16 Week Appointment

It's hard to describe the feeling of waiting for a Dr. appointment. This time B was with me, and he couldn't help but notice that I was practically bouncing off the walls with anticipation. I was swinging my legs, picking my nails, staring all over the place. I took heavy breaths and sighed over and over. He kept trying to calm me down, but it was no use. The Dr. was running extremely late. As they walked us back, they led us to a room I did not want to enter. It was the room where I learned that my cervix was incompetent. I paused at the door and asked the nurse if I was going to see Dr. G, the man who had placed my cerclage. The man I felt 100% confident in.

She shook her head and told me I'd be seeing Dr. M. The Dr. who treated me while I was in the hospital on bed rest with Bremy. The Dr. who was cold. The Dr. who couldn't do anything for me. I bent my knees and cringed. "I don't want to see Dr. M!" I whined. I could not physically hide my frustration. B looked embarrassed. I knew I sounded like a child, but I was not happy. She offered to reschedule, but I knew I needed to see a Dr. and B had made it to the appointment so there was no going back. I reluctantly sat down.

After what seemed like an hour, the ultrasound tech came in. I've had her for my past three appointments and she's very sweet and seems very knowledgeable. As soon as I saw my moving baby, and heard the heartbeat, my body relaxed. There's nothing like that sound. The viewing went well. Baby's heart rate was 150 and everything measured perfectly.

Then the Dr. came in. I felt like they told her. She was more chipper than usual and acted like she recognized us. She took a look at my cervix and said it was looking beautiful. The cerclage was in perfect position and there'd been no change to my cervix. It was measuring  at over 4 cm. A great length.

She asked if I had been having any problems, and I mentioned that for the past several days my underwear had been more wet than normal. She asked a few questions about how much, whether it had an odor (it didn't) etc, etc. She decided to be safe and take a swab to rule out an infection.

She was able to test and see that I did in fact have an infection. Bacterial vaginosis. I'd had it before in 2007, when I was not pregnant. That time it had an odor and I'd gone in to get it checked.

I told her that last time, with Bremy, at my 16 week appointment, I told my OB that my  underwear was wet and she had told me it was normal. I asked if I could have had this infection then, and if it going untreated may have caused the loss of my baby girl. She nodded and said it was certainly possible. It made me angry, but I understand that without knowing my history, it made it hard for them to think anything was wrong last time, at 16 weeks. At my 20 week appointment, my cervix was still closed, but open at 22 weeks. So somewhere in that  time, my cervix inexplicably opened.

She wrote me a script for flagyl, an antibitoic and told me all should be well since we caught it early and all still looks well with my cervix. I'm so glad she checked for me.

I am taking this as a hint that I really need to be hypersentive to every little thing. You never know. With IC, you don't feel much so I have to pay attention to what I'm feeling.