The Funnel

Last week I had an OBGYN check up. I am 28 weeks now and beginning my third trimester! My goodness, can it be true? I SWEAR that just yesterday we were staring at a pee stick wondering if we really knew what we were getting into. Time has flown right into my final 'mester and I imagine I'll be saying the same thing in two months when I am holding my new baby. Sorry, gotta grab a tissue real quick.

Ah, so the appointment last week...
I had a sono, which I've been getting often to watch a cyst or mass on my right ovary. The ovary is fine (relatively speaking) with no changes in the size of the cyst and no pain associated with it, but Doc. is keeping her eye on it. While taking measurements of that, and amniotic fluid, and baby, my sonographer came across a cervical funnel. This is not so bad but definitely not good. It is an opening in my cervix which appropriately enough looks like a funnel as it narrows down and opens into "the canal". I'll save you the pain of hearing the "V" word. It's just not one of the world most beautiful words, I know.

So the crazy part is when Mom and Josh and I are sitting in the examination room waiting to see Doc, and she walks in and shows us the picture of this fascinating (sarcasm) cervical funnel and tells me I have the possibility of going into pre-term labor in the next two weeks. Point blank. Staring straight at me. So Josh and mom and I looked at each other and started laughing! I guess shock/nervous laughter is more accurate but I really was not expecting those words to come out of her mouth, and it was a little funny in an ironic sort of way. But mostly I was floored! She said there would be more testing (called a fetal fibronectin test) and a follow up sono in one week. No bed rest was ordered, life was to go on as normal. I wasn't having anything remotely close to contractions or cramping so that was excellent. Even more excellent was that my cervix was not thinning. It was nice and thick at something like 38 cm (out of 40ish max)...how's that for too much information?!

On Monday I called to check on the test results and Nurse Tiffany broke it to me that my sample wasn't sent to the lab frozen like it should have, so there were no results. Oh man, didn't she know that we paced the house all weekend wondering if it was time to go ahead and pack a hospital bag? Didn't she know that people's lives were at stake here?! Just kidding, everyone's life was just fine...in fact the baby was at a point developmentally where everything was up and running and had something happened even the lungs were developed enough to survive in the outside world. Never mind that my dearest only weighed 2 lbs. 8 oz., AND the baby's room wasn't ready!

Today we returned for the follow up sono. And like a good friend, the smiling sonographer said "Oh hon, there's nothing there. It's strong and thick in there. Ohhh, the baby just elbowed me!" She was very jovial which I could appreciate given the news. Then, just like every other time, the magic happened...we saw the eyes, and the heart, and the feet and fingers and spine and the cheeks, and finally the tech swears our little turkey stuck it's tongue out at us. I think it was actually licking its lips because of the chocolate covered Krispy Kreme that I had just shared with it. Sorry, gotta go grab a tissue again. Gosh I love that baby.

Doc confirmed the nonexistent state of the funnel and told us that either it was nothing in the first place, or perhaps the baby was putting too much pressure there and it opened a bit. It was a 7mm opening to be exact...less than a centimeter. Funny how less than a centimeter can represent so much. At first, for a split second I dreamed of how cool it would be to have my baby two months early. But making a human is a little different than, say, taking cookies out of the oven a few minutes early. Or leaving the nail salon before you know you're nails are really good and dry. Wouldn't you agree? Luckily our baby decided to stay nice and cozy in my belly a bit longer - or my body chose not to kick out its tenant too early after all. I may have to sit down and have a talk with "someone"; don't they know that I am the one in charge here? So maybe I'm not the one in charge...these shows of perspective are quite enlightening.