This is Tough

We've waited two days now to write this blog as we needed to digest the situation a bit.

I was on my way out of town Friday morning and received an email from the doctor. Not good.

They did the latest ultrasound on Friday and the twins' heartbeats have disappeared. We received a digital image of the scan and it showed both still there, but their heartbeats have stopped. There is no explanation for this and the doctor said that it appears that this spontaneous miscarriage was a result of a chromosomal problem that can occur in 10% of IVF cases.

This really sucks. And we both feel a bit shocked and like something is missing.

But, C is trying to be the positive one and is saying that mother nature knows best and clearly if something wasn't right with the twins, it is better to know that now than to know that six months from now.

I'm going to talk to the doctor this week to understand next steps. I think we wait and in about a month they will try to implant some of the frozen embryos that remained.

To think that we're back to square one and that we have to go through all of the emotional waiting again is really tough. But alas. Looks like that's where we're at.

More to come when we know more.

8 weeks, 3 days?

Two months down. Seven more to go.

I think.

Just when I'm getting the hang of all of this and think that I understand the science and the process, some little factoid pops up that sends me back to Google trying to make sense of it all. I'm now confused.

Today we got an update from the doc and apparently all is good. He included the latest ultrasound (which looks like a big black and white blur to me) and a few stats:

1>there is a twin gestation.

2>the crown rump length of both twins is 0.41 cms corresponds to 6 w+6 days.

3>heart beat is present in both twins.

4>heart rate is between 150 to 170 bpm.

He said all is good and we just wait now for the next ultrasound (in 10-ish days) to see how much they grow.

So here's where I'm confused, and maybe somebody has the answer for me... The CRL corresponds to 6 weeks +6 days. The problem is that the implantation of the embryos took place on June 19. That was 8 weeks +3 days ago. That to me means that the twins are 1 week and a few days behind of where they should be right now. Right?

I called the doctor and spoke with him and he said that everything is fine and that we just wait for the report from the next ultrasound.

So confused...

But at least we don't have any bad news. So that's a very good thing.

Now we just wait.

I'm starting to think about when and how to tell work (assuming things continue to be positive) and am trying to make sense of how "maternity leave" is going to work for me given the situation. I'm hoping they will work something out with me since this isn't the most "traditional" way of going about it all :)

Keeping our fingers crossed. Still.

A 6 a.m. Surprise

We’ve been traveling the past week so apologies for not having updated the blog sooner. While we were driving through Mexico, we got an update that the yolk was detected in the ultrasound and that was a good next step. It appeared a few days later than normal, but the fact that it appeared was a good thing.

We were glad to hear that all was well, but not thrilled that everything was showing up a few days later than normal.

Oh wait, it gets better.

So we’ve been waiting for the full report to come back with a picture of the ultrasound. At 6 a.m. this morning, we received an email from Dr. Samit that put this entire “a few days late” scenario into context.

I’m going to share the exact note with you so that you can get the same impact that we did reading it:

Mr. E,

I think this will take you by surprise as it did us. You have TWINS.

Yes that is right.

There are two gestational sacs and heartbeat is present in both. However one sac appeared late and is smaller in size than the other one.

This is seen often in twin pregnancies, however as the pregnancy continues they will catch up with each other.

We still have to keep monitoring closely though. We will keep you abreast of the scene.

And that was our 6 a.m. note.

This, more than any other of the updates has really hit home and emotionally has gotten us excited. There is still a long road ahead though and we know that none of this is for sure and that we really can’t get too excited about any of this quite yet.

Crazy, huh?

Twins.

"I am Optimistic"

“I am optimistic.”

Those were the three words that really stood out in Dr. Samit’s latest email update. We didn’t get detailed numbers as to the size or the beta hcg levels or any of that, but we did get a positive email.

The second ultrasound was scheduled for Tuesday and it sounds like it went well. You tell me:

“good news the sac is growing in size. Her blood work is all normal. I am optimistic. We just have to wait. I shall give you a pic as soon as possible.”

All I can think of is: “Are we really just seven months and a few weeks from little baby Hyderabad (no that’s not the name we chose) coming into the world?” Seriously?

I know, many more hurdles and much more waiting. But this is good news for now.

And “I am optimistic” that we’re going to have a celebratory drink or two this weekend with friends in DC.

PS- I really want this first trimester to pass so that we can start to buy cute things, think about baby’s room, and start to act like excited parents-to-be instead of worried humans waiting for medical updates every week :)

No Jumping the Gun

No jumping the gun.

That's what I have to keep telling myself. C and I have become pros at Google-ing the very limited info that we receive and quickly becoming "pros" at surrogacy. Actually, we have no idea what end is up really and it's kind of funny how wrong we are sometimes.

Over the weekend, we received an update from Dr. Samit. It started with "Finally some luck.' And then said that they did the ultrasound on Saturday and they did find a "tiny gestational sac." I'd post pics but they weren't able to send them due to "technical reasons." The gestational sac appeared a few days later than usual but according to the doc, this can happen sometimes.

He also let us know that the surrogate is on complete bed rest and they will do a scan again on Tuesday to check on further growth.

With this information in hand, we quickly resorted to Google where we found out that a small gestational sac could be a problem... that if it doesn't grow and measure properly, the pregnancy will likely not be viable... that showing up late could be an issue... and on and on.

I sent a note to the doc thanking him for the news and asking if it was indeed not as positive as we had hoped for. He quickly responded and said that actually, this is exactly what we hoped for and that the gestational sac is good news.

In our rush to figure out what this all meant and to try and put some sense to it all, we missed the fact that finding a gestational sac on the ultrasound was exactly what we should have been waiting for. Google has changed the world, for the better I think as knowledge can spread like a wildfire now. But it's also caused a bit of information overload. Case at point.

So for now we're in a good place. And we wait to hear more following the next ultrasound.

Thanks to everyone who has given their support and perspective to the situation. It's what makes sense of this entire thing.

Patience is Overrated

As you've probably gathered by now, we're taking the Apple iPhone 4 route to dealing with the waiting part of this whole process. That is, we're pretending nothing is wrong and avoiding really analyzing things day to day.

Ha.

No seriously though, things have been super busy at work and in general so time is going somewhat fast. But not fast enough. The ultrasound was done yesterday and late, late last night we got an email from the doctor saying that:

"the endometrium is thick and the blood levels are good but the gestational sac has not appeared on usg. sometimes the sac appears late. we will repeat another scan on saturday morning. no reason to panic."

Hmmm. What does this mean? It means (at the very least) that we now have to wait until sometime Saturday to get another update on this. Though we're a bit discouraged since you'd think that they should have been able to see the sac. Right?

It's been one of those days...and not necessarily the news we wanted. But, I guess we have to be patient and see what happens.

But patience, truly, is overrated.

Fireworks

It was a rainy day yesterday and the gloom made me sleepy. A big Thai dinner helped put me into a solid sleep... Until 3 a.m. when C decided to roll over and wake me up and ask me to check my email to see if we heard anything from Dr. Samit (since it was now Friday afternoon in India).

Like clockwork, we got an email at 2:22 a.m. that said we have a "good sign" and that the surrogate's beta hcg levels have more than doubled since Wednesday afternoon and are now at 64.32 miu. Yippeeee. That's the news we were waiting for. After laying in bed with my mind racing, we both eventually fell back asleep. Until the dogs decided they needed to play at 5:45 a.m.

We're excited. And nervous again. Because now that we've gotten good news, we have to wait. How long, you ask? 10 days or so. That's when good 'ol Samit will do an ultrasound to detect a potential heartbeat and gestational sac. Good news for now though, and that's all we can ask for.

It's been an interesting process thus far. We've had the most interesting signs. C having dreams of little baby girls, our favorite TV shows all the sudden focusing on babies or surrogacy (ie. Brothers and Sisters). The night we await a response from the doctor about the latest beta hcg levels, we're woken up every few hours by noise, by dogs, by C. And interestingly, C was frustrated the other night and went out to take a walk and the first thing he saw was a baby's one-piece shirt thingy laying on the ground. He turned around and came back upstairs...in a bit of shock.

I know we can't look into every little thing for a sign of hope, but there have been different things that have happened that you couldn't easily turn a blind eye to.

We're off to have a late-morning margarita shortly. It's the 4th of July weekend after all. And deep down, we have something really great to celebrate.

Happy Fourth of July.