The Ultrasound

I can't think of many things more exciting than the ultrasound where you get to find out the sex of your baby. What a cool thing we get to do. So...Becky and I had been so excited about it. Her OB had referred us to a perinatal specialist who dealt with twins and other high risk pregnancies. Pretty standard....nothing to worry about. We go into the ultrasound room and the technician spreads the goop all over Becky's tummy and we get to see our twins! It took about 2 minutes....and sure enough they were sharing a placenta. Identical twins! And to top it off....2 boys! Identical twin boys! Can you imagine that? Two identical twin boys that look like me? The world was about to get exponentially better looking! So....the tech continues with the ultrasound and is raving about how everything looks with "baby A".... better known as Declan. She does all the measurements and checks the blood flow and he looks great! She was laughing and congratulating us as we were so happy to be having two boys. Then she started measuring "baby B"....better known as Isaac. Instantly there was no more laughing. She didn't say anything. She completed all the measurements and blood flow checks. She then turned to us and said "Dr. McFarland will be here to see you shortly." Not sure if you've ever experienced a nurse or tech say something like that...but I can assure you that it is rather unnerving. A few minutes later, Dr. Melinda McFarland walked in and very cordially and professionally shook our hands and took a seat. She proceeded to tell us that Isaac was 50% smaller than Declan. They were sharing the same placenta and Declan was taking about 70% of the fluid in the placenta. Also, the blood flow to Isaac from the umbilical cord was very sparse. All of this meant that our perinatal "specialist" was sending us to another "specialist".....this time in Houston. There were several things that could be causing this condition. The specialists in Houston (Dr. Moise, and Dr. Johnson) are the premier specialists in the country dealing with placental sharing issues and what is known as twin to twin transfusion syndrome. The best in the business....3 hours from home. We went home very nervous. We had no idea what any of this meant. All we knew was that if a specialist was sending us to another specialist....that it must be serious. Dr. McFarland was concerned that the boys had twin to twin transfusion syndrome. She also talked about a few other possibilities. The bottom line for them was that Declan was getting plenty of nourishment and Isaac was getting next to nothing. We were told to prepare for the very real possibility that one or both of our miracle boys would not make it. In fact, it was recommended to us that we "selectively reduce". Can you imagine making a choice to "selectively reduce"? We were given a miracle of a second baby....and were going to choose to turn that miracle away? As if...we know that God gave us this miracle and we felt he would prepare a way to make things work. For now....it is off to Houston and find out the problem and begin making it better!