A week later another bomb. I felt like a big black cloud was following us. Our MFM Doctor, the woman who deliver the news of the MoMos called to tell us the blood work came back positive for Downs giving us a 1 in 12 chance they have Downs Syndrome. She recommended an amniocentesis to determine if the twins did have a genetic disorder She told us there were also some disorders that could end in stillbirth and after a very involved pregnancy a long hospital stay and all the stress, that would be tragic. We went in that day for the amnio.
She took a very long needle and stuck it in my belly to extract some amniotic fluid for testing.
We were able to watch the ultrasound as she did this and poor baby B kept backing up into the needle. It was frightening to watch. After it was done the assistant said "Are you ok, do you need to sit down?" I thought she was talking to me but she was talking to Cary, who was ghost white.
Now more waiting.... This was right around Christmas and we were going back to California to spend xmas with my family in Paradise. I really hoped we would have the news before we left so I would not be stressed the whole time I was on Holiday.
Cary's Commentary:
The first week or two after we learned we had Momo's, I spent many late nights Googling everything about Momo's. Its a relativly new science; 30 years ago before ultrasounds, people didnt know they had Momo's until birth, and 50% of them died at delivery. Therefore, most of the info on Momo's is relativedly new.
The "benchmark" study for Momo's, called the "Heybourne study", talks about how inpatient monitoring of the Momo twins significantly increases survivial rates. By checking yourself into the hospital, and closely mointiroing the babies for the myriad of issues they can have (including cord compression, Twin to Twin transfusion syndrome (TTTS), Intrauterine growth restriction (IUGR), Pre term labor, pre ecclampsia etc etc etc) you are able to make better decisions and have better care options.
Ironically, we discovered that Kent Heybourne, the author of the study, worked under Dr Richard Porreco in Denver! Our friend Michelle was pregnant with twins in Boulder, and her doctor was Porreco. So we scheduled a visit with Porreco for a 2nd opinion.
Once we saw him, he confirmed the diagnosis of Momo twins...
The amniocentesis was rough. We had recieved a 1 in 12 chance of Downs's syndrome from some early bloodwork. Anytime you have a child, you always run risks. They usually go up with age. With Rylan, we had also had some sketchy bloodwork with elevated chances of problems, but had faith and optimism that everything was fine, and in fact everything was.
I watched in as Dr Harper plunged a super long needle into my wife's belly, and watched on the ultrasound screen as the needle entered the womb and parked right next to baby B to start extracting fluid. Baby B did'nt like it: She starting flipping and flopping and banging her butt against the needle (I wonder if she's have a scar)...The whole thing was fairly traumatizing. I turned white and had to sit down.
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