I.V.Effed: No Sex, No Lies, and No Videotape

Clearly, I am not pregnant.  And I love the nurse for believing me when I talked to her the day before the beta, instead of scolding me for giving up hope or whatever.  I had a phone consult scheduled with Dr D for this past Friday, only to be later told he was in surgery all day and couldn’t commit to a time.  The time he COULD commit to turned out to be 1:15 on Sunday afternoon…the first time in 48 hours I let my phone out of my sight/range of hearing (it was Sunday, for crimenys sake!  seriously.  I was shopping).  So he left a message, just completely standard…sorry your fet didn’t work, you seem to have none left, if you want to go ahead with a fresh, call my nurse and my office and we’ll get you on the calendar, same exact protocol, call if you have questions…right.  Like I’ll get ahold of him.  It would be easier to reach Barack at 1600 PA Ave. 

Here’s my thing.  We go same protocol?  I’m two years older.  Getting up to that magic threshold of (shhhhh, 3-5).  Will same protocol be okay?  And no need to check out my utes, give it the all-clear?  And what about my slightly elevated tsh that nootherdoctorwouldthinkishighbutthisonethinksistoohighandneedstobecontrolledwithmedication?  I’m just so nervous.  Last chance at a fresh one (gulp).  I had told T earlier this year I was okay with that, I am and can be happy with my family the way it is right now, hell, two years ago I was convinced it was never going to be this.  A truly is my miracle baby.  But now that it is approaching…the door is going to be closed for good, and I am sad (I obviously talk like it won’t work.  See previous post about 20 embryos, 2 children, and understand my thoughts).  I understand that every family comes to a point where reproduction stops…but in more cases than not, the FAMILY decides to end the reproduction, the REPRODUCTION doesn’t end the family.  Big diff.

I also found out this week two good friends are expecting next summer.  One has a son that is two days older than A.  She is so damn fertile, it is mindblowing.  But I love her more than life, so I can never be anything but happy for her.  She is the type of person who DESERVES fertility, whatever that means (this of course implies I don’t?).  So while I am thrilled for her having #3, I am also slightly jealous (which I freely admit to her) because clearly, I want to be in the same position.  But I’m not.  And then I think about all of the amazing people I have met through my infertility journey and I think SHUT THE HELL UP C there are so many people out there still that don’t even have what you have.  So it’s a freaking back and forth in my head, all day long.  What is that they say?  The heart wants what the heart wants.

Sooooooo…to summarize my cycling future: I am on the co culture waitlist for January.  If I dont get in then, I get in February for sure.  If all goes well, I respond as expected to drugs, etc etc etc…best case I will be cycling end of January, next case I will be cycling end of February.  Two cycles timed as such have brought me my sons (and a third a double-miscarriage–but still a pregnancy).  Luckily, I have a few weeks off to just enjoy Christmas with the amazing family I have…and really, I can.  The place I am in now, compared to where I was two years ago… the difference is inconceivable.  No pun…intended.

No Comments | In: December 2011 | | #

You bet.  P is four, A recently turned one.  I am ready to ride the infertility-coaster for another go (or few) at it, but there are some stipulations put in place by the husband (after all, he’s lived with my all sorts of crazy since we started trying to have a baby back in 2006…and even though Crazy C has hibernated for the past 15 or 16 months, she’s ready to come out for one final roar.)  So husband’s stipulations are as follows: 1. we are done trying by the end of 2012. 2. If we are going to do a fresh cycle at all, we do it in the beginning of the new year.

My feelings on the above are varied–while I am ready to put the Life of Fruitlessly Trying behind me, I am also so damn stubborn and determined that I think, “see, you didnt ever really quit when you were trying for number two.  Does number three deserve any less effort?”  But I also want to keep the peace and happiness we have now found, and I don’t want my family unit to suffer unnecessarily.  I am on board to go for a fresh cycle as soon as possible (just need to talk to dr, etc etc).  Of course, I need to wait a few days because I am at the end of a busted frozen cycle–two more transferred in and nothing of it.  Bringing the grand total to…twenty transferred, two children.  So, with my stellar math skills working overtime, it seems I am working at 10%.  Good grief, Charlie Brown, that sucks.  Can’t call the dr now because beta isn’t until Tuesday (no, I am not wrong and pregnant like I was last time.  I am not.  you’ll see).  Anyway, don’t want to be a total loon too early, so will talk to them on Tuesday when they call with my beta results and ask about getting fit in for coculture, finish up necessary bloodwork, etc etc.  (Oh, another wrench into the mix…elevated TSH.  So an effed up thyroid.  Have been on the meds for about six weeks now…we’ll see what it does.  Other than give me heart palpitations).  So maybe I can do a fresh in January/Feb, then clean out the freezers over the course of the year, and then, throw in the needle.  Man.  I was so hoping that the transfer of our two bestest frosted embryos would be the break of a lifetime, but no dice. 

Oh who am I kidding.  I am trying to keep in mind that I shouldn’t plan…we plan, God laughs, and all that.  Though I don’t really think he laughs, because that would be kind of mean.  And quite unGodlike.

So I will plan…and likely my plans will be upended.  But I want to try again.  I have some fight in me to try again.  I look at my great boys, how far I have come, this insane journey, and I think, yep, I would do that over again if I knew it would get me here.  So now, I will get back into my crazysuit and hold on for the duration.

 Back in the game.  But playing only for a limited time.

No Comments | In: December 2011 | | #

but little A arrived at 11:32 pm on Veterans Day.  11/11.  A perfect date for an ex-high-school-history-teacher.  He was 7lbs, 15oz and 20 inches long.  He has been a perfect little dream baby so far–unlike his older brother who was essentially kicked out of the nursery for screaming nonstop.   We are definitely having some adjustment problems from big brother P…he has been acting out in ridiculously cliche ways for someone with a new little sibling…and of course, being now the Terrible Three doesn’t help matters.  But we’re surviving.  And if little A continues in his awesomeness, we may just be able to thaw our frozen tykes and try for a third sometime down the line.  Although…we are two for eighteen…and we only have eight frozen.  History would show we’re one short…but I’m getting waaaaay ahead of myself here.  Waywaywaywayway.  Just going to enjoy the blessings we have right now.

I’m tired…really really tired…but I am so happy right now, to have my little family.  My houseful of boys.  My miracles, as silly and sappy as it sounds.  I look down at A right now and see him as the child who almost wasn’t.  Even T is a miracle for me…he’s stuck around for 12 years.  That’s nothing if not miraculous.  Pee on the toilet and around the toilet and on the wall next to the toilet…dirty shoes and knees and firetruck obsessions.   Ah, my future for the next 18 years.  And I am in love with it all.

3 Comments | In: November '10 | | #

I was feeling really ready the other day–ready to get the show on the road.  But now…not so ready.  P has been in the throes of the end of the twos/start of the threes (happy belated bday, little man) and his behavior has caused me to worry about what the heck it’s going to be like when he’s throwing himself around a room in a tantrum as a tiny little guy squirms and cries in my arms…(also, have not yet found The Name for the next installation.  P has offered a number of interesting suggestions along the way, and at random times will offer such gems as “blueberry” “fireman s.am”"mommy”and any name of any person we have recently learned.)  I remember being like this with P, though–wanting to not be pregnant anymore just to have my own self to myself, but then also not wanting to have this little being leave me…and of course, I was scared about the things to come.  I am also struggling with the whole “how can I ever feel about my second the way I feel about my first” syndrome…P was our miracle baby.  The apple of our eye.  The king of the house.  The greatest joy ever.  Now he’ll have to move over to share the throne…and it ain’t going to be easy for anyone, I’m sure.  I feel weird feeling this way since the effort and time and pain endured to become and remain pregnant this time far surpassed the time for P…but now it all feels different somehow.  I don’t know how to describe it.

Other musings: 

1. the other day we were singing “somew.here over the rai.nbow” in a music class…and yep, of course, I started to cry (the week prior we sang “lea.ving on a jet pl.ane” and I cried then too).  But I thought about how I am now on the side of the rainbow where everything is good and right and happy…though I never did think I’d be here again.  And I realized with such fierceness that everyone who ever wants to have a child should get to find this side of the rainbow.  Should never have to feel that they’ll never make it there.  Because the fact is, it is the complete opposite feeling of what you feel when you are in the depths of dispair, certain you will never be a mom.  It is entering a completely different realm, in a way…you always know where you’ve come from, but the amazingness of being pregnant and on your way to your dream is so incredible, and it is heartbreaking that not everyone gets to experience it. 

2.  Baby has dropped into the pelvic area (engaged, if you will), I am 1-2 cm dilated, but not much effacing going on.  I think it’s all about right where it should be for being 36 weeks and 2/3 days.  I am still hoping for a 39-40 week pregnancy (who wants their turkey in a hospital, no matter HOW swanky said hospital is?)

3. Giulia.na and Bill is the best show to hit the airways that deals with IF.  I cried the first episode when they found out they were pregnant.  I cried at the previews for what is to come.  In one clip G says “I feel like I am being punished for something…” and holy crap, did that hit home.  That’s exactly how I felt.  I felt I was being punished for who I was, something I had done maybe.  I wish only that more people knew of/tuned in to the show…because I can only assume it would help so many who are unfamiliar with this situation, as they watch strangers go through it all on camera.  From the procedures, the waiting, the joy, the incredible pain…and that’s only what G and B let the viewers see…

4. Seriously.  What am I going to name this little boy?  We have approximately three weeks to figure it out…and I don’t believe in the “we’ll know when we see him” stuff–he will look (hopefully) like a red-faced, naked, puffy eyed little boy.  Certainly I won’t be able to discern his true name from that????

1 Comment | In: October '10 | | #

I know.  You’ve known this for a while.  And so have I…but here’s the thing.  Friday P and I were at Hom.egoo.ds and he had to use the bathroom (I swear, he uses it as often as I do these days. However, his needs stems from a newfound infatuation with potties (thank you, newly potty-trained son)  soap dispensers and the ever popular debate “Handdryer v papertowel”…though he calls handdryer machines “leafblowers.”)  Digression over.  Anyhow.  There is a semi-full length mirror in this particular bathroom…and I saw my profile for a second.  And I saw that I was pregnant.  Really, truly, no-one-mistakes-me-for-a-bloated-person pregnant.  (I get that this seems silly.  I have looked pregnant for quite a while, and every day do see my person when I get dressed.  But there was something about that moment, about the angle, about…something…) I just stopped and stared at that person for a few seconds…because I remember so vividly the days/weeks/months/years I was convinced I wasn’t going to see that again.  And it was so strange…to be like, yup, there I am…pregnant.  A little boy will be coming around sometime in the next 7 weeks or so.  And he’s in there.  Growing, elbowing, smashing, pressing, contorting…getting ready to come and join our crazy family…

3 Comments | In: October '10 | | #

My sweet P,

           Today mommy and daddy took you to your very first day of nursery school.  Three days a week, three hours a day…it seems like I have all of this “found” time now.  It has been just one month shy of three years that you and I have spent practically all of our waking minutes together.  I know that now the time is right for you to start school–you woke up today and said to me “I can’t wait for gool today!”  It has been the greatest blessing being able to spend these past years with you.  I thank your dad that he works so hard to let me stay home with you, because even though sometimes you drive me crazy (especially lately!) I wouldn’t have it any other way.  I was not the mom to drop you off at a friends, or have a sitter come so I could go shopping or get a manicure by myself…I was not the mom who handed you off to your dad when he walked in the door at night.  I was not the mom who couldn’t wait for a night out without you, or the mom who left you at the daycare at a gym.  I instead held you close, and kept you, my little buddy with me when I could.  I chose my “me” time to be when you nap, and I cherish the weekends that you, me and daddy are all together, rather than look for chances to get away.  You have come with me to the grocery store, the mall, RE appointments, OB appointments…basically anywhere I have needed to be, within reason, you’ve come along.  As I reread this now, I realize it may sound like I was too protective…but I know the kiss and hug you gave me as you walked into your classroom today without a tear demonstrate that I’ve done okay by you (so far).  Sure, there’ve been some mess-ups.  I’ve done some mean-mommy things that I’m not proud of (I did NOT need to throw the cereal box on the floor last week when I couldn’t handle the fiftieth time you were telling me no, you wanted Life…and we didn’t have Life…) but I made a promise to myself that I would always tell you after a “fight” that I loved you, that I was sorry, and give you kisses and hugs. 

             For a very long time I was afraid I wasn’t going to be able to have my own child.  And then came you. You warm my heart and make me laugh a hundred times a day.  I love that you kiss my leg with the painful veins as I get dressed in the morning, I love that you want me to sing to you still and cuddle in your rocking chair, I (secretly) love that only I will do when you wake in the middle of the night or need to be tucked in again or have to use the potty….  I love that you have a fiercely independent streak, as I was afraid at one point I might squash that with my overwhelming love.  I love that you have started to take a protective interest in your baby brother in my belly, giving him kisses, saying hello to him, and laying your head on me to try and hear or feel him when he gets a bad case of the hiccups.  There was also a long time when I didn’t think I would be able to give you a brother to love.  You were there for me to hold and cuddle and cry on when I lost the babies last March.  You were there with your sweet face to comfort me when I found out cycle after cycle had failed.  You didn’t ever know what was wrong, but you were always good for a hug.

                 I am so proud of the little almost-three-year old that you are, and I look forward to watching you grow up.  You are truly a gift to me and to your daddy.  I love you more than I ever thought I could love another, and more than you will ever be able to know.  In two months our lives will change a lot.  But you will always be my sweet little guy, my big hearted son, who may test me to my limits some days, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.

                               I love you, P.  Love, love love you.

1 Comment | In: September '10 | | #

There are some things I really need to get going on. 

1. I want to change the layout of the blog.  However, being that I am blognorant, I don’t know when and if I can get it done.  But I am feeling the pull of a newer look (after all, been at this bad boy for just over a year now….)

2. I want to post more (because you know, when I get all famous because my blog is the bestest blog in the history of all blogs and people are racing to read my blog-turned-book-bestseller, who wants it to drop off with the pregnancy?)  Ha. hahaha.

3. I want to start getting things “ready.”  After all…I’m only three weeks from being 30 weeks, which in my mind is like “yep, you’re getting there.”  So I want to start readying my life for the coming of a new little guy.  P is NOT ready–he told us yesterday that he wanted Baby Pablo to stay in my tummy ever ever.  He did not care when I told him that neither mommy nor baby pablo think this is a good idea.  So he needs to get ready emotionally, just as I need to get the house and all other baby things in order.

4. I want to start cooking again.  Real cooking, not the kind where grilling precooked sausage on the grill counts as cooking.  I mean, soups, casseroles, other tasty treats.  That has gone by the wayside this summer.

5. Um, those other four are a lot for right now.  There are, of course, about six thousand things that fit under #4, but no need to stress out naming them all right now.  I just want to really be embracing this thing that is causing nighttime pee-trips, backaches and stretch marks (only on my right ass cheek.  Nothing anywhere else.  Yet.)  I want to live in the moment–for who knows what the future brings?

This is all for now.  Short but sweet post.  Happy anniversary to me and T (six years), and happy anniversary, i-v-effed.  Will be back soon……..

2 Comments | In: August '10 | | #

and for the first time, I’m not feeling the funk of “shit, here comes winter, here I am, still trying to get pregnant, my favorite times of year have passed and now I have to be in winter, feeling just as crappy inside as the weather is outside.“   I definitely think I am a seasonal-affective-disorder person, and would probably benefit from one of those fake-sun-lamps in my living room.  Just to bask under in a swimsuit with a book come mid-January…

      but anyway.  24 weeks along yesterday–and had a little scare.  I was having braxton-hicks all morning, and they weren’t stopping.  We’re talking over a dozen in the span of two hours, and I started to freak out a little.  So I tried to go about my morning like all was fine (well, I watched PBS sprout with P and T in bed, drank gallons of water, and just relaxed as long as possible)…but then decided that I was being incredibly stupid if I didn’t take advantage of the fact that it was a Sunday, there was no need to drag P along with me anywhere…and only a doctor could really make me feel okay about everything.  Thus, I found myself reclining in a comfy hospital bed in Labor and Delivery (helllooo, reallynicehospitalIamgoingtobedeliveringat!) for four hours, being monitored, internally examined, cultured, etc.  The monitors were definitely noting the contracting, but after a good while they subsided, picked up again an hour or so later, and then subsided again.  The exam noted a closed cervix, and all cultures came back negative.  My prescription?  Pelvic rest, lots of water, and rest.  As soon as I heard the cervix was closed I about jumped for joy.  Diagnosis?  Nada.   But haven’t had more than one or two since I came back home yesterday around 3.

         24 weeks was a little early to be thinking of bringing home Baby Pablo (or Baby Tyrone, depending on which Bac.kyardi.gan P feels like naming him after on any given day).  I am glad he is staying put.

I also think I’m going to try to be a More Active Blogger.  So what if my situation has changed?  I am still an IVF vet.  It still plays into my life–and though I do not need it as the crutch I needed to get through a very dark time, I could certainly benefit from some more reflection in my life right now.  I had a few moments this weekend to go for a solo walk, and I found myself thinking about how incredibly different my mindset is now than it was a year ago.  It is amazing how I can feel such peace and happiness and wholeness by having this little guy growing inside of me–compared to when I didn’t, when I never thought I would know that feeling again, when I thought I had done something that the universe was punishing me for…it is like every cliche in the book.  The darkness lifted.  The sadness became a memory, a part of me that will always be, but doesn’t define me anymore (I always felt like people could LOOK at me and detect the sadness and pain).  As someone who has also lived with an eating disorder, I often felt like THAT too defined me.  And after some time, I learned for myself that I wasn’t defined by that, it was just a really hard thing that was part of me, but wasn’t ALL of me.  I think I can now see infertility as the same thing.  When we are in the worst worst worst part of it, it is all that we are, it consumes us (similar to the e.d.).  But once we have emerged from the darkest part–it is still always there, it still comes into our life in some way every day…but it isn’t our only “thing.”  This all may sound like a pretty banal revelation–but to me…it was a hell of a big one.

4 Comments | In: August '10 | | #

It’s a boy.  He’s healthy.  Measuring big(gish).  I’m thrilled… All parts are where they should be and everything looks to be in working order.  I then told two good (but far away) friends that I am pregnant.  Kind of weird to just say it now…and slowly, I guess, I feel more comfortable sharing the news.  I will be seeing them in two weeks anyway, so thought I should give some notice.  Still, I’d say about 75% of “my people” are in the dark.

Right now, I am the happy little pregnant person that I love to hate while undergoing failed cycle after failed cycle.  I look pregnant.  I feel happy and right and good.  I am even so stupid as to sometimes forget about the possibility of something going wrong in the next 20 weeks–and already, I am mulling over names with T.  I waver still between wanting to be so happy and live life like it is meant to be lived–and the caution that I want to throw to the wind, but remember that maybe I shouldn’t.

I also happily accepted a new role as Godmom the other week.  I’ve never been anything so special to anyone before–and though sometimes it doesn’t mean anything, to me it means a lot.  My godmother played a huge and important role in my life growing up, and still does.  I sometimes smile for no reason lately.  (also, sometimes I cry and get angry and sad for no reason–but that was always the norm.  the extra bit of happiness that comes around these days is definitely new).

I sit and think about last year this time (failed FET), last August, last September, last December….and right now, it looks like the months won’t be the same this year as they were last year (fail, cancel, fail).  I just think about how it is so damn GOOD and was once so damn BAD.  Really, I am hateable.  Well, except for those who live with me or interact with me regularly.  For them, they are probably so relieved I’m no longer Angry Bitter C.  I have it all right now.  A great husband, good friends and family, a wonderful little son, a son on the way…I.have.it.all.  Dammit that I didn’t come here the way I wanted to–and it may not stay this way–but for right now, for this very little fleeting moment in time, I have it all.

I still don’t know where to take this blog from here–it isnt the appropriate place to chat about pregnancy (and really, I don’t chat about it.  Well, there are two friends who are also currently pregnant and I talk to them about stuff.  Otherwise, I’m pretty mute about it all).  But it is another hundred bucks or so to keep this site for next year….and then what?  I know that if we have a healthy baby we will surely be doing this again….we have enough embryos on ice to play a five-on-five basketball game.  And I know by now that it would be work to do it again–taxing and anger-inducing and blah blah blah.  So maybe if we do ever get there, I’d need this again.  Because truly, this has been my lifeline for the past 11 months.  I would not have made it through the darkest points without it, and those who read and reach out.  I just don’t know.  I have another five weeks until renewal date for my domain–so I guess I’ll wait and see.

7 Comments | In: July 10 | | #

It’s kind of weird for me to be writing about being pregnant on the site where I have only until March 15 been writing about not being pregnant.  Obviously I wish I didn’t have to keep the blog so infertility-focused for the length of time I did…but whatever.  I swear, it seems like water under the bridge now.  Of course it would be great if I had never gone through all I did the past few years–and I only started the blog in the middle of the mess.  But now, while pregnant, I find myself thinking of the NEXT baby–you know, when we try again with medical help for two years straight to have another child.  Damn girl, you’re not even halfway through this one (17.5 weeks though) and already looking ahead, thinking,  yep, might try again if this one is a keeper.  I have the amazing talent of “forgetting” really shitty things–I mean, I don’t hang onto the complete shittiness of them all–and some, I block out altogether.  So that aids in my ability to just think about myself as just another pregnant mom of a 2.5 year old, going about my business right now.  Today, I write today on a day when I am feeling blessed and happy and blissful.  In less than three weeks I find out if this baby is a girl or a boy.  That will open a torrent of other emotions–if it is a girl, I may explode.  I am so petrified petrified petrified of raising a little girl.  Not just in “today’s world”, but in my own HOME.  I had a damn good relationship with my parents and still do–but there are parts of that relationship that led me to some unhealthy life behaviors for a long time (haven’t come out of the closet yet on this one–but had, for many years, a few variations of eating disorders.  Denied it, sought help, didn’t recover, denied it, denied it, sought help…and will always be “recovering”).  I have never had a very positive self image, my self esteem has never been all that it should be as a woman in her early thirties–and so while I have gone to therapy, worked through some problems, come to terms with myself–I still worry about the havoc my person could wreak on a girl.  (I am pretty sure my therapy will have to pick up again, to make sure I don’t project any of my insecurities on my little girl).  A boy–I can do it.  P is a pretty great kid, and I think I could raise another great kid.  Girl=Scardy C.   However, I would of course rather work through the terror of raising a girl than not raising anything at all. 

time will tell.  but my money is on girl.

2 Comments | In: June '10 | | #