33 Weeks

 

        I cannot believe that we are just about 5 weeks from meeting our sweet little girl! Our MFM (Maternal Fetal Medicine doctor, aka - high risk pregnancy doctor) wants baby girl to "cook" as long as possible which means her goal is for us to have our scheduled c - section at 39 weeks.  This past week we had our weekly MFM appointment.  Baby girl was not wanting to cooperate with the non-stress test and was being her normal stubborn self kicking the monitors and then hiding from them.  That was requiring the doctors to keep me hooked up to the monitors for over half an hour to get just about 14 good minutes of heart beat recording.  When they did get those 14 minutes straight of heartbeat she had a good strong heartbeat which is wonderful!! It was a lot of fun sitting there just getting to her my sweet daughter's heartbeat! 
      The very next day we had our appointment with the Cardiologist.  The cardiologist was looking to see if we can locate the Superior Vena Cava vein (SVC) and where the vein inserts  into the heart.  Following a very long ultra sound they were able to locate the vein and see where it inserted into the heart!! Huge sigh of relief! The doctor said that baby girl actually has two SVC veins, which is unusual but not problematic.  The right sided SVC is inserted into the correct location and side of the heart.  The left sided SVC is inserted into the correct atrium but inserts in the back of the heart. Once again this is not normal but should not be problematic for baby girl in the long run.  While this is incredible news for baby girl because its a huge step towards a healthy little girl, she is still not out of the woods yet!! We will still be monitored by the cardiologist after she is born.  Due to the nature of the ompahlocele and having organs outside her body there will still be pressure on her heart pulling it down some in her chest cavity.  This means that some things that happen naturally as a newborn gets bigger, like normal holes and gaps babies are born with, may not naturally fix themselves.  None of this is a guarantee but doctors have to talk about worse case scenarios and some typical things they have seen with similar cases.  If this does happen, it may cause her to need heart surgery but none of this will be known until she is here and is getting bigger.  For now we just wait and continue to pray for a quick surgery for the omphalocele and the best health for her little heart! As of right now the other big change this means is that baby girl will be in regular NICU and not the cardiac wing.