The 21 week scan

We went to Leicester royal infirmary for the 21 week ultrasound scan, it started off ok, everyone was in high spirits, as you are on these occasions. The sonalogist was taking a bit more time than usual looking at the baby.  I should have realised that something was wrong really, but I didn't.  After a while, she told us "I need to get a better view of the baby, and to do that I want him to move a bit".  She asked my girlfriend if she wouldn't mind drinking a couple of glasses of water, going for a walk, then coming back to see if she could get a better view.  This we did, and when we returned she took us to a different room with a bigger scanner in.  Still, alarm bells were not ringing.  I said to her "Wow, we get a better machine this time as well".  Her reply still didn't let on that she suspected something was wrong.

So, she's scanning away for a good ten minutes, then turns to us and says "Right, I have seen something that concerns me."  At this point I was so worried I just can't put into words.  "Looking at his head, near his mouth I can see a gap".  She paused and I said "Cleft palate?".  She replied with "Well, a cleft lip at least.  I can't see the palate".  This put a real damper on the day.

I walked out of the scanning room in a real miserable mood.  My daughter and girlfriend were with me, and neither of them knew what a cleft lip and/or palate was.  I said I would show them some pictures on the internet when we got back.  This I did, which promptly had my daughter in tears.  It was the worst day of my life, my world had collapsed.  Our baby is going to have a gaping hole in his face.

About two weeks later we went back for a more detailed scan with a consultant sonalogist. He scanned the baby and confirmed, yes, he's got a cleft lip, possibly palate too.  Then he started saying "I have found something else" - Oh god, not more!  He went on to explain that the baby is showing signs of a PUJ.  This is a shrinking of the pelvic-urethral junction.  Basically, the pipe that connects the kidneys to the bladder is too small.  It was affecting both kidneys, more so on one side than the other.  We came to know this as "The kidney thing".  What it meant is that the baby would not be able to pee with as much force as he needs to.  I was horrified at the thought of not being able to play "Let's see who can pee the furthest" with my son.  Seriously though, I asked what this problem means and it turns out that in rare cases, surgery is needed to expand the junction, otherwise just 'keeping an eye' on the little chap is usually sufficient.  Not that bad then eh?  Yes actually, from here it got worse.