Of course they want to keep the baby in there as long as possible as long as all is going well. Because we don't know what is causing the fluid to be low, we watch for everything. I will take my temp every day to watch for fever. Any abdominal tenderness is a warning sign. Now if I have any bleeding I have to call the doctor and not wait it out. There's many things that could go wrong with the baby because of low amniotic fluid as well. The lungs may never develop properly which wouldn't allow him to breathe. He could compress his cord which wouldn't have a favorable outcome. And if he's always stuck in the same position, he doesn't get to move his arms and legs around and may need physical therapy after birth to get his muscle working properly, it they function at all. Of course everything could be just fine with the baby and we just keep watching and monitoring. But the chances of having a premie are high too. If I could get the little guy (or girl) to just hang on a couple more weeks until they do another ultrasound, I think I'll be able to breathe. And once again we do not know what we are having at the moment. The tech today said she was pretty sure it was a girl, but not 100% becuase of the difficulty of making things out, but she said three white lines usually means a girl. The last ultrasound we had was at the hospital and she said because they (in the ER) don't do alot of OB ultrasounds, they may not have been correct in prediciting the sex. So, right now, who knows. All I want now is for the baby to be ok, hang in there as long as possible and have the least amount of problems. I think I can handle the NICU again (although it could be a lot longer of a stay) and even handle having another child with disabilites. Just hang in there little one! I know a lot of this can be hard to handle at first, but they always have to tell you everything so you can be prepared for anything while hoping for the best. I don't know what will happen, I just know everything will be ok and that we will be taken care of even if Todd is gone when all this happens. My next ultrasound is June 10th. Todd will leave June 16th for Washington. He doesn't get back until July 18th. Everything will be good. I'm not on bedrest right now, thank goodness. I'm allowed to go about my everyday buisness, just no strenous exercise, heavy lifting, pelvic rest, and have the doctors permission to be lazy.

Update on this adventurous pregnancy!

So today I went in for an ultrasound and saw the doctor as well. I still have placenta previa. That hasn't moved. I also still have some blood at the top of the uterus. It was also detected that my amniotic fluid is low. Tomorrow I will go to see a maternal fetal specialist. I have no idea what to expect or what they will say. I don't feel worried. I think things will be ok. I didn't bring any pictures home from this ultasound becuase it was really hard to see. When the fluid is low, it makes it harder to see. She was able to see and meaure a few things like the brain, heart, bladder, kidneys, spine. She couldn't see the stomach. And she couldn't get a good measurement of the trapped blood. Amniotic fluid is considered low when it is measuring 5 cm. Mine was 3 cm. So, we'll see what happens tomorrow. I'm still feeling him kick, though!