The world keeps on turning

My obstetrician has been great throughout this process. She pulled strings to get me in quickly for the invasive diagnostic test cvs sampling which is a procedure that involves extracting tissue from the placenta. It will tell me with 100% certainty whether our baby is affected by Down syndrome.
The procedure carries a 2% risk of miscarriage but I no longer pay heed to percentages anymore. When your unlucky enough to be the 1 in 90 affected by Down’s all that goes out the window. You realise there is no rhyme or reason to anything. Of course i don’t want to put my baby at risk, nobody would, but it’s where I found myself.
I was so nervous about the procedure itself. They use a long needle to extract fluid through the belly or vaginally like a Pap smear. Depending on where the placenta lies they decide which method is deemed better access from looking at the ultrasound. My placenta was lying low so they accessed vaginally.
They did a ultrasound prior to measure the nuchal fold which was 2.5 which apparently isn’t an alarming number in itself. They weren’t sure they could make out a nasal bone or that it wasn’t as distinct as the bones of the rest of the face but said that could of been because I’m only 11.5 weeks and often it’s not visible till 12.5 weeks. She said the scan was inconclusive. I both hate and love that these results have given me a sliver of hope.
I’ll get results back from cvs test in 48 hours. These results are preliminary called FISH but are still diagnostic and will tell me with certainty whether she is affected. I understand that more detailed results due in 7-10 days.
Emotionally how do I feel? I think I’ve come to the stage where I feel numb. I don’t even have the words. I’ve spent a lot of time researching downs the past few days. I’ve hardly left my house. I had my daughters kindergarten orientation the morning of our diagnosis. That was hard but I had to pull myself together. It’s my 41st birthday tomorrow. Yesterday my husbands family put on a nice lunch for me which was lovely. I put on a brave face. His family doesn’t know we are pregnant although I think they suspect it.
I haven’t told anyone about what is happening except for my best friend who cried on the phone with me and another good friend of mine. I told work that I was having complications with the baby and left it at that for now. One of my best friends had a baby yesterday. A little girl and she is so cute. I don’t know if I can go see her though. Does that make me a bad person?
I’ve been trying to sleep the day and night away hoping it eases the pain but there’s no escape from this. She reminds me often that she’s there growing inside of me, with her nausea and tiredness she still creates for me. My daughter just wants to be close to me and is climbing on top of me in bed a lot, maybe unknowingly wanting to be near her sister too. My husband is quiet. The sky pours with rain but once again the world keeps on turning unawares.

A million pieces of me…

My obstetrician called me at 6:30 in the morning and asked me to come in to discuss harmony test results first thing. I went in and she said the results said 99% chance of Down syndrome. I asked how accurate they were and she said accurate. I asked if the percentages vary as it does when you get a probability based on an ultrasound and blood test but she said no it’s the nature of the test.
Due to these tests still being screening and not diagnostic she suggested doing a cvs test which I’m doing today. It’s pretty much to just confirm findings and said I should prepare myself accordingly. She said she’d be very surprised if the test read as a false positive.
I had an ultrasound done in her clinic to check for heart beat and my heart sank. I saw her there, so tiny but so much a baby now. She was jumping around and kicking away. So much life. My heart broke like I never could of imagined it capable.
I also know now that it’s a girl. I wasn’t going to ask my ob but I couldnt help myself and I snuck a look at the results. I shouldn’t of.
My daughter asked why I am so sad. I said mummy is just a bit sad as I have to go the doctors today. She replied with ‘but mummy you always get needles and you are always brave.’ That much is true. Not today though. My heart sinks at the thought of seeing her on the ultrasound again.
My husband, my daughter and I were in the car and somehow she brought up the topic of babies. She talked about how she’s going to have a baby sister and I just broke. There’s a million pieces of me now.

Devastated

Just got my results from our harmony test and am devastated. Results came back positive and/ or high risk for Down syndrome. I knew we would be high risk considering my age but can’t believe this is truly happening. It’s not diagnostic but considered pretty accurate. We see our obstetrician as soon as possible to discuss it further but in the mean time I’m a complete mess. Devastated doesn’t even come close. I think the next step will be diagnostic testing.
Probably clutching at straws but has anyone heard of false positives with this test?

10 weeks 5 days

Well here I am.

I had our first appointment with the obstetrician yesterday, the same one who delivered our daughter 4.5 years ago. She did an ultrasound and I saw the fluttering heartbeat. I exhaled a little. I told her how anxious I was feeling this time around and she acknowledged it but she’s not the type to utter reassurances. She’s pretty straight forward and more of a ‘get the job done’ type of person which is fine and I think actually calms me down a bit.
She organised all the scans and blood tests I would need and said she would induce me at 38 weeks of I hadn’t given birth by then. This came as a surprise and she explained it’s to minimise the risk of still birth with me being over 40 and 41 at the time I’ll be giving birth. This freaked me out a little. Apparently from 38 weeks gestation the risk increases with each passing week. Here I was thinking we could relax after our 12 week screening.
On the advice of our fertility specialist we had a harmony test done this week. It’s a non invasive blood test that screens for chromosome abnormalities 21, 18 and 13 and also tests for x & Y chromosome. It’s a test done from 10 weeks gestation. It has a higher abnormality detection rate then the standard ultrasound and blood tests carried about between 11 and 13 weeks. It is still just a screening method not a diagnostic one like the more invasive tests. We are hoping and praying for a low risk result coming through from our test. I’d really hate to have to go through with an invasive test considering the chances of miscarriage associated with the procedures. It seems I’m getting ahead of myself though…typical!
Our obstetrician asked our daughter, who I had with me at the appointment whether she wanted a little brother or sister. I had meant to discreetly mention to the doc that we hadn’t discussed the pregnancy with her yet and were holding off till we get results from the screening. A little late for that now as she instantly had a million questions for me.
Is there really a baby in your tummy mummy?
See I told you there was a baby in there.
Mummy I would really like a little baby sister.
Mummy how long till the baby is here?
I couldn’t help but smile at her she was so excited but I was a little annoyed at the doctor.
The pessimist in me is still so frightened of losing this baby. I don’t want to jinx this pregnancy in anyway. I’ve even been reluctant to blog the past few weeks through fear of a jinx. Saying it out loud makes me realise how pessimistic I really sound.
There was tears today when I spoke to a girlfriend about the appointment and about her plan of inducing me and the still born risk. I just want to be able to exhale. When will that be. This is harder than I thought it would be.
I’m so grateful, beyond grateful really that I’ve been blessed with this pregnancy, but I’m equally as frightened. This I didn’t expect so much.
Just have to take it day by day, look for the good in everything and trust that all is as it should be.
Much love and light to you all xx