Wednesday, July 25, 2007

7 days & counting.... Jacob's Story

I've written Jacob's story and next week a shortened version should go up on the http://www.kidswithheart.org/ website for his first birthday. I'm going to share the story in parts over the next few days since it is kind of long... Part one follows:

Jacob's Story

Jeff and I had been married for about 2 and a half years when we decided we were ready to start a family. We got pregnant in November. Towards the end of November, and beginning of December, I felt different, and I thought I might be pregnant. On Saturday, December 3, I took a home pregnancy test, and it was positive! I showed Jeff the test and had to explain the results as he woke up Saturday morning and needless to say, he was thrilled. We surprised our parents at Christmas with our big news. In January, we told our friends and family.

On March 8, we had an ultrasound and found out we were having a baby boy. We were very happy and had already picked out a name, Jacob. At the March 8 ultrasound, Jacob was in a funny position and they could not get a clear view of his heart. The ultrasound technician mentioned that they may send me back for another ultrasound to try to view the heart at a later time. I had my next OB appointment a week later, but it was hurried, and I forgot to ask about the ultrasound. At my April appointment, I asked the doctor about the ultrasound. He hurriedly went over it with me. I asked him about the heart not being visualized clearly. He said since there was no family history of heart problems, that a repeat ultrasound would not be necessary. Of course, we had no reason to suspect anything unusual, so we did not press the issue.

The remainder of my pregnancy was very normal. It was quite a hot summer, but I managed by drinking milkshakes whenever I could! In July, by 36 weeks, Jacob had "dropped" into position, and one of my doctors said that meant I probably would not go past my due date of August 11. At my 37 week appointment on July 26, I was 2 cm dilated, 80% effaced, and Jacob had dropped from negative 1 to 0 station in the pelvis.

To be continued...

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I am looking forward to reading the rest of the story over the next few days.

Christina said...

We were told Transposition is very hard to see in an ultrasound. They have to be specifically looking for it to see it.
I do not think I wrote about our ultrasounds with Jacob. They actually did two because they couldn't see the heart very good the first time. My sister's son has Tetralogy of Fellot so they actually were looking at the heart for a defect and still didn't see the Transposition! I think they mostly look for 4 chambers and move on.