I'm home!!!

Okay, so actually I've been home for a couple of days. They released me from the hospital on Thursday afternoon. It's so nice to be home. My parents brought Jefferson back yesterday and all he's done since he's been home is sleep. He hasn't even eaten- he's too exhausted.

I went for my ultrasound Thursday morning- my nurse wheeled me downstairs for it. We didn't have our regular ultrasound tech, but the one we had was really good- she explained everything she was looking at. She started by checking my cervix. It looked about the same as last week. She even got some measurements that looked better than at my ultrasound two weeks ago, but then she got a couple that were a little shorter. It looked good, though, which was such a relief.

Then she looked at the babies. They're both still head down and baby A's head is right by my cervix and baby B's head is right at baby A's chin. The babies both looked great. We could see them opening their mouths and got good looks at their beating hearts. The tech also pointed out their bladders, kidneys and stomachs. It's amazing what you can see with an ultrasound. Then she told us the approximate weights on the babies... Baby A is measuring about 4 pounds 13 ounces and baby B is measuring right at 5 pounds!!! They're so big for their gestational age, but still within normal limits. They are running the upper 70s to low 80s percentile for their gestational age. And the tech told us they're growing about 1/2 a pound a week at this point. That means that if we make it to 36 weeks I could end up having two 7 pound babies! That's just crazy! Especially after we were so worried about them being born early and being so small. Just a couple of weeks ago we were trying to figure out if we needed to get preemie clothes. Well, I don't think that's going to be a problem now. They may not even last in newborn clothes for very long at this rate!

Their fluid levels looked good, too. Oddly enough, after all this time with baby A being bigger and having more fluid, now baby B is bigger and has more fluid. Their fluid levels are still within normal limits, too, though.

So basically, everything looked great at the ultrasound. We talked to the doctor down there for a couple minutes. She asked me how long they'd kept me at the hospital after my last ultrasound and seemed surprised when I told her that I was still there and whether or not I had to stay depended on this ultrasound. So she said she would call my OBs and let them know how the ultrasound went so they could decide if they were going to send me home or not.

We went back up to my room and my nurse came in and did my daily non-stress test. Of course it was one of my worst. Baby A would not stay on the monitors and I was having quite a few contractions. The contractions slowed down after I'd been on the monitors for 40 minutes or so and I went quite awhile without any- which made the nurse feel better about it. So she took me off the monitors and went to try to get in touch with my OB to talk to them about it and see if she needed to put me back on. Well, they never called her back, instead my OB showed up at the hospital.

She came in the room and told us that we were going home! She said she wasn't concerned about the contractions because the ultrasounds (especially the internal one) can irritate the uterus and cause contractions and cramping. She said that from what she'd been told everything was good with my ultrasound- although all she was worried about was my cervix- and that I was good to come home and be on bed rest here. Ben asked her if they'd told her how big the babies are and she said no, so he told her. She said those were great sizes and that 5 pounds is really the weight they want them to be before they will send them home from the hospital, so it's great that our girls are already about that big. But we still want to keep them in there for another 4 weeks. She also told us that she had been prepared to come examine me before sending me home, but after my ultrasound she didn't see any reason to. She'll just check me when I go in for my appointment (which she had already made for us) next week. So now I'm free from doctors until Thursday unless something happens. She sent me home with prescriptions for Procardia (to control contractions) and Ambien (to help me sleep).

Ben left me at the hospital one more time and came home to get a suitcase in order to pack up all my stuff. I had lunch at the hospital and took my 2pm dose of Procardia and then I was free to go home!

Here are the pictures from the ultrasound. In the first one you can see baby A's profile and then baby B's head right at her chin. If you look closely at the third picture, you can see the membrane separating the babies right up against baby A's face.

Baby A:

Baby B:
So now I'm on the couch for the next few weeks. I have no idea when or if my OB will lift any of my bed rest restrictions. I'm really hoping to make it far enough that she'll loosen my restrictions or possibly take me off of bed rest. It'd be nice to be able to go out to dinner at least once with my husband before these girls are born...