Half way through!

Wednesday 8th December: 20 weeks pregnant! Officially half way through! Although, it is possible that these two wrigglers will make their appearance well before I get to 40 weeks, so it could be said I'm over half way. Now that is a little scary. The other reason to be excited: wednesday 8 december was the day of the 'big' scan, the 20 week anomaly scan. A pregnancy milestone and yet another moment to worry about. This is the scan where they check everything for problems, and I mean everything. We were in the ultrasound room for around 45 minutes while the sonographer looked at everything from every imaginable angle. The main concern for me was making sure that firstly, they both had heartbeats, and secondly they were growing well. Two very big ticks in both of those boxes, phew! Left hand baby was first to be analysed from head to toe. Baby was very wriggly, I dont think they appreciated being poked with the scanner! They were quite well behaved though, and let the sonographer see everything she needed to. Spinal column, arms/hands, legs/feet, pelvis, skull all present and correct. We saw the separate areas of the brain, the four chambers in the heart, kidneys, stomach and bladder, again all present and correct. So far so good (time for another sigh of relief!). No sign of spina bifida or a cleft palate. This is going well... OK then, next!

Where Lefty had been behaved, Righty wasnt.. Baby had decided to curl up right behind my right hip bone, making it very difficult for the sonographer to see anything she needed to. Cue some rather awkward gymnastics on my part. First of all the bed was tipped up to try and get baby to come out of hiding, a procedure which only resulted in me feeling as though I was about to slide off the bed and end up in an upside down crumpled heap behind the scanner. This was followed by 'just turn onto your left side' said the sonographer. Sounds easy, but being tipped head down at a rather worrying angle and then trying to turn onto your left side while someone is attached to you is not that easy. Factor in that your clothes are either bunched around your boobs or about to display all your modesty to the room (or most likely both at the same time) and you're covered in slimy gel which gets everywhere, suddenly a simple manoeuvre becomes anything but simple! Anyway, after all that, baby moved enough (on their terms) for the necessary measurements to be taken and logged. Repeat the sigh of relief, and relax. All is good. Both babies are growing well, both well within the guideline measurements expected for 20wk foetus/foetuses/foeti?? Whatever, they are where they should be which is very reassuring.

The last pic shows the size differences from 12 - 20 wks, with 20wks on the left and 12wks on the right. The centre pic is from 16wks.

Our next scan is booked for 4 Feb, it seems so far away! SInce 12 weeks we've been scanned every four weeks so having to wait eight weeks between the 20 and 28 wk scans seems like a lifetime. The next milestone is on 5 Jan: Viability Day, the day from which the twins stand a chance of survival if they are born early; every day after 5 Jan is a day in their favour. Hopefully they will stay put until at least the end of March. After that I may be begging the consultant to take them out!