Certainly Uncertain

You would think that after five years of infertility I would be used to uncertainty.  In fact, I was used to uncertainty – uncertainty about whether or not we would have a child.  Once that was resolved, it didn’t occur to me that uncertainty would most certainly once again be part of my life.  Silly girl!

Of course, Rex is a constant source of uncertainty for me.  Each “wwwwwwwwaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh!” raises the usual questions.  Is he tired? Hungry? Cold? Hot? Bored?  Not one to make it easy, he of course provides few to no clues as to the source of his angst and instead ramps up the crying as if to say, “Schnell, woman! My needs, they must be met! Now!”  If I’m really missing the clues and not responding correctly to his desires, he shrieks.  I seriously question sometimes the wisdom of evolution in making infants the most annoying at the time that they are most dependent upon their caregivers.

Then there are the questions about whether he eats too much, sleeps too little and gets enough tummy time, interaction, fresh air, SAT preparation, and Mozart (kidding on those last two, but not really).  I wonder when I should start trying to get him on a sleep schedule and whether it is a pipe dream to even hope that he might sleep for six hour stretches at night by the time he’s three months old.

Unfortunately, Rex does not corner the market on uncertainty in our lives right now.  Mr. X’s employer has seen to that.  The day after Mr. X went back to work after Rex was born, Big Company informed him that it was going to transfer him (and by extension, us) to a small city about four hours from here.  Away from family and Big Company’s fabulously awesome daycare center and our friends and a decent airport, etc.   I was shocked, but not surprised – we knew that this day would come and the location could have been a lot, lot worse (think town with a population of 2,000 people).  I came to terms with it and we started talking about when we would have to put the house on the market.

Then, they mixed it up – now the assignment was temporary to permanent meaning we couldn’t even sell our current house or buy a new house – we’d be in limbo for six months.  Hopefully, we can push back on this particular part of it because what’s the point of making it temporary to permanent if you know that it’s going to be permanent?! Just make it permanent from the outset and we’ll all be a lot happier.

As with all drama we’ve had in our lives in the past, we’ll get through this too.  But, that doesn’t mean I won’t complain till the cows come home about it.

Delivered

First, thank you so much to everyone for your lovely wishes of good luck on my delivery.  It was so wonderful to read all of your messages!

We arrived promptly at 5am on St. Patrick’s Day, with no expectations of what was about to happen. You can read as much as you want in a book, but the experience is uniquely personal.

I was  hooked up to the pitocin drip by about 6am (after a really nasty round with the IV insertion) and didn’t really get much in the way of contractions. My OB arrived at 9am to break my water and jokingly said that she was going to wipe the smile off my face.  She was so not kidding. Having my water broken was easily more painful than anything I dealt with in all of my infertility treatments.  I was coming off the bed in pain.  The pain then triggered a nice crying fit.

Once she managed to nicely wipe the smile off my face, my contractions came on very strong and very fast which really surprised me.  I was in constant pain it seemed. They kept asking me if I wanted my epidural (which I ordered ahead of time – I knew I would want one and once I did, I would not want to wait) and I said no.  I wanted to get a good idea of how I could handle them.  After an hour, I knew I was done and wanted my epidural.  I decided that I had experienced enough to know what they felt like but I didn’t need any more.  Once I had the epidural, though, all was right with the world.

It also managed to speed up my progress – in one hour, I went from 2cm to 9cm.  I thought my nurse was crazy when she told me.  I quickly progressed to the full 10 cm, but unfortunately, Little B was still up pretty high (-1 station).  After being at 10cm for about 2 hours, my OB called and instructed that they had me start to push.  I pushed for an hour and didn’t make any progress.  So, they let me rest for an hour and then we started up again – only, this time, I was put in every conceivable position to push to get him down – truly, the Kama Sutra of Birthing Positions.  After about an hour and a half I managed to get him down and thank goodness for that – I was very close to a c-section.  All of a sudden, there was just a flurry of activity – my OB was getting suited up, Mr. X was holding up my right leg and I was fitted with an oxygen mask to help me get air to Little B while I pushed.

And, Little B was born at 5:59pm! All of a sudden, there was a little alien on my chest looking right at me with beautiful blue eyes and a rather dazed look.  We all wiped him down and I was just overwhelmed.  Mr. X cut the cord and Little B was whisked away to the warmer to be weighed and cleaned.

I, on the other hand, was attacked with a needle and thread by my OB – I managed to get a 2nd degree vaginal tear pushing him out.  They had to give me a boost on my epidural because it hurt so much while she was stitching me up.

So, our little boy arrived in the world in the usual way and is slowly working his way into our hearts.

It’s Time

As we’ve gotten closer to term, I gave some thought to induction but figured that it would only be an option once we get past a due date with no progress.  What I didn’t factor in was the possibility of a not-so-overdue, but rather gargantuan baby.

The estimate from yesterday’s ultrasound was a whopping 8lbs 12 oz.  The doctor did tell me that there is a 20% swing in either direction meaning he could either be on the heavy side of 7lbs or on the really heavy side of 9lbs.  Either way, I say oof.  I may have child-bearing hips, but I don’t know if they are up for the challenge of passing a possibly almost 10 lb bowling ball.  So, we decided to pull the trigger right at 40 weeks before he got any bigger and my chances of a c-section increase.  As it is, my chances are at about 20-30% because of my cervix, which is neither favorable nor unfavorable.

So, tomorrow at 5am, we present ourselves at the hospital for induction.

It’s time.

So Engaging

While we were dining at my parents’ house on Saturday night, I noticed a distinctly different feeling… down there.  Call it pelvic pressure, call it baby breakdancing on my cervix, I had a pretty good idea of what was going on: Little B has begun to make his final descent into My Pelvis Airport.  I had read about lightening, but it was always in that amorphous later portion of pregnancy that I would get to at some unknown point in the future.  That unknown point has apparently arrived.

Of course, this means that we are getting a little bit closer to D-Day, still not knowing exactly when that will be.  The part of me that would like my body back is close to being ready. The rest of me is not.

Still, everytime he sends shockwaves down my hoohah, I imagine some perky flight attendant in my uterus with the on board PA system chirping about tray tables in their upright and locked position and seat backs fully upright.  Hopefully, they also covered the importance of keeping arms and legs inside the cabin at all times during final descent. Otherwise, it could be ugly.

Is This Thing On?

Lots of pregnancy mentions below.

It’s February. Did you know that?  My due date is next month. Next month.  Last summer, March seemed awfully far away, and now, we’re looking at 6 weeks left.

Oof.

We’ve been busy, though.

• I met with both of the other OBs in the practice and found one that I really like.  She’s straightforward and very thorough.  Two of my favorite attributes.  She even got me an u/s which was amazing. I hadn’t seen Little B since 24 weeks and boy has he grown.  He’s measuring 5lbs and at 35 weeks (I was 33w5d at the time).  Fluid levels are good, cervix is 4 cm and shut up like a steel trap.

• We attended childbirth class which was like Lamaze Lite.  We also saw the obligatory childbirth video although it was the non-freak out version especially designed for pregnant ladies.  The other version is the birth control version shown to teenagers with screaming banshee women with no pain relief.  The only screaming in our video was the baby right after it was born.  Probably a good choice for showing to expectant first timers.

• The week after childbirth class, we went to Baby 101 class (not the real name) and learned how to diaper, swaddle, hold and feed a plastic baby who’s head really did go all the way around.  I made that gem of a discovery and almost got into trouble with the instructor.  Mr. X managed to get the diaper on backwards the first time and we both had a good time practicing the football hold.  We also got the tour of labor and delivery.  We are at a brand new hospital and it is really, really nice. Very quiet too, so we’ll hopefully get lots of attention when the time comes.

• Next week we attend a class on how to introduce your baby to your pets.  Like the slackers that they are, though, the animals don’t have to actually attend the class.  We are the ones that have to go and pay attention. They get to stay home and snooze.

• We are slowly working away at the names list.  We decided early on that we did not want to settle on a name before Little B arrives.  We may pick a name and it’s not him at all. So, we have a short list of names that we’ve been trying out these past few weeks.  But, no final decisions until the end.

Basically, we’re doing this whole process in our own way and still, as always, one day at a time.  But, the days are definitely numbered.  41 to be exact.

The 300

According to WordPress, this is my 300th post on this here blog.

Wow.

Who knew I would still be going at 300?  You would have thought that I c0uld have pretty much said it all by now.  Apparently not. 

Am I sorry that there is more to say, that I haven’t reached that point in my journey where I can stop writing about infertility? Not really.  I have a feeling that if Ididn’t write about infertility, I would bitch about something else.  So, why not write about something that’s really important rather than moan about the more trivial aspects of my life?  Wait, I do that, too.  Oh well. It’s my blog, right?

Who knows how many more posts there will be on this here blog.  With my current rate of luck, I suspect there will be plenty more. But, most importantly, I want to thank everyone who has read just one or all 300 of these posts.  I can only imagine how tedious it has been and for that, you deserve 300 toothpicks.

image: justmakeit

Requiem for A Cycle

It was a beautiful spring day today. The sun shone brightly, the trees showed off their new green bling, the geraniums were in full bloom. I started off the day on a professional high after having given a kick-ass presentation yesterday out of town.

By 12:30, I felt the defeat that only infertility can sock you with.

At 11:30, I had my IVF post-mortem with Dr. Salsa.  I had no problem with the clinical details – my E2 levels, number of follicles on any given visit, lining check – all of which were projected onto the wall in a weird sort of Excel spreadsheet.  I could handle the discussion of a new protocol.  I could even handle the discussion of what could have possibly gone wrong such that my two beautiful embryos decided not to hang around. 

What I couldn’t handle was when Dr. Salsa decided to share with me just how unbelievable it was to him that this cycle didn’t work by sharing stats from the clinic:

Of the 13 women, including myself, who cycled in that particular period, 11 – yes, 11 – got pregnant.  I was one of 2 who didn’t.  And, just to drive home his point, he said, “I would have put money that you would not have been one of the two.”

Um, NOT HELPING.

So, let’s recap. Even though I had a pretty perfect cycle with an embyro that made it to the freezer and no apparent risk factors, I managed to be one of 2 out of 13 women who still couldn’t get pregnant.  I already felt awful about the negative. I already felt – rightly or not, that is not the question – like a giant failure with a capital F. I already felt like shit just being there, seeing the financial coordinator who did get knocked up with Dr. Salsa’s brand of IVF.  THIS WAS NOT INFORMATION THAT I NEEDED TO KNOW, AND CERTAINLY NOT NOW. 

Later, when I was home and had spent some time decompressing with the dog, I sent Dr. Salsa an email. I explained that I did not want to know about how everyone else did. I explained that I am an inherently competitive person and in this particular arena, hearing about others did in the exact same IVF cycle when mine did not work was just not helpful. I asked him not to share that kind of information with me again because it just sends me into competition mode, and usually, I end up with the short end of a very long stick, which just makes me feel worse.  Sending the email helped and his response was very nice. He apparently knew by my expression the minute he finished the sentence that this was not information that was helpful to me.  It doesn’t un-ring the bell, though. It doesn’t make me forget that I was in the 15% who didn’t make it this time. 

And, so what if I was able to have a lovely glass of w(h)ine with dinner? I’m still no closert to being in that magic 11.  I can feel the bitterness choking me.

The Dog and Baby Show

I can’t remember now where I heard the adage that couples just starting out in life should start small when it come to keeping other things alive.  So, start with plants, graduate to animals and then actual live human children.  The theory is that if you can keep plants and animals alive, then you can probably do the whole baby thing. 

I used to think this was a bunch of bunk mainly because it doesn’t take into account whether or not you actually want to keep the thing alive.  I’m terrible at keeping plants alive because I consistently forget to water them, and I am not remorseful enough to make an effort to remember.  I have no problem remembering to water the kitties, however, because I have every desire to keep them alive and purring until they die a peaceful death of old age.  The saying assumes that each has the same level of respect.  I love my kitties and I tolerate my plants.

I do think, though, that whoever came up with this theory was on to something when you apply it to dogs.  In fact, I think G, our new (to us) old Golden Retriever has (temporarily) cured my Baby Lust.  I honestly had no clue how much work a dog really takes.  Walks twice a day, daily grooming, playing twice a day out in the backyard, feeding, holy crap it is unbelievable!  And there’s the worrying about training, leash pulling, eating the kitties’ food, chasing the kitties (that happened yesterday), the thunderstorm phobia.  This dog is more work in one day than the kitties are in an entire week.

It is enough to make you question whether you really want to have an infant who is likely ten times more work. Yeah, I said it.  Is that heresy?

There would be some marked differences: Mr. X would share a whole lot more of the responsibilities, and presumably we would have 9 months to get used to the idea of an infant. But still. After the honeymoon phase ends and people stop coming by to visit to see the new baby, it is you and them and that’s it.  Of course, you can take the kid everywhere. The dog, not so much.

For now, I’m going to enjoy not being obsessed with the state of my uterus (or anyone else’s for that matter) and enjoy navigating my way through new doggy-mommyhood. Woof.

image: wader