Sad and angry

A negative IVF is, as I can now attest, like being kicked very hard in the stomach when you least expect it. When I was six years old I can remember joyfully pushing an empty swing, a large blue wooden swing in our neighborhood park, and when I turned my head for just a split second, the sucker flew at my stomach and knocked all the air out of my lungs. Suddenly I was flat on my back on the ground, swing flying recklessly over me so I couldn't get up, gasping for breath and feeling dazed. I don't remember how long the sensation lasted but the surprise and shock and helplessness stays with me to this day. Tuesday was a lot like that.

The worst part in all this though has to be that gnawing rage, that tightening in the throat that heart sinking feeling of being in a very long line and being sent back to the end of the line as if all of your waiting in that line never counted at all. It's being told they are out of stock, there may be more, please try again tomorrow, next week, another time.

No that's not the worst part. The worst part is being sad and having your son see you sad. It's trying to put on a brave face for him and feeling the weight of this news in all of your limbs like lead pellets poured into your joints. It's crying in front of him because the tears are right there and once they spill over the edge it's like someone has turned on a too full hose, a hose bursting and bulging to be released of all its pressure before it splits in half. Once the tears come they last for several minutes and you bury your face in a pillow and try swallowing them down but it doesn't do any good. With the tears should come the healing but it's slow and difficult and each time the tears come and dry up you wonder how many more tears there are and how deep this reserve is anyway. There are a lot because the pain keeps filling the trench back up with more and the pain does not stop, refuses to go away.

My next appointment is September 20th, an eternity of waiting. Time to think and obsess and don armour for the next battle. This is not a pink, light-filled, fuzzy positive thinking fest where happy, confident people will win the baby. This is a war and only the strong will get there in one piece. No, not positive thinking but flat on your stomach clawing and scratching your way through a mine field armed only with a penciled map, a battered helmet and the overwhelming will to get to the other side no matter what condition you end up in, just arrive somehow.

Maybe in there somewhere lies a message of faith too, I don't know. To me though faith is lying on your back, hoping that something will come to you. This may have been my past philosophy, a quaint and simple belief that the universe will do what's necessary and right, but not anymore. Now I'm strapping on boots. Now I'm going to battle. I don't think I'll get there without a fight and after all isn't it a maternal instinct to fight for our children at any cost?

About that dream...

What happens to a dream deferred?

Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?

Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.

Or does it explode?

-Langston Hughes

2.6 sounds like a GPA not a Beta

I thought I'd be relieved to get the bad news over with but instead I'm just really sad and I feel bad for Seb who is sad too but trying to stay brave for me. And as if things couldn't be timed better, my cat is missing and has been since Monday Morning. I know that's not a long time but she always comes in at night and sleeps with me. She's slept with me almost every night for the past six years and she hasn't been seen for over 24 hours. I'm really worried. She's like one of my kids.

Right now I'm just trying to empty my head of all the crap it had stored for the past 75 days of the treatment. I guess we'll be doing this again but right now I can't hold another bit of information about any of this in my aching head. It's just overflowing.

Tomorrow will end the torture

I'm sure to be the first one through the laboratory doors tomorrow morning. Believe me when I say I want this over. This weekend has been hellish.

I google until I'm cross-eyed. I can't help it: ivf+hope+spotting, negative hpt+ivf+late implantation, miracle IVF story+negative hpt and it goes on and on. I'm so ready for this to be over.

I really want to stop the progesterone. I want to stop running to the toilet to see if the spotting is still there. I want to stop focusing on THIS and start focusing on something else.

I've even considered changing the date on my BETA lab prescription.

Did I mention that I want this to be over with because I do.

Screwy

Oh how I hate progesterone. I've abruptly stopped spotting except for the faintest of faint spotting and yet still no period. I'm sure it's the progesterone . . .

and the elevated temperatures too . . . progesterone

and probably my snarly mood . . . progesterone

I'm sure that if I stop the supplements my period will finally arrive and we can put this dog to rest. But I can't stop them until Tuesday . . . just in case

aaaahhhhh make it stop!!

It looks very bleak

Two negative pregnancy tests and light spotting do not look good. I'm 14dpo today and I don't see myself getting that beta on Tuesday. I still have to do the putain beta because the doctor will want it as "confirmation" since sadly he does not accept underwear as proof of putting this cycle to rest.

This smarts because I freaking let Hope in the door again, damn fool that I am. It was a gashderned IVF for god's sake so how can you blame me. Heck, lock the door you say --that sucker was wide open with a cool breeze blowing through. I got left at the altar in a major way.

I'm officially dreading Tuesday and all contact with any human beings at this point.

'scuze me while I scrub these tire tracks off my back. Life is completely in the gutter this weekend and poor Seb is having to put up with me for three full days, poor slob. He gets to hear my sappy "you should have married someone fertile" speech and I get to hear his "maybe it's me with the problem you never know" speech...again. We really need new speeches.

Oh the infertility banter of the "unexplained" We have no one to blame for our misery and we're stuck in the hamster wheel of modern medicine.

Crap.

For those following along at home...a recap

The funny thing about online communication is that you speak through written words with friends all the time and never, never NEVER speak with them on the phone..."gad as IF!" This rule got broken a lot over the two months I was out of service by those who happen to have my telephone number. Of those friends I can't tell you how many thought that I was hiding out because my IVF had gone awry. This had me laughing because if anything an IVF failure would leave me full of words, many very nasty, but full of lots of things to say and heck, lets be honest an outlet for it. No, it wasn't that at all.

The IVF is still going on. I think it's probably the longest ever in the history of modern and cave medicine combined. It has taken two long months to get to transfer. A small eternity in IVF time.

Everything was going well back at the end of May, normal and fine, until suddenly my local doctor, the esteemed Dr. Stonehenge took off for ten days holiday to god knows where and left me scan-less and doctor-less and with only two choices: go to Lyon three times in the next week for prescriptions and scans or draw out the treatment a little longer. I chose to wait for him to get back rather than drive and drive and drive for two weeks and so they put me on a continued dose of Decapyptyl for his leave time and I took an appointment for when he got back.

When Stonehenge finally did get back and I was to start stims, my scan showed a cyst the size of a golf ball or bowling ball take your pick, and I couldn't start stims until the pesky little sucker was drained and laid to rest. This all involved what turned out to be an initially scary hospital trip where the staff told me they wouldn't be using any anesthesia and then promptly produced the large IVF needle that most doctors try to avoid letting you see for fear it will make you run screaming through the automatic doors, gown flapping open behind you in your haste. Honestly though the mega needle though frightening to look at, only hurt a little bit and the staff was very nice and talked to me through it all telling me how brave I was. It made me realize that the local anaesthesia would work fine when it came IVF retrieval time and I was happy for this because anaesthesia is the worldwide leading cause of death on the operating bloc and with statistics like that should be avoided as much as possible.

So the peskering "little sister" cyst was drained and then, I was told I'd be able to start stims in one week but that I'd be coasted on them for an extra two weeks. The reasons behind this two week delay were I imagined so I could regained strength from the cyst procedure or perhaps so that they could check for any new cyst growth in the coming weeks or maybe just because they had to do a seasonal cleaning of petri dishes in the laboratory, all reasonable excuses, or so I thought. But when we finally asked Mr. Nervous the intern of Doctor Dieu why we had to wait two extra weeks he simply shrugged and claimed quite candidly that they didn't have a place in the planning for me anymore. Thank you very much sir. I like knowing I'm injecting myself with synthetic hamster urine for two weeks because you have a government imposed 35 hour work week. I would have preferred the cleaning the petri dishes story.

So I've finally made it through all of this. The retrieval went well and 7 follicles rapidly became 4 embryos, which eventually became 3 and those 3 were transferred last Monday. Two were average Joes and though one was a potential serial killer, we insisted they transfer it anyway because after all it would be our little serial killer now wouldn't it, and we'd just have to keep a better eye on the cats that's all.

On Tuesday of next week I'll have a blood test to see what of it. I really don't feel pregnant at all and many things feel downright normal which is either good or bad or hey who knows. I'm very emotionless about all of this which kind of scares me because it's not really normal to feel like this. I certainly didn't feel like this last IVF cycle. I was very touchy and nervous and crying a lot and worried about things like the toaster popping up too slowly, "why is it taking SO long!" and making lists of potential IVF clinics in Bangladesh where they'd agree to transfer 10 or 20 embryos, I mean come on one would be bound to stick around right?

You can even see that the past few IUI's left me this way, emotional and crazed on the brink of losing grip with reality. But this cycle I refuse to get caught up. I'm not taking my temperature or studying symptoms or getting the least bit strunng out or in a frenzy that might end up sending me into some sort of tailspin spiraling out of control.

Right now I feel like on Tuesday if my beta is at say minus 5 or something horrid, I may react simply as if someone said "and would you like fries with your order?" But then again I may just duck in a shop alcove and ball my eyes out before I get home.

An imposed break

Well I think I needed a break from the computer world and holy ceramic cows if I didn't get it. The little guy was in the shop for two months, two months yes that's right TWO months, and then was promptly lost, and then and now replaced. The break from the cyber world was difficult at first and then it became liberating. It was just me against the world with no cheerleaders, I guess as it should be....as it really is if you think about it.

Coming back I see that many cyber friends are pregnant. whoopee!!

Okay, I do have to admit that the green monster is coming out a little. Mainly this is because I can't really join in yet and I really want to. I'm not in that club yet. I'm still in the uh er, other club which, let's admit it now, nobody really likes being in anyway, the Desperately Trying to get Pregnant Month after Month Club.

I hate this club too. I want out too!

Although I've filled out countless membership forms, heck was even a former member in good standing, I can't seem to get my latest application approved. Meanwhile I'm trying to be patient and not get pissy over things like when the box of pregnancy clothes falls on my head in the basement, breaks open and spills the entire contents onto the floor at my feet. I mean of all the boxes that were stacked up there, go figure.

Giving up things

I'm doing okay with the giving up things, well kind of. I have to admit that giving up a few of my favorite things for this IVF has been especially hard.

After all I've been a very good girl for several months, trialing my way through three count 'em three IUI's and what on earth did it get me? A lot of resentment that's what. I hate resentment. It makes it all so much worse.

and so ...

I had some wine with dinner all weekend.

I had some non-herbal tea too with breakfast.

I loaded up on sugar with a friend who was visiting.

Will all these little sins lead to bad eggs? These are just minor slips of the tounge. After all I won't allow this trend to continue. Have I already done myself in?

Oh well, at least I won't harbor resentment if things don't work. I'll only have guilt to deal with and maybe that's the easier of the two emotions. The psychology of all of this is very amusing.

The first days

I've started the supression for the IVF with an injectible drug called Décapeptyl which I belive is French. I don't see the doctor for at least two more weeks, a long grueling wait-a-thon, the first of many.

It was very strange starting this whole treatment on our vacation in Tuscany. Tuscany, ... the mist, the hills, olive trees

... and mixing drugs in little vials.

Uh yeah right, okay.

A little bit of annasteezhuh pleezh

Okay I know I murdered the spelling, but it's funnetik you see... and I'm a lazy ho with attitude so there.

There isn't much to say but I felt that an update was in order, as much for myself as for anyone who might actually still be reading this diary. Like I said, I'm a lazy ho...did I mention the attitude part?

Let's see, well no baby making this month and already we're up to cycle day sixteen here. It's the thermometer against the wall thing, in other words...no temping! Yay! Who likes doing that anyway? Okay well, me I suppose, but I'm out of the habit so I feel all empowered about it.

Meanwhile I don't have my groovy, little advent calendar to moon over. That kind of stinks.

do you get it?...moon over...haven't lost my sense of humour in all of this.

I start suppressing ovulation on May first, May Day actually, and it's a full two and a half weeks before I even start stims. A long, drawn out month of highs and lows I'm sure.

I wasn't going to do the anaesthesia and had planned to be awake and fully AWARE of the 12 inch needle going into my Netherlands, not for the sake of safety or principle or anything like that, but for another more pressing reason. We got invited to Tuscany by my friend Riana and her husband and I really really, really wanted to go. My anaesthesia consultation appointment fell in the middle of the Tuscan week and it was going to be impossible to change it since it had been made nearly two months ago. Anyway, the choice was clearly, anaesthesia or Tuscany and I chose ... TUSCANY you fool! Oh my god who wouldn't, please what an idiot!

So anyway back from our super long weekend today there was a France Telecom message waiting for me. My appointment has been serendipitously changed to early next week just out of the blue. I couldn't believe my ears. A second chance to be anaesthetised. How could I say no when the anaesthesia Gods are sending me such a message as if from the heavens above?

So that's where I am as of today. Cool as a cucumber so far, I'll be officially starting my treatment in the rolling hills of Tuscany with a good friend and my anaesthesia consulatation all arranged. No worries.

I can't wait to get on with all of this and get a newborn baby in these hungry momma arms. And you know what, something makes me feel like it could happen very soon. Is it considered in poor taste to be optimistic at this point? No it's probably just plain sick, but I think I'm going to throw caution to the wind and plow ahead with the optimism thingy. No cheering me on please, I'm mumbling all this under my breath and darting my eyes around enough about it. If you say nice things I'll only go hide under the dining room table, chew my fingernails and start humming The Marseillaise.

Otherwise I have a plan B. I'm just going to go to the park next week and scream at some poor, isolated mother GIVE ME THAT BABY NOW LADY!! while I lunge myself at her funky, red aluminum wheeled Bugaboo stroller.

May day ...m'aider

I start my treatment on May day. Isn't that wonderful! I'm feeling back on cloud nine. The treatment is a little longer than the treatment for an IUI since for the first 13-16 days your ovulation is completely supressed, and then afterwards carefully controlled over a period of about 8-10 days while you take stims. For me that stimulant will be Gonal-F, 100 IUs this time instead of the 75 IU's I did for the inseminations. It's also combined with a drug called l'Uveris (in French at least), and well, not actally combined because one is in pen form and one is in regular old needle form. That means two, count 'em, two injections per night. Oh well, I think I'd do ten injections per night if I had to. I really don't care just gimme 'dat baby!

So this month is just a lazy month of kicking back and enjoying life as much as possible before entering the loony bin of laboratory manufactured hormones. I've decided I'm giving up alcohol and caffeine the last week of April, difficult I wanna tell you because I am such a wino and a total and complete caffeine wench, but sigh necessary I suppose. Hey you are talking to the woman who gave up coffee and almost all alcohol for 15 months during pregnancy and early breastfeeding, and that's when you really need it. I think I can do it again. It's just hard getting started and getting weaned off of the stuff.

I don't know if we will try to make babies this month or not. On the one hand I could get pregnant and not have to do the IVF can I get a whoo whoo but on the other hand I think we've been down that long and winding road before. Perhaps we will and perhaps we won't. The same goes for charting. I may take my temperature each and every morning and then again I may hit the snooze button and chuck the plastic piece of sh*t against the wall each morning just to hear the clang of the battery jar around inside. A lot of good the bastard's done me so far!

I guess we shall see shant we.

The incredibly amazing Doctor Dieu

It was so weird to see Dr. Dieu again after such a long absence. Our last meeting was in September. Nothing much had changed. I still think he should just go ahead and install those mirrors behind his patients in his office. He always acts like he's admiring himself anyway. His ego is really too big to fit into that tiny space.

A few brief facts about Dr. Dieu:

1)He was recommended to us as THE authority on IVF in the region
2)How could we disagree since he helped us have Baby S
3)He doesn't say anything when you first meet him, just stares at you and waits
4)This is some sort of tactic I'm sure--something he learned at a seminar
5)It bugs me.
6)Seb does the same thing but it's because he's timid and not brash
7)They stared at each other for an uncomfortable amount of time which was really funny, each waiting for the other to speak.
8)He drives an Austin Mini
9)And yet he's really tall for a French guy--it must be a funny sight to see him climb into that car
10)He makes chauvinistic jokes about women and then laughs while looking at the husband.
11)When I first met him he told me to stay off the internet because it would just confuse me.
12)How wrong he was, because that's how I got all of my information.
13) He never explains anything, he just makes small talk.
14)He makes lots of small talk about the United States.
15)He likes to tell me how Americans are allowed to transfer "as many embryos as they want" when they do IVF.
16) That remark caused me to lump him in with all the French people I meet who think all Americans wear cowboy hats and eat cheeseburgers.
17)He always reminds me that in France you can only transfer two embryos at a time.
18)I talked him into transferring three last time...and will talk him into three again I'm sure.
19)He once yelled at his stagiére and called him an imbecile in front of me and Seb
20)I Googled his name out of curiosity a few years ago and two French girls on an internet forum were saying how "easy on the eyes he was."
21)His teeth are yellow, crooked and have brown marks in between them.
22)The appointment, a private consultation lasted less than 15 minutes and cost me 80 euros.
23)He told me that I shouldn't complain about anything because my treatment was free.
24)I had to remind him that we pay taxes...lots of taxes.
24)He petted Baby S's head and told me he should be in magazines.
25)I had the distinct feeling he was taking credit for my baby I don't know why.
26)He told me that women who need more than local anaesthesia for IVF egg retrieval are imagining the pain,
27)Then he asked me if I'd given birth naturally as if that somehow would make it easier
28)His entire office reeks of cigarette smoke.

So there now you have a clearer picture of who I'm dealing with. He is a case and a half, a case for a reality check, a man who most likely charmed his way through medical school and beyond. He was the superior of Doctor Stonehenge for a couple of years and Dr. Stonehenge is severely intimidated by him. He is about as intimidating a character as a mouse on steroids, all tweek and no squeak. But I don't really see how I can reject him. I can't afford to not like him. He was the only thing that ever worked.

To me this overinflated bully represents hope. He is quite plainly my next best shot. I'm torn between admiration and revolt.

I guess I have to embrace him but I will never call him "easy on they eyes," mark my words.

And the break goes on

Yes it's still break time. It feels good. I don't feel like I've missed much, don't get a wave of nostalgia sweeping over me as I pass the pharmacy or my doctor's office, or when I open the fridge and see the opened box of Gonal F sitting there, waiting.

My consultation appointment with Dr. Dieu is this week.

My period is due tomorrow.

I'm ready to get back to normal.

It's funny what passes for normal these days.

How about a little purification?

Since I've been on the drug Gonal-F I have noticed something odd. I sweat like a stinky racehorse. I smell horrid. I'm sweaty anyway but this is much worse. It's a chemical waste smell. It's no small wonder after three cycles in a row.

My friend Riana has posted on her little food blog a great step by step detox diet that is a wonderful way to make a fresh start if you've been abusing your body with medicine, alcohol, junk food, sugar or even just stress (I get gold stars for all of those thank you very much). I think these detoxes are really important and I used to do them all the time way back when I was treating my body like a temple and not a waste dump.

So, here's to turning over new leaves. And here's the diet.

It's like I was saying

There's that old familiar refrain. I know this song man.

It's cycle day one, but hey who's counting.

I'm just happy all this is over with.

But still...

cycle day one always sucks.

Still on that break

I'm just here kind of waiting around for Miss Florence to blast her way through my bathroom door. She hasn't left any calling cards yet.

As opposed to last cycle's house rockin' symptoms party, I have no symptoms this cycle. Or maybe it's just that I don't care much about this cycle and I'm not looking for symptoms. In any case I am on cd 12 or something like that so she should be coming around here soon.

I haven't been temping much this cycle for obvious reasons, but for the last two days I broke down and took my temps. My temps are still above cover line but not doing The Cat on A Hot Tin Roof thing they should be doing if all was right with the world. They're slowly slipping. That's usually the beginning of the end for me.

Bye bye IUI's. We hated suffering through you and we'll be very glad very soon that you are a distant desert mirage in our dirty rearview mirror. I think I may even throw a party in honor of your demise!

The break...just what the doctor didn't order

I seem to be taking a mental break. It's not really me who decided, it's my lazy bones head who just decided to stop counting, to stop temping, and you know what? I actually had to count on my fingers which cycle day I was on this morning.

"Had to count ..."echo, echo, echo... Well I'll be.

What's incredible is that about this time in most cycles I start wearing my little white t-shirts that have CYCLE DAY 10 emblazoned across the chest in black letters, and I walk around with my head cast down mumbling to my invisible posse... ovulation day, cervical mucous, days past, headache, progesterone level, cramps!, cramps?, cramps...hmmm....

...at least I think this is cycle day ten. Maybe it's tomorrow. For some reason the number did not stick in my head and I haven't got the energy to recount.

I guess I'm close to the obsessive period but I really would rather think of other things than start to worry.

Then again I can't guarantee that I won't start obsessing over the next few days now can I? I just really, really hope to have this cycle over with and have all the others be a distant memory, and start looking towards the IVF in May.

Another charming trigger

Well I triggered this morning. I had two follicles, a 11mm guy we won't even count and then a 22mm shiner who is kicking my butt with her hot molten lava nucleus! I have no idea why I feel so stimmed, but I am really, really huge like I'm pregnant and ouchie! the girls are tender, left and right.

It's the same drill, a visit to the clinic tomorrow for several hours of hanging out and doing nothing while we wait. The "squirt," then the drive home. The routine.

In much better news, I have made an appointment with Dr. Dieu for a consultation in early April for the IVF. I also have an appointment with the anaesthesiologist for early May, because I really do prefer to be out for the IVF retrieval. I know many people aren't knocked out and it goes very well, dentist appointment right? I just feel less stressed if I don't have to see what's going on. On the other hand my friend Dee swears she was dropped during one of her IVF retrievals because she woke up with a wrenched back and had no idea why! She's got a point, they can pretty much manage the whole thing however they like and treat you like a piece of meat for the thirty minutes that you're out cold. But to be honest that huge 8 incher of a needle used for retrieving the eggs is what really freaks me out. I guess I don't have to look at it but the stress of being aware of it makes swoon.

Disco inferno

It seems I'm a bit overstimmed. There's some "play that funky music white girl" going on in my poor, over-inflated ovaries and the girls are not pleased. I look hilariously pregnant. My neighbors have been staring and scratching their heads. They all know we're trying to have another baby and from the looks of it congratulations are in order, right? I have switched to expandable waistbands over the long and painful weekend and have been doing the dreaded belly rub gesture in an effort to calm the Latin Hustle.

Gonal-F and I have a sordid little past with overstimulation. I had OHSS bad enough with my first IVF to land myself in the hospital. Well in true French fashion they wanted to land me in the hospital but in the Lyon hospital two hours away. "Uh, yeah, let me just grab my keys and drive there guys. After all it only hurt when I breathe you know..." Seb was getting ready to leave on a business trip and I just rolled my eyes and said "oh hell I'll just deal with it." I couldn't be bothered. I just tried to drink a lot of water in between the vomiting and roll with the punches. What I didn't know at the time but learned later is that OHSS is pretty serious business and I was being extremely stupid. It all turned out okay but I think I was lucky that I didn't seriously hurt myself.

I don't think I'm quite as severe this time around. I'm just displaying my classic verve of loving this drug enough to puff out like a mini croissant in a 350 degree farenheit oven. It's at least comforting to know that some things are happening in there.

Three time the lady

Did you ever swear that you wouldn't help out an annoying, whiny pseudo friend who calls you at all hours of the night going on and and on about her loser boyfriend, and complains about her problems in minute detail to no end? Did you ever hang up the phone, sighing and say "never again!" only to call her back one week later and say, "hey what's going on? Is everything okay?" *

I have no idea how I got roped into it, but we're doing a third IUI. It was as if Dr. Stonehenge had a whiteboard behind his desk and was presenting me the situation in a red sharpie, circling the crucial points. "In scenario one Miss Chris, you take a much needed break and call me back in a month or so for IUI number three. That's not a problem for me. You probably need a break. You seem tired and that's normal." I looked at him and my heart felt squeezed and I had that little shortness of breath thing that makes me feel like I'm smothering. The "lost time" feeling. The "I'm going to be thirty-eight years old in one month" feeling. He was already on scenario two, "we can try to contact Dr. Dieu and SEE if he'll allow you to move on to IVF but he is my superior and if he suggests IUI I think he has a reason behind it and I think we should respect that." In other words "I'm chicken shit intimidated by this guy and you're stuck in the middle dear patient. The final scenario was underscored, clearly his favorite "Let's try one more IUI and see what results we get." My eyes were fixed to the wall behind him where there is a picture of Dr. Stonehenge and a woman, his wife I presume, on vacation in what looks like Florida or Tahiti, and the sun is setting behind them, and their faces are bathed in in that surreal, tropical orange glow that you only see in holiday snapshots. "Umm, yes okay" I sighed, "I guess I'll do number three and get it over with."

I have decided that I will be the unwilling participant in this cycle. I will drink coffee, I will drink wine, I will eat sugar and all manner of nasty things and take my temperature when I feel like it and I will swear loudly and wrassle pigs in mud if the mood strikes me. And I will shoot poison eye darts at anyone who dares to tell me that "pregnant women" shouldn't drink or eat this or that, I swear I will. I will do whatever I want to and this cycle will pass before my next birthday. My body will do the cycle while I stand on the sidelines and watch it all happen. I will not even think about the treatment. I will do my injections, uh, I mean her injections at whatever hour it happens to be before she goes to bed. And so there will be my promised break. A mental break from the person who is enthusiastic!! about!! getting!! pregnant!!, to someone standing on the sidelines staring at a game being played out and rooting for neither team.

*This scenario doesn't actually represent any of my annoying whiny friends, (who I love dearly by the way, whiny or not). It's just an extreme example of course and probably more representative of myself than anyone I know.

The long and whiney road

Even though my energy levels are at zero, no wait at negative one actually, maybe even lower, I am going to strap my boots back on and go see Dr. Stonehenge at nine a.m. tomorrow morning. I'm going to maneuver his office with my whiney baby and I'm going to look him squarely in the eye. I'm going to hold his gaze for ten whole seconds and then I'm going to blurt out, "do you really believe we have a snowball's chance in hell of this ever working, and if you don't then why are you putting me through this hell!?"

Now all I have to do is translate all that into French: Snowball=boule de neige, chance=chance, hell=enfer. Somehow I think it will lose its oomph. The French language is so colorless. Maybe I should just act slighted and uninvolved.

And for the record, I'm still having symptoms. Still having pelvic pressure, sore boobs and belly button tugging. I have learned a valuable lesson.

Symptoms=pregnant/not pregnant.

The gross underuse of the F word

My temps plummeted this morning so it looks like I'm out. The goddamned ship is getting ready to leave port and I'm definitely not going to be on it.

This sucks.

Plain and f*cking simply put THIS REALLY, REALLY SUCKS.

Now I'm off to the f*cking store to buy f*cking tampons because I will have none tomorrow when the great flood arrives.

I should just buy them at the pharmacy when I buy the Gonal-F. "Yes and a jumbo size box of THOSE please."

Merry f*cking Christmas to me...grump, grump, grump.

Idiot alert

Okay wait, I just re-read my last few posts and I think I should probably stop smoking those progesterone pills and swallow them like it says on the nice pretty box.

I'm being a complete idiot. I'm really setting myself up for a burn here. I think I need to just sleeeewwrrr 'er down a notch.

It's been intervention time for a couple of days here and believe-you-me I saw it coming. Excuse me for just a moment while I share a letter sent by my alter ego, "Ernestine," who you may know as the crazy laundromat lady with combat boots, and who by the way, body builds by lifting cars in her spare time and eats onion and hot pepper chili cheese dogs slathered in salsa for breakfast. This came in the mail this afternoon, special delivery:

Dear Miss!

I gotta tell you, stop being so freakin' stupid! [bitch slap]

You're on progesterone for bejesus sakes so you'll have about a billion phantom symptoms like sore boobs, headaches, and being a bitchy wife! Stop imagining that these might be pregnancy symptoms. Puh-leeese!!!

It's only 12 days past ovulation moron. You might want to stop and remember the 15 day luteal phase you had three months ago! And what about the little 30 day cycle, huh? Did you just happen to forget about that one?

And hey, whoa...what's this 'testing on Sunday' business! "ohh mommy I'm gonna test the day after my period is due...wahhhh!" Yeah, well miss I think you better rethink that one a wee bit longer because you may be getting your period as you're doing the freakin' test.

And all this nya-nya-nya about sore belly buttons. No one on the planet has ever had this symptom except one single halfhazardly documented person and for all you know she's dead from a bleeding hernia! And I got a newsflash for you: cramps and pelvic pressure SAME THING ...on everyone else's reality show!

Get a life you little weasel before I squash your head with a rusty tractor part.
[double bitch slap]

All my best,
Ernestine

So thank you Ernestine. I needed that. You always know how to set me straight. Because if this ship sails and I'm not on it I'm going to be jumping in swimming after it, screaming and crying for them to bring back my brand new Louis Vitton luggage set. And when they don't come back I'm going to be sitting on the dock with my face buried in my hands bawling my eyes out. Yep, I'm in deep.

Crapper. damnfreakincrappitycrap.

I will stay calm from here on out. I will stay sane for sanity's sake and remind myself of the fact that as difficult as it is to admit, after this cycle I'll be taking a very long break one way or another.

The torture chamber, madame

12dpo

Did I mention that hope villain and I arelikethis. Making margaritas, dancing in the living room, and dishing dirt over The Superficial Weekly, he is definitely one of the girls.

Last night as I lay in bed with the covers pulled up to my eyes, I had these funny little terrible twinges on the left side of my pelvis. Well, not so terrible actually because I said to myself "wow, that's awesome...twinges!" And with my face under the covers I could not stop smiling. I was so nervous about falling asleep and having it all end, having to wake up and go down that dark road again, I couldn't sleep. I didn't want to stop smiling. And then I finally fell asleep praying that I'd get a huge temperature reading the next morning and not the awful plunge.

The next morning I didn't get a huge temperature, but I got an even one. And hey, that's good enough for me.

And yes, there is a little more boob pain, but I'm not really a boob pain girl so it's not a concern one way or the other. But the most important thing of all is that there is pressure; enormous pressure in my pelvis. And I wouldn't call it cramps, I'd call it pressure. So either this is going to be the worst period ever or I'm...I'm...ahhhhhh

...no I won't say it. I refuse.

We'll see on Sunday.

The lurker

Damn. The hope villain has been hanging outside my door, lurking. It's cold outside. I invited him in for coffee. He came right in and made himself at home. He put his feet up next to the fire and stayed.

I should have known.

I'm 11dpo and for four days now I've been having cramps. Yes, period cramps. AF cramps or whatever you want to call them. I've also been having lots of weird symptoms. Most symptoms are related to the progesterone, glowy skin, morning sickness, and the tingling in my breasts. There's another one, a symptom I find unusual though. I have a poking feeling in my belly button when I turn a certain way. It's definitely something new.

Of course I Googled it. What else is a person to do? But nary a person claimed it had happened to them, well...except one person it seems. On BabySnark I found this woman who'd kept a detailed symptoms log of her days leading up to a positive pregnancy test. A woman after my own heart. She's a list maker. I do exactly the same thing.

So here's her list and please pay special attention to the "belly button poking" because THIS IS WHAT IT IS EXACTLY:

3dpo & 4dpo – Butterflies in stomach, but not nauseous; mild cramping (ovulation type).
5dpo – Serious AF cramps (thought I was going to start two weeks early!).
8dpo – AF cramps (low down), sharp pain left ovary in p.m., mild AF cramps just above pubic bone (all across), bloated.
10dpo – Morning temp 37.2 (98.96), serious AF cramps in late p.m., ''who-ha'' entrance much wetter (tip of C soft).
11dpo – Serious cramping R all day (sharp pains running over my R hip to lower back) – fever of 100.9 F. (N.B. Found out later I had a corpus luteum cyst.)
12dpo – Cramps (pain) in R side all day, though milder than yesterday; CF abundant.
13dpo – Tested – BFN – Pain in bellybutton (like someone poked their finger in it), and the feeling continues from there down the middle of my stomach; slight heartburn/nausea.
14dpo – Mild pain in belly button, very tired.
15dpo – Bad cramps (pain) in R side, AF cramps (straight across) in late p.m., belly button pain, got up early 5 a.m.
16dpo – Got up early again.
17 dpo – Pelvic pain continues (1/2 day of work only), woke up at 5 a.m. (2 hours early).
18 & 19 dpo – Pelvic pain consistent (no work, lied flat all day). Slight belly button pain. AF arrived (so I thought), but blood was brown and light. Read up on this site & others regarding menstruation and pregnancy. Woke up early 5 a.m.
20 dpo – Woke up really early (3:30), had to pee! Tested ++++++. (Pain in lower back straight across, sciatica on R aggravated.)
Note: I didn’t chart temps, only CP & CF. CP was high for 5 days (during O), and we BD x 2 during that time – once on the highest day. No egg white this month to go by. CP started to lower slightly after that and firm up, but then seemed to go back up 5 days later, and soften significantly at the tip after 10 days. CF dried up after O, then got very lotiony (though not abundant), with a few creamy days thrown in. When I got AF, didn’t make sense because CP was high & soft still, instead of low & firm.

So you see. Maybe I'm not such a nut. Or maybe I am.

And because you read this far, I 'll continue reporting my symptoms. I also had a bloody nose this morning. The only time I've ever had a bloody nose was when I was pregnant. In fact for the first trimester with baby S I looked like a prize fighter half the time. And I'm peeing every two seconds, but that's also because I'm checking and checking and checking, and worrying? Can we really count that? Maybe not.

So thank you hope villain. I should have never let you in. You've got me all wound up and where will you be when the ball drops? Over at someone else's house that's where.

A little progesterone vacation

Yesterday I decided not to take the progesterone pills for a day. I considered that this was potentally foolish, but did it anyway because I'd been feeling so horrible for so many days. I was happy for the break. It was Sunday and we made crépes and relaxed by the fire. I didn't have to sit there holding my stomach, feeling like I was on a roller coaster ride.

I started back on them today. The old nausea is coming on strong so it's quite obvious that it's the pills. I don't know why I seem so sensitive to it. It doesn't seem to bother anyone else that I've talked with. Hmm, I must be one of the lucky ones.

Bleh...progesterone

My progesterone supplements are making me ill, very ill in fact. Yes, hear-ye, hear-ye I have "faux morning sickness!" Isn't that cruel? I may not even be pregnant but I have to suffer through the indignity of this, a diet of salty foods and sodie-pop for the next week.

It's also mimicking lots of other pregnancy symptoms like tingling sensations in my boobs and some weird headaches. This stuff is evil. And adding insult to injury it makes a real pastey goo down yonder all day long, making me ask the question at the end of the day, "wash 'em or toss 'em?" Yeah I know, yuck.

So, don't get too excited. It's only 7dpo and it's way too early for the hope villain to make his appearance on my front doorstep. White fedora, sly smile and knowing wink, he's such a charmer you just can't resist him. I'm going to try. In fact I think I'll need to be about 20dpo before I'll let myself fall into that trap again.

Morbid night musings

So I was just lying awake last night and I said to myself, what if everything were lost. Like what if I got diagnosed with some kind of terminal cancer tomorrow, what would that do to my priorities? Don't ask why these thoughts were there. I found it hard to go to sleep without them.

I'd definitely stop all efforts at having a child. I mean of course, who wouldn't. I'd not even miss the idea that I'd be childless. I'd be worrying about other things, important things. I'd be throwing all of myself into giving my son and my husband what love I could as my last days rolled by. They are my real world and I'd need them to get through each passing day. I'd hold onto each second and use each minute to teach my child what I think he needs to know before I leave. I'd give all I have to them. This is what I mean by seeing my priorities with a clearer eye. I'm not seeing things in the right perspective right now at all. Some unattainable beast is monopolising my ability to see what's really important to me. I think that's what annoys me right now, that I have this beautiful, perfect boy and that I have to be distracted with this horrid infertility monster once again. This is why I talked with Seb about accepting the end of all of this nonsensical cycling. It's not to say that I can or will do it, it's just to explain the why.

There's a weird twist with trying to conceive. You can't just sort of turn off the button and not be involved, not stare at the calendar and not live for the famous two week wait. You just can't and it's funny because you can go to work and cook dinners each week and grocery shop and do other mundane things without the stress of waiting for and worrying about them, but trying to make babies as mundane as it is, is so different. It's like there's a biophysical chip in a woman's brain that won't let her be at peace until she gets that child. The chip sort of bleeps-bleeps all day long, and transmits the message to her brain and her heart and her everything, to think about procreating all day long. I don't know if it's possible to turn off the chip ourselves. It may be like that worm in The Matrix pulled from Keanu Reeve's stomach by suction. You'd have to physically deworm me to get me to forget that I want another baby. You'd have to give me a drug. You'd have to counsel me. You'd have to give me conk on the head. Even then it might not work.

Why is that I wonder?

In my late night, restless, ceiling staring slumber I wondered something weird. Had anyone ever become pregnant and then discovered they had a terminal illness like cancer? You know, kind of the reverse of what I'd been thinking earlier hey, night musings are like this. I decide I'd Google it the next morning and see. And well, the answer is yes. It was this poor woman, Susan Torres who went into a coma at 17 weeks gestation. I think this is an amazing story. Uh, better go grab the Kleenex.

As an aside, don't you think Susan Torres' husband looks just like Justin Timberlake. Watch the little video clip.

Paper shuffle

Thankfully this weekend went well, better than last weekend. It wasn't difficult to find an improvement over the grueling, bitter winds of last weekend. Last weekend was a horrible one with a plunge so low that I will actually attest that I saw nothing but thick blackness suspended like a cloud of mist all around me. I rarely get depressed and so it made it even worse to see where I actually had brought myself, or maybe better said where circumstances had brought me. Where was I? How did I get here? Will I get out? I felt like I was clawing at the walls for answers. I think it was the hormones. In fact I'm sure of it because the headaches had arrived too and those are sure signs that something just isn't natural. A sign that we are not in the realm of what is normal.

Seb was grumpy all that weekend too and we flew into each others face a little too often for even our own tastes. All we hoped for was that it would get better in a few days; that life would look sunnier in a few days time and we wouldn't have to live in this mire for very much longer. Since I was in the middle of the treatment and Seb was in the middle of his job changes, there didn't seem to be much hope for immediate changes and so we waded through until Monday and braved out the week as it crept by day by disgusting day. When this Saturday rolled around we did the transfer for the IUI and just like that everything returned to a temporary semblance of normalcy. How convenient this pattern was becoming. Each month we build and build to this bright spot where for two weeks there is hope and happiness, only to have it dump us brusquely once again at the bottom of that pit on day 23 or 31, depending on the generosity of our lunar mentors.

I told Seb over that horrible weekend that I thought I wanted to stop the treatment after this cycle. My head was so full I couldn't hold another thought inside it and I told him that if I continued like this I feared there wouldn't be much of me left to give to him and Baby S. I explained it to him that in my mind I had slowly laid out the mental paperwork necessary for accepting our not having this second child and it was really just a matter of looking over the documents and reading them through... and then of course the final step would be signing them. He'd have to look at them too. He'd have to sign them. Could he do that? He said he really didn't know if he could but he understood what this was doing to us and especially to me and he saw the need to maybe have a sort of break from all of this. I explained to him that a break would mean nothing and that what I needed was closure. After closure I could start living a normal life and start enjoying my son and our life much more. We discussed adoption and I explained to him that adoption was just another form of what we were doing now. Other worries, other stresses but very much the same in many ways. The same type of problems but with different faces and all revolving around the unattainable.

It was a very difficult weekend. This weekend was much better, but the papers are still there in my head floating around in a sort of wind storm. I'm not sure what to do with them for now. Maybe they can be shelved for just a little while longer but I'm not so sure if that's even going to be possible.

Saturday is a fine day

The good doctor has agreed to delay me to Saturday and I'm pleased. I'm not pleased that all of this putting off and putting off has made me have three appointments this week and three blood draws. Well after tomorrow it will be three in all. Land sakes my arm is full of holes! This shall be dubbed as the cycle where I was jabbed a zillion times.

Seb is pleased that he doesn't have to take a day off of work. He's probably the most pleased with the timing, although it does mean another very early morning drive to the clinic where we'll do the whole ordeal. He just went there last Saturday at the crack of dawn because he needed to provide them with a fresh sperm sample. At least this week he has company, the bitchy hormonal wife and the grumpy 'morning hating' baby.*

So there we are. I mean here we are. What is this, January? Yes, nearly January's end. And what I wonder does February have in store? Does it have better things than December had? Hmmm, maybe it does. Does it have what late November had, oh dear I hope not shudder, or maybe, just maybe it has what October had big smile.

You just never know what to expect do you?

*Baby S would sleep until afternoon if we let him. We usually let him sleep until at least nine or ten am to avoid the wrath of the grumps.

Little egg stay put!

It seems that this little egg is not ready to make her appearance on the big stage yet. She's a slow one, a 12mm little putz.

So everything is on hold. I have another appointment on Thursday morning. We'll even be trying to slow things down to hold out for a Saturday transfer if that's even remotely possible. Is it? Seb is so buried in work and meetings on Friday that it may be next to near impossible for him if it falls on Friday. Of course he told me this two weeks ago and of course it ends up falling on Friday. Could have been any other day? Why no, of course not.

I hope she holds out until Friday. Stay put you little beast. We aren't ready for you just yet.

Here we go again

Tomorrow I think we'll trigger and if so that means 24 hours later I'm off to the clinic for another chance at greatness. I only hope we do a better job this time than we did last time. As far as IUI's go I just seem to be a total fuck up.

"Now is the winter of our dis..dis..."

"CUT! Try it again Misschrisc. Take SEVEN" *clack*"

"NOW is the WINTER of their...uh, our...Oh dear, sorry everyone."

"CUT! MAKEUP! Take it from the top please...God she's an idiot! TAKE 45 PLEASE" *clack*

"Now is the summer...oh er, WINTER yes...sorry I meant to say Winter, uh."

*clack* *clack* *clack!!*

So yeah, uh tomorrow.

Blasé

After an exhausting night with teething baby I climbed into bed at midnight, only to roll over and curse, "crap I forgot my damn injection."

I climbed out of bed barefoot, grabbed my stash, jabbed and clicked and tossed it all back in the fridge.

"you're done already,...wow."
"shh, let's sleep."

Shwew

Made it through the torture of the DEATH NEEDLE! What a big joke that was ha ha! Actually the truth is--wanna know the real truth? Okay well I'll tell you that it doesn't hurt a bit, not one bit. Wimpy me, it took me all of five seconds to jab myself so you can imagine a real sadist in action. I kind of liked doing it actually. Now I know why Seb gets all excited about giving me my injections. He just likes playing doctor.

Well, not any more buddy. Back down mister because there's a new nurse in town and she just stole your job.

Game two

I had my état de lieu *this morning and all is clear for game two. I was in a terrible mood and poor Dr. Stonehenge, nervous, fidgety Dr. Stonehenge got the full brunt of all of my sarcasm. "Okay doc one down only three to go!" He looked at me nervously and said "aww no don't say that, you have to be positive, c'mon now Madame Misschris." I gave him a perfect "look-I'm-a-ripely-aged-veteran-here,-not-some-28-year-old-little-Clomid-hussy. Cut-the-positive-thinking-crap-and-give-me-my-scrips" look. He stopped the banter, shook my hand and we parted ways agreeing to meet up the middle of next week.

Now the stinker. Seb isn't here and he always does my injections for me. What am I going to do? Baby S is terrible with needles and so the only one left is ME. Okay I can do this I guess but it's probably going to take me an hour to psyche myself up. Oh god I hope I don't end up injecting the whole pen full of Gonal-F! I can just see myself doing that too.

*état de lieu is French for that apartment/home inspection you have before you move out of or into a new place. It's not really what they call it at my RE's office but it's how I described the procedure to my French MIL and she completely understood that they were looking for "nail holes" and "carpet splotches" in my uterus.

It's like a board game

Where you have to go back to the beginning of the board and you lose a turn and you don't get to pass GO. It's completely unfair and I'm very tired of playing this stupid game.

Tomorrow I'll be going through my monotonous Monday list of stuff to do and over half of it is fucking fertility related...call doctor, call clinics, call lab, order meds. This is all so tiring.

I'm feeling very beat up. I'm really getting to the point where I'm ready to give up. I really, really am. My god I've already been here. I've done all this before for over five freakin' years of my life and I really don't think I have the energy to do it for very much longer. I'm just drained. The worst part is that I no longer feel like me at all. I feel like someone who goes through the motions of being me until she can have a positive pregnancy test. The me person pops up occasionally but she's squashed by this pathetic THING. It's completely taken over my life and I hate it. I just want to step away and let somebody else deal with it while I go on trying to enjoy my life a little ...

BUT IT WON'T LET ME!!

Underwear Patrol

I haven't been thinking so much about the IUI lately as not thinking about it. I think that by 10 days past ovulation I'm pretty much waiting for my own personal doomsday to arrive. This isn't negative thinking so much as an act of self preservation at this point. I'm pretty sure everyone does this. Any shred of hope is cast carelessly aside and there is a precise mental list of "next steps:" -- order new meds, call doctor, update labs, all necessary steps for moving on to the next IUI and the next and the next.

I have started having cramps, and where I used to call these early cramps implantation!!, I now stoically remark that they are probably the beginning of d-day. I'm on full alert, but here is the old lower backache, the dreaded bloatedness and the general and absolute beginning of fatigue. The only thing left is the splat of confirmation telling me that it's definitely time to put the dusty old hope villain away for another time. I no longer am bothered to wipe off the fingerprint smudges before stashing him in his well worn little cardboard box. Hope is funny like that, you're much more careless with it when it hasn't gracefully seen you through all of your difficult moments. Somehow, maybe out of pure unadulterated habit, you keep bringing it along each time for the ride.

My temps have been a little all over the place. It's been a little difficult in the new place to take a proper temperature. Seb gets up at ungodly hours for his training, baby S is awake at the crack of dawn one day and then sleeping until 10:30 the next. I'm up and down a few times a night. I've tried to adjust the temps accordingly but It's still kind of unclear what's going on. One good thing I suppose is that I haven't had a drop below coverline...yet.

I definitely miss my chart. I really miss our home.

Wherein the diary gets written in an archaic and unnatural way

Well, we're off to Lyon next week to live in a temporary house for the next few months, only returning here on the weekends. It's a bit scary. I've had a lot of sleepless nights over this move and the many sudden changes it will bring in both the short and long term. As crazy as it sounds the thought of my loss of internet access and the loss of my very dear diary I've been keeping here has been one of the thing which has upset me the most. The writing I do here really helps me keep a clear head and lets me see a reflection of who I am in all this clunkety-junk mess of ups and downs I seem to be getting myself into lately. I guess I need to write to see who I am and what I feel. Maybe this is because I have no idea who I am and holding this mirror up sometimes lets me say "hey there's that woman, the one who's a little frightened, a lot stronger than she thinks and who seems to be a pretty good mother. I think I remember her." I often don't recognize this person until I see her a few months later while reading through old diary entries.

Anyway, after much refection and worrying it finally did occur to me that I was being silly. Many, many years ago people actually wrote in diaries and didn't publish them on a screen for all the world to see and analyze didn't they? They didn't get clever responses to each entry like, "Such a delight to hear that you and Mr. Chapman are eager to have a second child. Mrs. Beckman the elder will be so pleased to hear that," or "You and Jonathon should not have been holding hands in the garden while the Chancellor was not in the city, shame on you ... but do tell more!" And they didn't get to compare their stories to others' who'd had similar experiences not unlike their own in many ways, so they could obsess over the details of these stories and find deeper meaning and delightful irony in the similarity of their own circumstances. And thus I think their lives must have been much less rich and colorful and probably very, very unfulfilled. Plus just think how they couldn't google something every time they had say "nervous illnesses," "female complaints" or "the shivers" and find diagnosis or a cure in a matter of minutes and perhaps save their or their husband's life just like that.

It must have been very difficult.

So, anyway my conclusion is that I've decided to keep writing my diary anyway, and then I think simply dump the entries into the computer on the weekend when we return home from Lyon to hammer the walls or whatever it is we'll be doing when we come back to our house. I know what I'll be doing at least. I'll be playing catch up and driving Seb mad screaming, "my god woman will you stop it with that damn computer! There are more important things in life." And I will contine to peek at the screen each time he runs downstairs to fetch a screw or drill bit, and then pretend I'm just tidying up near the computer table just as he walks in again catching me gasping "OH GOD...she's having twins!"

Computer and those within you, you will be sorely missed! *sob* Sunday is our last day together for a while *sniff* I hope our time apart is short. *sniff* *sniff*

Obsessing after all

I know I said that this was like any other two week wait but I lied. Holy crap I'm already thinking two weeks ahead wondering lots of things:

shouldn't I be taking progesterone because I'm not and I've had a miscarriage already that we don't know the reason for...

how will Seb get another day off from his new job to repeat his sperm test that will be outdated before the next iui and then get another day off if we have to do another iui...

how on earth will we squeeze in three iui's over the next three months without my body being completely exhausted by Spring...

will an eventual IVF be a failure because we squeezed in all these lame procedures and manipulated my cycle way too many times...

And of course I could go on and on and on.

Nerves shot...transfer over

We did the transfer yesterday and we're now in the two week wait (only one week and six days after today but hey who's counting). It all went well in the end despite the mess Dr. Stonehenge's office made of things. The clinic who washed the sperm couldn't have been nicer and more patient with us and blamed the doctor for not offering us the proper proctocol. They went out of their way to help us and made me want to reach over and hug them and gush "Oh my god thank you so much you guys are AMAZING!" But I kept my reserve and just said thank you about 100 times.

Among the many things Dr. Stonehenge should have done but didn't was of course ordering the bloodwork on both of us. He did simply assume that we had our bloodwork updated and yet we didn't. My flying to the local lab with a very old prescription the other day to quickly do mine saved us because they were able to look up the results using some kind of global browser that allows you to find results as soon as they're ready.* Seb had to do his bloodwork there on the spot and we had to wait until 4pm for the results. There was also lots of missing paperwork and the lab staff just shook their heads and said, "you don't just stimulate a poor client and send them off with the wrong papers hoping for the best..." This is exactly what I was trying to tell the SUCKretary at Henge's office and I was glad that they thought his his staff was incompetent too and it wasn't just me.

We retrieved the sperm at four o'clock and rushed back to Dr. Stonehenge's office for a rather late transfer. I think we missed it in all honesty. We triggered the egg at 8:30am on Monday and couldn't do the transfer until 5:30pm on Tuesday because of all the missing papers. I think that's late in the game. Also I had lots of EWCM Moday and Tuesday morning as I'd had for days, but right before the transfer it had pretty much stopped. This morning it's completely gone and temps are starting to rise.

We bd'd the night before the IUI because I was pretty sure that everything wouldn't go as planned. I was happy that we'd done that in spite of the fact that it might mess up Seb's results the next day. Ironically he had really good results so it didn't mess anything up. So there is a very good argument for bd'ing every day leading up to ovulation instead of every other day like some doctors suggest.

Here we are in a two week wait again. I don't feel more optimistic than a usual two week wait. I feel normal. I feel eager to get past all this IUI crap and get on with the real deal; the IVF. I feel like the bad little girl who has to eat all of her vegetables before getting dessert.

I'm pouting.

*Strangely the lab told me that there is a woman in the system with my exact same name who lives in my town and is using the local lab I use. She was born the same year as me but with a birthdate 11 days before mine. Now tell me isn't that weird? I've always wondered why they make me repeat my name and address over and over.

The wonderful thing about triggers is triggers are wonderful things

I triggered this morning after eyeing two lovely follicules, one a whopping 19mm beauty and then the ugly stepsister, a 10mm straggler. I'd evidently been told to bring my trigger shot with me to the appointment, but I really don't remember Dr. Stonehenge mentioning this at all. In other words he didn't. No problem, I sprinted the 2 miles home, downhill and then sprinted back up, uphill to his office, pushing an overloaded baby carriage with a very disgruntled baby bundled inside. Since Dr. Stonehenge was long gone to the hospital for his rounds by then, his colleague Dr. Abnormally Friendly gave me the shot. I reminded him that he was the person who had seen me for my miscarriage at the hospital a few months ago. He looked at me very kindly and said, "Oh that was a difficult time...I hope you're feeling better now." I told him I was and that we had some hope for this cycle.

There were a few snags ... naturally. On the way out I got the telephone number of the clinic from Dr. Stonehenge's secretary for tomorrow's sperm washing. Dr. Stonehenge had suggested I call the clinic right away to make an appointment for our coming in tomorrow and I wanted to follow his advice and call from my cell phone right away. But, when I called the clinic it was closed for the holidays and it had been closed since December 21st! Well, pardon my french but welcome to fucking France. They reopen tomorrow. So I went back to the secretary hoping to get the phone number of another clinic or a worst case scenario and so I opened my mouth and said "look, the clinic is closed and I was supposed to make an app..." but she interrupted me and said in a very annoyed tone "WHAT?...I don't understand anything you're saying to me." At which point I said in a sarcastically polite tone "umm yes, maybe because I haven't finished my sentence." It all went downhill from there and she said after rebuking me for not making my appointment with the clinic two weeks ago* that I should just go to the clinic tomorrow and see if they'll take us. Well, seeing as they've been closed since uh, what the first day of Hanukkha, I'm sure we'll have no problems being walk-in patients tomorrow morning. Why, we probably won't have to wait very long at all! In other words, have your husband take a day off from his new job** so he can drive three hours from Lyon and then drive one hour to the middle of nowhere to a wanking station that might or might not let him wank while your egg sits there waiting patiently or not. Oh go on, what have you got to lose!

Asshole.

The second snag was the blood draw. As I left the secretary said, "as long as your husband has his blood draws on file..." or something like that (I swear she spoke one quarter swahili because half of what she said sounded like jibberish to me) and I said "what?" and she sighed really loudly and said "he has to have the blood draws on file in the clinic. You know the ones he did when he did his sperm culture. He does right?" And I sighed knowing full well that he didn't get them. He was never told to. And so I left shaking my head and when I got out in the street the tears starting flowing and they wouldn't stop. I tucked myself and baby S into a shop alcove and pretended to be shoe shopping until they stopped flowing but they didn't stop and so I just kept walking. I cried because I realized that I should have done a series of blood draws too and no one had reminded us. Dr. Stonehenge in all of the chaos of us switching from IVF to IUI had probably figured that we knew we had to have them for ALL procedures. We didn't know and he hadn't reminded us by giving us a prescription for a lab visit.

I went home again and called the secretary back, "Umm these blood draws can you explain the..." she cut me off again "you'll have to ask the clinic when your husband does his sperm sample." "Yes, I know but what I want to know is about me? Do I have to get blood draws too and what exactly are they agan?" And we went around for a few minutes because I could not for the life of me get it through her head that I was looking for information about ME not my husband. Finally she said "ooh lala c'est pas vrai..." which in French means "are you stupid or what?" or something along those lines. And so I said, "can't we just page Dr. Stonehenge at the hospital and ask him to call me?" and she practically screamed "MADAME I SAID THE CLINIC WILL TELL YOU WHAT YOU NEED AND IF THERE'S A PROBLEM THERE'S ALWAYS NEXT MONTH!" And I realized then that there are two sets of people in this world; those that are loving and kind and then this slimy fucking ho.

I considered going to the hospital to ask Dr. Stonehenge in person but I decided to take matters in my own hands. I found a prescription for the blood draws in my old IVF papers and went back uphill 2 miles with the baby carriage in tow to the lab to do them. The results won't be ready for three days though which probably means that the clinic will turn us away tomorrow morning. I'm just so frustrated that I wasn't given the blood lab prescriptions from Dr. Stonehenge when we started the IUI. I know I should have remembered them, lord knows I've done enough of them, but it doesn't seem very efficient that they don't have a better system with all of the papers given to the patient in advance. I have to rely on him and he's always in such a hurry to get me out the door and get on to the next patient that he forgets half of what he's supposed to tell me.***

So that's where we are. And hey if it doesn't work there's always "NEXT MONTH" right.****

*The girl is sadly misinformed if she thinks you can make an appointment for a sperm meeting an egg two weeks in advance, either that or she knows something I don't which could explain LOTS of thing!

**Seb started his new job and we're temporarily living apart because of it. Fertility treatment, new job, moving...hey what stress? No stress here.

***like the time he forgot to tell me that I'd failed my glucose tolerance test for gestational diabetes. He told me one month later when he looked at my file on the computer and said "so how's the diet going?" And I said, "Umm, what diet?"

****I won't tell you what I said to her when she said this to me because frankly I can't even remember half of it. Suffice to say you should never doublecross a woman hopped up on hormones or you will definitely get an earful. She deserved it and lots more. For the first time I have to say I'm happy about my Gonal-F rages.

Looks

I can't complain too much because Blogger is free but what's up with the crappy templates? Can't they come up with some better styles? Maybe some more interesting styles?

I'm a little frustrated with the lack of decent working templates too. This is my third one. The first template 'thisawayrose' kept sliding my links down to the bottom of the page. The last one 'snapshot' kept having crazy lines running through it. A bit like getting bad television reception. Okay here is number three. Lets hope it works because I'm running out of choices.

*And I just noticed that this new template is one which doesn't put the spaces after a period. I can't win.

On our way

After a little confusion about the availability of Dr. Stonhenge, --his secretary got to hear my pathetic sobbing "he told me he'd be there...," -- I've started the injections for the IUI.

You won't hear any more complaints from me for the next few weeks. I'm playing Miss Positive Thinker from here on out. I know, I know you wanna whack me upside the head don't you. Positive people are assholes. I hate them too. I just can't stand staying negative during a treatment. I force myself be positive. It helps me stay reasonably sane even if I don't believe it.

My next appointment is Monday the 2nd of January. We'll take a look under the hood and see what's happening. After that we'll either tweak the meds or trigger the egg either that night or the next night. Then we just have to coordinate Seb's little contribution. Same old drill except I forgot how wonderfully rapid an IUI can be.

Meanwhile excuse me while I go 'click' my injection. These little injection pens are great. I'm only doing 75IU's of Gonal F so the injections really feel like nothing. It wasn't like that when I did my IVF's. I had to mix two meds together and change the dosage after a few weeks. This is so much easier and so much less mess.

I just hope it's working...

Sympathy

Finally a scrap of good news. Dr.'Henge said we could go ahead with the IUI this next cycle *rolling eyes* Yes, he really did roll his eyes, A LOT actually! Everytime he said IUI he sighed, shrugged his shoulders and rolled his eyes. He said there was nothing he could do though because Dr. Dieu is, well Dr. Dieu and that's that. Dr. Dieu has the final word in this case. I just wanted to run over and bear hug him! Just the fact that he sympathizes with me for the In Utile Insemination made me feel better. He said we'd try to get away with just doing three, not four, and that we'd do them "bang, bang, swish" and then we'd move on to IVF no later than May. I felt a small sense of relief that he was taking a special interest in my case, and that he wasn't willing to drag it out past late Spring. I know that in France anything scheduled for later than May gets trapped in the Great Summer Exodous and nothing really gets done until the rentrée in the Fall. As I left he threw in a sympa, "I'm available for you anytime you need something," and he actually didn't charge me for the visit! Goodness me. Dr. Stonehenge you rock!

Seb came with me and had lots of questions. He always has lots of questions *sigh* Here's just a sample of three he asked to give you an idea:

When will I have to wank?
Will I be able to wank in *blank* town's clinic or will I have to go to *blank* town's clinic?
Do I have to give another wanking sample before the actual wank?

You know, lots of questions like that, but nothing about the wife's emotional fragility, statistical data or potential harmful aspects of several healthy doses of Gonal F. To his credit he used to ask these questions but I think we've both become tired and we kind of just want to know where we're supposed to be and when. I guess I'm sort of the same way, only now I'm such an expert that I can quickly calculate which day I'll have the transfer and which day Seb will have to wank. While Dr. 'Henge had trouble giving him a date, I quickly said January 8-12 as a ballpark figure.

As we were chatting with Dr.'Henge Seb discovered that my period would arrive with the Christmas tidings. This really isn't a problem for me or Dr. 'Henge since I won't start treatment until the second or third day after my period starts and I don't really have to worry about being home right away. I have this lovely three day window after my period, enough time for a scan and some drug shopping and a tea. But as we were leaving Seb said, "maybe we should just stay here for Christmas." And I said "No, your parents are expecting us. I don't think we should disappoint them." And he kept saying "no, no I think we need to relax. I think we need some time to focus on us." And then suddenly there was another man I wanted to jump on and bear hug, and I actually did. So we've decided that we'll stay here for the holidays and we stopped on the way home and bought a five euro Christmas tree. Yep, five euros. It's a little lopsided but it was the best of the five euros lot.

Another reason we're staying here is because of the move. I haven't announced this officially so all my lurking friends WHO NEVER POST COMMENTS will now call me screaming, "you put this in your BLOG and I get to read about it there and you don't even call me...," but yes, it's true and yes you read it here first. We're not sure about any of the logistics yet, and Seb of course was asking all those wanking questions because he does need to know how on earth he'll get here and there for samples. Baby S and I will most likely stay here and consider this our home base, especially during the weeks leading up to the transfer when I'll have to be doing all the scans. But, Seb is being put up in style for the first few months in a three bedroom house with a little patio and garden, so we may get more comfortable there and decide to change our basecamp to a place with a warm shower. It might just be too tempting.

My temps seem to be dropping and I'm cramping so things are looking ominous for this cycle. I don't expect to make it to Christmas eve, let alone Friday. I'm just hoping for the weekend so that it doesn't mess with our plan. Because you know now we got us a plan now!

Christmas presents from The Grinch

I got a wonderful Christmas present from Dr. Stonehenge on Friday in the form of an appointment with him for this week, his busiest period. His secretary must have heard the desperation in my voice, or maybe it was the incessant calling last week to see if she had a cancellation. She finally dug up some space in her book, squeezing me in between no doubt two very pregnant patients. So tomorrow afternoon I'll have my rapid fire chat with the geekily handsome but very petite Dr.'Henge about the next big step, the IUI. I'm sure the conversation will terminate with the standard "call when you get your next period" schpiel. But it's the first positive news I've had in so many weeks and I'm taking it and gnawing on it like the table scrap that it is. This hungry dog's ribs are starting to show.

We had a nice weekend celebrating Christmas with a few neighbors in front of our newly installed fireplace. Guilt and obsession combined told me to abstain from bad things like foie gras, certain cheeses and of course alcohol, but my long standing demonic hatred for abstention for conception purposes won out and I celebrated the holiday festivities guilt free with a glass of champagne in hand (a glass or...uh maybe two that is). I woke up to a small headache, a lot of guilt and a massive temperature dip. Today it's all straightened out and looking upwards again. Who knew alcohol could reek such havoc on a bbt?

The rest of my cycle will play out at my mother-in-law's house over the holiday weekend. The idea of not having access to my chart to obsess over leaves me in a slight state of panic. The thought of receiving my period on Christmas Eve (very cruel) leaves me thinking that there really is an Infertility Grinch cavorting about at this time of year spreading 'stanky-stunk' Christmas cheer. Let's hope he doesn't make it to my in-laws. They no longer have a fireplace since they moved last month and I think this might be a good sign; no passageway for the Grinch. But, maybe his two sizes too small heart will find me a few days after Christmas as I sit curled up in front of our new fireplace at home. Let's just hope he stays up in the mountains where he belongs and leaves me to enjoy the ultimate gift.

Dream one

It's a very hot day, I'd say about 110 degrees outside and my lips are cracked they're so parched. I'd like to get in the shade but I look down and see that my feet are cemented to the ground. Off in the distance there's a lemonade stand with fresh icy lemonade being prepared by two adorable little girls in blue crushed velvet dresses with white pinafore collars. I watch them prepare the first batch, first cutting the fat, juicy lemons, then adding a half cup of sugar, and some cold water. They shake the mixture in a metal canister full of ice, giggling all the while. They keep beckoning for me to come to them to get the lemonade but my legs are stuck, all the way to my shins. I'm really thirsty. Why don't they just bring me the lemonade! I pull a few coins from my pocket and toss them to the girls, and finally one of them comes over, gingerly holding a sweaty glass of citrus heaven in both of her little hands. She sets the glass at my feet and then skips away back to her stand. I lick my lips in anticipation of that first sip. I'm so relieved. Finally some satisfaction. I bend down to pick the glass up, but as do I realize that it's just out of reach. My legs are cemented too high to bend enough to reach it. "Uh hey, little girl, little girl over here! Hey you! Hey..." I try to get it again, bending really low and stretching my fingers, but it's really just out of reach. I try to get their attention again but the two girls are suddenly swamped with customers and can barely make the lemonade fast enough to serve everyone.

Meanwhile I watch all the customers off in the distance enjoying their lemonade, chatting and laughing. They're complaining about the weather and about how hot it is, but hey how can they complain. They have their lemonade! They're drinking their lemonade! They have no idea what it means to be so hot and thirsty!

Meanwhile my glass sits at my feet just out of reach, the ice has long since melted and there's a wet spot on the pavement from the condensation. My legs are tired. I'm frustrated and all I want now is to get my feet out of the cement and sit down. Forget the lemonade I just need to rest.

IUI: it's usually inutile, no really

I'm trying to stay an optimist about the next few months even though it's almost impossible to not think back to all those awful IUI trials. I really hated that period of my treatment; a real low point in my life. Whenever I think back to that time I get very angry and sad thinking of all the time wasted with an RE who refused to refer us for IVF until we'd completed all five IUI cycles, even though Seb had terrible motility and a less than stellar count ... awww, I still love you honey, dont worry

The IUI's were physically very painful because the doctor always used a small clamp to open my cervix and this usually resulted in a 40 minute bloodbath and hours and hours of cramps. I don't know why but she found this, in her words "perfectly normal" that the whole event was a torturous pit that I fell into each few months. She also dubbed me the 'impatient patient' because of my distate for the whole IUI process and it's useless waste of time and energy. I was eager to move on to IVF so the whole ordeal could be done in a more sophisticated scientific fashion instead of with tools and methods adapted from Stonhenge.

Maybe this time it won't be so painful. Maybe the RE was just an incompetent ho. Perhaps it was the negative vibes emitting from my ovaries or my refusal to believe in fuzzy positive thoughts. Maybe this time I'll leave the ob's office with hope instead of a wad of paper towels between my legs. One can dream.

The other sucky thing is that we may still be moving. This "should we or shouldn't we move to Lyon" thing has been going on for about two months now. Seb and I decided last week that he definitely should go and we'd be much better off financially and blah, blah, blah. And I added, "yeah and Dr. Dieu is like right around the corner, so no more overnight trips to go to the hospital for IVF procedures, cool!" Umm, except that I'm not his patient anymore as of Friday afternoon. Oops. If we still decide to move I have to find a new ob who will do the IUI's and that's going to take a few months at least. We may not even move to Lyon now because the idea of finding a new doctor gives me the heebies. These fertility specialists are a funny lot. Some are horror stories in their own right, demoralizing and accusatory. I hate to be negative and say that we won't find a good doctor, but a good doctor, and by 'good' I mean caring and motivated to see you have success despite your age or reserve, well, it just isn't the norm it's the exception.

Meanwhile I ovulated this cycle a little earlier than last cycle. I looked back over my temps for last cycle and saw that the temp that determined my ovulation day was taken when I was travelling and had gotten up very early. I tried discarding it and it gave me an O day of two days earlier. This time around I was eyeing the calendar instead of my signs, deciding that we'd hit the last four days before O like bandits. Well, that was just plain stupid. O came and went without my even noticing she was here, until she'd gone of course, tarty wench. Luckily we'd started trying on day 10, nice and early. I really hate Seb's job, and they're to blame if this cycle is bust. He had his monthly Thursday night meeting with the night crew the day before O! He was really tired the next morning, too tired for bd and then crashed early the next night to catch up on his rest. Wouldn't you know! Arrrg!!!.

It ain't over until...well about 10 days from now. Meanwhile excuse me while I go and scrub my skin free of all this greasy HOPE oozing out of my pores. I really have to get some good strong prescription gel cleanser for this. It's getting annoying.

Say it ain't so ...

I got a call from Dr. Dieu himself this morning. I found it very strange that he'd be calling me himself. Very strange.

dieu: So how's the little tyke these days?

me: Fine doctor, doing very well thanks... just get on with it will you...

dieu: ::cheerily:: So you had a spontaneous pregnancy?

me: Yes, that ended in a miscarriage.

dieu: ...but a spontaneous pregnancy just the same

yes: umm yes ...where is this leading?

dieu: So this is some good news then! why the fuck is this good news please tell me? Here's what we're going to do, we're going to try a few inuterine inseminations first and see how that goes. Your local OB can handle them. All very straightforward. Simple stuff.

me: not sure if I heard that correctly Do you mean IUI's?

dieu: Yep, IUI's.

me: Yes but doctor I did five IUI's and it never worked. It took over two years of my life. It was very frustrating. I really think...

dieu: ...oh it works more often than you think. Maybe you were just on the wrong side of the odds. We'll try it again and see.

me: But it's really more of a time issue these days. I'll be 38 years old in March and I think that I need to ...

dieu: Honestly, I can't recommend you for an IVF until you do at least four rounds of IUI.

me: FOUR rounds!?

dieu: It will go quickly and if it doesn't work we'll go straight to the IVF.

me: :speechless:

dieu: We have patient's who are still trying to get their first baby Madame. With your spontaneous pregnancy I can't say I can recommend you for IVF. It will go quickly, don't worry you'll be holding that baby before you know it.

Fuck. I've just been dumped by my RE. All because I got pregnant and lost a baby after over six months of trying. If I could have imagined a worse case scenario it would not have even been this awful.

* I just called the secretary of my ob who says that my ob will not be seeing any patients until after January first. When I tried to explain to her that I was not a newly pregnant patient, but that I was preparing for (an utterly useless) fertility treatment (that should be happening SOON damnitt to hell), she said "I'm sorry madame there are NO exceptions!"

I think the universe has just turned wrong side out and upside down. Can someone please tell me what the fuck is going on?

Optimistic response...yay I suppose

I finally got through today, whew! Only three thousand phone calls. Maybe she was on vacation, or possibly on strike. It's usually one or the other here in France. Who the hell knows or cares. The most important thing is that Nurse Dieu finally picked up her #@[!|* phone and she was actually very nice. I told her my long, sad story and she made some notes. And, well she seemed to think that I could start treatment on my very next cycle! The holiday cycle! I explained that I was going to be getting my next period on Christmas Eve and wouldn't that be a problem because they're closed for two weeks? I can never remember the word for day before Christmas in french, 'reveillon' so I stumbled around and said "uh...uh...the day before Christmas" which sounded kind of retarded when translated...like I didn't know what time of the year it was, let alone my cycle own day. But, she didn't think that would be a problem at all. You see they're closed for procedures for the holiday period but my actual retreival wouldn't be until mid January. I'd just be doing injections over the holidays. Lovely imagery...injections over the holidays...Anyway, she is supposed to check with Dr. Dieu and get back with me today.

I suddenly had terribly mixed feeling about ttc this cycle. What if I get yet another bum pregnancy? But isn't that awful to wish I wouldn't get pregnant this cycle? I was feeling so optimistic too. I suppose I have no choice at this point than to give this cycle everything I can. Sort of close my eyes and and jump off the cliff of hope, hold your nose point your toes. If I didn't I'd feel like an idiot, especially if there's a snafu in the IVF cycle, like overstimming or not enough follicules or something. It's not like that never happens. Then I'd be even more depressed because I stopped a perfectly good natural cycle for a crappy IVF. Because as you are well aware our store's my personal motto is: :points to sign: "We Will Not Let Any Cycle Be Wasted!" (...or your money back)

My little psychosis. Ain't it cute? I may end up with about 5 kids by the time I'm 45. Everyone will whisper, "Hey you know she thought she was infertile! She actually used to have a blog about it." But wouldn't that be poetic justice. And I've always wanted to name my imaginary stairstep children with matching first letters; Selina, Shelby, Sherbert, Shreve, and Sheldon; and make elaborate, little, matching holiday outfits for them in blue crushed velvet, ohhh, just the name alone makes me shiver...

Back down Mrs. Duggar, you don't have the corner on the baby making market just yet. And I might just be craftier than you with a Singer!*


*Why on earth does she make those pinafore collars so huge?

Helloooooo is anyone there?

I wasted two hours and forty five minute of my life trying to call the nurse at my RE's office yesterday.

me: dial dial dial dial dial
them: ring ring ring ring ring ring ring ....*

*repeat repeatedly and then repeat again

My RE works out of a huge hospital in Lyon and his staff is notoriously impossible to get on the phone. His secretary's office takes about a week to get through to. I'm not joking. First the line will be busy for hours, days even. Then after you've redialed about a jillion times, you will be put on hold for at least 45 minutes. This is the exciting part because you know you're in now, you're on hold . But as is often the case, after about twenty minutes you will get cut off for some mysterious reason; coffee break perhaps? I have only been in the secretary's offices one time and I had to wait in a line of about six people to see someone. Apparently their job is not just answering the phone but also fielding questions of all sort in person and handing off prescription paperwork.

However, this is no longer a problem for me. Since I'm a patient now who will be undergoing treatment I have a special private number I can call. The nurse hotline. She's available between certain specific hours for patient's questions regarding current treatment. You can only call her for questions if you're a patient on the verge of doing your IVF, period. No more waiting on hold! Lovely. But now get this--she never, ever answers her friggin' phone! She used to answer her phone, albeit after about 20 minutes of busy signals. I know because I called her just last month. So yesterday after one week of ringing, in frustration I actually resorted to calling the secretary instead, and when I finally got through she gave me the NURSE'S NUMBER...Argggggh!

Socialized medicine is lovely but get in line sistah! I'm so tired of not having access to this doctor. I'm so very tired of not getting detailed explanations and having to look things up on the internet. And I'm so tired of waiting.

I am so angry that I miscarried. Honestly it would have been so much easier to have never have become pregnant and to have started the meds when my period ended. Instead here I am back to square one. I'm sure the nurse will suggest that we come in again and consult with the RE. A two and a half hour drive. Ten minutes with Dr. Dieu, consisting mainly of his reflections about US politics and Florida vacation spots, and then we'll be back on track to waiting for my next period. It does feel like a vicious circle.

I know I probably have no right to complain about my free treatment. No right whatsoever. And I'm eternally grateful for it. But, it feels a bit like not having the right to complain about infertility after you already have one beautiful kid. Or how about not having the right to complain about the hardships of motherhood because you know others don't even have one kid, you know because you stood right next to them. And yet it can't all be kept inside. This is my disclaimer to complain.

But hey, hold on a minute. Maybe this next cycle will result in a natural pregnancy! A real keeper this time around. Maybe I will be able to look back at this diary entry in a few months time and say tsk, tsk, tsk because my belly will be out further than I could have imagined and I'll roll my eyes and say, "Oh look how silly and obsessed I was. Oh my god!" And I'll laugh at myself worrying about a nurse who doesn't answer her phone. My mind will go dreamy and I'll lazily switch over to thinking of my new pregnancy, "oh heck that kind of reminds me of my new ob's office. I mean gee I can hardly ever get in for my scans on time because I can never get through to Dr. Handsome's secretary. And that gel really tickles my stomach ..." and I'll be so into the pregnancy mode that I won't care about anything to do with infertility. And I probably won't even remember this poor, obsessed soul who ranted over her morning coffee about a missing nurse.

The selfish pregnant lady. Oh god I hate her.

A visit to the pharmacy pt. II

This visit to the pharmacy went much better. I passed several pharmacies in the center of town before finding one that looked promising. In other words it was filled with women. In fact it was filled with only women, the clients as well as cashiers, about 15 people loitering around discussing their problems with a caring femme manning every register. A Wiccan pharmacy perhaps? A good sign.

My instincts were right because the owner was a woman, and she seemed very interested in helping me discover an herbal formula for ttc. I wrote down several herbs in english on a paper; yam root, red clover and red rasberry leaf, and she told me she would research it over the weekend, translate it if possible and that I should return on Monday for her results. Wow.

I've never had such help in my normal pharmacy around the corner. So, I'd say I have a new pharmacy now! I'm not sure why but for some reason here in France you stay loyal to one pharmacy and that's that. It's the same for the boulangeries, butchers and flourists. I however have no qualms about leaving my farty, old pharmacy where they keep asking me for my coordinates, even though I've spent more time in there than in my own bathroom at home. And when I tell them "I'm in the computer, or at least I should be by now!" they always say, "maybe it's because you are étranger," Which is all very ridiculous. They simply never bothered to reserve me in their system because hearing my accent they automatically deleted me from their files thinking I'm a tourist. It took two IVFs to get my name in their system! That's about 10,000 euros worth of fertility drugs, bastards! They've made a fortune off of me. And besides they always rush me out when I'm there. I really have no qualms about leaving them behind for "La Pharmacie des Femmes".

In other news I got some folic acid, B6 and 100 mg of baby aspirin. I still haven't quit caffine in the morning. It's more of a vice than I thought it was. At least I have something to blame if this cycle doesn't work.