Playing Catch Up

As some of you may know, the baby making process for us has been quite a roller coaster ride! We were stoked to find out that we were expecting and although we couldn't wait to scream it from the rooftops, we felt we should wait until the end of the first trimester. We told our son and extended family at Christmas and everyone was so excited!

Eighteen weeks in and everything was going great! We had our anatomical sonogram on February 12, 2013. We were so excited to be able to see baby Knapp! We... Chris... decided that we should wait to find out what the gender of the baby was until Saturday at our Gender Reveal Party.  As you can imagine, this was pretty difficult for us. We went to the appointment and all of the measurements were good, but we were there for what seemed like forever because the ultrasound tech couldn't get good pictures of babies heart.

On Friday, February 15 I received a call from the OB/GYN referring me to see a perinatologist. Come to find out, Baby Knapp has Single Umbilical Artery also known as Two Vessel Cord which means he only had one umbilical artery and one vein instead of two arteries and one vein. According to the Internet this occurs in .2% - 1% of pregnancies. My emotions at this point were a bit crazy. I wasn't sure if we should even have the gender reveal party because I was unsure of what we were about to face. After talking with Chris and my family we decided to celebrate the next day. It was then that we found out we were having a boy who we then named Mason Cole.

On Friday, February 22 we went to see Dr. Wolfe. I remember him asking if we knew why we were there. I simply replied with the SUA diagnosis. A while into the sonogram he turned and asked us if we had been told of any heart abnormalities. I thought I panicked at the SUA diagnosis... I am not quite sure how to express my feelings at this point. Trying to get past the lump in my throat I told him that all we knew about the heart was that she couldn't get any real good pictures. It was then that we learned of Baby Mason's TGA diagnosis. In the first few weeks of life, during the construction of his heart, something went wrong. Mason has Transposition of the Great Arteries which means his aorta and pulmonary artery are switched. Currently, he is able to get blood through the umbilical cord which is allowing him to thrive. After he is born his blood will not be able to carry oxygen to the rest of his body. Mason will undergo open heart surgery within the first two weeks of his life during which they will switch the arteries to allow his heart to function properly.

We were hoping to be able to have Mason in Kansas City, but after visiting the Cardiologist he told us that he felt that it was best to have Mason in Boston. Although it is a 24 hour drive, what option do we have? We want the best for him! In the meantime, we are enjoying getting to see our baby frequently through sonograms and we are anxiously awaiting his arrival!  Hopefully we will know a little bit more on our next visit in April.