Today, 9 days postpartum, I'm about 20-week sized. Maybe a tad smaller? Definitely a bunch jigglier. :)
I never would have guessed that 32-week shot would be my last belly picture. If goals or positive thinking or research or willpower or anything else could have controlled it, it wouldn't be and we'd still be trucking along. But Christopher (Baby A) was apparently up on his research and knew most triplet pregnancies last 32-33 weeks. My body was happy to oblige and didn't react at all to the magnesium sulfate. And so we helped the statistic, delivering at 32.5 weeks, 2 days after that picture was taken at 32w1d.
It was difficult for me to leave Houston, knowing the babies were still in the hospital. It was naive of me, but I honestly believed in our full-term goal so fully that I had never really thought about the reality of not getting "the moment." By that, I mean the moment we, as surrogates, do this for-- the handing over of the babies, the watching parents' dreams come true. Happy faces, no worries, babies snug in their own beds, surrounded by their families. That's the end of the journey and we're not there yet. For now, we're in a bit of a purgatory, while the babies grow up a bit in isolettes in the NICU. I really would do anything to get a do-over for this last bit-- to hold them in a little longer and grow them a little stronger. But that wasn't our story.
Don't get me wrong-- it's still a happy ending. The babies are doing well. M and N couldn't be better friends or more grateful or more kind in keeping me updated every day. I'm just waiting for Christopher, Isabel, and Nicholas to get home so I can go visit and hold them all and see them strong and healthy, with their family. That's when this chapter will close for me.
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