Here is how our journey started.

This journey recently started two years ago when we moved back to the USA from Australia. Leon and I (Kim) thought that God had wanted us to adopt children from the foster care system. To make a very long story short we ended up after a very long wait in the grasp of adopting two young children from DSS. As we prepared for the journey into adopting these children it was brought to our attention that these children were not "legally" free and could be upwards of a year on top of much my husband was going to be transferred out of state which meant we wouldn't be able to leave the state if we moved foward. With those things in view we decided not to move forward with this adoption. Needless to say this was a very hard time for us and we struggled to understand Gods purpose for our family, especially since we had felt so sure about us having two more children.

Well on Sept. 10th I found out that I was pregnant. I had always wanted more children but it just wasnt happening, so when people ask if we were trying then yes... we had been trying for a longgggg time. Our oldest son Jonathan is 14 and Hannah is 12. So we feel that this pregnacy is in Gods timing and not our own. We are so thrilled.

Since I have had problems in the past the doctor did our first ultrasound at 5 weeks and everything looked great. Of course you could not see very much just the one sac but it was right on track. Then I had a second ultrasound on Oct. 21st. The doctor was just doing her thing and then she said....Oh there is two... and I quickly said "two what?" :). Her response was quick that we were having twins. What! We were having twins! She said that they were right on track for thier growth and that there were two heartbeats. After those comments I was just in happy land. God had answered our prayers for two more children. She immediately shared her concern that she thought that the twins may be monoamniotic /monoamniotic Twins also known as momo twins. This mainly means that my twins are in the same amniotic sac and there is a high risk for cord entanglement or cord compression.
At this point I was so overjoyed about being pregnant with twins that I just didnt hear her concerns. We went back for another ultrasound on Oct. 30th to make sure of the diagnosis. Leon was able to go with me to this appointment and sure enough it was confirmed that we were having momo twins. Our doctor sent us to MUSC to see a Twin specialist. Dr. Newman, because momo twins are often misdignosed, and he futher confirm that our twins were definately momo. When he did the 2nd level ultrasound we saw that our twins cords were already tangled. Of course I just had a meltdown because I think the realitity of our situation became very clear with the specialist. Dr. Newman informed us that momo twins have a 50/50 chance at surviving because of the danger of them getting wraped up and tanlged in each others cord. He also made it clear that there is nothing that we can do or that he can do until our babies get to a viable age. He said that when I make it to 24-26 weeks that I would need to go into the hospital for inpatient care so that they can monitor the babies. Once the babies show any sign of distress then they would deliver the babies and then we would have a higher chance of saving them. He said that for momo twins the longest that I would go is 32-34 weeks max.

So, we're now at 12-1/2 weeks and have the next OBGYN appointment in two weeks and then have level 2 ultrasound (for genetic development, sex of the babies (although the data suggests 70% of all momo twins are girls) at MUSC again on December 15th.

So, we place our Faith in Jesus and pray for our unborn twins that He will keep them safe, and sound inside me until >32 weeks! We must walk by faith, everyday and always remember that God is in control. One thing that I learned recently in CBS is that God tells us in the Bible to "Fear Not" 365 times. I find that very comforting that I have a "fear not" for every day!

Thank you for taking the time to read our story and we will try to keep everyone up to date with how our twins are doing. Thank you in advance for all your prayers.

Many Blessings! The Topalian Family