Getting Closer...

Our little fighters looked great on our ultrasound this morning!! Fluid and dopplers looked normal. Growth was not checked, because the margin of error in the weight measurements makes it silly to check each week. Up until now, growth has been checked every 3 weeks... starting next week, it will be checked every other week. The babies were certainly moving around a lot, and Baby B has made her home underneath the right side of my rib cage... not the most comfortable, but I'll live. My blood pressure was also much better today!

A profile picture of Baby A

After our ultrasound, we got a quick tour of the NICU at U of M. It seems like a great place, and they really do whatever they can to accommodate parents who have a baby/babies there, but being 2 1/2 hours from home is still not ideal for us. We are working on getting a tour/meeting set up with the NICU at DeVos, so that we can be prepared for whatever happens. If we get closer to our new "due date" and things still look stable, we will likely look into having the babies in Grand Rapids.

We also had our fetal echocardiograms today. Twins are at a slightly higher risk for congenital heart defects than single babies, and the recipient twin in TTTS (baby A) is at risk for heart failure due to fluid overload. Our regular doctors are trained to look at the contractility, function, etc. of babies' hearts on ultrasound, and they didn't see any problems, but they referred us to a pediatric cardiologist just to be sure. We were told to prepare for the test to take at least 2 hours. From my perspective, it felt no different from an ultrasound, and I had no idea how I was going to lay on one of those tables for 2 hours. Fortunately for me, the table was more like a really comfy bed, and the test only took about 45 minutes. The even better news was that the anatomy AND function of both the girls' hearts is completely normal! It's such a relief to know that, when the babies are born, we won't be dealing with any major heart issues on top of any other problems they may have. The peds cardiologist did warn us that some minor heart defects can't be detected by an echocardiogram, but anything major has been ruled out!

Since my last post, we've also hit our big 28 week milestone. Ever since our surgery (which was more than 11 weeks ago now!), our doctor has been talking about 28 weeks, and how it is such a big deal to get there. Well, we're there and still truckin' along! At maximum, our babies will be here in 5 1/2 weeks! We just can't wait.

Next week Tuesday is our next ultrasound and a consultation with a neonatologist to follow.

28 Weeks

Thanks for all your thoughts, prayers, and support!

The VPs