Tuesday, August 31, 2010

Nothing boring about 33 weeks

Today Garrett and I went for our 33 week checkup. (I get really excited about going to the doctor since it's the only time I am allowed our of the house and each week brings me closer to our 34 week mark) Our ultrasound showed that everything looked great. Baby A is still breech and very low! His feet are right next to Baby B's head. The past few days I have had a lot of pain when I try to walk, change positions on the couch, lift my legs to get up the stairs...just about everything other then be completely still causes pain. Seeing how low the boys are positioned explains why I have been so uncomfortable. Other then seeing Baby A kicking his brother in the head (won't be the last time), everything looked great! My exam was another story. The doctor found that I am dilated 1cm. She could also feel a foot belonging to Baby A! (Weird? Yes. Kinda gross? Yes. Freaked me out? Completely.) Since this is a big change from last week, I got my weekly shot and was sent off to the hospital...again. Garrett and I are at the hospital so often, the nurses remember us and know us by name. I got hooked up to all kinds of monitors, got my movement buzzer, and waited two hours for the doctor to check me again to see if I had dilated any further and was actually in labor. Luckily the babies were very active so the movement buzzer got a lot of use giving my something to do while Garrett channel surfed. After being checked again by the doctor (I was still only at 1cm and my contractions were not close enough) we were sent home! Never a dull moment these days!

Friday, August 27, 2010

No one is stressed at the Fuller house!

Yesterday we went for our first of our weekly Non- Stress Test. I got hooked up to three monitors: one for each heartbeat and one to count contractions. Heading over to the hospital Garrett and I were a little nervous. The last time we had a non-stress test, I didn't see the outside world for three days. Yesterday was different, everyone was willing to cooperate! The nurse found both heartbeats easily which is very hard with twins. By the time you get a good reading on one, the other one has moved or changed position. I had a Jeopardy like buzzer to click anytime I felt any movement. Ideally, each movement corresponds with an increase in heart rate. The first few minutes on the monitor it looked like the boys were napping so I was given some orange juice to drink and wake them up. After the orange juice they went nuts! Garrett couldn't believe how much they move after I eat or drink. (I've been telling him all along that they are Whitney babies- completely food driven) Half and hour went by and Garrett was getting a little restless so I put him in charge of the buzzer. He was beyond thrilled to click the button and see the mark show up on the chart printed out by the monitor. When our hour was up the on-call doctor came in and told us the babies look perfect, my contractions were far enough apart, and she will see us in a week. One more week closer to our 34 week mark!

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

41 weeks???

Ok, so I'm not really 41 weeks pregnant. (I would be a little more stressed it I was!) We went to our weekly checkup today, at 32 weeks, my belly of boys measures 41 weeks!!! I'm officially a house. Both Fuller boys are doing great. Baby A is still breech, which means automatic C-Section. Baby A (determined by which twin is positioned lower at the first measurement) decides what type of delivery we will have. I (and my doctor) would like to avoid a C-Section. No pressure Baby A. Now, in addition to being on strict bed rest and getting a progesterone shot every week, I am to start going to the hospital weekly for a non-stress test. The last time I had a non-stress test I didn't leave the hospital for three days. At least I get another day I am allowed to leave the house. Since there have been no changes (no babies are here yet) my doctor promised me that if I make it another two weeks (34 weeks) I will get limited activity back. If I can make it to 36 weeks after getting limited activity back I can have full activity!!! Once I get full activity back it won't be much longer until we meet these two!

Sunday, August 15, 2010

When I was pregnant with you...

Every mother has a list of things they had to give up or change in order to carry and raise children. (No? Not everyone does this? Must just be me.) When giving my mother any kind of grief, she would remind us of her C-Section scar due to my birth or her crusty rocking chairs from my sister wiping her nose on them. So I decided to keep a list of "when I was pregnant with you..." complaints to remind them of when they are older:

Giving up coffee- Like any good Lutheran, coffee is one of my favorite things and was my first sign I was pregnant. One morning my coffee tasted like lighter fluid and I knew something was up. I'll probably always associate coffee with being pregnant.

Not being able to eat cheese for 12 weeks- cheese really weirded me out in the beginning of my pregnancy.

Stretch marks- for 30 weeks I was able to avoid the evil stretch marks by buttering my belly with pure coco butter after every shower. One morning I woke up and it looked like I had slept with a tiger. Due to my shark belly white skin, they are not a normal color...they are Prince purple.

Out growing maternity tops- Maternity tops are SUPPOSED to last throughout an entire pregnancy. Due to Garrett and my ovaries being overachievers and creating twins...at almost 31 weeks, mine are no longer covering my rapidly expanding belly.

Missing my own baby shower- I can't wait to say, "well I missed my own baby shower because you two tried to come out early"

I'm sure in the next couple of weeks my list will keep growing. I can't wait to meet them so I can start rubbing in all that it took to carry twins.

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Baby Shower Weekend and 30 week checkup

Throughout my pregnancy I have been warned by our doctor that at some point I will most likely be on partial if not full bed rest. After all, I am only 5'3" and carrying A LOT of babies! So back in June I asked Garrett's mom to move the date of our baby shower from the end of August to an earlier date due to my fear of not going to my own shower. If only I knew then what I know now!

Garrett and I got home from the hospital Thursday afternoon. The day before my family (mom, dad, 3 sisters plus one boyfriend, god-mother, 2 cousins, and aunt and uncle) arrive in Michigan for our baby shower on Saturday. Garrett was in complete panic mode. Not only had we been in the hospital the past 3 days but not we have family on the way to see us and he's down a person (me) to help get the house ready. Luckily my family is more concerned with what our plans for dinner are and not if my TV has been dusted. Thank God.

My family arrives and we make a plan for the next day. Since I am now on complete bed rest due to pre-term labor, I can not go to my baby shower. My sister Mary is going to spend the day being my slave and Garrett will go to our shower (fake pregnancy belly and all) to host. Mary and I spent the day eating ice pops and watching bad TV. (She didn't mind missing the shower since she got to be in pajamas until 4pm) After the shower my family came back to our house to open some gift. We have extremely generous family and friends! These boys are already spoiled. Garrett and I are very lucky. We are so glad that so many members of my family made the trip out to see us for the weekend.

The rest of the weekend included the following events: me on the couch, my mom organizing everything, Mary trying to make Jack love her, a White Castle crave case, a trip to the Henry Ford Museum (for everyone but me and mom), washing onesies, "Stroh-isms", and more eating. It was a great weekend. We hated to see everyone leave! The next time they see us we will have 2 boys!

Tuesday morning we had our 30 week checkup. Everything went great! The boys weigh 3.7 and 3.9 pounds! That's a lot of baby I'm carrying! The doctor said feeling contractions is normal as long as they are not time-able or any more painful. I am on total bed rest. Only standing to shower, and get to the bathroom. The rest of my time is laying on either side or sitting at a 45 degree angle to relieve pressure from Baby A who is already sitting extremely low. The good news is that once we reach the 34 week mark I am going to get some activity back. After 34 weeks the boy's lungs will be developed and they are out of the "danger zone" for delivery. Any time after 34 weeks is bonus time. The babies will require less time in the NICU and most likely go home when we do if we can make it to at least 35-36 weeks. One week down, 4 to go!

Wednesday, August 11, 2010

29 week checkup + 36 hour hospital stay = complete bed rest unil 34 weeks

Last Tuesday started out completely normal. Garrett and I got up, got ready and headed off to our weekly appointment to get a peek at these boys. The ultra sound went great. Both boys were moving around and weigh just under 3 pounds!. Baby A sits very very low. So low that when I go from seated to walking it's extremely painful. During my exam with the doctor, he noticed that my cervix was softer then it should be at this point and he could feel a lot of pressure from Baby A's head. (Gross, I know). He suggested that Garrett and I "stop by" labor and delivery on our way home to make sure I was not having any contractions. So Garrett and I made our next appointment and headed off to the hospital.

We get to the hospital, check in, and I'm hooked up to three monitors. One to see if I'm having contractions, and one for each baby's heartbeat. After over an hour, the nurse came in to read the charts and teach Garrett what each monitor was doing. Garrett and I had some lunch, watched some TV and waited. The nurse came in again, read the charts and left to get the on call doctor. She came in 45 mins later, looked over everything that the monitor had picked up over the past 3 HOURS (!!!). She asked if I had been feeling anything. I said no, nothing but normal movement. The doctor let us know that I would have to be admitted overnight because even though I was not feeling them, I had been having contractions 4 minutes apart for about 45 minutes! She said that this is common in twin pregnancy. Even though the babies have not reached full term my uterus has. My body decided it was done being pregnant before the babies were ready so now we had to stop my body from contracting. The nurse came back in, hooked me up to an IV and took me up to my room for the night.

Garrett and I get settled into our room and the nurse explains everything that is going to happen. I am going to be hooked up to two IVs, one for fluids and one of magnesium sulfate, a drug used to slow contractions. For the next 24 hours I will be hooked up to the magnesium sulfate and I will get two steroid shots (24 hours apart) to help mature the boy's lungs in case they insist on coming early. Since all of this is being started after 4pm, we probably will not be released from the hospital until Thursday morning! Garrett headed home to pick up a few things and bring Jack over to his mom to watch while I settled in and try to relax.

The first night at the hospital was horrible, for me, Garrett slept just fine through the night. The magnesium made my legs extremely hot so getting comfortable enough to sleep was out of the question. Every hour a nurse was in our room to check my monitors and unplug me so I could use the bathroom. It was quite the project. As if being woken every hour wasn't bad enough, they had to take blood every 3 hours to make sure the levels of magnesium we not getting too high in my system. It was a rough night.

We spent all day Wednesday in the hospital watching movies and watching my monitors. We had an appointment with the high risk Doctor at the hospital. Both babies looked great so he didn't show any concern. I was still not feeling every contractions but I could watch the numbers on the monitor go up so I knew I was still having them. The contractions had slowed down overnight so they lowered my dosage of magnesium to get me ready to be taken off of it completely. We still had to spend another night in the hospital so I could get my second steroid shot.

Thursday morning I was taken off of all my IVs. I was still having contractions, but they were hours apart and no more painful then before. Since the babies showed no stress during this and showed no sign of making an early arrival we were able to go home at noon. I could not wait to get the IV, get home and sleep. Our doctor was on call that morning so he gave us all our instructions before we left. Until I reach 34 weeks I am on complete bed rest. I can move from bed to couch to bathroom. That's it. I am only allowed to sit upright while eating. I can take a cold shower once a day but my time standing during the entire day can equal no more then 2 hours. Every week from during my doctor appointments (the only time I am allowed to leave the house) I get a progesterone shot to remind my body that it had to stay pregnant a little longer.

This is going to be a long four weeks...