First Trimester Screening Ultrasound

We had our first trimester screening ultrasound yesterday. This is the ultrasound that uses a higher resolution ultrasound machine and a tech that has had special training to detect specific chromosomal abnormalities. They measure the fluid on the neck of the baby. If there is an increased amount of fluid, the risk of having a baby with a chromosomal abnormality goes up. They also draw my blood. Once they have both of these results, they come up with a magical number on my risk (one out of something chance) of having a baby with a chromosomal abnormality.

I had such mixed emotions about doing the screening. Initially, I didn't even ask the nurse at my OB's office to schedule the appointment. I knew if the result came back that we are at a higher risk, I wouldn't want to do a CVS or amnio because of the risks associated with them. I knew I wouldn't be able to terminate the pregnancy either. So then, why do the screening? But Dom really wanted to do it. Well, at least he did in the beginning. Last week, he started feeling more like me. So now I really wasn't sure as to why we were doing the screening!

But we did. And the good news is that our baby did not have an increased amount of fluid on his/her! The space on the neck that they measure was .19 cm on our baby and they aren't concerned unless it is above .35 cm. The radiologist came in and told us that "we have a perfectly normal first trimester baby." It felt pretty good to hear that! We won't have the results as our risk of having a baby with chromosomal abnormality until the results of my blood work is available. We should have that by the end of the week, but I'm not worried since the fluid was measuring so normal and we have a pretty clean family history!

Our other good news is that the baby is actually looking more like a human! He/she kept bringing it's hands up to it's face. We could see all of the fingers. There was even one time that you could tell that the baby has it's knees bent and ankles crossed and it looked like he/she was just lounging in the bottom of my uterus. I'm sad the tech didn't take a picture of that because it was so cute! We also watched him/her open it's mouth and swallow. He/she kept jumping off the bottom of uterus, which was annoying the tech! She was having a hard time getting the pictures she needed because it was so active.

So now for the stats...I was 12 weeks and 3 days yesterday, but the baby was measuring 13 weeks 0 days! He/she is now 4 days ahead of schedule! The heart rate was 163, which is pretty close to what we had been getting at home on our doppler for the last few days.

So here are the pictures:

The head with the arm and hand resting on the forehead area.


The profile and you can still see the hand on the forehead.


A close-up of the face/neck/head and the white-ish area on the left is the brain.


The entire body and another good profile shot.


A lot like the last one with the hands up by the face.


Pretty cute, huh!?!?!