Twins At 18 Weeks

Today was my 18 week doctors appointments.  I had two appointments today.  The first one was with Dr. Moore at 11:15 and the second was with Dr. Richardson at 2.  We dropped Liam off at Ryan's parents house because it is so much easier to go without a 2 year old!  We left early because I had bought some carseats from a girl on Craigslist and we were meeting her husband before we went to the appointments.  I was skeptical about buying them used but after talking to the girl I was sure these were in good condition.  This time around I am not as picky due to the fact that I have to buy everything in pairs.  Plus, throw in building a house on top of that!  So I figured that getting 2 carseats for $150 instead of paying $180 a piece for them was a deal!  Here is a picture of them!  I love them!  It's hard to tell but they are orange and grey not red and grey.

Here is what it is going to look like in public.  Lord, please help me!  

I have made some awesome twin mommy friends who have sold and given me some great things!  This snap and go stroller was one of the things that was given to me!

Dr. Moore was happy with my progress.  She said all my labs were good except she wanted to monitor my TSH level a little more.  So I had my blood drawn again.  She said that I will redo my glucose test around my 26 week appointment so I'm not out of the gestational diabetes woods yet!  I had a quick ultrasound at her office to look at their heartbeats.  Both are beating like they should!

After that appointment we ate at our favorite place to eat right now, Firehouse Subs.  If I wasn't pregnant with twins and in the middle of building a house, I would invest in one of those in Manchester.  If you haven't tried it then you need to next time you are in Murfreesboro.  We stopped by Sam's to get some water and Old Navy to waste time before our next appointment to picked up Liam more pajamas.  Then it was time for our next appointment.

Dr. Richardson wasn't in his Murfreesboro office today so we didn't to talk to him.  We had our ultrasound to look at all of their body parts to make sure both were growing accurately and evenly.  I don't see how they know what they are looking out.  Being in the medical field I can sometimes figure out what things are but I just don't get how they know where to move the transducer to know where to look for things.  It blows my mind!  But we got some good pictures and they both weigh 8 ounces each.  They were once again confirmed that they were boys!  We see him back in 2 more weeks for another ultrasound.  We were told that we will eventually do an Echocardiogram of them both to check their hearts.  She said that at 20 weeks their hearts are the size of quarters so anywhere after 20 weeks we will look into doing that.  All in all it was a good appointment day.  Everything seems to be going the way they should.  Hoping for an uneventful pregnancy and delivery!

Baby A's (still no names yet!) Profile

Baby A's Face

These are the first pictures I have of them together.  It's looking down on the tops of their heads.  They are kissing in this picture!

Baby B's Profile

Baby B's Face

Twins

I get a lot of questions on a daily basis regarding the twins.  Are the identical?  Are they boys? Are the girls?  When are you due?  Do twins run in your family?  Are you scared?  The answers get exhausting but I can't be anything but blessed.  So I figured to answer some of these questions, I would just blog about them.  Here is a little information about the kind of twins we have.  Monochorionic/Diamniotic Twins.

Monochorionic twins are monozygotic (identical) twins that share the same placenta. If the placenta is shared by more than two twins, these are monochorionic multiples. Monochorionic twins occur in 0.3% of all pregnancies. 75% of monozygotic twin pregnancies are monochorionic; the remaining 25% are dichorionic diamniotic. If the placenta divides, this takes place after the third day after fertilization.

Monochorionic twins generally have two amniotic sacs (called Monochorionic-Diamniotic "MoDi")  Monochorionic-Diamniotic twins are almost always monozygotic (or identical), with a few exceptions where the blastocysts have fused. - Wikipedia

These ultrasounds were from my appointment with Dr. Moore in December 11th.  This ultrasound was quick.  They just wanted to measure the heartbeat of them both.  They ultrasound tech let us take a quick picture of them before we left.

 Here is the pretty picture that Dr. Moore drew us.  It shows the 3 types of twins that form.  Ours is the one in the middle that I talked about in the beginning of the blog.  One placenta, 2 separate sacs.  She moved my due date back this appointment.  My original due date was on June 21 but now the plan is if they do not come before June 7th then they will induce me.  I will be delivered in an operating room with double the staff just in case there were complications with the delivery and/or the babies.  

After we talked to Dr. Moore I had to get my blood drawn.  I believe I was 11-12 weeks at this appointment and she had me do my glucose test early to see if I was gestational diabetic.  I was with Liam so they are keeping a close eye on my glucose.  I had to drink this nasty stuff on the was to the office.  I took my glucometer with me so that I could check it myself.  According to my meter I was not diabetic at this time.  I got a call about 3 weeks later saying that I had passed my glucose test but she wants me to repeat it around my 24-28 week due to the increase in insulin needed for the twins.  So it looks like that wont be the last bottle I have to drink :( 

  

As for complications in my pregnancy, I see Dr. Richardson, the high risk OBGYN at St Thomas Rutherford.  We had our first consultation on January 2nd.  Thinking it was just a consultation, I wasn't expecting to have an ultrasound.  The ultrasound took about an hour and in that hour we found out the sex of the twins.  BOYS!!!!  After the ultrasound we sat down with him and he talked about all the risks to look for and to answer any questions we had.  I have to see him every 2 weeks for the next 8 weeks to have an ultrasound and monitor for specific complications. Once those 8 weeks are up and no complications are seen then I no longer have to see him again.  Here is some information about the type of complications they are monitoring me for. 

In addition to a shared placenta, monochorionic twins also have their circulatory systems intermingled in random and unpredictable circulatory anastomoses. This can cause disproportionate blood supply, resulting in twin-to-twin transfusion syndrome (TTTS) in 20% of MoDi pregnancies. This is the main complication of monochorionic twins.

The 80% that of MoDi pregnancies without TTTS still have high rates of birth weight discordance, fetal growth restriction, prematurity and resultant cesarean section deliveries. One twin may also fail to develop a proper heart and become dependent on the pumping activity of the other twin's heart, resulting in twin reversed arterial perfusion. If one twin dies in utero, blood accumulates in that twin's body, causing exsanguination of the remaining twin. - Wikipedia

This is the picture that we sent all of our family and friends to announce that they were boys.  We had stopped at Babies R Us to look around and I saw these hershey kisses and thought that would be perfect.  

Both boys weighed around 6oz but were measuring 1 week bigger than my "due date."  I was 16 weeks at my appointment but they were measuring 17 weeks.  Twin A was slightly bigger that B but not by very much.  In terms of days, Twin A was 3 days bigger.  Dr Richardson said that on the next ultrasound they will be able to give me a more accurate due date.  

Here are some pictures of Twin A. 

 His heart rate was 148bpm

No question here!

His handsome face.  He was more cooperative than his brother!

Here is Twin B.  His heart rate was 150bpm. 

We were expecting this once we saw the first one! He just confirmed it!

These are the best pictures we could get of this stubborn one.  The first one is his face and its pretty creepy!  I have a picture of Liam just like it too!  The last one is the best profile we would get. 

As of right now we do not have names picked out.  We are throwing names around but I will update everyone once its official! 

Oh and for those who ask if twins run in our family, here is your answer thanks to Wikipedia...

Women who have a family history of fraternal twins have a higher chance of producing fraternal twins themselves, as there is a genetically linked tendency to hyper-ovulate. There is no known genetic link for identical twinning. Other factors that increase the odds of having fraternal twins include maternal age, fertility drugs and other fertility treatments, nutrition, and prior births. - Wikipedia

So NO, there is no genetic link.  Dr. Richardson says that this was a spontaneous separation of one egg and one sperm.  We just got lucky! 

Christmas 2013

Christmas Eve started with gingerbread cookies.  We had made and baked them days before but waited till Christmas eve to decorate them.  I put the icing on and Liam decorated them with sprinkles.  

When he wasn't decorating, he was eating them!

After decorating cookies we decided it would be best to let him open his presents from us.  I had to work Christmas Day and knew that that morning would be hectic.  We figured we would just do Santa stuff on Christmas day.  

After unwrapping he would say "Open!"  He wanted to open every present!

We had to read the books he got ...

Someone has been watching Momma pull tags off of things with her teeth.  

Christmas at the Gilley's consisted of good food, lots of presents, egg nog, dirty santa and family pictures!

Typical picture of the kids!

After the Gilley's we went to the Brasfield Christmas and had the famous Christmas breakfast.  Of course I forgot my camera again :(  Santa and his elves came to the door and sang a Christmas carol.  Liam loved it!  We played dirty santa and then made our way to the next place!

After the Brasfield Christmas we went to the McWhorter Christmas.  Of course I was so tired I forgot to take pictures there too.  I really have to get better at this!  We played dirty santa there too!  After we exchanged gifts we decided to head home to help Santa put together Liam's present!

Santa brought Liam a train table!!!!

Our stockings.  Santa started shopping a little early this year and perhaps "made" too many toys to put in his stocking :)

I love Christmas! 

Poor little guy.  He decided he wanted to sleep in that morning.  We had to wake him up or we would be rushed getting to the places we needed to go.  I had to be at work at 1pm that day so we had to get moving.  He was falling alseep while he was going through his stocking. 

Finally I laid him in the recliner to sleep it off while Ryan and I went through our stockings.

After our house we went to my parents house.  We opened gifts and ate breakfast.  Yum!

After my parents we went to Ryan's parents.  Unfortunately we didn't take any pictures.  We took our video camera with us and Ryan taped Liam opening up his presents.  If only we had more hands!

All in all Christmas was great.  I love buying gifts and giving them to family.  Seeing Liam's expressions makes it all the best!  I can't wait till next year when there will be 2 more rotten kids running (or crawling) around!