When Perfect Charts Attack!!!!

So, I'm on CD2. Big surprise there, eh? The good news: a normal LP for once and ordinary spotting levels. I am, of course, glad about that new development, but my self-diagnosing inner nurse is concerned. If low progesterone is not in fact the problem, then what in the hell is it? I don't have any other ideas and, incidentally, neither did Dr. All Business.

On to Plan 47 then. I'm doing the big CD3 bloodwork tomorrow, then the fantabulous HSG, then Clomid extravangza and Prometrium up the hoo-ha. I guess I had better dig out the Mucinex.

It is amazing to me how the emotional roller coaster manages to seem fresh and new every cycle. Even though it is the same process each and every time--despondency with AF, then single-minded eye on the prize, then creeping Hope and renewed chart stalking--the memories of all the failed cycles that have gone before layer one atop the other to make it something different. As this goes on and on and on, the actual process of TTC'ing takes up less of my conscious mind even while the emotional toll grows under the surface. I don't want to talk about it, don't want to think about it, I just want to wallow.

Predictably, I'll feel better in a few days. And I'll again forget all about getting kicked in the stomach by that perfect, perfect chart.

What New Fresh Hell Is This?

After bitching and moaning and whining about my terrible progesterone levels and spotting and short luteal phase, ad nauseaum, suddenly my progesterone is normal and my luteal phase is, gasp, up to 12dpo with no spotting? On a totally unmedicated cycle? How odd.

After last cycle's traumatic conclusion, I found myself actually avoiding my DH in fear and trepidation of the consequences. But I miscalculated. And it is actually possible.

I thought I had outfoxed Hope this time, but she was just hiding. Only to sneak up and whomp me a good one upside the head.

I just don't have anything else to say.

Score: Fertiles 547 Infertiles 0

JJ over at Jellybelly linked to an interesting newspaper article about surrogacy in this blog post. I'll cut to the chase on the article for you: single mom agrees to act as surrogate for Japanese couple, using man's sperm and a third woman's egg in an IVF procedure; the parties agree to implant two embryos; surrogate discovers she's pregnant with twins.

The reaction? The surrogacy agency tells her not to tell the couple that she is having twins. And why, you ask? So that she will be free to selectively abort one fetus if she decides she doesn't want to deal with a twin pregnancy. This made my skin crawl.

But wait, it gets better. I am casually discussing this situation with a Fertile Friend, secure in the knowledge that she would understand how truly horrible this would be for the hopeful parents in Japan, who may not get a chance for a second child and, even worse, wouldn't even know about it. But, Dear Reader, I am sure you see where this is going. FF was uncomfortably silent. She hemmed, she hawed. She finally said, "Well, I suppose it depends on how you feel about abortion rights."

WHAT? The surrogate's absolutely unfettered ability to abort a child she has no genetic part in but agreed to carry is an abortion rights issue?

Infertiles get no love.

Stepmonster

My stepson is driving me absolutely bananas. This is a bad thing.

A little background: I first met A when he was barely two years old. He was, to put it charitably, a hellion. He is now almost 5 and generally speaking, a really good kid. Smart, funny, well-behaved, etc etc etc. His mother is a whole different story, but we'll leave that for another time. A lives with us 50% and his mother 50% of the time. This is not an ideal arrangement but he seems to be okay with it, so that's what we do.

So now, suddenly, he has turned into sullen, pouty, won't-get-dressed-for-school child. He has gone from sunny and cheerful to dramatic acts of Gandhi-esque passive resistance each and every stinkin' morning. To make it even more fun and exciting for me, he now greets each attempted conversation with "I want my daddy." Knife to the heart, that one.

I have so many emotions swirling around this boy. When K and I first started dating, children were not yet really on my mind. I had only been out of law school a year or so and I was still intent on establishing my career. Not to mention that I was freshly divorced and not looking. So, obviously that all changed and A. was a big reason why. We had a very rocky relationship in the beginning but we came to understand and appreciate each other. And he made me realize how much I really did want a child of my own.

Enter TTC drama and "chemical pregnancies" (or whatever you want to call them). I have realized in their wake that one of my big fears is that I will never have a child of my own, but instead spend my life raising the child of another woman. A woman I don't like. A child who never stops talking about Mommy and, in moments of stress, seems to relish shutting me out.

I hasten to add, this is not his fault and I know this. He can and should talk about his Mommy as much as he wants to and DH and I are very careful never to disparage her or his feelings for her. But the net effect of this situation serves to constantly remind me that I am not his mother, I am not anyone's mother. I don't get a vote on where he goes to school, I don't get Mommy-I-love-you hugs, I don't get homemade Mother's Day cards. I just get to make the lunches and get him dressed and buy him toothpaste and give him baths and.........

And when he's "going through a phase" and acting like a little shit, this is all so much more deeply felt. Because the precarious affection that is between us in ordinary times goes missing. So I am left feeling like the unappreciated childless spinster maid.

I know I should be grateful to have a child in my life and mostly, I am. But not today.

I Wish I Were a Circus Clown

I am really seriously hating my job. Let me be more specific--I actually like what I do in my job, but I intensely dislike my colleagues. I want to leave but I don't know how to mesh that with the whole infertility treatment situation. If I move to a different job in the next few months and (hold your breath) miraculous things result from the aforementioned treatment, that would be quite sticky. But then again, I can't just put my whole life on hold for a pregnancy that may or may not occur. Right?

You're Going to Put That Where?

We have begun the truly humiliating portion of our infertility adventures. I had heard tell of the Dildo Cam (thanks CF'ers!) and its joys but--Oh. My. God. Imagining reclining uncomfortably while you pretend not to notice that four--count 'em FOUR--total strangers are assessing the relative suitability of your naughty parts. The whole experience was a teeny tiny step up the evolutionary scale from being a birthing cow up for auction and about to be thrown on the shoe leather heap because your left udder is not plump. I felt like my worthiness to even call myself a female was in question.

So dear K, ever-supportive, stayed there with me during the exam (yes, by the head, not the feet!) and now we both wish he hadn't. While I was trying not to notice the DC, he was trying not to notice the physical manipulation of his wife's body by some strange man. With strange male witnesses. This, apparently, is just too too much for a Southern man to take in stride. He was shaking by the time it was over and done with and as emotionally thrown as I've ever seen him. Not surprisingly, I was not sympathetic. After all, it's not as if the experience was a joyful one from this end. (Yes, bad joke acknowledged, but I'm leaving it). I just couldn't, and still can't, worry too much about whether K is uncomfortable. I mean, Jesus H. Christ--who is the one to get poked and prodded and weighed and judged? Well, you know the answer to that one.

Anyway, the upshot is that we are ramping up the appointments and tests and meds to a cruising altitude, i.e. much more than we were doing, but still a good deal less than many are forced to endure. And my guess is that we'll both be spending more time trying to navigate this emotional thicket too.

In Which I Ponder the RE Visit and Criminally Overuse the Word "Crap"

Is it time to talk about the baby thing? Sigh.

Some background: we've been trying since March 2004, which translates into ten cycles of failure. This, in and of itself, is not so very bad. Especially because I am one of the lucky ones who ovulate on my own on a pretty regular schedule. The bad part comes in the form of crap-ass progesterone levels. Anyway, long story short, in October and then again in December (on my first happy shiny Clomid cycle), I made it just far enough in the process to have faint positive tests, complete with a crappy ick feeling I have now come to associate with early pregnancy, and then came the horrific bleeding like a stuck pig.

Yes yes, very early on and all that. I've heard that and tell myself that. Guess what? It doesn't help. This is the death of Hope here kids, not just the loss of a little tissue.

So, I'm conflicted. I have spent almost a year thinking about this on a daily basis and, all too often, an every-other-second basis. And now, dead stop. I haven't returned to CM checking, CP checking, temp taking, BD logging, etc etc etc. The list of TTC activity is endless, no? Lord knows we all needed a break from that crap. The part that worries me a little is that once I realized I was likely edging up on O, my first thought was "stay away from the man." WTF? I am now pregnancy avoiding? Where did this come from?

Part of me thinks that this must be that fabled grieving process working its way out. Part of me wonders if I can even bring myself to go back to it. I mean, I am going to see the RE tomorrow, so I obviously haven't run totally in the other direction. But the utter lack of enthusiasm at the thought of TTC'ing again is really unnerving. I am afraid to try to get pregnant but I still want a baby. What do you do with that?

Would You Like to Meet My Stepson?

Old Pics 082
Originally uploaded by Mudbug.

Well, here he is. In all his four-year-old glory.

(Those are napkin rings on his ears.)

Whereupon I Discover the Web

I am the only one secretly tracking the trials of Ashlee Simpson, the patron saint of lame excuses? I could almost understand the SNL snafu, although acid reflux was a bit much. But then, getting flat booed off the stage by an entire stadium full of people at the Orange Bowl.

Quickly followed by this explanation:

"I was facing the Oklahoma Sooners [which had a bigger crowd on hand], and I was rooting for USC, and they played a clip of it, so maybe it was that those people didn't like me."

This is a brilliant beginning to a promising Pathetic Publicity meltdown. I just can't turn away.

But fortunately, I can always be washed clean of the celebrity goo by the cool clear web waters of itunes. Oh yes, "Sweet Thing" by Rufus & Chaka Khan, off Stompin' at the Savoy. Then a whole hour rooting around in Blaxploitation essentials and 70s soul mix lists. You just can't feel bad listening to that badassss bass line on Stevie Wonder's "Superstition," Ibrahim Ferrer crooning Cuban love songs and the Cowboy Junkies circling John Prine.

I love DSL. Can I get an amen?

Muddy Friday

In the Arkansas Mississippi River Delta, there is a peculiar type of mud they call "gumbo." Gumbo is incredibly thick and sticky and viscous and goopy and dark deep black and will suck your boots right off. Yet, that very same slop makes for very fertile ground.

In this inaugural blog, then, I will take this mud as my mascot. And hope that there is perhaps a point to the current nasty boot-sucking, soul-sucking goop patch we're going through.

I am hiding out again after yet another flurry of adrenaline-fueled work crap. These past few months have taken such a toll on me that I feel just flat knocked out, but most definitely NOT knocked up. More driving, more flying, more coming home late to messy house and sleeping husband and pets flying all akimbo. Is it any wonder that no little one wants to come roost in that? I don't think so.

The long stretch of TTC-fueled emotions running on warp drive has been replaced by......well, nothing. Dead air. This is actually a welcome break even though I know good and well it's a really big blaring warning sign. It's not for nothing that K. thinks I'm a good stroke candidate. When the alarm bells go silent, I probably ought to listen.

And I am, but the turnaround is slow and hard-coming. I feel like I should have one of those signs you see on semi trucks: WARNING: This Vehicle Makes Wide Right Turns.

Let's see if we can bring 'er on around.