20 Weeks

Time has been marching along.  Sorry I haven't posted, but I really haven't had much to say.  This has always been an infertility blog for me, so posting pregnancy related news, or non-news, seems foreign.

Since I hit 20 weeks, I thought I would post an update for anyone who still follows along.  I had thought about a 12 week, 14 week, 16 week and 18 week update, but I guess they just never happened.

Things have been relatively uneventful.  When I wrote a few months ago, I had just completed a mild bleeding episode.  And that was the last of the blood.  For the most part, my toilet paper inspections have yielded nothing out of the ordinary.

In early October my kids came down with slapc.heek, also called Fif.th's Disease.  It's a common virus among children where their cheeks look bright bright red and my kids also got rashes on their arms and legs.  For those of you who have dogs, it's also parvovirus (I thought, "great, my kids caught a virus that I vaccinate my dog against!").  Anyway, apparently this virus is cause for concern if you're pregnant because it can impact something relating to blood with the baby, potentially requiring a blood transfusion to the fetus.  Sounds scary, but didn't seem to be that big a deal because it's common to get when you're a kid and then you're immune.  My first blood test indicated that I have never been exposed, so I had a follow up test a few weeks ago which also showed that I hadn't been exposed.  Thank goodness.  I believe my OB's words were, "I've never had a patient with this condition, and I don't want you to be the first."  No kidding.

Running is still great.  I usually run 3 1/2 to 4 miles a day, 5-7 days a week, and when I have more time or rest, I'll go 5 or 6, but it's not that often because I can get pretty tired later in the day.  I don't know how long I will be able to keep this up for, so I will enjoy it while I can.  All my pregnancies have been at different times of the year (December, August, and now April due dates), and I've never been visibly pregnant and running during the cold season, so I don't have any running pants.  I've tried some yoga pants, but haven't found anything good.  For now my normal running pants are very old and stretched out, so I can still wear them and not care if I ruin them, but my Nike capris (with nice wide waist bands) are getting rather tight.  And I'm too cheap to go spend a bunch of money on something I may only wear for two months.  Must find cheap yoga pants that can double as running pants while I can still run, or lounge/walking pants when I'm done.  Please pass on any advice.  :)

Lastly, I had my anatomy scan this morning.  The baby was confirmed to be a girl, which is cool but scary (OMG, 3 girls!), but then again, I would be scared with a boy too (they're so squirty!).  At my NT scan in September, the doctor got a good shot and predicted girl (70% certainty), so it wasn't a surprise, but it was nice to be confirmed.

The baby's head is measuring small - maybe by about a week, so still within the normal range - but I need to go back in a couple of weeks to make sure that she just has a small head and doesn't have any developmental issues.  This pregnancy is keeping me on my toes.  I am trying to locate my ultrasound reports from my other children to see where they measured, but I guess the best thing to do is just wait and see.  The doctor didn't seem concerned, but just wanted to confirm.

Anyway, that's about it for now.  I do want to write at some point about the commercialization of infertility clinics.  One clinic has a lot of commercials on the news station that I list to, and I thought, "well, of course, they are a private clinic", but then one morning I turned on the TV to check on the status of a local transit strike and saw that my clinic (which is affiliated with the local university) was sponsoring the news ticker!  I guess there's a lot of competition for patients, especially when insurance isn't involved, but it just surprised me since I always considered my time at the clinic to be very private, personal and confidential (not that advertising made any difference in the way they treat you).

Work is beckoning, so I will sign off.  I hope all is well with everyone.  I do still read, but don't comment as often.  That's mostly due to the fact that I've had to increase my sleep!