Doctor Appointment Update

I didn't sleep well at all last night.  This morning was finally the doctor's appointment I've been waiting a month for.  The morning didn't go quite as I had expected, but maybe that's a good thing, because I didn't have enough time or energy to really get nervous. 

I had to do the gestational diabetes test this morning, in addition to everything else.  So, when I got to the office, I had to drink the sugar drink, and then they called me back for the ultrasound.  Sheila is the ultrasound tech that did our u/s today.  I believe she does all high risk pregnancies, so I wasn't too surprised when she was the one that called us back. 

I asked her if she would tell me what she was looking at, and she was pretty good about keeping me informed throughout the process.  When she started measuring the bones, I could see the length pop up in the bottom right hand corner of the screen.  I could tell that the numbers were still small, but I couldn't see them exactly, and if it showed percentages, I couldn't read that from where I was laying.  They finally got to evaluate his heart and it looks good, praise God!  She told me that he is weighing in at 1 pound 12 ounces. 

I finished the u/s and then went for the blood draw for the g/d test.  I don't have it!!!  Yay!  That's one thing I didn't want to have to worry about on top of everything else... talk about adding insult to injury!  However, they did notice that my white blood cell count is high. 

I finally got to see Tanya, my doctor.  She went over the g/d test first.  Since I haven't been sick lately, she ordered more labs due to my high white blood cell count, to see if there is anything else going on in my body.  Then we moved to the ultrasound.  She didn't beat around the bush, and was very honest and forthcoming.  She said, "There's no growth in the long bones."  Which is really what we expected, based on the last 2 ultrasounds.  She said that she's still thinking achondroplasia.  Everything else looks good, except now, his abdominal circumference is small.  That is typically not the norm with achon babies.  She said that it could be that he is right in the middle of a growth transition, where his torso is elongating, and we will start seeing his chest and abdomen protrude more, and that right now, it's just making the abdomen look comparatively smaller.  However, with my elevated wbc's she wants the extra labs to try to rule out anything else.  At this point, they have pretty much ruled out IUGR, because my amniotic fluid is on the high side and they did a scan to make sure blood and nutrient flow between the cord and placenta are fine, and she said that looks great. 

Tanya is having her office set me up an appointment with a maternal fetal medicine specialist as soon as possible.  She's hoping they will get me in this week, but it could be next week.  They will have a few more answers for me, may possibly have a more definitive diagnosis, and will help determine how we manage everything from this point forward.  I'm still anxiously waiting on the phone call to find out when that appointment is.  Tanya said it's a lot of hurry up and wait in cases like this.

So, overall, we got the news that I was pretty much expecting.  Rocky has handled it pretty well so far.  I think we'll be ready to start telling other people after our visit with the specialist.  But we haven't decided when to tell our parents yet.  It's not exactly the news I want to share with them on Christmas, but I want to go ahead and tell them all soon.  We can still use all the prayers anyone wants to send up.  We're still hoping and praying for no additional complications, and that we get the best possible diagnosis and report from the specialist.