so...

i think i'm going to officially go on blog hiatus. i just haven't really felt like reading or writing much about my i/f journey. it's there, but it's just a part of me, and when i think about it too much, i find that i start feeling sorry for myself. i get bitter and sad, and while i know i have to deal with that stuff, i just don't want to wallow in it. i have so much to be grateful for... my family, my husband, my friends, my life. i walk around our beautiful apartment with tears in my eyes that i can't share it with my mom or with a new baby, but then i look up and i realize it's a gorgeous day... and i can live it the way that it is, or i can feel sorry for myself that it isn't they way i pictured it would be. and, ultimately, i'm going to decide to live it the way that it is... and treasure it for what it is. that is what my mom would want me to do.

i am grateful for the connections i've made through this blog, and one day, i might return. but for the time being, this blog is growing a bit stale... and moldy, so i apologize. i will put my email in my profile in case anyone wants to keep in touch on a personal basis (emily, kate, katie, amanda, tracy... others). i will still be reading your blogs, and will comment when i can. hugs to all of you who've offered advice and encouragement!

admission

so, i guess i should admit it. i'm not doing anything this month... no pee sticks, no cbefm, no temping. i probably should be, but i just have lost interest. i figure i'll save the cbefm sticks for when i'm doing something new. nothing new this month. we haven't even been able to snu-snu since i've had these various tests. (though i'm still somewhat hopeful that we will as we get closer to the middle of the month... i don't actually know how long i'm supposed to wait after an s.i.s.... i guess i should call the doctor's office.)

all seems to be well on my side. no abnormalities on any of the tests, but mil has yet to do his s.a. he's scheduled for the 7th... yes, the 7th... as in 2 weeks from now. as in, we won't be able to start any kind of treatments until a whole 'nother month after this one. this kind of irritates me because he said that he would call to schedule something after our appointment in march, and didn't call anyone until yesterday. i know he's in medschool, and i know that studying is important, but i couldn't even remind him without him getting on my case. ok, so maybe i'm more than a little irritated. i know it will all happen in its own time. and i'm sure that he can't be excited about the prospect that it's looking like the problems might be on his side (though i remind him regularly how often infertility is totally unexplained). i am happy that my female organs seem to be in good working order... even if it makes the diagnosis more difficult. i don't even know what they do for male factor infertility. or with unexplained infertility... i guess i should look it up. surely, many folks have traveled this road before me. i mean, that's what the internet is for, isn't it?

thanks for the support!

still here

it's been a wacky few weeks. i'm debating whether i have the time to continue blogging.. especially with two separate blogs going -- my non-ttc/if blog and this one. i just don't seem to have the energy or interest to maintain it. i do like being part of the community, so i don't want to stop entirely, but i think i may want to focus on reading and commenting on others blogs more than writing in my own.


as of now, i've had my blood tests, this morning i had my hsg, and tomorrow afternoon i have my sis. all sorts of fun. so far all seems clear. mil has yet to schedule his s.a. i don't know what to say... he has a school exam on wednesday (on the reproductive and urinary systems, no less), so he really can't focus on this stuff until after. i just hope that he makes an appointment sooner rather than later, so we can get a plan before my next cycle. we shall see...

charting, shmarting

so, i totally took two crucial days away from the cbefm and the thermometer. saturday i got my first peak reading (yay!). then saturday night i left for california. i totally forgot to do either on sunday morning (though it's probably safe to assume that i had my second peak day), and monday morning (i.e., today) i was on a red-eye back to new york. needless to say i wouldn't have even known when to test, let alone had the space or time to do either. so here we are... sometime after peak but not knowing whether ovulation did or did not occur. ah, the mystery.

the wedding was fun, but as you can imagine a bit of a blur. i saw some old college friends (one who may or may not have been pg... something about the lack of alcohol and slightly queasy look on her face led me to believe the former). i went to target... my dream home and bought new eye-shadow... something i wear about once/year. a vaguely drunk, elderly man thought that because i was at the wedding sans husband, it was okay to request dances with me over and over again (taking time away only to harass my other dateless, female friend). i don't mind a turn around the dancefloor with a 70+ stranger every now and again, but given that i had all of 24 hours with my long-lost college friends, i thought 2-3 dances was more than enough.

the first visit

so, we went. i must admit that i was skeptical, but i liked dr. k. he wasn't an overwhelming personality, but that's not what i'm looking for in an r.e. he took a moment to ask about mil's med school and what he had done before starting -- which i thought was nice. most doctors in new york don't spare time for niceties.

dr. k's office was a bit of a mess though. the administrative staff was typical new york b*tch. i know that seems strong, but there's really no other way to describe it. people in certain service sectors in new york city generally don't bother to hide their distaste for their jobs or their distaste for you for being part of their job. the lady at the front desk was one of those people. mil didn't even bother to schedule his s.a. while he was waiting for me to take my blood tests because she was giving off a "don't talk to me cause i don't know nuh'in" kind of vibe.

the nurses on the other hand were very nice. after dr. k took a brief history, explained the basics of the process, and did my ultrasound, a nurse explained in detail the appointments i need to make during my next cycle -- and the appointment mil needs to make as well. overall, despite the b*tchy clerk, the experience was as positive as it could be. the side benefit of getting my ultrasound on day 14 (by coincidence, of course) was that i got to see a follicle about to rupture in my right ovary. that was pretty exciting (needless to say, mil and i snuck in some snu-snu later in the day). otherwise the ultrasound was uninteresting, so i guess we'll be awaiting the rest of the results...

now that it's started (and all i've paid so far is a co-pay), this seems more exciting than intimidating. i'm sure that will change as i ride this rollercoaster of i/f, but right now i feel hopeful... like i'm finally doing something to change the situation. and doing something is always better than waiting around for something to change me.

make an appointment... check

so, i've accomplished step 1. i've made an appointment with an r.e. i never actually heard back from my regular doctor, but she seemed confident in my old ob-gyn's recommendations, so i'm moving forward. mil and i are scheduled to meet dr. k a week from friday. i think i'm more nervous than i am excited. i feel like i should be relieved to be doing something finally, but i must i'm a little freaked... maybe more about the pending expenses than the procedures. i'm fortunate that i get a little bit of insurance coverage ($5k/year to be exact), but i don't know how quickly that will go. i mean an hsg can't be cheap. the website already warns of a $200 semen analysis that usually isn't covered by insurance. medication... blood work... actual doctor fees... i feel like that $5k could be gone in a matter of a few diagnostic visits -- let alone treatments. i'm a little anxious to say the least.

**

last night an older woman i recently met mentioned to me that maybe i shouldn't be in such a rush to have children. to her credit, she didn't know that i was already trying or that i've been having i/f issues. i had just said that i was a little jealous that my brother has a child to help him get through our mother's death. her comment was in response to my having also mentioned that mil is currently in medical school. she brought up the difficulties of raising a child while one's spouse is so busy with work/school. i have thought about this quite a bit since my mother died... not only because of how sad it is that my child(ren) will never meet her, but also because i always thought that my mother would be able to help me raise my children while mil is in school. she would be able to be that last-minute babysitter or even a regular babysitter for one or two days a week when i'd have to work. now i have to scratch that plan. if i work (which i pretty much have to do since mil isn't really bringing home the bacon yet), i'm going to have to put my child in daycare from a pretty young age (which i've never really wanted to do). i'm also basically going to be a single parent most of the time until mil finishes his residency (um... seven years from now?!?!).

so, is the best idea to wait? wait until what? mil won't really be able to spend much time at home for another five or six years at best. if my fertility is bad now at 30, i can only imagine it will be worse in five to six years. i know ivf success rates start going down after 30, so in many ways now is the best time. in the end, i am okay with adoption. i know that. and mil is, too. but do we just want to potentially throw away what may be our only opportunity to have biological children just because it's not the ideal time? i don't think so... but it is giving me pause. any thoughts from my esteemed readers?

we're moving!

well, we're not moving the site. (i haven't succumbed to the siren-call of word-press just yet.) but, no, mil and i are actually going to be moving apartments. this is very exciting. we're been in our current 1-bedroom apartment for the last six years, and we're definitely growing out of it (if not for the reasons we really wanted to grow out of it). our stuff lines every wall of our apartment in an attempt to keep valuable floor space clear for the occasional walk to the kitchen or more-occasional attempt at yoga.

we won't be going far... to a nice, new 2-bedroom apartment that should be available sometime in april. i know that i should just be thrilled, but i'm starting to get overwhelmed by the amount of things that have to be done in preparation for the move (um, like, hiring movers).
**
on the reproductive front, i've been very lax about updating my lovely little cbefm monitor. i barely touch the real thing these days because nothing is happening... well, nothing other than these lovely little chin-dumplings that have come to warn me that old lady flo is on her way into town. as i await her with little humor, i have decided that i am not waiting another month to make an appointment with an r.e. i just can't do it. i think i'm going to go to the doctor that my old ob-gyn's office recommended many moons ago. his clinic seems to have a pretty good success rate (for under 35: 109 IVF cycles --> 55% pregnancy rate --> 45% live birth rate). the rates are about as good as any of the other top centers in nyc, but with fewer overall cycles. i sent an email to my primary care doc to see if she has heard anything good/bad about the guy, so hopefully she'll second the ob-gyn's opinion and send me on my way. hopefully.

it's off to the doctor's office we go

well, not that doctor. not yet, at least. i met with my primary care doc -- whom i adore! she said she'd be happy to take a look at a list of r.e.'s on my plan if i need help finding one, but she suggested i meet with my new ob-gyn first though to get her recommendation. i already have an appointment with an ob-gyn in my pcp's practice scheduled for early april. i've decided to re-join the practice's ob-gyn department because a) they are about 2 blocks from my future residence and b) of all the ob-gyn's i've seen before, my last doctor there took on my yeast/b.v. issues most assiduously (though obviously not successfully) c) and did i mention -- they're 2 blocks from my future apartment? too bad there aren't any r.e.'s so close since it looks like i'll be seeing much more of him/her.

fun with photoshop

so, i have a wee photoshop bone in my body. i think it's close to the technophile bone, and directly descendant from the gene that made me want to play with calculators as a small child. buttons are my friends. unfortunately, none of this translates into loving to sit in front of a computer when i happen to be at work... unless i get to play with photoshop.

anyway, that said, i finally created my own little cbefm widget that lets you see where i am in my cycle. i have to show you the "peak" one because it's just so darn cute. is it just me, or do those little digital eggs just make you feel so warm and fertile inside?

unfortunately, i'm not enough of a technogeek to know how to make this cycle automatically, so at present, i have to update that little photo on a daily basis... it also means that i created 30+ jpegs of the widget, so i could cover most cases without having to go back into photoshop. if you are eager for the hard labor of updating your blog picture on a daily basis, i will be happy to send you a jpeg set corresponding to your general cbefm cycle... i just need to know what days you generally get low, high, and peak readings.

even better though would be to find someone tech savvy enough to show me how to get this to automatically update... i currently have the source file set up in layers, so i can relatively easily create a jpeg, but i'm sure that there's an easier way.
**
oh, and on another note, you'd think that after 15 months of trying, i would be able to nail down my ovulation date. according to my ff.com chart, i ovulated before i got a "peak" reading on my monitor... does that make any sense? as always, your shared wisdom is appreciated.

possibly fertile

so it appears that i am "possibly fertile." thankfully my monitor decided to display something other than "low" yesterday, so mil and i got down with the snu-snu. i've decided that "dancing" and "baby dancing" imply a certain spontaneity and an expectation that the "dancing" will result in a baby that no longer really applies to the situation. my calling mil at school in the afternoon to report a "high" reading on my cbefm, does not good foreplay make. don't get me wrong, we try to take the time to enjoy eachother's company, but knowing that you have to snu-snu takes away a certain romance from the act. of course, i'm not the first i.f. person to note this phenomenon... in fact, many a fertile woman has bemoaned the militant timing that goes into the "baby dance" as well. fortunately, the stars aligned, and i was in the mood at the same time the cbefm pronounced me of "high" (ha!) fertility, so a good time was had by all. (for some splendid reason, mil still only needs the suggestion of snu-snu to get in the mood.)

on another note, i finally told my brother that mil and i were having difficulty producing offspring the old-fashioned way. it was good to tell him... at least it might explain some of my bizarre and unexpected reactions to his "good news" that his wife is still blissfully pregnant and they saw the little wiglet on the ultrasound. don't get me wrong, i was very happy for them -- i want them to have a healthy and uneventful pregnancy, so i can have another niece/nephew to shower with all of the affection i can't yet give my own children, but i can't quite force the level of enthusiasm i know my brother wants and needs now that my mother is gone. hopefully, my explanation at least puts some pieces together for him and will offer me a little reprieve from questions as to when mil and i will start having kids of our own.

things that make you go "hmm..?"

so, it's cd 13, and i'm still getting a "low" reading on my cbefm... this is weird. the last 3 times i used this little contraption, i've had a high reading by cd 11. what could this mean? i'm temping as well, so i guess i'll have a back-up if it's the cbefm on the fritz... but that obviously doesn't help me predict my ovulation. i'm not gonna worry yet. maybe i'm just having a wonky cycle.

i have another question for the group. this is one of those questions that reminds me why i haven't invited my irl friends/family to read this blog, and if you're not comfortable with bodily fluid talk, you may want to stop here. anyway, to get to the point, i have had pretty much constant, mild yeast infections/bv since i had to take multiple antibiotics years ago for recurrent tonsillitis. i was just reading that bv can lead to pid (which i don't think i have but will ask my doctor about on my next visit) which can cause serious i.f. problems, but has anyone else had/heard of i.f. issues stemming from one or the other of these infections? just curious... i asked my ob-gyn if she thought this might cause fertility problems when i saw her last year, but she shrugged her shoulders and said, "shouldn't be a problem." (this is why i'm looking for a new ob-gyn... grr.)

back

so, i'm back from vail. my dad, brother, and i went for a brief ski trip -- that started out as a business meeting. fortunately the business meeting was canceled, so we got to spend all three days on the slopes. yay! the weather and the snow were pretty much perfect, so it was a great escape from the city crowds... albeit a very brief escape.

mil has agreed to starting the i.f. diagnostics sooner rather than later, assuming that we can find a clinic that will see us at off hours. i hope that there's someplace nearby that will do that because the poor guy has a busy enough schedule... he doesn't need to be making trips back to manhattan in the middle of the day just to wank into a cup. that wouldn't be fun. then again, who said that any of this is fun.

i have an annual check-up with my primary care doc early next month, so i will talk to her about all of this, and hopefully she can hook me up with a doctor and a lab (thanks for the tip, katie!) that's on our insurance... and hopefully meets some of the other qualifications you ladies mentioned. thank you for the advice! i'm ready to get this train out of the station. in the meantime, i'm trying to remember to take my temp in the morning and check my hormones on the little cbefm. you know they should make a little cbefm ticker, so you can show your daily reading... that would be fun!

***
update: i've added a fertility friend ticker at the bottom of the page in case you are curious as to where i am in my cycle (this will have to do until i can create my own little cbefm monitor tracker), and i've added a little news widget on the side. i'm pretty impressed that all i had to type in was "infertility" and suddenly i have a little rss news feed on the side of my blog... pretty cool.

cramps

cramps this month seem worse than ever... i don't know if it's psychological (a third close family friend announced her pregnancy this weekend) or physical... af came with a vengeance this morning with nary a warning spot. month 15 of trying by my count... i think we've played the odds, and they are no longer in our favor. bad luck and poor timing can't account for an 0 and 15 record. something else is at work here, and i'm ready to figure out what it is. i think i'm going to have a little chat with mil to see if we can move up our schedule without negatively affecting his schoolwork. the summer just seems an eternity away.

how did you go about finding your r.e.? any suggestions on where to start? i have an appointment with my primary care doctor in march. i think i may just ask her for a referral since i'll need one to utilize my puny insurance coverage anyway.

randomness

does anyone else use google for spellcheck?

any other folks salivating over the iphone? i lost (i.e., left) my ipod on a flight from houston to ny, and i've been wanting an iphone ever since. i'm trying to hold out until they have at least 32gb of storage, but it's proving quite difficult. the adult in me knows it's stupid to buy now, but the technophile in me is just saying: gimme, gimme, gimme.

speaking of the technophile in me... have you guys seen these? so cute! must have one!

wow, i don't know what i'm going to do when i have to start paying for i/f treatments. i'll have to learn self-restraint. what's funny, is that my area of psych research is on delay of gratification. i'm a prime example of what not to do.

ah... tuesday

supertuesday, in fact. have you voted? i hope so! (then again, some of you can't) so exciting... i'm in the fortunate position to have to choose between two decent candidates. such a rare treat.

mil and i have given this month the old college try. maybe life will surprise me, but for some reason i tend to doubt it. i've already bought a new box of tampons, so clearly my hopes are low. i think if mil were able, i'd start this i/f treatment stuff right now. but, alas, he's still knee-deep in biochemistry books.

based on my imperfect memory, i'd guess i'm on cd 21... about 6-8 dpo. on day 14, i started taking some lh tests, and since they were just getting lighter and lighter, i decided to take my temperature to discover that i'd already ovulated. yay! fortunately, mil and i had been taking care of business earlier in the week just in case. if you can't tell, i'll probably be cracking open that cbefm again next month... enough of this taking it easy, i want to get pregnant d*mmit! (oh, and just to make matters more annoying, i got a call from a close family friend who got married a year after us -- she's pregnant! yay! ...grumble.)

chirp

my little twirp. as annoying as she can be when i'm trying to make dinner, the tick-tick-tick of izzy's little toes on the wood floor melt my heart.

a vibrant shade of green

so, we all know the feeling. it's happened to every one of us... the call from a best friend, a sister, or a sister-in-law. on the phone last night, my brother muttered under his breath "[s-i-l]'s pregnant." i had been waiting for it. my s-i-l was pregnant a few months ago, and sadly, it didn't last. i tried my best to sound excited for them... knowing that they were having mixed emotions as well (happy about the pregnancy, but fearing it wouldn't last). they don't know that mil and i have been trying for over a year, but my brother detected the sadness in my voice. i didn't explain. i said i was tired.

somehow this time hurts more than last time... i don't know if it's because we are now officially infertile... or because my mom isn't around to comfort me. last night i was a mess of emotions... anger, sadness, self-pity. mil tried to make me feel better, but nothing can take the place of having my own child. it just seems so f***ing unfair. why does my 100 lb. (5'10"), big-busted, breastfeeding s-i-l get to get pregnant? why can't it be me? i've never really smoked or drank or slept around...

what makes me so upset is that i don't want to be jealous. i want to be genuinely happy for my brother and his wife. i know that my brother needs some of that support that he lost with my mom. i've never been the envious type before. i've always been happy with my lot in life, knowing that i've been incredibly blessed by my family and friends. for some reason this i/f thing is knocking loose my sense of self-satisfaction... and i feel like that is making it hard for me to be the kind of person i want to be.

coffee!!!

so, i admit it, i'm a coffee drinker. i don't quite know how i'd survive the work day without my first cup of joe (though odds are "face down on the keyboard"). i was reading one of my favorite i.f. blogs, and it mentioned this lovely little article about caffeine increasing a woman's risk for miscarriage. i have to say, i hate these articles. one day you read about how a little caffeine won't hurt you and the next you read how 10 ounces of coffee can double your risk of miscarriage... huh!?!

i actually loved this quote from Dr. Carolyn Westhoff in the article: “Just interviewing women, over half of whom had already had their
miscarriage, does not strike me as the best way to get at the real
scientific question here,” she said. “But it is an excellent way to
scare women.”

personally, i tried decaf coffee for a while when we first started trying to make a baby, but given that it did little to alleviate the face-down-on-the-keyboard syndrome, i went back to my wanton ways... i now try to limit myself to a small cup of regular coffee, once a day. what about you guys? any other vices that you resumed after trying for far too long? (i want some company here...)

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here she comes again

well, to be precise, she already came. a couple of days "late" -- but here nonetheless. my cycle seems to be a little less predictable than it was a couple of months ago. it had always been 28 days on the dot, but now it seems to be closer to 30-31 days. the cramps had me well prepared, but no matter how ridiculous it seems, being even an hour late brings a hint of hope. all of my typical pms symptoms were there, but the lack of af birthed a little voice... a little voice that said "maybe." well, af shut her up. thank you.

in addition to the banner, i've updated the little "about us" section and added a few links to the sidebar. i'm eager to do more... my creativity needs an outlet, but i have yet to figure out what that would be.

i realized that there are a couple of non-ttc/if things that are happening in my life that might be of some remote interest. 1) i registered for a photography course. i am very excited, but somewhat annoyed because i ordered the class textbook yesterday, and today i received an email that they had told us the wrong book. urgh! other than that though... i can't wait to improve my photography skills. maybe it will even lead to a new, more exciting career... who knows? 2) we might have found a place to live! this is far more thrilling than the photography class. we've been looking for a 2 bedroom apt since last july, but we had been looking in brooklyn (makes sense since that's where mil's med school is). well, last week we decided that brooklyn is nice and all, but far too expensive for the market. we should pay more and live in manhattan! well, it wasn't exactly that... it's a much longer, more revealing story i'm not quite ready to tell. but the bottom line is that it seems like it will happen, and it has a washer/dryer! i know, i know, such luxury!

mmm... cramps

so, even though i'm not tracking my cycle in the traditional charting sort of way, we did make an attempt to get pregnant this month. we were in houston, and since my brain was in aruba, i completely forgot all of my usual... ehum... simulants... of the mucus kind. in november i had bought a package of preseed that has yet to be opened, and i have a huge jar of evening primrose oil... not to mention the fertile aid cm pills i had been popping at mid-cycle. all were left neatly stored in new york while we were trying valiantly in houston. whether that had anything to do with the fact that i am feeling decidedly pms-y cramps today (um, two weeks later) or not is another story. i don't think i have much more of this "chill... let's see what happens" approach in me. fortunately, i'm due for a gyn check-up in a couple of months, so maybe that will coincide with my giving in to medical intervention. i sure am tired of old a.f... though i guess i'm glad she still comes on a relatively consistent basis.

btw, did you recognize any of my little toy munchkins... like the sad uterus monster?

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