After the wonderful news that Frankie does not have Downs, Edwards, Patau’s or anything else I had to get back on track and yesterday I had my 28 week check up with my midwife. She didn’t know what had happened in Birmingham last Monday so I filled her in and she was really supportive, and even said on the basis of the initial screening results I’d had at 12 weeks pregnant even she would have said that amniocentesis wouldn’t have been necessary, but that it was great news that all the test results had come back okay.
She checked my blood pressure which was perfect (which was a miracle given all I’d been through this week), measured Frankie and said he is exactly the right size and estimated that he was around 2lbs 10oz in weight, and confirmed he is already in the head down position. As there is a history of type 2 diabetes in my family she said I should have the glucose tolerance test repeated to make sure I don’t have gestational diabetes. (I had one of these early September and it wasn’t very pleasant as you have to drink a huge glass of lucozade as part of the test, and I hate lucozade! Not only that, but it gave me chronic indigestion for the rest of the day after I had to have the test and I felt really ill, so I’ll have to write off the day I have that test done and make sure I don’t plan anything.
It looks like my care will now transfer back to the Worcestershire Royal Hospital from Birmingham, so she is going to organise to put me back into the obstetrician care system so that Frankie can have growth scans there to keep an eye on him until he’s here. I also need to book a tour of the delivery suite at the hospital, and decide if I take part in any antenatal classes. Two of the ones I’ve been offered are on birth and labour (my placenta is low so it is likely I will just be booked in for a caesarean if it doesn’t move) and breastfeeding (I won’t be able to breastfeed Frankie because of his cleft lip and palate, he’ll have to be fed with special bottles and I’ll have to express my milk for him if I can) so I’m not sure they will be of any benefit, other than to meet other Mum’s, and I’ve already got the Mission2Mum group as well as all the lovely people I’ve met as a result of this blog and the Cleft Lip & Palate Association charity. I’ve got a bit of time to decide what to do about those, as they aren’t till the end of this month anyway.
Next week I have a 4D scan booked at Babyvision Ltd in Shrewsbury. CLAPA fund certain centres in the UK to provide 4D scans to parents who have received a cleft diagnosis, and the nearest centre to us that offers 4D scans is in Shrewsbury, so not too bad distance wise. We would have paid privately to have a 4D scan done of Frankie, and had looked at a centre in Cirencester, but I found out about the places that CLAPA fund to provide the scans and Shrewsbury isn’t that much further than Circencester would be. Plus we can buy a DVD of the scan – it is incredible that he’ll be able to see himself inside me before he is born, I’m amazed at how far technology has come on!
Everyone is saying to me try to relax and enjoy the rest of my pregnancy, and now I am officially in the third trimester I will try to, but it isn’t easy when at every appointment and every scan recently something else, and then something else, and then something else has manifested itself. I’m sure I will be on “red alert” even when we have the 4D scan next week and my future scans and appointments, I won’t be able to help it. But for Frankie’s sake I will try to relax, as he will pick up from me if I am feeling worried, stressed or tense and I don’t want to pass that on to him through me.
I just want him born safely and in my arms, and am counting down the time now until he’s here next January.
