First visit with the Ob/Gyn

Our carrier "graduated" from the fertility clinic and is now seeing a new ob/gyn.  On Thursday, she established care and had another ultrasound at the new office and this time her husband videotaped the ultrasound for us!!  The baby sitting lower in her uterus was easy to see from the get-go and his heart was just fluttering away like crazy.  It was a good profile shot so his head and little stubby appendages were visible and looked just like the pics I've seen online for 9 week old embryos.  The baby sitting higher in the uterus took them a bit longer to get a decent shot but I could sort of make him out; not as clearly as the first one though.

According to our carrier, this appointment was VERY awkward but they were kind, they listened and gave easy to understand information.  This is a new ob/gyn for her so when she initially set up the appt with the nurse, the nurse started to ask her all about her medical history assuming that she was the biological mother and also about the fathers history.  Obviously she didn't know this info right off hand and so she had to explain to the nurse this unique situation.  The nurse and our carrier had a good laugh on the phone about it all and I'm sure the ob/gyn office will find their new patient quite interesting.

Our carrier has confidence in the OB since she has experience with twins and also because she is not a proponent of interventions without evidence backed practice which sits well with her (and with me).  We'll likely have more ultrasound scans with the twins because while fundal height (a measure of the size of her uterus to assess fetal growth and development) is a good indicator of growth for a singlet, it doesn't give a clear picture of whether twins are growing like they should.  They will keep an eye on the placentas as they develop and since there is a higher chance of gestational diabetes due to the extra placental hormones, they will also closely monitor her blood-sugar levels.

Overall, the OB was optimistic about the pregnancy, happy with her weight gain and blood pressure and felt good with the records of her other pregnancies.  Everything is going well!

She now has a first trimester screening (blood work and a high quality scan) on December 4th so hopefully we can get some pics to share on this blog and then a regular OB visit on December 12th.

8 Week Ultrasound

Our carrier had another ultrasound today and she told me that the doctor was able to see both babies right away and that they are measuring right on at 8 weeks; 8 weeks 4 days for one of them and the other at 8 weeks 0 days.  Not sure why there is a four day difference since insemination and transfer all happened at the same time but I guess the one guy is just a hair bigger.

On the ultrasound, the baby on the left was laying on his back and the other seemed to be standing up on the right side of her uterus.  Our carrier said that they look like little sea monkeys with stubby appendages; cute sea monkeys of course.

The doctor at the fertility clinic said that everything looked great and that our carrier will now "graduate" to her regular ob/gyn.  Her first ob appointment is on Nov. 11th which I think will be fairly uneventful; should just be establishing care, no testing.

I was hoping to hear about the heart rate of the twins but apparently no value was given, the report only stated that "cardiac activity" was observed.  Kind of frustrating really but hopefully we can get some numbers at the appointment next week.  The normal fetal heart rate ranges from 120-180 beats per minute (adults average 80-85 bpm) so as long we're in that range, I'll start to worry less about any potential miscarriage.

The next ultrasound will be at 12 weeks when the first trimester ends so there likely won't be any updates on the blog until then unless something major happens.