33 weeks

A lot has happened in the time since my last post. Antibody titer levels went up so I have been getting weekly ultrasounds since mid July. Levels started in zone c which isn't too bad. Zones are A through D with A being the worst. Eventually I went to zone B and around 9/5, they thought Ryah was in zone A. Went through monitoring for 4 days where I was in zone A for 2 days and down to zone B the last 2 days. They decided to expect the worst & go into do a blood transfusion procedure in case Ryah was in fact anemic. Once in the procedure, they numbed my belly & stuck a big needle in. It felt uncomfortable and large! They took several samples from the umbilical cord and got one result that was really low. Because of that sample, they started the blood transfusion while they waited for 2 other sample results. They had injected 20ml of blood when they got the other results back. Those results were normal so they stopped the transfusion.
They had numbed me 3 different times, 3 different needles, and stuck 3 big needles in my belly during this procedure. All to find out that Ryah wasn't anemic and she was doing fine in zone B. My doctor said the blood flow study, which is the ultrasound of her brain, can sometimes be overly sensitive and give a false positive. They were just being extra cautious in our case.
Now, my doctor has decided to move up my scheduled c-section date from 10/28 to 10/23. That's if everything goes OK between now and then, so as long as we stay in zone B.

Update on Pregnancy #3...aka Ryah Ann!

It's been about 3 months since I last posted. I really need to remember to keep up with my blogging! Since my last post, we found out that the Rh level in my blood was not "fixed" with the large number of rhogam shots I had. I am Rh sensitized and have the antibody built up against C. So far everything has been good! We found out that we were having a girl and had to come up with a creative name to match Mylah's name. Luckily, I came across a traveler somehow at work with the name Ryah. I loved it and told Nathan who also loved it. Middle name is Ann after my mom (and sister, Liz). ;) We've been having monthly appointments until next week, then we'll start appointments every 2 weeks. So far my antibody titer levels have not changed much or at all so things have been going smoothly. I've slowly been getting Ryah's room together. I went through Jonathon's clothes and kept stuff that Ryah would be able to wear and got things cleared out to donate/give away. It was hard the first 2 days I was going through stuff. Just thinking how he didn't get to wear certain cute outfits. I believe God has a reason for everything and that someday we'll find out what that reason is... With this pregnancy, I've had the worst back pain I've ever had. I had minor back pain with my other two pregnancies but it hurts to do ANYTHING with this one! I went to a chiropractor last week to be evaluated and go back tomorrow for some relief (hopefully). I also started physical therapy with recommendation from my doctor. I start that today. I was thinking if I do both, I'll for sure get some relief somewhere!!

Our Angel - Jonathon Louis Hennecke

I started writing this post in July 2012. I never finished it-never found time to. It has been sitting in my drafts so I have FINALLY decided to complete it... July 8th 2012 I noticed Jonathon wasn't moving as much as he had been. He was a constant mover around bedtime. As soon as I would change positions (sitting to laying down or laying on side to back) I would do kick counts and he would move 10 times in less than 2 minutes. This Sunday evening, he moved less than 10 times in an hour. I called labor and delivery and they said to monitor it for 30 more minutes to see if it changed any. He moved 5 times in 30 minutes-which is about average for the suggested 10 times in an hour but was not "average" for Jonathon. July 9th 2012 Monday he still wasn't moving as much as normal so I called my doctor's office and they said to come into Labor and Delivery to be monitored. They said his heart rate was fine and near the end of the monitoring session, he started moving around to a more "normal" rate for Jonathon. So I went home glad that I went in and had everything checked out, just in case something was wrong. July 12th 2012 Thursday I went in for my 36 week checkup. I hadn't really felt him move too much (I had only been up for an hour before going to my appointment) plus I was busy getting ready to leave so didn't even think about kick counts. I had also had reassurance that everything was "okay" on Monday that I didn't even consider what was about to be the worst day (and worst next few days) of my life. I was seeing the nurse practitioner, Lisa, since my doctor was on vacation. I told her about the activity since Sunday and how he was moving a lot on Wednesday when I last noticed. I told her that I had a softball game that night so I was busy keeping our team's score and didn't happen to notice anything abnormal with Jonathon's movements. Then she did the normal and started to check for his heart rate. She checked ALL OVER and couldn't find it. For whatever reason, I was still not worried at this point. She said that Dr. Glover would do an ultrasound across the office to have everything checked out. I was still not worried after starting the ultrasound, I thought to myself, "he's going to find the heartbeat and I'll be able to go back to work." He looked around for a while & finally turned the monitor and said something along the lines of, "Here is where we should see the heartbeat...It's not there. I'm sorry." It took a minute to register what he just said. I couldn't understand how my baby could be fine when monitored Monday, even fine when I knew he was moving just the day before! He then explained that he really couldn't tell what happened and that it could be a cord accident or something else-they wouldn't know until we delivered the baby. I was at the doctor by myself so I had to call Nathan to tell him the hardest thing I've ever had to say, "they couldn't find Jonathon's heartbeat," and, "they don't know why and won't know until I have a c-section to deliver him." I called my sisters & my mom and they all came up to the doctor's building to be with me. Once I had a better hold of myself, we left and all went to Nathan's grandma's house. Nathan was riding back from work and I didn't get to see him until then. Once I saw him, we both just cried. We had to tell everyone else in our family that our son was gone and prepare for the c-section the following day, first thing in the morning. We stayed at Nathan's grandma's house so they could watch Mylah for us while we were in the hospital. I got little sleep that night... I went through surgery the next morning, half of the time I was sleeping because whatever they gave me to "relax me" made me go to sleep. We got to hold Jonathon and get pictures with him. He was 7lb 10oz-which would be a healthy sized baby for most people! He was already 21 inches long-if he had gone the next week and 1/2, he may have been longer. He was beautiful and had SO MUCH HAIR! I thought his hairline was crazy because his hair went all the way to his eyebrows. Now, I see that Mylah has a similar hairline in her baby pictures and that she's just as hairy on her back! So they're very much alike in that way. When Dr Glover delivered, he noticed that Jonathon was pale and so was the placenta. He also noticed that the umbilical cord was on the shorter side of normal but wasn't abnormally short. He told us later that he believed that what occurred was a fetal maternal hemorrhage. The majority of Jonathon's blood (possibly close to all) left his body through the umbilical cord into my system. This explained why he was so pale and why the placenta had little blood in it as well. Dr Glover also knew that because of Jonathon having a different blood type, I would have to have Rhogam shots to correct the Rh factor in my blood. Dr Glover conferred with the Midwest Maternal & Fetal Medicine office in St. Louis on how many Rhogam shots I would need. Turns out they were going to go with 11, but in the end I had 12 just to be safe. We had his funeral Monday the 16th. Everything seemed okay until we walked into church for the service, then Nathan & I both bawled our eyes out. We are very thankful/blessed/grateful that Deacon Leon officiated the service and did a GREAT job. It was very meaningful coming from him because he had followed my posts on facebook and been a great influence on me the past year while going through RCIA. He made me laugh & cry which made it a little easier. We buried Jonathon at St Francis Borgia cemetery. He is in his own plot in between Nathan's and my plots. We did that so we'd both be around him...

Pregnancy #3

Three months after we had Jonathon we had to have my blood tested again to see if the 12 Rhogam shots corrected the Rh "thing" (not sure what it's called!) in my blood. Found out we were good there! But, we found that my blood had an antibody built up against C. Dr Potts (my normal ob) said that next step is testing Nathan's blood to see if he carries antigen C. Turns out, Nathan carries it. In December I had an appointment with a doctor at Midwest Maternal Fetal Medicine-I had gone off of the recommendation of friends on Facebook and chose Dr Bartlesmeyer. (So glad I did!) In my appointment I found out that HE was actually the doctor that Dr Glover conferred with on the number of Rhogam shots needed to correct the issue with Jonathon's blood in my system. He did a very good job of explaining what would possibly happen if the next baby (or any other future babies) carried C. If Nathan has CC (big C big C) the baby would definitely have C in their blood. If Nathan carried cc or Cc, then the baby would only have a chance of carrying it. If the baby carries C (of any size-CC, Cc, or cc) my body would possibly try to fight off the baby because of the antibody built up against the antigen the baby has. This would mean that the baby would possibly, at some time during pregnancy, be struggling to get blood. There are different blood tests to find out if that would be happening then ultrasounds would be done to monitor the blood flow in the baby's brain. If blood flow moves faster, it means the baby is struggling to get blood to their organs. If this were to happen, depending on the severity the baby could have to have a blood transfusion through the umbilical cord, may have to deliver early, and/or have a blood transfusion after delivery. (All of these things wouldn't happen until after the 20 week mark.) I felt like I knew so much more after going to see Dr Bartlesmeyer and was ready to face what would happen when we decided to get pregnant. We started trying in January 2013 and found out we were pregnant at the end of February 2013! I went to the doctor March 28th and had an ultrasound. Found only one baby and everything was normal and measured exactly where I should-on schedule for due date of November 8th 2013. Saw Dr Bartlesmeyer after my ultrasound and he said that the longest I would go is 38-39 weeks, I immediately thought "Halloween baby!" but then thought about how Mylah would not get to have a good Halloween trick or treating and how maybe the baby wouldn't like a Halloween birthday. So, I think as long as everything goes okay and I get to choose a c-section date, I will pick an even number day (I prefer even over odd numbers-not sure why!) Tomorrow I will be 11 weeks and will continue to pray that everything with this pregnancy goes well. I have an appointment Tuesday with Dr Bartlesmeyer and ultrasound on 5/2...