Defying all the odds

Max had s traumatic and quick birth at 36+2. I haven't written the while story on here I know, but it was all very quick (fully dialated within 2hrs of arriving at hospital) and after he failed to get into a good 'birth position' and he became distressed we were wheeled into theatre for an emergency forceps delivery. It was terrifying, painful and completely overwhelming but he arrived safe and sound and is now asleep on my boob. 

After he was born there was a bit of commotion from the side of the theatre and lots of medics exclaiming 'oohs' and 'ahhs' and Martin was told to bring the camera as he would want to take s picture of this...what this was we didn't know.

Well here is what was causing so much commotion (sorry for a graphic photo!)

Max had what is called a 'True knot' in his umbilical cord. He was always an sctive baby but whilst in utero had managed to roll through a loop in his cord creating a perfect knot.

At the time I didn't think much of it but the doctors told us it was rare but Max was fine. It's only now during hours of late night Breast feeding that we've looked further into this and read more about these true knots. Well, they regularly cause stillbirths as babies are often deprived of oxygen due to this knot tightening. Many scientific research papers have stated that the biggest risk to babies with true knots occurs after 37weeks, when room becomes less and babies tighten the knot with most movements. Many knots, like ours, are undetected before birth and aren't discovrted until baby has been delivered. 

I dread to think what may have happened had I not gone into labour early, he may very well not be here. 

This little man has kept the medical community on their toes since day one. 

12 months

February 8th 2014 was the date of our egg collection and fertilisation of our little embryos.

February 8th 2015 and this little embryo is getting more perfect by the day

The story isn't over yet

4 years in infertility and then you hear the doctor say the words "I'm going to diagnose postnatal depression and anxiety". yowzers

I love Max more than anything and I haven't struggled to bond. My PND seems to have manifested itself in irrational thoughts of harm coming to him with an awful obsession that he will die. On Sunday morning I woke to a vivid daydream of someone's hands holding my son under water. He was wearing his blue sleep suit with the monkeys on, one of his favourites. There's was nothing I could do to get the hands from his shoulders holding him under. I spent the next 4hours uncontrollably sobbing.

This is just one more kink in the chain

Merry Christmas

To all I know, I hope you have an extremely merry and very happy Christmas.

Lots of love from us and our 33 week Christmas Turkey. It's been a long road and taken us almost 5 years but for once our year is ending on a high.You get the underwear shot for free as it's Christmas.

Names

Ive always been interested in different regions of the world and how they name their children, mums name, dads name, family name, middle names etc...and by searching the Internet for more information it seems that there are tons and tons or pages dedicated to naming children 'the British way' and that, apparently, we have a certain way of naming babies....I'm not so sure myself but it got me thinking.

This little one has a name and has had a name since he was a frozen embryo in an industrial freezer. His middle name has always been 'Raymond'...this isn't exactly my first choice of name but it's DHs beloved grandfathers name who passed away shortly before we began IVF and it seems fitting to use it. Sadly, at 14 weeks pregnant DH also lost his uncle who he loved dearly. This was completely unexpected and hit everyone hard, uncle was very supportive when we suffered our miscarriage and unfortunately died a few days before we told family our news which means he never knew he was going to be a great uncle. 

So we have toyed with the idea of using both names as Baby Bs 'middle names', but I'm not sure if it's too much on the poor guy? His name would then be M_______ Raymond William Briggs. Which is kinda long...

So what are people's thoughts? Two name too many or ok as it will only be used for formal purposes such as passports etc..?

Week 32

Still not loving them. Jeez I've seen woman with twins have perfectly smooth tummies at full term - this monster still have 6 weeks to go! Given that I've lost 8lbs since my GD diagnoses and he's not the size of a 3 year old I don't know why he's doing such a number on my belly. Clearly shitty skin genes!

This week we discovered the beginnings of placental insifficiency which they have chalked down to the diabetes. This means that there is restricted blood flow from the placenta to baby B which can slow down growth but, more importantly, can quickly deteriorate to complete placental break down. He's absolutely perfect at the minute and as they caught it really early they're not too concerned that things will dramatically decline. It will mean regular monitoring from now on to see how he's doing. This week alone we've had a repeat doppler scan, a diabetes check up and a CTG tomorrow morning. Next week we have another growth scan and see what else they would like. So far this monster isn't actually too monster like - he's in the 53rd centile and weighs around 4lbs. He's distinctly average size wise :)

Love thy pregnant body

I've mentioned before that stretch marks have NOT been my best friend during the past 6 weeks or so. In fact I don't know if I'm ashamed to admit that I've cried about these more times than I care to remember. I knew I was going to get them as I already have a collection of them of my thighs, hips and boobs from puberty and my skin is not made of stretchy stuff. Did that make it any easier when I first noticed them? Nope.

The thing to understand is that I don't hate them because of what they signify, my skin is stretching to accommodate my son, I love them for this. I hate them because they're forever, they're now here to stay with me for the rest of my waking days and there's very little I can do about it. Yes they will fade like me others, but my pre-pregnancy body is now gone, completely. As a woman who loves nothing more than throwing on a bikini and sitting on the sun these new lines take some getting used to. My current fear is never having the confidence to go to the beach with my son and splash in the sea without feeling too self conscious, I don't want to spend the rest of my life feeling unattractive and I certainly don't want to spend a majority of it too ashamed to be naked in front of my own husband due to my crepe like tummy...

So in order to try and learn to love my lines I'm going to stop ignoring them and try to learn to love (!) them. Which will include taking weekly photographs of my tummy to see how they've progressed, in the hope that one day I'll look back on them and actually feel proud. I'm not saying im going to post these photos on my blog, but to jump in feet first I decided the first 'stretch mark diary' should debut on here...