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Tuesday, January 27, 2009

22 Week OB Appt

We had a regular appointment with Dr. Madonia today and everything looked great. My BP was a little low I think at 104/61 but I guess not low enough for him to be worried. I had gained 7 pounds which just totally freaks me out. When I mentioned it to him he laughed at me b/c I told him that I had been eating Oreo Cake. He was of course not worried about the weight gain, he seldoms worries about those things! I get to do the blood sugar test at my next appointment and that stuff is SO gross!! I asked when I would get another ultrasound and he said that I could have one whenever they could get one scheduled.

The good part about being in tight with the girls that work there is that there was an 11am appt that I had 5min to get into! We got to see Kallie again and confirmed that it is still a girl! She is measuring at 23 weeks which is a little ahead and weighs 1lb 4oz. I figured out why the movements seemed so high and its b/c she is head down and her legs are up high. All of her organs looked great, her heart looked perfect as did her spine.

The only problem is that she has a 2 Vessel Cord, which means that in normal pregnancies there are two arteries and one vein and Kallie only has one of each.
Here is an explanation and details I found online:
A two-vessel cord identifies one artery and one vein, rather than 2 arteries and 1 vein, the expected 3-vessel cord. This variation is found in less than 1% of single babies and may be higher when there are twins. Most children, at least 70%, are normal. The problem with our statistics is that the reports of two vessel cords are more likely to be in association is an abnormal pregnancy: what we call, a bias of ascertainment.A two vessel cord can be associated with a variety of organ-system and chromosomal abnormalities: the reassuring news for you is that all the organ systems are normally formed.A two vessel cord can be associated with impaired growth as the pregnancy progresses: this is monitored by serial ultrasound studies to document the size/weight of the baby and biophysical profile (combines ultrasound measures with fetal heart rate patterns)to assure baby health.
The normal fetal heart rate is 120 to 160 bpm. Your heart rate and mine also vary over a wide range depending on our activity, sleep/wake, food intake, hormone surges; the same thing happens with babies.

Based on the fact that all of Kallie's organs look great, Dr Madonia was not concerned. He called me and said that what they typically look for is kidney issues and hers are perfect and functioning exactly right. He said that before ultrasound was so sophisticated they would have no idea the baby had a 2 Vessel Cord so when they would deliver and baby and discover that they would check their kidneys. I asked about the low birth weight and he said that it can cause that so we would have more ultrasounds to measure her weight gain and watch her closely.

I have also read that it can cause the babies to stop growing and in that case they will deliver the baby early. From what I have read most babies are normal unless there is some other genetic issue or its a problem with the organs which we know Kallie does not have. Before the tech told me about the cord I asked her if this was the scan where we would find out about any major organ issues and she said yes, that everything looked perfect and she was doing great. She also checked for a cleft pallete and that was normal as well.

It really worries me simply b/c there is something not right with her and that's alarming. However, it doesn't seem to be a major issue and one that is probably going to amount to nothing but a whole lot of worry!
So I have talked to a few girls on Fertility Friend who have said that they were diagnosed with the same condition and they all have healthy babies that had no problems. One girl did say that she delivered early and that her son had some minor kidney problems, and that his kidneys looked good on ultrasound but he has done just fine. She said that there is no way for them to know if the kidney problems and early delivery were an affect of the 2 Vessel Cord or something else. All in all, everyone has said that their children turned out just fine, they had some extra monitoring but that was all reassuring. So I feel better about it now!

Here are some pictures of our precious baby girl:



She is swallowing in this picture and you can see her tongue.


Her long skinny foot, like Kennedy Jane and me!


Its a GIRL!





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