10 weeks

The good news is the morning sickness is fading. I'm 10 weeks today. I no longer wake up feeling like I'm going to be sick. Sometimes throughout the day I get waves of nausea but a quick gag or two and I'm back to myself. My energy is beginning to return little by little too. It's nice to finally feel like a normal human being again and I'm sure the kids are enjoying having their Mommy back too.

Today is a semi big day in Scooby Snax's life. Today at 11:30 I go for an ultrasound at the perinatologist's office. They'll be checking my cervical length for a base number. That way as I get further into my pregnancy we'll be able to tell if it's thinning out at all. They'll also be double checking that we don't have another set of conjoined twins in there. I'm happy to get another peak at the munchkin and hopefully a good picture. Abby is coming with me. She's really excited. A part of me is nervous. I guess the worry will never go away although my anxiety is nowhere near as high as it was at this point in my pregnancy with Alexa. See what a healthy pregnancy and baby will do for your mental health?

Scooby Snack's 1st ultrasound

At my initial meeting and pregnancy test at the midwives I was given a referral for an ultrasound to be done by the perinatologists at Delaware County. Since being pregnant with the twins I am almost guaranteed an early ultrasound. It is great for easing my worries and the midwives know that I am a worry wart. This time I had an additional reason for the early u/s. This time they want to check my cervical length too. One of the complications of the laser surgery on pregnancy is that sometimes the cervix can shorten too soon with the weight from the baby. I have an appointment on July 25th.

In other baby bump news I have been feeling extremely nauseous. I have only actually thrown up once but the sick feeling just never goes away. I'm sure if it weren't for my complete hatred of throwing up I would've done so a few times. There are times when I just have to sit quietly and breathe slowly so that I can get rid of the urge. The midwives have taken mercy on me and prescribed some anti-nausea meds. First I started out on reglan. It didn't seem to do much. Then I tried phernegran. Still no help. Finally my insurance approved zofran. The midwives seemed to think this would be the answer. Unfortunately I'm still gagging and suffering almost non stop. I pray that there's only a couple more weeks of this and then my hormone levels should level out a bit. The good news that came from all of my sickness is that the midwives wanted me to have an earlier ultrasound done to rule out twins. They said that with my "history of twins" and my exaggerated nausea it wouldn't hurt to have an ultrasound done in radiology.

July 7th was the day. Burt came along with me as usual. My appointment was for 10:15am so I started drinking my 32ozs of water at 9:30am. We arrived at radiology at 10:00. I thought for sure being early was a good thing and that maybe they'd take me back earlier. No such luck! 11:00 came and went and I was ready to pee my pants. I paced the hallway just waiting to be called. Finally when I was on the verge of having an accident the tech brought us back. I told her I didn't know how long I might be able to hold it in. She said she'd do a quick abdominal one but that we probably wouldn't see the baby that way. She kept to her word and after getting a few shots of my ovaries I was allowed to pee. Sweet relief! As soon as we started the vaginal ultrasound Burt spotted the baby right away. Just one little bean in there. Snuggled in. A heartbeat of 163bpm. She showed Burt the sac, the baby and the heartbeat. I finally got a glimpse of the baby right before she wrapped it up. A sweet little scooby snack! The tech printed me out two pictures. Neither one was very good. For some reason the radiology department prints their pictures on computer paper. They're not very clear and this time the tech even cut the paper so that the only part you could try to see was the baby. Weird! Needless to say I am excited for the ultrasound on the 25th where I'll actually get a good look at what will be our 4th child.

Announcements

I'm always weary about starting a pregnancy blog or about announcing my pregnancy to friends and family. There's always that small thought in the back of my mind. What if I loose this baby? So I wait. I usually wait until I've had an ultrasound showing me a healthy baby, but waiting is so so hard. It's especially hard in regaurds to Abby and Nathan. They have ears like a cheetah and hear everything. If the kids were to be left in the dark Burt and I just wouldn't be able to talk about this pregnancy. I wasn't quite sure what to do. Burt fixed that for me. Shortly after he learned of the news he came out to the living room where me and the kids were sitting. He made it short and sweet and blurted it out. "Mommy is pregnant guys". I'd be lying if I wasn't a bit shocked but mostly I felt relief. Abby seemed a bit reserved at first. Nathan was excited immediately. We all talked about how nice it would be to have a little boy to round out the bunch. Soon after Daddy left for work I talked more with Abby. Her initial response to the news had me a little worried. What was she thinking? After talking with her for a few minutes I realized my fears were silly. She was very excited! Probably more so then Nathan, but both kids talked about it all day. Before we announced it to anyone else I knew we had to find a cute way to tell my Mom and Amanda. I decided on buying Alexa a "Big Sister" t-shirt from Carters and wrapping it in a box. We let Alexa open the gift right after cake that night. Burt held it up and there was complete silence. Did they not understand it? Were they not happy? I finally said "If Alexa is a big sister, what does that mean?" And then it dawned on them. Everyone was a bit quiet after that. I'm pretty sure that most of it had to do with the tension that was already there about my mom moving to Amsterdam. Maybe she was sad at the idea of missing out on a grandchild. I'll never know, but I was definitely dissapointed. After we broke the news to them everyone else was just easy. I think I called Cindy and told her. Shannon knew even before Burt. I blurted it out on Rose's facebook page in hopes that it would make her call me ASAP. And of course my JB Mommas knew right away. I still kept it underwraps as far as a general facebook announcement. Those people could wait until I had my ultrasound. Giving immediate friends and family bad news would be much easier then having to tell the 150 something facebook aquaintances I have.

June 16th, 2011

I'm pretty sure I don't have to go into all the details about how this welcomed surprise came into our life. Although it is important to recall some details. May 28th was definitely the day. I remember it well. Not because I was charting or in trying to conceive mode this time. I remember it because it was our first oops moment since Alexa had been born. I remember checking my calendar right after the fact. I was only cd 18. Still could've been too early to ovulate. I made a short note in my "my days" app and we went about our night. 5 days later I had laser surgery of my cervix. I hope that this doesn't play a major role in this story but in case it does the facts are here. The morning of the laser surgery they did a blood pregnancy test. It came out negative of course because even though I must have been preggo my body showed no signs of it yet. The days passed. I was so consumed by Alexa's party planning that I gave the idea of pregnancy little thought. Only when I checked in my "my days" app did I even realize on June 15th that I would've been on cd 35. Even for me it was getting to be a bit long. That night I dug in the bathroom cabinet and discovered I had a digital pregnancy test still left over from my pregnancy with the youngst McCabe. I checked the expiration date. Not expired until July. Score! I left the test in the cabinet and went to bed. I knew if I didn't have my period by the morning that I should take the test. June 16th I woke up ready to celebrate my little miracle's 1st birthday! I stumbled into the bathroom and put in my contacts, peed, and took the test. I sat there as the little hour glass blinked. I wonder if the people who invented those tests thought about the effect that that little hour glass would have on millions of women trying to conceive. I remember staring at that hour glass time and time again when we were trying to get pregnant almost two years prior. I stared as it blinked and I'd imagine the word pregnant there. This time was quite different. I really don't think I was expecting to see the result that I did. But POP! There it was. Clear as day. PREGNANT. I hurried up and hid the test. I had a birthday girl to get out of her crib. Abby, Nathan and I walked into her room singing "Happy Birthday". My baby girl was one. What a happy day! The rest of the morning seemed as if time was standing still. I got Alexa dressed in her special "Birthday Girl" shirt and bib. We waited for Daddy to get back from a quick run to his friend's house. The wait seemed liked hours. I was worried about how he'd take the news. We had always talked about wanting to have another baby close in age to Alexa. We loved watching Abby and Nathan grow into best friends and we always assumed it was because of how close in age they were. We knew we wanted the same for Alexa. We just didn't know that we wanted it right now. When he came in he made a beeline to the sink. There was a sinkful of dishes calling his name. As he washd the dishes I grabbed Alexa and handed her the pregnancy test. I stood her up a few feet from Burt and let her walk towards him. I said to Burt, "The birthday girl is behind you". He immediately turned around and started singing "Happy Birthday" to her. He sang the whole song and never once saw the test in her hand. It wasn't until I said "Alexa, Daddy isn't very observant today" that he turned around and took notice. "You're pregnant!?!?!", he said. I just looked at him and nodded. We both stood there in shock for a minute. I think at that moment it finally sunk in. We talked back and forth for a few minutes. We discussed how Alexa would be 20 or 21 months before the baby was even born. By the end of the conversation Burt was feeling overwhelmed but excited. My mind was still racing though. I just had this laser surgery. What effect did the anesthesia have on the baby? Would my cervix be capable of even carrying this prenancy to term? And of course with our passed pregnancies not far from my thoughts...was this little baby okay in there? All of these thoughts had to wait. Afterall, I had a one year old to celebrate!