"Be Positive, Patient and Persistent "
All right!!! Here I am 20 weeks!!! I am half way there and I am so happy to say that! The kids are kicking me a lot which just feels like a lot of thuds.
In order to deal with my paranoia and hypochondriac ways I have been approaching this pregnancy in segments so to speak. I take it one pregnancy milestone at a time. I do this so I don't get overwhelmed but all the tests and scans.
For example. At first when I found out I was preggers. I only focused on the 8 week ultrasound and did not think beyond that. Then after I made it through that mile marker, I focused on our 12 week and so on. I knew my next big thing was going to be the 20 week anatomy scan. I was so very nervous for my anatomy scan (I had mine done at 19 weeks they can do it between 18 and 20 weeks) this is a big scan because they look at all the structures of the little beans to make sure everything is where it needs to be and functioning well. This is also when you can find out what you are having. Since working in the NICU for 4 years, I have become so paranoid and freak out about everything. My biggest battle this whole pregnancy has been filtering out those freaked out thoughts and to focus on the good.
So it was the day of my anatomy scan. As I was getting ready in the morning for my scan I started my usual anxiety attack. It starts in the morning where I get sick to my stomach. I end up not eating breakfast and then on my drive over to the doctor I start sweating profusely (like nasty pit stain sweaty) and bite my nails to little nubs. We had a little quick ultrasound the week before because since moving to Ohio my OBGYN had not done an ultrasound and wanted to check that everything was ok (I was 18 weeks).
Side Note: At my 12 week scan the doctor told me he thought he knew the sexes of the babies. He told me that he thought we had one of each. He was defiantly not a 100% sure of this but that was his best guess. Matt and I told our close family that they think the sexes are a boy and a girl and we carried on thinking this way until our first OB visit in Ohio.
During that quick 18 week scan I asked the doctor if she could confirm the sexes for me. She said "Well, baby A is a girl." She then scans over to baby B and goes "I believe that B is a girl as well!" I was surprised. I said, "are you sure that it is a girl?" She told us that if she was a betting woman she would say so. However, she told me to hold off saying anything until we get the anatomy scan the following week. Matt was with me when we found this news and we both just laughed. Twin girlies! That is so crazy!!!
I was then scheduled for my anatomy scan a week later with the high risk OB who is the anatomy guru. Matt was not able to come to the anatomy scan with me due to work. So I was flying solo on this one. I walked into the OB's office and still freaking out (now I legit do have pit sweat marks.) I nervously waited for the doctor to call me. I was meeting the high risk doctor for the first time. (Carrying a twin pregnancy automatically flags you as high risk, that is why I get a special doc.)
In walks the nicest man I have ever met. He was so kind and started chatting with me. He wondered how I landed in his office from a recent move from DC. I told him that my sister-in-law's mother had twin boys about 22 years ago and that she told me to come see him. He was flattered that she recommended him.
After chatting, he told me to plop up on the ultrasound table. He placed the ultrasound on me and notices that I am a bit anxious. He noticed that I was holding my breath and stopped for a second and said, "ok... lets take 3 deep breaths together. It will be ok" I calmed down a bit.
Then he started the scan. Here are some of the images we saw.
Lets have a little lesson on how to read ultrasounds:
In order to deal with my paranoia and hypochondriac ways I have been approaching this pregnancy in segments so to speak. I take it one pregnancy milestone at a time. I do this so I don't get overwhelmed but all the tests and scans.
For example. At first when I found out I was preggers. I only focused on the 8 week ultrasound and did not think beyond that. Then after I made it through that mile marker, I focused on our 12 week and so on. I knew my next big thing was going to be the 20 week anatomy scan. I was so very nervous for my anatomy scan (I had mine done at 19 weeks they can do it between 18 and 20 weeks) this is a big scan because they look at all the structures of the little beans to make sure everything is where it needs to be and functioning well. This is also when you can find out what you are having. Since working in the NICU for 4 years, I have become so paranoid and freak out about everything. My biggest battle this whole pregnancy has been filtering out those freaked out thoughts and to focus on the good.
So it was the day of my anatomy scan. As I was getting ready in the morning for my scan I started my usual anxiety attack. It starts in the morning where I get sick to my stomach. I end up not eating breakfast and then on my drive over to the doctor I start sweating profusely (like nasty pit stain sweaty) and bite my nails to little nubs. We had a little quick ultrasound the week before because since moving to Ohio my OBGYN had not done an ultrasound and wanted to check that everything was ok (I was 18 weeks).
Side Note: At my 12 week scan the doctor told me he thought he knew the sexes of the babies. He told me that he thought we had one of each. He was defiantly not a 100% sure of this but that was his best guess. Matt and I told our close family that they think the sexes are a boy and a girl and we carried on thinking this way until our first OB visit in Ohio.
During that quick 18 week scan I asked the doctor if she could confirm the sexes for me. She said "Well, baby A is a girl." She then scans over to baby B and goes "I believe that B is a girl as well!" I was surprised. I said, "are you sure that it is a girl?" She told us that if she was a betting woman she would say so. However, she told me to hold off saying anything until we get the anatomy scan the following week. Matt was with me when we found this news and we both just laughed. Twin girlies! That is so crazy!!!
I was then scheduled for my anatomy scan a week later with the high risk OB who is the anatomy guru. Matt was not able to come to the anatomy scan with me due to work. So I was flying solo on this one. I walked into the OB's office and still freaking out (now I legit do have pit sweat marks.) I nervously waited for the doctor to call me. I was meeting the high risk doctor for the first time. (Carrying a twin pregnancy automatically flags you as high risk, that is why I get a special doc.)
In walks the nicest man I have ever met. He was so kind and started chatting with me. He wondered how I landed in his office from a recent move from DC. I told him that my sister-in-law's mother had twin boys about 22 years ago and that she told me to come see him. He was flattered that she recommended him.
After chatting, he told me to plop up on the ultrasound table. He placed the ultrasound on me and notices that I am a bit anxious. He noticed that I was holding my breath and stopped for a second and said, "ok... lets take 3 deep breaths together. It will be ok" I calmed down a bit.
Then he started the scan. Here are some of the images we saw.
Lets have a little lesson on how to read ultrasounds:
Here is one of the first images. This is baby B she is the one that is higher up and right around the height of my belly button. That is actually Baby A's foot almost in B's mouth. However, it really isn't in her mouth because they are separated by a membrane that keeps the girls in two separate sacs. You can kinda see that membrane over Baby B's her nose.
Here is baby girl A. She Is below Baby B and she sits on my bladder. Her head literally pushes into my bladder all day long. She is head down while baby B is laying across my belly (kinda in a breech position)with her feet toward her sister. That little blob under her nose is a hand.
Ok so this one gets confusing.... so let me explain. What you are seeing are both babies and you can see that they are in two different scas. See the "sac line" that is the membrane that separates them. They are constantly pushing on each other though. It is pretty thin. That is baby A's butt and you can she is a girl. See where the mouse arrow is pointing to? You can see 3 white lines. That means a girl. With a Boy you would see a little nub which would be the penis between the legs. As for B, I have no clue what I am looking, but there she is! So you can see random limbs of both of them.
So there you have it. We did the whole scan and the doctor measured that they are growing appropriately. He does this by measuring the bones in the leg, the abdominal circumference, and the circumference of the heads. Both babes are measuring appropriately. Baby A is actually slightly bigger than B but not by much. They are both weighting about 10oz (about the sizes of mangos). They also look at the heart to make sure that structure of the heart looks good. There should be 4 chambers in the heart. They also take a look for the kidney and stomach. Another important thing to note is the umbilical cord. It is important to have a 3 vessel cord. In the cord there will be 2 arteries and 1 vein. Sometimes babies will have 2 vessel cord where they will be missing an artery in the cord. This could lead to some problems.
As for the scan all things look good for both babies. We wrapped up our ultrasound and then I headed out of the office. I sat in the car and had a little moment of pure joy and thankfulness, "Thank you God." I had passed yet another major milestone on this pregnancy journey.
As for the scan all things look good for both babies. We wrapped up our ultrasound and then I headed out of the office. I sat in the car and had a little moment of pure joy and thankfulness, "Thank you God." I had passed yet another major milestone on this pregnancy journey.