Mac Family: Bad blood

The good news: My 20-week ultrasound came back completely normal. I think I am a big time worrier, especially since becoming a mom. When that 20-week ultrasound rolls around each time, I worry more about whether the baby is healthy than I do about the gender of the baby. On my drive to my recent 20-week ultrasound, I could not help but worry all the way there, although I did maintain the faith that everything would most likely be okay. I was excited, also, about finding out whether this child would be a boy or a girl!

I always worry about the possibility of spina bifida or anencephaly. These conditions exist, and I spend a lot of time in the blog world, reading blogs of people whose babies have died from birth defects. This big ultrasound stresses me out each time! With Reilly, we found out that she had cysts on her brain shortly after the 20-week ultrasound. Thankfully, when we had another ultrasound approximately six weeks later, the cysts had disappeared.

Of course, we felt blessed.

Every mom wants her child to be healthy. Every mom loves her child more than life itself long before that baby is born. I am no exception.

The bad news: When I had my prenatal blood work done with this current pregnancy, the results showed an antibody in my blood. This may or may not be a serious condition.

When I was between 8-9 weeks pregnant, I experienced some bleeding. This really freaked me out, as I had never experienced any type of bleeding with the previous two pregnancies. I thought that I was possibly having a miscarriage.

I first went to a local hospital, where they are complete idiots (and I say that based on multiple visits there) who refused to do anything to help me. This was, of course, after sitting in their waiting room for at least a couple of hours.

The doctor there acted like it was no big deal. They even told me that if it was a miscarriage that there was nothing they could do about it. That may indeed be true, but I believe they should have done an ultrasound to determine if the baby still had a heartbeat. I was told that they did not believe they needed to do that, and...I was told that I would find out in the weeks to come whether I had experienced a miscarriage or not. Nice.

Let me just say that I am a mellow person about 90% of the time. This time fell into that other 10% of the time. I tried to demand an ultrasound. I told them I had the right to know if I had had a miscarriage. They disagreed with me. I walked out of the ER right in the middle of a [pointless] conversation with these people and headed to the Holland Hospital.

Poor Dave.

At Holland Hospital, I did not have to wait long at all. They were very thorough, and in the end, they did an ultrasound, which showed the baby's strong heartbeat. Thank God.

People may or may not know that I underwent fertility treatments to have all of my children. I cannot get pregnant on my own.

The fertility drugs (injectibles) I took this time around caused cysts to form on my ovaries. We had an ultrasound done at both 6.5 weeks and 8 weeks at the fertility clinic. I was told early on that there was a large cyst on my one ovary from the medication.

I believe that the bleeding I experienced was from this large cyst rupturing. Yet, at the local hospital, they refused to do an ultrasound to (1) see if the baby still had a heartbeat and (2) to see if the cyst was still there. It seemed like common sense to me.

At Holland Hospital, the cyst was gone. I think I was right in thinking this is what caused the bleeding. The doctors could not say with any certainty the cause of the bleeding. They diagnosed it as a threatened miscarriage and put me on bedrest for a couple of days.

They also gave me the Rogham shot, which is what they give mothers with negative blood types at around the 28th week of pregnancy...or, they give it to mothers with negative blood types early if they experience any type of bleeding. I have the Rh factor, which could potentially be very serious for the baby I am carrying. It was never a problem in the past because I never developed an antibody in my blood...until this third pregnancy.

My doctor explained to me that since I had already had the Rogham shot, that this may have caused a false antibody to develop in the blood. He told me that the antibody typically went away approximately 12 weeks after receiving the shot.

Twelve weeks later, I had blood work done again. My doctor called me tonight to tell me that I was still testing positive for the antibody in my blood.

I will be tested again for it soon. It may be possible that I was tested just a little bit early for the issue to resolve itself.

My doctor is the calmest person on the planet, which is good for someone like me. We are opposites and balance each other out. He told me he does not anticipate any serious issues because they will be monitoring everything very carefully.

If the antibody does not go away, then I will be tested frequently through blood work and ultrasounds to make sure the baby is still okay.

That is why my 20-week ultrasound [the normal results] is so important to me. What could happen in a situation like this one is my *incapatible* blood may cross the placenta and mix with the baby's blood, thus attacking the baby's red blood cells. Some articles I read about the Rh factor described it as the mother being allergic to the pregnancy. Thus, the body attempts to fight off the pregnancy, which it reads as a foreign substance. The baby may develop anemia in the process, which could produce devastating effects for everybody.

An ultrasound could reveal enlarged organs in the baby. At this point, the baby and her organs are all normal. This is a blessing!

The baby may need to receive blood transfusions through an amniocentesis; or the baby may need to be delivered early (and possibly very early) if it is being attacked and poisoned by my *bad blood*. A lesser situation would be the baby would have to receive a blood transfusion upon delivery if my blood crosses over to the baby's blood through the placenta during delivery.

I am not a doctor, but I have been reading about this condition, and this is my understanding. One part is a little unclear to me.

Dave and my doctor believe that the antibody should not pose a threat to the baby during this current pregnancy. It may become a serious problem in subsequent pregnancies. We all know there will not be any more pregnancies!

So I am uncertain whether there is a high risk for this current pregnancy or in a future pregnancy. It is possible it may be a problem this time.

I believe I will be undergoing a lot of testing for the remainder of this pregnancy, unless the antibody goes away. I am not too hopeful about that since it is still there after 12 weeks. I just want the baby to be okay; that is all.

I am a very strong person. I think that is why all of this crap happens to me...because I can handle it. The only thing I do not handle well is hyperemesis [severe morning sickness]. That kicks my butt, but other than that, I am a very determined person with a strong sense of faith that everything will be okay in the end. My doctor is very reassuring, which helps tremendously. Your thoughts and prayers would be greatly appreciated, also, as we pray for the health of our baby girl.

I just want to make it through the next 126 days and be blessed with another healthy baby. One day at a time is all we can do.