Guess What??

We’re expecting again!!!! I am happy to announce that I am 13 weeks pregnant, due September 17th. Keith and I found out on January 10th, which means we’ve been sitting on the news for quite some time now. Before this weekend, I’d only told my 2 close friends (one of whom called me out at dinner when I didn’t order a drink, so I had to spill it to her!) and my cousin. We had originally debated waiting until Easter to tell our families so that we could do it in person. However, I will be 19 weeks by then and we thought that might be a little too long to keep it to ourselves. Plus, by that point I wouldn’t even have to say anything…my belly would be obvious enough! Since I couldn’t do it in person, I decided to surprise them on Saturday with an email with our ultrasound photos and the prego pics we’ve taken so far. Needless to say, they are pretty gung-ho!

Right now I’m feeling really good. Physically, I’ve felt my energy levels returning in the past 2 weeks, and the nauseous, “blech” feeling I had for about 5 weeks is gone. I should probably enjoy this honeymoon period of not really feeling pregnant or uncomfortable. Emotionally, I’ve felt a wave of sentiments, as one can imagine. There have been moments of fear and trepidation. I don’t think I’ll ever have the fortune of being naïve or blissfully unaware of the possibility of complications from now on. But overall I’ve felt really positive. This past week Keith and I went back to Independence to do the first trimester screening. Because we just moved to Springfield, my new doctor’s office didn’t think they could get me in on time for this (it has to be done between 11 weeks 1 day and 13 weeks 6 days). The screening consists of a perinatal ultrasound and a blood test. The ultrasound measures the nuchal fold, a pocket of fluid behind the baby’s neck. Anything over a certain measurement could indicate an abnormality. Our measurements, we were told, were in a healthy range, and everything else looked good (praise the Lord!). We won’t have the results of the blood test until the end of this week, or possibly next week. Once they have both results, they are combined to give us our risk (high or low) of having a baby with Down’s Syndrome, Trisomy 13 or Trisomy 18. Though this screening does not give a guaranteed yes or no diagnosis, it is said to detect 91% of Down’s Syndrome cases and 95% of Trisomy 13 and Trisomy 18 cases. Therefore, we’re hopeful that if our blood results are negative there’s a good chance that everything is just fine. Until I get that phone call all we can do is pray, pray, PRAY!

So that’s our big news. Whew, it feels good to finally let it out publicly! I’ll end with the pics that I sent our family. The first ultrasound is from our first appointment back in January. The other two are from Friday. The first of those is a profile shot, and the other one shows the baby looking at us. Enjoy!






Love,
Ashley