1st Trimester Review

Since tomorrow officially starts my 2nd trimester, I thought that I would do a review of my 1st trimester. There has been a lot of excitement and surprises (not to mention lots of morning sickness and other pregnancy symptoms). It's been amazing and overwhelming.

It started out with disappointment that I wasn't pregnant the previous month. We just decided, "Let's keep trying. God will make it happen in His perfect timing." Little did we know that in the next couple of weeks we would be pregnant again. I just knew it had happened even a few days after which coincided with my birthday. I was sick as a dog on my birthday and couldn't eat anything much for a few days. The next weekend we had my family birthday get together and I cooked most of the food, hosted it, and cleaned up a pretty good deal. I felt awful and passed out as soon as everyone left. I just had a strong feeling I was pregnant. Lee told me to wait until a test would work so I didn't spend a fortune on pregnancy tests (he knows me too well).

On Wednesday, February 24th, I took a test and it was faintly positive. I was psyched! I knew that it wasn't likely to get a positive (even a faint positive) unless I was in fact pregnant. I tested again (and again, and again, and again) until I got a strong positive on Friday. I called my OB to see about getting my HCG tested since I had the miscarriage in November. I was excited but didn't want to get too excited until I knew that things looked good. I went in on Monday, March 1st and got the test done. I couldn't wait to find out the results. She called me Tuesday after Bible study and said, "It's good." I immediately started crying I was so happy. She said, "They are 505 which is actually high." I was thrilled! I went back Tuesday, March 3rd, and got another test done. She called me and told me, "They tripled, they are 1550." I knew that was good news.

After much research on HCG (yes I am an avid google searcher), I realized that tripling could be a sign of twins. I mentioned it to Lee and joked about it a few times and he always said, "I don't see how it could be." Luke told me it was going to be twins a bunch and even told me what we should do with the nursery for a baby boy and a baby girl. It was precious and part of me thought, "It would be really cool to have twins since Luke will nearly be 5 when we have the baby and we want 3-4 kids." I never really thought it was possible.

I had tons of sickness and thought, "This must be a girl." I wasn't sick at all with Luke so I knew something was different. Little did I know what the real "something different" was.

On Thursday, March 25th, with full hearts and a little anxiety, we went for my check-up and ultrasound. I got all the practical, necessary things done while Lee and Luke waited in the waiting room and then they got everything ready and brought them in. We looked at the ultrasound and saw a blob. I was so happy. Then she measured it and we saw, heard, and measured the heartbeat. I was already crying I was so happy. Lee and Luke were stoked. Then she said, "And here's something you probably weren't expecting." I said, "TWINS?!?!" She said, "YES!" I said, "Are you serious?!?!" She said, "YES!" We measured it and we saw, heard, and measured the heartbeat. Two healthy babies. I was laughing and crying the rest of the ultrasound and appointment.

They gave us the run-down on twins. We were told there would be more doctor's appointments, more ultrasounds, and that we would probably only go until around 37 weeks. All I could really think about was, "Wow! God has truly answered our prayers with a double blessing." We took our pile of information and stack of pictures and went to the car and sat there calling family.

Each conversation went:
Us: "The appointment took longer than we thought. Sorry."
Them: "So what did you find out?"
Us: "Well we didn't see exactly what we thought we would see."
Them: "What is it?"
Us: "We are having twins!!!!"
Them: "No way. You are joking" (or something to that effect)
Us: "Seriously, we are having two babies." (and trying to convince them)

It was soooooo funny! Everyone was shocked!

I posted the pics and told everyone (because I can't stand to share good news). Everyone was surprised and excited for us.

I spent a few days being really anxious and after praying with my pastor, I felt a lot better. I continued to pray everytime I got scared or worried. I committed both babies to the Lord and prayed a hedge of protection around them. Knowing that God has His hands holding them makes me feel better anytime fear or worry tries to creep in.

The past few weeks have been filled with sickness, going to the bathroom all the time, and trying to eat whatever whenever I can. We've been working on and selecting baby names, working on collecting things we are going to need since we will have two babies this time, planning the nursery, and just being extremely excited about the future and our growing family.

As we embark on the 2nd trimester, I am really excited. Tomorrow is officially 12 weeks and we have a special ultrasound to see the babies again. Monday I have my 12 week check up. In a few weeks we will get to find out the genders. We will be spending the 2nd trimester picking out the rest of our baby needs, planning showers, having showers, and getting everything ready for the babies. I am really looking forward to it.