My new MoMo World
And this post is the reason I wanted to start my blog...
At my 9 week scan, there wasn't one heartbeat, there were two! How did this happen? So with any pregnancy comes that inate sense of concern, maternal instinct and love - all of my friends talk about it, as soon as you have a positive pregnancy test - you are a mum!
My IVF specialist/Gynaecologist rushed me into Ultrasound Care, as she has never missed 2 heartbeats in her career - the panic on her face tells me this is not going to be an easy process. With mixed emotions, I lie there, whilst 2 sonographers and an obstetrician are trying to work out what type of identical twins my babies are...
"Emma, as we thought, you my love are in a high risk pregnancy - your little babies are known as Monochorionic-Monoamniotic (MCMA) Twins. The good news is, there is no evidence that they are conjoined or that any of their organs are connected. We are going to be seeing a lot of you, we will need to monitor you every week. Right now we need to have a little chat about what all of this means for you and your babies and we are going to refer you to a Maternal Fetal Medicine specialist"
I don't think I will ever forget those words, as I lay there on my own - because remember I am the independent, confident woman thinking I can handle anything, so didn't need anyone to come with me to my 9 week scan... well I will be honest, I don't think I have ever felt so scared or lonely as I did in that 30 minutes! I was on the phone to mum and straight after that call, her and dad were on the next flight!
And there it is, I have a entered a whole new and very rare world of pregnancy - my perfectly healthy egg split, for no reason, it's just a freak of nature and just one of those things (combined with the fact I never seem to do things normally!)
In dizygotic multiple pregnancies, each fetus has its own placenta (either separate or fused), amnion and chorion. In monozygotic multiple pregnancies, the situation is more complex depending on the timing of the division of the egg:
Embryo splits at 3 days: two chorions, two amnions.
Embryo splits at 4-7 days: single placenta, one chorion, two amnions.
Embryo splits at 8-12 days: single placenta, one chorion and one amnion (rare - 1-2% of monochorionic pregnancies).
Embryo splits at 13 days: conjoined twins (Siamese twins) - very rare.
I was in the third stage - One Placenta, One Chorion and One Amnion... this basically means my twins were very close! They shared the same sac and one placenta and there was no membrane to separate them, which increases the risk to this pregnancy type.
I have become a member of 2 new crews - SMC and now - "MoMo Mums" - I can't offer you a link here, as I haven't found any of these groups in Australia, only comment boards. I feel this is a problem, there just isn't enough information on MCMA twins and multiple births, I am trying to work with IVF Australia and MFM Units in Australia, to create more sites and channels to get this information. Us new mums, in this situation, need to get as much information as we can... I was all over Google looking for every ounce of information and searching for the "positive" stories of successful MCMA pregnancies.
So here's the girl who wants it all, remember? I continue to go about my life and carry on working hard, nobody needs to know I am pregnant yet and especially not what I am going through. I wasn't planning on telling people (aside from my family and close friends) until I got to the 12 week mark, however following this particular days events I decided to wait until I got to 20 weeks.
A friend, who is based in USA, just told me she is 13 weeks pregnant and said to me... "it's quite a scary time isn't it Em? Just constant paranoia amongst the excitement" yes, that it is...