Recently in Baby Quest Category

**Disclaimer: I am not writing this post because I think I am pregnant. In fact, I made the decision a while ago to give up thinking that I am pregnant. It’s less disappointing that way. I still hope, sure, but I just assume that I’m not and proceed from there. At this point it is a policy that has yet to be proven wrong. **

I have a question for all you who have been pregnant. (Sorry, guys, you’re kind of excluded from this one.) What’s it like, at the beginning? I realized the other day that I have no idea. I know some of it can be similar to PMS, because you hear people talk about sore boobs and being tired and cranky and moody, which pretty much describes my PMS symptoms. I always kind of assumed the absence of PMS would be a clue, because maybe the pregnancy symptoms kick in later, but now I’m not so sure.

There’s a whole long technical explanation for why I’m not so sure, but I just wrote it out, and it’s really boring. Really. Boring. So let’s just leave it at I’m curious. If (when) I don’t get pregnant this month, we’re moving ahead with either one more IUI or straight to IVF, and so my chances of getting pregnant should be improving. And I want to know what it’s like. When we first started trying to conceive, I had naïve notions about how we’d have a perfect, romantic evening followed by fireworks-filled sex in perfect harmony, and then somehow, I’d just know that we’d been successful*. Going on four years later, I may be just a tad more cynical about the process. Still, I’d like to know, did you feel different at all, or was it like any other month? If you felt different, how early did you start to feel different? Were you taken by surprise, slightly suspicious that something might be up, or totally expecting it?

I’d love to hear your stories.

P.S. Totally unrelated, but very exciting to me – I won my first chess game tonight! John gave me two do-overs when I made particularly stupid moves (“are you sure you want to do that?” he’d ask. “You might want to examine the board a little more closely.”) and then refused to give himself a do-over when he made a stupid move, so I had a little help. I’m happy the game is starting to make more sense to me. It’s nice to have one win under my belt. I’m sure I’ll have to work really hard to get the next one!

* Not that we don’t have “perfect, romantic evenings followed by fireworks-filled sex in perfect harmony...”. It’s just that I don’t think they are going to result in conception anymore.

While at a party on Saturday, I got to talking to another infertile, and had sort of an epiphany. I don’t talk about my infertility all that much. Sometimes I don’t want to talk about it. At other times I’m practically incapable of talking about it – the words just won’t come. And sometimes, both here and out in the world, I feel like I can’t talk about it. That if I bring it up one time too many, the reaction I’ll get will be “Are you still carping about infertility? Could you just get pregnant or shut the hell up already?”

But for some reason, while talking to this woman who I don’t even know very well, the words just started bubbling up out of me. Maybe it was because I knew she knew all the little nuances and crappiness of infertility. My story is frustrating, but hers is awful. Maybe it was because she’s a pretty open and easy to talk to kind of person. Or maybe I had hit a point where not talking wasn’t an option any more. Whatever the reason, it felt so good to open up and share, even a little way, my hopes and doubts and frustrations and the 15 conflicting emotions I have at any given moment. I didn’t even realize I had been holding all that in, until I felt the weight lift. I was practically giddy on the drive home. Of course, I did have a nice time at the party too, so I’m sure that contributed. But it showed me just how much I’ve been keeping bottled up, and how much better I could feel if I change what I’m doing. So, I think I probably will reach out and talk about my infertility more now. Hopefully it won’t get to the level of carping.

I’ve been busy with work this week, as well as battling a cold which has left me awfully tired each night, and also partially obsessed with infertility, which is just not very interesting to anyone outside my head. I’m still (perhaps perpetually) busy at work, and the occasional wave of exhaustion is still sneaking up on me and catching me unaware in a meeting or while I’m sitting in traffic. I had a visit with my doctor on Monday, which initially just left me feeling even more depressed – why, why can’t doctors ever give you a straightforward answer? Tell me what you think for crying out loud! – but now John and I have taken what the doctor said and carefully crafted our own plan. Two more tries “acoustically” because my hormonal situation has changed since I’ve lost weight and gotten my diabetes under control. If that doesn’t work, we’ll do one IUI with drugs, and if that doesn’t work, then we take the IVF plunge. In the mean time, John will take a fertility supplement, since they say it can’t hurt, and I will take prenatal vitamins, since they say I should.

It is a relief to have a plan, even if it isn’t a plan that I love. Now that we’ve got that sorted out, I feel better, aside from having a stupid cold that is. My office is a plague zone right now. Half the hall had the stomach flu, and everyone else is catching this cold/sinus/chills thing that I can’t quite seem to shake.

Then, on top of all of that, this has been a very busy TV week for me. After a very long drought, suddenly, shows! Shows that I watch all have new episodes. So I had Rome, and Prison Break and Studio 60 and Veronica Mars and Top Chef to watch. Monday night was chock full o’ disappointments as Prison Break is losing me by taking too long to accomplish anything, and Studio 60 is pushing this weird Josh from the West Wing stalks Jordan and calls it romance storyline that I do not like. I love Steven Weber and Ed Asner though. Love them. I think I would watch a show just about the two of them and their adventures in TV exec-hood. Veronica Mars was awesome as always (and she got back together with Logan! Yay! Even though I know it won’t last!) and Top Chef is such a total addiction for me at this point. Too bad next week is the season finale. But, they’ve set up an excellent showdown, and I’m going to have fun rooting for Marcel to win. That’s right, I said Marcel.

Lest you think I spend too much time on television shows and have no culture, I’ll have you know that I’m taking my dad to the symphony tomorrow night, which was his Christmas present. He’s only called me about it three times this week, so I think maybe he is a little excited. That’s actually kind of nice, and I’m glad I came up with a present he likes so much.

So, what’s going on with you, Internet? Did you watch any good TV this week? Got any weekend plans?

On Friday my sister-in-law called to tell us that she’s pregnant. With her third child in just under five years. Poor John didn’t even tell me until today, worried, I guess, that it might trigger some sort of wild Rolo/M&M/pretzel trail mix backslide on my part. A not altogether misplaced fear on his part, but I’m doing ok. Aside from my initially bitter reflexive response, “Of course she is…” I’m even happy for her. I love my niece and nephew, so naturally I’m happy that I have another one on the way. I don’t have a problem with other people having children. I just want some of my own.

Anyway, after a few days of being off kilter, a little less focused than is typical for me, and even more likely to cry than usual, I’ve applied my usual remedies and coping skills, and I’m feeling better.

I bought a whole bunch of books at Borders and I plan on spending plenty of time firmly ensconced in fantasy novels. Infertility is typically not an issue there. The people in those stories generally have problems with dragons or magic or something else equally unlikely to ever be a difficulty for me, so it is a nice escape.

I tend to bake when I’m upset about something, but this weekend, in an effort to stay healthy, I made homemade tomato soup and shepherd’s pie instead. They were both tasty, but baking is more satisfying. Why baking? I have no idea, but it usually works. I also tend to bake when it snows. It snowed today, so I was practically in a frenzy of wanting to bake. Now there’s an image for you -- me, cruising through my kitchen like a shark, randomly attacking the baking soda and vanilla, my hair all sculpted into a fin and splattered with flour. I didn’t bake though. I sealed the windows in my bedroom, hopefully raising the temperature in there out of the sub-artic ranges.

And then finally, as part of my resolution to do more to help others and a part of Beth’s Small Change project, I bought a bunch of toys for Dr. Bear’s closet at Children’s Hospital. Sometimes when I’m feeling crappy, stepping outside myself and doing something nice for someone else is the best thing I can do. The toys didn’t cost me very much money, and I had fun picking them out. I got the sweetest little Classic Pooh bear/musical stuffed animal, a mini Etch-a-sketch, crayons and a coloring book, and a little handheld Tetris game. Hopefully they’ll make some sick kids feel at least slightly better for a little while.

The failing part of trying to conceive. Last night I was so upset I couldn’t even write about it. All I could do was go to the store, buy the ingredients for my own personal recipe for exceedingly unhealthy trail mix (M&M’s, Rolos and pretzels – delish) and devour it while escaping into the world of a book. The only other alternative was sitting on the stairs crying and feeling hopeless, so I’d say junk food and a novel were better. Why the stairs? I have no idea, but that’s where I would have done my crying last night if I hadn’t managed to distract myself.

And then this morning, just getting up was such an effort. Everything was so gloomy and it felt like I was underwater or behind a grey veil. I hate feeling that way. I hate that I was stupid enough to hope that losing 35 pounds and getting my diabetes under control might be enough to solve whatever the problem is. You’d think after all this time, I’d have learned my lesson, but no, I have to be Miss Dumbass Donkey Hopeful and think that maybe I’ll get pregnant on my own. Well, not completely on my own, of course, but without having to resort to doctors and technology.

Instead, that’s exactly what is coming next. I’m going to be 36 in March, and I don’t have time to waste pussyfooting around and moaning about how I don’t want to be infertile. That’s the way it is, and I need to suck it up and accept reality.

I gave myself quite a talking to/pep talk this morning. I knew if I could just get up and get going, I could make it through the veil…this time anyway. I’m pretty resilient, but it gets a little harder not be down and stay down each time we try and fail. Right now I can still convince myself that my time will come. I’m not sure what I’ll do if the day ever comes that I can’t. Maybe it won’t ever come. Or maybe I’ll handle it better than I think I will.

When I went to the endocrinologist in August, she congratulated me on the progress I’d made, and said that as far as she was concerned, I could start trying to get pregnant. I explained that I wanted to lose a little more weight and we left it at that. When I went to the endocrinologist last week, she flat out encouraged me to start trying to conceive again. I’m trying too hard to be perfect, she said, and I’m not getting any younger.

Well, yes, I know I’m not getting any younger, thank you very much. But it did get me to thinking…is my perfectionism (a known flaw of mine) getting in the way of something I want so very badly? I’ve lost 34 pounds so far. No, I’m not down to my perfect weight, or even my goal weight, but I am so much healthier than I was. Am I healthy enough now? If my doctor says that I am, well, that kind of means that I am, doesn’t it?

Or do I have other reasons for waiting that have nothing to do with my perfectionist tendencies? Let's not forget that this is the doctor who didn't believe I could lose as much as I already have. Maybe she thinks I'll never get to my goal weight. Plus, I read a study that says that every extra pound you carry when you are pregnant is more likely to make a diabetic pregnancy high risk, even for women with a normal BMI. So that would seem to indicate that maybe I should try to lose more weight, because every pound closer to my perfect weight means a healthier pregnancy. Let’s face it – I don’t just want to get pregnant here. I want to have a healthy baby.

And then there’s the infertility factor. Back when we first started trying, I looked around at my pregnant friends, and I could imagine being like them one day. That my turn would come, and I’d be the one feeling the baby kick, picking out paint for a nursery, and emanating that quiet introspective steadiness they all seemed to develop at one point or another. Somewhere along the way I lost that. I can no longer picture myself pregnant. There’s a part of me that is convinced that it isn’t going to happen for me, ever. I guess holding off and waiting to try again is a sort of self defense mechanism. We can’t fail if we don’t try. Our life is fine the way it is.

But then I see get together with one of my friends and see the joy they take in their children, and see what neat people their children are. I read Neil Gaiman’s recent post on his daughter’s scribbling on a white board in their house and see the tangle of pride and enjoyment and love he has with her. Or I read Chris’s thoughts on how his family has become the most important part of his life, and I think, yes, I really do want that.

It’s time to try again.

I have just been exhausted for the past few days, suffering from unusually bad PMS. Each night this week I was so tired I could barely string two words together – hence the lack of posting. I wanted a donut so badly I practically started composing a Krispy Kreme Manifesto in my head, declaring our inalienable right to donuts, regardless of diet restrictions. I’m pretty sure cravings like that are what lead to things like fried Twinkies getting invented. Well, that and stoners with access to deep fryers. On top of that, yesterday, an OnStar commercial on the radio made me cry. And I was crampy and bloated and sore breasted and above all, bitter. Bitter because I thought I had four to six more days of PMS still to come, on top of the days and days I’d already gotten to enjoy.

Instead, for the first time since we started trying to conceive and I started paying attention to when my period arrived, I had a 28 day cycle. For those of you who don’t know, that’s what’s normal. Could it be that the Metformin and the weight loss (I’ve lost 28.4 pounds to date) are really working? Obviously one month of normalcy isn’t even a trend, but it could turn into one. All I know is, this time the arrival of my period has left me feeling hopeful about my fertility.

My friend Jules asked me to babysit her little boy Malcolm tonight. I said I would do it, but I think she could tell I was a little reluctant. I also think she thought I was reluctant because babysitting him on a weeknight is a bit of a hassle, which it is. It’s not so much of a hassle that I wouldn’t do it, though. I love hanging out and taking care of Malcolm. He’s a sweet and smart kid, and a lot of fun.

No, the problem goes way beyond missing my workout and having a long drive and a late night. I’ve been feeling rather fragile about my infertility lately. Just when I think I’m fine and life is rolling along, then wham! I get thrown off balance. The other day I was returning something to Kohl’s (in a fit of temporary insanity, I bought a vest. I’m way too short-waisted to pull off a vest. I don’t know what I was thinking.) and I had to walk through the baby section to get to customer service. As I passed by all those cute little clothes, this overwhelming wave of longing and sadness washed over me. I almost burst into tears right there in the middle of the store. Sometimes it is just so hard to keep waiting and not doing anything but working to lose weight. I want so badly to be taking action, to be getting closer to having a child. At least when we were trying and failing there was a chance each month that I’d get pregnant. Not much of a chance, even when we threw in thousands of dollars of fertility drugs, but I usually had a glimmer of hope. Now I’ve got nothing. Just eating healthy and working out and losing weight at a snail’s pace and being patient. I hate being patient. We’ve already tried to conceive for more than three years, and I wanted to have a child even before that. Isn’t that enough? When will my turn come?

Anyway, because I’m feeling touchy about the infertility right now, I wasn’t sure about being so vividly reminded of all that I am missing out on by not having children (for now). But at the same time, I didn’t want to say, I’m sorry, you can’t count on me to help you out because I’m infertile. That would be lame, and it’s not the kind of person I want to be. I want to take joy in my friends’ children and in my nieces and nephews. It’s important to me to be connected to their lives, and I don’t want to lose that to infertility too. So I won’t let it.

Lately I’ve been feeling a bit impatient. I’ve hit a plateau in my weight loss, which is frustrating me. I’m down 22 pounds, which is great. Every day I find some new outfit that I haven’t been able to wear in years that fits again. I can actually see muscle definition starting to appear, and I’ve made great strides in getting more fit. I did 5.24 miles on the elliptical machine the other day. Why 5.24 miles and not 5.25, which would be much more pleasing? Because I programmed it for an hour and it wouldn’t let me keep going to get to 5.25. You have no idea how much that offended my slightly compulsive side. But my point is, progress is being made.

And yet…I really thought I would have lost more weight by now. 22 pounds in just under five months is not all that impressive. I’m anxious to get back to trying to conceive, and I haven’t lost enough weight to do that yet. I’m pretty sure you have to gain at least 15 pounds or 20 pounds when you’re pregnant, and who knows how much I’d actually gain. That would put me right back where I was, which is bad. I think I have to lose at least another 20 pounds. And the thought of waiting another five months before we can even start trying again is damn depressing, particularly when you assume, as I do, that I’ll have to wait some more. Because it’s not like I’ll lose 20 more pounds and miraculously get pregnant immediately. There’s no guarantee that I’ll ever get pregnant. My fancy pants new RE that I started seeing in January did figure out that I had diabetes, so kudos to him, but he hasn’t gotten to treat me for infertility at all, and here it is, August already. Maybe my undiagnosed diabetes was the problem, but maybe it wasn’t the whole problem. Perhaps losing weight and getting my blood sugar under control will be enough…but perhaps it won’t. There’s just so much that I still don’t know and can’t control, and it is starting to make me itchy and impatient. I’m trying very hard to stay focused on the positive, particularly when I have so much to be positive about, but some days it is hard to believe that I’m getting any closer to having a baby.

Or perhaps it’s just me. I’m willing to admit the possibility that I may be the weirdo here.

Back in March, when the notion that I had diabetes first surfaced, John and I decided that we would take a break from trying to conceive until I lost weight, got my blood sugar under control, and figured out how to handle my new reality. I think it was the right decision to make, and we’re still abiding by it.

In some ways it has been wonderfully freeing. Infertility touches your life in so many ways that someone who has never had to think about being infertile realizes. I don’t worry about my basal body temperature anymore, so if I wake up in the middle of the night and have to pee, I don’t have to squint at the clock and try to figure out whether or not I’ll still have three hours of uninterrupted sleep before I take my temperature in the morning. I’ve been taking Advil and Sudafed with abandon for the excruciating sinus headaches I tend to get in the summer when we have a lot of thunderstorms. When I think about traveling, I don’t have to worry about whether or not John and I will be together when I’m supposed to ovulate. If I wanted to drink, I could (although I’m still figuring out the rules for diabetes and alcohol, so I haven’t been. I’m not much of a drinker now anyway.) I can have caffeine if I feel like it. And sex can be about intimacy and having fun, without any other goals nagging at the back of my mind.

In short, I’ve been able to just enjoy the very good life I have, instead of always yearning for and focusing on our pursuit of pregnancy. It’s been a nice break. I like not having to spend so much time and energy worrying about infertility, wanting to be pregnant, obsessing about timing, and cervical fluid and vitamins and random studies I read about on the Internet. I like being thrilled when other people find out they are pregnant. Although I will say right now that I recently read that Paris Hilton said she wants to have children soon, and if that useless, spoiled rich girl gets to have a baby before I do? I will be bitter. Do you hear me universe? BIT. TER.

And yet…when I’m in my co-worker’s office and see the quiet pride and happiness on his face as he looks at photos someone just emailed him of his baby…when I read a post on someone’s blog where their joy in their child just shines through…as I watch my friends’ (online and off) kids grow and learn and turn into such fascinating little people…the yearning is still there. I want to be a mom. I want to have a family of my own.

This little interlude has shown me that the world won’t end if I never get pregnant. And it has underscored even more how very much I want it to happen.

Well, you all are the perfect antidote to my stupid doctor! If ever I start to doubt that I can do this, all I have to do is go back to the comments on my last post to get re-energized.

I’ve been thinking about my doctor, and why she is (in my mind, anyway) so relentlessly negative. I believe she would say that she is trying to help me be realistic. What she doesn’t realize is how determined an infertile woman can be to get pregnant. I see my diabetes as my main obstacle now. And the way to control the diabetes is to eat right, exercise and get fit. Once I do that, I can move on to the next step of actually trying to conceive again. And I want to get to that next step with every fiber of my being.

My guess is that she typically deals with people who are more resistant to making changes than I am. I perfectly prepared to eat 1,200-1,500 calories a day, exercise 5-6 days per week and severely limit sweets and junk food for the rest of my life, for a few reasons.

First off, as I may have mentioned before, I want to have a baby. Hell, I want to have more than one baby, and I’m 35 years old, so time, she is a wastin’. I can’t afford to sit around being in denial and not dealing with this problem. My second reason is also infertility-related, in a way. There are so many terrible complications that can happen to you if you don’t manage this disease properly. And just my intensive interaction with the medical profession for my infertility has been enough to make me less than interested in having any preventable medical interactions in the future. I’ve had really nice doctors, but given a choice, I’ll skip the hours spent in waiting rooms and then again on the examining table, the endless labwork, the constant wrangling with the insurance companies over bills, the bruises, the tests and so on and so on.

Also, while many people with diabetes seem to believe that complications won’t happen to them, I don’t feel that way at all. Infertility happened to me. Why wouldn’t complications from diabetes?

And finally, I’ve seen the results of poorly managed diabetes firsthand. I saw my dad in the emergency room, incoherent and drifting in and out of consciousness with a blood sugar over 700. I saw him in the ICU on IV’s and machines for two days while his body recovered. No thank you. That is not going to be my life.

I’ve come up with a plan for dealing with Dr. Negativo. I spent Wednesday evening (after working out and eating my healthy dinner) constructing a spreadsheet to track my blood sugar levels, my food consumption and my exercise. I am the queen of spreadsheets, so believe me when I tell you that this sucker is comprehensive. I’m also going to incorporate an “inches lost” section, after several people suggested tracking inches instead of weight loss as a way of measuring my progress. I have to go get a soft tape measure before I can add that one though. And if my next appointment doesn’t go more smoothly, I am going to see if I can switch to another doctor in the same practice.

My nurse from the fertility clinic called today. It seems they were going through the results of the various blood work and tests I’ve had done, and she wanted to make sure I’d been fasting when they did one particular set of blood work, because my glucose levels looked high. I verified that I had fasted on that day, and she said she’d have to talk to the doctor and get back to me, but that he may want to put me on Metformin. Which was one of the options we discussed when I had my initial visit with the doctor.

Unfortunately, I didn’t think to ask her what my fasting glucose level was, and she didn’t get back to me this afternoon. Typing “high fasting glucose” into Google was kind of scary, because all the results I saw make it sound like I’m about to be diagnosed with diabetes. I don’t think that’s actually the case, as insulin resistance and high glucose frequently come along with PCOS. And possible (non-standard) PCOS is one of the diagnoses I’ve gotten. If anything, it just gives me additional motivation to get in shape. But even more, it means there might actually be a tangible reason for my infertility – something to fix, instead of possibilities and maybes. At this point, after all this time, that would mean the world to me.

Tomorrow morning I go for my repeat HSG. Not my idea of a good time, but whatever, it’s not that bad. The problem is that I have to be there at 7:15 in the morning. I’m usually just getting out of bed at 7:15 in the morning! Instead, tomorrow I have to be at the doctor’s office 25 miles away from my house. I am really NOT a morning person. My appointment is for 7:30, but they say I have to be there at 7:15. And if I’m not there on time, they’ll bump me and I’d have to wait a whole other month before I could have the test done. That seems to be the new trend with doctors – they want you to come early even though they are going to make you wait around anyway. Although I don’t see how they could be backed up at 7:15 in the morning, so maybe I won’t have to wait around this time.

In an effort to combat my natural morning stupor, I’m getting absolutely everything ready tonight so all I have to do in the morning is shower, put on my clothes, hop in the car and go. Please tell me there’s no traffic at 6:30 am! If there’s traffic I might just have a nervous breakdown.

When I had my appointment with the new fertility doctor, they gave me orders to have a bunch of blood work done. So much blood work that I couldn’t have it all done at once. I’ve been putting off going to the lab. I’m not sure why. I just kept coming up with seemingly valid reasons not to go. I always have plenty of work to use as an excuse. But at the same time, I fretted about what “my” nurse would think about me that I hadn’t run right out and gotten the tests done immediately. Because I’m neurotic like that, like that would make any difference. Anyway, John and I went and got the first set of blood drawn on Saturday, and because I am lucky, I got to go back and get more blood drawn today.

I went at 2:15, thinking that they wouldn’t be crowded. They weren’t when I got there, but there were only two people working, so we patients stacked up quickly. After an interminable wait in the waiting room of doom, I finally got to go in the back. My lab tech was great. He was British and had a London gangster-movie accent – “here’s the fing” “I’ll be roight wif you” – which was a nice distraction from the eight (eight!) tubes of blood he was taking out of my arm. By the time he was done, I was ready to demand cookies and juice.

Last week, my job and my infertility chose Friday to join forces to make my life difficult. Friday night I was feeling so sorry for myself that I actually almost started crying. I was driving home at 10:00 o’clock that night, and it felt like they had combined to suck the life out of me. I was so tired all I could do was crawl home, eat a bowl of noodles and sit on the couch staring blankly at the documentary John was watching on the history channel.

Work is work, and of course I can’t talk about it, but I will say that Friday was a trying day, work-wise. And, then on the fertility front, things just got confusing. When I called my old doctor about getting my records, she said she’d be willing to work with my insurance company so that I didn’t have to pay out of network costs. If I could get them to confirm in writing that I wouldn’t incur any additional costs, I would consider sticking with her. But I don’t know. I think there are benefits to staying with her – she’s an excellent doctor and I get very personal attention from her. And I was a little turned off by the whole “we have a process” vibe from the clinic. But the clinic has more resources, and a very successful reputation, offices close to my work and my house, and I liked the doctor I met there, too.

Right in the middle of all of this, my financial coordinator from the new clinic called and said that she had gotten me approved for diagnostics, but that my insurance doesn’t cover IUI. And if they don’t cover IUI I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do. I’m not sure I’m ready to do IVF. For that matter, my insurance will cover IVF, but I don’t know what requirements I have to meet before they will approve it. And if I do go with IVF, am I better off with a big clinic?

Anyway, I had a lot on my mind, and a tough, 12-hour work day. On top of that, I had a mini-bout of insomnia last week. Not the terrible up until 4 a. m. kind, but I was about two hours short every single night, so by Friday I was exhausted. Being tired always makes me weepy.

But now, after two days of rest and relaxation, I’m starting to regain my equilibrium. Work will sort itself out, eventually, so I’ll try not to worry about that situation. There’s nothing I can do about it anyway. I don’t have the money to pay for an IUI right now, so I don’t really have to make a decision there right away. I will work on getting more detail from the insurance company and the doctors so I can make a good choice.

But more than anything, I’m trying to keep the fact that I have a good life fixed firmly in my mind. I have a wonderful husband who loves me. I have a sweet little dog, a healthy family, and amazing friends. I don’t have to worry about where my next meal is coming from or fear for my safety. John and I own our home, something which seemed impossible just two years ago. I’ve got a good job, which I even enjoy most of the time. I need to focus on appreciating what I’ve got now, and be positive. And maybe, just maybe, that which seems impossible now, will become possible.

I’ve been feeling wildly adventurous lately. Ok, not really. But I did try two new food items today. Split pea soup and peach yogurt. Last night when I went grocery shopping I was checking out the soup selections and realized that I had never had split pea soup. I just assumed I wouldn’t like it because it is green and mushy looking. Plus, it is frequently made with ham, but this was vegetarian. Well, it turns out that I don’t hate split pea soup. I think it is kind of boring, but I don’t hate it. And the peach yogurt thing was just a whim. That experiment was a success, which means now I can have yogurt flavor variety.

I mentioned all this food exploration to a friend in passing today (we were discussing how I don’t like carrot cake, and I was explaining that I felt I had tried enough new food for one day) and she asked, half kidding, if I was going to blog about the pea soup. And here I am, writing about it. But really it is just a set up for the segue into talking about the other new thing I’ve tried recently…the new doctor.

I’ve already written and discarded two posts about the new fertility doctor and clinic. I’m not sure why. I think it has something to do with my reluctance to seek treatment or talk about my infertility in general. But I’m trying to put all of that behind me now. Time is passing. I was 32 when I started trying to conceive; I’ll be 35 in March. And 35 seems to be some sort of magic fertility number, so my watchwords for this year are positive, assertive and aggressive. I’ve got to keep a positive attitude. I’ve got to be assertive in discussing what I want with the doctors. And I can’t hang back from treatment and hope for the best. If I really do want a baby (or really, a chance at more than one child) it is time to get serious.

So, the new clinic. The visit went well. It’s clear that this will be very different from the treatment I was doing before. My old doctor didn’t have any associates. Hell, half the time she didn’t even have a receptionist. This new place is definitely in the business of fertility. I now have an RE – a man, and I while I wasn’t sure how I’d feel about that, he was actually very easy to talk to – a nurse who will schedule appointments for me and get coordinate testing, prescriptions, instructions and results, and a financial coordinator who will work with my insurance company and get approvals and information about what is covered or not covered. They have lab facilities and acupuncturists and support groups and classes where you learn how to give yourself injections. The new doctor seems to think my old doctor was on to something with her diagnosis of potential non-standard PCOS. That may be why I’m having such a hard time losing weight, too. If they start me on Metformin it could make a huge difference, apparently. They want to repeat blood work on me and on John, and they want me to do another HSG. Apparently the tubes can spasm shut during the test, so maybe I don’t have a blocked right fallopian tube after all. Although I’m inclined to think that I do, personally. But even if I do, they may be able to try to thread something through the tube if they see a blockage during the HSG to see if they can open it up. No matter what they find, he seemed to think there was still reason to believe that doing an IUI with injectables could work. And there’s still a ton of stuff we haven’t tried yet. So I left feeling a little overwhelmed, but also very hopeful.

That seems to be the theme I keep returning to this week.

First, at work. For the last four and a half months, I’ve been working on a series of…projects, let’s call them, that sort of fell outside my normal job description. Well, kind of, but not really. It’s hard to explain without details. But anyway, my point is, I was doing something different-ish, and it went very well, and now I’m handing it over to someone else and going back to focusing on my old job. But I’m coming at it from a very different place than where I was when I took on the new projects in September. I have more people reporting to me now, and being a good manager is not something I'm still working at. I have to take on a bigger leadership role on my team to take some of the load off of my boss, who has seen changes in her own role. I know I'm capable, but I have to change my focus. It will be my old job, but in a new way.

And then there’s the thing I’ve been obsessing about all week. My break from fertility treatments is coming to an end. Tomorrow I start with the new doctor. Actually, instead of the one RE like I saw before, this is a whole clinic, and one with a pretty good reputation. I’ve been wobbling back and forth between hopeful (new doctors! A clinic! More resources! Untried treatments! Better insurance coverage!) and a growing worry that it won’t make any difference. It’s been two and a half years of trying now. I started 2004 saying “this is the year I’ll have my baby.” I started 2005 the same way. Now here we are starting 2006, and I’m trying to believe that this year, it will really happen.

As much as I hate to crush all of the fun speculation going on in the comments of my last post, I’m pretty sure my potato salad craving was just weird, unusually early PMS. Apparently instead of craving normal stuff, my body has decided to make me want to eat food I won’t even enjoy.

Of course I would love it if you were all right. I’ll admit that part of me still hopes each month that I’ll get pregnant on my own, but in my heart of hearts, I don’t really believe that will really happen. The sheer number of obstacles my body would have to overcome to get pregnant without some sort of assistance make it very unlikely to occur.

And this afternoon I’m pretty sure I felt a cramp and I got very crabby too. Seriously, you would not believe how irritated I was that there was no hot chocolate in the kitchen closest to my office. I mean, I had to walk down the hall to one of the other kitchens! I practically stomped my way down the hall. And I’m re-reading a book I’ve read before, and one of the characters dies at the end, and I almost started crying when he first appeared in the story because I know he’s going to die. So, yep, PMS.

Sorry to spoil everyone’s fun.

Contented and pleased. That’s the way I feel right now, which is nice. I had a lovely, quiet weekend which is definitely contributing to my sense of peace. But the main reason is that while I was walking Seamus last night I realized how much progress I’ve made with how I’m feeling about fertility treatment. I was thinking about the new fertility center I’m going to try in January, about maybe checking out their website and contacting someone who I know used their services. And it hit me that I’m feeling hopeful again…and ready to start over.

It was funny, too. I was in just about the exact same spot where I was two and a half months ago when the whole notion of taking a break first occurred to me (as I was walking around with the dog, crying and hoping I wouldn’t run into anyone who wanted to talk to me.) I was so tired, and so stressed out and so unhappy about the whole experience. And terrified that taking a break was wrong, or stupid. But now, I know I made the right choice. Yay me.

I'm still feeling a bit on the fragile side, but my doctor did manage to do the IUI this morning. We'll see. It's a fine line to walk, being hopeful and yet not getting your hopes up, but I'm trying.

I was supposed to have an IUI yesterday, but we encountered a problem and couldn’t do it. Which left me on the kitchen floor, sobbing, wondering why the universe doesn’t want me to have a baby, while John tried to convince me it will be ok and Seamus anxiously licked my face. I’m very lucky to have them.

My doctor is confident we’ll be fine if we try again on Monday, so that’s the plan. I’m trying very hard to stay hopeful. This cycle has been rough – I’ve had blood drawn every day, and so my arms are covered in needle marks and bruises. It’s a great look. I’ve spent hours sitting in the waiting room at my doctor’s office, fretting about the fact that I should be at work, and even more hours at work, trying to make up some of the time I’ve missed. I’m behind on everything, and even worse, I get home so late that I’m not getting to spend any time just relaxing and enjoying my time with John and Seamus. Oh – with one exception. I did take Tuesday afternoon off to spend with Jules and Malcolm, which was wonderful, if all too brief. But that just put me even farther behind, of course. It was totally worth it though.

I also attended a bridal shower yesterday. A very nice one, and exactly what I needed to cheer up a bit. I knew a couple of the people who would be there, but I wasn’t sure I would fit in – they are all Lilly Pulitzer and David Yurman, and I am…not. Well, if I had more money, I wouldn’t mind having a David Yurman bracelet, but I’ll never be a Lilly Pulitzer kind of girl. Anyway, it turned out that I quite liked all of the people there, and I’m looking forward to seeing them again at the wedding.

However, the shower was 55 miles away from my house. Not too bad a drive on a weekend, mostly highway driving. I would, however, I like to share a few observations from my 110 mile round trip, if I may.

1) Ohio drivers and I have a very different interpretation of how fast you should go in the left lane.

2) If you are driving a ‘70’s-era conversion van with 4 bikes precariously perched on the back and a lopsided turtle carrier on the top, you most definitely do not belong in the left lane.

3) People driving Buicks will invariably go under the speed limit.

4) People driving Lexuses (Lexae?) will invariably cut you off because they are too important to look to see if there is anyone else in the lane. Or because the driver is on a cell phone.

5) The motto of gas stations in Old Town Alexandria seems to be “screw the consumer out of every cent they’ve got.” 7 gallons of gas cost me $20!

It keeps finding new ways to be infertile. Every time I think we must have solved the problem, my body finds a way to confound me.

Intermittent ovulation? Solution: Clomiphene.

Only responding on the side with the blocked fallopian tube? Why, Follistim will take care of that – and how!

Crappy cervical mucus? Meet my friend IUI, which allows me to bypass you altogether.

And now my doctor thinks I have some sort of progesterone production deficiency. Thank you, body, for thwarting me at every turn. What the hell did I ever do to you?

The one benefit to being pessimistic is that I was not surprised that I am not pregnant. Frustrated and disappointed, sure, but not surprised. The doctor thinks I should a break from all of the medications etc…this month, and I have to admit, I’m kind of glad. Not that I’m giving up or anything. We’ll try again in August. And again and again until we’re successful. But for now, I could use a little rest from the extra hormones and having to think about my fertility all of the damn time.

Plus it will give me the chance to deal with the return of Darth Tooth.

Remember Darth Tooth? Back in December, I went to the dentist and had to have half of my fillings replaced, and get new fillings done, and there was all this talk of the removal of my bad tooth and titanium tooth implants and so on? Well, I went back to get my teeth cleaned recently and told the dentist ol’ Darth had given me a twinge or two recently, so they took an x-ray and compared it to the one they took in December. And here’s what I heard next: “Oh my God! I have never seen a tooth disintegrate that completely that quickly.”

Great. So I have to get Darth extracted. 80% of which will be covered by my insurance. Unfortunately, 0% of the titanium tooth implant is covered. Plus, the slightly less evil tooth next to Darth – let’s call it Governor Tarkin, to stick with the Star Wars theme – (God, I’m a geek) has to have a crown lengthening and a new crown put on. If you don‘t know what a crown lengthening is, rejoice! If you do, you have my sympathies. And I have to submit x-rays to my insurance company to prove I need the crown lengthening before they’ll pay for it. Like they have some problem with people having that procedure done for fun all the damn time.

The weird thing is, I’m ok with all of this. There isn’t anything I can do about it, and I’ve decided not to let it bother me. I just hope I can keep the positive feeling going.

All is well with the house. It passed the extremely thorough inspection with flying colors! And we locked in the interest rate on our mortgage. Now we’re looking for new living room furniture.

On the reproductive front, I had an HSG test, where they shoot dye into your reproductive system and take an x-ray to look for trouble. There are people all over the internet who say it is very painful, but I didn’t think it was that bad.

It was still unsettling though. My doctor was late, of course. Then the techs got snippy with each other. Then the radiologist came in, and started barking orders and muttering– turn to the left, lift your hip, I can’t see, that’s just spillage, push more dye in, your right fallopian tube is blocked. Push more dye in, yep, the right side is completely blocked.

Wait, what?

And then my doctor says “the preliminary results show your right fallopian tube is blocked. We’ll talk about the final results tomorrow.” And leaves, along with the radiologist. Which left me alone on the table, feeling just a little bewildered.

So naturally, I went straight back to my office and spent the next hour looking up “blocked fallopian tube” on the internet, which was a mistake and a half. According to the Internet:
a) my only hope of getting pregnant is IVF

b) no, no, now I won’t need any treatment, because the dye from the HSG will have blasted open any blockage and I’ll get pregnant in the next three months

c) I have to have a laparoscopy to get the tube unblocked.

d) Recovery from said laparoscopy will take a) 3-4 hours, b) 3 to 4 days, or c) 3 to 4 weeks

e) No, what I need is Clomid (ok, I can maybe see this helping me, with my one open tube)

f) Actually the best treatment is IUI ( I really don’t get that one)

g) No, I should go with this non-invasive treatment that will magically unblock the fallopian tube

Sometimes the internet is not your friend. And do you know what the worst part is? I still don’t have any answers. I went to see the doctor to go over all of the results from the eleventy-bajillion tests we’ve done recently. I waited forever, and finally had to leave without getting to talk to her because we had to go to the house inspection. So frustrating! I’ll track her down this week, but thank goodness I’m still riding that house-buying high, or I would have been a wreck the last few days.

There are these stages of grief that people go through when they get bad news. They are denial, anger, bargaining and acceptance. I think there might be one more, but I can’t remember what it is right now. Ok, I just checked (thank you, Google), and the missing stage is depression. Hey, I’ve got that one covered too! Anyway, I had my third visit with the fertility specialist today. I hadn’t wanted to go to a specialist. I kept putting it off, thinking, well, we didn’t time things right at first because I didn’t know that I ovulate late (true) and besides that, I don’t ovulate every single month (also true) and maybe this month, this time, I’ll get pregnant (sadly, not true). But my friends kept urging me to go. At least you’ll know if something is wrong, they said. And after the first visit, I did feel good. I felt like I was taking action – doing something to make this whole baby thing happen.

But after that something changed. And this where the denial comes in, I guess. I had it in my head that I’d go in there and she’d say “Oh, you’ll be fine. Here, have some Clomid.” I was even prepared for something along the lines of “Hey tubby, why don’t you try losing 20 lbs. You’ll have much better luck.” But instead it’s all “did anyone ever mention you might have uterine fibroids” and “I’m concerned about your right ovary” and test after test after test and I hate every fucking minute of it. When she says I’m a good candidate for IUI, I just want to cry. Or possibly scream. It’s all moving so fast, and part of me just wants to stop. To say never mind, and simply go back to having sex each month and hoping for the best.

And then I wonder, what the hell is wrong with me? I desperately want to have children, so why am I so reluctant to do all of this? Why do I resent having to go to the doctor and doing some tests? My husband (usually the negative one in the marriage) can look at it and say, just keep in mind that there’s a baby at the end of all of this. Why can’t I do that? In the end, I suppose it comes down to this: Some part of me still hopes I’ll get to have sex with my husband and get pregnant, just like a normal person. And the rest of me is pissed off that it might not/probably won’t happen that way.

If you want to have a baby, but what you have instead is PMS (again,) take a little tip from me.

Under no circumstances should you watch the show “Make Room for Baby.”

If you do, you will most likely find yourself sitting on your couch., clutching your knitting and crying as you watch the 21 year old single mom with a dead brother give birth…hoping that your husband doesn’t wander into the living room and see you blubbering…hating yourself for crying over such a corny show…and yet, unable to change the channel.

In fact, no woman with PMS should watch this show. It hits the trifecta of cheesiness – sort of a combination of A Baby Story, Extreme Makeover Home Edition and While You Were Out. When the mother-to-be with the sob story goes into labor, the host of the show, a designer, carpenters, and the mother-to-be’s friends come in and redo some part of the house and create a space for the baby. It’s hokey and poorly produced, with all sorts of manufactured drama (hello, you show a woman in labor. No fake drama needed) but somehow strangely compelling.

And the worst part is, I had to go meet my mom and I didn’t even get to see the end of the show!

Listen, body. We need to talk.

There is a 59 year old woman in Georgia who is pregnant with twins. A 59 year old woman who had her tubes tied 33 years ago. Is pregnant. And not after lots of fuss and expensive fertility treatments either. Do you know what her body did? Well, first it staved off menopause. Then her fallopian tubes actually grew back. Grew back! And then, well...sex...and poof! twins.

Now, let's take a look at your behavior, shall we?

I'm healthy. Only 33 years old. Well nourished. I've certainly had plenty of sex. I've been doing all sorts of temperature taking and charting and I've spent a fortune on ovulation predictor kits. I think I've done my part here. And yet, I am not pregnant.

It seems to me that you're not really trying very hard. So here's the deal: You've got about 15 days. I want you to use that time to think about your participation in this project so far, and come back ready to take care of business.

Got it? Good.

Not pregnant. And at first, I was in a very black mood about it. I was going to hide under my covers and stay there forever. I hated everyone and everything. I thought many bitter thoughts along the lines of “Here I am, taking vitamins and avoiding caffeine and giving up my allergy pills and my rosacea medication, taking my temperature every morning and buying expensive ovulation predictor kits so we can time things right and what do I get? Nothing! While crack whores get pregnant.”

It was all very self pitying and not pretty. But then I started thinking about something my yoga teacher said in class on Sunday about having compassion for yourself as well as others. And I decided to give myself a break. So it didn’t happen this month. It will happen. And in the meantime, I have a husband who I love and who makes me deliriously happy, fabulous friends I can really count on, a wonderful dog, a healthy family, and an excellent job that I enjoy. What more could I ask for?

Well, actually, I do have one request for the universe. Zoot’s petition says it all: “Oh Honey. It looks like I'm not pregnant, I'm sorry. But have a look at my ASS.”

Here’s what it is like to be inside my head right now:

Workity work, work, work. Accidentally brush boobs while typing. Oh, they are still sore! Ok, sore boobs, check. Basal body temperature above coverline, check. Tired, check. Could I be pregnant?

Workity work, work, work. Hmmm….I wonder what people are saying online about the debate last night. Check out Slate, CNN, MSNBC and WashingtonPost.com. Oh look, a couple of people have mentioned the weird smirks and odd giggly thing Bush had going on last night. I guess he was trying hard not to look bored and angry like he did in the first debate. And yes! People did notice that whenever he didn’t want to answer a question he talked about education. God, that man is an idiot. I can’t believe he is our president or that he even has a fighting chance at getting re-elected. Oh, and I wonder if I'm pregnant. Are my boobs still sore? Surreptitiously poke self in boob so co-workers passing by won’t see. Ouch. Ok, good.

Workity work, work, work. Is that a cramp? That might be a cramp. Are my boobs still sore? Poke. Ouch. Ok, good. Is there any way a cramp could be a sign of pregnancy? To the Internet!

**searching**

Click on first Google link: Nope, nothing about cramps on this list.
Click on second Google link: Yuck. Scary pro-life site.
Click on third Google link: Ooh, here’s one.
Cramping could be a sign of:
a) an expanding uterus. Uh, I think it’s a little early for that one.
b) the implantation of the egg in your uterus. Hey, that would actually be happening right about now.
c) an ectopic pregnancy. Oh great. I could finally get pregnant and then have it be ectopic. Hadn’t thought of that.
d) or just that your period is coming. Yep, this would be the most likely reason.

Why do you get your hopes up? You do this every month and then you are never pregnant.

But, then again, one of these times I have to actually be pregnant, right?

Oh, who knows. Maybe it wasn’t even a cramp.

Poke. Ouch. Ok, good.

Sounds mysterious, doesn’t it? But no, I’m not a man, baby. Nor am I a vampire, a pirate or a mind-controlled secret agent (although if I was a mind-controlled secret agent, would I know it? Food for thought.)

However, I have decided to start talking about something I haven’t discussed here before. For over a year now, I’ve been trying to get pregnant, with no success. It’s not something I talk about with, well, anyone. Ever. John and I don’t even talk about it much. It’s as if talking about me not getting pregnant might mean there’s a problem. And maybe there is – I don’t know. I’m sure as hell not pregnant yet.

But I know not talking about it is not healthy for me. Today, we found out John’s sister is pregnant with her second child, which, I have to admit, I already suspected. And instead of being happy for her like I should have been, I was jealous. It’s unfair, I thought. She got married six weeks before we did, and she’s going to have two children before we even have one.

And that is NOT the kind of person I am. I will not become one of those people who can’t be happy when something good happens to someone else. So, instead of pretending that there’s nothing going on, I’m going to talk about my frustrations and my worries and my hopes about this whole trying to conceive process. I’m putting the infertility blogs I read on my blogroll. It’s not the only topic I’m going to write about, of course, but I’m hopeful that posting about this openly will keep me from turning into some horrible, bitter person who can’t feel joy for others.

That’s it. Not a very juicy or fun secret. But one I think it is important for me to let out of the bag.