Second Trimester!

Those are two words I wasn't sure I'd ever be writing in regard to myself. Yet, here we are.

I know some people count 12 weeks as the 2nd trimester, and others count 13. The peri counts it at 14, and for some reason I felt compelled to follow that - maybe because I wanted to be able to say it without any doubt about whether we really had reached the milestone.

To celebrate, R and I went out to dinner at my favorite Mexican restaurant.

The ultrasound was pretty uneventful. The techs aren't measuring the length every time anymore, just doing a really quick check of the heart rate. It was in the 150s today, which is where it's been for the last few weeks, so nothing new there. This time, Kiddo was facing in a way that was difficult to see much, so the tech couldn't get a shot that she felt was worthy of printing.

She casually mentioned that normally at this time, with most of their patients, they might not do another ultrasound for a month. I just laughed. Then she suggested that maybe I could try to stretch it out to two weeks.

I told her I could be okay with that as long as we could hear the heartbeat with a doppler at the appointment during the weeks that didn't include an ultrasound. She said we're just at the cusp of being able to hear the heartbeat that way and that she knew I'd freak out if they had problems finding it. So ultrasounds it is, at least for a few more weeks.

Given our rather tense conversation on Saturday, I thought it might be a kind of uncomfortable appointment with the peri, but she was actually very nice. She is trying hard to do anything she can think of to ease my fears (other than monitoring my progesterone levels). She mentioned the AFP (alpha fetal protein? - I haven't looked it up yet) test, which is a blood test that checks for spinal issues in the baby. It's supposed to be done between weeks 15-18, and she said "Why don't we just go ahead and do all of your tests at the beginning of the testing windows? The sooner you have results showing everything is okay, the better you'll feel." So we'll also be doing the big 18- to 20-week scan at 18 weeks.

She also said she has another patient (further along than me) who is from the same RE and has had a very similar history to me. She said she thought it might be helpful for me to talk with someone else who is now progressing after so many losses, so she offered to ask that patient if she'd be willing to call me. I said that was fine and gave her my cell number to pass along.

I also reminded her that it was another friend of mine who is also the RE's patient who referred me to her, and she said "Yeah, but that's not the same. Her history is different than yours, so for her, the pregnancy experience wasn't the same as it is for someone with your history." I'm glad she gets that, and understands that someone with as many losses as we've had is going to be so much more nervous than even the typical high-risk patient.

About the progesterone...I'll write more on that in the next couple of days. It's late, and I'm finding myself yawning and struggling to keep my eyes open as I type this post, so it would probably be a rather incoherent update. For now, suffice it to say that I'm still taking the suppositories...