Baby Higgins #2
*January 22- found out I was pregnant! It was 3-4 days before when I was expecting my period, but decided on a whim to take a test while Jacob was at work! I had my IUD taken out in late November and had one cycle in late December and got pregnant in early January!*January 28- went to my OBGYN for the first time to get blood work done and was given prescription for Lovenox shots
*January 29- started shots. One daily injection of Lovenox 40mg in my stomach.
*January 30- told our families in Austin with Embry wearing a "big sister" shirt
*February 2- more blood work at the doctor
*February 18- vaginal ultrasound
*March 4- ultrasound and more blood work.
*March 31- ultrasound
Telling Everyone
I found out I was pregnant on January 22 and told Jacob that evening with Embry wearing her Big Sister shirt! I FaceTimed Tomi that afternoon in Australia and told her! I also told a few friends over the next few days!January 30 we were all going to be in Austin with both sets of our parents plus my grandparents from Chicago! When Embry was about to go play outside, we had Jacob go upstairs to "get shoes on" aka change Embry into her Big Sister shirt. Of course, my mom noticed first and everyone was so excited!!
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| Found out I was pregnant January 22, 3-4 days before my missed period, so I was shocked it was already positive! |
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| Telling Aunt Tomi before everyone else on FaceTime |
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| How we announced on social media =) |
Doctor's Appointments
With my blood clot disorder, Factor V Leiden, my OBGYN wanted me to call her right when I got pregnant, so I went in right away and once blood work confirmed I was pregnant, I started on Lovenox shots. For the next month I was going in at least weekly for blood work basically to make sure I was staying pregnant since I was on blood thinners. Embry got very comfortable with my doctors office and actually loves going!
I'm now on a normal schedule and won't go back for another month. May 4 I will be a little more than 18 weeks and we'll go in for the big anatomy scan and we'll find out the gender. We will do that ultrasound with the perinatologist we saw at the end of my pregnancy with Embry. Since so much went wrong at the end with Embry (I had excess fluid, she had excess fluid-or so they thought, she was big, etc.), my OBGYN wants me to get a baseline sonogram with the high risk doctor in case things get wonky at the end again. So we're actually excited to have a "level 2" sonogram done on this little one and get some good sonogram images. We both also really love Dr. Reinhart so we're exicted to see him again.
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| February 18- first ultrasound |
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| March 4 ultrasound |
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| March 31 ultrasound |
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| Embry has to bring her doctor's kit to each of my appointments! So cute! |
The Lovenox Shots
So I started Lovenox shots the day my doctor confirmed my pregnancy. I do one 40 mg shot every 24 hours. Pretty much they suck. They're expensive ($400 a month), it hurts, I bruise, the bruises hurt, etc.... But I just have to remind myself that plenty of people out there struggle with infertility and really the shots don't seem that bad after all.
I will continue the shots until 36 weeks pregnant, when I will switch to Heparin shots every 12 hours. (Here's the rundown on blood thinners- Coumadin is the pill form, which you can't take while pregnant, bummer because it's super super cheap. Lovenox is the shot form which is safe during pregnant and while breastfeeding. Heparin is the IV form and has a much shorter half-life than Lovenox, meaning it only stays in your system for 12 hours instead of 24 hours....so I'll literally have a syringe and a bottle of the medicine and have to give myself doses every 12 hours for the last few weeks. They do this because they don't want you to go into labor while on blood thinners....and Lovenox lasts 24 hours). So even though I will have another c-section, most likely at 39 weeks, but just in case I went into labor, that is standard for blood thinners and pregnancy. I will get back on Lovenox for 6 weeks post-partum.
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| Shots and my last c-section scar...which is vertical =/ |
Overall
Overall this pregnancy has kind of flown by! Despite going to the doctor about 100 times the first few months, it's true, keeping up with a toddler you kind of forget your pregnant. I have the normal first trimester symptoms of exhaustion and unfortunately this time around I have nausea. Around 7.5 weeks my doctor put me on Diclegis, an anti-nausea medicine, since I had been having trouble eating well rounded meals and having some nausea. Well at 12 weeks I forgot to take it one day and vomited 7-8 times in a matter of a few hours. It was HORRIBLE. Like at one point I threw up what seemed like everything in my stomach and wanted to take a shower, and once I got in the shower, I had another wave of nausea and was puking in the shower. So I think I got on the meds just in time before the real sickness kicked in. I hope to start tapering off the closer I get to 15 weeks and hope I feel back to normal! Luckily, as long as I take the pills I feel good! I haven't gained any weight so far, but I do feel like my body is starting to change. I think I started showing around 16 weeks with Embry and I hear it happens earlier with each pregnancy. I'm almost 14 weeks and starting to feel a little bulge when I try to sleep on my stomach-hah. It's that sensation where you can't push it in, like I can my flabby post-Embry tummy ;)
Like I said above, we find out the gender May 4 with the perinatologist! I'm so excited!!! I feel like it feels much more real when you know the gender of the baby! Since it's a Monday, we don't plan on doing any big gender reveal, we'll probably just Facetime our families after the appointment and tell everyone!
We haven't really told Embry much of anything yet. I didn't really want her walking around pointing to my belly saying baby before we got into the second trimester. I'm not sure she will fully understand it once we tell her anyway! But I do think she'll be an awesome big sister. She is at a really fun, baby loving stage and just adores all of my friends babies. Her thing is "she likes me" when she makes one of her little baby friends smile.
Think that's all for now! Not sure how I'll continue to make updates about this pregnancy, but there will be some updates and some point ;)
