A Second Baby Story

It’s been a little over three weeks since Samantha joined our family, and a little over nine months since I first set out to write this post. I had the best of intentions to blog all the details of this pregnancy the way I did with Lana, but caring for a three year-old, managing an intensive project for work, and dealing with a horribly uncomfortable pregnancy drained my energy and diminished my ability to write more than a coherent sentence or two. It’s been a roller coaster ride, so let me start at the beginning when we hopped on board.

It was late February when I first began to suspect I was pregnant again. John and I had just decided to begin trying for another baby at the end of 2008 and hoped to time the pregnancy so I could avoid another late-stage pregnancy during the sweltering Georgia summer. We’d had a couple of false alarms in previous months, but the fact that all of my pants were suddenly too tight in the waist made me think this time was different. We missed the whole peeing on a stick experience with Lana, so it took a few tries to convince us this was for real. Three positive tests later, we informed Lana that she would be a big sister and then announced the pregnancy to our family during a retirement celebration for John’s dad.

Things moved pretty quickly from there. My pregnancy symptoms kicked in almost immediately, although this time around the morning sickness was actually evening sickness and I found that it could be mostly alleviated by eating throughout the day. I began to show much more quickly this time around, which I hear is normal for a second pregnancy and possibly also related to the eating all day. Things checked out well with my new doctor, we breathed a sigh of relief when we saw just one little peanut of a baby on the nine week ultrasound, and we began the exciting process of preparing for a new baby.

Then it all went to hell. About 16 weeks into the pregnancy, I went in for an early blood glucose test (mandatory for anyone that’s previously delivered an almost 10-lb baby) and the multiple marker screening test, a blood test that can tell you if your baby is at increased risk for conditions like neural tube defects or chromosomal abnormalities. I was given the screening test when pregnant with Lana and things checked out fine. When it was presented as an optional test this time around, I deliberated and ultimately decided to do it again. I took both the blood sugar and multiple marker screening test early in the week and was told to expect a call in about two weeks if there were any problems.

To my surprise, I came downstairs from my office a little after 5pm that Friday to find a voicemail that a nurse left just minutes earlier requesting me to call her back about my test results. My stomach lurched and my temper flared once I realized I would have to spend all weekend worrying what this meant until I could reach someone on Monday morning. Why do doctor’s offices do this to people? Is it like the practice of firing people late on Friday so they can’t make a big scene? I tried to stay positive and hoped that it was a problem with my blood sugar, which wouldn’t be a huge shock since I flunked my first glucose test while pregnant with Lana.

I made it through the weekend without too much anxiety and placed a call to the nurse first thing Monday morning. Of course I was sent to her voicemail and had to wait another hour before the phone rang again. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the nurse calling me back. A representative from the Maternal Fetal Medicine office politely informed me that she was calling to schedule my Level II Ultrasound. Never mind that I hadn’t yet been informed by my doctor’s office why I needed a special ultrasound -- I knew immediately that it was bad news. Even worse, I’d have to wait a week before I could have the ultrasound completed. By the time the nurse finally got around to calling me back I was in such a state of distress that I barely heard her vague explanation of the “elevated risk” the screening test indicated.

Despite my concern, I tried to soldier on through my day and gave John, who happened to be off work that day, and Lana a kiss goodbye as I headed downtown for some morning meetings. I barely made it to the interstate before I had a total and complete meltdown. I turned around and drove to my doctor’s office where I alarmed both staff and patients when I turned up unannounced -- a pregnant, weeping mess. They ushered me into an examination room and a nurse retrieved my test results. She began to go over the printout, which listed various disorders in the form of a ratio that indicated my baby’s risk of having that problem. She explained that a test is deemed abnormal if one of the risk assessments is higher than 1 in 250.. Then she showed me the line that made my heart stop:

Trisomy 21 -- 1:11

As I let the news sink in that my baby had a one in 11 chance of being born with Down syndrome, I felt a sense of complete and utter despair. I returned home to sob on John’s shoulder and try to explain to my concerned daughter why Mommy was crying. I spent the next few days crunching numbers through tears -- one in eleven meant there was just a nine percent chance that my baby would be affected. Reassuring in theory, but not once I determined that a .4 percent risk was enough to trigger an abnormal result. I began combing through online message boards and a community of women on BabyCenter.com who had received abnormal results. I rarely found any women with a higher risk assessment than mine, and some with much lower risks had gone on to give birth to babies with Down syndrome.

I’ve tried and tried to think of a way to describe how I felt during that period of uncertainty, but I really have no words. It was, without a doubt, the worst time of my life. As I began to envision a life with a special needs child, endless scenarios ran through my head. Would the baby have some of the most serious health problems of Down syndrome, and not be strong enough to survive? Would he/she be highly functioning, and live a good life under our care? Would we be able to find a good school and playmates for the child? Would Lana feel burdened by caring for him/her once John and I were gone? Was I a complete and total asshole for being so distraught at the idea of a special needs child?

I did attempt to hold myself together in front of Lana, but I was clearly not successful. I think my lowest point came during a quiet car ride with John’s parents and Lana to dinner on the Sunday evening before our Tuesday ultrasound. Lana looked over to me from her car seat and asked, completely out of the blue, “Mama, is the baby ok?” I responded the only way I could -- “I hope so, sweetie.”

The day of the ultrasound finally arrived and I fought to keep down my breakfast as I walked into the exam room. A technician informed us that she would conduct the scan and then call in the doctor to interpret the results. We would also be able to learn the sex of the baby, which should have been exciting but was completely overshadowed by the concerns we were there to address.

I held my breath as we began to see the first images of our baby. I concentrated on the technician’s face as she began to search for “markers” that might indicate Down syndrome. Because I was so focused on analyzing her body language and trying to interpret the images on screen, I almost missed her announcement that we were having a girl. I had thoroughly convinced myself that this baby was a boy and, very possibly, a boy with Down syndrome. With that mental image disrupted, I allowed myself to hope for the best. John finally voiced the question in my head and asked the tech, “How are we looking?” She explained that she didn’t see any markers to indicate a problem, but the doctor would need to provide the official results. For the first time in a week, I felt my chest relax a bit. The doctor’s assessment was similar, but she did explain that almost half of baby’s with Down syndrome do not show any obvious markers on ultrasound. Unable to face another six months of worry, we scheduled an amniocentesis for later that week. That procedure would give us conclusive results and the peace of mind I very much needed after the testing ordeal.

The evening after the ultrasound, we took Lana out for a dinner that felt like a celebration. We ate pizza, laughed, and John even won Lana a teddy bear from the claw machine. To cap off the evening, we headed to Babies R Us to shop for crib bedding for our “girl baby”, as Lana christened her. It felt like a very dark cloud was lifting.

The amniocentesis went off without a hitch and John even managed to stay at my side while a very large needle was inserted into my belly. Four days later I got a call from the doctor with the best news I’ve ever heard -- “Your baby is completely normal.”

The rest of my pregnancy proceeded normally with the only real concern being the potentially large size of my girl baby. I’ll address that in my next post about the delivery, but suffice it to say that Samantha was not the 11 lb moose that ultrasound indicated she might be. The pregnancy was uncomfortable, but whenever I felt particularly bad I thought back to the testing scare and counted my blessings to be carrying a healthy baby.


It’s still hard for me to remember how terrified I felt during that two week period back in June (I had to wipe tears off my laptop no less than three times during the composition of this post), but I feel that in a weird way it was a blessing in disguise. I will never again take for granted the amazing miracle of bringing a healthy child into this world. Every time I look into Samantha’s beautiful face, I remember all my fears for her health and future and I am so, so thrilled to have her here, safe and well in my arms.