trusting and waiting

A week ago Tuesday we had our 20-week ultrasound. It was great to see the baby jumping around and count its little fingers and toes. We decided not to find out the gender because it was so much fun to be surprised when Liam was born. Everything looked good except later that evening my doctor contacted me to tell me that they had noticed some fluid surrounding the baby’s lungs. She said this could mean many different things so we really wouldn’t know much until we did some more tests.

As you can imagine, it is stressful not knowing what is going on with our baby, and not even knowing whether there was anything to be worried about. We have been praying a lot this week and God has given us a sense of peace, which we are thankful for, as we know that worrying will not accomplish anything.

Today Phil was able to take a sick day from work to be with me at the hospital as I underwent more tests to try and determine what is going on with our baby. At this point, the only diagnosis we have been given is bilateral pleural effusions (fluid surrounding both lungs).  A second ultrasound revealed pretty much the same findings as the one last week, which are that there does not appear to be any other defects (heart, kidneys, etc.) that are commonly associated with this condition. So, that is good news. However, the cause of the fluid is still unknown.

Apparently pleural effusion is a very rare condition that can either exist on its own with no other abnormalities, or it can be associated with a number of other issues (heart defect, downs syndrome, tumor, infection, etc.). Because no other abnormalities were detected in the ultrasounds, it does not seem very likely that any of these other conditions are present. However, they cannot rule anything out yet and may need to do more testing to make sure. If it is only the pleural effusions and nothing else, they said there is about a 20% chance it the fluid could decrease or go away on it’s own. Which also means there is an 80% chance it could increase.

Right now their main concern is monitoring the fluid levels and how much it is compressing the lungs. If it gets to the point where the lung development is being seriously impaired, they will need to do a procedure to drain the fluid from around the lungs. This of course poses risks of early labor so the longer they can wait to do this the better. If they end up having to do this drainage procedure, at that point they would also be able to test the fluid for genetic abnormalities, which could help determine the cause of this all and what treatment might be needed after delivery. If things stay the same or get better then we will just wait until the baby is born to determine whether there are any other conditions present and whether or not any surgeries will be needed.

So, for now they are just going to have me continue with my regular activities and come back in for an ultrasound every 2 weeks. Of course there are many worst-case scenarios that still exist, but today the doctors were fairly positive and said that while this is a serious condition, it was not the worst case of pleural effusions they had seen.

Now it looks like we are just left to wait and trust that God has this little one in his hands. We pray that the fluid would not impair the baby’s lung development and that no other issues will come up. It’s hard not having answers but good to remind ourselves that we can’t always be in control and that sometimes being forced to lose control of our lives strengthens our faith and our character.

a miracle in progress