A couple days after my water broke I had an appointment with a Material-Fetal Medicine (MFM) doctor. These type of doctors take care of pregnancies with more severe conditions with either unborn babies and/or moms; conditions like pPROM. We weren’t really sure what to expect from this type of appointment. So far our appointments for the baby were fun and exciting (aside from the bad news one).
Driving to this appointment was a silent ride, which is pretty unusual for us because I’m a talker. Sitting in the waiting room felt like we were there for hours! I started by getting an ultrasound. It looked the same as the one from the day before. The baby’s heart rate was still strong and within normal range, so that was good news! After the ultrasound we waited to meet the doctor.
Being in the medical field I was hoping for a doctor who was straight forward and honest, but still believed in miracles. Because we needed one. Lucky for us, that’s exactly the kind of doctor we got. She talked about things like Potter’s Sequence and Pulmonary Hypoplasia. She told us our baby could have severe physical deformities due to the limited space. She talked about how our baby could only live a couple hours after birth, and that we would have to prepare ourselves to sign a birth AND death certificate on the same day. All of those things seemed so scary to hear that day but one thing she did say was what we needed to hear.
“Your baby has a strong heart beat despite having no measurable fluid.”
That was really all we needed to hear to make our decision. Our doctor give us the option to terminate the pregnancy because the potential outcome could be pretty severe. Not to mention the emotional toll something like that could put on a family, marriage, and the child. We decided that if my water breaking was a sign of a late term miscarriage, we were just going wait it out and let things happen the way they were supposed to. Our doctor supported our decision and said she would continue to monitor me and the baby until 23 weeks when I would have to be admitted into the hospital, per pPROM protocol.
We left that appointment almost joyful. I guess because we had some definitive answers and we got to see that our baby was still chugging along. I was also put on bed rest until I delivered, which sucked, but I would have stood on my head for five months if that gave my baby a fighting chance. We wouldn’t have to see the MFM again for another month but I was required to see my regular OBGYN once a week. That was nice because we had the opportunity to hear our baby’s heart beat every week. A little good sprinkled in with the bad definitely lifted our spirits.
raeraesorad 