There were many twists and turns along my journey to meet my daughter Aliyah or they may have been signs I will never know for sure......the first was that my husband and I had actually decided to start trying for another baby back in late August of 2009 I called my OB's office to set up an appointment but was informed they were booked out until January of 2010!!! Crazy huh?? Finally in January 2010 I went in for the removal of my IUD at that time my Dr warned me that since I had the IUD for close to 4 years it would be a while before I could conceive up to a year. Well.....I became pregnant within a month of my IUD removal.
Shortly after I discovered I was pregnant I started bleeding and cramping, worried something was terribly wrong and scared to death I called my OB she told me that it either was nothing serious because some women have minor bleeding in the first weeks of pregnancy BUT that bleeding was also sometimes the first sign of an early miscarriage and there was nothing they could do to stop it. :( I was advised to stay in bed and take it easy sure enough after a few days of rest the bleeding stopped. {something most may not know is that as high as 80% of baby's conceived with Ds miscarry :( so in other words these baby's are miracles!} Now I just had to wait until my first prenatal visit at 10 weeks along for the ultrasound to confirm if there was a viable fetus in my womb....Crying from pure joy I was so relieved when I saw the tiny bean shape with the center flickering away, it was my baby's beating heart! Thank God!!
As my prenatal care progressed I was asked multiple times if I would be interested in the triple screening test for "birth defects" by the way may I say I HATE THAT TERM!! Anyway.... I refused it twice then the third time I was asked I agreed to have it done. I remember so clearly what I said to the Dr "it wouldn't matter anyway" little did I know!! By this point in my pregnancy it was cutting it close to the time frame in which these screening tests needed to be done so I was sent to my local lab that same day for the blood work as for the ("nuchal translucency scan" I did NOT know this at the time but it's a fancy word for a special ultrasound of the baby's neck.) I was sent out of Sacramento to Roseville CA about 30 minutes away at a later date.
I went in for the ultrasound portion of my prenatal screening I was so excited because I was going to see my baby again! :) My baby moved around like crazy so the poor ultrasound Tech was having a hard time getting the measurements she needed for the screening test. Finally my little one settled down enough for her to do her job, I could tell she was really trying to measure and remeasure "something" on the baby very carefully, she then asked the Perinatologist { A subspecialty of obstetrics concerned with the care of the fetus and complicated, high-risk pregnancies.} to come try he also measured and remeasured diligently. I at this time had no idea something was "wrong" the Doctor then asked if had I done the blood work yet? I told him I had done it in the Sacramento office he then told me they couldn't locate my blood results in the computer which he needed to combine with the ultrasound in order to come up with a proper screening result so he would need to call me later if anything came up.
Well........ the Doctor never called. For some reason I just did not call him to follow up which I usually do with everything! I just simply assumed that with no call nothing was wrong. (Mind you that back when we had these screening tests done at 13 weeks my husband and I had decided since it was early in the pregnancy if there was something "wrong" we might consider terminating depending on the severity of the problem.)
Four weeks later at my regular prenatal visit with my Ob (which I will call Dr. Superman) asked me "if they (at the Prinatologist) had informed me that my baby's neck measured a little big?" I answered "No" and giggled because I thought to myself "its probably a boy! My husband is built like that I guess my kid will play football someday, cool!" Dr. Superman then excused himself politely he went into his office next door but I could hear him speaking with somebody over the phone and he sounded upset he was kinda yelling at them. He then came into my room again sat down and said in a very kind tone "I'm sorry that they didn't call you with your results sooner, but the screening test show that your baby has a 1 in 73 chance of being born with DOWN SYNDROME."
I just looked at him with no reactionm I WAS IN SHOCK and I had my then 4 year old with me I didn't want her to see me cry. Dr Superman look concerned he asked me if I knew what Down syndrome was? I said "Yes." I then asked him "how can we know for sure?" he said a amniocentesis would be the next step to confirm or rule out the diagnosis. I asked him "What can I do now? What are my options I'm 17 weeks along?" He told me "It's up to you, you can do whatever you like at this point." { I will forever carry the guilt of my first reaction to this news } He set up my appointment for the next morning for the Amnio I then left. As soon as I got into my car I just started BAWLING!! like a baby, my poor daughter was in the back seat listening to me I told her that mommy's tummy was hurting. I then called my husband Ricky at work to let him know what was happening he was not upset by the news or he didn't show it.
As you have read in my post about our diagnosis we did the Amino the next day it came back 2 weeks later confirming our baby was in fact going to be born with Translocation Down Syndrome then 2 weeks after that we found out that I was born with a chromosomal abnormality myself and so on and so on.....So as you can see there were a lot of twists and turns or "signs" whatever you want to call them, everything happens for a reason God was in control and he knew what he was doing even if I at first didn't want to follow the path he set for me.
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