So this whole adventure began on February 14, 2012, Valentines Day, when we were set up to have our first ultrasound. We were unsure of my last menstral period, because I was nursing our first, then 4 month old, Ethan. They started the ultrasound by measuring my uterus as well as the fallopian tubes, general OB stuff, I was so used to the whole idea of an ultrasound after just having had about a million with my first pregnancy.
My fiance Tim and I were so giddy and anxious to finally see this little bean and see how far along I actually was! I was shoked that I already felt so bloated and so very pregnant. I had horrible morning sickness and had a really hard time keeping anything down. Along with the extreme fatigure which I sort of pushed off on being a stay at home, full time nursing mother, to a bouncing, scooting, sitting alone, tank of a 4 month old son named Ethan.
Anyways back to the story....
We were sitting in the room and the ultrasound technician started looking at the screen with a very concentrated look. She stepped out of the room to consult with another technician, which instantly made us very nervous. The thoughts "is the baby ok?", "is it alive?", "is there a heartbeat or major defect?", just kept running through Tim, and my mind. Then the second tech stepped out and the other one said, "well I am going to have to tell you what I am looking at...." She took the wand and said "here is one baby..." and scanning to the left she said "and theres the other."
And then there were two.
Pictures of the Twins!
We had our son Ethan with us for this appointment because we couldn't find a babysitter. Our general OB's nurse came in and asked if she could take E from us for a bit to let the news set in. Just as she was walking out our Maternal Fetal Specialist, who we would soon become very close to, walked in.
He explained I was 6 weeks 1 day along. There were two yolk sacs and two little beating hearts in the same sac. We were going to have two little identical people in our lives soon.
It took us about 8 weeks to finally get settled into the fact we were going to have twins. Everything was sailing along super smoothly and we were having regular 4 week appointments with our general OB, Dr. H., and appointments every 2 weeks, Dr. A and Dr. T.
At our 18 week appointment everything changed. After our ultrasound we were given the devistating news that our twins, boucing baby identical BOYS, had a fatal disease called Twin to Twin Transfusion Syndrome, or TTTS. TTTS is when the boys have an unequal placenta blood share in which one baby has more fluid and the other almost none. As well as a list of complications for both the overage or fluid or the lack there of. We were suddenly faced with a 80-100% of losing our boys without medical intervention.
Our MFM, Dr. A, came in and suggested that we immediatly pack our bags and find a way to Cincinnati, Ohio, to go to the Fetal Care Center at the Childrens Hospital of Cincinnati to meet with a group of surgens to discuss our options for treatment as well as a complete and correct diagnosis.
After our trip to Cincy, as the locals call it, we made a choice that since we were only at Stage 1 of 5 of the disease and that we only had a 1/3 chance of it progressing past stage 1, we would go home and have an amnioreduction to help level out the fluid levels and hopefully restore balance and take the pressure off of Gabriel, our donor. It would also take the pressure off of Gavin, our recipients, heart. This was at 19 weeks.
At 20 weeks we went in for our bimonthly ultrasound and found that Gabriel had no measurable fluid and no visable bladder. This was devistating. It means that we were in the third of mother/babies progress.
We just had to have identical twins, 1 in 250, chance of having twins with TTTS, 10%, chances of progressing past stage 1, 33%.
We were in this small tiny group of pregnancies with this small tiny chance of this disorder and the small chance it could progress. Could this get any worse?
We will have to go back to Cincinnati to have Selective Fetalscopic Laser Photocoagulation, or SFLP, and here we are. Our testing begins tomorrow. We have a three hour ultrasound, a fetal echocardiogram, and blood work tomorrow, and wednesday we have surgery.
Tomorrow we will have more information! So I guess I'll leave here tonight, a basket of nerves, 400 miles away from my fiance and son, sitting in a hotel room with my mother, trying to fall asleep, to hear hopefully the best bad news tomorrow that we can.
Two heartbeats, two babies moving, a sliver of hope.
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