Our Miracle, Milo

Well, it's officially 9 weeks (or less) until we meet our sweet boy. We currently need to discuss more of his birth timeline with our doctors, as Madison suggested induction at 39 weeks, but our OB in Wausau is thinking close to 37 weeks. I want to do more research within the SOFT organization to see if there's any evidence to support a certain timeline for delivery, provided urgent medical intervention isn't needed.  If you know me, the idea of induction is not my cup of tea. Ryleigh was induced due to Premature Rupture of Membranes (PROM) and from her water breaking to delivery was 53 hours. I so desperately wanted a low-intervention birth, but due to the time it took, we had lots of intervention... Oliver's spontaneous labor was about 12 hours from first contraction to delivery, with Oliver's actual delivery taking one minute (I'm not joking, the nurse caught him!). Despite hemorrhaging afterwards, it truly was the ideal birth! This time around, however, we k...

This week, I feel VERY pregnant. I've had some lower back pain that is really bothering me, and making me waddle like I'm closer to the end of my pregnancy than I am. Thankfully chiropractic care has helped it quite a bit! However, I still have a ways to go, so hopefully I can get this sorted out and not let it get any worse, because lifting toddlers with an aching back is NOT an easy feat.  With being 29 weeks, it's been a realization that it will be 10 weeks or less until we meet our sweet Milo. This has brought some increased anxiety because there are so many 'what ifs' surrounding everything with Milo, his birth, and what happens next after birth. I've been controlling what I can by reading many stories about other children (and ADULTS) with Trisomy 13 and buying some things for Milo. With our other two kiddos, we bought the typical milestone blankets that you take pictures each month on. For Milo, we got the blocks so we can take pictures for each day he...

So we have officially hit the third trimester! We've reflected a lot about how these past two months have crawled, but we are so excited to hit this next milestone. Milo continues to be an active and strong baby which is always reassuring.  Today, we had our big day of appointments in Madison. I am pretty exhausted as I type this out, so hopefully this all makes sense.  We started our day with a fetal echocardiogram followed up by a meeting with the cardiologist. The cardiologist went over the diagram we were first given, and shared some changes that they were able to see now that Milo is bigger. The biggest thing is that Milo's pulmonary artery has some blood flow in it. This could not be visualized in the first echo so this is good news. This means that Milo's heart is potentially able to function on it's own for longer than we initially thought. If his pulmonary artery was completely closed, a surgery would have been necessary right away to keep him alive. Now, the d...

Shortly after I made my last blog post, Chelsea (with Chelsea May Photography) posted a sneak peek of our spur of the moment maternity photos. We are in LOVE. There's something about the sun peeking through, and the white dress that just makes all of it feel so personal. He's such a pure, innocent, ray of sunshine in our lives already.  Check out the sneak peek!!  There were some great ones of our family too, which truly captured the essence of us.  Today, we got my primary OB care switched over to another OB I've seen before, but he's now in Wausau. Thankfully, this eliminates a stressor because now if we would have any complications or if Milo would decide to make his presence sooner than anticipated, we could go to Wausau where there's a NICU, whereas Rapids does not have the NICU capabilities we need for Milo. It's bittersweet though, because I absolutely love the doctor I was seeing. We also got Ryleigh in with a therapist so we can start navigating how to ...

Thankfully, my blood pressure has seemingly leveled out for now! I am continuing to keep a close eye on it though. I also have started checking my blood sugars as I had gestational diabetes with Oliver, and I'm finding that this might be something that's causing me to feel off. My fasting number was off this morning, which was never an issue with Oliver, and my 2 hr post dinner level was also off, so I plan to continue to check my sugars for the rest of the week. My 3 hour glucose test is scheduled for Saturday, but if my numbers continue to be off this week, I think it's safe to say I have it... Time will tell I guess! Anyway...We've hit 27 weeks! We are feeling so grateful for this next milestone because last week, we were worried that my BP would cause things to change rapidly. So because of that, we were able to squeeze in some maternity photos this weekend (Thanks, Chelsea!), I snug in a prenatal massage (Thanks, Sarah Jean!), and we are trying to make sure we have...

Thursday night, we had our first scare. My blood pressure was elevated, and I was feeling off. I was tired, and felt foggy. I had a long day at work with field trips, meetings, and then an after school literacy night I volunteered for. By the end of the night, I was WIPED, but checked my blood pressure just to be safe. It was elevated but I had hoped some sleep would help it go down. I woke around 11 and it was higher than before, and that's when the shakes started.  As I was trying to decide what to do, I realized... We had NO idea where we needed to go to be evaluated: Wisconsin Rapids, Wausau, or Madison? I called Wausau and got through to a nurse where she acknowledge my levels were elevated, but not to a point where I needed to be seen urgently. She let us decide if we wanted to rest and wait it out, or go in. We decided to rest and wait it out. While going through this though, there were so many thoughts.. "He's not ready." "My body is failing him." ...