Catching You Up

I decided to start a blog to keep everyone updated on the triplet's progress day to day.  It seemed easier than sending and answering individual emails and texts - though that is one way to kill the time!  So here goes the first post which includes a little catching you all up on the last few days so it is going to be a little long.

On Friday January 20th at our Perinatologist appointment it was discovered that Baby C, better known as Emma, is having circulatory issues.  That alone landed me in the hospital that day for bed rest and close monitoring of her especially but also her identical twin Alex since they now share a placenta.  Additionally, my cervix had shortened to 2.5cm which is the cut off for being off bed rest and needing to be put on it.  So double whammy Friday morning.  Luckily there was no imminent danger so I was allowed to go home and pack, eat lunch, and I even squeezed in a maternity photo shoot with my amazing photographer friend Sarah!  So happy to have done those photo's, Sarah already sent me two and they are awesome!  I will find out if I can post some soon.

Emma's circulatory issue stems from the placenta.  She has low/immeasurable diastolic pressure.  Simply meaning the blood from the placenta is flowing into her still but isn't coming back out as well as it should.  She currently doesn't have back flow of the blood which is a good thing!  So there are many scenarios of what could happen with this.  One, the worst case is she starts having back flow of blood and that will stop her growth and everyone has to be delivered early, this week or next.  Two, the circulation stays the way it currently is, not worsening not improving, and she still doesn't have good growth in two weeks, we probably deliver at 29 weeks.  Third, circulation stays the way it is but she keeps growing enough then everyone stays in.  Fourth, her circulation improves and she grows then again everyone stays in and we shoot for 34 + weeks.  There is a small possibility Alex's circulation could become affected also but that would mostly happen if Emma's worsens or doesn't improve.  This apparently is very common in triplets, even twins, and a lot of them do manage to hang on with bed rest for many more weeks.  So we are hopeful.  Just to clarify, the problem is in the placenta, not Emma's heart so this won't affect her outside the womb.

When we finally go to the hospital I was admitted and put in a Labor and Delivery room because antipartum was full.  No big deal they are right next to each other and nice for me because the LD room is HUGE compared to the Anti room.  I didn't have to go on an IV which is so nice, I have more mobility and less irritating things attached to me.  They gave me my first steroid shot to help mature the triplets lungs in case things get worse and we have to deliver in the next week or two.  So I will hang out in LD until a woman with triplets in antipartum delivers this week, then I get her room :)  The nice thing about having triplets is I need so much additional monitoring equipment that they have to keep me in big rooms.  This hospital only has 2 large antipartum rooms so I have one waiting for me now.  :)  Yay!  This is a big deal to me because I was in a small room at 13 weeks and it was icky.  Old, run down, tiny tiny with a tiny tiny bathroom to boot, and loud in a more used hallway.  The large room is much more quite, recently updated and doesn't feel claustrophobic.  Fingers crossed it has a view too, my current room does and that's nice.

Saturday morning both my OB and the second perinatologist visited me and gave a lot of reassurance.  The perinatologist did another sonogram and nothing had changed.  I will be given a sonogram every other day unless anything indicates I need one sooner.  I get their heart rates monitored 2 times a day, which is a ridiculous ordeal right now.  Since there are a lot of women here needing monitored and another triplet mom I got stuck with one new monitor and one old one.  They each only monitor 2 babies at a time.  So for the past 2 days they have had Ethan and Alex on the new monitor and then they spend over an hour trying to get Emma on the old monitor.  Finally this morning I asked why we couldn't try getting Emma on the new monitor, she is deeper and harder to trace and the new monitor seems far more sensitive.  Well, they got her immediately, of course...  But that meant one of the other babies needed to move to the old monitor.  I suggested Ethan he doesn't have as much room to move and is fairly shallow.  They were able to get him on the monitor pretty quickly too.  Now you'd think they would then catch Alex on the new monitor, but for some stupid reason they try and get her on the old one too...  Why?  So they spend 30+ minutes trying to catch Alex's heart rate and of course they can't.  I am getting more and more frustrated at this point and have asked twice why they can't just get her on the new monitor.  FINALLY, a new nurse comes in and does it they way I keep suggesting and we have everyone easy and finally finish, again after an hour.  So tonight I am demanding Emma and Alex go on the new monitor and Ethan only on the old.  Apparently when I get the other triplet mom's room I get two new monitors and this won't be an issue.  I know, seems like I"m making a big deal out of this but is is very irritating and uncomfortable to my stomach leaving me with a red itchy belly.  They also always do it when my dinner arrives so I only eat cold dinners...  AND they interrupt prime time TV which is the only TV worth watching each day.  So it would be great if this got easier.  :)

Sunday morning I was woken up by strong contractions at 5am.  I been having contractions since 17 weeks it isn't abnormal to be feeling them.  They have woken me up at night before.  So I cat napped with them until about 6:30 and then called a nurse to put me on a monitor.  After an hour it showed I was having regular contractions every 7 minutes and she wanted to call a doc to ask about giving me a Terbutaline injection to calm them down.  The doc decided with the other stuff going on we should do the shot.  So at 8:30 I got the drug.  The nurse asked if I'd had the medicine before, I said no and she said the common side effect is feeling gittery like having too much caffeine.  I got the shot, ran to the bathroom, came back out and was shaking head to toe.  The nurse came back in with my breakfast right away and I asked if it happened that fast and she said yep.  I was shaking like crazy, far more than caffeine can make you shake, more like having drug with draws or very advanced Parkinson's.  Kind of crazy.  It lasted about an hour and a half.  The nurse said the drug opens up all the vessels to get blood to the uterus and relax it.

Also, today, Sunday the Neonatologist came to visit us and talk about what the babies might face with premature birth, both starting next week and through 34 weeks.  He was very nice, explained everything thoroughly and in an understandable manner.  He was very positive that even if we have to deliver soon things will be ok.  There will be struggles but they have a lot of experience with babies as early as 23 weeks that make it.

The rest of Sunday has been fairly uneventful.  There was some entertainment earlier in the day, the woman in the room next to me was in labor and the first time I heard her the was a lot of screaming and cussing as her first painful contractions started.  I don't think she was prepared to feel that.  :)  For the next 8 hours we heard a lot out of her.  Did I say my room was quiet?  Haha.  No, it really is, so no worries.

Yuan cooked me dinner tonight for Chinese New Years and as of midnight tonight our babies will officially be born as Dragons!  For those of you who don't know Yuan is a tiger and I'm a dragon so he is going to be very out numbered by 4 dragons.  Dragons are a bit of an aggressive year so he's in for 3 more Adrienne personalities...  Poor guy.  He made dumplings and some Chinese broccoli - they were DELICIOUS and I wanted to keep eating but my limited space meant limited dumplings.  I'm hoping for a repeat tomorrow night.  :)

Sunday looks like it is ending with us watching the 49ers and Giants (go Eli!) and waiting for our 2nd hear rate monitoring of the day.

I will try to blog about progress at least every other day and I doubt they will be nearly as long as this, but as I said, I had some catching up to do.

I'm at Baylor of Grapevine Hospital in the Labor and Delivery ward, 2nd floor of the Women's Center.  I would love visitors so email me and we can set up a day and time. My friend Katie recommended borrowing dvd's of TV shows I haven't seen so if you have any that you are willing to share email me and I'll tell you if I've seen or not.  If you are visiting I would love to play games, I have cards, or you can bring a game, just talk, and some of you will get roped into giving me my 30 minute wheel chair ride of the day or helping me with bed exercises.

Thank you all who already know and have written with well wishes, we really appreciate them.  Just keep praying for them to stay in 34+ weeks.