The following is a guest post from Kristin Netterstrom, a reporter at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette who recently shared news that she and her husband are expecting. We hope to keep up with Kristin as her special pregnancy progresses.
Children are entertaining to write about, but remember those 9 (or 10) months leading up to family fun? Not so much fun. My body has been taken over by an alien that can’t drink, stay up late or fit into pants with zippers.
But I am so thankful, at 19 weeks, to be pregnant. Bloated belly and all. It has been quite a roller coaster ride.
The same day I discovered I was pregnant, I found out my dog was dying from a stomach tumor. Good news to balance the bad, right?
The pee stick said I was pregnant. But then the doctor a week later told me I wasn’t. At least, not with a real baby. From the ultrasound and high pregnancy hormone levels, he suspected a molar pregnancy. This happens when there’s not enough DNA information from both parents to make a real baby.
The doctor suggested we wait – four long weeks – to make sure his diagnosis was correct before we acted to remove the fake baby. He even used scary words like “cancer” since cancerous growths happen in some cases of molar pregnancy. A month later, the radiologist said he thought he saw a fetal pole and a heartbeat.
So baby was on again. Maybe. It wasn’t until three months into this odyssey that a specialist confirmed a real pregnancy. That’s when my husband and I stopped calling it “cyst baby” and “mutant spawn” and replaced those nicknames with “Higglett” – a take on our last name, Higgins.
Unfortunately, the specialist also saw a tumor on the placenta, where the umbilical cord branches out to the baby. The official medical term is “chorioangioma.” It’s a benign tumor that can cause anemia or heart failure in a baby, or worse when there’s fluid found under the skin.
I’ve read studies on the Internet that say such a tumor happens 1 in 1,000 births to 1 in 9,000 births, and that they’ve been associated with older women, in multiple pregnancies or female babies. You can rule out the first two for me – I’m only 28 and there’s just one baby.
We find out the baby’s sex next week. Several friends have guessed it’s a boy or a girl. We have no preference. Just a healthy baby and full-term pregnancy.
It’s only after next week’s ultrasound that I think we’ll be able to breathe and finally wrap our brains around the idea of a June baby.
I’m sending good thoughts your way! And thanks for sharing your story — I know it can make you feel very … exposed.
Thanks so much for writing this, Kristin. We’re behind you each step of the way.
I’m thinking good thoughts for you and Dusty. PLEASE let me know if there is anything you guys need.
The first weeks of pregnancy are hard, scary times no matter what … this must be almost unbearable. My thoughts are with you!
Welcome to the Mamma’s blog spot, Kristin. Thanks for sharing your pregnancy journey with us. I look forward to more postings. Sending you and your husband, good thoughts and warm wishes.
Kirstin, I remember lots of scare during my triplet pregnancy, especially Twin-Twin Transfusion Syndrome, which can happen up to 24-weeks when identicals share a sack. After making it past that, I then developed pre-eclampsia. Then, after the delivery, just when I thought the coast was clear, I got heart failure. Pregnancy is not for wimps, so hang in there.