Expired Eggs?

So, when we went to the OB (yes, we went to an OB... *gasp* But only so I can get some tests done I want that insurance will pay for... ;) ) he made a comment about my eggs. 

Granted, I said something first. I mentioned that I wanted the first trimester screen for Trisomy disorders (13, 18, Down's Syndrome, etc.) because at 38 (39 by the time this baby is born) my eggs are just a little past their expiration date. 

He nodded and said, "I always tell my patients, you've had those eggs since you were born! Would you eat eggs that were 38 years old?"

Okay, first of all... dude, no one gets to make comments about my eggs but me.  Got it? That's like a direct reference to a woman's age, which, at mine, just isn't cool. Secondly... who would EAT human eggs!? Like, what, they're some strange sort of caviar!? That brings up some twisted horror cannibalism thing I don't even want to think about... eww!

But I digress. The OB and I had a little discussion about birth, I refused a pelvic or pap (just had a pap back in January, I'm good, thanks!) and although the nurse looked at me like I had three heads and kept trying to get me to strip for her and put on the little paper dress (three times! She came back three times! lol) the doc was okay with my refusal. 

The important this is he ordered my test and we went and saw the baby. Again. Looks more like a baby now than a blob, which was nice to see. But again, my knowledge of birth and all that "doctorin' stuff" irked someone. 

The u/s results themselves came out fine... from everything I could discern. They didn't check a lot of the soft markers I thought they should have, but the nuchal space wasn't measuring abnormal, so that's good, and we did see a nasal bone.

If you don't know anything about the new first trimester screen for genetic issues, the ultrasound portion is called the "nuchal translucency scan." Basically, they're checking a space behind the baby's neck to see if it's swollen. They've discovered that a majority (1 in 4) babies with a trisomy disorder will have a swollen nuchal space. They also check other things - like the appearance of a nasal bone. Down's Syndrome babies often don't have one that appears between the 11-13th week (when they do this test) but you can normally see the nasal bone in babies without a trisomy disorder. There are other soft markers they look for (echogenic bowel, cysts in the brain, etc.) as well, and they also do a blood test to check both HCG and PAPPA in the mother's blood. They put it all together and give you a risk factor for giving birth to a child with a genetic disorder.

I probably wouldn't have even considered this test, if I didn't know how exponentially the odds go up of having a child with a trisomy disorder after the age of thirty-five. You can see, on this table, how the risks go up.

Age (years)	Frequency of Fetuses with Down Syndrome to Normal Fetuses at 16 weeks of pregnancy	Frequency of Live Births of Babies with Down Syndrome to Normal Births
15 - 19	----	1 / 1250
20 - 24	----	1 / 1400
25 - 29	----	1 / 1100
30 - 31	----	1 / 900
32	----	1 / 750
33	1 / 420	1 / 625
34	1 / 325	1 / 500
35	1 / 250	1 / 350
36	1 / 200	1 / 275
37	1 / 150	1 / 225
38	1 / 120	1 / 175
39	1 / 100	1 / 140
40	1 / 75	1 / 100
41	1 / 60	1 / 85
42	1 / 45	1 / 65
43	1 / 35	1 / 50
44	1 / 30	1 / 40
45 and older	1 / 20	1 / 25

So anyway, back to the actual ultrasound. The tech was having a hard time getting baby to move into the position she wanted, so she didn't take hardly any time at the end to take good pics because she was too frustrated. 

(And although I wanted a video, and they told me on the phone they could do one, the tech told me, "Oh we will only tape once, so I'll do it now if you want, but this isn't a very long or interesting scan, you should probably wait for the 20 week one. GRRR. Okay, fine, then... figured I'd get pictures, that would suffice. *sigh*) 

Anyway, she got so frustrated with baby's uncooperativeness that she even called the doc in to re-check what she'd measured. Then, of course, the doc decides to blame it on my weight... but when I asked if a transvag would be better, she said, "no."

And then the doc says, "You need to have an u/s every 5-6 weeks from now on to measure the baby's size." Huh? WTH? Why?

"It's hard to palpate a baby on someone your size, and we need to know how big baby will be for delivery."

Oh freakin' PLEASE! I've had two home births and two midwives who could palpate my babies JUST fine, thankyouverymuch. (I didn't say that... )

I DID say, "Isn't late u/s notoriously inaccurate for judging a baby's actual size?"

"Well, something is better than nothing."

FEH!

She was also really, really, really hard to get info out of. She didn't like that I was educated about the scan, that I knew terms like "echogenic bowel" and wanted to know if baby had one. She was very avoidant, and just kept giving me the equivalent of "don't worry your pretty head about it" again and again. GRRRR.

So I'll ask for copies of the test results from the doc in two weeks, when I see him, and I'm calling around to interview home birth midwives this week.

Guess I needed a kick in the butt to motivate me! 

But here are two (albiet blurry) pictures of little Luke or Lucy:

 

 

Questions

Questions Zoe has asked every day this week:

How big is the baby today?

Is the baby coming out today?

When's the baby coming again?

Can we tell if it's a boy or girl yet?

Questions Dmitri has asked every day this week:

Can I have another snack?

Why can't I take Pokemon cards to school?

Is it martial arts day yet? (They just started Tae Kwon Do last week)

Can I go outside and play?

The Rabbit Really Died!

Okay, not really... but if we were back in the day, he would have! Now I just have a little plastic stick with some chemical paper reaction to say, "We're Pregnant!" Baby number five, due April 8, 2009, planning another home birth. This one will be an Aries... THAT should be fun! We were planning another Aquarian, but the universe had other plans.

We did see an OB, had an early ultrasound. That was new - I've never had one so early. There's actually a moving-around little baby in there! It's only about the size of a kumquat, apparently, although I swear I've felt it moving already!

Here's a "picture" of our little one:

 

If you can't tell, that round thing on the right is the head - the rest, kind of curling around on the left, is the body. (Baby's looking down). If you look close, you can see little arms and legs. We actually saw them waving around at us during the ultrasound!

We told the kids - Zoe is so excited she can hardly contain herself. We let her call and tell the grandparents. Dmitri got to tell them when the baby's coming. And he made it very clear that he wants a baby brother. Zoe wants a baby sister. So someone is gonna be disappointed... :x 

We're still tossing around name variations, but we know, at least, what the baby will be called. If it's a girl: Lucy; and if it's a boy: Luke. We've got all sorts of variations and spellings, though, from Lucille, Lucia, Lucida or Lucienne for a girl to Lucas, Lucius, and Lukanos for a boy. And more...

He/she will be named after both of his/her maternal grandmothers (they were both named Lucille) and a very good friend of ours, Luke, who passed away a few years ago. As for middle names, we may just go all egotistical with Dawn and Michael, who knows? :)

NOW we just have to try and stick to our guns and NOT find out the sex beforehand. I already have grandmothers who want to buy clothes, who are clamoring to know! Eek! I don't know if I can sit in the ultrasound room, and have the tech find out, and NOT ask. At first, I really wanted it to be a surprise, but now Michael says he doesn't care if it's a surprise - he'd be fine with knowing or waiting.

Sheesh. Make my life difficult why don't ya?!

7:15 pm

So it's 7:15 p.m. and in my bed, there's this:

In the livingroom, there's this:

I think 1st grade must be tough! ;)
 

Ode to Tomatoes

I have a whole container FULL of tomatoes, and they're really starting to ripen up nicely!

Found this amazing poem by Pablo Neruda that I put on the refrigerator as we're trying to work our way through our yummy harvest.

The street
filled with tomatoes,
midday,
summer,
light is
halved
like
a
tomato,
its juice
runs
through the streets.
In December,
unabated,
the tomato
invades
the kitchen,
it enters at lunchtime,
takes
its ease
on countertops,
among glasses,
butter dishes,
blue saltcellars.
It sheds
its own light,
benign majesty.
Unfortunately, we must
murder it:
the knife
sinks
into living flesh,
red
viscera,
a cool
sun,
profound,
inexhaustible,
populates the salads
of Chile,
happily, it is wed
to the clear onion,
and to celebrate the union
we
pour
oil,
essential
child of the olive,
onto its halved hemispheres,
pepper
adds
its fragrance,
salt, its magnetism;
it is the wedding
of the day,
parsley
hoists
its flag,
potatoes
bubble vigorously,
the aroma
of the roast
knocks
at the door,
it’s time!
come on!
and, on
the table, at the midpoint
of summer,
the tomato,
star of earth,
recurrent
and fertile
star,
displays
its convolutions,
its canals,
its remarkable amplitude
and abundance,
no pit,
no husk,
no leaves or thorns,
the tomato offers
its gift
of fiery color
and cool completeness.

First Day of School 2008

Here they are, waiting for the bus to come take them to first grade: 

Yes, I'm the anal retentive mother who actually made name tags for each kid with their school name, bus numbers, teachers' names and room numbers. Hey, at least I didn't actually GO to the school on the first day this time! 

The bus, thankfully, drops off and picks up right in front of the house. Yay! Makes life so much easier. They've got a short bus ride there and a loooooong bus ride home, so we'll see how they do. No incidents yesterday, and both of them came home with lots of stories about the playground and new friends.

Zoe said: "We're not doing math and hard stuff - we're doing fun stuff!"  Ha. One the first day? Of course! :)

Dmitri said, "My teacher is very pretty and very nice!" Whew. Last year, his teacher was "very pretty and very mean." LOL

Now we'll just have to see how things go when they start doing the "hard stuff" and the teachers don't seem quite so nice anymore...