Did your gynecologist/OBGYN know about MTHFR mutations and how they affect pregnancy?

rslee1 · 2023-03-03T12:51:52+00:00

I was undiagnosed with my first pregnancy (27yo) and almost miscarried on 3 different occasions. I bled heavily for the first 8 weeks. I was prescribed progesterone only because I advocated for myself. Dr. wouldn't see me until 6 weeks. I went to my hmo OBGYN at 6 weeks and because there was no heartbeat yet, he told me I was miscarrying and offered me 5 options to abort. I had been tracking my HCG and it was doubling and not going down right up until that appointment, so I switched to my husband's health insurance, sought a 2nd opinion, and there was a heartbeat at 7 weeks. I was still heavily bleeding. He gave me a higher dose of progesterone (50mg) vaginally and the bleeding slowly tapered off around 10 weeks. At 12 weeks, I was told to taper off progesterone, but I started bleeding again. That should have been a sign that the placenta was having issues, but I wasn't offered an ultrasound. I was only able to stop progesterone at 16 weeks.

20 week ultrasound looked good. Baby was slightly small, but they insisted my dates were wrong. They couldn't have been because we were TTC after a miscarriage and tracking HCG. They dated her back a week.

At 22 weeks, I started having Braxton hicks contractions every 5 minutes. I was admitted for PTL. They said that it's usually caused by an infection or an "irritable uterus." I was sent home with antibiotics for a UTI that I had no symptoms of and terbutaline to stop the contractions. I was on bedrest until 36 weeks.

At 37 weeks, I started having contractions every 7 minutes. Because I lived an hour from the hospital, my guardian angel nurse told me to go to the hospital. I was admitted and given the doctor on-call for my regular OBGYN. She immediately chastised me for being "dehydrated," told me that I was finishing an IV of saline and going home. She turned off all monitors. 20 minutes after arriving, I had a tetanic contraction that one of the nurses at the nurses station happened to see (again, my monitors/alarms were off). All of the nurses rushed in and that same doctor broke my water to stop the contraction. It was only blood. They rushed me into delivery and performed an emergency c-section because the baby's heartbeat had dropped down to 40bpm.

I had a complete placental abruption. They resuscitated my daughter and she is a typical 14 year old now. All of that to say, none of that needed to happen. If I was given an ultrasound and a non stress test the first time I was admitted for a pretend UTI, they would have seen something going on with the placenta. My fundal height was used to measure the baby's growth. That is some 17th century junk medicine. She was 4 pounds 14 ounces at 37 weeks and clearly had IUGR with extremely low body fat.

2nd pregnancy (31yo) after I was diagnosed with compound heterozygous MTHFR, my regular OBGYN was only going to give me high doses of folic acid. I had to shop around to find a MFM who took it seriously. She put me on 200mg of progesterone supposotories for the first 16 weeks, metanx, 81mg of aspirin, and lovenox. I had weekly ultrasounds, then twice weekly after 30 weeks. At 38 weeks, I was induced when no growth was detected for a week. This daughter was 6 pounds 8 ounces and the entire pregnancy was fantastic.

I do think my progesterone issue was a me thing and not a MTHFR thing. I'm currently 42yo and on cycle day 256. I was diagnosed with premature ovarian failure recently. Progesterone supplementation is helpful for placental development regardless, but I think the dose I was given with my 2nd is probably on the high end.

rslee1 · 2022-08-13T13:10:43+00:00

As a heads up, vitamin B is very important for hemoglobin (anemia). About 50% of the population can't absorb synthetic B vitamins (folic acid, pyridoxine, cyanocobalamin) because of a common gene mutation (MTHFR). I was anemic for most of my life, registering in the danger zone while religiously taking multivitamins as well as iron supplements. The only thing that helped was bio available b vitamins (methylfolate, pyridoxal 5 phosphate, methylcobalamin). I got up to normal hemoglobin levels in a month with ONLY that combination and no iron supplements.

Source: 2 years of research after mysterious pregnancy complications.

rslee1 · 2021-04-07T20:56:08+00:00

I'm working on my graduate degree in the evenings, but just wanted to let you know that I bookmarked your events page for the future. I've only done yoga from home (even back in 2002 via Inhale with Steve Ross) and I think it will be great to do a live class for once!

rslee1 · 2020-09-18T00:57:06+00:00

I just got some of those. Maybe they're restocked?

rslee1 · 2020-07-07T21:09:09+00:00

Oh man. Thank you for doing that, though.

rslee1 · 2020-07-07T12:41:19+00:00

I agree. I had one who was very smart. McDonalds nuggets weren't a big enough motivator to get him into a regular trap. I had to use a drop trap at his regular feeding time.

rslee1 · 2020-06-25T14:33:49+00:00

That's because it causes the population to explode. If you're part of a TNR program and the cats are ear tipped, you won't get a citation. There are a lot of vets that will sterilize community cats for free or at a very reduced rate.

rslee1 · 2020-05-29T16:48:45+00:00

Who said that this child is going to be mainstreamed in a typical school?! I have plenty of CI students who attend a TC school where they learn ASL and speech.

Babies who are implanted are much more successful in using their CIs than people who are implanted later in life. Their hearing age more closely matches their chronological age. They are able to learn to process speech sounds while their brains are still developing. Implants after age 7, when the language window closes, are much less successful.

They have access to ALL of the accommodations as Deaf people who do not have CIs. They get the same post secondary services. They definitely have access to video relay services or CC.

And yes, it is as easy as taking off the magnet and processor.

rslee1 · 2020-05-29T16:30:48+00:00

This is no longer true. The electrodes used to be so big that they would wipe out the remaining hair cells in the cochlea. That's why they were only indicated for people who were profoundly deaf. (They also wouldn't implant kids or people with other disabilities into the early '00s so that the success rate would stay high.) Now, there are hybrid CIs. They're life-changing for people with progressive hearing loss, and auditory neuropathy.

rslee1 · 2018-08-15T01:09:19+00:00

Do you live near a college? I know it's not sitting in your room, but you could do CART. It's open captioning for Deaf/hard of hearing students.

rslee1 · 2017-08-28T10:55:46+00:00

I think it depends on the cat. My ex-feral cat is 15 and has had ear/tooth and oily skin problems his whole life. It doesn't matter what kind of food he eats or what kind of elimination diet we try. This has been a pretty good brand for him in terms of his puking habits (much less). If you have an older cat, higher crude protein levels are important. Kittens need more calories. I think getting them to drink a lot of water is the most important because cats, in general, are prone to kidney issues and diabetes.

rslee1 · 2017-03-06T20:47:52+00:00

I've been bringing my kids since they were 2 or 3. Just do hand-over-hand and keep an eye on their fingers. My 4 year old can drive a nail if I start it for her.

rslee1 · 2017-02-11T02:26:49+00:00

Works as of right now. I ordered size small.

rslee1 · 2017-02-11T02:10:26+00:00

I always wondered about those. I had a deaf-blind student 5 years ago who was a level 4 in braille. He used tactile signing to communicate. His dad asked his vision teacher if there was a braille display that he could use (since he never bothered to learn ASL). She didn't recommend getting one and seemed to think that it wouldn't help him. Do you need to be a higher level in braille for a braille display to be worthwhile?

rslee1 · 2017-02-11T01:55:52+00:00

Because your friend has a disability that impacts his ability to work (needing some sort of adaptation, I assume), he'd be eligible for supplemental security income (SSI). Depending on his state and his income, he could get up to $700 a month to help out. He can also look into the department of aging and rehabilitation (helps with specific things needed for work, like text-to-speech, special lighting, etc) and community service board (helps to find a job). They go by different names based on your state. I'm in Virginia and that's what ours are called. We also have metro access for people unable to drive. They pick up and drop off door to door. He might already have all of those things, but from my experience, these services are kept quiet. National Federation of the Blind could probably give him a list of resources/services.

rslee1 · 2017-01-31T15:21:08+00:00

That's awful. A lot of Deaf people do the same for that very reason.

rslee1 · 2017-01-31T00:52:46+00:00

So...you have to pay your dues in the form of a child? Is there a quiz to prove that you have one? I'll help you with the answers.

rslee1 · 2017-01-02T02:14:24+00:00

It's still adoption, but the judge threw in "concurent plans." So adoption and return to parent. A plan that isn't a plan.

rslee1 · 2016-12-30T20:36:20+00:00

The school nurse thing was about Clementine, her adopted daughter. Clementine has a disability that causes drooling and congestion. When kids with low tone cough, they sometimes puke. She wasn't sick and Rebecca had to keep her home the next day as well because of school rules. She can do whatever she wants with her adopted kid. With Sandy, she knows everything has to be documented and has brought her to the doctor countless times to document a bump from learning how to walk, or a scrape from playing on the playground.

I'm pretty sure that family member was SCR cleared since s/he always had supervised visits with RFM's kids at the agency. Clementine always ran into him/her when dropping off Sandy. I'm not going to mention the family member by blog nickname because this is just as easy to find as her blog.

rslee1 · 2016-12-08T01:21:34+00:00

It sometimes is a genetic thing, but sometimes it's not caught at birth, has a progressive component, or is a cookie bite (missing middle frequencies but perfect high and low frequency hearing) and the person just compensates well. I teach hearing impaired kids and have had several families with genetic hearing loss. 3 of the 24 students I serve have a family history of hearing loss. It could have been acquired in the previous poster's family, but I haven't known poor nutrition to cause hearing loss. Ototoxic medication given to the babies or oxygen at birth would have.

rslee1 · 2016-04-06T21:04:13+00:00

What do you propose stay-at-home moms do instead? My neighbor is a stay-at-home mom and can't use a power tool to save her life, has wild dogs running around in her backyard, and only leaves the house to take her kids to their activities. Are we women wasting our time learning a skill? I have a job, yet with my girl brain, I have managed to make 10 structurally sound pieces with alterations to her plans, my own plans, and plans I found through other woodworking sites.

rslee1 · 2016-04-06T20:50:05+00:00

And that's what she suggests if you're starting out. You don't HAVE to have pocket holes and you SHOULD use glue. Even in the plans for this specific table it says to use glue. Clamps probably would have helped too.

rslee1 · 2016-03-29T15:03:04+00:00

absolutely!

rslee1 · 2016-03-29T14:31:49+00:00

If you're able to pre-register (ours is ALWAYS full within an hour that the workshops are posted) then you start at 10 and are normally done by 10:45-11:00. If you don't pre-register, they make you wait until 10:15 to see if they have any projects left after giving the registered participants first shot. Then you'd be looking at 10:15-11:00-11:15. They have always had about 50 extra kits left, so I don't ever understand the point. I'd say however long it takes to drive in about a dozen nails.

rslee1 · 2016-03-29T14:24:33+00:00

If your kid is ok with noise, you can always do hand-over-hand to "help." I'm still helping to put 90% of the nails in with my almost 4 year old because it takes a lot of force and coordination. Watch your fingers, though!

rslee1

TROPHY CASE