The 12 week scan - an emotional rollercoaster

A couple of months ago I emailed Manda at Treefall to offer my sympathy when she had some bad blood test results for her long awaited MP2. She was worried about risking an amnio and having been through a similar experience with Alex I wanted to email her to let her know she wasn't alone. And I wrote that I was trying to get pregnant but already terrified of being in that very same position again. As it turned out everything was fine and someone somewhere had input the wrong due date which skewed the results. I was so relieved for her as Manda and I have very similar tales; same age, a history of infertility and miscarriage and mercifully we both have a much loved toddler at home.

What I didn't expect was to have an almost identical experience to hers.

We had booked a private nuchal fold scan for 12 weeks as it is a more thorough scan than the NHS dating scan and it is combined with a new early blood test result. Our reasoning was that if something was wrong the earlier we knew about it the better and the longer we would have to come to a decision about amnios and futher testing etc. At my age (38) these things are heavily recommended and as I have another child to think about I was keen to know as much info as possible.

The scan was fine. The baby looked healthy (and waved at us) and the nuchal fold measured 1.4 which is spot on. We breathed a huge sigh of relief as Alex's nuchal fold had been 2.5 and just on the borderline for abnormal ( we chose not to have an amnio with him). I finally let go some of my fears and let myself believe we might be having another baby in May.

But then we moved over to the computer where the consultant inputted all the data. His face fell and he muttered something. I looked at the screen and my heart stopped. The Papp A blood test results came back with a 1 in 17 chance of Downs (should have been about 1 in 250 for my age) and 1 in 200 for Trisomy 13 and 18 (should have been 1 in 1400). I just couldn't take it in. Seconds ago everything had been looking rosy and now everything looked blacker than black. My poor beautiful baby. Then I just broke down and started sobbing so hard I couldn't speak.

The consultant double checked the results with the lab which confirmed them. There was no chance they were wrong. So we left and drove home through the pouring rain with tears falling down our faces. We talked and cried and cried and talked and then we retreated into exhausted silence.

I couldn't believe we were in this situation again. Although this time the statistics were much much worse than they were with Alex. There was so much to think about, what impact it would have on Alex and his life, how would we deal with things, what decisions could we with live with and which were just not possible . I made a decision a long time before we had Alex that we could not terminate a child with Downs. It really helped me to know that I had made that decision already but I was worried what impact it would have on Alex, especially if the child has serious medical problems such as a heart defect (common in Downs). What really worried me worst of all were the trisomy 13 and 18 results as they are supposedly incompatible with life (edited to add - please see Therese Ann's comment!). I had known there was a chance of all this happening but the scan had lulled me into such a state of false security that I just couldn't get my head round it at all.

When we got home we just hugged each other for a long time. And then the phone rang and it was the hospital. The consultant has stayed behind to go over the data again and again. And he found one of the dates was wrong. When he changed it it changed the results - back to normal.
The risk went from 1 in 17 to 1 in 650 for Downs and 1 in 200 to 1 in 14000 for the other trisomies. So we went from happy to desperate to pure joy in the space of a few hours.

So my thanksgiving day was spent thinking how incredibly lucky we are. To have one wonderful child and another one hopefully on the way. That some people never get to have children at all. That we may have got bad results but we got a phone call that changed all that and gave us the most wonderful good news. That most people who get bad results don't get that phone call later. We are so very very grateful.

Winter Sunset

This was the view from our house a couple of weeks ago (before the rain and snow). A nice photo to make up for the lack of anything handmade and the very wordy previous post.

Bob the Builder has moved in next door

This is the view from my front door! My whole house is vibrating as I write this.

Alex is very excited as there are great big yellow diggers and dumper trucks living next door and he gets to watch them from his perch on the back of the sofa looking out of the living room window. Me on the other hand, I'm not so happy about it.

When we moved here 4 years ago from London we were after a quiet country life. Unfortunately due to budget restrictions we could only afford a small modern terraced house in a cul-de-sac and not the detached country cottage of our dreams. However its big saving grace was that it was at the end of the row and over looked fields at the back. We had neighbours on one side but on the other was a lovely rambling old garden filled with apple trees and an impressive vegetable plot. It made our tiny garden feel much bigger and gave us the privacy we were looking for.

However last year the two old gentlemen who live there sold off their garden to our local garden grabbing developers. I don't blame them as they are in their late seventies,they need something to cushion them through old age and they were offered 6 figure sums for the land which would be hard to refuse for anyone. But I am gutted.

Now they are building not one but two houses on a relatively small patch of land right next to mine. They are going to have patios rather than gardens so their houses will be about 10 feet away from mine. I will be overlooked completely in both the garden (from one house) and inside the house(from the other at the front). I can live with the building noise and disturbance, the loss of the lovely garden but what I cannot live with is the loss of privacy and the lack of space. I feeled hemmed in and they haven't even finished digging the foundations yet.

I have seen the house designs and they are lovely, white weatherboard and terracotta tiled roofs and a lovely traditional design. They will be very attractive to look at. What I am not keen on is the fact that they will be able to see me in my PJs in my own home and vice versa! We tried complaining about how close it was to ours at the planning stage but because we live in the modern high density part of the village we didn't have a leg to stand on. Plus we are the only ones affected by it so we had no support. We bought this house purely because it wasn't overlooked so the building work is very detrimental to our enjoyment of the house and garden but we just don't rate as important enough to stop the development.

So I guess we are going to have to move. We will have to leave the area as there is nothing affordable here and move further east where it is out of commuter belt. I will miss this lovely village and my friends here but I know I can't live hemmed in on all sides. When to move will be the question - if the building work gets completed sometime in the spring we will sell up then. However if all goes according to plan we will be having a baby at the end of May - Slap bang in the middle of things. We have to decide whether to try moving before so putting the house on the market in Feb 08 (when it looks at its worst) or after and not moving till Autumn 08 (and trying the keep a house with a toddler and a newborn tidy for viewings). Hmmm. This could be interesting.

Oh yes and the 4 bed house they built up the road with no garden just sold for £600K - what madness! Who wants a family house without a garden?? Not me that's for sure.

Fireworks

Well the boy doesn't like fireworks much so we managed one quick photo and then we left. Maybe next year.

Pre-School is Just Around the Corner - argh.

First of all apologies for the lack of any creative/crafting vibe around here. I have no energy or enthusiasm for anything at the moment as I still feel terrible. However Alex keeps me occupied and gives me lots of kisses and cuddles and that is the best medicine you could ask for!

We went to have a look at the local pre-school playgroup last week. It is in the same building as the local primary school that I would like him to attend eventually. It is a really sweet Victorian red-brick building and it's small and personal which I much prefer. I hate these giant schools which I think are so overwhelming for small children. We are very lucky in that our local primary school has an excellent reputation and the kids seem to love it there. Anyway the pre-school group is separate although in the same building which means they can use the same facilities - a lovely grassy wooded playground, kitchen, bathrooms - and get used to the environment before having to go to school all day all week.

Alex was born in the summer so he will have just turned 4 by the time he is meant to go to school. I think this is terribly young and would love to wait till he is 5 (and homeschool) but I might have to go along with this. So the thought that, when he does eventually go to school, he will be in the same building surrounded by the same people (including his friends) is a very comforting one.

However the group is pretty big with up to 26 kids on Mondays and Tuesdays (when I work and had planned to take him). When we were there on a Wednesday there were only 10 kids and I thought this was a much better number - less noisy and manic! So we may swap days so he goes on the quieter days. He is a very mellow easy going little boy and he does get picked upon by the alpha male toddlers so I am hoping a smaller group will avoid this.

I got very teary at the idea of him going to school (I am so with you on that Suzie Sews!) - it all seems far too soon. However I know that it will be good for him, that he likes socialising and the stimulation it will give him will do him the world of good. It is only for 2 1/2 hrs and would only be twice a week so it's not too demanding. Still it feels like the end of babyhood and the start of a new phase in his life - one that goes on for another 16+ years. Also there is the matter of trust. The only people who I leave Alex with are his grandparents and his Dad. I have never left him with anyone else and the idea of leaving him with a bunch of relative strangers, even if very experienced and well qualified, is a weird one. One I have to do eventually but not one I am looking forward to. I guess these things are as much a rite-of-passage for me as they are for him.