Our Biggest Week Ever!

So much news to report this week that I'm not sure where to begin!

Friends, on Thursday I hit 24 weeks, so we now officially have (drumroll please), viable babies! If you look at the NICU chart I posted earlier, you will see that based on the babies age they now have a 76% chance of survival, and based on weights, an 80% chance. If they delivered today, their chances of disability would still be high, but of course not guaranteed either way. The longer they stay inside the better their chances of being healthy. Our next big milestone is to reach 28 weeks, at which point their survival chances go all the way up to 95%. Please pray that we make it safely through August with all the babies inside and growing!

This week I had two steroid shots to help the babies lungs. They begin to work very quickly, so if the babies were to deliver early, these shots would mean their lungs have a little boost over other babies at their age. The shots can be repeated at four week intervals, so we will do this again at 28 weeks. The nurse at the docs office gave me the first shot on Tuesday, and Super Hubs gave me the second the following day. I have to tell you that Andy's injection was far less painful than the one the nurse gave (sorry Mary).

This is normally the point where I would insert pictures of each baby as I tell you about our latest appointment, however I can't do that this time. Tuesday, as Emily started the ultrasound, we were both surprised to find three baby boys in a jumbled wrestling pile, and one baby girl stretched out with all the space in the world! The only picture we could get of the boys was of their heads.

Emily laughed and wondered if the boys would figure out that they have all sorts of room to stretch out to the left, or if they would just stay in their huddle on the right. It was quite a challenge to get all the measurements with the boys so packed in, but Emily stuck with it and we got everybody's stats.

Micah  - 1lb. 8oz.
               684 grams
                Heartbeat 145 bpm
                84th percentile

Becker  - 1lb. 7oz.
                651 grams
                Heartbeat 150 bpm
                71st percentile

Roland  - 1lb. 8oz.
                668 grams
                Heartbeat 135 bpm
                78th percentile

So as you can see, the boys are doing great. We are happy to see them so high in overall percentile as we continue to work toward our goal of 3 pound birth weights.

And then there's the Little Princess. Emily joked that she is pushing all the boys out of her way so that the pictures would all be of her, and so far she is quite photogenic. Doesn't she look like she's posing?

Then Emily flipped a switch and I was thrilled to see this! Isn't technology amazing?

Marin - 1lb. 9oz.

              696 grams

              Heartbeat 145bpm

              89th percentile

So far our little girl outweighs the boys, though not by much. 

All the babies are doing great, as am I apparently. When we met with the doc we were surprised when he said that he didn't need to see me for two more weeks!

Speaking of seeing me, there's a whole lot of me to see these days. Here I am on Thursday, at exactly 24 weeks.

And here is a comparison of just six weeks ago. Can you believe how quickly I'm growing?

With the progression of pregnancy comes new hurdles every week. I was getting around pretty well up until recently, when my left side began to swell. The doctor looked at the leg to be sure it wasn't a blood clot, but unfortunately just a few minutes on my feet can double my leg in size. The right leg is also pretty swollen, but nothing compared to the left! See how smooth and tight the skin is pulled? If we looked up a bit, you'd see that my left knee is about the size of my thigh!

With the swelling came came another big restriction. I can no longer walk around to do the grocery shopping. Isn't is amazing the little things we take for granted until they are taken away from us? But never fear, we've found a fix, delivered to the front of the store by Dear Hubs himself!

Yes, I have become a Cart Person. My quad mom group tells me this is excellent practice for the stares I will get when I am eventually grocery shopping with the quads, but I think I would still prefer to pass on the experience. Andy found the whole thing hilarious, especially when I couldn't make a tight turn and had to throw it in reverse, which caused a Beep, Beep, Beep to sound loudly through the store.

Our last big milestone of the week was a shuffling of vehicles. Andy and my mom drove to Peoria, Illinois last week to pick up our new minivan, which left us with three vehicles. Since my Mazda is five years newer than Andy's Honda, and with 100,000 fewer miles, Andy decided reluctantly that it was the Honda we should sell. It was a tough decision as this was the first brand new car he had ever bought, and had planned to drive it until it disintegrated into a pile of rubble in front of the house! Seriously. Andy takes great care of his cars, so it was not surprising that the second people who looked at the car bought it, but it was definitely a sad parting for Andy.

On Sunday, our first outing in the new minivan was dinner with a local quad family. Becky and Andy have two girl and two boy quads, plus a big sister. Becky and I have met before and stay in frequent contact, and I was able to meet her three year old quads back on my first visit with her this Spring. For Andy though, this was an entirely new experience. Although Andy and I have been together for five years, I have rarely had the opportunity to see him around small children, so this was a new experience for me as well. I wish you all could have seen him! He took to the kids like he'd known them their entire lives. As Becky and I sat chatting on the couch we looked over at one point to see four three year olds dangling from Andy's arms and legs, laughing and clearly enjoying themselves. It truly melted me to see him having so much fun with the kiddos. He's going to be a great dad when our little ones come along!

That's it for now. Please pray for us to make it safely through August, and then we'll start praying about September. I admit I am really taking this a day at a time though. I wake up each morning and thank God for another day of babies safe inside.

Love and blessings,

Jen