Luckily, our appointment was first thing in the morning so we didn't have to wait long. Tim dropped off Hunter at my parents' house while I finished getting ready and closed up the house. I got there first, which was ok, because at this office you have to check in at the hospital and then you get to go up to the office that you need. They make you wear a hospital wristband and everything..... its a pain and a half. Since we have been pretty frequent visitors, though, they let us just go straight up and do the wristband thing in the regular office.
While I was signing in and waiting for Tim, the doctor peeked her her head around the corner and said that she had gotten our amnio results last night. Then she looked around, and asked if Tim was coming. When I told her that he was, she looked relieved. She then asked if we just wanted to go ahead and look at the results before going into the ultrasound room. This made my nerves shoot through the roof! Why did I absolutely need my husband there? Was she thinking that there was something in the amnio results that would make us not even need an ultrasound?
Since I had woken up early, I managed to consume and unreal amount of water by the time the called me back at 9:30. I had used the restroom before I went up the elevator, then again when I got off the elevator, and felt like I needed to pee again before the ultrasound, but didn't want to be a pain so I figured I would wait until after. She scanned the ultrasound wand over my belly and we could see a huge black bubble. We have come to realize that black in an ultrasound is fluid, and I was hoping that it was the amniotic fluid. It was my bladder, a very full bladder. She asked if I needed to use the restroom, which by then I was dying (can you tell how often I am going these days?), so I got up. When we looked at the screen again, we could see Charlotte surrounded by black fluid. We have gotten so pretty used to seeing her squished up against the walls of my uterus that we could see a big difference right away. She started measuring the fluid level and we were both holding our breath and hoping that we were reading her code accurately.
There are two ways to measure fluid level. One being the amniotic fluid index (AFI) and the other being maximum vertical pocket (MVP). With AFI, they take a picture of the baby and measure 4 quadrants around her. Then they add the pockets together to get the measurement. With MVP, they find the one single largest (tallest) pocket and measure that. Then they multiply by four to get the amniotic fluid volume. Talking with one sonographer, we learned that the AFI is the older way to get the information, even though pretty much all doctors prefer to do it that way, but really MVP is more accurate and you want that one pocket to be over 2 cm. I tend to think that I would like to see the AFI because at our 3rd ultrasound since this whole scare happened there was one single pocket of 2 cm, and the rest were so small that they were immeasurable. Definitely not a good thing, but fine according to MVP rules. Of course, this is all just how I layman understands it!
Back to the ultrasound....
All of her pockets were in the 2-3 cm range, with the largest vertical pocket being 3.2. We were ecstatic!! The doctor came in at this point, and looked along with us. She noticed right away that there was more fluid, and when she saw the numbers add up to 9.57 she was amazed! She said, "Whatever you're doing..... keep doing it!". We all marveled as we watched Charlotte drinking in the fluid, and wriggling around in there. If was very obvious that there was a substantial amount of increased fluid, and that was so exciting!
We then looked at the other issues that had been noticed. One being her echogenic bowels. Her tummy had been previously showing up as bright as bone in the ultrasound, but was explained by the blood in her fluid. Blood shows up brightly, and when she swallowed the fluid, it got in her belly. Luckily today, her belly did not look nearly as bright as before, and it was nowhere near as 'bright as bone' on the screen.
They scrutinized her spine and could see no features of a neural tube defect. The elevated numbers in the fluid at the time of the amnio was likely because there was so much of my blood in there.
The echogenic foci on the heart was still there, which still sucks, but the doctors are not worried about it. If this would have been the only thing that was seen initially, then they would have said that they happen often and either do not cause a problem or that they go away before birth. The problem was that there were other soft markers for Down's Syndrome or other chromosomal abnormalities, so it raised a red flag. Since we have been tested, nothing has come back abnormal.
They wouldn't measure her because it hadn't been three weeks since my last measurements were taken, so that will come tomorrow, and I am so anxious about it! I don't know if they want her to have caught up to where she should be, or just to have grown at all, or somewhere in between.
Leaving the doctor, I was so excited, but then when it came time to share the new update, it was hard to fully let myself be in a happy place. It isn't like I just had to pass one test to make it to the next level, we have to KEEP getting good reports. The fluid went from normal to crazy, dangerous, below level in a matter of four weeks, and managed to get up to a 'decent' level in two and a half weeks. I am so nervous that we will go in one week and see it back down to a nothing.
The outlet mall was close by, so before my next appointment I swung in there and picked up a few baby girl items. I feel weird buying girl items. Like, if I buy too many then I will jinx this whole good turn in events. That... and I have been programmed to buying boy things for a over a year!
I go back tomorrow and will get an update as soon as I can! Thank you for those who have prayed for this sweet baby girl! We love her so much already!
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