on gender - or is it sex?

The news is in!

yup, it's a girl!

Tireegal, Tireegal, where have you been?

It's been a humdrum kind of time - which when you have been on the roller-coaster I have recently is sort of a welcome lull.
So far things are all quiet on the uterine front. ( Thank you, thank you Higher Powers, Goddesses and Deities!) I had to have a bit of a talk to my ob practice ( namely the doctor in charge) after my little drama in L and D. No-one followed up on me after my level two ultra-sound and I had to go in after our weekend away and demand some answers - or at least some acknowledgment that there might be a problem, Huston. The midwife didn't bother to call me; I got to call and talk to her nurse just before we went on our weekend to Michigan, who told me she thought I should just take it easy and come back in a month. The Monday after I got back I was so worried and freaked out and feeling completely neglected and invisible that I called them up and told them the problem. I got to talk to the head OBs nurse and she told me to come in right away, which I did. I then proceeded to tell her that I had not gotten the follow up or advice I needed, that it took me forever to get pregnant and had taken a huge emotional, psychological and financial toll on me, and please could I get some answers? She was sympathetic and proactive and I did finally get to see the doctor, who gave me an apology of sorts for not following up with me after my fun bleeding episode. He examined me - declared me okay for now, and promised to do more follow up - more ultra-sound and more monitoring of the situation. He told me I will be having a c-section almost for sure and I can see the midwives but I have to see him. At this point I am kind of pissed at the midwives. I have barely seen them and each time has been rushed. And the one who sent me to L and D didn't even bother to call and see how I was. Maybe that's just their protocol - maybe I was asking for too much, but I am still kind of pissed. So I have a midwife appointment on Thursday which I will probably go to so I can get the wholistic treatment and then after my second level two ultrasound on Monday 14th ( where we hope to find out the sex of the baby) I go back to see the doc again. When I saw him two weeks ago at 17 weeks I was measuring 24 weeks because of my big ass fibroid. I am of the conviction that I should not be making any plans after the beginning of September - just in case. He told me of the risks and signs of pre-term labor - which I will be prone to - and sent me on my merry way.

In other news: Susan and I have been busy planning our wedding which is July 17th at our very crunchy, funky, liberal UCC church. It is going to be a simple affair ( I know, that's what they all say) and the most planning that is going into it is the actual service itself - as Susan is studying to be a minister she has a good handle on it - and picking the music, readings, etc etc. Neither of us knows what we are going to wear. No it won't be white dresses either. We know what we will be serving ( tea with sandwiches, scones and cookies - prepared by S, my nieces and I ) and a wedding cake made by my baking aficionado niece C. The biggest issues are: how will we keep it all cool with only one fridge at the church (answer; coolers) how will people survive in the un -airconditioned sanctuary ( answer: colorful paper fans provided by us and a liberal supply of water) and yes, what will we wear? ( answer: we dont' know!) We have some ideas for rings: did you know that if you google "rings" you get one price and if you google "wedding rings' you get another one about 5 x higher? We are going to get silver rings probably with a celtic design. Not posh or expensive. We are not sure what to have engraved inside. As my fingers are beginning to swell I am a bit concerned about what size to get - esp as at some point the ring will be too big for me! We still have to write our vows. So far 61 people say they are coming out of a possible 150 and 50 have not responded. We decided on the date at the last minute and lots of people are going out of town. I am really excited to be getting married after almost twelve years and it's such fun planning it with S. Yes, I know that's a cliche! And no, it's not legal either. But we aren't letting that stop us. Maybe we will run off to Iowa or DC one of these days to get a piece of paper recognized in about 6 or 7 states? Who knows?

In Blogland: I have been reading all of you on my blogroll - but I tend to do it late at night on the couch with my I-phone. Hence my pitiful lack of commenting. I am glad that you are all still there -and to those of my sisters in the muddy TTC trenches of this journey, I hold my breath as I read your posts and pray you don't disappear off the blogosphere, even though you are discouraged and spent and I have no right to make such demands on you. I value you so much and I wish that we could sit around with cups of tea and other fun beverages and share in a big fun messy comfortable circle of friends.

In animal news: The kitties still don't have homes and after conferring with the local stray / feral cat people we decided to let them all out again. They love their territory and apparently it's rarely successful re-locating cats like these who are so rooted to their place. We are still hoping to find indoor / outdoor homes for the two lovers Blackie and Sidekick - who still come in and out, and Mama Cass who makes an appearance when she feels like it. We think Twinkletoes would be a great pet and of course Georgia Peach -who is so so shy you can't really get close. But others don't think so and the shelters are over-run with cats and dogs that are victims of foreclosures. The cat shelter told us the cats would do really badly in a shelter and the most humane thing would be to leave them where they are. We were so close to finding a home for Blackie and Sidekick but the couple who came to see them felt that they hadn't "bonded with them" enough in their short visit. I was heartbroken. We still feed the cats and provide them with shelter and water. We still say hi to them when they are sunning themselves in the garden. We are still their guardians. And the dogs; well they are 13 and a half and slowing down a lot. Both of them have had upset stomachs for the few weeks or so and the usual medicine is not helping. I am taking them to the vets for their yearly shots next weekend and hoping to get some ideas for healing their tummies. They have been doing so well on a special and expensive diet for about a year, but currently Ollie is refusing food a lot and is favoring chicken and rice on his own schedule.

Okay, this is getting long, boring and rambly...

Good-night all,
TG:)

holding steady (or medical intervention all the way on this pregnancy)

Thanks so much for all of your lovely comments and concerns. Here's the scooparooney.
We had the ultrasound yesterday and Womble was doing fine. Wiggling around and being cute. Weighing about 8 oz!
The verdict seems to be the fibroid is irritating my uterus and maybe breaking down sending funny hormones around and getting my ute in a tizzy.
The doc at the ultrasound place did not seem too fazed by it. Neither did the doc who is in the midwives practice that was on call while I was at the hospital.
I have to go back after my anatomy scan on June 19th and see the doc - instead of the nurse midwives and talk C-section. The fibroid is right above my cervix -hasn't budged or got smaller. No way out for baby that way unless something moves.
Hmm.... I might be selling all the natural childbirth books I diligently bought but have not read!
Doctor's orders:No strenuous exercise, no pre-natal yoga, take it easy. ( ho hum that will be hard!)
Still a tiny bit of pink showing otherwise cramps and bleeding gone.
We are heading to Michigan to a B and B for a much needed break this weekend. Wish it was longer. I am so glad to get out of town, spend some much needed time with my sweetie - who passed her interview with flying colors - yeah!
Thanks so much to all of you for worrying about me:)
I will be off line but checking my i phone this weekend and will catch up on blogging next week:)

Cramping and bleeding in L and D with update*

Yup, just when all was going smoothly I end up bleeding and driving myself to Labor and Delivery.
Driving home early from work to meet the engineer and the plumber I felt a bit crampy, when I got out if my car I felt damp and when I got to the bathroom there was blood covering my undies and my pants. Commence calm panic while giving instructions to the engineer who arrived as I was running through the house knickerless!
I called the midwife who told me to come to the hospital L and D department and check myself in.
I got here fast and Susan zoomed the twenty plus miles from work to get here just in time to see an ultrasound of my nicely closed cervix but too late to see the happy go lucky wiggly baby doing the fandango in the uterus.
The verdict: inconclusive. It could be my fibroid which is low and near my cervix, it could be th remainder of the subchorionic hemotoma.
I get a thorough wanding as well as the regular ultrasounds. They decide to monitor me: it turns out I'm have some contractions. They're about to put me on pelvic rest and send me home when I feel more bleeding. So I'm still stuck here while they decide what to do. Breathe breathe breathe.
Guess I won't be going to pre-natal yoga tomorrow after all.
We're waiting to find out the verdict.
Breathe breathe breathe.

* update:
they sent us home after a few hours with an order for an ultrasound in fetal diagnostics today. I had some more cramping and bleeding last night but the bleeding has now stopped. Still feeling a bit crampy. I'm waiting for Susan to come home to take me to the appointment at 1pm. She has one of the most important interviews of her new career - to get into "in care status" with the local UCC conference. It's really hard to get an interview and she wouldn't have been able to get one til fall - so I'm like, GO! She needs to be "in care" for two years before she can be ordained - so it's a big ass deal esp. with timing her career change. Go Susie, go Susie!

Who's the father? Or A little distraction for Mothers' day...

Yes, I finally got asked the million dollar question today. It came from a very nice, very intelligent engineer guy who has been master-minding the solution to the insidious basement seepage that had made our floors buckle and our wallets groan.
He's been over to our house the past three Saturdays for whole mornings, over-seeing the rodding of our sewers, cleaning of our catch basin and most recently spearheading the discovery of a crack in our foundation. Next Saturday he and the plumber will be here all day digging a big hole under our laundry closet down to the sewer to fix a broken pipe that caused the damp in our kitchen ( or we hope that it is the cause!)
I was talking about how we had a lot going on and were trying to get our house in order, and errrm, I am errm pregnant. He looked surprised but interested and said:
"Oh, wow, you're pregnant?"
Then without skipping a beat:
"So who's the father?"
Me: errm, we have a donor. An anonymous donor.
Him: oh, interesting
Me: well, you know, Susan has a low sperm count
Him: oh yeah, chuckle!

That was it - I walked away back into the kitchen and it was business as usual.
I kept playing the whole thing over in my head. How did that happen so fast? It seemed to go okay. I thought I was kind of funny. Wow, he didn't have any qualms about asking that question. He's seen us together the past three weeks - he must know we are a couple....hmmm.hmmm....weird!!!

Now for the question that's really going to be priceless:
How will I respond when it's one of my clients who asks?

Heartbroken - none baby related

I don't have the emotional energy to tell the whole story now, but we have been fostering / sheltering some neighborhood stray / feral cats ( all sweet, non -aggressive but very shy) and we've been trying to find homes for them so they can ditch their outside lifestyle for something more comfortable and permanent. Here are the kitties.
We housed them in our back bedroom over the winter ( and they were free to come and go when the weather improved) and were optimistic about finding them homes this spring. Well you know it's kitten season, everyone is getting foreclosed on and giving up their pets, and our cats aren't what you would call "desirable" in the  adoption world.

We have tried and tried to find them  suitable loving and understanding homes and even had two visits this weekend  with prospective adopters, and each ended up with  a heartbreaking and resounding NO.
We consulted the local shelter who said they would do terribly in a shelter and be way stressed; relocating to a farm would be cruel as it's taking them out of their own environment and they often get lost or disappear and don't return.

They need a house with a cat door and a yard and someone to love them forever.  We happened on this whole thing by accident and  our teeny "spare" room was overtaken with  sweet and funny cats,  litter-boxes and fur-balls and S is allergic and we need somewhere to be at least half a baby room. And our two dogs want to eat them. I never planned to have cats. I love them but because of S's allergies it was out of the question. They  showed up under the neighbors porch two years ago and I started feeding them and spayed / neutered them, provided them with heated shelters,  cared for a litter of kittens that they had, found the kittens  homes and gradually these adult cats started hanging around more and wanting to be with us and bond with us.

I have become so attached to them. I have been sobbing for three days at the thought that the only solution ( according to the feral cat lady at the local shelter ) is to acclimatize them back to being permanent outdoor cats with shelters and heated bowls and the perils of crossing the roads and having to fight for territory with big- ass big- balled strays  and neighborhood bully cats.
If you read this and feel you could give one or more of them a home, I will drive any of them up to 500 miles to get to you ( isn't that a song?)
I know it's a long shot. And if you can't do anything, please send happy home vibes their way.
Thank you:)

What if?

This post is a part of  National Infertility Awareness Week (April 24th–May 1st) and an awe inspiring joint venture between Melissa and Resolve.

Read about Infertility here.

It's called Project If  and there you will find the original What If's as well as the posts written in response to them here.


So I couldn't think of a What If, because to tell the truth I feel so lucky and surprised to be pregnant it's hard to go to the land of what if right now. Except when I wonder every day - what if my baby's heart has stopped beating? That's the biggest what if in my conscious mind.  And it happens over and over every day. I even rehearse the bad sad posts in my head because I am convinced  that one day this will all be over. So yeah, I am not so happy go lucky as I would like these days

After my 14 week unscheduled visit to my midwife ( because of a fall I had while walking my dogs - and spying gang bangers - ) and hearing the hearbeat at 148 BPM I am feeling a little reassured.

So I didn't know what to write my What If about. And then last night I had the weirdest dream.

It involved our sperm donor, our egg donor and our  remaining embryos. The What If was one of those greedy what if's that only people with one child are lucky enough to have. Yes, I'm ahead of the game. It was what if this baby that is growing inside me is the only one we ever have. Yes, I know that seems ungrateful to me and it certainly seems ungrateful if you are one of the hundreds of thousands ( and probably more) women struggling to have even one baby. But this is how my dreaming subconscious showed it to me:

(Insert funky dream music here)

The  Big Business Fertility Clinic told us that of the remaining  five embryos that we were hoping to use to conceive baby number two,  two had been thawed wrong ( and they mumbled something about not reading the instructions properly - WHAT?!!!!) And the three left didn't look promising. We could put them all back or try for another cycle with our donor.

The egg donor was in a room at the clinic and we were begging her to donate again because the remaining embryos didn't look good. She said she was scared to and that last time the people at the clinic had not treated her very well and been very blase about med doses and basically asked her what SHE thought was a good dose. 

The sperm donor had  gotten hold of our bank account number and had deposited twenty Euros into our account just to let us know that he could and to mess with our heads.

We were beside ourselves......

When I  woke up this morning and told Susan about my dream I had no idea what it meant.  And I am not one of those people who goes around interpreting my dreams. But then I looked at the three scenarios and realized what I thought it was all about.

In all three scenarios we were not in control -  yes, there was a semblance of control in that we could say we had five embryos ( which the clinic interfered with) we had an egg donor ( who the clinic had treated badly) and a sperm donor ( who was playing games with us). But how much control did we really have and how much do we have? Not a whole lot. And that, dear readers, is how the vast majority of us IFers live our lives. Bargaining with God, praying for good news, reaching out for that inevitable next plan and next addictive morsel of hope that comes with the plan. Not in a whole lot of control. The only control, I venture to say, is the kind of control that comes with letting go and knowing that our reaction  to disappointment, loss, heartbreak is the only thing we can control. Or that's what we like to believe.

The decision to use donor eggs came out of a wish for some kind of control. I wanted those embryos in my body, I didn't want to be at the mercy of the whims of first parents who might not pick us ( I mean, who would?) or social service departments nosing in our business and saying our house was too small or too untidy or too below ground! I wanted some say. Even if it was just in picking donors that we liked and felt some kinship with. Some people call this buying a baby. I do not.

By some fluke I had excellent insurance which would cover most of the procedures if not the eggs and sperm or freezing. It was the quickest, least costly way to our baby - and the one with the highest chance of success.  And so far it has worked. My fantasy of having some kind of control has almost born fruit. I have a baby inside me with  a beating heart and the usual number of limbs and organs. But my dream showed me how little control I really have, how many things can ( and have ) gone wrong and how fragile this life inside me is.

And because I don't know what else to do, I pray everyday that this little one inside me knows how to go on living and breathing despite my worry and despite the fact that I can't control much about this whole experience. I can eat, exercise, take deep breaths, stay off of high buildings and hope that the love I feel for this baby will keep her safe.

What if my baby is born well and she is  beautiful and we are the happiest parents alive? And what if, when the time is right, we have another one?