As the tear flow...

I am struck with such sadness as I continue to follow this journey...not only for myself but for the others that are on this same path. It is hard to watch the other families say hello and goodbye all in the same day. It is hard to know that of the many families that I am following I am the last one to likely deliver. Therefore, I will have witnessed their joy and pain all prior to my own. Kinda hard to swallow...

I have some catching up to do and I will try to keep it all in some type of order.

Back to thanksgiving...

It was sorta a tough day as I started out having a hard time being happy and well, I guess thankful. It took me a long time to come to realize that I DO have lots to be thankful for. I, for some reason, could only focus on the bad things that have happened (diagnosis wise) opposed to the numerous good, positive things. Once it all hit me I was able to run off a list...a list of the ultimate things that I am thankful for...the two wonderful, healthy children that are here w/ me now, the great man in my life who has been by my side thru what I thought were the toughest times of my life (if only I knew then what I know now...as well as what lies ahead)...the job that I have, the house that we live in, the vehicle that I have...even though I am not due till March, I could not imagine being pregnant and on a donkey right now! I am thankful that the Lord has never turned his back on me although I have gone a stray at times. I am thankful that Jesus died for my sins and that I and my family have such an opportunity to spend eternity w/ Our God in Heaven! And although I do not know if Eva will be w/ us for next Thanksgiving, as much as I hope and pray that she is, she was w/ us THIS Thanksgiving, alive and well.

Moving on to Monday, November 26th's doctors appointments...We first met w/ the pediatric cardiologist. She was very nice once we got past her question of "Well, what are you going to do about the Trisomy 18"? I guess she thought that we would go to the extreme of finding out the condition of Eva's heart and THEN choose to terminate? Was she kidding me? Maybe I should have expected her questioning...here's why...

When I called to schedule the appointment for the fetel echo cardiogram (this was back on November 6th after my level II ultrasound) I chose the 26th for several reasons...it was a day that the kids were off school where I could still take them to daycare, I could take the day off to make the long holiday weekend longer and I would be 22 weeks on the 26th so even though Eva had been measuring 10 days behind I thought the view of her heart would be pretty good based on her size opposed to making the appt any sooner and her being even smaller. The women whom I spoke to when I scheduled called me back after I chose the 26th to see if I could come the 19th instead. I expressed to her my reasoning for wanting to wait and asked why they thought it would be better to come in the 19th. I could hear her hold the phone in her hand and could hear her conversing w/ someone in the background. She came back to the phone and preceded to say that Dr. K thought that it would be better because if I was going to terminate I could still do so opposed to waiting another week...I said "ARE YOU KIDDING ME...WE ARE NOT TERMINATING! Why didn't you just ask me that from the start."? She said, "Oh, okay. Dr. K just wanted to make sure you knew that before it was too late to do so". I could not believe my ears. WHY would I go to such extremes to have a fetal echo cardiogram on a baby that I was going to dispose of. Why would I necessarily care to even look at the condition of her heart if that were the case?

So, moving on...The appointment went pretty good. Dr. K told us that Eva has a 4-5 mm hole between the left and right ventricles (VSD) as well as Mitral Valve Prolapse. She pretty much assured us that both of these are not major, but minor, and should not have any effect on carrying to term nor a normal vaginal delivery (although we will be pushing for a c-section anyway). She scheduled to see me again in another 5 weeks to follow-up on the MVP. She also said that a pediatric cardiologist will be present at delivery to look at Eva's heart again. She stated that if we make it to a 3-4 month mark (after delivery) and Eva seems to not be growing because of her heart (which could be due to the T-18 itself) it would be then that they would talk about surgery. I know that we will have to fight surgeons to do this...but we will just cross that bridge when we get to it, with hopes and prayers that we indeed do. All in all we were satisfied w/ this appointment.

My back is starting to hurt due to the lack of a comfy computer chair at my bedroom computer...so I will continue this tomorrow.