The Scary Side Of The 2nd Trimester

Man, oh man. This second trimester has been a DOOZEY! It’s been filled with so many ups and down and has honestly just been such an emotional roller coaster! In the beginning of the second trimester I had just been SO stressed out because my OB/GYN office had been giving me the run around with testing. Basically, I was supposed to get my first trimester screening done before I turned 13 weeks and 6 days. Well, this was also during the holidays so people had called out and my 12 week appointment got rescheduled for the next week. The next week comes along, I go to my appointment and they realized they never rescheduled the actual screening. As luck would have it, we had a pretty intense snow storm coming the next day , Thursday, which was going to be week 13 & day 6. All of the offices were closing because of the anticipated snow storm. So they were trying to get me to go on that Friday (start of week 14) to a different office to see if I could get the screening done since they were also all booked up. Not that it would have mattered because it was already too late and I missed the first trimester window, and yes the tests are that time sensitive. They basically wanted to have me go to another office to see if they could get any kind of reading but it was going to be a waste of time.

First of all, not only did they want me to go to the other office for the screening but they also then wanted me to go back to their office later with some paperwork I’d receive and to also do bloodwork. Keep in mind I would also have been with my 2 year old during this nonsense run around. So I obviously said no and told them I would just get the Cell Free DNA testing done because it would have covered all of my tests that I hadn’t gotten done (and since I was super impatient I would also get to find out the gender of the baby early). Well that was also a mess trying to coordinate because when I called my insurance company they told me that if it wasn’t medically necessary we might have to pay more for it, but they wouldn’t be able to tell us just yet. So now I’m a frantic mess, panicking because I have no idea about the state of health of this baby. So I start venting my frustration to Stephen, bless his soul. After flipping out for like 15 minutes straight he tells me the tests don’t really matter because regardless we are still keeping this baby and reminded me that back in the day they didn’t even do so many tests. He reminds me it’s strictly informational and doesn’t change anything. Then I had a moment of reflection because he was completely right. Don’t get me wrong, these tests are completely helpful when it comes to being informed about your child’s health, and deciding what steps to take if there is something really wrong. It’s just nice to know ahead of time for proper planning purposes.

I’ve mentioned before that I ALWAYS need to know things ahead of time for planning purposes. Nothing makes me more anxious than not having a plan for things, especially when it has to do with a child. After talking things through with Stephen I was left feeling reassured. Ultimately the most important things are that I am pregnant and we are having a baby, everything else can be dealt with. My plan at that point was to just wait for my fetal survey (which usually happens between weeks 16-18) and then if they noticed any abnormalities I would just get the Cell Free DNA testing done then since it would be medically necessary.

SO, now it is around week 17 and its time for my fetal survey, which is just an ultrasound that will check on the baby in more detail so that every limb, organ etc. gets evaluated. This is my favorite ultrasound because it is the longest one and you just get to stare at every inch of your baby on a big screen! So here I am on a Tuesday morning getting my fetal survey done, happy as EVER.  I am watching my baby dance around and checking out her nice long legs and adorable face. At this point I don’t know the gender of the baby. I told the ultrasound technician that I didn’t want to know either because we were having a gender reveal party, so she later comes back with an envelope that has the gender on it and I’m super thrilled. Then the doctor comes in to check the baby out herself and I ask her how everything was looking and how the baby was doing and she says “everything looks great but…”.

These are words that NO parent ever wants to hear. I just remember feeling absolutely terrified and anxious in that moment. The doctor says “everything looks great but we are seeing a calcium deposit in the baby’s heart and that is usually a soft marker for Down Syndrome, we will need to do further testing”. At this point I am beside myself, completely filled with so much sadness and confusion and of course just start crying. I had absolutely no idea what any of this meant so I had asked her to explain in detail what the odds were, what next steps we had to take and what effect this would have on our baby’s heart. She then says that although it is a soft marker for Down Syndrome, calcium in the heart is also common and can turn out to be nothing. Then we start talking about the Cell Free DNA testing because at this point it is medically necessary and I plan on getting it done. She leaves the room and I am just sitting there, just so sad at the thought that there could be anything wrong with the baby at all. I then start feeling super guilty for being so sad because I should be feeling grateful and happy that I am even pregnant at all.

I call Stephen because he couldn’t make it to the appointment that day and I can barely even talk about it because I’m just crying the whole time. Pregnancy hormones will be the death of me I swear. Anyways I should preface this by saying that I always get mad at Stephen for his initial responses to things because he can be negative sometimes. We are opposite in the sense that I am an extreme optimist and he’s a realist (borderline pessimist lol). It’s a great balance because it gives me the reality check that I need because life isn’t all rainbows and butterflies. But still, I get mad at him for always being the realist that he is and at times bursting my bubble. So I call him to tell him what’s going on, expecting him to be negative, stressed and freak out. Instead, I was met with SUCH optimism! I have never, in my whole 9 years of being with Stephen, ever dealt with him being THAT positive about anything lol. Throughout our conversation I went from utter sadness to laughter. He was reassuring me that it doesn’t even matter and that great he/she would be. He talked about how much love we would still have for him/her and how much of a great life the baby would have. He kept cracking jokes about how spoiled she would be and all of the fun activities we would get her into. He was just so sure and optimistic. I was absolutely amazed. He was just so happy to be having another baby and nothing was going to get in the way of that. It makes a world of difference to have someone by your side who can snap you out of the depth of your emotions.

We hang up the phone and I get bloodwork done and I wait for the longest week of my life to get those results. I won’t lie my hormones got the best of me a few more times that week of course. But it was more guilt than sadness. I would go from being sad to straight up guilt because at the end of the day I was still going to have a baby and it would be the biggest blessing of my life regardless. One day I was talking to Stephen about my guilt and he was telling me that he read a ton of mom blogs with similar stories and that it turned out to be fine and that it would probably just go away and that even if the baby did have Down Syndrome everything would still be okay. Besides him being so sweet I was dying at the fact that he read mom blogs, he is the absolute cutest HAHAHA, idk why I thought that was so funny! He was just trying so hard to relate to me and find positive things to say, I was so grateful for him in that moment. Every once in a while I realize just how truly blessed I am for having him.

Well that weekend, Saturday, was actually our gender reveal party. Our gender reveal party was absolutely amazing and filled with so much love. We found out we were having a girl and we were just SOOOOOO extremely happy! I just remember seeing that one little piece of pink confetti and being so happy and in such disbelief. I wrote a whole post about it already so check that out of you haven’t!  Anyways about a week and a half goes by and I’m at Marshalls shopping, picking up some toys for Asher and cute dresses for baby girl. I am finally at the register and while getting rung up I get the call (of all inconvenient places lol). So I am now frantically getting my crap together and walk over to a corner. They tell me that everything came back NORMAL and that we have one healthy baby!! Naturally I start sobbing haha because apparently that’s all I do. I can’t even explain how HAPPY I was and relieved and guilty again and back to happy. I call Stephen and he’s just so calm and happy haha. I think that aside from Asher’s birth and of course getting married, that that was the best day of my life.

 Anyways, all is well with baby! She has been kicking and dancing every chance she gets. I got a 3D ultrasound of her absolutely adorable little face and I am even more in love! I will be posting more details about the second trimester in a follow up post since this post is longer than I intended it to be. So excited to share more of this journey with you all <3

XOXO