14 Weeks

Brian and I are very thankful once again for God granting us grace and giving us baby #2. We are knowledgeable of God's sovereignty in our lives everyday, so after losing two babies to miscarriages between May and October, we are extremely grateful for His blessing of forming this child in my womb. We are currently 14 weeks along in this pregnancy. The picture below is of a 14 wk. old baby in the womb. I am just amazed at what technology can do these days.

This pregnancy has been somewhat different from my first one. The doctors had me on pregnancy hormones and large intakes of folic acid for the first 12 weeks which contributed to alot of nausea, exhaustion, and headaches, but I haven't got sick like I did with Allyson. Because of my last two miscarriages I have been labeled as a high risk pregnancy. That means lots of ultrasounds between weeks 5 and 8. I won't have another ultrasound until week 18 when we hopefully will be able to find out the sex of the baby. We ask for your prayers before this ultrasound because the doctor will be looking for possible spine and brain defects that could have formed due to my MTHFR mutation (Methylene-Tetra-Hydro-Folate-Reductase). After my second miscarriage the doctors did some exstensive blood work to see if they could find the problem and they discovered I was born with a gene mutation that causes blood clotting. Basically this mutated gene fights against my bobies absorption of folic acid. Folic acid is what breaks down red blood cells and prevents clotting. The blood clotting is what was causing my miscarriages so the solution was to fight the gene and take more folic acid. Pregnant women take 400 mcg of folic acid in their prenatal pills and I have to take 4000 mcg. The only concern we have with all of this information is that I was already 3 weeks into this pregnancy when they discovered the problem, so there is concern that the lack of folic acid in those first few weeks could have been essential for the growth of the babies spine and brain. Our hope is in the fact that God is in complete control of everything and He has a perfect plan for this child, no matter what the results.

We have a "boy or girl" poll on our page so that you can guess the sex of our child. I was right when I guessed Allyson was a girl, but I am having a hard time figuring this one out. At 6 wks the babies heartbeat was 118. Then at 8 weeks the babies HB was 178. At my last appointment at 13 weeks the HB was 150. I haven't had any morning sickness like I did with Allyson and I am not as tired. With Allyson my skin seemed to clear up and glow and so far with this one my skin seems to break out certain times each month. My belly is not big enough to compare how I am carrying the baby just yet (high or low). I am very confused by my cravings because I am really drawn towards meats, cheeses, and breads, but I also have found myself not being able to resist a run to the store for a blow pop.....haha! I went throught a mexican phase where we had taco salads once every week and Qudoba was my restaurant of choose whenever we went out. My husband was loving every minute of it.
Here are a list of some things that are the same as my pregnancy with Allyson:
* My bellybutton popping out
* Only sleeping on my left side
* Weight gain has been the same so far
* Having weird unexplainable dreams
I will leave it up to you now to decide what you think I am having. There is a 50/50 chance you will be right...haha. I will keep you updated as I experience more changes and hopefully be able to post some pictures of my growing belly.
Take Care
Lisa