Read/Write struct to fifo in C

I'm trying to pass structs between processes using named pipes. I got stuck at trying to open the pipe non-blocking mode. Here's my code for writing to the fifo:

void writeUpdate() {
    // Create fifo for writing updates:
    strcpy(fifo_write, routing_table->routerName);
    // Check if fifo exists:
    if(access(fifo_write, F_OK) == -1 )
        fd_write = mkfifo(fifo_write, 0777);
    else if(access(fifo_write, F_OK) == 0) {
        printf("writeUpdate: FIFO %s already exists\n", fifo_write);
        //fd_write = open(fifo_write, O_WRONLY|O_NONBLOCK);
    }
    fd_write = open(fifo_write, O_WRONLY|O_NONBLOCK);
    if(fd_write < 0)
        perror("Create fifo error");
    else {
        int num_bytes = write(fd_write, routing_table, sizeof(routing_table));
        if(num_bytes == 0)
            printf("Nothing was written to FIFO %s\n", fifo_write);
        printf("Wrote %d bytes. Sizeof struct: %d\n", num_bytes,sizeof(routing_table)+1);
        }
    close(fd_write);
   }

routing_table is a pointer to my struct, it's allocated, so there's no prob with the name of the fifo or smth like that.
If I open the fifo without the O_NONBLOCK option, it writes smth for the first time, but then it blocks because I'm having troubles reading the struct too. And after the first time, the initial fifo is created, but other fifo's appear, named '.', '..'.
With O_NONBLOCK option set, it creates the fifo but always throws an error: 'No such device or address'. Any idea why this happens? Thanks.

EDIT: Ok, so I'm clear now about opening the fifo, but I have another problem, in fact reading/writing the struct to the fifo was my issue to start with. My code to read the struct:

void readUpdate() {
struct rttable *updateData;
allocate();

strcpy(fifo_read, routing_table->table[0].router);

// Check if fifo exists:
if(access(fifo_read, F_OK) == -1 )
    fd_read = mkfifo(fifo_read, 777);
else if(access(fifo_read, F_OK) == 0) {
    printf("ReadUpdate: FIFO %s already exists\n Reading from %s\n", fifo_read, fifo_read);        
}
fd_read = open(fifo_read, O_RDONLY|O_NONBLOCK);
int num_bytes = read(fd_read, updateData, sizeof(updateData));
close(fd_read);
if(num_bytes > 0) {
    if(updateData == NULL)
        printf("Read data is null: yes");
    else
        printf("Read from fifo: %s %d\n", updateData->routerName, num_bytes);

    int result = unlink(fifo_read);
    if(result < 0)
        perror("Unlink fifo error\n");
    else {
        printf("Unlinking successful for fifo %s\n", fifo_read);
        printf("Updating table..\n");
        //update(updateData);
        print_table_update(updateData);
    }
} else
    printf("Nothing was read from FIFO %s\n", fifo_read);
}

It opens the fifo and tries to read, but it seems like nothing is in the fifo, although in writeUpdate the first time it says it wrote 4 bytes (this seems wrong too). At reading, first time around it prints 'a' and then num_bytes is always <=0.
I've looked around and only found this example, with simple write/read, is there smth more needed when writing a struct?

My struct looks like this:

typedef struct distance_table {
char dest[20];       //destination network
char router[20];     // via router..
int distance;
} distance_table;

typedef struct rttable {
char routerName[10];
char networkName[20];
struct distance_table table[50];
int nrRouters;
} rttable;

struct rttable *routing_table;