Happy 18 Weeks!

At the very beginning of my pregnancy I felt like the days could not go by any slower. It took FOREVER for a week to roll around! I suppose that is in part due to how miserable I was from weeks 5-13. But now that the holidays are over, and I am finally feeling better, I am finding it hard to believe that I am 18 weeks! Two weeks shy of being half way there! Besides being sick for eight weeks straight, I had a hard time believing this pregnancy was real. Even after hearing the heartbeat at my 13 week appointment, I still didn't believe there was a tiny peanut growing inside of me. Until yesterday...1/11/11. Chad and I got to see this little 9 oz being moving around inside of me. I thought I would cry, but instead every time it moved, I laughed. I think Chad may have blinked twice in a 30 minute period. I don't even think he looked at me once because he was so mesmerized by what was on the screen. When the ultrasound began, the baby had one foot up by it's head as if it were to say "ARE YOU SURE YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW MY GENDER??" We of course couldn't tell, but the ultrasound tech said she "had a pretty good idea." For those of you who don't know, we decided to keep the gender a surprise! We went back and forth for awhile and decided that the sound of "it's a ______" in the delivery room, is well worth waiting 40 weeks! To be totally honest...I thought it would be so hard to not ask or not look for that "third leg," but I don't think I thought about it once in the whole 30 minute ultrasound. I was so fixated on what I was seeing that gender was the last thing to cross my mind. When we were sitting in the room waiting for the doc to come in, Chad, once again, said "now I really think it's a boy." I said "and why is that?" And his reasoning was "I don't know, just the way it was moving it's arms and legs..." Really Chad?? I love you, but that is the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard. Next to him saying that he thinks that the baby occupies its time in the womb by doing curls with the umbilical cord. Do you think he wants a lacrosse player?? He is nuts!

The doc finally entered the room and that is when my nervous nurse mode kicked in. All I wanted to hear him say is "everything is perfect! See you in four weeks!" He DID say that everything with the baby looked PERFECT! What a relief!!!!! They were unable to see a portion of the baby's spine due to it laying transverse, so he said "unfortunately" with sarcasm in his voice, we will need to get another ultrasound in about eight weeks. The only other thing that he said was a slight concern, was the placement of my placenta. They diagnosed me with a marginal placenta previa. Again, this whole being a nurse and knowing too much thing is not good at times like this!!! All I heard was placental previa and thought about all the deliveries I have been to for babies who were born to mom's with placental previas. SCARY STUFF! A placental previa can be marginal/partial or complete. Complete is obviously the worse of the two. Many women with complete placental previas end up on bed rest at some point during their pregnancy and all deliver via c-section. The concern is that the placenta has implanted too close to the cervix and if it does not move toward the end of pregnancy, the fear is that as you begin to dilate, the placenta will tear away causing both mom and baby to hemorrhage. It turns out that a large percentage of women have a marginal placenta previa in the early part of the second trimester. The hope is that as the uterus grows, the placenta will shift away from the cervix. So they will be monitoring that at our next ultrasound as well. He did say however, that if it does not shift, which he is confident it will, but if it does not, we may be looking at a c-section. I told him that I did not have my heart set on anything but a healthy baby, so whatever has to happen to get this baby here safe at the end of 40 weeks I am more than okay with. The only other instructions he gave were to avoid any "trauma" for the next eight weeks...aka intercourse. Haha. Poor Chad. Although I think the doctor scared him enough that even if we were cleared, he would avoid me until the baby is walking! Haha. So, all in all, a very good appointment! He did tell me that my weight has stayed the same, so the goal for our next appointment in four weeks is...WEIGHT GAIN! You don't have to tell me twice!

I don't have a belly pic for this week yet, but these are even better...our little alien baby :) The last one is my favorite, Chad loves the foot prints, and well the first one...is a little scary looking!!