Good news at the doctor today

Today's appointment finally brought some good news. Elizabeth's blood pressure is back down, her lab work came back fine, and the babies are still doing great. She does, however, get to continue her 24-hour urine collection. Doesn't it look like fun...



There was another exciting developement as well. We have an induction date!! We are currently on the schedule for induction at 10:00 am on next Friday, October 6th. There is a slight stipulation though. On Monday they are going to check Elizabeth's cervix and she needs to be 2-3 cm dilated in order for them to be able to induce. The doctor seemed pretty confident that this will be the case since she was so effaced the last time they checked. She also said, "Hopefully they'll come before then." We couldn't agree more!

Let the peeing begin...

Well, not the best news after today's blood pressure/urine check with the nurse practicioner. Elizabeth's blood pressure was still elevated, although it did go down a bit after resting for a few minutes. They did check on the babies, and they seem to be doing just fine. The nurse practicioner consulted with the doctor on call, Dr. Borhan (we saw her when we went the hospital earlier in the pregnancy). Here is the new plan:

- They drew some blood today to test liver and kidney function, the results will be available tomorrow.

- Starting tomorrow morning Elizabeth will be collecting all of her urine and storing it in our refrigerator for 24 hours. (YUK!) We will drop off the sample at the hospital lab on Saturday. They will do another blood test then to look for changes in kidney/liver function.

- Elizabeth is going back to see the nurse practicioner again in the morning.

I'll update the blog tomorrow afternoon/evening to keep everyone up to speed.

Quick update

Hi all, just a quick update on today's developments. Around 9 am this morning Elizabeth developed a headache. As mentioned in the previous post, her blood pressure was high on Monday. The doctor told her to call if she got a headache.

They were able to get her in at 1:50 this afternoon. They checked her blood pressure and it was about the same as on Monday, still a little high. Both babies' heart rates were fine, and she even made a comment about Hannah being really active. That's the first time that's ever happened! Since Elizabeth had also been having some cramping today, they did an exam and said that she was "really thin" and that the baby's head was "right there."

The nurse practicioner went and consulted with Dr. Asdell for a few minutes. She came back and said they weren't going to do anything drastic. They sent us home with instructions to keep taking it easy, take Tylenol for the headache, and come back on Thursday to have another blood pressure/urine check. So, the appointment that I mentioned for tomorrow has been moved to Thursday. I'll check back in then.

36 Weeks and STILL Counting...

It's hard to believe that another week has come and gone, and that we are another week closer to holding our babies! This last week was pretty rough on Elizabeth. I'll tell you about that, and then I'll update you on today's appointment. Don't be too disappointed, but there won't be any pictures with this post.

Elizabeth's near picture-perfect pregnancy had a little hiccup this past week. Luckily, there is no risk of harm to the babies or permanent harm to mom! She developed a condition called PUPPP, which stands for Pruritic Uricarial Papules and Plaques of Pregnancy. Translation - really, really, really itchy rash. It started out on her belly, and then over a couple of days spread to her arms and legs. Once we figured out what was going on, we called the doctor, and they agreed with our diagnosis (we're pretty good diagnosticians considering this problem affects around 0.5% of first pregnancies). Elizabeth met with a nurse practicioner at the doctor's office on Wednesday, and they referred her to see a dermatologist the following morning. He gave her a steroid shot, some oral steroids and asked her to take Claritin and Mangesium Sulfate supplements every day. Including her prenatal vitamins, she's now taking 14 pills a day. Her skin is already starting to look a lot better, but she is still experiencing quite a lot of itching. She has had several nights with virtually no sleep.

Today's appointment had a new surprise as well. The doctor noticed today that her blood pressure was starting to rise (they described it as the upper end of normal), and that she had gained more weight than expected last week. These things could be early signs of pre-ecclampsia, or (hopefully) they could be related to all of the steroids she is taking. In order to be sure everything is okay, she is going to go back in on Wednesday to have her blood pressure checked again and to have her urine checked for protein. The doctor said if it was still elevated then that we would "have to talk." I checked her blood pressure here at home this evening with our automatic machine, and it was was very similar to what it has always been. So, hopefully everything is fine and it was just a fluke. Until Wednesday she is on doctor's orders to rest as much as she can on her left side, drink lots of water, and to avoid salty foods.

Other than the elevated blood pressure things seem to be okay. Both babies' heart rates were in the 130's.

I will be sure to update the blog as soon as we know something on Wednesday. If I don't get something posted by the end of that night, you can probably assume that we had to deliver the babies.

35 weeks and counting...

Well, I'm back. If you remember from my last post, I mentioned that the next one would either be when the babies were born, or after the doctor's appointment. Everybody is apparently very happy (except perhaps Elizabeth) and wants to keep this pregnancy going for a little longer.

We had an ultrasound with today's appointment. It was definitely the least exciting ultrasound so far, because it is just too hard to really see anything now that they are so big. In fact, Hannah's head is down really low and it took some fancy wand-work from the ultrasound tech to even measure her head. Both babies appear to be doing great. Hannah is weighing in at 5 lb 3 oz, and Noah measured 5 lb 9 oz. The doctor mentioned that this is a 7% difference and is perfectly acceptable. The other good news is that both babies stayed head down (vertex), and there's really no chance of them flipping now. We did get just one snapshot of each baby. As I mentioned Hannah is really far down now, so we just got a picture of her foot. Very cute though...



Since Noah is up higher we were able to get a profile of his face...



HOPEFULLY, this will be the last time we have to look at them as a bunch of fuzzy lines on a television screen, and the next time we see them it will be in person.

Next we met with Dr. Asdell. She was very pleased that Elizabeth had made it to 35 weeks. Elizabeth is now measuring 43-44 weeks, or in other words, a whole month bigger than a full-term singleton. If you've ever wondered what a woman a month past term might look like, I'll show you. It's just absolutely amazing to me how beautiful she still looks. I think she was "made" to carry twins!




An exam was involved in this visit, but didn't turn up much hope of anything getting started anytime soon. She was dilated one centimeter and she didn't mention that she was effaced (thinned) at all. She did make a comment right when she started that she felt a head, but later said that it was still pretty high up. That would have been Hannah's head, she will definitely be the first one to join us on the outside.

Dr. Asdell did mention that if Elizabeth makes it to 38 weeks and has started to dilate then she will consider inducing at that point. She didn't make any promises. I don't think it'll last that long anyway. Elizabeth has started to notice some contractions and it seems (to me anyway) that they are starting to occur more frequently. It's all a waiting game now. It does look like my guess will be a bit off though. Regardless, they'll be here soon!

The next post will be after next week's doctor's appointment on Monday, or after the babies are born. Until then...

All showered out...

Well, they've come to an end...no more baby showers. There were four in all. That's two for each baby! Seriously, we are extremely appreciative for each and every one of them. Everyone was so generous, and we truly appreciate all that everyone has done for us.

Last Friday was the final shower. It was thrown by Elizabeth's visiting teachers from church. Here's a picture of the hostesses with the mosteses.



Everyone came here to the house, which was nice, because it meant we didn't have to lug all the gifts home afterward. We received lots of very useful gifts. At this shower we received more gear than clothes. I don't know how they all resisted the urge to buy those cute matching outfits! It's hard to pick favorites, but one of my favorites was definitely a gift from Sis. Vest who used to be Elizabeth's 1st Counselor when she was the Primary President. She made a really neat mobile with lambs. Since both of the babies already have mobiles for their cribs we are going to hang this one in a corner of the room up near the ceiling. I think it will look really neat.



Refreshments included fresh fruit and chocolate fondue and a beautiful cake from Long's Bakery (yum!).



Elizabeth had a doctor's appointment today. I didn't go again this time because there was no ultrasound. Everything went great! She is now measuring 39-40 weeks (how comfortable that must be). Hannah's heart rate was in the 140's, and Noah's heat rate was in the 150's. Dr. Asdell made a comment about Noah being much more active than Hannah. Sounds like we're in for a real treat! ;) She said to keep up the good work and that 35 weeks is a good goal. That's only 12 days away!! EEK! She did say, of course, the longer the better. So for now, Elizabeth will keep trying to hold them in (much to her dismay)!

The next doctor's appointment will be in two weeks. It will include an ultrasound and an exam. Now the question is....will she make it?

I thought it might be fun to have everyone take a guess when they will be born and see who is closest. My guess is going to be 36 weeks exactly, which is September 28th. What's your guess? You can enter it by adding a comment to the post. It's pretty self-explanatory, hopefully everyone can figure it out.

The next post will either be after the next doctor's appointment in two weeks or if something else happens in the meantime. I'll be anxiously waiting for the next post....believe me!