Week 24: Doctor's Appt, Hospital Tour and Going F.B.O.

I’m not entirely feeling in the mood to write today but I have Wi-Fi so I feel compelled to take advantage of a little dedicated computer time! Since I wrote last week, we had another doctor’s visit. Everything was looking perfect with the babies! We did our regular ultrasound but actually didn’t walk away with any photos this week. That’s ok though because our stash of ultrasound photos is getting quite large! And from this point on I’m only going to start having more and more ultrasounds so I don’t really need pictures every single time. The doctor told us that once I go in patient (in 8 days ahh!) the babies will still be a bit too small to do the traditional non-stress tests with the heart rate monitors on my belly so we will continue checking on them via ultrasound until they get big enough that we can successfully identify and track each of their heart rates for 20-30 minutes on the monitors that they will strap to my belly.

I also had a little check up so I know that my blood pressure is looking great and I should know the results of my glucose test by the end of today. For those who don’t know, it’s standard nowadays to do the glucose test to check women for Gestational Diabetes. I had heard a lot about this dreaded test. That the drink tastes horrible and it’s so awful but honestly it wasn’t that bad at all and I might even go so far as to say that I liked the drink! It was just a small 8oz bottle of flat orange soda basically. And I love orange soda hah! Then I had to wait an hour and they drew my blood. Because the test was done on a Friday afternoon they said they wouldn’t have results until today (Monday) so I will either receive a call by the end of the day saying that I failed the first 1 hour test and will need to do a 3 hour test later this week or I won’t receive a call and everything will be fine! From what I know, the 3 hour test will involve fasting for a large handful of hours, drinking the drink again and then having my blood drawn at 1, 2 and 3 hours after finishing the drink. Hopefully we won’t even have to worry about it so I’ll wait until we know more to bother getting into what a bummer I feel like that test would be!

After our scheduled visits we went over to the hospital where I will be admitted and had the chance to walk around the unit where I will stay and ask some questions. We found out that visiting hours are 9am-9pm and there isn’t really a limit to the number of people who can visit at a given time which may seem like a funny thing to ask about but I have a big family and we like any excuse to gather en masse. We learned that a dietician will come meet with me to try to sort out the best possible and most bearable food arrangements given the length of my stay. There is however a fridge and a microwave that I will have access to so I can have some of my own snacks and meals on hand. We also found out that I will have to acquire special permission from the doctors to even leave my unit of the hospital… at each step it seems like they keep narrowing my access to the world outside the hospital. At first the doctor said, “oh sure you can leave the hospital!” and we didn’t ask any further questions and assumed I would be able to run errands or go out for dinner. The second time we asked, a few weeks after the first time, they told us that for liability reasons, once I was admitted, I would not be able to leave the hospital until I was discharged but I would still be able to go down to the cafeteria or out to the garden. Then this most recent time, we find out I can’t even leave the hallway where my room will be located. It’s been a little difficult news to accept. No sunshine, no fresh air, no change of scenery whatsoever?

I’m very hopeful that the doctors will at least give me permission to go downstairs to the atrium to get some fresh air or walk to the cafeteria for a sandwich or a coffee. As long as the babies continue to look as good as they have been looking, I hope they’ll feel comfortable to give me a few minutes of “freedom” a day. I can’t imagine not leaving my hallway even once during the course of 8 weeks. Seems unfathomable but it is only for 8 weeks and of course I will do whatever is necessary for these babies. The weird thing about all of this is that the babies are doing so remarkably well that it seems funny to be taking such drastic measures to protect them. Everything about this pregnancy and their existence seems so perfectly normal, even though it isn’t! There are major risks and concerns that can arise but so far, I think they’re even surprising the doctors a little bit with how well they’re doing. So I will happily take up my place in the antepartum wing next week and hope beyond all hopes that the babies continue to shock us all with their abundant resilience and strength while I hibernate and embrace my last chances to watch tv or read a book uninterrupted.

Another big piece of the puzzle this week was making this pregnancy F.B.O. (Facebook Official)! Despite my Instagram account dedicated to fertility and pregnancy (@making.of.a.mama) and deciding to start this blog, I’ve generally been extremely private about this pregnancy. But it felt like time to announce these twins to the world. I’m happy to have even more people rooting for them and to let the world know about this huge exciting transition that we are going through. I am always so comforted whenever anyone offers up prayers or hopes or good vibes to the universe for our babies. They are up against a lot and the more good juju out there in the world for them, the better, no matter what form it comes in! A group from my parents’ church sent me a prayer shawl with these beautiful offerings:

And another friend of my mom’s sent her this message that she shared with me, “I once again awakened with Carolyn and you all on my mind.  My prayers are rather unconventional, but they were sent into the stratosphere”.

My sister is participating in a gathering this weekend in Salt Lake City where she lives that will celebrate the goddess Ọ̀ṣun of the Candomblé tradition from Brazil. She is the goddess of fertility, love and freshwater so my sister will bring flowers that a priest will pray over and then place into a freshwater stream as an offering to the goddess in honor of the twins. I am just so in love with all the ways in which the twins are being cared for spiritually and I am so happy for any offerings of hope or good blessings! The concept touches me in a way that catches my breath in my throat and makes me ugly cry with gratitude on a regular basis.

And on that beautiful note, I will end this blog post. Thank you for caring about all of us enough to read this. Thank you for your offers of prayers and blessings and help and encouragement. Our tribe will get us through all of this! The unknowns, the trials, the challenges, the triumphs. We are incredibly lucky and our twins are even luckier!