And the results are....

Inconclusive :)

Oh well. The bright side is that both the doctor and the nurse practitioner think that all is going very well and that there is no predictable reason why the sonogram should show otherwise. That was good to hear. On the down side, it was just a shade too early to get a good picture inside the uterus, so we have to wait until Tuesday afternoon for a second look. At that point, hopefully we will see everything we need to.

It was a good visit though. We did a full medical and pregnancy history...I've now been pregnant five times. Wow! That's a lot. The nurse went over signs, symptoms, family histories, etc. She said all the numbers are still looking good and that there's no reason to worry about the dip in progesterone. Apparently when you first get pregnant, there's a surge, and then it drops and eventually levels out. The progesterone that I'm taking is a precaution to keep it high.

Met with the doctor and she did a pelvic and said everything felt like it should. She also told me that by the time this is all over, my belly is going to be one big ugly bruise. Oh well. I'll take that. She tried to help me with my nerves by saying that we're pretty well out of the woods for another ectopic. She said that would have presented as slow doubling or not quite doubling numbers and that the progesterone would have been almost non-existent. It's nice to know that this issue might be out of the running :)

In other news, she said that there was no reason to think that things weren't developing properly or that there wouldn't be a heartbeat next week. Of course, that's qualified with the always-present, "You can never be 100% sure," but it's good to hear that there's no apparent reason anything should not go according to plan. She feels very certain that if we can get out of the first trimester - mid May - that we are good to go and should have no real issues. That's good.

So, we have to wait a few more days, but she did calm me down a bit. That was helpful. I had a lot of blood drawn for standard test (HIV, STD's, Iron counts, etc - all mandated by the state), and we don't expect anything weird to come back (maybe a low iron level).

We did find out that I may have to be referred to a maternal medical specialist (whatever that is) due to these complicating factors. That means I may not get a choice on whether to do quad screening and other tests like that (these are tests that look for cystic fibrosis, down syndrome, etc and are done around 16 weeks). That only concerns me because there's a good chance of a false positive - which then requires more invasive testing. But, it's good that the doctor is covering all the bases and carefully watching everything.

No exercise still. She said I can walk but can't exert myself or do anything close to exercise. Bummer. I guess I'll just continue to expand in peace :)

I did get my Similac New Mom bag today with all the fun goodies (coupons, day planner, magazines, etc). That was another milestone for us. In addition, I found out that this will be one well-photographed fetus. Starting next week, we will do a sonogram every two weeks until week 12. Then we do one at Week 18-20 (somewhere in there) to check gender. Finally, we do one every other week or so starting at week 28. This is especially important for me because of the risk of pre-term labor (apparently a big deal that we will have to discuss when we make it out of the first trimester. Since I have a history of pre-term labor, this is a serious issue for us - pretty dangerous.) At least I will be well taken care of and will see a lot of the little person. I also have my at-home fetal doppler for all the in-between, pre-kicking times.

So, that's the news for today. With any luck, the time will fly by and Tuesday will be here before I know it and we'll all breathe easier. Thanks again for all your thoughts and prayers! You guys are such an awesome support team!