Ultrasound Unsensored

When my husband & I decided to get a midwife this time around, it was with the greatest desire to be free from medical interventions and the pressuring fear mongering that's associated with it, not just during labor & delivery, but throughout the pregnancy too.  It really has been a fairly ideal experience thus far with our chosen midwife. She is very non-invasive when it comes to exams. She hasn't even touched my privates yet, and the pregnancy is half over. That's more than I can say about my first pregnancy prenatal exams. In fact, she didn't even require me to prove my pregnancy when I first saw her, with any such urine or blood test. I could've just pretended, and she would've never known...until the next couple appointments when she would've tried to listen for a heartbeat, of course.  She did eventually do a blood test to check my nutrient levels and a rule out possible viruses, as is her standard procedure. My results came back fine, with only a slight vitamin D deficiency, which is actually not a surprising find considering we live in the cloudy northwest, and it's the middle of winter. I tacked on a D3 supplement to my daily prenatal vitamins.

There are a few procedures that providers are required to offer their patients, and those include a couple of genetic tests for cystic fibrosis as well as down syndrome. As with my first pregnancy, we already knew we would opt out of these tests. Reason being, I don't need the stress of worrying about freaky test results concerning my baby's health.  And we also both agree that we didn't want to do any invasive or risky tests like the amniocentesis that pricks a hole in your uterus to test amniotic fluid for signs of down syndrome. We said no to all of these, most specifically because we were told our insurance might not cover those types of tests, and besides, if we were getting the recommended 20 week ultrasound, most of these things would be detected then.

Sabina's 20 Week Ultrasound

We didn't have to do the ultrasound.  It was up to us, our midwife said, but we wanted to for a number of reasons. One, we just wanted reassurance that everything with our baby was developing fine, and two, we wanted to make sure of the number of babies I'm carrying, and of course the most popular reason, to find out the gender. We wanted to be able to prepare, and part of that preparation is being motivated by discovering just who is in there. It's where I felt my connection and relationship with Sabina began to blossom, when I found out she was a girl and saw her beautiful profile. That was by far one of the top most exciting days of my pregnancy with her, along with the baby shower and her birthday.  We left happy, unable to wipe the grins off our faces as we imagined our precious little girl, and saw a clear vision of our future for the first time.

It's a Boy!

The one thing about our midwife is that she doesn't perform her own ultrasounds. She sent us out to another facility to have ours done. Little did I know, it was actually at a hospital in a neighboring city. It started out really pleasant with the preparation and such.  I was happy they let my daughter in with my husband so she could see the baby too.  And the ultrasound tech who did my whole ultrasound was really nice, telling me all the things she was doing, and keeping the conversation light and positive. We were asked if we wanted to know the sex beforehand, to which we said yes, and surprisingly only a couple minutes into the exam, she rolls over the baby's bum and says "and you're definitely having a little boy!" Oh my god. I cannot tell you how thrilled that made me feel. We both gasped and I reached out and grabbed Mike's hand. We were perfectly keen on the idea that another girl would be fun for Sabina to have a little sister, and we could reuse all her pink girlie baby stuff again, but both of us wanted a boy. I mean, naturally, since we already have a girl. Don't ever get me wrong. I'm so incredibly happy I have the little girl I so wanted to dress up cute in pretty dresses and watch blossom into a beautiful young lady and eventually be the mother of the bride and watch her get married, and I hope we remain close throughout her life. But there is just something different about having a boy that sends chills through me.  I knew Mike wanted a son, and I always wanted him to have one, but there was more to it for me than that. I just wanted to be able to experience that relationship that is so precious with mothers & sons. Boys love, respect and protect their moms.  I wanted that. We were in awe, on cloud nine, unable to believe our luck that we got our boy.

Baby Boy's 20 Week Ultrasound

It couldn't have been much more than maybe fifteen minutes before the perfect image of our new baby boy came crashing down on our heads. It was when the doctor came in to analyze our ultrasound results. As soon as she asked me if I'd had any complications with my first pregnancy, I knew she was about to point out some possibly discouraging things.  I told her no, my pregnancy with Sabina was surprisingly great. At that, she gelled up my belly and began to show us several things she found wrong with our baby. One: his legs measured just slightly shorter than average.  But then she looked at my husband and wrote that off as being part of his smaller Asian genes. The second thing she found was that our baby's umbilical cord was attached in a place that made it more difficult for him to receive the appropriate amount of nutrients, and she said this could lead to him not gaining enough weight and having to be delivered early.  She proceeded to tell me I needed to eat a lot of meat and cheese (I'm vegan, so I gagged a little). The third thing was more complicated, she said. It was a condition related to the kidneys in which they didn't seem to be emptying in to the bladder efficiently or as fast as other babies at that age. She called it Mild Bilateral Pyelectasis or Hydronephrosis.  She tried to remind us that all these issues often correct themselves before birth, but the thing that came out of her mouth next was the bomb that popped my baby boy balloon and sent me spiraling south into the pit of despair.  What each of these conditions she mentioned have in common is that they're all associated with the chromosomal abnormality, Down Syndrome.

Down Syndrome. 

3D Ultrasound image of our boy kicking back in utero

That's all I could focus on thereafter. I only just found out moments earlier that we were having a little baby boy. A son. His future had already flashed through our minds, and we were ecstatic at the idea of sharing this news with friends & family. Then we are shot down with the devastating possibility that our son will spend his entire life in special needs care, and never even have a chance at the future we imagined for him. It was utterly heartbreaking. I agreed to a blood test for Down Syndrome detection, and then learned we have to wait for the results for two weeks. Still, I had to make an appointment to come back for a follow up ultrasound at 32 weeks gestation to see if these conditions improve at all. I was hurled right back into the medical world with fears and threats I never wanted to have about my pregnancy. We left the hospital with our hearts in our shoes, and remained in a depressed funk for the remainder of the day and sleepless night.  I am so crushed and completely furious that they ruined a very special day for us. I didn't feel excited anymore. I didn't want to update the baby registry with cute little boy things, as I'd previously planned to do after the ultrasound. I lost the excitement of picking out baby names. I didn't want to share the news with anyone. Neither of us did. We just weren't feeling it anymore. We decided not to utter a word about it until after we get our results in 2 weeks. The scary news completely slammed us. Now, no matter what the outcome is, I will always remember the day I found out I was having a boy as one of the most heartbreaking days of my life.

UPDATE: Test results for down syndrome negative! We have been to the 32 week followup appointment now as well, and our boy is growing fine.  His kidneys are still not functioning normally, but we are not worried about his prognosis.  I'm still on the road with a healthy pregnancy, but due to our unnecessarily stressful experience at that first ultrasound, along with a few other patients with that same type of experience, our midwife is no longer opting to send her patients to that particular clinic anymore.  Glad we could help others not experience that kind of pain, at least!!!