9w5d - Released to OB, sorta...

Friday was supposed to be my last RE appointment. In the morning I did the bloodwork and then we had our ultrasound. Our little ones are doing so wonderful! They're growing and their little hearts are perfect!

Here's baby A, who was all curled up. My husband swears that he saw this one snuggle up more while my RE was taking the picture, but my RE didn't point it out, so he can't be sure. Baby A's heartbeat was up to 183bpm, which my RE labeled as perfect for 9-10 weeks. :)

Here is baby B. :) I didn't expect to really see them moving this soon but right after my RE took the picture and got their heartrate (181, yay!) he went back to pointing out the head, body, arm and leg buds and that little one shook it's butt at us! It was the cutest thing. Then it wiggled it's butt again and then shook it's head back and forth like it was dancing! I absolutely can't wait to see them again now!

The only sorta bad thing that came up was that my RE called me in the afternoon and told me that he had just finished dictating a letter to my OB and MFM but that he wanted me to come back in on Monday to have my blood redrawn. Apparently, my hCG (beta) dropped from 50k+ to 41-42k between 8w5d and 9w5d. He wasn't really concerned since the babies are both doing so well and it's normal for your hCG level to peak then decrease throughout the rest of your pregnancy. He said normally that doesn't start happening until 9-10 weeks, but I might have just started a little early.

Right when I hit 9 weeks, my morning sickness that had been all day, every day calmed down to just 3-4 times a day. I started getting massive headaches and being even more exhausted than normal as well. Of course, I Googled and found several stories of this same thing happening and these women going on to have babies, so I'm not too concerned. I'm just hoping tomorrow brings good news, just as I'm hoping Tuesday (first OB appt) and Thursday (first MFM appt) bring good news too. :)

They caught up!!!

Yay!!! We're so, so excited that our two little ones had a nice little growth spurt for us and have basically caught up! :) Last week, they were measuring a week behind (6w5d at 7w5d) so we were just hoping that they didn't fall anymore behind than those 7 days. We were in for a shock!

Baby A is now measuring 8w1d with a heartrate of 158bpm. He/she was hiding up in a corner and not cooperating for a good picture this week. :)

Baby B is measuring 8w2d with a heartrate of 167bpm. We got a great picture of him/her and if you look closely, the little line that comes down from the baby is a hand! We totally melted. :)

And here is their first picture together! We've been able to get their sacs in the same picture, but this is the first one where we've gotten both of the babies together. We're so in love!

Last RE appointment is Friday the 28th and first OB appointment is Tuesday, September 1st!

Started weaning off PIO tonight!

This is a pretty pointless post, but I'm so happy to start weaning off the PIO! I've been doing 1cc of PIO every night plus my Lovenox shots. Tonight I got to reduce it down to .5cc which I'll take for a week and then be done with PIO! Yay for only one shot a night starting next Wednesday!

Next ultrasound is on Friday at 8w5d. Here's hoping that these little ones are still growing strong and healthy and want to show off for us!

7w5d u/s - The Big Test

I call it the big test because this was an unplanned ultrasound. I normally go on the first day of each week (6w1d, 7w1d, etc.) but at my 7w1d appointment, my RE didn't see any growth or a heartrate increase. He told me it could just be early technology and that I should come back today at 7w5d to be checked again by him.

I have morning (read: ALL DAY) sickness anyways. It's pretty bad and I have it pretty much all the time. This morning I seriously thought I was going to toss my cookies a few times. Before we left, in the car, walking up to the office, in the room. It was awful. I try not to stress, but we've lost twins before. I can not lose these babies. I just can't.

My RE told us that he wanted to see appropriate growth between Monday and today. That was his main concern, not necessarily how I'm measuring week/day wise because I very well could have had late implanters or they could just be a little slow and pick up later on.

The good news: both babies are now measuring 6w5d, up from 6w2d on Monday. Both babies heartbeats went up too from 100 and 109 to 118 and 115. :) We could actually hear their heartbeats today which we haven't been able to up to this point, it just sounded like static. My RE was pleased with the progress and said that while we aren't out of the woods obviously since we aren't holding a baby right now (he's very adamant that being "safe" or "successful" is holding a live baby) he thinks that we're making really good progress and he's happy with how well we're doing.

I'm also being watched extra carefully now. Normally at my clinic, you're released at 8 weeks to your OB. In my case, my RE said that he's going to watch me until 9-10 weeks. He doesn't want to let me go until he's extremely confident that I have a sustainable pregnancy and he's done everything he can. Once I'm released I'll be sent to my OB (who may refer me to a high risk OB or perinatologist) and also monitored by my Maternal Fetal Medicine practice. I'm confident that I'm in good hands, but I'm going to miss the weekly ultrasounds. They're comforting.

Thank you everyone that prayed for us and kept us and our babies in your thoughts. I was never really a religious person, but my husband and I have prayed every night for these babies. We have always said, we didn't care what we had to do, we will do anything in our power to try to have at least one healthy, live child in our arms. If someone out there has been listening to us and sparing us another heartache, thank you.

Please pray/keep our babies in your thoughts

We went in today for our 7w1d ultrasound and my RE measured the babies at 6w2d with heartbeats of 100 and 109. Obviously this is similar to last week although the actual babies looked completely different and much bigger and more defined to both my husband and myself.

We're hoping that we're just victims of technology and that there was just some bad measuring last week to this week and that when we go back on Friday we have some growth from today. My RE is looking to see mostly a growth spurt between today and Friday to confirm that it's just measuring too early and the difference in two different doctors measuring.

Please keep these little ones in your thoughts and prayers so that on Friday I have some great news to pass along and this little scare is the only one we have this pregnancy. I can not fathom losing these twins too.

6w1d Ultrasound

Baby A: 105bpm, measuring 6w1d

Baby B: 96bpm, measuring 6w4d

We are so overjoyed and so cautiously happy! This is such a dramatic difference than last time and gives us hope that these will be our strong, healthy, live babies!

(u/s pictures to come later)