YOUR OVER-35 PREGNANCY GDE(ISBN=9780761526988)

M. Kelly Shanahan, M.D.:

When I was a small child, I wanted to be a jockey, but I soon grew too tall. Then, when I was 11, a fall from a trampoline changed by life: I ruptured my spleen and had major surgery. From that time, I knew what I wanted to be when I grew up: a doctor.

My course never faltered. I graduated from high school, attended Bryn Mawr College, majoring in biology, and was accepted at the University of Virginia School of Medicine. When doing my obstetrics rotation and delivering a baby to a woman having her fourth child, I found my specialty. I did my ob/gyn residency at Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia. It was trial by fire. The program at the time was in a state of transition and we were short-handed and under supervised, but I learned how to think on my feet. I came out of that program well equipped to handle any emergency.

After almost three years in practice, I decided to look West for a more balanced life. I found a job at Lake Tahoe, with another woman. Shortly after I moved here, I met a wonderful man, and we were married. He always knew he wanted children, and convinced me that starting a family would be a good idea. I agreed, and being the successful physician who had always accomplished everything I set out to do figured getting pregnant would be easy.

I was wrong. I was not ovulating. I embarked on the rocky pathway of infertility, treating myself for almost a year. I got pregnant on Clomid, but miscarried. I miscarried again in 1997. That loss was devastating. I felt like I was a double failure—both as a woman and as an ob/gyn. I joined an e-mail support group and told my story on the Women's Health Forum at obgyn.net, a site for which I acted as an advisor and expert. It took me six months to get the courage to try again.

I conceived, and thanks to treatments for the antiphospholipid syndrome that was the cause of my miscarriages, this third time was a charm: after Pergonal, progesterone, aspirin and twice daily heparin shots, I delivered my daughter on 12/1/98. She is a miracle, and I am so grateful to have her. I now know how lucky we really are; in May 2000, I miscarried again, despite treatment.

I am still very proud of the "MD" after my name—I worked very hard to get it—but now it stands for more than "Medical Doctor." Now it stands for something much more important and rewarding "Mother/Doctor."

Contents
Preface
Acknowledgments
Pregnancy Planning
Week 1: The Menstrual Cycle
Week 2: Ovulation and Fertilization
Week 3: Implantation
Week 4: Where's My Period?
Week 5: Why Am I So Tired??
Week 6: First Doctor's Visit
Week 7: Morning (and Noon and Night) Sickness
Week 8: Dashed Hopes
Week 9: Teratogens, or What to Avoid When You're Expecting
Week 10: Chorionic Villus Sampling
Week 11: Eating for Two
Week 12: No, You're Not Losing Your Mind, You're Just Pregnant
Week 13: Interpretation of Prenatal Blood Tests
Week 14: Telling the World
Week 15: More Blood Tests: The "Triple Screen"
Week 16: Amniocentesis
Week 17: Financial Considerations
Week 18: Baby Pictures
Week 19: There's a Whole Lotta Shakin' Going On!
Week 20: Baby Is Exercising—And So Should You
Week 21: Why Do I Have to Get On That Darn Scale!
Week 22: Baby, Oh Baby, the Places You'll Go
Week 23: Mirror, Mirror on the Wall
Week 24: Born Too Soon
Week 25: Bleeding
Week 26: Working Nine to Five
Week 27: It's a Boy and a Girl and . . .
Week 28: Too Sweet
Week 29: Divide and Conquer
Week 30: Preterm Labor
Week 31: It's a Family Affair
Week 32: Learning About Labor
Week 33: Blueprint for Birth
Week 34: High Blood Pressure and Pre-Eclampsia
Week 35: Here's Looking at You, Kid
Week 36: To Breast or Not to Breast, That Is the Question
Week 37: The Home Stretch
Week 38: Pain Control
Week 39: Cesarean Section and VBAC
Week 40: Labor Day
Postparcum: Where's the Instruction Manual?
Epilogue
Glossary
Index