Looks like a Healthy Baby Boy is coming!

There are few things that compare to the wonder of seeing a little life moving on a screen - a life that just a few months prior did not exist but now is growing inside of you. It is a gift, a treasure not to be taken for granted.

Of course, if you're like my husband, you may not know what you're looking at half the time. Ultrasounds can't always provide the most clear picture, but they can provide a lot of information.

The profile of our baby...if you can tell :)

In the weeks leading up to my 19 week ultrasound, people often asked the question, "Are you hoping for a boy this time?"

To that I'd reply something like, "That would be great, though I really love my two girls and would be fine to add another to the mix. But Adria is quite convinced it's a baby brother!"

And the person would follow with a comment most pregnant women have heard, "Just as long as it's a healthy baby, right?"

Honestly, I sometimes hesitated with my response to this. Yes, I want and pray for a healthy baby...more than I care what the gender is...but it's not a requirement for my love and acceptance of this child.

When you've been there in the ultrasound room and watched the doctor point out the birth defect on your growing baby and learned how it will impact the rest of your child's life, it is a moment of fear and the tears fall. All else fades as your mind struggles to grasp the fact that you are not carrying a "healthy baby". But there is movement, there is life and that little baby girl is yours.

So when the doctors asked the question about Adria, "Do you want to terminate the pregnancy?"...because this is not a "normal baby"... the answer is NO!  Perfectly healthy or not, this is my baby.

That is what we experienced when I was 20 weeks pregnant with our first child, who is now an incredible little six year old girl named Adria. Still, we hope and pray for a healthy baby.

A Baby Boy?!

As you can imagine, with an experience like this in our history, my husband and I headed to my Level 2 ultrasound on Tuesday with a mix of excitement over seeing our baby and finding out the gender, combined with tinge of nervous anticipation of what the ultrasound might reveal.

When I was pregnant with Adria, we had to travel about 1.5 hours to Annapolis, Md. and Newark, Del. to get a high level ultrasound at a Maternal Fetal Medicine specialist. Since then, Bayhealth has opened a new MFM practice in Dover, which is much closer to home.

Ironically, Adria had an ultrasound done much like Mommy's exactly one week before mine.
Her urologist has this done once or twice a year to take a look at her bladder and kidneys.
Having spina bifida often leads to issues of incontinence, weak bladder, and reflux in the kidneys.

It was a nasty, rainy day with my husband Adrian and I both coughing and sneezing as we went in for my ultrasound. The tech said it would take about 45 minutes for her to gather all the information needed, as she knew our history since we had met with a genetic counselor prior to that day.

We told her that we were VERY interested in finding out whether baby was a boy or girl!

As she started, right away we saw a nicely shaped skull and a fluttering little heart (always good signs). A few minutes in, she got a view of the legs and bottom and said, "It looks like you're going to have another girl!"

Okay, Adrian and I just smiled at each other. No biggie. We know little girls.

"Hold on," the tech said, "The umbilical cord is in the way and kind of blocking the view." For a few minutes she kept moving her device around my belly, trying for different angles. "Oh wait, look at that," she said, "I was wrong, it is a boy! Sorry for leading you the wrong way with that."

Oh really? Well that's pretty exciting! If she's sure.... The tech was pretty confident after that, we are carrying a little boy. Yeah, Adria will be excited! (Even before I was pregnant, she was asking for a little brother.)

The ultrasound continued, and we watched closely, paying special attention to the spine when she took those pictures. The techs are not supposed to tell us if they find anything abnormal, that comes directly from the doctor. But, we now have a good idea what spina bifida looks like in an ultrasound and did not see anything on our baby that gave us reason for concern. Having a child with a Neural Tube Defect, does put us at increased risk for having another baby with something similar, but I had taken high doses of Folic Acid prior to conceiving which greatly reduces the risk.

At the completion of the ultrasound, the doctor came in and confirmed that our baby looks healthy and she sees no indication of spina bifida or other defects! That's the news we wanted to hear. She said that there was a small difference in a chromosome in the brain, but thought the baby looked good and did not give us reason for concern.

We left feeling doubly blessed...to be expecting our first SON... and to be carrying a healthy baby!

After we left the ultrasound, we bought this cute pair of BLUE shoes!

Later that day, when Adria came home from school, she was happy to hear the news but she asked, "Is he in our family now?" I think she was hoping mom was bringing him home...outside my belly. He's not ready to meet us yet little girl! She'll have to wait until sometime around May for that.

But Adria called it from the start. From the moment we told her Mommy had a surprise, she knew it was her baby brother :)