Ultrasound: I felt like I was in their waiting room for hours, in reality... probably about an hour. Just enough time to let the situation get to me, as I watched every gorgeous pregnant women walk in and out with their significant others. They all seemed to be smiling ear to ear, waddling as cute as can be, hands resting on big baby bumps. Every one of them seemed happy with the perfect world they were living in. While I commiserated about the thing I was about to find out. I rested my hands on either side of my big baby bump and wanted to be one of them.
When they finally called my name, we wondered through a maze of hallways to a big comfy room and got started straight away. Decent sized flat screen monitor, right in front of me. I stared as they went through what seemed like a very strategic plan. One step at a time, only ever skipping one step, and coming immediately back to it. (It looked like she couldn't figure out a left bone from a right bone.) I didn't say a single word, to scared to hear about "other" abnormalities. The silence was broken when the ultrasound tech commented, "Who's got big feet?" The answer to that question was me: 5'1 wearing size 10 shoes. The baby's feet were almost 3 inches long with a month still left to grow!
Then came the fun part. They wiggled me, laid me on one side, then the next side. Tilted me UPSIDE DOWN. I almost got sick and had to sit up. Then upside down again I went. All shook up... and they could NOT get that little man to get his hands out of his mouth! After a fair amount of extra time spent trying, she gave up and called the doctor to come try. Bryan said he noticed that she also spent a little extra time examining his heart. Sure enough when the doctor came in to try his hand at getting a better picture of my baby sucking on his fist, they wanted to talk to me about the possibility of a heart problem. I just love this, "We aren't sure. Its nothing to be alarmed about. We just want a cardiologist to come look at his heart. We think one ventricle appears slightly larger then the other. This could mean..."
Of course, the cardiologist didn't have time to see us. So, I need to schedule another appointment. With the baby's hand in front of his face, they also couldn't tell me anything else about my little man's cleft, except that they are pretty sure he has a cleft. It appears to be only on one side of his face.
Genetic counselor: He was definitely straight off the boat from Germany. We chit chatted about our heritage, where we grew up, and how my obgyn was his roommate in college. Obviously we went over family history of deformities, which neither of our families have any. Concluding that a cleft lip is probably "isolated" and not genetic. He threw out some tiny number at what are chances are of having another baby with a cleft. (Obviously we wont the lottery on that the first time, when the number was smaller, so I'm not sure it helps.) I nervously had to ask if there was any chance this was more then a deformity, especially now that I have to come back for an EKG of the baby's heart. "It's possible, though the cleft looks to be isolated."
On to Matt, the craniofacial team coordinator. Awesome. I felt incredibly comfortable talking to him. He answered all of our questions. We looked at the still pictures from my ultrasounds earlier. Laughed about how my baby had his hand in front of his mouth, making it impossible to know more about his specific cleft deformity. He gave us a free pack of 6 bottles. Showed us before and after pictures of cleft lip repairs. It is a 90% chance in a boy that his palate is effected with the cleft. He gave me advice, telling me not to worry about the heart problem. If there was a problem there, he said it was probably unrelated, that at this point the doctor's just want to be thorough. Told me not to take advice from the delivery nurses, that they have no knowledge of cleft babies (not comforting), but that I could call the office at any time, day or night. If I needed help feeding the baby, that it is much easier then I was imagining, that I could call and someone would sit and talk me through it. When I left that office, for just a moment, I had no worries. Of course, some of the worries came back, but I felt confident. He assured me that they would go over every medical concern I had, blood testing and genetic history 2 weeks before surgery.
He also told me, that this wasn't my fault. That this wasn't anything that I did wrong. That they don't know what causes it, but sometimes it just happens. That there simply wasn't enough facial tissue to finish forming his face. I believed him, I was reassured, and completely confident that everything was going to be perfect... Because he had that scar on his lip. Matt, our wonderful craniofacial coordinator, was an advocate for craniofacial deformities, because he had a cleft lip. After truly feeling how wonderful this experience was with Matt today, I was
I didn't want to be one of those other mothers. This was my big footed baby. And this was were I was meant to live, next to the nations #1 children's hospital. Odd, for someone who doesnt know much about God, but I truly felt like someone put us here, lead us where we needed to be, and gave us everything we needed to handle this.
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