Wednesday, August 20, 2008

Dr. Davis

Little Miss and I left the house at 10:30 yesterday morning. I picked up my uncle to have some company for the almost two hour drive and then dropped the Nut off at my mother-in-law's. Hubby met us there with lunch that my uncle and I ate in the car on the way to New Jersey. We arrived at 12:45 for my 1:00 appointment.

The long story short is that Dr. Davis was called into surgery at 1:15. I had yet to be scanned and he said to give him an hour. The tech then took me back to complete the remainder of the First Trimester Screen. Everything looked good. The baby is measuring right on target, exactly 11w 5d and is 5.03 cm. This was all determined with a transabdominal ultrasound. The baby was quite active to start with. It bounced back and forth and was very cute to watch. It actually reminded me very much of my scans with Little Miss. The profile and shape of the head is very similar.

The tech wanted to get a better view of the baby so she did a transvaginal ultrasound. I asked her to please check my cervix as it had yet to be evaluated. She couldn't locate my cervix beyond seeing the stitch. We made the assumption that my uterus was still flipped. She went back to evaluate the baby but the little stinker decided to take a nap and was now sleeping on its tummy. After much prodding, she gave me some juice in hopes of waking it up. Sure enough, the gymnastics show continued and it flipped over and over.

I got dressed and waited for Dr. Davis to return. By my estimate it wasn't going to be more than 15 or 20 minutes. Thankfully I was finishing a book for book club and had plenty to do.

As he walked in with his med student shadow, he called me into his office. He looked at the ultrasound and announced that my uterus was in perfect position. Then why is my cervix not visible??? He said he didn't know and that we should go take a look. Off I went to another scan room and had another transvaginal ultrasound. This time it was right there, measuring 2.4-2.5. I had a completely empty bladder the first time and this time could have used to go before the exam but didn't want to take the time. Thankfully I didn't because that made all the difference in seeing what I wanted them to see.

Dr. Davis then ran off to write orders and announced I should wait in his office so we could talk. After much more waiting, we basically discussed the following:

1. My first trimester screen came back with values less than 1 in 10,000.
2. He dictated a letter to Dr. C, explaining the TAC and how bed rest is not indicated unless there is a problem. He also stated his case for wanting to prescribe antibiotics and P17. The P17 I will have no issues with but the antibiotics, I think will be harder to convince Dr. C to agree to. I am going to call my regular GYN this week and see what her thoughts are as she was going to talk to her high-risk OBs down at Penn for me.
3. Dr. Davis acknowledged again that pregnancy is NOT just physical, that it's emotional too. He feels it's very important to treat both aspects and has agreed to see me whenever I feel the need to be evaluated. He explained that based on his 20+ years of experience he knows I will get far into the third trimester. But he knows that my experience is a 24w 5d Cesarean delivery of a 1lb 6 oz micropreemie and that I need to do all that I can to not worry. If that means being seen by him everyday, so be it. I like that understanding and wish more doctors believed in this way of practicing such a sensitive discipline of medicine.

Of course at 4:15, my visit ended with tears, a big hug from Dr. Davis and the scheduling of my next appointment in two weeks on September 4.

By the way, in an email posted to Abbyloopers, Marie, the woman from CA is doing great post-surgery on Monday. Just another reason Dr. Davis is the very best!

So our long day was even longer as we drove home, picked up the Nut, grabbed Boston Market and ate dinner at my mom's. I was so exhausted my mom and brother had to drive us home. I just couldn't drive anymore. We didn't get home until 8:00 pm.

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