Thursday, May 26, 2011

31 Week Update

The doctor did an ultrasound to get a clear idea of Baby’s position last week. While most babies would still have plenty of time to move into birthing position, babies in a bicornuate uterus are most likely in their final position by this point. Oddly enough, BabyGirl had moved! All of a sudden, I’d noticed that her kicks were not where they were previously. I kept telling Justin (lucky dog) that I had crazy pressure on my pelvis and bladder. Maybe (maybe? MAYBE?!) she was head down? I don’t know. Quite frankly, it was a total mystery by the time we got to the ultrasound.

Well, it took exactly one second of ultrasound for the doctor to say, “breech!” Unlike Amelia, who was technically ‘transverse’ (read: completely sideways), this baby did in fact move from her previous position but not necessarily to the right position. ha. Well, she tried! She’s in the ‘frank breech’ position, which is the classic, butt-down breech position. You know, like this

 

She’s not quite as folded up as this picture indicates because her head is off to the side, under my right rib and her feet then are over on the left between my hips and ribs. So her body goes from my rib down to my pelvis and the legs go up to the other side. This is much different than Amelia, who stretched across my ribs from head to butt.

What does it mean?

It’s good news and bad news. The bad news is that if she stays where she is now, she will be undeliverable vaginally and require surgery. In fact, we’ve already schedule the surgery for 38 weeks just in case I make it that far. It’s bad news because breech babies have their own complications, most specifically with hip development. There’s some good news too! First, so far, I actually think Baby’s position is more comfortable than Amelia’s was. I’m not really wide across, so Amelia’s little body stretching across my ribs was horribly painful in the end. Beyond uncomfortable, I cried just from sheer pain in the last weeks with A. This baby is not in the right position, but at least still lying up and down rather than side to side. We are supposed  to carry our babies lengthwise because we are longer than we are wide. So that’s good. And since she’s moved to this current position, the deep bruise I had in my uterus and side from her heels pressing me is getting a lot better. Yeah, that sucked. My big discomfort with this position is that she is literally sitting on my pelvic area and bladder. I am quite certain that I am going to piss myself at some point before this is over and/or my crotch is going to BREAK under the weight. (seriously, how do they cast a broken crotch?) Back to the good news.  Another really good thing about this position—as opposed to Amelia’s—is that if her butt stays down, labor is potentially a lot less dangerous than it was the first time. Her bottom would prevent tiny parts and/or the umbilical cord from coming out in the event of cervical dilation. Little parts and cord coming out are crazy dangerous and with a quick labor, add a level of panicked rush to get to the hospital that was seriously stressing me out. We’d need to get to the hospital pretty quick regardless if I were in labor, but not in the same way as we would if the baby was feet down. That is more like call-an-ambulance kind of hurry than I’d prefer. Call me crazy.


So that’s that for now. We have a scheduled c-section with the anticipation of going into labor prior to that date. Doesn’t labor plus surgery sound awesome? ha. This time, I am determined to control as much of the experience as possible. I am going to meet with an anesthesiologist in advance and talk about the terrible reaction I had to the meds last time.  It was definitely not typical and what made Amelia’s birth very emotionally difficult for me. Oh and physically too since I threw up for hours and hours violently. If the baby arrives safely, is healthy, AND I can manage to hold/feed her as soon as possible after birth, I will consider it a success. Again, call me crazy.

 

There’s the news for now. Everything else is right on target. Babygirl is measuring perfectly, my blood work is okay—anemic but not diabetic, and my blood pressure was already lower after only 2 hours of summer under my belt. ha. In all fairness, my BP is always pretty low, but it had gone up considerably while I was dealing with some stressful work stuff the week before finals. I think it was 118/60-something. Then the following week, two hours after finishing finals, it was down to 98/60 something. Things are going so well that the doc took me off the once-a-week visit schedule to two weeks between visits.


My only job from here is to stay pregnant!

2 comments:

Monica said...

Is it wrong that this post sounds both terrifying and exciting at the same time?

Gena said...

That's pretty much how I feel too! But I am pretty sure that's how we all feel headed towards birth no matter the situation. There are no easy ways out unfortunately and then you've got this whole new person in your life. So you have immense highs and lows all at once. Eek.