Thursday, March 25, 2010

Encouraging Day

We had a good, long day today.

We saw the doctor this morning and had some more of our questions answered – including the fact that amniotic fluid levels do fluctuate. We asked how gestational age is measured – whether it is by how far the pregnancy is along or to what developmental size the baby is developed. Thankfully, it’s according to how far along the pregnancy is… this is important because baby A measures consistently smaller than the approximate due date. Encouraging stuff.

We also had the opportunity to go on a tour of the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) at the University of Chicago. We were really impressed! The floor we toured had 6 pods that each had room for 8 babies. The pod had several nurses attending to the babies, and each baby had either a crib or incubator in a surprisingly spacious area. We found out more about what could happen after the baby is born – in terms of procedures, where the babies will go, whether we’ll be able to see them immediately – lots of details. You might be able to tell that we’re detail-oriented with this pregnancy =), so that was encouraging for us, too. We found out that babies who are 23-24 weeks along have about a 50-50 chance of survival in this NICU; Lisa is at 26 weeks and 4 days today… and of course, the longer the pregnancy goes, the better off we’ll likely be.

In the afternoon, we had an ultrasound in which we saw that the amniotic fluid had increased for both twins – both were measuring over 3 cm each, which is quite an improvement from last week. Both their MCA levels were good – twin A’s had improved from last week – and that gave us more hope today.

All in all, a very good day today. It still ended up being 10 hours from the time we left home this morning until the time we returned, but the good news made the day seem shorter. =) We thank you SO MUCH for all your prayers and ask that you continue to lift up our girls to our incredible God and Heavenly Father. We’ve talked a lot about numbers – percentages, gestational age, weight (which we didn’t find out today – sorry!)… but we know that ultimately only one number matters: the fact that God has all the days of these girls’ lives numbered. We take the most encouragement from that truth… and yet we mysteriously do everything we can – including praying a ton – to help these girls. Thanks for joining us. =)

2 comments:

Jane Klein-Bondy said...

Hi! You don't know me, but I heard about your situation from Pastor Rick and Brittany Roeda - Pastor Rick is our Youth Pastor here in Grimsby, Ontario. We had TTTS with our twin boys and they are doing great! They are 2 1/2 and are 26, 27 lbs. We had the surgery on them at 19 weeks. I delivered at 34 weeks, 6 days. They were born at 4'5 and 4'14. When they first went into surgery, Joshua was 1/2 the weight of his brother Caleb, and had no amniotic fluid. They told us Joshua likely wouldn't make it. But through the grace of God, they both made it through surgery, and Joshua quickly got amniotic fluid and caught up in weight, now they are often "one" pound off each other. I have been praying for you and will continue too. Please, if you have any questions about anything or need encouragement - please e-mail me at klein_bondy@hotmail.com
Jane Klein-Bondy

Jane Klein-Bondy said...

BTW - it's funny - my husbands name is Jeff as well !