unquestionable love

So I guess it's not really madness. I can't complain too much about the s/e that I get from Clomid.

What I can complain about, though, is bleeding. Yes, folks. I'm stii..ii...ll..lll... bleeding. 21 days. J has always had this stupid joke that he doesn't trust anything that bleeds for 5 days and doesn't die, ie WOMEN. Yeah, that's just him being facetious. But I'm starting to wonder. I kind of don't even trust something that bleeds for 21 days straight and doesn't die! And it's friggin' ME!

Anyway, moving on. So I am relieved to be starting Clomid again tonight. It feels good to be moving on. I'm nervous that my body is all screwey, but as long as the bleeding has ceased by another day or two, it'll be fine. After all, on a normal cycle, I start my Clomid on CD3 and I'm still bleeding. So that's no biggie. But I'll be glad to make it to my u/s and I'll be elated to see actual follies.

In other fun news, when I picked up my Rx this evening, the pharmacist had to come over because there was a note on my account that they can't get the trigger shot. Big surprise. But she came over to try to straighten things out (which ended up working out fine because I knew that the other pharmacist across town always kept a supply for me and the ONE other infertile lady in this city, so she got it from him for me..yay!) and asked how I like my RE. I figured it was just casual conversation, but I said that I love him and his entire staff and she said that she used him. I had a pretty lengthy conversation with her and she was really sweet. Plus, she now has 4 kids. 1 from IUI, twins from IVF and a little surprise. She wished me luck and was really just endearing. It always feels nice to talk to someone who "gets" it. Plus, this cycle just HAS to work since the entire universe seems to be out of the trigger shot. It feels like my last chance!

I also got lots of vitamins today. $60 later, I am stocked up on all of the following:
L-Arginine
Folic Acid
Vitamin E
Vitamin C
Green Tea
Chasteberry

Though I am hearing contradicting reports about how much or what I should take. I have read a lot about L-Arginine, so I am going to stick to that. Plus the Folic and the Vitamin E & C are fine, I'm sure. I may hold off on the Chasteberry and Green Tea until I talk to my RE.

Finally, I am proud to say that I have lost a smidgeon of weight. But best of all, I did 3 miles tonight and felt great! I used to run a few miles at a time with no problem, but that was, oh, probably 40 pounds ago. So I am happy to report that I am up to running 3/4 of a mile all at once. Tonight, I kept up a constant run & walk switch-off even after my 3/4 mile, so I feel pretty good. I have about 2 pounds to get over my BIG hurdle. 2 pounds. I feel like once I get those 2 lbs. off, things will take a turn for the better in terms of how my clothes fit and being able to tell that I have lost like 15 pounds.

That's pretty much all I've got. As if it isn't enough.

(WARNING: This will be long.)

I do. For sure. I've had 2 pretty telling experiences with a psychic. Not the kind of psychic that you have to weave in and out through beaded doorways and go underground to get to. The 2, and now a third as of last night, psychics that I have had interesting experiences were just people that I happened to know or meet, and with the one especially, the conversation came up and I found out that she can read palms, see dead people, and see auras around people. W.E.I.R.D., let me tell you.

And actually, she hates to have people find out about it, but after several drinks during a conference in December, and on the Odyssey Cruise ship in Chicago, I looked down the table and she was reading someone's palm. So that got us on the conversation and when asked about how she learned how to do this, someone at the table jokingly said, "You learned it at Community College, didn't you?" (In a group of University Advancement professionals, he was trying to be funny.) But I said, "No, you learned it from your grandmother, didn't you?" Which was right. I don't know how I knew that, I just had that feeling that it was an inherited thing.

Sooo anyway, come to find out, she hates talking about it and tries not to tell people. But like I said, several free drinks later, and we all probably talk about things we don't want to. So when she did my reading, she said that my husband adores me and we will have a very happy life and an amazing marriage. BUT she said that it would be 3 years before I would have a baby (she didn't know much about my IF struggles) and that I would have 1 little girl. WHAT?!?! No. I want a baby NOW and I want more than 1! SO that was a hard night. But she also said that I had a red aura, which was shining really unusually bright. Red is the color of love and she said that I have a lot of love and support and happiness beaming from me. True, except for the IF stuff. But I just told myself that you don't live your life by what they say and that it was interesting, etc. She also heard from my dead great grandmother and was SPOT on. (She knew that she was hispanic and didn't speak good English and Grandma Ma said that I was going to be just FINE and that I would never have to worry about money or having enough food...something that she did have to worry about...and that my baby girl was going to be the light of my life and she would make me so proud.)

So I have never blogged about this because I still keep hope that it won't be 3 years and maybe she was a little off about that. I get all of the other stuff, but I think I will seriously be in a psych ward if I have to wait another 2 1/2 years! It's almost been 2 already.

So, to continue my novel, last night I was talking to my sister about my HSG. She had lunch yesterday with a friend who has dreams and premonitions and gets feelings about stuff. I had NO clue that she had these abilities and I don't think my sister did either. But yesterday, my sister was telling A about a dream that she had, where I had a little girl with blonde curly hair and our cousin, who is pg right now, brought her baby home from the hospital. So my sister said that she knows I'm going to have a girl with curly hair. A tells her that yes, I will have a girl with curly hair, but that I need not waste my money this year because it's not going to happen. WHAT?!?! It's just a feeling that she has, but she said that it just isn't going to happen this year and she thinks J and I should save our money.

Now what?! I certainly am not going to put things off or cancel treatment, but it seems like this is the message that I'm being told over and over. I am truly not sure that I will be able to handle much longer of this pressure. Aaaahhh. I certainly don't know whether I fully believe all of this is true, but I know that these 2 women have these abilities and they are good people. I know that they wouldn't say things to hurt anyone or anything. But I told my sister that I want her to get A to sit down with us and tell us some other stuff! We'll see how that goes.

Enough for today's crystal ball. I just thought that was interesting, and in 2 1/2 years I may be blogging about how both of those ladies were right, only I'll be blogging from a psychiatric hospital somewhere instead of from my office.

My 2nd, follow-up, HSG was this morning. Basically, it was just to check that my uterus was the correct shape and the entire septum was removed during my surgery and that nothing has since blocked my tubes. It came out perfectly. Thank heavens.

I felt like it hurt less this time and I chose a little tiny circle on the ceiling and breathed in and out while focusing on that. I think all of this Wii Fit yoga is really helping things! It certainly did not tickle, but I think the pain was far less horrific than last time. And my RE was laughing at me because he asked me if I could relax my butt a little while he was positioning things. My response: a resounding "NO." He said he didn't think he'd ever had a flat-out "no" before. Some people say they are trying or they actuallly do, but I just couldn't do it. I was so tense from the buildup (which included waiting for nearly 2 hours) and the anticipation of the pain.

I felt like an old pro because there were 3 other girls all waiting with me to get theirs done and I was the only one who had had one before. They all kept asking different questions and I couldn't lie and tell them it didn't hurt but after I came out, I gave them my suggestion of focusing on the ceiling. I think it really helped. It was actually really nice to have the time to sit and talk to them about their journeys and just have that unspoken camaraderie that just isn't found with people IRL. One girl, as it turns out, even works for the same University as I do, and funny enough, she is in HR for my father in-law's department and was in the process that helped to hire him on. She was talking about how much she loved him and how he's so great and it was all just really weird since our RE's office is an hour's drive south. So I gave her my card and we're going to try to grab lunch sometime.

Anyway, I'm glad to have that overwith. Now, I'm off the BCP and will start Clomid in 5 days again. Yay!!

...is to vent and/or say things that you might not be able to say to people IRL, right?

Okay. Good.

So I have had this on my mind for a few days and I need to figure out how to approach it. So natch, I need to blog it out, so to speak. As you may know if you've read this blog for any length of time, my BIL and SIL are pg. They are coming home (they're from Boston, we're in IN) on the 4th for a last visit before they have the baby and so we are planning a small shower for her. It's my idea and I'm actually patting myself on the back pretty much daily because they weren't the most gentle people when it came to telling us about their pgcy. Plus, she hated kids up until the day she got pg and said for their entire marriage that she did not want kids. But whatever. I'm getting off track. So my MIL and I start talking about the shower and then we have this conversation:

MIL: Okay, so I have a gift for you. You need to let
me know if you want it when J & L are here or if you'd rather have it
now.

Me: Why do I have to decide that?

MIL: Because I don't want it to upset you or get you
depressed. (Read: I'm giving you something baby related even though you
aren't currently, and may never be, pregnant.)

Okay. So here's the dilemma: how do I approach her about not wanting to receive the gift at all? I have a sneaking suspicion that said gift is something sentimental, like a onesie that J wore when he was a baby, and I assume that she wants to give us one and BIL&Co. one. I think it's amazing that she saved things like this. I think it's exciting. But I don't want that gift or any one like it. Not until it is OUR time. Plus, I feel like this is J&L's time. Their special and amazing time. Not ours. I know that MIL doesn't want us to feel left out, but the fact of the matter is we are left out. And it's going to hurt a helluva lot more if I have to one day give those things back because we're never able to have a baby of our own. Plus, I do want to save some fun things like that for if/when I am pregnant and have a shower of my own.

I just don't know how to approach it without severely hurting her feelings. Or sounding ungrateful. I'm really working on this grace thing. I don't know if I've blogged about that, maybe another time. But I'm working on handling things with grace in a way that I won't be ashamed of in the future. And I don't want the people around me to think that I am this uberhateful bitch. Some days are certainly better than others. But the point is that I don't want to hurt MIL's feelings because I know that she is doing it out of a kind and sweet place. I'm stuck...

I had a late morning dream today. You know, one of those that you have in the 5 minutes between your alarm going off and actually waking up. Where it seems so real but then you wake up and can't figure out what the hell just happened. Yeah, I had one of those. All I remember is that it involved me walking into the bathroom and J putting on my pantyhose. (!!!) He said he had to dress up and wasn't sure how formal it had to be. Then he was putting socks on and going to put pants on. He was ripping my hose because he was too tall and I ripped them off of him and pinched him really hard.

I am sure that a dream analyst would have a field day with that one!

For the record, NO I don't think my husband has feminine tendencies. I think it has to do with him going away this evening and he was packing last night and fretting over what to wear. One of the things that I always fret about when I have a big meeting like he does is whether or not to wear pantyhose with my suits. So there. That's where it comes from. I think.

I'm sad today. First of all, it's gloomy and rainy and storming, so that never helps things. But mostly, I'm down in the dumps and wollering in self pity for another reason. You see, I work at a large University and the Day on Campus is happening where all of the incoming freshman come with their parents and get their e-mail accounts set up, take tours of campus, see the buildings that they'll have classes in, etc. It's so cute to see all of these wide-eyed kids, fresh out of high school, usually with either a map opened and a look of being lost or standing next to their parents who are holding a map while the kid snarls at how totally annoying their parents are being. It's just cute.

So why am I sad? I guess pretty much, I'm sad because I never had that. My parents weren't involved. They didn't take part in things like that. The most they really did was offer up their W-2's so that I could fill out my financial aid forms by myself (or with a little help from my grandma). So seeing all of these students with their parents all proud and excited is a little bit of a sting, but then I get to thinking about these parents and how they are probably just so nervous and excited and...well, just proud! I heard one mom say that they were all done for the day, but she wanted to just drive by the health clinic so that her son knows where it is...just in case! And what stings more than the fact that I didn't get to be "that" student with the involved and supportive parents is that I am nervous that I will never have the opportunity to be "that" parent. It's what I want more than anything and lately I can't help myself from thinking like this. Will I ever get a day on campus with my kids? Will I ever get to worry about what color to paint the now-bare and empty nursery? Will I ever get to plan kid-friendly vacations? To plan birthday parties? I'm just not sure and today, maybe because of the rain or the reminder of what I didn't have as a kid, I am sad.

I saw this over at Lawyers Do Not Eat Their Young and I am in amazement!! Crazy. Not at all what I thought a follie OR an egg actually looked like. But interesting, indeed!

I'm so sad. My husband goes to every appointment that we have. EVERY one. I don't know why and I know it isn't necessary, but I really appreciate the company and the support. I think it's sweet. And I have gotten used to it. So we found out last week that he has to travel to Milwaukee during my HSG next week and I am really bummed out. Everything hurts a smidge less when he's holding my hand. It didn't even occur to either of us until the other night and we both kind of realized it at the same time. He's sad, too.

I think I might have to have my sister go with me. :) I need someone to baby me and she's good at that, too.

Spoke with the nurse and we are (sort of) back to square 1. I started BCP 2 nights ago (which, by the way, just feels so ironic) and will have another HSG on the 18th. I will stop the pills on the 17th, triggering AF and will start Clomid again 3 days after my HSG. Then we will proceed with the IUI as scheduled. I guess I feel good about this, especially since we're just postponing things by about 2 weeks instead of by a whole month. Plus, I'm hoping that the HSG will do wonders like it has for some and that we will be lucky in those 3 months following the HSG.

AF was here in full force again yesterday. It sucked. We went to a baseball game for J's birthday and I made like 700 trips to the bathroom and went through what seemed like 4,000 heavy duty pads. I'm sure the people around us thought that I had the runs (and not the baseball kind of runs!).

BUT, the good news of the day was that we were actually *really* lucky.

• First, they called for an 80% chance of rain. We took the gamble and drove the hour to Indy, ate at Red Robin (one of J's favorites) and then headed to the game and the weather was GORGEOUS. We both got a little too much sun. Then they won 1/2 way through the 9th inning and the rain clouds rolled in. They waited for us!
• Also, as we were walking in, this girl comes up and asks if we already have tickets. We didn't yet and she gave us 2 free! They are only $13 each, but it basically paid for our beer! And the seats were awesome because she had won them, so we were right on the 3rd base line behind the dugout.
• Then J caught a ball! He gave it to the little girl that was with the lady who gave us the free tickets, though. It was the least we could do.
• Finally, we were on the Kiss Cam!!

All that good luck, and we decided to get some lottery tickets! Too bad I wasn't around O time, otherwise we could have tried our luck there, too. I'll be sure to shout it to the world if I am the winner of a cool mil from those lottery tickets!