I Am a Case Study In Progress

Oh dear blog friends, I have been dying to update on what we heard yesterday. I was so cheesed last night when I was unable to write a blog post from my phone. All I could do was type a title! I seriously had a hard time falling asleep last night, even though I had been up since 5:30 a.m., because I was so excited about the whole day yesterday.

I am not sure how to write all of this out without this post becoming a mile long, so I will do it all in bullet point. Let me start out by saying I was gobsmacked with the information in each and every bullet point below.

• The doctors at Mayo seriously ROCK!!! I can't say that enough. They were sooo excited to meet us. We spent 2.5 hours there talking to two doctors and a fellow. TWO AND A HALF HOURS! I think they were so excited to meet us because, well, once again, they have never heard of a story like mine, and I know they want to be a part of it. I want them to be as well. The most impressive part is that they knew my entire story without looking at my records once. They even knew dates and details. Dr. Jensen said she had been looking over my records for the last two weeks. :o I couldn't believe it.
• We met with the Fellow first (and I can't remember his name, which makes me feel horrible). We went over our story with him, and right out of the gate he told us our doctor here was being very overly conservative. He told me that once this weak spot is fixed, he saw no reason we couldn't go on to have more children. *pick my jaw up off the floor*
• Then we met with Dr. Jensen, who had been with another patient when we arrived. She walked through that door with a huge smile on her face, completely excited and happy to met us. She went to Baby Bean first and cooed over her, saying, "You're the magic that brought us all here." I LOVED HER! She went over our story, and said all of the same things her Fellow did.
• She thinks my needing to be hospitalized at 24 is crazy. Her words. She sees no need for it.
• The chances of an embryo implanting in the scar tissue from the surgery is not the 95% our doctor here quoted us, but rather a fraction of a fraction of a percent. As in, highly unlikely. And if it does, the pregnancy will not be a good one and will have to be terminated as early as possible because a baby cannot thrive in scar tissue where there is no blood flow.
• The last bullet point means that Baby Bean did not implant in my septum removal scar tissue. Rather, she implanted next to it and by chance, her placenta grew over the weak area from the septum removal. Which means that the thickness of my uterus was not uniform all of the way across the fundus when I got pregnant, which is not what we had been lead to believe before yesterday.
• There was nothing drawing the placenta to attach where it did. It was just a coincidence. But because the endometrium had been compromised during the septum removal, it made it easy for the placenta to breach the uterine muscle, which then treated the placenta like a cancer and tried to remove it from the uterus by pushing it out into the body where it could be "fought off" by antibodies.
• We had been told that our chances of that happening again are really good... up until yesterday. The doctors at Mayo said once this weak spot is removed, there will be a uniform thickness across the entire top of the fundus, and what happened last time will not happen again.
• The chances of another placenta breaching scar tissue, growing through the fundus, or making it outside of the uterus, not very likely.

Before Dr. Jensen had come in, the Fellow asked how long we were in town and asked if we wanted to meet with a High Risk OB while we were there, because as RE's, they could not answer questions about pregnancy after the surgery. Dr. Jensen agreed. So while we were talking to her and picking our jaws up off the floor, the Fellow had gone to find Dr. Rose. We were gobsmacked once again when he showed up and joined our appointment, and here's were things get even better!

• He told us we can absolutely go on to have another pregnancy! There is no reason we can't. This repair only puts me at about the same risk of a rupture as a woman who has had a Classic C-Section, which is when the incision goes from the top of the uterus to the bottom, rather than side to side. That risk is about 30%. Still a high risk pregnancy, but we already knew that.
• He sees no reason to be hospitalized at 24 weeks. He suggested we find a High Risk OB here and line out a plan of action before we get pregnant. Typically women at an increased risk of rupture are given an amniocentesis at 36 weeks to check the lung maturity of the baby, and then a c-section is scheduled for 37 weeks. Labor is not permissive, and if it happens, the baby will be taken via emergency c-section.
• Our doctor here told me I could rupture and not even know it. Dr. Rose disagreed and told me what warning signs I would need to look for, primarily a sharp pain, bleeding, or amniotic fluid leaking. As such, he told me to make sure we found a hospital here who had an OB and anesthesiologist on staff at all times, to ensure quick delivery should a rupture occur.
• The chances of our baby being born early, a single digit percentage.
• The chances of me dying from a pregnancy under these circumstances, a fraction of a fraction of a percentage (as in .09%).
• The chance of a rupture under these circumstances, a single digit percentage.
• The changes of a hysterectomy if I do rupture, a single digit percentage. Dr. Rose even told me that he has yet to repair a rupture where he was unable to preserve fertility, and where the woman was not able to go on to have more children. Okay, jaw totally on the floor. I had resigned myself to an immediate hysterectomy and only being able to get pregnant once more. He saw no reason we couldn't go on to have many more!
• The chances of a rupture if we got pregnant with twins would only go up a little more.

All three doctors said I could even go on to have another pregnancy without fixing the weak spot, although they recommend I fix it.

Both Dr. Jensen and Dr. Rose gave me their information to keep in touch because they want to keep up on what happens with us as we move forward with the surgery and pregnancy, even if we don't have the surgery done there. Partly because I am one in a zillion (they even agreed with that), and partly because they felt a connection with us. I know I will end up being a case study in this situation (they told me I would be), and I am more than happy to be one, more than happy to pave the way for any other women who might one day find themselves in similar circumstances.

I want to have Dr. Jensen perform my surgery, but we are still trying to determine if the Mayo is in network for our insurance, if not, it would be too costly, although Hubs says he doesn't care. He says it is up to me where I get it done. He honestly would rather not have our doctor here do it because he didn't like the way Dr. D painted such a bleak picture and scared the ever living hell out of us by giving us such overly conservative information, telling us such horrifying things would happen if we got pregnant, and then telling us a pregnancy would be in God's hands (not that they all aren't). But if we do the surgery at Mayo, we'd be looking at a pretty penny. Maybe its worth it though. Once again, he has left the decision completely up to me.

All that matters is I GET TO HAVE MORE CHILDREN!!!!

I asked Hubs on the way home if he wanted to knock me up in a few months. He said, "Sure!"

Thank you friends for all of your support, prayers, and love through all of this. I could never have gotten through the low moments without all of you. I am so excited I finally get to share such wonderful news for a change.