My perinatologist (Dr. D) called me last week and said she felt I needed to have an amnio done. This is where they take amniotic fluid out of your body with a needle and then test it. It is considered more accurate because they are actually analyzing the baby's DNA instead of my blood. I felt like we had already crossed this bridge when we got the initial diagnosis. They told us that the blood test was 99.7% accurate and his ultrasound findings are consistent with his diagnosis. I didn't feel like we needed any additional tests.
Beyond that, I feel like he isn't meant to be here on earth for very long. This understanding of who he is, is more telling to me than the medical tests. Despite this, we decided to just go ahead with the procedure. Dr. D felt like, after taking with some other doctors, that we needed to be absolutely sure before making these huge life or death decisions about his care pre and post delivery. Also, he doesn't have any massive malformations as babies with trisomy 18 often do. Me and Jason felt like it was a reasonable thing to do.
Yesterday, I talked with Dr. T about it and he agreed with me even though he feels like this diagnosis is pretty definite. He also told me that they sometimes do therapeutic amnios to relieve some of the pressure caused by the extra fluid. I was quite excited about this prospect. I have a lot of amniotic fluid and it is quite miserable. I was excited to get rid of some of it. I talked with Dr. D about this. She said they don't normally do it because there is risks involved with extracting a lot of fluid. Of course. It makes sense.
I am not very happy with Dr. T telling me this. (I am mostly kidding, because I like him so much). But I was a little sad. That being said, I would never do anything to put Eli at risk for my own comfort. I value his life much more than my own comfort and I'm sure most pregnant moms feel the same. Dr. D said that we could even have him early if I became too uncomfortable. How funny that a medical professional would say this. I just think that being uncomfortable is such a minor problem. I think about people who have chronic pain. They don't have a purpose behind the pain like I do. That must be incredible hard to deal with... no end in sight without a seemingly important reason behind it.
I didn't particularly enjoy the procedure, but it was really ok. We are supposed to get the results in 12 days or so. One thing it will tell us that the blood test didn't, is what type of trisomy 18 he has. There are three types (with 95% of them being full trisomy). The type of trisomy doesn't necessarily affect their prognosis, so it doesn't matter a great deal. It is just additional info. I don't think I will be preoccupied with this. I'll let you know.
They did a full ultrasound prior to the amnio. I didn't know they were going to do this. I have an ultrasound scheduled for next week which they cancelled. I am kind of sad about it because we were going to take the kids to that ultrasound. Katelyn has especially been looking forward to it. I didn't want to take them the amnio for obvious reasons. Had I known they were going to do an ultrasound prior to, I would have brought them anyways and had them sit out in the hall when they pulled the needles out. We do have another one scheduled for Oct. 6, so its not too far away. Here is what they saw on ultrasound:
Growth: He is in the 10th percentile. This is as good as we can hope for. He was at the same percentile last time we had an ultrasound. So he is basically measuring 2 weeks behind.
Fluid: Mine was 24. Normal is 1-20. They expect this and wouldn't have me deliver based on this finding alone.
Placenta: They usually check this and they didn't this time. I didn't realize it until after we left. I think I was too focused on the amnio. I am assuming its fine because he is still growing reasonably well.
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