Second trimester

Today, according to my phone app, I'm starting the second trimester! No more bleeding since last tuesday and I have listened a couple of times to Phoenix heartbeat so all seems good.
This is a long weekend here (monday is holiday), we bought Oliver a winter coat (it's freezing!) and we'll be going to a Halloween party at some friends' tomorrow. We'll also start sharing the news with friends and I think I'm starting to show a bit (still no belly pic taken, but it'll happen soon).

Clock is going back tonight which means from tomorrow it'll be dark really soon here and it'll be time for hot chocolate...yummy! I love this time of the year, in fact I think I love all seasons, but Autumn is just different. The red leaves, the darkness, the chill in the air and the occasional fog...it is magic!

The reason why

I had a very long day yesterday, we had an event in college which I had to attend and I was on my feet for hours. I went to the toilet and had a gush of blood. Oh for God's sake... couldn't leave, had to wait for about an hour till the event was over. I went to the toilet another couple of times and no more blood. 

When I finally got home at about 9pm I had made up my mind that I was going to get checked out. This was no longer spotting. Of course I also used the doppler to see if Phoenix was still with us and thankfully I found very quickly a nice HB. Mike called me a taxi and off I went. I suppose this is one of those situations when not having any support is a bit of a problem, but we managed. I got to the hospital just after 10, the taxi driver was a lovely man with 5 children of his own and was very reassuring. I checked in and was told it was going to be about an hour as there were a few people ahead of me. Ah well, that's no biggie (read: I know the baby is alive!). But I was actually seen at about 1.30 am!! The doctor on the floor was called twice for two emergency c-sections...anyway, she was lovely, gave a scan which showed a healthy sleeping Phoenix with a perfect HB and nothing wrong at all, no SCH, no bleeding, nice placenta etc. She then suggested to have a look at the cervix to see if there was something obvious (my paranoia was of course that all the coughing had shortened the cervix, causing the bleeding), and there was!! It is called ectropion and it's a common occurrence in pregnancy. Practically a bit of the uterine lining start covering the cervical canal and appears through the cervix. This easily bleeds. Totally benign and nothing to worry about. I want to thank my ciber friend Gen who kept me company via Whatsapp during the wait and got me thinking I also wanted to eat fish! I got home and in bed at 3.45 am. Needless to say when the alarm went off before 7 I thought I had just closed my eyes...so today and tomorrow I'm taking it easy!

13w2d, awful cough and welcome back spotting (not!)

It must be over two weeks I have this awful cough. It doesn't bother me at night at all, and mostly not during the day, but I get these fits mid morning which are terrible! It's chesty and scratchy and unmaskable. I obviously forgot to tell the OB last monday, so I never took anything. But last tuesday I decided to the to a chemist which was handy (not my usual one) and the guy says that a particular syrup which I had at home was suitable for pregnancy. So off I went and since tuesday I started taking this med once a day (not 3). Till on friday I decided to consult Dr. Google to see if it was true. It wasn't. Panic. Ok, I started saying to myself that I didn't take that much after all and that I'll just kill that pharmacist who obviously doesn't know his job. On saturday I called my chemist and asked her opinion. She would not have recommended it. So I went back to the moron-chemist and after a brief intro to make sure he remembered me from last tuesday, I asked him if he was sure about the safety of carbocisteine (the active molecule in the drug) in pregnancy, because my doctor (Google) told me to stop it immediately. he was adamant it was safe, but of course to stop it if I was told so, he even checked a book which apparently confirmed his opinion. Anyway, I can't undo what I have done and just have to hope for the best. Since last thursday we have been able to pick up the HB on the home doppler, and it was still there on saturday which was quite reassuring.
I don't know if it's the cough or what by my spotting is back. He comes visiting about once a week since last week, not much at all, mostly brown streaks in between the usual mucus or just a brown tinge. I'm starting thinking it's my cervix and that's it. Annoying though, VERY annoying. Mostly because yo don't know if it's going to stay like that or become a full flow at some point. I just have to hope for the best.

In other news, I have been awarded among other 30 bloggers for a fertility advice award! Apparently I'm an authority in the field!

The OB meets Phoenix

I had the most reassuring visit with the OB today. Dr. Wonderful was as lovely as I remembered. We had the usual chit chat on my history but he had all my files on the previous pregnancy and from the hospital so it was quick. Then I showed him our NT results, he thought they were actually quite good. He said the major factor in the risk calculation is still given by my age (more than the NT measurements and the bloods), so it would have been impossible to have stats as good as with Oliver. He thinks that for my age our numbers are good but still wrote down the risk and made a note for the 20 weeks scan. I mentioned before he is a experienced ultrasound operator, he scanned a cyber friend of mine from a local board to rule out her foetus for retinoblastoma, this is something so difficult to do in utero, actually people travel from afar to have his opinion. He said T13 can definitely be diagnosed by ultrasound, T18 is very likely to have markers also (even though not always) and T21 occasionally can be diagnosed in utero but not so often. I asked him if he would recommend an amnio. He said he personally wouldn't but it's our decision. In his opinion our numbers are good and much better than the chance of miscarriage the amnio has. Is it worth it? So I trust him and we'll wait and see. I mentioned my concerns about the low PAPP-A, once again he was so knowledgeable I felt really reassured. Again he made a note of it for closer monitoring on baby's growth, but said the association between low PAPP-A and issues is quite minimal, maybe a 5% of pregnancy with low PAPP-A has then some problems but most of the pregnancies are absolutely fine. Then he gave me a quick scan and Phoenix looked bigger and we listen briefly to the HB which sounded strong and regular. Dr. W commented also on how thin the nuchal fold looked and how everything looked perfectly normal and healthy. I also got my bloods done already, so the results will be there for the next time.
My next apt is in 5 weeks, I have re-read my blog posts on how poorly I coped with the waiting the last time, somehow I hope this time I'll be better! I also already have the doppler at home so in a week or so I'll give it a go to reassure myself!
I have not said anything in work yet, may just wait another couple of weeks to be out of the first trimester before sharing. Also, I have not taken one single belly shot yet...not good! Poor Phoenix, already been treated differently!

NT scan and other updates

I have to say much to my surprise, this pregnancy seems to be flying. Which is a good thing in my eyes.
So Oliver and I came back late on Sunday night, very very tired (both of us) and thankfully we both had a good night sleep. Sleeping at my parents' is still a challenge. A huge one. I think on saturday night Oliver woke up at 4.15 and it was up and down till about 5.30. Down for a bit till 8.00 when he was up for the day. Thankfully mom came to pick him up and I rested a bit longer. I have no idea what the problem is, he HATED going to bed, cried his eyes out the minute we entered the bedroom, I think it's because it's much bigger than his and it was scary. Oh I don't know. But at least my parents never once commented on the crying. It was a good break though not particularly relaxing. Since we are back, we had no issues.

And today it was the time for our NT scan. The scan itself went great, Phoenix was measuring right on track (11w4d), happily moving and with a strong HB of 167 wohoo! NT at 1.15 mm and lovely nasal bone too. But my bloods weren't as good, plus we had the complication that we had retrieval when I was still 36 (ok, we said to the tech 37 as I would have been 37 a couple of weeks later). Anyway, my stats with Oliver were fabulous (T21 1:4646, T18/13 1:8406) so it's hard not to compare, but this time I have 1:1076 chance for T21 and, a bit more concerning, a 1:452 chance of T13/18. What screwed the stats is my PAPP-A value which is a bit low at 0.37 MoM. I definitely believe more a good scan than the bloods but of course I started reading on low PAPP-A and the main concern seems to be the possibility that the placenta will have some issues later on in the pregnancy. Thankfully my OB, which I will see on monday, is the top expert in sonography, I will talk to him about these results and see what he thinks. I had issues with Oliver too at the end of the pregnancy (emergency C-section at 36w6d after scan showed he had not grown for 3 weeks) thought the pathology results on the placenta didn't show much a part from some inflammation. I could restart the cardio-aspirin which I had stopped when I was diagnosed with SCH (now totally gone) to help blood flow. We'll see. But I'm not particularly concerned about the stats. Unless the OB recommends otherwise we won't be doing CVS or amnio (also in Ireland termination is illegal).

Me, Oliver and Phoenix in Italy

We arrived today, no particular problems on the flight, we were lucky to have three seats for ourselves which gave Oliver a bit more room to move around.
Almost as soon as I met my parents at the airport they said their OB friend was happy to scan me within the hour. So mam and I went to the clinic and we were relieved to see a much bigger (and moving!) Phoenix which is now measuring only 2 days behind at 10w1d (I'm 10w3d)!! I am really happy and now feel much more positive. No sign of SCH which is nice too. We could see the arms and legs, the brains, the heartbeat (we didn't measure it but he said it looked perfect) and it was incredible how he was moving around. I have to remember to update this post with a pic as soon as I get home.

The weather here is great, quite warn for us coming from Ireland, and really enjoying it. Oliver seems to have settled very quickly, he didn't sleep on the plain so was quite tired but went with nonno to the park and had lots of fun at the playground while we were at the clinic and then had a nap on the way home. He's in bed now and everything is quiet, hopefully we'll have a good night sleep. Missing Mike quite a bit already, I'm sure time will fly though, I am quite busy between meeting with colleagues tomorrow and going to Milan for a talk on thursday. Better get some rest myself!