Our BOY looks great!

Where do I even begin?

I would try to explain my anxiety leading up to today's appointment, but I think I'd rather show you my anxiety. Azumio is a company that has several cool iPhone apps. One that can read your heart rate, one that assesses the quality of your sleep, and one that claims to measure stress. The heart rate and sleep apps are very cool and for the most part I've found them surprisingly accurate. The stress app is fun, but I don't know how scientific it is . . . My stress level seems to always fall in the medium range (30ish to 50ish percent). What are the odds my stress level is always in the same range? Well as my appointment was running a few minutes late and I felt more and more sick, I thought I'd check my stress level for a way to pass a few minutes:



My highest reading ever prior to this was 48%!!!

Luckily my appointment started shortly thereafter.

I learned that my second AFP level was 2.8 MoM - worse than the first reading.  We had a very long ultrasound (it lasted almost an hour) and the technician was very thorough.  We had to stop a couple of times, take a break, have me roll over, move around, etc because baby boy was not exactly wanting to cooperate with all the spine shots that the technician needed.  But he finally obliged and she got all the measurements for both the standard anatomy scan and the scan for the elevated AFP.

And yes, it's a he.  Obviously and clearly, a he.

To get right to the point, his brain and spine look PERFECT.  As does everything else for that matter, with the exception of his left kidney, which has a little bit of extra fluid on it.  Not only did they tell us that it's nothing to worry about, but we went through this EXACT same thing with our son (even the same kidney), and know first hand that it's really not a problem.

A couple of other important notes.  My cervix - which I had been worried about because of the extremely low pain I've been having . . . 4cm and closed - EXCELLENT.  My placenta - so ridiculously anterior that it's hard to believe a random biological event would be that perfect centered in the front . . . but it's already moved up from my 12 week appointment and is not anywhere remotely near my cervix at this point.  Fluid levels are normal.

Size.  Hahahahahaha.  Hahahahahaha.  Oh lucky me.  Everything, and I mean everything is measuring ahead by almost a week.  From the skull to the femur.  And a 19 week fetus should weigh ~8.5 ounces and our boy is already estimated to be 10 ounces.  He seems to be following in his big brother's footsteps already!

After the ultrasound we got to meet with our MFM doctor (he didn't actually perform the ultrasound).  When we were referred to this practice, I of course did my research and found that overall it was a well liked and well trusted practice in our area.  They have two locations and doctors bounce back and forth between both locations depending on the day.  While all the doctors are well liked, Dr. K. is who you want to see.  He's the most senior, and general considered *the* MFM guy.  I was freakin ecstatic when I heard he was the doctor there today.  I was THRILLED.  He reviewed my chart - both the test results sent over by my midwives and the ultrasound images and said he absolutely rules out any neural tube defects with the baby.  The absolute only problem he sees is the kidney issue that the tech had already told us about.  He made us swear that we understood it was really a non-issue (he was relieved we've been through it before, so he didn't have to sell that point).  BUT . . . big BUT . . .

My MoM levels did rise fairly significantly considering there was only 1 week between blood draws.  And remember, those aren't absolute levels - those are levels relative to the median adjusted for gestational age.  So at 16w6d my levels were 2.56x higher than you would expect them to be and at 17w6d my levels were 2.8x higher than you would expect them to be.  So we can not rule out the possibility of placenta problems.  Dr. K. highlighted everything I really already knew . . . The possibility of pre-term labor.  The possibility of IUGR.  The possibility of placental abruption.  But he was also very pointed with his words.  He said, "You are parents.  You are hearing 'pre-term labor' and 'IUGR' and 'placental abruption.'  The word I want you to focus on is 'possibility.'  You may very likely experience none of these things."  But they will be monitored starting in the third trimester with detailed ultrasounds by his staff.  So we scheduled our first one in October when I will be 26 weeks.

Needless to say, the appointment was a HUGE PHENOMENAL success.  Better than we could have ever hoped.  And for whatever brief moments of "oh, we won't get to parent a little girl" we may have had, we are both super excited and actually downright thrilled to fill out our family with another little boy.

And if you made it this far, here are some pictures of our little healthy man.

People always commented on how perfectly symmetrical my son's "softball" head was when he was a bald baby.  Looks like little brother will be no different:



And I'm not actually a fan of 3D ultrasounds, but with the elevated risk concerns, they did do several 3D images and measurements.  (And yes, I did block out his boy parts out of this picture.  Even fetuses deserve a little privacy.)



And one final note.  We finally told big brother about all of this tonight.  I'll share that story tomorrow.  But I teared up on more than one occasion.  For as difficult as our 2 1/2 year old can be sometimes, he has moments when I truly can't imagine a more perfect child on the planet.  :)

Thank you so much for all your thoughts and prayers over the last week.  I can not begin to tell you what it means to me, and I can happily sign off tonight saying I actually feel like we might get to bring this little guy home in January.