A scare... ready to reveal...

Okay, so I only let a few select people know what was going on with my pregnancy;

I went into the doctor's at 16 weeks for a prenatal check up. They already had to do blood work, and the doctor suggested because of my age I should allow for the Quad Screen.

A week later, I received a phone call saying that the test came back positive that the baby could possibly be Down's. That day they scheduled me for an Ultrasound for the next week, but finding out on Thursday and waiting until Tuesday was killing me. I think all I basically did was sit in front of my computer and research the whole thing. I found that there were very few blogs on this and many people asking questions.

I was so nervous waking up that Tuesday morning. I was thankful Fireman took the day off to be with me and to help get the kids on the bus and drive me to the office for our first look at our fourth child. We picked up one of my friends who I knew was a big support through the whole ordeal. We arrived early, thankfully because I had a full bladder for the ultrasound. They walked us back to the room, and had a tv screen mounted so I could see, as well as the technician's own screen on the computer. She was very helpful for explaining what she was looking for and with all of the research I did when she mentioned it I knew what it was. We looked for the nuchal fold, one of the down's markers and it showed thin, Praise the Lord! As we went through she was printing out all of the photos. I was in tears from that point on until we were able to go into the examining room.

While she was setting up I asked that if she could tell what the baby was we would like to know. At 18 weeks, I prayed it would be obvious; as I really thought with my cravings this was a boy. I cried even harder when she told us it was a girl! Honestly, all we want is a healthy baby, but it would have been nice for our 12 year old to have a brother and also a chance at something he has always wanted; a roommate! Even though I cried, I cried from happiness because everything I heard pointed to a so far healthy child. I believe this child has a shy side, as it took everything me and the technician could do to get the baby to turn for a profile shot to look for the other marker; the nasal bone. It even resulted in me going to the restroom to try to get her to move around. Yes I will probably have a habit to break, sleeping on her belly, as she made a nice cushy place to sleep!

The doctor looked at the results, she called the lab and gave the results of the ultrasound to the lab and after getting new results came in and told me that the chances were better with the ultrasound that with the blood test alone. I told her off the bat that it did not matter if the baby would have down's or not that we would not terminate the pregnancy anyways, and she stated that she would not at this time recommend an amnio anyways. Before I left, she stated that we would need to schedule two more ultrasounds; a month apart just to follow the baby's growth and to verify everything would be okay.

That day, before walking into the appointment; we had our boy's name chosen, but later that afternoon we had settled finally on a girls name.... Gracie Lynne Mann. So our Gracie Lynne is already loved, already cherished and has already left footprints on our hearts!

First baby pictures: