Duke Medicine...

I have to say that while I grew up loving Duke (my Mom went to school there), I have a love for Duke all on my own. They have such a GREAT fetal diagnostic department and wonderful OBGYN's! I could not ask for a better place to be . I learned when I was pregnant with Hope that the fetal department was awesome, and then I learned that the doctors at Duke Children's Hospital are top notch. Today, I was reminded of why I love going to Duke.

Today’s appointment went as well as it could have gone! First, I was able to met with "our" genetic counselor to review family history and to understand the range of testing available throughout the pregnancy. This is the fourth pregnancy (Hope Noelle, a tubal, Chayse Nicole, and this one) that she has worked with us on and it is so nice to see a familiar face when you are in the middle of such uncertainty. I did not have to rehash anything with her as she remembers our family and I have to say, what a feeling of peace that gives!!! To have someone that you can connect with during such an emotional time is priceless. I was reminded today that I am exactly where I am supposed to be.

I had blood work was drawn for screenings on three Trisomy's... Trisomy 21 (Down Syndrome), Trisomy 18 (Edwards Syndrome), and Trisomy 13 (Patau Syndrome). Babies with these trisomy's sometimes show a pattern in the blood work... Hope's pattern was high-low, high-low which is a pattern for Down Syndrome. It will take a week to ten days to get these test results back so please keep that in your prayers.

We also had an ultrasound where the fluid on the neck in measured. Studies have shown a direct link between excess fluid found at the back of the baby’s neck (nuchal translucency) to trisomy's and to heart defects. This test/ultrasound HAS to be done between 11 and 13 weeks gestation. The normal range of fluid is 1 to 3 millimeters and anything above 3 mm can be indication of a syndrome or heart defect... both of which we had in Hope Noelle. Today, our sweet one's fluid measurement was 1.4mm! This is the EXACT same measurement that Chayse had! No anomalies were detected at this time for this stage of our pregnancy. We will go back around 17-18 weeks and have the organs and bones scanned to check their development and make sure all is still on track! Thank God for a good report this far! As I said before, it will take about 7-10 days for the blood work results to come back.

That said, seeing the baby today on the ultrasound was amazing. The littlest Burgess was all over the place! I was so excited to see that little bitty baby in there, kicking and moving... what a sigh of relief!!!! The tech was able to get a few pictures... I will get them posted in the next day or two!