rocking the boat, ever so slowly

One of the things I really struggle with is when I should make the call.

When am I ready to pick it all up again and start with the sonograms and co-pays? When am I ready to start with the tears and frustration and hating myself? When am I going to be ready to allow myself to hope?

To be certain, if I woke up tomorrow and found out I was pregnant, I would be pretty freaking excited. First of all, FREEEEEEEE! Dudes, a free baby would be awesome.

And also? No emotional baggage! Woooooo!

Because if I'm being honest with myself, the reason I haven't made the phone call is because I'm selfish. Things are pretty damn perfect right now. We have finally, freaking FINALLY, figured out how to live and have a child in our home. We sleep at night. I am wearing my pre-pregnancy bras. Claire is communicating with us. I am wearing pants with a SINGLE DIGIT SIZE.

I mean, really big deal stuff people.

I've been delaying on the call, even though we've been ready for another baby for several months. There's always the nagging thought that it might take a long time so, you know, better get going if we ever want to arrive at our destination.

I'm really curious how I'm going to handle it all. I can't decide if we'll go straight back to FSH injections or maybe do a few innocuous (and cheap) IUIs first? Was it all spectacularly bad timing or maybe I had a progesterone deficiency? Did I just need more eggs after all?

Eggs.

The idea of having twins next time is...giving me pause. I have days where I envision us with three children and I think it would be amazing and fun and make us so incredibly happy. I have days where I see other families with three children and I think, "Oh, HELLS no."

Because if we do go back to the FSH injections, how many cycles can I cancel, because I've overstimmed, before I lose my shit? How many cycles can I spend a couple grand on before we just throw in the towel and try not to go broke. We already got lucky once. Pushing for two feels...risky.

So, I still haven't called. And I'm not planning to for a while.

oh, um, HI THERE

I have a confession. When I got pregnant I had to unsubscribe from a lot of blogs. Blogs I loved. Women I loved. Stories I loved. It wasn't something I came to lightly. No, I hemmed and hawed over the idea for weeks before finally doing it. It was tough, to voluntarily walk away, to literally abandon the community that kept me off of anti-depressants and gave me so much support. It felt...wrong.

What happened was that while I was pregnant, once I got to 12 weeks I just wanted to freaking have fun and kick back and relaaaaax. There was no way I could that by reading 100+ infertility blog every day plsu Lost and Found. NO WAY. I just couldn't do it any more. I wanted to leave the world of infertility behind me. Been there, done that, bought that t-shirt. I needed to move on.

It was the only way I could deal with it. I kept a handful and dropped the rest. More than 100 of them. Ouch.

And now, it would seem that I'm back. Maybe? Or perhaps I'm just ready to join the community again.

Anyway, Heather mentioned me in her most recent post and I was like, OMG seriously? PEOPLE STILL READ THIS? Wow. Just....wow. I don't deserve any readers after my hiatus and Google Reader purge.

If you're still out there, do you mind dropping me a little comment? I'll make it easy, tell me what you had for dinner tonight; I need ideas anyway.

I want to make sure that if you're reading this neglected corner of the internet that I'm reading your corner as well.

Thanks!

taking the plunge

Last month I could totally tell when I was ovulating. I mentioned it to the husband and he took that as a sign that we needed to kick our evening activities into high gear. But we were both sick and I just...kind of didn't want to. And I didn't feel pressured to.

It was really different to feel that way. Whereas before I had Claire I was hyper-aware of my cycle. Where I was, how long I had to wait to test. Each month stretched out before me. Time seemed to tick by so freaking slowly.

And now? I think I'm in week 3 of my cycle? Maybe I started week 4? I don't know. I have no clue when to expect my period and I won't until I actually pull out a calendar and COUNT. My period caught me by surprise last month. "Another month? Already gone? REALLY? "

Time is just flying by.

When I think about having another baby I feel happy. I do not feel desperate, strung out, depressed, or unfulfilled. I felt all of those things when we were trying for our daughter.

I feel content. I feel like I'm playing in a bonus round where I can still walk away with my prize intact. If I end up winning this time, I'll be happy.

Lately I've been thinking about when to go back to the RE.

If I want to go back.

I'm pretty freaked out by the idea of multiples. I know that it's a distinct possibility since we scored two embryos last time (one only made it to 7 weeks).

I'm ready for 2 kids. I'm not so sure about 3. And man, aren't I a crappy person to say that? I KNOW that any more kids I have will be awesome. It's so SELFISH of me to want to limit the happiness, to put a cap on my family. I should just take what I get and SHUT UP ALREADY. DON'T I KNOW HOW LUCKY I AM? Gah! I'm such an ungrateful bitch!

But since I do get to choose, what do I want? Because see, these are the decisions and questions you have to think about when you can't just open a bottle of wine and have an oopsie. I don't want to think about these things. I have to. I have to be prepared to live with and accept the results of my decisions.

Do I want just one? Will I be happy with one child for the rest of my life? I would like to give Claire a sibling. Am I open to three? What if we get pregnant with triplets? WHAT THEN OMG?

Part of what makes me so frustrated is that same old line about how getting pregnant isn't simple for us. There's no accident waiting to happen. It's calculated, planned and strategized. I know that a lot of mothers struggle with when/if to add to their families. The questions about spreading the attention, not messing up a good thing all apply here. But, as with any family that struggles with infertility, the same rules don't apply to us. We get an extra-special layer of complexity to consider.

I feel forced to jump in the pool before I'm ready, in an misguided effort to not miss the entire summer. I won't know how it feels until I'm already under water. And at that point, I'm already wet. There's no un-doing it.

flashes of want and desire

It's been almost a year since she was born.

I can hardly believe it. It's like I'm in one of those movies where the character flashes forward and scenes are thrown up on the screen, one after the other, so that you swallow up a whole year's worth of experiences in a few moments.

FLASH

She's born. She's gorgeous.

FLASH

It's her first Christmas, she's darling in red velour.

FLASH

She's rolling over!

FLASH

She's crawling!

FLASH

We're on our first vacation to the beach. She's not really fond of sand.

FLASH

She starts feeding herself Cheerios.

FLASH

She can pull up onto furniture.

FLASH

She's walking. She says Mama.

FLASH

She's eyeing her birthday cupcake with trepidation.

Underneath all of this joy, there's wonky stuff going on with me. I've lost the baby weight, but I still have all of my infertility weight. (15 pounds - HOLLA!) My period came back. Twice now. I have felt...rumblings and twinges in that ovary-type-area. I'm pretty sure I'm ovulating regularly, just like I used to. Much to my surprise, she weaned herself; my sex drive came back.

She's a year old. We're thinking about going for it all again. We would like more children. (Do you like the way I say that, as it's really that simple? "Yes, I would like another bowl of ice cream.")

The part about this that really pisses me off is that we can't just fucking relax and go with it. I feel like now that I've gotten my period a few times, we're on the clock. I feel like if we don't want to waste time we'll figure shit out and MAKE IT HAPPEN. I feel like we might be foolish for taking time off, before investing emotionally in this idea, getting our hopes up and really allowing ourselves to want it very badly. I am scared of what happens when we decide (and we WILL get there) that our lives aren't complete without more children. Right now we just know that we would like more children. They are not required at this moment.

There's also the matter of our diagnosis: UNEXPLAINED. Was it all a matter of spectacularly bad timing? I don't think so. Are we stupid to try on our own? Making a baby for free sounds pretty....awesome actually. FREE! WHOA! I would love to save several grand if I could.

Knowing what we know now, we're all too aware of the timeline involved. It takes 9 months to cook a baby. If we started now and got pregnant within 6 months, (I'm being optimistic) we'd have a new baby in December of next year. December 2010! That seems soon, but it would be just over two years after Claire had been born. If we wait longer to start then we're pushing the 3-year mark, maybe closer to 4.

I don't put a lot of stock in all of the preferred child-separation windows. My brother and I are 2 years apart. Husband and his brother are 4. We're all friends as adults and we had nice childhoods.

Rather, I would like to limit my diapering years. My breastfeeding years. My messy, cleaning up pureed carrot off the kitchen floor years. I'm eager to get to the softball games and making Christmas cookies together years. I don't want to be changing diapers for the next 7 years of my life. No. I do not. I want to be cheering for home runs, teaching kids how to vacuum and handing out allowances.

Plus, I'm 30. I'm no spring chicken. I know that my fertility level can dramatically change between 28 (when we started trying for our first) and, well, whenever we get on the next train. If we wait another two years I'll be 32...who the hell knows what will be going on with me then. I already know that I'm damaged goods; do I have a fast-approaching expiration date?

Plus, I'm selfish. I like not worrying about leaky breasts. I like having a waist. I like sleeping at night. I want to give myself a break. I want to relax and enjoy this time in our lives. I want to savor this rich reward that we worked so hard for, that is here now. I don't like the person I become when I fixate on what I don't have. After three years of trying, pregnancy and post-partum craziness, things are NORMAL. WOW, THIS IS NICE. I would like to see what normal is like for more than four months.

And yet...January, and a whole new year of plan minimums and deductibles is coming up. If we WERE going to get pregnant in 2010, early would be good. Financially, if we clock treatment and birth all in one plan year that would be awesome.

I think what this boils down to is that I'm not ready to feel like shit again. But, oh, how I would love to feel as doubly happy and fulfilled as I am now.

hi. i'm back for round two. maybe. I think so. actually, I don't know.

My daughter is seven months old. And she is perfect. Wonderful. Gorgeous.

And I am starting to read infertility blogs again. I am starting to think about, consider, muse upon...wait for it....baby # 2.

Primarily, if there will be a second baby. I'm going through all of the classic things that mothers MUST go feel. How will I ever love another baby as much?

(Of course, I will. I will love any subsequent children even more...love has a tricky way of growing exponentially like that.)

I am feeling selfish though. After almost THREE YEARS of giving my body up for trying to get pregnant, fertility treatments, pregnancy, birth, recovery, and 7 months going of breastfeeding...I am sort of looking forward to having my body be something just for me.

I have lost all of my baby weight. I have not lost all of my infertility weight. It hangs around my midsection, decorated by my stretch marks from pregnancy. My breasts are no longer firm and full. They are soft and hang lower.

I would not trade it. But I wonder...Can I do it again? Can I allow myself to want? Can I put myself through the roller coaster? Can we spend that much? Will it be easy? Now that I know it's possible to get pregnant? Or will it be tougher? Did we catch lightning in a bottle that first time? Am I asking too much?

I don't know. She's seven months old. If I want a hope in hell of having my children close together I need to start thinking about this now.

But I'm really not ready to think about it. And yet...I feel like I have to because of how difficult it was to have our first child.

I'm not ready to make any phone calls to my RE's office. But I'm sort of starting to think about it. A little.

it was worth it. all of the heartache, frustration and tears. SO WORTH IT.

Last Tuesday at 8 pm we arrived at the hospital rather perky and excited about being induced. As we walked in the main entrance I said to him,

“You know, it's almost too big of an idea to take seriously. We're walking in today and in a few days they're going to let us walk out of here with a baby. A BABY! A whole new person!”

After checking in we were shown to a L&D Suite. Yes, they call them "suites" which I find to be both hilarious and a bit sad as it is probably the most expensive night I'll ever spend away from home and there weren't even any fluffy white towels set out for me. (The towels were rather pathetic actually. And there were only two. And they were small.)

My nurse placed two rounds of Cytotec overnight. The goal was to get me a few centimeters dilated by morning. It was possible that the Cytotec might throw me into full-on labor on my own. (I was really hoping that would happen.)

She makes a note that I am still not dilated at all at 41 weeks and change (WTF!?) and I try to sleep.

6 am

The Cytotec hasn't exactly done a great job: only 1 cm dilated. Barely. UGH.

They started my IV and hung a bag of Pitocin. My doctor broke my water. All right – this was it. Things were going to start happening!

6 am to 12 pm

The first few hours were definitely painful. But the contractions were far enough apart that I thought,

“Hey, I can manage this! It's ok! It hurts, but I can do it.”

Then as the Pitocin steadily got dialed up all morning they got far more intense, longer and more frequent. It HURT A LOT, but I thought that surely because I was in so much pain and they felt so powerful that I was really good at this being induced thing. I had been on a steadily increasing drip of Pitocin for SIX WHOLE HOURS at this point and was having to work very hard to get through each contraction. I figured the baby would be here by 3.

At noon my doctor checked on me. I thought I'd be several centimeters dilated.

HA. Oh, ha. HA HA HA HA HA.

She pronounced that I was only 2.5 cm and said she thought we'd be here a while. That she'd likely be born “very late tonight and that there were still several hours ahead of us. Maybe not until midnight.”

CRAP. Midnight? It was only noon!

If this is what it felt like to get to 2.5 cm then OH MY GOD, what will going to 10 cm be like?! I knew right then that I couldn't possibly go for 12 more hours and that I would be asking for an epidural at some point, but I resolved to try and make it as long as I could.

Noon to 3:30pm

Things rapidly increased on a pain/intensity scale.

I kept thinking that I hadn't found the right position to control the pain so I kept trying new things, not actually realizing that labor ITSELF was getting more intense and that I was making good progress because as labor goes on IT GETS HARDER (duh).

They had told me with some authority that it would take a REALLY LONG time (and they even made a face when they said it), so it never occurred to me that I might be making good progress and getting close to 10 cm.

I was preparing myself for a delivery at midnight and a long, slow grind towards the finish line.

Also not helping me realize that I was making any progress was that my contractions were really irregular. I'd have a couple of really, really bad ones that were long with no break in between followed by some smaller, shorter ones several minutes apart.

This really screwed with my head.

I would be all ready to say, “I want my epidural!” but then a set of the lighter (relatively speaking of course) contractions would come on and I'd be like,

“Oh, no way. I can handle this. I can SO do this!”

About 3pm though I lost control of my breathing and was taking deep, shallow breaths - basically hyperventilating. I could feel myself starting to panic a bit. Husband is still talking me through each contraction, but it's not helping at this point. The contractions are coming on really, really fast and there doesn't seem to be a break in between them.

I have to put on an oxygen mask because my shallow, rapid breathing is making the baby a bit unresponsive. I wasn't happy about this but I quickly changed my mind when I figured out that it made me feel ten thousand times better. I looooved my oxygen mask.

By the time 3:30 rolled around I decided I could not take the pain any more and I wanted relief. I asked for the epidural. Now, please.

I soothed myself with the thought that there was an end in sight. Relief was on the way. I could handle the next contractions knowing that there wouldn't be many more of them I would feel. I could do it for another half hour.

3:30 pm - 4:50 pm

The epidural was a fiasco from the start.

Out of all the things that I knew could go badly/wrong that day the epidural was not one I had considered. It was my back up plan all day long. My insurance policy.The one sure thing.

Oh ho, was that was a mistake.

First off, I needed to go through one bag of saline fluid before I could get it and I didn't realize that ALL DAMN DAY I had not even gone through the requisite one bag of fluid. (Seriously, nurses?! WHAT THE HELL?)

They accelerated the drip and I had to wait on it to finish. Meanwhile, the contractions get stronger, I muscle through them thinking there is relief in sight right after I finish this bag of fluid.

That was wrong too.

People, I labored for ELEVEN PITOCIN INDUCED HOURS before I had relief. Even though I asked for the relief at about 3:30, I didn't get it until nearly 5.

They had to do the epidural twice. The first time it only worked on my right half. Initially I was fine with that because hey – HALF THE PAIN. But then the WHOLE THING wore off entirely and I could feel everything again in all its holy unbelievably painful glory.

They call the anesthesiologist back and this takes a while. She has to remove the first one and place an entirely new one - all while I'm having the worst contractions yet. They were completely unmanageable because of the way I was sitting all hunched over – they were HORRIBLE. I was screaming and cussing and basically being a crazy lady in labor.

I remember feeling badly for saying “fuck!” so much in front of the nurses because it's just not a polite thing to say to someone who is trying to help you, but then I was like they've seen it all. So I let it fly.

All the while the anesthesiologist is having a tough time getting the needle placed correctly because I cannot sit still and and there's something wonky about my back and the needle - I don't know, IT TOOK FOREVER.

They made the husband sit in a chair, helpless and watching me scream through contractions while the anesthesiologist muscles a big ass needle in my back for the SECOND time.

The entire time I'm saying, “I feel like I need to push, I HAVE to push.”

Meanwhile, they actually have this conversation while she's jabbing me, as if I can't hear them:

Anesthesiologist: Oh, she says she has to push, should we check her?

Nurse: No, no. There's no way she's fully dilated. She was only 2 cm at noon! We'll check her after the epidural is placed.

Anesthesiologist: Are you sure?

Nurse: Yes, there's no way she's ready.

They get the epidural placed and working correctly about 4:50. I immediately feel five thousand times better.

4:50 - 5:12 pm

They check me after and the nurse says, “Oh my goodness! We're having a baby! RIGHT NOW! You're fully dilated!”

SERIOUSLY?!

I was in total amazement. I was proud of myself for basically going all the way on my own. If I hadn't been so excited about that I think I would have been more irritated.

It never occurred to me all afternoon that I was simply going through the stages of labor as I'd read about them. Yes, very much annoying that nobody bothered to check me because I think if I had been told how well I was doing it would have been all the motivation I needed to do the whole thing on my own. In that way, I do feel a little slighted.

My nurse also mentioned that the baby was at +2 station and that it would be really easy for me to push her out. She guessed only a few pushes. She said the baby would be here in just a few minutes.

I was thrilled to hear this. All day I had been thinking that I needed to save up all this energy to push and now here was a lady telling me that I'd barely have to work at all.

She was right. After no more than ten relatively easy minutes she was born with her cord looped around her neck twice at 5:12 pm. 7 pounds, 4 ounces; 19 inches long. She scored an 8 and 9 on her APGAR tests and cried loudly.

It was the sweetest sound I'd ever heard. I looked at my husband and said,

"Oh my God. That's our baby girl. She's finally here."

Nothing yet.

41 weeks today and no baby.

Not dilated. Not effaced. She hasn't engaged at all. There's not anything really indicating that I'll go into labor, well, ever. I am scheduled for an induction on Wednesday.

Those of you reading at my other blog know that I am really disappointed about this. Devastated, even. Last week when I scheduled it I thought I wouldn't even get to today with no baby - and yet here I am. I was trying to be optimistic.

Who would have ever thought that given the trouble I had getting pregnant in the first place that I would be such a champ at staying pregnant? (Perpetually!)

On some level, this feels like another round of my body failing me. I desperately wanted the whole experience of giving birth and trying it naturally - or at the very least of being in control of my own destiny to start with.

And now it will be so managed. I'll probably be confined to a bed. I don't think I can handle several hours of pitocin contractions without pain relief. And I'm not even going to talk about the upped risk factor for a c-section because I've done that research ten times over and at this point all it does is increase my anxiety level to even THINK about it.

So that's where I'm at. 41 weeks and still pregnant - but I'll finally have my daughter by the end of this week.

And that's really the light at the end of the tunnel - it's what I'm focusing on. After all this time - more than 2 years of wanting to be a parent - there's an end date when I know it will actually happen.

Or rather, a start date. A really fantastic start date.