appointment with the high-risk OB in the U.S. and the big announcement!

When I booked my trip to the U.S., I decided to make an appointment with a high-risk OB, for a few reasons.
One: if anything were to happen while I’m here, I wanted someone to have my records and be familiar with my history.
Two: I haven’t decided where I’m going to deliver, might be in Ireland, might be here, might be somewhere else.
Three: while I adore my high-risk OB in Dublin, there are a few things that just aren’t “done” in Ireland and I wanted a U.S. trained physician to give me a thorough exam and advise as to whether I needed to have any additional tests, etc…

The appointment was fine and I had a chance to meet with the hospital birthing center staff, the prenatal assessment nurse, and the high-risk OB. She went over my records and we discussed the heparin. I was kind of hoping to be switched to Lovenox (only one injection per day and much less stingy, or so I’m told). The OB here said that she agreed with the fertility clinic in Dublin; I can’t be on low dose heparin (Lovenox, Clexane, or Innohep). There are just too many auto-immune issues and they are too severe, so I’m stuck with heparin and the two, stingy injections per day, oh well. She said that she would like to induce or schedule a c-section at 39 weeks, which is two weeks later than what I’ve otherwise been told, so that was good news. She also said that I’m “at much higher risk for fetal death” because of the autoimmune issues, so she will be scheduling BioPhysical Profiles every week, should I come back to the U.S. She did a very thorough exam, ultrasound, blood work, etc and everything looks great. Next week I’m scheduled to see her again, more tests and another ultrasound.

And now the big news….

When I was 16 weeks pregnant, I asked my maternal fetal medicine doctor if he could make a “guess” as to the baby’s gender. He said that it was still very early, but if he were a guessing man, he’d guess that “it’s a girl” and that he “didn’t see a penis.” LOL. Since it was so early, we didn’t want to tell very many people, just in case. When I was 21 weeks 1 day pregnant, I had the “anatomy scan”. Not knowing my doctor’s guess, the doctor doing the scan also said that it was a girl. At that point, we started telling more people. I’ve now had yet another doctor tell me that it’s definitely a girl. So there you go…

IT’S A GIRL!!!!!!!