I'm still here!

Thanks to my peeps who have emailed or commented to check on me :). It's been over a week since my last post which has been due to a threefold scenario: 1) insanely busy at work, 2) naptime and 3) waiting to post until I had my full NT screen results.

To elaborate:

Work: The powers that be have set our sales projections for the 4th quarter (Jan/Feb/March) to be higher than the projections for the 3Q (Oct/Nov/Dec). So, even though we blew the projections out of the water for 3Q, now things are a disaster. There is no way any company would have better sales in the post-holiday quarter, no matter the industry -- people don't buy things in January and February. They pay off their credit card bills from November and December. This is especially true for big ticket items, like computers, which is my industry. This is doubly annoying because our bonuses are directly tied to whether we meet projections. I feel like the execs purposely set the projections unrealistically high so that we couldn't meet them and therefore would not get bonuses YET AGAIN. I know, I know, I should just be grateful to have a good job in this economy and, believe me, having grown up with a dad who never worked and a proud mom who was forced to buy our groceries with food stamps, I DO appreciate it. I'm just mad at the fat cats of the company who admit they pay us less than the industry standard because the bonus program is "so generous", but then don't give us said bonuses for possibly two years running now. Anyhow, even though we worked like dogs in the holiday season and posted our best sales numbers in two years, now we've being warned of possible layoffs and no bonuses because of these unattainable projections and the result is us working like dogs again, trying to get more and more aggressive sales up on the web. Oh well, I'm still happy to have a job :).

Naptime: As far as naptime goes, same old story. Eating like a horse (and, oh, is my waistline showing it!) and craving naps like crazy. Happy for these continued signs that Bug is doing well. I have to say that I've had it pretty easy, the nausea - which was never very bad - is totally gone. My one RL friend who knows about my IF trials and tribulations has always said that since I had such a hard time getting pregnant, that she was gambling that when/if I did (and it stuck) that I'd have an easy time. Unlike her, who got pregnant instantly and was sick as a dog the whole time. IFers revenge!

1T screen: now, on to the meaty stuff: the NT screen aka 1st Trimester screening. DH and I went in to the hospital where we're planning on delivering next fall. They have a very well-respected prenatal genetics department and in case the results led us to choose to have a CVS, I wanted to go to one of the best places in the city. For those who haven't had one, the 1st trimester screen combines an ultrasound and blood work and along with your age, gives you a modified risk for select chromosomal abnormalities, rather than the default age risk. The ultrasound measures the fluid at the back of the fetus' neck, the nuchal transparency. It should, ideally, be between 0.0-2.2mm, with the range of 2.2-3.0mm being kind of a grey area. Levels higher than 3.0mm raise your risk significantly for Down's and other issues. The blood work measures PAPP-A (Pregnancy Associated Plasma Protein A, produced by the placenta) and HCG. PAPP-A is significantly reduced in the blood of women carrying fetuses with Down syndrome and Trisomy 18: the median MoMs are 0.44 and 0.32, respectively (compared to 1.0 for unaffected fetuses). As for HCG, serum levels of hCG tend to be high in patients carrying a fetus affected with Down syndrome. The median concentration for free Beta hCG in the blood of women carrying fetuses with Down syndrome, measured as a multiple of the median (MoM), is 1.9 (compared to 1.0 for unaffected fetuses). Phew, OK - so basically you want, ideally, your NT measurement to be below 2.2mm, your PAPP-A to be higher than 1.0 MoM and your HCG to be lower than 1.0 MoM.

Anyway, based on my age (39) alone, my risk for abnormalities was a flat 1/60 according to my testing center. Blech, definitely higher than other places report for a 39-year-old, but I'd rather err on the worse odds than be given false hope. We thought that since our initial meeting with the genetic counselor was last Wednesday, when I was exactly 11 weeks, that it would just be a talk and then maybe I'd come back this week to do the NT scan, as most people seem to have the 1T tests @ 12 weeks. But lo and behold, they said that 11 weeks was fine and I could get it done right away and did I want to? Duh!! Turn down a peek at Bug and get this worrisome hurdle done sooner? You bet! So we went right in for the ultrasound.

The u/s tech was great and found Bug right away -- abdominally!! She kept saying Bug was adorable and when I accused her, jokingly, of saying that to all the girls, she grabbed me arm and insisted "No, I actually don't. Some of them are NOT adorable!", LOL. I got scared at first because I couldn't immediately see a heartbeat flicker on the screen (does the skin become less transparent at this point?) but then I saw that Bug was waving his/her little arms and legs around and looked just great. The tech left to get the doctor, who would be the one to do the actual NT measurement. The doctor came in, was also great and measured the NT at 1.0mm. Perfect! She said it was as good as it gets because the baby does need some fluid at the back of the beck, so 1.0mm at 11weeks is spot on. Phew!!!! In addition, Bug measured at 11w5d, so a good 5 days ahead. Yippee!!

We then gave blood and just got the results of that this morning. My PAPP-A was 1.45 MoM (great) and my HCG was 1.45 MoM which is fine, well below the median though a little less spectacular, however she did warn us that since this was initially a twin pregnancy, to expect my HCG to be artificially elevated. But the important part of all this is that my individual risk has now been adjusted from 1/60 to 1/1,000 for chromosomal problems. Yay!

We still think that we'll do an amnio around 15 weeks. Given my history of losses, I really would like 100% reassurance so that I can, hopefully, settle down and enjoy this pregnancy. But we're very happy to be able to skip the much riskier CVS and take a break for a few weeks before the amnio.

My pending-cartwheel list is getting close to the end. Just two more! I'm certainly not 100% relaxed yet, but I'm started to believe a little bit more each day.

1. Beta #1 (12/29 - 13dpo): 242 - check!
2. Beta #2 (1/2 - 17dpo): 1,206 - check!
3. Beta #3 (1/7 - 22dpo): 8,848 - check!
4. Ultrasound #1 (1/13): 6 weeks - check!
5. Ultrasound #2 (1/20) - 7 weeks - check!
6. Ultrasound #3 (1/29) - 8w2d - check!
7. Ultrasound #4 (2/10) - 10 weeks. I have never made it this far before. - check!
8. First appt with OBGYN (2/11) - 10w1d - check!
9. Genetic counseling + 1st trimester screening (2/17) - check! (risk reduced to 1/1,000)
10. Viability ultrasound 13 weeks (3/4) - somehow I swindled this u/s out of my OB
11. Amnio @ 15 weeks (@ 3/17)

Finally, I have some awesome awards I've been kindly given over the past couple of weeks. I appreciate them greatly and haven't forgotten! I'm going to try to post in reply to those later this week and pass on the awards to the many deserving ladies!