Friday, January 2, 2009

A little on the birds and the bees...

Though I am not an obstetric gynecologist, I feel I am correct in the fact that I am about to express. All you doc friends--especially you Brian N., please correct me if I am wrong.

I talked to a fellow a couple weeks ago. He is in his 40's I believe. He has a set of twins and I asked him if he was surprised when he found out that his wife was expecting twins. (We sure were! I was halfway through my pregnancy! At least it wasn't like my friend's mom--she had to be put under during the delivery and when she came to, she found out that two babies were waiting for her, not one!) He told me that he wasn't surprised at all. I questioned further, wondering if twins ran in his wife's family. No he said, twins "ran" in his family.

Okay.

I did not correct him, but boy, he should have been SHOCKED that HIS wife had twins! Sorry to pop your bubble guys, but you have NOTHING to do with your wife having or not having twins/multiples. I realized this when I told people I was expecting twins. Many asked if twins ran in my side of the family or my husband's. I thought about it and realized that asking if twins ran in Lee's family was a silly question. Lee is not a blood relation of mine and I have none of his genes in me. If Lee does have a "twin gene" in him, it will be made manifest when (if) our girls have twins, or if Clark or Cal's daughters have twins/multiples. The fact that Lee's brother has twin girls is a mere coincidence. I am not blood related to his brother or his sister-in-law.

A little on multiple "multiple" pregnancies...

I went in for a yearly check-up several weeks ago and the doctors here thought I had a fibroid tumor. That of course made me a little anxious. I have always been "healthy" and even when pregnant have had no complications. After some blood work I was told that the tumor was benign, which was a relief; but still, the thought of a benign tumor wasn't that great either.

My doctor sent me to a specialist to double check the whole tumor thing. The ultrasound technician didn't think it was a fibroid, but wasn't quite sure what it was. The doctor came in and got a good look at the dark spot showing up on the ultrasound screen. It was the remnants of a twin! He showed me a faint line of a spinal cord and something else, but I can't remember.

They also looked at my other baby, which looks healthy and well--a boy, due May 31. It may seem odd and maybe unfeeling to some of you, but the news that I didn't have a tumor and that it was a "vanishing twin", was wonderful. I never saw the twin in baby form. It hasn't completely vanished yet either. It will eventually be reabsorbed, probably into my placenta, or will deliver when baby number FIVE is born.

Wow. Five kids sounds like a lot! I don't know how my mom had 10 or how Lee's mom had seven! My mom tells people she had them one at a time. That is not the case for me. Two twin pregnancies so far...hmm...I wonder if my sisters will have twins too!

I wonder if I'll have triplets next...



Child #1 and child #5 in the same picture.

14 comments:

Lisa and company said...

Congrats on a new baby boy on the way!!!!!

Shannon @ Lifelong Impressions said...

Congrats on the baby boy!

To add to your twin comments there is one new classification of twins. It is super super rare though as I think there is only one documented case. It is when a mom only produces one egg, two sperm fertalize it, AND it splits into two babies. They have the same genes from the mom and a set of their own from the dad. Weird, huh?

But really that classification isn't worth talking about except to the stubborn people in the world who just like to argue any point. lol

Sorry about the vanishing twin. Fibroids aren't so bad most of the time. I have some and they grew to bigger then my original uterus size during pregnancy. They can be painful though and cause heavy periods.

Guess what? There is another set of twins in our ward now?!?!? This is a boy/girl set about three months old. This really must be the twin ward. We miss you guys.

Anonymous said...

Yeah Congrats!!!! Jada my third girl also was a mutiple pregnancy with a vanishing twin. My mom also had one with my youngest sister. Glad everything looks ok !
Laura Schmidt

T said...

Congrats! Our daughter is also expecting a boy (March 15). That is interesting about the twin. We were just talking about having twins the other day and how having fraternal twins is so much more common that having identical ones. It is interesting how the human body works.

Sarah said...

Congratulations, Ruth! Super exciting! And crazy about two twin pregnancies!

Lance and Ariel said...

oh my goodness!! congrats!! how exciting!

The Letterman's said...

Congrats on 5! Wow you guys are making it a little tough to keep up here ;)!
My brother and his wife have maternal twins
and my sister and her hubby have identical boys
My brother and his wife were involved in a study at the U of U when she was pregnant and they determined that both sides can have an influence on the twin factor, intresting eh?

Nicole said...

WOW number 5, Congratulations!!! That is super exciting! Can you imagine if you would have had twins again, crazy! I'm glad that everything is okay and that you are healthy.

The Castleton Family said...

Ruth!! Congrats on number 5! That must have been stressful when they first mentioned a tumor to you. I am glad things turned out good. Congrats again on baby #5!!

maren bosley said...

Congrats Ruth!!! I didn't even know you were pregnant! How are you feeling???

I was blog hopping one evening and found a couple that had a set of twins 11 months after they were married and then had another set of twins just 11 months after that! Makes my life seem like a piece of cake!!!

Rachel said...

Wow Ruth, you really are super mom! It's so fun to keep up with your growing family! Congratulations on the baby boy!

Ryan-n-Amanda said...

Wow! 5 kids! How blessed you guys are! Congrats. I am glad things are working out with the pregnancy and it is not a tumor.
Amanda

Kelly said...

Congrats! We're so excited for you guys. We find out this week what we're having - we'll let you know!

Liz said...

Congratulations! That is really exciting. You are a super mom, five just seems like so many, but you'll do it wonderfully.

I hope you holidays went well. Take care. :-)