A good man will love, even if he isn't sure that he is loved in return.
A good man never gives up, but knows when to quit.
A good man will kiss you in spite of coffee breath or head colds.
A good man doesn't just love his children, but makes sure that his children know they are loved.
A good man is grateful for every bit of knowledge and every skill that he has been taught or acquired.
A good man will tell you you are beautiful when you've gone six days without a shower and you have black circles under your eyes and your legs are so swollen that they look like barrels.
A good man will cry with you.
A good man will laugh with you.
A good man will fight to provide the best he can for you with what God has allowed him to have.
A good man will honor you with how he talks to and treats you; not just in front of others, but in private.
A good man will laugh at you when you try to be funny, even if you actually aren't.
A good man is gentle and kind.
A good man will spoil you - not necessarily with gifts, but with sacrifices of his time and his energy, and sometimes his sanity.
April 28. It was 4am and I hadn't been to sleep yet. I'd tossed and turned, checked the clock, browsed my facebook... but not slept. I was up, trying to snack on granola while pulling my hair into tight french braids. I'd been wearing that hair style almost every day for 2 weeks while we tried every safe home-induction method we could think of to try to avoid pitocin, but they had all failed and we were one hour from checking in at our local hospital. Through the night I had had several decent contractions, but no pattern: same as the 14 days leading up to that morning. We got in the car and the nervous nausea hit. "Don't forget, you have to stay with H, 'cause she will need you more than I will while I'm pushing A out." It was a plan we had hashed through a dozen times. The Dr was fine with H going straight to my chest, and me meeting her, but then she was going to be moved to an incubator until her brother showed up. And we were worried about her. She barely passed kick counts, and we had spent the first week of the month frantically worried about her after an ultrasound had been poorly read and we were told that she was a high risk baby.
Bed rest buddy! Preterm labor signs at 32 weeks meant 2 wks bedrest.
We had already been worried about her. She was hard to feel due to both placentas being on the front of my uterus, and she was fairly inactive. She never responded to our touch or voices like her brother did, and between our 20 week and 32 week ultrasounds she had gone from 20% bigger than her brother to 20% smaller. In March we had an ultrasound that showed a marginal placental previa, which meant that if H's placenta didn't move, we'd have to have a c-section. So we scheduled an ultrasound for April 1st.
Working on the nursery in March - almost there!
At a weekly movement monitoring sessions. At least it was a comfy seat!
Then the April 1st ultrasound showed potentially disastrous issues with her placenta. While it had moved far enough to not be a placental previa, we were told that she had a VCI that was very close to the cervix, creating the possibility (though only slight) of vasa previa, where the veins of the umbilical cord are attached to the cervix, meaning that going into labor can shred them and cause the baby to bleed to death. The VCI without the vasa previa meant potential malnourishment, a fragile umbilical cord and, due to position, increased the risk of umbilical prolapse. Our Dr B sent us to a specialist here in town for a more detailed ultrasound, scheduled a non-stress-test ultrasound to check the health of both babies and recommended we fully transfer care to our local hospital. So we did. And, over the course of the week it took to get from the very ugly diagnosis to our ultrasound with the specialist, we cried and prayed and cried and prayed and cried and prayed... And had the stress test ultrasound, which H didn't do well at. She technically got her points, after a lot of being pushed and coaxed, but it took every second of her 30 minutes. A, on the other hand, got all of his points within about 8 minutes. Then we had the ultrasound with the specialist and, guess what? The diagnosis had either been completely false, or God had just fixed it. There was slight separation of the veins in the cord, (instead of being one thick cord as it entered the placenta, it was divided into its 2 veins and 1 artery just outside the placenta) but it was in a safe location and only very slight. To this day, we wonder if the bad ultrasound was just to get us to move care closer to home. Anyway, the specialist cleared us for an attempt at a natural birth and assured us that H was within normal size ranges and referred us to a Dr L here that he knew was capable and willing to fight for a natural twin delivery. At that point, both babies were head-down, so we were prime candidates. He also scheduled us for a weekly AFI ultrasound and 30 minute monitoring session.
36 Weeks
At our first appointment with our new dr at 36 weeks pregnant, I was 2cm and 80% and she was convinced I wouldn't make it another week, but scheduled an induction for the 28th anyway.
On the 20th of April I had called my birth assistant/midwife and she spent the evening sitting with me, counting contractions, which weren't quitting, but didn't seem to be getting stronger after a very long day of off and on labor. I had been taking every safe "helpful" supplement I could get my hands on, walking, and other various things to induce, so it wasn't a strong labor pattern. So E (my midwife) called a chiropractor friend because we felt like my hips were horrifically off, and they were. After a late night adjustment and with labor still piddling around, I decided to go ahead and go to the hospital and see if they could lightly encourage what I already had, as opposed to going in for a full jump start a week later. Well, after walking halls at the hospital and labor completely fizzling out, we all went home at 2am. I spent the next day crying. All day. I was finally having to give up the last little bit of control I had felt like I had with my birth plan. Over 18 weeks it had gone from a home birth with a pool for labor and a fire in the fireplace to this: a pitocin induction and pushing babies out in a cold, sterile operating room. We had been told that we probably would have to have a c-section, then that our baby girl would probably die if we didn't have a section, then that we were fine to have a natural birth and she was perfectly safe. We had been from midwife care to OB care to specialist care and now to a new OB.
Easter Egg hunt, 37 weeks.
It was a lot. Going to the hospital that Sunday night had been a silly, impractical decision from a birth point of view, but it was essential for my emotional sanity. After that day I was able to let go. I was able to spend the next 6 days taking naps and trying to clean up the house. (That's difficult when you have gained 65 pounds in 26 weeks and your hips, back and feet despise you with) I was able to look forward to laying in bed and letting pitocin bring on the contractions without my aching feet having to walk or my nauseated stomach having to swallow any more pills. We had worked out a detailed plan with our new doctor. Light pitocin to start things, then turn it off. Epidural port placed, but no meds, at 7 cm. Epidural started as I was pushing H out, so that if we had to do a version wouldn't be unbearable or a section wouldn't be under general if either were required. It made sense. I figured it was a 12-14 hour plan. But nope. It was fast.
It was all. So. Fast.
Weeks of carrying so much weight, of Helena being so low, of so much pressure and so much prep -- I don't think we made it over a 10 on the pitocin drip (that's a nothing, by the way) and I never actually made it to 10cm. We started pit at 8am, and had both babies before 2pm.
I'll never forget how angry I was when they started wheeling me to the OR. 20 minutes before they had said I was a 7. With Gavin, 7cm happened 5 hours before he was born. FIVE. HOURS. I had no idea I was in transition, I just thought it was the worst pre-transition labor that had ever happened. Ever. Anywhere in the history of the world. I was dying, and convinced I had 4 hours of labor left. I remember thinking "I'm soooo glad we're set up for an epidural, because I cannot do this flat on my back in a cold room for 4 hours!" and then I hissed (or yelled, or said... I felt like hissing...) between contractions that I wanted my epidural NOW. Quinn and Eva were laughing at me, but I had no idea why. I felt like I was being drug into a dungeon or torture and flames for the rest of eternity... And it was back labor. I felt completely gypped. I wasn't supposed to have back labor. Everybody says I was pushing involuntarily -- I guess I was, but truth is I was just focusing every bit of energy and strength I had on my low back and tailbone because of the horrific back labor pain. Turns out Helena was posterior. Go figure. They got me onto the table and propped my feet on the stirrups and the anaesthesioligist was there asking me all kinds of light hearted, weird questions. Thankfully, I knew he was making sure I was staying cognitive while dosing my port with a shot of something, or I would have been ticked off. Then they let me push her out.
She was so tiny. And skinny. And intense. Her huge eyes burned into mine as soon as they put her quiet little self on my chest. She was 5lb, 14 oz, but so long... and I felt my heart breaking. Isn't that terrible? But she needed to stay with me. She needed to be warm and close to me in that freezing, bright, noisy room, but ugly blue gloves had to carry her away. I kept trying to see her while they were monitoring Adoniram, and I was so glad to see Quinn hovering over her bed, holding her hand, just like we had said. The drug in my epi port kicked in about then, and I'm so glad, because I wasn't paying attention, but I was later informed that they had held Adoniram in place internally after breaking his water. I didn't feel it. I didn't know. I was just looking for my girl. And then his cord prolapsed, which would have meant emergency section with a lot of doctors, but my doctor simply pushed him back up into the birth canal, moved his cord up behind him and let me push him down again. Also would have been horrifically painful without the epidural... But less than 10 minutes after she was born, her brother followed her. He was 18 oz bigger, and his faces was all scrunched up into an unhappy pout, but he felt and sounded and smelled so sweet when I pulled him close to my face. I had to fight for him a bit -- I kept reaching for him, and caught hold of him and pulled him up to me, but there was a nurse I was fighting over him with. It didn't annoy me until later, then it made me mad. See, Adoniram was breathing to fast and too shallow. His respiration were high and he was fighting for each breath. He was a good color, and he was snuggling close to my chest and had strong movements, but it only took them a minute to pull him away from me too. They brought Helena back to me right away, but it took a while for them to bring him back. When they did, I held them both for a minute before Quinn leaned in and talked very softly in my ear. "He's not breathing well, girly, they want to take him to NICU for a few hours." I don't know if I said anything. I just remember thinking "but he's perfect." And he pretty much was.
(quick
shout out to sarahcarterphotos.com for being such a sweet, quiet
presence while taking such beautiful pictures! Thank you! )
Quinn didn't get to hold Helena until after he had spent a couple hours with Adoniram at the NICU -- this is in my recovery room, holding her for the first time.
Gavin and Helena
4 hours later his respirations were down and they let me nurse him in the NICU, but since they had already started him on a glucose drip (grrrrrrr) he had to be fully admitted and they kept him 48 hours in that nasty, lonely little room on a forced 3 hr feeding schedule. (to be fair, the nurses were very sweet and loved on and talked to him a lot...but he wasn't with us.)
I look back and I don't know how I did it. 2 days and 2 nights, feeding Helena in our room every chance I got, and working through stressful, frantic feedings in the NICU on the other end of our floor every 3 hours. Poor bubber was desperately hungry every time, and they were giving him a pacifier when I wasn't there (nurses thought it was odd, but around an hour before feeding time, every time, he would have a meltdown.) so he was confused and had a hard time nursing effectively. The first night I had to call a nurse to wheel me there, but the second morning my legs were so swollen that they were worried about blood clots and made me walk it every time, so I spent 36 hours walking back and forth by myself while Quinn kept Helena, who wasn't allowed out of the postpartum ward and couldn't go near the NICU.
Visiting my newborn boy when he was 4 hours old. Right before they let me nurse him.
Telling Quinn that his respirations were down and that I was going to be allowed to feed him.
That was Monday night, all day Tuesday, Tuesday night and then on Wednesday the director of the NICU ordered them to let me nurse on demand so that they could wean him off the glucose faster. (They were taking it down one point every time he had a good blood sugar number before a feeding)
Sweet, skinny little Helena. This was as close to uncovered as I could bear for her to be. It was so hard to keep her warm!
We were discharged Wednesday afternoon, but he wasn't. He was off the glucose by 9pm, but had to be observed for 12 hours before he could go home, and we thanked God for a team of nurses that loved us and him, because they fought hard to get us a care-by-parent room, even though we technically weren't the kind of family that needed one.
We left Helena with the nurses on Tuesday so we could both spend some time with Adoniram. This was the first time Quinn got to hold him.
Me and my Dommy-Boy.
It was an uncomfortable, long night in a dark, depressing room, but we were finally together. The next day they let us go home, and Mom brought Gavin home, and it finally started feeling like we were a family.
Quinn waiting for me to call and say he could bring Helena to our family room...
And me waiting for Quinn and Helena after they let Adoniram leave NICU
Babies together for the first time.
I feel like how I closed Gavin's birth story fits pretty well here. Like Gavin's birth story "It wasn't something amazingly beautiful, and it most
definitely wasn't perfect, but every bit of it was God led, and it was
miraculous, and it brought us the loves of our lives, and it taught us
how to love each other more deeply. Our special somebodies have faces now,
and names, and know our voices and looks into our eyes and melt our
hearts every time we look into theirs."
8 Weeks. Feeling Disgusting. I cannot
wait until my yard is this green again.
Winter, be gone!
It all made more sense when Tammy showed us two babies.
The extra sickness, the tons and tons and tons of movement, the movement at my ribcage at the same time as my bladder even though my baby was only supposed to be about 10 oz, the fact that I'd been measuring a month (or more) ahead, the round ligament pain so early on, the migraines, etc.
I had no idea how weird my day to day life was going to be, though.
I was eating 80-100g of protein a day and drinking a minimum of my 8 cups of water, often 12. (3 quarts)
Twins meant an instant switch to 130-150g of protein daily and a minimum of 1 gallon of water.
I had been trying to work out, even though at 20 weeks I still had morning sickness and headaches and I *really* didn't want to. But when you're pregnant, you work out.
Twins meant that workouts were suddenly very low priority, and that I wasn't to physically push myself AT. ALL.
I had been planning a home birth with my dearly-loved midwives (who were also quickly becoming my closest friends, due to getting to work with them several days a week as an admin assistant). I was going to have candlelight and a fire in my fireplace. I was going to labor in a warm birth pool. I was going to push my baby out in my own home and be tucked into my own bed just minutes after. I wasn't going to be in a cold hospital room with nurses who switched shifts half way through my labor so that I wouldn't even have a chance to get to know the assistants who were with me.
A snapshot by the 3 year old from 14 weeks pregnant.
Twins meant that my hopes and plans for my birth went out the window. Twins are high risk for premature delivery and transverse positioning. It's uncommon for both of them to present head down (and very hard on them during labor if they do) so there's almost always one that's breech. They're high risk for malnourishment and NICU care. My midwives don't deliver twins. That meant the cold hospital room, potential for rude or hateful nurses, probably delivery in an operating room because it's policy for a lot of hospitals, and a likely c-section.
My midwives have an OB that they have an extremely good relationship with. He studied in the Netherlands, shadowing midwives, after completing med-school and appreciates the natural process of birth. He's comfortable with delivering breech babies because he's been trained to do so, unlike the majority of American OB/GYNs who have never delivered a breech baby and who schedule a section for any mom who shows up with a baby presenting breech. He has a very high success rate for vaginal twin deliveries because he doesn't see them as an automatic c-section. Also because he is comfortable with external versions and is really good at getting baby #2 into a good position after baby #1 is born. He's also at a small hospital, so he's on call for his patients 24/7, so there's no chance of his clients ending up with an OB who doesn't see things how he does.
20 Week 3D ultrasound of Helena and Adoniram's faces
But he's 90 miles away from us.
Our home town, as opposed to this Dr. B (different Dr. B than my fertility Dr.) has two large hospitals, one of them less than 7 minutes from our house, but a ridiculously high c-section rate. Nobody in town will deliver a breech baby if they can help it, and twins are pretty routinely a scheduled 37 week c-section, regardless of position or health.
But it was a no-brainer to us. Of course we'd drive. I wasn't about to sign up for a voluntary abdominal surgery just because my Dr. hadn't been trained to let a baby be born in the less than most ideal position.
So we started working on insurance paper work (We've been uninsured since Q started working from home in April of 2013) so that we could set up an appointment with Dr. B.
My midwives mentioned that, since it was so far to drive, there was a possibility that the Dr. would let them do my bloodwork and more simple checkups, instead of us going out there every couple weeks.
That would be when I realized how torn I actually was. Quinn's response was "well, if we're going to all this trouble because we need different care, then why would we outsource? Don't we need as much time with this doctor as possible?"
It had only been 3 days since we had found out, and I kind of lost it. We were in the car and I launched into a "now see here" speech. I didn't know I felt how I did, but I found myself choking through a long list of reasons I was heartbroken to be going back into the medical system for a birth that was supposed to be my dream birth. I was half way through my pregnancy and every list and hope and picture that I'd been creating was being tossed into the trash. Of course I wanted to do what was best for my babies, but it was a massive mental and emotional transition to be going through.
Quinn got it. Of course he did. He always does.
And please don't get me wrong. We couldn't stop smiling, other than that 5 minute conversation. We were/are beside ourselves with the joy of this, and every time we see pics of Gavin as a baby we go "man, how are we gonna deal with TWICE that much sweetness and cuteness?"
The OB is an awesome guy... I think... we had our January prenatal with
him, and he ran the ultrasound machine to check H and A's growth. He was
kind and gentle and knowledgeable and was very careful to make it very
clear that our transition to his care could be gradual. He was fine with
me consulting with and seeing the midwives, as long as we saw him as
often as he needed to check on growth and placenta health.
So my midwives are who I go to for blood work, advice, concerns, etc. I probably talk to them way more than most their full-time clients do, but I'm sooo glad that I don't have to talk to a faceless nurse everytime I have an unexpected pain or deal with ridiculous amounts of dizziness.
And my OB is who is going to be doing a dozen more ultrasounds on my darlings and who will review every bit of bloodwork and who will be there to deliver our babies.
So our new care plan:
Continue talking to the midwives about everything under the sun that my body feels. (sorry, ladies.)
Count down to 35 weeks - any preterm labor before April 5th means driving to one of our local Labor and Delivery units and praying that our babies don't have to go through too much misery while their lungs continue to develop.
See Dr. B once in February for an ultrasound. (next week! I can't wait to peek at their faces again!)
Stop life at 32 weeks. Not entirely, but Quinn's pretty adamant that he wants me 90% off my feet at that point (which happens to fall on my birthday) so that we can be as careful about making it the last 3 needed weeks as we possibly can.
See Dr. B twice in March for ultrasounds.
See Dr. B every week in April for an ultrasound, and the midwives one or two times a week for heart tone checks.
Start natural induction methods (pretty much just herbal encouragement) at 37 weeks.
Use whatever (medical) induction means are needed before 39 weeks.
Have babies the last week of April! (week 38-39)
Induction before 40 weeks is because Dr. B feels strongly that, with a multiples pregnancy, the risk of one or both of the babies becoming malnourished (because my body can't keep up with their needs) outweighs the risk of low development around the 38 week mark.
Their growth is already delayed. That's not a bad thing with twins. At almost 20 weeks they were only a couple days behind, but at almost 24 weeks they were a little over a week behind in measurements. That's completely acceptable with twins, since growing at the rate of single babies could create way too much demand on mom's body and, honestly, there just isn't room.
I'm kind of anxious to see how far behind they will be at almost 28 weeks. I hope they're not losing too much ground, even if it is considered normal and acceptable.
So, how has it been?
It's been grueling. Honestly.
With Gavin I hit "feeling fantastic" at about 16 weeks and I felt amazing until 3 days before he was born. Sure there was round ligament pain, I had a bout with kidney stones, it was difficult to sleep, I had to pee all the time and at about 6.5 months I started getting migraines every evening that lasted for 6-8 weeks. But we camped and floated and shopped and I went to every event I could find and we traveled and I worked out several times a week...
The other day I was griping at my Mom that I kept expecting my "feeling fantastic" to hit, but it kept not hitting. She raised one eyebrow and said "honey, it hit at 16 weeks, lasted 5 days and left again."
And yeah. That was pretty much it.
I feel fine, I'm super happy and I'm enjoying all the quiet home time that I'm getting this time. Last week illustrates the difference, though, because poor Quinn was going crazy. He was lonely, tired of the house and... lonely. He kept trying to talk me into having people over, going out for double dates, crashing friends' houses to hang out, etc. Finally I was like "Look, YOU go hang out with so-and-so and I'll stay here and sleep!"
We are Di/Di wth separate placentas, which is the least
likely to have complications. So grateful!
So that's our new precedent. We go to church and I sit in a lawn chair in the basement while he and Gavin sit in service. He goes to hang with friends and I stay home. He goes out for coffee and a chat with a buddy and I make him drive through Krispy Kreme.
And up until 2 weeks ago I thought I was complication-free, but 2 weeks ago I had a scare that was either a UTI or a kidney stone. It resolved in 24 hours after 2 quarts of the pithiest, sourest cranberry juice I've ever had. (I literally just had a full body shudder just thinking about the stuff.) And then this past week has been constant glucose checks and a switch from eating every 3 hours to every 2, and adding more carbs and fats back into my diet to get higher calorie counts because I was having hypoglycemic crashes several times a day because these buggers are sapping every bit of energy and every calorie I consume. Thankfully, I don't have to set an alarm and eat every 2 hours during the night, but I am supposed to eat a couple bites every time I get up to use the bathroom.
*sigh*
I hate food.
Is anyone still reading? This is sooo muuuuch wordage. I apologize -- I'm just hoping to get everything caught up (blog, scrap books, baby books) before they get here...
Anyway, I was pretty convinced that I wanted the baby and Gavin to bunk together, but we had to re-examine that decision when we found out there were two of them. We're still sticking with that plan, even though we could turn the office into a nursery, because we really want Gavin to start sharing his room now.
So I'm going to be picking up different furniture entirely. A more compact toddler bed instead of Gavin's convertible crib, mini cribs instead of a full size crib, a closet makeover for more storage space and a hidey-hole for Gavin. Lingerie dressers for the twins instead of standard sized dressers, a chest of drawers instead of a dresser for Gavin, etc. I'm gonna paint neutral (gray and white, still debating whether or not to use some taupe as well) and let each child's belongings be the colorful splashes that the room will need.
The really overwhelming factor in all of this isn't the extended shopping list or the to-dos of redoing a bedroom. The really overwheming factor is that my energy comes in 10 minutes spurts that end with me panting on the couch. That said, I'm soooo glad I'm not on bedrest, and can still get little things done! Even if that just means a five minute bathroom scouring, or throwing together a "homemade" meal of canned sauce and pasta.
So. To conclude. I'll keep you all updated. Part 4 will be a birth story, and may not happen until May or June, so let this little compilation of clips solace you until then:
This entry is a bit on the boring side. It's the informative piece. The piece that says exactly what we did to combat our diagnosis, once we finally got a diagnosis. There will be more fun and storytelling in Part 3. I promise.
The nurse injected a large needle of something into my leg. She smiled and said "most doctors make their patients do this without a painkiller. I'm always grateful for Dr. B, 'cause he won't let us do it if you haven't had something to help."
It kind of took my breath away to hear her say that. I don't know what I was expecting, but I knew I hadn't expected it to require a needle full of pain killers. It was a "simple" procedure that was standard after the basics of progesterone blood draws and temperature charts and standard tests on Quinn. Everything so far had said we were ovulating, and with no other health complications there was no reason for us to be struggling to conceive, but here we were, 20-some cycles into our journey and they couldn't give us a reason why.
And so, we were there. I was under a massive x-ray machine thing, a radiologist, an OB, 3 nurses and my husband all in the room with me. It was cold. My OB prepped the biggest needle I have ever seen and after a couple seconds of very sharp pain he showed me the needle on the display screen for the machine. Then he started the dye injection. He emptied that syringe of dark blue dye quickly, needing enough pressure that it wouldn't just fill my uterus, but shoot through my falopian tubes and fill my ovaries. The purpose was two-fold: To check for any blockages, collapses or cysts, as well as to potential "blast clear" any of the said blockages or collapses.
It was probably the most physically miserable 3 minutes of my life.
After 4 hours of transition and pushing out Mr. G's 14.5" head with nothing but a muscle relaxant, that's kind of a big deal for me to say. If you're looking at a hysterosalpingogram
then make sure your doctor gives you a pain killer before he starts the procedure. You won't regret it.
But they found nothing. "Of course", he said, " If there was a collapse then we might not have seen it because the dye inflated it so quickly. Most people with unexplained infertility get pregnant within three cycles of this procedure, so if it didn't help, we'll know in three months."
20 minutes later I was sitting on the hood of our car in the hospital parking lot, my head in my hands, shaking like a leaf and trying not to throw up. The nausea and severe cramping were normal side effects. Nothing to worry about.
-----------------
6 months (and 8 cycles) later, Quinn had been re-tested but only because we didn't know what was next. If we were ovulating then the recommended fertility medication (chemical) shots wouldn't help. If Quinn was fine then there wasn't anything that would help him. Quinn had recently ordered another text book on fertility, as well as a package of LH strips so I could check LH levels.
And, frankly, the last test had jarred me enough that I wasn't sure I wanted to know what was next.
This would be the point when Quinn became the absolute hero of the story.
Why?
Because I gave up.
I was tired of crying. Tired of scheduling our marriage around graphs and charts. Tired of my piles of supplements and tired of being tired. Tired of calendars and thermometers and prayers and being told that there was nothing wrong with me, even though my body wouldn't do the one thing that a woman's body is supposed to be capable of doing, whether she's tall or short, strong or weak, and whether or not it's wanted.
But Quinn, being the research-aholic that he is, blasted through his text book and took over. He started sticking the thermometer in my mouth every morning when he got up (he's always been the early bird in the family) and keeping track of the charts. He started handing me my vitamins every day and he pushed me into talking to my midwife friend about where we were and what my symptoms were.
My sister in law had recommended several months before that I go gluten-free, since there were lots of links between gluten-sensitivity and unexplained infertility, and since Quinn was handling the emotional burden of the pills and charts, I decided I may as well cut wheat out of my diet. (My first cycle after going off gluten was 4 days longer than my cycles had been for the past 2 years, which was the first notable difference that ANY supplement or treatment we had tried had affected) About that time my midwife recommended a saliva test to check essential hormones ( < link is an affiliate link) that she could look at, and that we could use to start consultations with a hormone specialist if it showed up any abnormalities. We were in a somewhat tight spot, financially, but God put it on a friend's heart to offer to pay for half of the test for us, so we went for it.
And so in April of 2013, we got the test results back and they showed that all of my hormones were either truly elevated or borderline elevated. My midwife told me something I absolutely did not expect. Those results indicated PCOS. Especially the fact that both my testosterone AND estrogen were significantly elevated. And then there was the fact that my LH strips were almost useless because I could use them for 10 days straight and get a positive result every day. So I had elevated LH as well.
Now, PCOS isn't for early-20's girls who are well inside their healthy weight spectrum and who have super short cycles.
No, PCOS is typically symptomized first and foremost by cycles that go 2-3 months instead of 28-32 days. Doctors won't even test for PCOS of you don't fit a fairly standard set of symptoms:
Excess Weight
Excessively Long Cycles
Extra Body Hair
High Blood Pressure
PCOS wasn't me.
It couldn't be me.
And the dye test had shown that I didn't have any cysts. How could I be PCOS without any cysts?
Turns out that the PCOS disorder eventually causes cysts, but the actual disorder is a specific hormone imbalance, not a list of symptoms.
Inositol regulates the reception insulin. One of the main reasons for PCOS (as I understand it) is insulin resistance causing overproduction of hormones. That's why EVERYTHING gets elevated with PCOS. (Note, with a gluten sensitivity the body reads gluten as sugar, thereby creating even larger sugar spikes and causing the well-known gluten headaches. Not sure whether a breakdown in our insulin receptors causes the gluten sensitivity, or if the gluten sensitivity causes an overload on the receptors, but either way they are very closely tied together) Inositol is being studied in relation to PCOS all the time, and every study seems to be more promising than the last.
He was still regimenting my pills and temperatures, and I was using LH strips. Now he was making sure I had food every 3 hours as well, and dosing me with DCI (D-chiro inositol).
The DCI was brutal stuff. I thought I had the flu for the first 3 days I was on it before we realized that it was actually the DCI, so we switched to the Myo-inositol, which is a lot gentler. It also comes in a powder, so we were able to start with smaller doses and work our way up. We used it through June and July, accompanied by the diet changes, and had possible miscarriages both months. (one month was a faint positive at 24 days, but then a negative at 25 and obviously didn't maintain).
August is when we conceived, just 4.5 months after going off gluten and 3.5 months after fighting my invisible foe. It was 4.5 months of Quinn bringing me pills, sticking a thermometer in my mouth, charting the calendar, bringing me gluten-free take out at work, buying me gluten free snacks, and holding me night after night, telling me that we were so close. It seems like it was a daily ritual for him to point out all the specifics of how God had led those few months, and to recite the symptoms of progress that we were making.
He wouldn't let it rest.
And I'm so glad he didn't. Part 3 will be some of the differences between a twins pregnancy and a singleton pregnancy, why we switched care providers, and more of the story of how the last 2 months of gone. For now, I'm healthy and happy and 26 weeks along.
I posted the first week of August that we weren't pregnant, but we felt like we were making progress with my health.
Well, we were making progress with my health. (I'll cover HOW in a later part)
Fastforward a few weeks: Gavin's birthday was in August, and I went all out for our little family party. Streamers and helium balloons and the works. The night before his birthday I was up until midnight, finishing his mini-cake (since it was just the three of us) and touching up the decorations so that he would wake up to a perfect morning. But see, my little man was too old, and every time I was too busy to play with him I felt guilty because my body hadn't been able to produce a sibling for him, and every time I looked at how grown up he was I felt a gaping hole because both Quinn and I knew the joy of having siblings growing up with us, close to our age and always ready to enjoy anything with us. I've said before that I had wanted so badly to put him in a "big brother" onesie for his 1st birthday, and now here we were, on his third birthday, and I still couldn't say he was a big brother.
I stood in the kitchen and sobbed. I couldn't even stop. It was irrational, it was faithless, it was raw, but years and cycles and losses and lonely nights sitting on the bathroom floor not wanting Quinn to know I was falling apart AGAIN all came piling onto that moment of guilt because all I wanted for my darling boy was for him to not be alone in his room any more. For someone for him to teach and play with and take care of as only big brothers could do and that was something I couldn't give him.
Quinn heard me, or rather, heard that I suddenly wasn't bustling all over the house, and came to find me. He held me and he told me over and over that it wasn't my fault, that God would work it out in time, and that someday the hurt would go away.
The irony of that night to me is that as I was standing there weeping, my body was nurturing and growing the beautiful little cell that my wonderful Jesus was waiting to breathe a soul into. And while Jesus was catching all my tears and crying with me, He was waiting to bless me beyond what I could dream or imagine. Thinking of how He has planned each one of us, and knows us from that moment when He chooses to give us life, gives me the shivers. Every "unplanned" or "unwanted" baby was planned and wanted before their mothers knew they existed. They were loved with everlasting love from the moment that He made the choice to breathe into them a precious, eternal soul.
A couple weeks later, as we headed into the start of September, I was feeling thoroughly "buggy" and having daily nosebleeds. We spent a day at church and got in the car to head home and another nosebleed hit, so Quinn pulled into Walmart and made me go in for a pregnancy test. I wasn't "late", so it seemed silly to bother testing early, but I felt bad enough that I followed.
I got a two pack. Just in case.
And that night we got a very faint positive.
Yep. It was that faint. Look REALLY close for the second line...
You would think we would have been dancing and screaming after over 30 infertile cycles and at least two possible miscarriages, but we didn't. We kind of just sat around staring at it, trying to decide if it even counted as a positive line. I texted a picture of it to my midwife and asked her if it counted as a line. Her response was that it did, and that it was better than the line she had gotten a week before. (!!) That made me laugh, since she was the one helping me diagnose my hormone problems and she and I had had regular discussions about her testing and how she was doing as well.
The next morning I got a slightly better positive. Enough for us to start letting it sink in.
We spent the afternoon (it was Labor Day) out at my Mom's and managed to not say anything, since we hadn't decided how long we were going to wait to tell. We weren't even to the 4 week mark and only had a faint positive on a 5 day early test...
But we told. As soon as the younger siblings were all tucked into bed Quinn made me show my Mom a picture of the test. We knew that we needed prayer, if nothing else, and that my early symptoms meant my hormones were doing what they were supposed to: Going crazy.
Obviously we were all a little apprehensive, and my midwife had me get a blood draw on Tuesday morning to check hcg and progesterone levels to see if my body needed any boosting to maintain the pregnancy, but my numbers came back better than good and we passed the 30 day mark, which is as far as any of our possible miscarriages had ever made it, and we started to relax and rejoice and enjoy the idea of it.
But I was soooo sick.
At about 7 weeks (mid-late September) I was almost too sick to attend revival at our church, and Sunday morning I wanted so badly to stay home, but knew that people would start to wonder if I didn't make it, so we went ahead and announced/asked prayer, even though it was a special revival week and we had a lot of guests and a guest preacher. It was wonderful, though. The guest pastor (who I've known since I was 8 years old) had one of my brothers and my Dad come to the front with me and Quinn and the three of them prayed over us, that the Lord would bless and protect our pregnancy.
But....
I was sooooo sick.
Like, multiple times worse than with Gavin. I threw up every single day, had constant nosebleeds, was dizzy, couldn't sleep, had daily migraines that would make me throw up even more, etc. And the round ligament pain started at about 10 weeks, instead of mid-pregnancy. I felt like I had a hyperactive circus monkey the size of a peanut bouncing around at about 8-9 weeks. My midwives were continuing to monitor my hormones and had lots of advice and help to offer, but it was a long haul. We officially hired the midwives I work with as our birth team and started making a home birth plan. I couldn't wait. We had just had our fireplace resealed and I was looking forward to a springtime birth with a fire in the fireplace and a warm birth pool to labor in.
My first prenatal was at almost 15 weeks. I had put it off, since we were doing all the bloodwork and other care anyway. I felt big, and was still fairly sick, but had a few good hours every day. The appointment went well, we found a strong heartbeat and they measured my fundal height. Weird thing -- I was measuring at 20 weeks pregnant. We were so sure of our due date, though, so the midwife doing the appointment searched everywhere for a second heartbeat to check for twins, but couldn't find one. We figured it was extra amniotic fluid, or my body had been really weird and I was a month ahead. I had an ultrasound scheduled for a month later, so we settled into the Thanksgiving/Christmas prep chaos.
We talked about how fun it would be if we were a month further along than we thought. Looked back on our temperature charts and calendar and talked about that only being possible if I had miscarried a twin the month before and then my body just hadn't acknowledged the living one until later (is that even possible? I doubt it... but you try to quantify these things...) The idea of twins came up, since there are several twins on Quinn's side, but I didn't think there were any on my side, and a quick google search showed that a father cannot be the cause of his own twins.
So the week before Christmas hit and everyone was begging for us to tell the baby's gender right away, since we had waited until almost 20 weeks for our ultrasound, but I wanted to wait until Christmas and incorporate it into gifts. Why not, right??
We got to our appointment with Tammy and I climbed up on her table, chatting to Gavin about how he was gonna see an "x-ray" of our baby. I mentioned to her that I was measuring ahead, and if she noticed anything like excess amniotic fluid then I'd be really curious to know why.
Both heads -- measuring Baby Girl's Head with baby boy's head on the left
She did a quick scan over my tummy and quickly lifted the doppler.
Tammy: "This is your first ultrasound this pregnancy?"
Me: "Yep. That looked like a head and a tummy...?" (I had seen what my eyes had said was two heads, but if you've ever seen this view of an ultrasound, you'd know why I second guessed)
She looked at Quinn. "Good. You're sitting down."
She looked back at me. "No, sweetie, that was two heads. You're having twins."
I screamed. Or, I think it came out as more of a hoarse, high pitched, extended whine, because I couldn't breathe, but it felt like a scream. Quinn yelled a less politically correct version of "Heck yeah" and we high fived. I couldn't see from the tears in my eyes. Tammy was laughing and jumping up and down. She was just happy that we were so happy.
Jesus hadn't been waiting to breathe life into one little cell -- He had been waiting for two. Two separate sets of perfect DNA, two separate eggs. A boy and a girl. Both of them with every bone and chamber and structure exactly as it should be. The roller coaster of finding TWO OF THEM and then the sudden rush of concerns because twins have a much higher tendency for deformities, chromosomal disorders, etc, then watching her measure every bone and check fingers and toes and heart chambers and lungs and even look for cleft lips.... and seeing that there was nothing wrong. They were only 2 days different in size, too, so they were growing at the same rate, and only a couple days behind where they were supposed to be, so getting plenty of nutrition.
I suddenly couldn't wait to tell the "baby's gender". This was so much bigger than that. We texted friends and made sure that everybody who could be was going to be at Wednesday night service that night. We had talked about a little box with a colored balloon in it as an announcement, but now Quinn wanted to go big. We stopped at a shipping store for large boxes, a grocery store for helium balloons and I was so glad that I had extra wrapping paper and wide ribbon on hand. We went home and wrapped the two big boxes, each with a pink balloon and a blue balloon secured to the bottom, then met Quinn's mom to send one home with her to open with Quinn's little siblings and headed to church with the other and 6 boxes of Krispy Kremes.
For now, I'm sure you're tired of reading, and I'm tired of writing.
But coming up in the next part will be the change of care plans, new shopping lists, more round ligament pain, ridiculous amounts of protein and water, our naming process, Gavin talking about his brother and sister and so on. I'll also dive into some of the practical information on what we diagnosed and how we treated it to become pregnant and basic information on my disorder and why I wasn't immediately diagnosed by my OB.
