More of the Story

Continued…
Okay, now where was I… Well, we found out we’re having triplets and started telling our family and friends.

On May 7th we had our first doctor appointment over in Peoria with the specialists. They started with another sono. It was awesome to see the babies moving around in there. They were bouncing and kicking. One of them was even sucking his/her thumb. Another one looked like he/she was kicking his/her brother/sister in the head (and so it begins!).

After she took a number of photos of the babies, Dr. Leonardi came in and looked at the sonos. They started talking in soft voices saying a lot of medical techno jargon. They finally said everything was looking good and that he’d talk to us shortly after the sono was over. We asked if they could video tape the sono and she said yes. We’ll definitely bring a tape with us next time!

They moved us to a little conference room and we waited to talk with the doctor. He came in and said the babies looked good. He also said that two of them are identical twins! They were able to tell because they are sharing a placenta. More medical jargon – Monochorionic Diamniotic Twins. Basically, they have their own amniotic sacs but they share the placenta. (After doing some internet research, it sounds like approximately 70% of identical twins are in this category). He spent the next 15 minutes or so scaring the crap out of us with all the possible bad things that could happen. In the end, he said the best bet is to be cautious and take a look at the babies often. He suggested sonos every two weeks, especially after 16 weeks and then every 3 weeks beginning around 24-26 weeks. Also, no more travel after 16 weeks and no more going to work at 20. He also suggested I pack my hospital bag early and bring it with me from now on to all of my doctor appointments – just in case.

Unless you’re pregnant or recently been pregnant or have a friend that’s pregnant, the weeks thing is just strange. In a typical pregnancy, they mark 40 weeks from the beginning of your last period to the due date of the baby. 20 weeks would be half way through. That’s about 5 months of bed rest for me (assuming we go full term). Whatever is best for the babies… that’s what I keep telling myself! Tons of scary information from the doctor, but the part we keep hanging on to is that the babies are all growing well and have healthy heart rates. The rest is a wait and see thing.
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Well, we’re down to 2 months that I can still go out and get prepared for the babies. We sat down and tried to figure out how much we can get done in that short period of time. We started looking for a new vehicle (because I don’t think we can fit 3 car seats in Adam’s 2 door Mitsubishi Eclipse – heck, I’m not sure we can fit them in my Camry either!). Unfortunately, the sports car has to go and get replaced with a mini-van! We also started our baby gift registries. The first stop was Target here in town. Our Target isn’t very big, but it gave us some initial ideas. Adam enjoyed using the scanner to select items. And use it we did… almost everything – quantity = 3!

May 19th, Mom, Brandon and I went up to Chicago to see Wicked (The Darnells also joined us at the play. Such an awesome show – I highly recommend it!!!). Before the play, we stopped at the Babies ‘R’ Us in Schaumburg. They have a huge store with tons of options and things you’d never think about needing. While we were there, mom and Brandon befriended a couple that had twins and highly recommended the Graco Duo-Glider stroller. It was nice to see someone using it with two carriers in it. We had been looking at the stroller in the store, but we weren’t sure it would fit two infants. It does!

Adam and I also went down to the Decatur Target to look at their baby selection. Much more than the Bloomington store, so we loaded up the registry even more. It’s hard to pick neutral colors when we don’t know if they’re all boys, all girls or a mix. I’m not big on pink anyway, so most of the colors are more blues and greens and yellows. Jennifer K. and I also checked out the Peoria and Springfield stores. After all that, and some additional online validation and research, I think I’m confident in saying all that is done! On to the next task…

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May 21st/23rd – Our doctor appointment in Bloomington with Dr. Dudley went well. We saw her on Monday for a routine check-up. It was the first time we were going to listen to the heart beats (although the machine in Peoria picked them up at our last sono). At this point in the pregnancy, they typically use a little microphone machine to pick up the heart beats. She could easily find mine, and then a baby’s. The differences between the two are drastic. My heart rate is probably around 70 and the baby’s was about 148! Problem was, she couldn’t tell if she was getting different babies or the same baby as she moved the microphone around. Ended up, she sent us in to get a sono. All the heart rates were good (and about the same). We came back on Wednesday to get the official measurement sonos. Again, everyone looked good, measuring in at 15 weeks. They were each .3 pounds. But, they seemed to be a bit shy because they didn’t want us to know if they were boys or girls. Guess it’s a good thing we’re getting so many sonos. Maybe eventually we’ll find out the sexes!

Okay, well that’s all for tonight. I’ll post more tomorrow (hopefully). I have updates about our first baby shower, painting the room, another doctor appointment (and the sexes of the babies) and our first crib building! Check back soon for more updates!

Baby Blog – Part 1 – The Beginning

They say change is good for the soul, that it’s inevitable, a part of life, right? Well, that is definitely true in our case! Sorry this first entry is long, but it’s been a busy couple of months (and I’ve been too lazy to start). Anyway… here goes the beginning of our story…

Back in early March, Adam and I found out we were pregnant – great news! We decided to share our news with our parents and siblings while we were in Jamaica (in April). May not have been the most direct method, but how often do you get a postcard from Jamaica announcing a new grandchild? Now our parents can say they have! I may have been a little vague with the wording, and didn’t mention when we were due, but the picture was much better than any words.

I had been having morning sickness off and on for about a month. The sickness was better while we were in Jamaica, but traveling on the Jamaican roadways was horrible. I usually don’t get car sick, but I definitely did down there! The 1 ½ hour trip to the airport was especially rough. Thankfully, I wasn’t the only one in the van that needed to pull over!

The Monday after our trip, we had our first doctor appointment and sonogram. I still wasn’t feeling very good, probably dehydrated (yes Adam, you told me to drink more water). I was also extra emotional, which seemed to be the trend in the mornings. We met with Dr. Dudley and she began the sonogram. She found the baby and a good heartbeat. Good sign! Then she found a second baby. Did I mention I was already emotional? I started crying. Adam was much better and very excited. Again, everything looked great and a good heartbeat. She sent us back to the sono tech to get some better measurements of the twins. The initial machine is good for quick looks but not as advanced as their other machine.

We got back to the other room and Amy started taking measurements. She was excited because they were testing out a new machine and it has a software package to specifically measure twins. Since they hadn’t had the opportunity to use it, she was more than happy to try it out. She began taking measurements, and taking more measurements, and more measurements, and more... you get my point. Adam was sitting where he could see the screen, but I couldn’t see anything of what she was doing. FINALLY, she turned the screen and started showing us the babies. She showed us baby A, pointed out the head, heartbeat, etc – all good. Then she showed us baby B noting that with multiples they each get their own alpha notation. And then she showed us baby C. Yeah, that makes three. Again, I started bawling. And again, Adam did much better! Amy mentioned that she didn’t tell us earlier because she needed me to lay still so she could get the measurements. It seems when I bawl, I shake too much.

Okay, so that’s it… Three babies. Needless to say we were shocked and excited and happy and all that. But basically, shocked. I know I had more questions for Dr. Dudley, but they all left my head when I heard 3 babies. Because of the higher risk, they set us up with an appointment over in Peoria with Maternal-Fetal specialists. And so begins our many doctor appointments.

I called in sick that Monday. I really was sick (I came home and slept all afternoon). The next question (besides, how are we going to do this?): How do we tell our families and friends?! It’s not something you just pick up the phone and say – Hey mom and dad, we’re having a litter. Thankfully, that Friday was Mom’s birthday so we would already be going to Decatur. Done, we’ll tell them in person then. Also, I was singing with the VillageAires, a choir in Minonk. We had practice on Thursday so Adam decided to come up with me, have dinner with his folks, and announce our new news. He started by showing them pictures, announcing baby A, and then baby B, and then baby C. It’s amazing the interesting looks on a person's face as it dawns on them we mean there are really three babies in there. They were, of course, excited and surprised. Judy mentioned that she’d been lighting candles and saying prayers that we’d have another baby. Seems she lit a LOT of candles :)

Okay, one announcement down, one to go. Friday was mom’s birthday, her 50th to be exact. I figured this was a one time opportunity to see her reaction to our news. I called Brandon and asked him to tape mom’s reaction when we gave her our birthday gift. He of course wanted to know what it was, but I was evil and didn’t tell him. He tried to guess and one guess was close (a sono picture with twins). Still evil, I simply said he’d have to wait. So, I took our sono pics and printed them out and put them in a frame. (Check out dad’s blog spot to see the final product.) We walked into the restaurant and immediately gave mom her gift and said open it. Brandon started rolling tape. The footage is priceless. Check it out.

So, mom announced it to everyone else in the room and to everyone as they came in and to some people on the phone if they couldn’t make it. I have a big family, but news travels fast!

Okay, I’m going to have to finish this later, but at least I got ya started on our story. I’ll post more soon (I promise) with the rest of the story up to the present. Stay tuned… there’s more to come!