Lets Count the Wait

It is hard to believe how much waiting I have done. It is something that has been on my mind lately. Why the wait? What have I learned through it all?

Grumps and I have been trying to have a family for over 5 years. Yep five years and we haven't seemed to have done much compared to the rest of the world. Usually people after this length of time either have their family or have just moved on. Here we sit stuck in the middle.

Lets list the wait!

*It all began with Grumps 5 year plan. As a kid I wanted to start having babies as soon as I got married. Well my thoughts on that changed with maturity. I knew we needed to develop our relationship and figure US out. As each year went by I began to ask Grumps if we could shorten our plan. I even began to pray for my little babies which I didn't have yet. Right before our 5 year mark we began to do it like rabbits. I just knew we would have a baby in our hands in no time. Ahummm lets move on!

*After our first year of trying we began the lovely testing process. There goes more wait. Wait for the test. Wait for the results. Wait for Grumps to come back from training. Wait for recovery. WAIT!!!!

*Then the lovely endo was discovered. Another HUGE moment of wait while I was on Lupron. The year on awful drugs seemed like eternity. I tried to make the best of it by enjoying friends and beverages. It helped some.

*Of course we were blessed with a moment of a baby as our wait ended. But then we lost our little one to heaven and had to wait as we recovered.

*I really thought all the wait was over when we began our trip to the RE and treatments. Well we went on another wait. The insurance wait of 6 months.

*Finally we have IVF insight. We are right in the middle of it all. Our dreams are about to come true (okay hope for the dream to come true) when we get the call about my mom. WAIT AGAIN!

It seems we have spent more time waiting than anything else. What has it taught me? Ummmmmmmmmmmmm.......... LONG PAUSE! I guess it has taught me how not to stress. How to trust. How to just enjoy the moment no matter what it brings. I can't let disappointment and major changes determine the quality of my life. I have to really make the best of a yuck situation. All things happen for a reason. Lets chew on that for a moment.

I have a list of things that wouldn't have happened in my life from friendships to time with my mom. During the wait you have to look at it as a time to find you in a new way. Find how you can touch others. How can you make the best of a not so great situation.

Embrace the wait and live!

A Missed Opportunity

and how I can't breathe!

Grumps and I have been trying for a family for 4 years and 7 months. In other words, a very long time. During that time we have never missed an opportunity to TRY. Yes we missed times when he was away or when I was on Lupron or miscarried but all other months were a go. Some months we gave it ALL we had a million times in a month. Other times it was a hit or miss. And even still there were months it was a one time go. This month NONE!

This doesn't mean we haven't had 'moments'. We just haven't tried during out little window. There really isn't a reason. Yep I haven't felt well. My insides have really hurt. We have been busy and tired. But we usually push through and try. Last night was our last chance moment and Grumps car got slightly hit in our parking lot. So it was a no go. He was not in a good place.

As I went to bed I started having that panic moment. I felt like I couldn't breathe. How could we miss a good opportunity? It was hard to just let this month go. No symptoms. No 'thinking'. No wondering at all. Maybe it will be a nice break but I feel like I completely missed it. I missed that 0 to 5% chance this month. See that did make me laugh.

In all of this freak out today at work I really had a hard time. I haven't had a hard time in months. But it was a "I can't breathe" day for sure. There are at least 5 women pregnant at my school. Most all are do in Aprilish. They are starting to tell and show just a tad. I was okay with it at first but now I can't breathe. How will I be able to handle them all at once? I have dealt with many pregnant women at work before but never all at once right in my face.

There was a moment after hearing major talk about it all, seeing bellies, and thinking "I don't fit" when I had to do all I could do to hold in the tears and screams. I wanted to run to the bathroom, lock the door and never leave. I couldn't breathe.

Thank God for my girls. My day got better with wine and dinner. I can only hope I can make it through the rest of the year. It is pretty bad when you are already counting down until June.

Here is my song for today. Maybe even the year. All I can do is breathe for sure! Even that is hard!

Full of my new favorite word!

I am done! DONE WITH IT ALL! I don't want pity I just have to yell

I AM DONE! DONE WITH HOPE! DONE WITH IT ALL!

Today is day 30 of my cycle. Ladies I NEVER go that long. Okay there have been a couple of months. So I wasn't going to test but I couldn't help myself. I was full of hope. All month I haven't even thought about being pregnant. I barely tried. I would check my chart once in a blue moon and then move on. NO HOPE! I just didn't care. I am trying to enjoy where I am.

BUT it all started yesterday. I was expecting my cycle to start. NOPE it didn't happen. I was shocked. I went to bed thinking about being pregnant. Thinking, WOW it would be a miracle. It must be all the dang vitamins and what not that I am on. It must be doing the deed twice in one day. That just doesn't happen. I try to stay grounded but I wake up early consumed by it. AF still isn't here. I even got like 5 emails in the past couple of weeks telling friends to pray for me or whatever. I thought, "It must be for my baby." NOPE it must be for me getting the freaking B**ch!

I go to a 1 year birthday party FULL OF HOPE! I am even wearing the necklace. I had checked when I would be due before I left the house. I had sworn to never do that again. I am so full of hope by the time that I leave the party, I stop and buy I f'ing test!

Big FREAKING FAT NEGATIVE!

I AM DONE!

I will not even mark on my chart when AF shows anymore. I will mark it down somewhere to remember the date but no more counting days or weeks. This summer is about me. I will enjoy my freedom and life to the max. Screw trying to get pregnant. I am over it this month!

Can you tell I am so done with all this sh*t? There, I said it! My favorite word!

Trying Hard

I am trying very hard this morning to paste a smile on my face.

I am trying hard not to be bitter.

I am very hard not to say, "Why not me?"

I want to be happy for others. I am trying to do this~!

Trying to see the brighter side.

Trying to understand.

BOY is it ever hard!

Of course I asked for this announcement. I didn't want to hear about it face to face. I asked for her to test. I wanted to just get it over with. I was hoping for good things but yet hoping I got it first. The odds were stacked up against her. She is over weight and older. So is her husband. She has only been trying for a VERY short time. I am so glad she didn't have to go through the pain of it all. But why not me?

Okay I slipped. I guess I am not trying hard enough. Thank God I haven't cried yet. Thank God I checked my work email before I left the house. Thank God I have a long commute to try to be composed before I had to see her this morning.

I heard a song on my ride in this morning that will help me fake it through the day. Of course I can't find it now that I need it!

*Please don't think I am not happy for you. I truly am. It is just bittersweet. There is nothing that can change it!

A Flicker of Hope

We have talked a lot about hope around here. (I am too lazy to link to any hope posts. If you want to read them click on my hope label.) I even have a 'hope' necklace that I will post about later. After my last cycle with the nice IUI we are on hold. I have come to grips with that. I truly don't expect to get pregnant on my own. Now if God wants to do His thing, I am cool with that.

Well now I am on day 20 something of this cycle. I have taken it very easy. No temping and just doing whatever whenever without stress or fear. We did have moments around the right time so there is always that flicker of hope. But it is amazing how the same stupid thoughts start up even though I said this would be an easy and fun time of waiting.

My boobs hurt. I can't stop thinking about how big and hard and painful they are. I am sure they feel the same every month but of course that stupid flicker kicks in every time.

Then I started thinking, I know to make a baby but do I REALLY know how? I have read the books, blogs, websites, message boards. I have checked my cm for FOREVER and my temp just as long. I have done the every day of sex. Every other day of sex. All month of sex. 2 weeks of sex. SEX SEX SEX. (WOW I am going to get hits for that one!) We do it the good ole missionary way. The hips have come up. The legs high in the air. Instead cups and DRY sex have also been tried. I have laid on my back throughout the entire night, never getting up to go to the bathroom.

With all that said, am I doing it wrong? Seriously, have you ever thought that? Have you ever wondered if you are just plain stupid? It is like the person who truly believes with all her heart that she is an incredible singer but it completely tone deaf and can't carry a tune. I know that I am doing it right but sometimes I just wonder.

Anyone else crazy like me?

So Hard

Back when we started
We didn't know how hard it was
Living on nothing
But what the wind would bring to us
Now we've got something
I can imagine fighting for
So why is fighting all that we're good at anymore

And sometimes I don't have the energy
To prove everybody wrong
And I try my best to be strong
But you know it's so hard
It's so hard

It's so hard when it doesn't come easy
It's so hard when it doesn't come fast
It's so hard when it doesn't come easy
It's so hard

It felt like a given
Something a woman's born to do
A natural ambition
To see a reflection of me and you

And I'd feel so guilty
If that was a gift I couldn't give
And could you be happy
If life wasn't how we pictured it

And sometimes I just want to wait it out
To prove everybody wrong
And I need your help to move on
Cause you know it's so hard
It's so hard

It's so hard when it doesn't come easy
It's so hard when it doesn't come fast
It's so hard when it doesn't come easy
So hard

I can live for the moment
When all these clouds open up for me to see
And show me a vision
Of you and me swimming peacefully

Last night you told me
That you can't remember
How to feel free

It's so hard when it doesn't come easy
It's so hard when it doesn't come fast
It's so hard when it doesn't come easy, easy

It's so hard

Dixie Chicks

I know that this song has been around for awhile. I heard it the other day driving home from work. It was perfect for how I have been feeling. Why does it all have to be so hard? Why can't it be easy?

Barren Bitches Book Tour 3: The Time Traveler's Wife

I read The Time Traveler's Wife last year before I had a miscarriage myself. It touched me to the core of my being. I fell in love with the characters and found myself pleading God for a different ending. After my own loss of an angel to heaven I began to think about this book again and again. It began to haunt me. I had an even more connection with it. This is a book that should be read over and over to be reminded of love and loss.

Take some time to read the questions and comment as they touch you. If you haven't read the book, do. You will never be the same.

Don't forget to hop along to another stop on this blog tour by visiting the main list at http://stirrup-queens.blogspot.com/. You can also sign up for the next book on this online book club: Waiting for Daisy by Peggy Orenstein.

Onto the questions!!!

Loss (and unrealized dreams) are a theme in this story -- Henry loses his mother, Clare loses Henry often and sometimes for long stretches, Clare's grandmother loses her brother and her husband, etc. At one point, her grandmother asks Clare, "do you ever miss him?" She replies, "every day, every minute. Every minute, yes that's the way, isn't it?" ... Self-pity floods me as though I've been injected with it. It's that way, isn't it? Isn't it?" How has your loss and/or unrealized dream changed you?

I have been talking and thinking about this very thought all week. Before my unrealized dream of having a family and the loss of my little one to heaven I was every one's cheerleader. I was full of hope and optimism. I never wavered in doubt or faith. I ALWAYS saw the silver lining. Now that I am still waiting while many others have moved on to their dreams I am changed. I don't see the world quite the same. I still have a positive attitude but it is very guarded. I still cheer others on but deep inside I have a little doubt that never was there before. I long for the old me sometimes. I am not sure I like how I am changed.

That is the ugly change that has happened. I keep that part a secret. It only comes out when I am low and blue. I believe that there has been good change. I value life more. I cherish my friendships to a greater regard. I work hard to find the little blessings that are in my life that before would have gone unnoticed. I have compassion and understanding because I have felt loss. I now know what it means for God to be my everything.

If someone told you with certainty that you will have a baby sometime in the near future, like Clare was told, how would that affect you? Would it change your approach to cycling?

My hope would be restored. I would have a new strength to push forward past the loss and pain and disappointment. Knowing that my dream would be coming true at some point would give me the reason not to stop. But I also believe that it would drive me crazy each month even more. I would wonder if this was the month. I also wonder if I would relax or do the opposite and work harder, which is funny since you can only do so much in order to conceive. I also wonder if I would question the person as time went on and my dream still hadn't come true.

Now if only we could find that person who could tell me my future. :)

For Henry, time travel is a heavy burden; because of this, he is very reluctant to pass down his gene mutation to his offspring - particularly when it results in multiple miscarriages. Do you think Clare is being irresponsible in pushing to have a biological child that is both a part of she and Henry? Or is it more than being a parent in which she covets?

I believe that Clare is going with her heart. She longs to hold onto a part of Henry, hoping that the part of Henry that would be in her child would never leave her. She has always had Henry throughout her life, something that many of us never have experienced. I am sure she knows that he won't be with her for forever. Always having someone and then never having them there with you for the rest of time could destroy a person. I believe she never gave up hope and stopped trying for her biological child because it would mean she would be letting go of Henry forever.

If you read the book without knowing about the pregnancy/miscarriage aspect of the storyline, how did you feel when you got to that part of the story? If you were unprepared for that aspect of the storyline, did you find it particularly jarring or upsetting? Or, if you read the book already knowing about this storyline, do you think that changed how you reacted to it? Did you find the pregnancy/miscarriage aspect made you relate to the characters more?

When I read this book I had no idea what to expect. I had yet to have had a pregnancy/miscarriage. When I got to the part of the story where Clare had had many miscarriages and then woke up covered in blood I was so upset for her. I knew the longing that she had for that cycle to work. I cried and cried for her feeling the pain and sadness. I felt so empty for her. So hopeless. I began to beg for it to end and for her to have her dream. When she finally was pregnant again I worried for her. I was waiting for something awful to happen. When it never did I was so relieved.

Having this be a major part of the storyline helped me to have an even deeper connection with the book. I became Clare. I became Henry. I felt their pain. I felt my own pain.

The New Plan

SUCKS!

Yep that's right, there is a plan. It isn't my plan. I don't like the plan. But it is the new plan. You want to hear it?

First, Grumps and I communicate about as well as two strangers. We used to not be this way but since we have taken the road of infertility it has just gotten bad. We talk but neither listen. We think what we each want and hope that the other will agree with that. But we never do.

Going into this last IUI I knew that he wanted to wait until I could switch insurances. I told him that I couldn't wait. I needed to press on. He was totally for that. In my mind that meant he would push forward with me if this one failed. He would do whatever to afford the IUIs. In his mind he was thinking THIS WILL WORK! I wasn't thinking that.

SO the IUI fails. He wants me to take a break because of my mono. Why risk money/IUI if my mono could cause an unknown problem. I needed my RE to tell me that. He agreed with Grumps. I was fine with that. If the doctor who wants my money thinks a month off would help then I am all for it. I tell Grumps this when he gets home. He says, "Good, we can't afford it anyways." NICE! I got upset, he apologizes.

This goes on and on. I will just get to the point. We are waiting until I can switch to my work insurance in October before moving forward with anything. YEP 6 months!

Grumps says, "This will be a nice break." WHATEVER!

He says, "What is the RUSH!" Yea, we have really been rushing.

I tried to explain my heart, how I was feeling. I gave up. He doesn't get it.

I say, "I was hoping we would be pregnant before our miscarriage due date."

I also say, "I wanted to be pregnant before D had her baby. To be pregnant together."

He says, "I don't harbor hard feelings towards her. I am not jealous. You should be happy. This is hard for her too." SO MISSING THE POINT!

I cried and cried and am still crying. He left the room. But we are going to see his family this summer on the other side of North America.

I totally get what he is thinking, but that isn't what I am feeling. Now I really want to quit. Totally want to quit all of this.

I know many of you are thinking, "Why can't they afford IUIs? They are cheap." Not with my clinic. Our last one was $1600. The next one will be $1400 and then down to $1300. So it isn't a drop in the bucket.

MAN I was doing so good trying to be better about things but now I am just PISSED!

Pour Me a Glass of Wine

Oh wait, I already did!

That's right. I am not pregnant. I got the call from my nurse, NEGATIVE! I let my voice mail catch it while I was teaching. I took a moment outside my room to listen. I heard it in her voice before she even had to say anything. I deleted the message, took a breath, and walked back into my room to finish the day.

I wanted to cry. I wanted to scream. I wanted to just crawl under the covers for forever. But I pressed on and 'inspired' my kids!

My girls called and emailed. I felt hugs from all over the place.

I didn't know how to tell Grumps. I had planned to stop at the store and buy him something that said 'Daddy' today. I was torn about texting him, calling him, or waiting to tell him in person. He called me first. We shot the breeze for a couple of minutes and then I just say, "We aren't pregnant." He was so shocked. He totally had HUGE hope!

I had let myself start hoping yesterday. I had started planning and having HUGE hope. I wish I hadn't. Thank GOD I had others holding my hope the entire time. How hard it would have been if I had known all along that I was pregnant. Being that hopeful.

I came home and put on The Wreckers, opened the wine, started dinner and held back the tears. I wanted to cry alone. I didn't want Grumps to see my heart broken. He came up to grab dinner and pulled me out of my chair. He heard the music, saw the wine, and knew that my heart was hurt. He held me and let me cry. We don't do that very often. I cried really hard. I told him how I wish there wasn't money involved. The money part makes it hard. He said, "Don't worry about the money."

Now I just enjoy my life right NOW! We still need to talk about what's next. Do we spend more money for the next IUI like our RE wants to do? Or do we wait until the fall when I can switch insurances and not have to worry about the money? My heart says to go for another IUI. I am not sure what Grumps' brain is telling him.

Thank you for all of your prayers and support during this cycle. I don't' know how many of you do this month after month. I don't know how you go through IVF and make it out okay on the other side.

Off to finish my first glass of wine and start on the second.

In the Genes

Or is it just taught.

Today on my lovely drive to work I passed a bus stop with kids from my school. I pass them every morning. If I pass that spot and they aren't there then we know that either I am really late or I am REALLY late.

At the bus stop today there was the same cute little blond girl dancing around. She is always doing some sort of cheer or dance routine. Yes, I also get stuck at that very spot every morning. She wasn't just dancing today she was holding a baby. At first I thought it was a real baby until she threw it into the air. I wanted to scream, STOP until I saw it was way too small to be real. She was playing with this doll acting like she was rocking it to sleep for another super little girl. It was really precious. She had all the motions down perfectly. The rocking, swinging, singing. It hit my heart pretty hard. It also made me wonder if woman have this need to have babies in our genes, our makeup or is it just taught.

Growing up I always had dolls. I always played house. I always took care of every one. Of course I was the oldest so that didn't help. When my little sister was born I was 10. I became her second mom. I got up in the night to feed and put her back to bed. I changed diapers. I rocked her to sleep. I even spanked her when she got older. When she was sick she cried for me, not for my mom.

Being a mom was totally my number one desire for my life besides being a wife. I had huge plans as a little girl to be married by 18 and have all my kids by 19. Yes, I didn't have a grasp on time yet but you get the gist. I wanted it all.

So thinking back to that little girl and me as a kid, is this desire learned or born? I know the answer isn't that important but I just can't stop thinking about that little doll. If we didn't give little girls dolls would they still have that baby desire.

Man I hate how infertility can seep into all areas of your life including your commute to work.

Oh by the way, still now Aunt Flow. Of course I tested and of course it was a bfn. I also got my injectibles in the mail today. They are now loving my fridge.

The Results are in

And all of our tests came out fine. Yippee skippy! No I am glad that Grumps 'friends' work just fine. My insides look pretty from a distance and my blood is healthy.

The RE pulled out a piece of paper to do his 'thinking' on. He likes to brainstorm on paper and then give you his brainstorm thoughts. It makes me giggle inside. He made a nice little time line for this up coming cycle.

We are on for an IUI! It all begins next week with my injections class. Next I will call on day 1, in about 2 weeks. Then do the nice day 3 u/s. Start Clomid and fsh injections and have more u/s. Then onto the IUI. I am pretty sure it will be the last week of March. We will get to enjoy part of the 2ww in Jamaica. Grumps of course would like to wait a month so that I don't ruin my chances by drinking. WHATEVER! Even my nurse said that it would be totally fine.

It feels good to have a plan.