This old hen

At 37 years old I am solidly in the "elderly" category for a woman trying to get pregnant. I started this journey at 32 years old. A year later we did the basic infertility work up and found nothing wrong. "Keep trying" I was told "sometimes the mystery resolves itself". Now I'm back in infertility treatment and the basic work up has some different weight to it. Now there is an "age factor" to my infertility. Though the work up is exactly the same the focus is different enough. Looking at my FSH at 33 years old is to make sure something isn't "wrong" with me. Looking at my FSH at 37 years old is to see how far the natural aging of my reproductive system has gotten and if it is enough to have me give up then and there.

So I'm going in for a pelvic ultrasound to make sure there are still no masses in my uterus and my ovaries look normal. Then I'm doing a Clom.id challenge test, without insemination, and blood work to see if my body can still get poked and prodded into making some decent eggs or if my laying days are over and it is time for the soup pot.

It feels strange. I've had these tests before, nothing surprising. This time, however, the results will decide if those last two IF cycles are worth a try or if I'm already out of the baby-making game. Stranger still, I'm not sure which result I'm hoping for anymore.

Remembering Mom

Six years ago today my mother committed suicide. She felt trapped, hopeless and completely helpless to change her situation. My mom was in so much pain, physical and psychological, that death seemed the only option.

I'm not going to pretend my mom was all wonderful. She had her faults. We didn't get along and she sure as hell fucked me up in some ways. I still have some pretty strange body image issues and "work through the pain" ideas that are completely hers. However, she also taught me to be independent and strong. She accepted and loved me when I came out as queer, supported my polyamorous relationships and could care less if I made a lot of money as long as I was happy. All things considered, she wasn't horrible, just a flawed human being like the rest of us.

She thought that her death wouldn't matter. She thought I wouldn't care if she killed herself. She thought that my brother and I would be better off without her. I think a lot of people who attempt/commit suicide think that. It is NEVER true. Her suicide is a horrible legacy that she has left my brother and I. It will always be a part of us now. Not just her death but the fact that she took her own life, choosing to leave T and I behind to deal with the confusion, guilt, feelings of betrayal and anger that is part of every suicide survivor's inheritance.

As some one who has suffered with clinical depression all my life I know how tempting the though of suicide can be. What always stopped me was the thought of how it would effect the people who I left behind. I couldn't do that to my mom, my brother, my friends and lovers. Now that I know first hand what if feels like to be the one left behind I wish I could prevent it from happening to anyone ever again.

So this is in the memory of my mom, Colleen, and in honor of all of us that were left to pick up the pieces after a loved one commits suicide.

If you are considering suicide please hear me when I say that it isn't your only option. Somethings can be fixed, somethings can heal. You can and will feel better than this someday. Some one cares about you even if you don't realize it. Reach out and get help. Please try.

GET HELP!
Global: International Association for Suicide Prevention has information for crisis centers all over the world.

In the US: National Suicide Prevention Lifetime or Call 1-800-273-TALK (8255)

In Canada: Centre for Suicide Prevention

Leaves fall and I fall with them

I have major depressive disorder. When you look at my family history it is pretty easy to assume that a good chunk of this disorder is a result of a bad roll of the genetic dice. I don't process serotonin and dopamine in ways that keep my mood generally stable.

Depression is cyclical with me. Late fall and winter are the hardest times. This was made even worse with the anniversary of my mom's suicide landing on December 1st. I was hoping with the amazing success of my latest drug therapy and the changes in my life that I would escape my usual Fall/Winter depressive episode. No such luck. Of course, some of this is situational. The issues with infertility and the impending unsatisfied ending of my ttc journey is a huge stressor that isn't making the season any easier. We are also trying to clean up our finances and that isn't any fun no matter what the season. In general though, my life is very good. "The house guest", as Monkey and Author call my depression, doesn't seem to care that things are generally good. My mind is a funny ol' place right now. And though it is not nearly as bad as it was this time last year, I'm still struggling.

The last chapter

Bee contacted us last week to officially end our donor relationship. He's sorry. He wishes things hadn't worked out this way. Blah, Blah, Blah. Whatever. Really, I'm not upset with him. A little annoyed but I can't work up much anger at him. I've been through this before and I don't get terribly attached to donors anymore. After last month I expected this.

So, here is where we are: I'm done with donors. I can't muster up the energy or hope it takes to slog through and find a match. We feel we've done all we can ourselves. We have two Clomid/Trigger/IUI cycles waiting for us with our NP. We think that Feb/March 2012 will be a good time to do those. As I've said before, these are our "no regrets" cycles. The last thing we need to check off our list to feel like we did the best we could manage. We will use frozen sperm and jump through all the fertility clinic hoops for those last two cycles but if those don't work, well, not every infertility story ends with a baby. Actually, a majority of them don't.

After that we will go on with our lives. Our hearts will break, and mend. We will grieve our loss of the child that never was and then move on to celebrate the life we already have. Until then, I try take care of myself and to start learning to let go.

Mending heart

Over the last week or so I've notice something strange. When I see pregnant people, babies or young children I'm not struck in the heart with painful longing. Sometimes a little twinge of sadness but only for a moment. How did this come about? Is my heart mending from the last 5 years of infertility? That seems too simple to be true. I'm expecting the pain to return. I'm sure I will have bad days again. Days when the loss of my chance to parent will strike me so hard I can't breathe. But this last week has shown me I can have good days too. Someday, the good days will outnumber the bad. It is like my heart is giving me a little taste of healing to tell me I can return from the "land of IF" whole even without a child.

Leaves aren't the only thing changing

I think the biggest change is how I'm feeling about trying to get pregnant. As of right now we are planning to do one insem each cycle with Bee until early next year. Once we've saved up enough we will do my last two clinic infertility cycles. I'm already thinking beyond those cycles to giving up. Of course, I've been thinking about that for awhile but, well, I guess I'm making the assumption that they won't work. I don't expect to get pregnant but I have to try. I have to check it off the list so I don't feel regret sometime later. Grief I will feel no matter what I do but I don't want to have regrets.

As a result of my lack of hope, I'm feeling pretty detached from the process. This weekend starts my fertile period. We emailed the dates to Bee and he hasn't gotten back to us yet. I'm indifferent. We could do an insem this cycle or not. Monkey, however, is not making the "it won't work" assumption. He can't really think about after the infertility cycles to giving up. Though he says he would be fine to give up I don't think he ever imagined we'd get to this point. It isn't a real possibility in his mind yet. He truly believes that, somehow, between now and then I will get pregnant and have a baby. I don't believe that at all. As I said before, I'm only doing these last attempts so that I know in my heart and my mind that I did whatever I was capable of to get pregnant. If Monkey is right and I do get pregnant in this process I will be completely and utterly shocked. It will actually require me to shift my life view back to what it was before I lost hope. Well, some of it anyway. I rather like some of the downsizing ideas that have come out of planning a different life.

Monkey and I have always been on different stages in this ttc process. I always feel like I'm a step or two ahead of him in it. I guess that isn't unusual since it is my body we are working with. I have to think ahead every two weeks and beyond. He has less to do in the theoretical stages of becoming a parent this way. He is thinking about it more now because he is trying to prepare for the possibility that it really won't happen. It makes me sad to see him trying to hold back the grief. I know all too well what it feels like.

To a certain extent I'm just ready for this to be over. I consider the possibility of giving up before the IF cycles but only for a moment. I need that closure. I need that final option behind me to let go. So now I'm in a ttc limbo with nothing to do but go through the motions and wait to see what happens.

Thinking off the shelf

Sometimes wandering the internet aimlessly pays off!I found a clever kitchen organization tip while wandering Pintrest.

We are a snacking household. We love to nibble. Being on WW while being a snacking household is a challenge but we have found a bunch of low "point" tasty noms. However, a bunch of little snacks make for a jumble of half filled boxes and random things lost in the back of the shelf. I've tried various ways to keep these snacks organized but nothing works for long. So when I found this clever little idea I rushed right out to get what I needed.

TADA!


This is a clear plastic, over the door, shoe organizer used to hold all our little nibbles along with our c-drink and ginger drink packets. We can now see and find everything. No more digging through piles for something and no more reaching for a box to find it is empty. Currently it is on our kitchen door out to the hall but I may move it to the back of the pantry door since I've already opened the door on Author while he was deciding on a snack. Whichever door it is on it has already make things much easier!

The beginning of the end of another beginning.

October marks five years of my life focused on trying to get pregnant. I've had a few long breaks in those years. One break was almost a whole year its self. However the thoughts, emotions and planning of ttc was never very far off even on the breaks.

October also brings my 37th birthday. About a year and a half ago I decided that 37 was a good age to seriously reconsider continuing the babyquest.

Monday I got an email from our donor, Bee, saying that his life has been taking some crazy stressful turns. As a result, though he would really like to continue helping us, he can only do it if we are able to do a "more targeted approach". We have yet to hear from him exactly what he means by that. We assume it means doing one insemination a cycle. Though I do not blame him for the sudden turn in his life (a big part of it is a family illness) I'm still very disappointed. I really thought things were set for a good long try with this donor.

So all of these things hit me at once. The five year anniversary of our first ttc cycle, my 37th birthday in a few weeks and my donor limiting access unexpectedly. Usually when setbacks hit me on this ttc journey I bounce back, after a "life is fucking unfair why can't I have a baby" tantrum, with an adjusted course on the quest. This time was a little different. This time I didn't have the tantrum, though I did end up crying a little. This time I started to wonder "Is it time to start thinking about giving up"? I've never thought this particular thing before. I've thought about what it would mean to give up. I've even wondered how I would know when it was the right time to give up. However, this is the first time I've actually thought "is it time"? I feel like this is a sign that the time for giving up is getting closer.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not giving up yet. Monkey and I have decided that, for now, we will keep trying with Bee until January. At that time we will do our last two Clo.mid/trigger/IUI cycles available to us. After that, well, I'm starting to explore the other possible ending of my ttc journey. The one that doesn't end with the birth of a baby. I've mentioned before that adoption would be, at best, complicated if not impossible due to my open poly household. I'm not sure I want to go through that. As a result, most of what I'm considering is what my life would be like if I don't become a parent.

How would I feel about that in the long term? I know in the short term I would be heartbroken and grieving but I would work through that. When I hit menopause would I regret giving up before my cycles did? Would I always have that knife to the heart feeling when I see babies? Would I regret not jumping through all the hoops to attempt adoption? I'm big on researching. I went hunting for books and blogs on living childfree after infertility. There are very few that exist. Even fewer are available at my, usually well stocked, county library. I know there are lots of people who go through infertility and don't end up with a baby at the end. Where are all their stories? It feels rather lonely in this place in between giving up and going on.

One person's trash...

As my household clears out our mounds of built-up stuff Monkey has started checking on Ebay if our outgoing items are worth anything. While looking at, what I think of as a pile of junk, I laughed at his efforts and went back to sorting. The books I could see being worth some trade-in credit at Powell's and maybe we could find some specialty vinyl record store that wanted some of our three boxes of inherited records but the rest... Well, Monkey ignored me and went on checking. Most of what he was checking on was outdated tech. Who wants a zip drive nowadays in the time of 4g thumb drives cheep at every store? It seems some one does, along with a lot of other odds and ends that we have no use for. So far it looks like we may make enough to fund our last vacation of the season coming next week.

This is especially fortunate as predictions of a bad winter to come have been starting to pop up. As a result, we are shelling out on a whole cord of wood as well as preparing to go through a lot more heating oil.

I will never doubt the interest of some one else wanting what I'm getting rid of. I'm hoping these things are going to people who will use them rather than junk up someone else's life.

My hero

My primary partner, Monkey, works in community mental health. He does a very, very difficult job with, sometimes very, ill patients on a very tight budget. He hears horrible stories of abuse and neglect from the histories of many of his clients. Sometimes they take out their pain on him by yelling and threatening him. Sometimes, thankfully rare, he loses clients to suicide or overdose. He goes through this every day at the office. Every day he gets up and goes back again for more. He does it because he loves his job. He cares about these people who no one else are helping. He believes that each client has the ability, with some help, to be stable, happy, sober, whatever. When he worked exclusively in addictions he always believed that if some one blew out of treatment that they would come back and, next time, they would succeed at getting sober. Every. Single. Time. Monkey is one of my heroes. How he manages to have worked in community mental health for the past 12 years and not become jaded and bitter has always amazed me.

He posted on his own blog yesterday about his work. You can read it here. He is an amazing guy, my Monkey. I'm so proud of who he is and the work he does. :)

Downsizing

I liked to think I'm not much of a "stuff" person. However, I looked around my house a few months ago and realized that it was packed to the rafters with, well, stuff! When Monkey and I moved into the house we rattled around in it like two marbles in a pickle jar. It was amazing to have so much space. We thought we'd never fill it up. It is now several years later and we have certainly managed to pack in the stuff. I am told this happens to everyone when you settle down in one place for long enough.

I hate feeling crowded. I feel mentally bloated. By current American standards, I have a small-ish house, however, I look around and feel like this should be more than enough space. Compared to other societies, this is an obscene amount of space. I feel like I'm being wasteful simply by using up space for what is essentially junk. My attic, basement and garage are full of stuff that no one has looked at for a year or more. (To be fair, the garage is mostly Author's stuff that he has been going through to minimize his own collection of stuff.) Do I really need any of this? For the most part the answer is no.

So Monkey and I are going on a stuff diet. Our goal is clear out all of our junk-hiding corners and maximize our use of space through organization. We are also being much more mindful of what we think we need to buy. This part is less of a problem for him as it is for me. I've practicing small amounts of retail therapy because of my trouble getting pregnant. (Didn't get a bfp this month? Buy a new whatever to feel better.) The problem is "small amounts" add up, put strain on our finances and fill our house with little bits of needless stuff. So I'm becoming more mindful about what I want to buy.

The stuff purge got us thinking about what we really wanted in our life. We are wondering if home-ownership was really the right path for us. Did we get the house just because that is what adults are supposed to want? Are we actually more urban-living type people than we thought? Would be be happier renting a nice apartment or townhouse in a more urban setting? It is too soon in this downsizing project to answer those questions but they are under consideration. We have giving ourselves 2 years to downsize our stuff, catch up with house maintenance and tighten up our budget. (This time will also "downsize" our pet population since I do believe that a couple of our elderly animals won't last beyond that. I love every one of my pets and will be sad when they pass away. However, I never intended to have quite so many.) Then we will reconsider our feelings about being home-owners.

We've already started the downsizing project by going through our clothes that no longer fit due to our physical downsizing. (Monkey, Author and I have lost over 120lb as a household so far!) It felt amazing to ruthlessly cull our clothes and get all those piles of stuff our of our drawers and closet. I'm about half way through minimizing my knitting/sewing/craft stuff as well. Downsizing is fun!

Does Google think I'm "evil?"

When Google Plus first started up I really liked the idea, the circles especially. Being able to post things only to specific groups of people seemed like a dream come true. My ttc/infertility folks wouldn't see my kinky/BDSM stuff. My fellow Jews could opt out of seeing pictures of my tattoos. I could keep my polyamory off the public posts. When the the name thing exploded I took a "wait and see" attitude. I did change my profile to my "legal" name but stopped promoting it on my other SocNet/Blog stuff. I also became very careful about what I posted. I'd hoped that Google would come to their senses and stop this name nonsense. Then I'd switch back to my protected name and have a blast in my various circles.

I was wrong. Mr. Schmidt, Google Chairman, has recently been very clear that G+ isn't a SocNet but an "Identity Service." Well, no thank you Google! I don't need or want an identity service. He was also pretty clear that the focus on "real" identity was about online purchasing. (Ah, so it is all about selling crap.) An even bigger "no thank you" on my part. Then the cherry on top of the shit sundae was this quote:

"But my general rule is people have a lot of free time and people on the Internet, there are people who do really really evil and wrong things on the Internet, and it would be useful if we had strong identity so we could weed them out. I’m not suggesting eliminating them, what I’m suggesting is if we knew their identity was accurate, we could rank them. Think of them like an identity
rank."

If you want to see the full transcript of the interview with Schmidt you can see it here: https://plus.google.com/117378076401635777570/posts/CjM2MPKocQP

So, does this mean that all of us who are concerned about privacy, and therefore wish to use something other than our legal names, are budding Internet sociopaths?

I don't need/want an identity service. I don't need yet another way for advertisers to target me and my household. As someone outside the mainstream, I really don't need my legal name plastered on the Internet any more than it already is. So bye bye Google Plus. I'll be deleting my account this weekend.

::sigh:: Too bad. It could have been a great idea.

Too old for rail?

One of the things that really changed when I was able to manage my depression was my interest in going to concerts. Before the experience of being in a crowd was often too much for me. I would only push myself to attend if it was some one I really wanted to see. I've also expanded my musical tastes and, as a result, am going to shows where I'm unfamiliar with the crowd.

I went to a Deadmau5 show last week. My first real dance music show. Previously, my concert-going experience was at industrial, goth and a few punk shows. I figured there was no way a electronic dance music crowd could be as intense as, say, Nine Inch Nails. When I found myself front and center on rail* I didn't think I'd have much of a problem holding the position. I didn't for the 2 opening acts and I had a blast. Then, right before Deadmau5 started shit started really squished. Still, I wasn't concerned. I'm a heavy person with a very low center of gravity. I'm hard to move if I don't want to move. Deadmau5 started and suddenly I'm besieged by douche bags. There are rules that were followed at the concerts I had been at before. Certain things were not done and if you couldn't push your way to rail after three tries somewhere you moved on. You don't slap people, hit them repeatedly on the head with your camera, or shove them so hard that five people in a row are almost toppled over. Apparently this is pretty normal for the show I was at. Author and I gave up rail within the first ten minutes of the headlining show. I was too pumped full of adrenaline at the time to realize that the experience had resulted in a painful wrenching of my hip. I ended up limping out of the show at the end and ending up in an urgent chiropractic appointment two days later as the injury got worse.

I've never had that happen. I've never given up rail because I felt unsafe. The security at the show was good but they definitely had their hands full so I don't see this as a failure there. Both of the worse behaved were, one way or another, talked to by security. It was too late for me though. The push that sent Author and I stumbling and, I think, caused my injury, was what caused security to come over.

All in all, the show was fabulous. The openers, Zedd and Excision, were awesome. The Deadmau5 show had an amazing light show that made being in the back a lot of fun. It was worth the trip to Seattle. Rail however was not worth the injury and pain. I'll be thinking carefully about going for rail at other EDM shows from now on.

*"Rail" is the front barrier at a general audience, no seats, show. This usually gives about a 3 foot space in front of the stage for security, photographers and, sometimes, replacement gear. This also allows for space to pull out crowd-surfers.

Drawing lines

I'm done. There is almost nothing Monkey's mother could say or do that would repair the damage she has done over the past couple days. I've tried to leave a door open for the possibility of reconciliation. I figured, if I have a kid, I'd have to interact with her for the sake of the kid knowing its only living grandparent. However, now that I've heard how disrespectful she of our family relationship and Monkey as an individual, I don't think she will recognize the child as family. That was the only thing keeping me willing to even bother talking to her. With that gone, I see no reason to even consider trying.

I've never believed the adage "blood is thicker than water" and now I just have another example of why chosen family is my only family.

So close I can taste it.

I have lost 60lb so far. I'm just about 5lb from having lost 20% of my starting body weight. I can't quite believe it yet when I look in the mirror or get on the scale each week there it is. My smallest pair of jeans are now so baggy I always need a belt. Even the shorts I bought earlier this season are getting baggy. Shirts that used to be tight are now more relaxed. I had to buy new, smaller underwear.

Monkey is also losing weight wonderfully. We've had to buy new clothes for him as well. I am small enough now that I can fit into his bigger clothes so I've been taking his shorts and a couple t-shirts from him. His jeans, if hemmed rather than just rolled up, are too short for me to use. (I'm not tall, only 5'4". Monkey is very short.) His style is very different than mine as well. I know that as cold weather approches we will both be forced to buy warmer clothes that actually fit.

I never thought I could be this successful at losing the weight. Everything is easier now. Even losing weight feels like less of a struggle now that I've been doing it for the last 7+ months. I feel like I'm riding a wave rather than trying to swim against the tide.

BFN Blues

Started bleeding today. I guess 1st time with new donor luck isn't in the cards for me. I am handling these letdowns better than I used to but nothing really takes the sting out of another failed cycle.

At least I get my martini tonight.

Halfway there but where am I going?

I hate the 2ww but I save a special place in my burning loathing for the second half. The last week of the 2ww is when things get real. You could be really pregnant at that time but it is too early to know for sure. You could also be really not pregnant and any hope is just a delusion. Through it all is the slow march to d-day, the day when your period is due...or the day you will be officially "late". All there is to do is plod along through it, alternately hopeful you are pregnant and convinced it didn't work.

I think it is the uncertainty in the face of potential reality that gets me. Something is happening, or not happening, right at that moment but I can't find out what! I am the worst at obsessively looking for signs of pregnancy even though I know that is silly. The one time I did get pregnant I was convinced I wasn't and, therefore, didn't find out that I had been until the miscarriage started. I don't trust early pregnancy tests to I avoid them for as long as possible. I'm stuck in this road with out knowing my destination. Will I be in bfn town and have to start my journey over again? Or, this time, will I find myself in the magical land of pregnancy and starting on a completely different road? Only time will tell, only waiting will resolve the question.

Fucking Sucks.

Sock Summit 2011

I'm a knitter. Hah! That is the first time I've really said that! I've always said "I'm learning to knit" or I'm trying to knit" but I think now I can really say I'm a knitter. Why? Because of the Sock Summit.

The Sock Summit is a conference every other year in Portland, Oregon (yay local to me) where it is all about knitting socks. Yes, there is a HUGE conference just about knitting socks. Their tagline is "Taking sock knitting almost too far." It is a thing. People come from all over. There are 4 days of classes for all kinds of things. There is also an amazing marketplace full of vendors. I'm not enough of a devotee to go more than one day but I did attend a 1hr class this year. I also went shopping!! I got some great punky knitting-related buttons and enough yarn to keep me happy for at least a couple months...maybe.

People outside of this kind of thing would think that a knitting, especially a sock knitting, convention would be full of little old ladies. It isn't so. Knitting is in with the DIY culture and, therefore, the Sock Summit was filled with tattoos, piercings, wild-colored hair and punk sensibility. I felt right at home.

Here are the buttons I managed to get!
Always!


Creepy Knitter!


The skull bag is my notions keeper. :)











And my new yarn to add to the stash!

The perfect cycle

The perfect cycle means nothing in trying to get pregnant. When donor visits are timed perfectly with fertile windows, you are feeling relaxed and healthy it feels like it should guarantee success. That isn't how this works. But still, when you have the perfect cycle, hope raises just a little. It all seems more possible that it will end with a positive pregnancy test, a worry-free pregnancy and a healthy birth. If only.

I've had more perfect cycles than I can remember. Obviously, it didn't mean anything about success. The one time I managed to get pregnant over the last 4 1/2 years of trying it was a comedy of errors. My cycle started while I was at a conference, at which I caught the worst stomach flu I've ever had in my life and my donor was out of town for my prime fertile days. Yet, this imperfect cycle resulted in, at least, a conception and a brief implantation.

You can't count on perfect cycles. I know that from painful experience. Yet I can't help but feel a bit more hopeful when everything falls into place so smoothly. I usually fight against this extra hope but this time I think I will embrace it. Who knows, maybe that will help too!

Google+

Do you have Google+? Do you want to find me on Google+? Search on Google+ for "Yeledov" and you will find me! :) Shiny!

Starting agian

It has begun. Today is our first insemination with our new donor, Bee. As luck would have it I'm also having my first day of feritle mucus. I started taking Evening Primrose Oil last month because I was concerned that my age was starting to effect my CM. Now I'm having epic spin. Seems the EPO is doing the trick! 

I'm a little nervous about tonight. Not worried, I know he'll show up and I'll get to insem. It is more the nerves from that first awkward time when you hand a jar to a guest in your home and send him to the bathroom to jack off into it. Queer ttc is often a surreal experience and this is one of those times.

I'm feeling optimistic. I haven't felt that way in a couple years. I am hopeful, not about individual cycles but the process and this donor. It feels odd but good. Maybe, after all this heartache, this is the time it will work.

Shiny!

I'm on Google Plus! I've spent way to much time on it today. I'm really liking it. With all my various worlds (ttc/infertility, genderqueer, kinky, poly, ect) it is good to be able to keep them separate but all on one socnet.

I'm not sure how to tell people to find me if they are on G+, especially since I don't use my real name here and I really don't want to put it out there. I guess, if you are on G+ and you want to find me then comment or email me from here and we will figure it out from there!

Just a quick IV bag and then I'll be going.

Last week I must have picked up a little bug. I had some intense gastrointestinal issues. I won't go into TMI-land but I will say that it was unpleasant, lasted 4 days straight and really had me struggling with staying hydrated. I was fine other than this one little issue but this "little" issue was starting to cause some serious worries. On the 4th day of this the advice nurse decided it was time for me to get checked out. My Saturday afternoon was spent at the urgent care center. Thankfully it wasn't very busy at that time. That morning I had started eating yogurt in hope of making my guts happier. By the time I got seen it seems the yogurt was doing the trick and I was doing much better. I was, however, dehydrated so they gave me some IV fluids and electrolites while they waited for my labs to come back, just in case. Between the extra fluids and the yogurt working its happy gut magic, I was feeling great by the time I left. The labs did confirm I was fighting something off but nothing looked too scary. They finished up pouring the fluids into me and gave me the list of "come back right away" symptoms I was sent home to eat more yogurt and keep downing fluids. Isn't always the way that the minute you arrive at urgent care you start to improve?! But at least I got a good boost in my hydration and the peace of mind that I wasn't seriously ill.

While I was kicked back with an IV in my hand (my arm veins were shy because I wasn't well-hydrated) I had a moment of profound gratitude. For $35 I was getting a lot of "just in case" care. The IV, the labs, the chat with the FNP were all available to me. It wasn't unreasonably extra care considering my symptoms but it is more than I would have gotten if I had to pay marked price for these services. I remember what it was like without insurance. I'm lucky to have such good coverage. It is ridiculous that I have to be "lucky" to access health care. Just because my partner has a good job, because our state requires fair treatment of queer couples so I can be on his insurance, because we have the money to pay for employee spouse coverage, because we have the money for the co-pay. Just because I'm lucky. It horrifies me when I think of all the people who need health care, not a "just in case" check like I did. Our system is fucked. The lottery is about luck, not people's lives. ::sigh::

It will all be ok...

Last week I was stressing. I was worried. We were still feeling the financial effects of a surprise $800 car repair bill. We had some serious issues to deal with concerning our property tax and our year long ordeal to set up an escrow account. I was even still concerned that Bee, the new donor, would somehow change his mind and back out.

As I was dropping off a box of extra kitchen stuff to donate I spied a bit of graffiti through some trees at the edge of the parking lot. "Does it really say that?!" I wondered and then I had to go see. I poked through a hole in the tree line and peeked through a hole in some chain link fence. Yes, it really does say that. It is like a message from the universe just for me. You can't see it unless you park in that one spot and look straight through the break in the trees. I felt like it was reminding me that nothing was really that bad. That, one way or another, everything always works out. That the world isn't conspiring against me. That I can change my world simply by changing my perspective and my assumptions.

This was just what I needed to see on that day. I spent a few minutes taking pictures of it, grateful that I had my new phone with the much better camera. I messed with some filters and tilt-shift to really make it stand out, like it did in my mind when I saw it. I tweeted it, posted it on my instagram and made it my lock screen on my phone so I could see it often. Now I'm sharing it here.

Yesterday, Monkey was notified that an error had occurred with his pay. He was not getting paid the correct rate because payroll never got the message that Monkey had his extra certification before starting. As a result he was owed 3 months of back-pay for the difference and would be getting the correct rate from now on. O.o!! We hadn't noticed! The paychecks were higher than his old job so we really didn't think it was too low. Now we have a windfall of cash that will fill the hole left by the car repairs and pay some of the property tax so that we can keep working on getting that damn escrow account set up.

It will all be ok. Yes, it will. :)

The Dinner Project - Taco Salad

For this Dinner Project post I'm going back to the meal that started this all. The taco salad that made me think "I need to take a picture of this!"

For our taco salads we have little or no carbie stuff. Author will sometimes have a few light tortilla chips with his but that is about it. Mostly, it is all about the meat and veg for me though we do have beans and rice as well.

We start with extra lean ground beef, no more than 5% fat. We get it from a place that grinds it's own beef and doesn't add any of that disgusting "pink slime" filler that is chemically treated. (If you don't know about this stuff I suggest you look it up. Foul! And in almost every bit of ground beef on the market!) Someday I'd like to grind my own beef but this supplier is fine until then. I cook the beef in salsa. Nom! Since Monkey has an allergy to fresh tomato, the salsa has to be blended smooth and cooked completely. (We have no idea why this works for him but is the only way he can eat tomato products without severe nausea/vomiting and hives.) As a result, I usually add some Anaheim peppers and

onions to give it a little more texture.

For the veg, I saute a bunch of veg, usually red and green peppers, onions and mushrooms. Then the fresh salad fixings. We usually go though whole head of lettuce for the three of us. I like a nice mix of butter and red leaf lettuce. I'm the only one who eats fresh tomatoes but, during the season, I use a ton of them! I also save a little of the salsa before blending it for Monkey so I can add it to my salad. We top off the veg with some olives and, sometimes, roasted green chili.

The fatty bits: Ideally we would have fresh guacamole but good avocados are 1) difficult to find in Oregon and 2) difficult to fit into a weight loss plan. Sometimes we find a good one and can't resist adding a tablespoon to our taco salad night. Avocados are the one thing I miss right now. There are no "light" avocados. To make up for the lack of creamy green goodness we do add sour cream. None of that "light" crap. I have yet to find a light sour cream that doesn't taste like paste. I do however use a very good Tillamook reduced-fat cheese. You still can't use much but an ounce of this can go a long way.

So here is the plate that started my interest in documenting my favorite dinners. Look at how beautiful! Look at how much food! While eating my amazing taco salad I don't feel deprived of quantity or taste. I can be a foodie and still lose the extra weight!

The Bee is cleared for flight.

The test results are back! That was really fast. It took less than 24 hours from blood draw to results. I'm impressed. Bee is clean, as we figured he would be since his risk factors are way low. So, now, it appears I have a donor. He will be coming over for tea and snacks on Sunday to sign the contract, talk details and setup our first inseminations.

My period is due in three days or so. This has lined up so perfectly I'm a little freaked out by it. I'm a little weirded out by feeling optimistic. After all this time, all these attempts, I still find myself feeling hopeful again with a new donor. It is true that I have more to be optimistic about this time. As I mentioned, I'm healthier in so many ways this time. That can't hurt.

So here I am, 4 1/2 years since that first ttc cycle. I have a new donor...again. Time to jump back in.

Donor karma

I feel like I've done something very good and am getting rewarded by our, soon to be, new donor. Maybe I've just burned off all my bad karma by having to weed through some really asshats to find this guy.

I think I'm going to call him Bee because he is both a "busy bee" and a "worker bee" in the project. Plus there is the whole "Birds & the Bees" thing that amuses me. (Though I guess with me it would be the Bears and the Bees!) So Bee is, hopefully, our new donor. Pending testing, which is in the works starting today. He should be getting the blood draws today and then it is just a matter of waiting for the results. I don't think there will be any problems but you have to check. Due diligence and all that.

Bee reminds me of my first donor. Eager, invested, accommodating and engaged. This makes me very happy. A little part of me is still waiting for it to all fall apart. I won't entirely believe this is worked out until he shows up for the first insemination. I do think that the decreased stress I felt about our first donor contributed to the one pregnancy that I managed to have, however briefly. Monkey is over the moon about Bee and is suddenly very optimistic again that I will be pregnant soon. I'm definitely more optimistic about the donor but that hasn't carried over to it actually working. We'll see though. I'm healthier than I've ever been, both mentally and physically. That certainly won't hurt our chances. I'm older and Bee is older than any other donor we've had but neither of us are completely out of the realm of likelihood to produce a child.

If the tests go as planned, as I expect they will, we will be starting next cycle. Since my cycle is due to start in a week that is right around the corner!

Pleasantly surpised

Well, pending std testing, it would appear we have a very eager and communicative donor set up. I'm still a little shocked. He is very communicative, engaged and thoughtful. He has a sense of humor about the process. He was curious about our poly situation and our gender identity but was respectful and open-minded. He wanted to know some basics about our family life and poly with kids stuff. He feels that if he is to participate in creating a child he has a responsibility to make sure the family is a good one. I can respect that. His only requirement is that he get a picture of the kid, however, he is open to being more involved if we are comfortable with it. We are leaving that open for now.

A strange thing, he sets off all of our gaydar something fierce but he has been very careful not to let on to his sexuality. We are confused by this but have chosen not to ask about it. I mean, if anyone is going to be accepting of this it is us. If he is gay/bi/queer he doesn't want to talk about it and that is fine with us. We respect his choice to keep sexual identity out of the donor relationship.

He is currently waiting for us to set up his tests. He has already asked "because I'm a planner!" when my next fertile window may be so he can mark it on his calendar.

I am pleasantly, cautiously hopeful that this will work out. If the test results get back in time we may be inseminating at the end of July.

I've got to figure out a blog name for him.

The dinner project - Strawberry milkshake

I know I call this "The Dinner Project" but what is dinner with out a little desert every now and then?

It is summer and we have a huge amount of strawberries showing up in our farmer's markets. We are eating about a 1/2 flat (that is 6 pints) a week. Well, I say "week" but what I really mean is "between Saturday (market day) and, at the latest, Tuesday." None of the berries last past that anyway. So how do we pack away that many berries? Aside from just stuffing our mouths with them we make shakes! This is one of those, "surprised I'm still losing weight" kind of thinks. I've found it is all about the right choices though. I will make some ice cream suggestions. We use Breyer's Fat Free Vanilla Ice Cream or Umpqua Nonfat Frozen Vanilla Yogurt. (I think Umpqua is a NW thing.) Reddi Whip has a very nice Fat Free whipped cream for a little extra on top. The most important thing is very ripe strawberries. If you can find Hood strawberries, an Oregon specialty, then you are in for a real treat. They are usually a June thing but, because of our late start to summer this year, we are getting them in abundance in July.

The basic recipe for the strawberry milkshake shown in the picture below is 1 cup of ice cream/frozen yogurt and 1 & 1/2 cup of Hood strawberries. The strawberries were so juicy that I didn't need to thin the shake down with a tablespoon of milk like I sometimes do. The trick to a thick and tasty milkshake is speed. Have everything ready before you combine and do short, fast bursts of blending. Don't take too long trying to get it perfectly smooth. You'll just end up with a soupy mess. (I knew managing that ice cream shop in college would pay off in the end!)

My amazing summer treat that I can still eat and be healthy!

Strangely optimistic

The potential donor flaked on the meeting and, now, off our list. Our car broke down, will take $700 to fix and the part won't arrive until Tuesday or Wednesday. We need to pay $650 of the several thousand in property taxes we owe in two weeks and it is taking months to set up escrow for this with our mortgage managing company.

And yet I feel strangely hopeful and optimistic.

This is why:

Monkey makes enough money now that, with some tightening of the budget and paying minimums on some bills, we can pay for the car fix and the "get off our back" amount of our property tax. We will then have a month more to get our mortgage company to finish setting up the escrow so the rest of the taxes will get taken care of. We can then pay off the rest of the taxes slowly over time.

We live in Portland, Oregon so going without a car for awhile is not too problematic. We have a great transit system here and I like the relaxed pace of bus transit. Plus, the weather is so nice right now we are walking a lot more anyway.

We have another donor on the list and he is very communicative. We are meeting him on Tuesday. He has been very engaged and proactive. I feel hopeful about him.

It feels strange to feel optimistic. I'm usually quite pessimistic. A week like this would usually have me completely freaked out and convinced that our world was about to fall apart. It is true that some of that was my depression/anxiety that was not being treated properly but some of it was just how I tended to look at the world. I've been trying to change my thinking patterns to be more optimistic. Hmmm...maybe it is working!

The hopeful skeptic

I have a meeting with a potential donor this week. I don't know much about him except that he says he is willing to meet our requirements, will communicate well and can show up during my fertile time. This is all I really care about. But I've had potential donors say all these things before and have them not be true. I no longer entirely believe it will be true but, well, if I wasn't still hopeful I wouldn't bother with the search any more. I am a skeptic but a hopeful one. I think that pretty much sums up my feelings about ttc in general. I am a hopeful skeptic.

The Dinner Project - Pizza

My first post in The Dinner Project is, by far, my favorite dinner. I mean, who doesn't love pizza?! It is a family favorite as well. My household excitedly repeats "Ooo! Pizza Night!!" when they see it on the menu at the beginning of the week. We do individual pizzas so we can make exactly what we each want.

Admittedly, this one can be a bit time consuming, especially if you aren't familiar with making basic bread dough. However, you can make this dough ahead and keep in the fridge for a few days or freeze it for a couple weeks. Just make sure to wrap it well so it doesn't dry out and leave plenty of time for it to get back to room temp before you make your pizza crust. Once you get the hang of it, making this simple bread dough is pretty easy. (If you have a good mixer with a bread hook it is a snap!)

This recipe for the basic bread dough that makes great pizza dough is a slightly modified version from a recipe in "The Naked Chef Takes Off" by Jamie Oliver. (I LOVE Jamie!!!) This recipe will make 3-4 individual pizzas or one big family-sized pizza. The three of us always have leftovers for lunch the next day. I don't have a pizza stone so we use our cast-iron skillets to bake our pizzas. You don't need either of those though. This will work just fine on a good baking sheet. We each like different thickness of crust so the different sizes of our skillets work well.

Basic Bread Dough:

1/2 lb whole wheat flour

1/2 lb unbleached white flour

1 cup warm water (not hot or cold as it will kill your yeast!)

3/4oz active dry yeast (1 and 1/2 envelopes of the 1/4oz dry yeast packets or, when taking from a jar, it is 3 3/8 tsp. If using fresh yeast then it is 1oz.)

1 tbsp sugar (I use raw sugar but you can use honey too.)

1 tbsp salt

Directions:

Weigh out your flour and set aside. (When baking, measuring flour by weight is much better. If you plan on making bread regularly I strongly suggest getting a kitchen scale. They are about $20 for a decent one at any

kitchen store. It has made me much more successful in baking!)

In a mixing bowl, combine water, yeast and sugar. The yeast should start to foam up a little after a minute or so. This is called "proofing." Basically, you are making sure your yeast is good. If it doesn't foam up then your yeast is too old/dead and your bread will not turn out. Add the salt to the mixture and stir until dissolved.

Now you are going to combine the yeast mixture with the flour. There are a few ways to do this. I use my mixer with a bread hook and slowly add the flour. Some people mix in the flour slowly to the yeast mixing bowl using their hand. (I've done that before too.) The fancy way is to make a little pile of flour on your counter, create a little bowl in the center, pour the yeast mixture into the little well made into the flour pile. You then slowly incorporate the two. I suck at doing this and always make a huge mess. Don't worry if you don't do this. Your bread will turn out fine being mixed in a bowl.

Keep mixing until you start to get a nice, elastic ball of dough. You may have to add a little more water if it looks a little dry and flaky or a bit more flour if it looks too sticky. Different kinds of flour and the temp/humidity will effect this so you just have to eyeball it each time. If you are using a mixer with a bread hook then just let it keep mixing. The bread hook will do all the kneading for you. If you are doing it by hand then plop that beautiful lump out onto a floured surface and KNEAD! (I won't go into proper kneading here. There are plenty of instructional videos on the web to help you along.) Giving your bread a good knead is very important for creating that fluffy texture. Not enough kneading means tough bread.

Set aside your bread dough, in a floured bowl, in a warm place with a damp cloth covering it to rise. For first rise should take an hour or two for the bread to double in size. Once it has done that, punch it down, knead it well again and place it back in the bowl for second rise. The second rise always takes less time. (Mine takes about 30 minutes usually but on really cold days it can take longer.) Punch it down, knead it a little and then you are ready to make your pizza crust.

I usually sprinkle some fine ground cornmeal on my pan but that is just optional. I'm not going to tell you how shape your dough because, to be honest, I kind of suck at it myself. I do my best and it always comes out good.

Put on your toppings and bake at 450 for about 25-30 minutes. If you make your crust really thick it will take longer. If you make your crust paper thin it will be done quickly so check often!

The sky is the limit with homemade pizza toppings. We try to keep it healthy so there are lots of veg and lean meat. We use skim mozzarella cheese and keep it to a couple ounces each. We plan adding some different cheeses as toppings this summer. The most popular toppings in my house include lean Canadian bacon, fresh basil, baby spinach, mushrooms, green peppers, roasted garlic, artichoke hearts (not marinated in oil) and olives. For sauce we each have our own favorites. I use a tablespoon of basil pesto. Monkey uses a mix of spaghetti sauce and feta dressing. Author uses straight up red pizza sauce. If we have it, Monkey and I will sometimes use a touch of truffle oil. (REAL truffle oil, not that chemical shit.) We all keep it very light since the best sauces are never low in fat. We usually sprinkle a little fancy salt and maybe some dried parsley or oregano to finish it off.

Dinner is Ready!

(This is my pizza. I forgot to take a picture before I started eating! It has pesto sauce, mozzarella cheese, fresh basil, Canadian bacon, spinach and a couple mushrooms. It is finished with some Sel Gris (French gray salt) and dried oregano.)

The Dinner Project

I am a foodie. I love to eat. I love good food, fancy and simple. I love to cook even though my skills are pretty down-home.

However, I also have a problem with food. Years of out of control Binge Eating Disorder added with a typical American diet/lifestyle made me morbidly obese. I was lucky enough to hit my mid-thirties with no sign of obesity related diseases but I knew it was only a matter of time before my luck would run out. Thankfully, I've managed to get what I needed to deal with my eating disorder and get my weight down before I lose my health. Last January I started both a cognitive behavioral therapy program and Weight Watchers Online. To date I have lost 51lb.

The other night I was sitting down for dinner, looking at this amazing taco salad that I had fixed my family, and thought "Why didn't I realize I could be healthy and still eat this good!" I grew up going on diet after bland diet, wishing I could just eat something that had some kind of taste. In the end, I always broke my diet because I missed the joy in eating good food. I still see images in the media of people on diets eating plain celery sticks and looking longingly at some one else's plate. Or, even worse, dieters chowing down daily on prepared meals filled with salt and chemicals. (Not to say I don't pop in a frozen lunch every once in awhile but it is pretty rare.) We are told that dieting is either suffering or replacing real food with some synthetic food alternative.

The truth is eating healthy and eating well really go hand in hand. Even when you are living this truth it can be easy to forget. I eat better now than I ever have in my life! I still get shocked at the dinner table sometimes when I realize how much I've already lost while still eating great. To remind myself and share it with the interwebs, I have decided to start The Dinner Project on my blog. I will post a picture and the recipe for my favorite meal of the week. (I'd love to do it almost daily but that would be a lot of work!) Mostly I am doing this to remind myself but I hope some one out there stumbles upon one of my dinner posts, gives the recipe a try and enjoys a healthy, tasty meal.

Let's eat!

The best laid plans

This past weekend was suppose to be our first grand outing since all the crap with Monkey's old work went to hell, his certification studying, him working 50hr weeks and then getting really sick from being overworked. It should have been a short but carefree trip up to Seattle for a dinner at our favorite Indian restaurant and the Daft Punk laser show at the Pacific Science Center. There should have also been plenty of time for "adult activities" and maybe even a little boozing (since I'm not ttc-ing right now.)

Our trip did happen however it involved dragging my sick ass around behind Monkey and Author. I caught Monkey's cold. A sick Bear is often grumpy. I'm afraid wasn't the best company. I also couldn't taste a bit of the wonderful lamb curry and mango lassi I always have. Nor could I focus much on the laser show since I felt like utter crap. There were good moments of the show where I was able to lose myself in the music and the visuals but not many. Even sick it was an awesome show, I just wasn't able to enjoy it. I couldn't taste any of the treats we had ready at the hotel for late night noshing and picking apart the show. I couldn't have any of the wine. Breakfast out, a rare event for us, was no better. By the time we were on the road home I was even sicker than I was when we left.

Today I haven't been up. I moved from bed to the futon downstairs and slept all morning. I think going on the trip might have been the wrong call considering how sick I am now. But we all so needed the outing. If I had stayed home then Monkey and Author would have refused to go so they could take care of me. Even today Author stayed home from work to keep and eye on me.

I know I'll get better soon. Chances are next weekend I'll be fine. I just wish the first trip of our travel season hadn't been marred by my being sick.

And to top it all off...I gained 3lb this week. I didn't exercise much because I was trying to fight off the beginnings of this cold. I didn't realize how important my exercise routines had become in my weight loss. I'm guessing I wouldn't have better results this week since I won't be working out any time soon. ::sigh::whine::grumble::

The hunt

The time has come. Monkey is no longer working 50 hr weeks. He is down to just his full time job. The cold he came down with while stressed to his limits is starting to fade away. His first real weekend in about 3 months starts tomorrow night.

It is time to hunt for a new sperm donor.

Monkey and Author are my sperm wranglers. Well, Monkey is the wrangler and Author helps with separating the good from the bad. We consider this a division of labor. He deals with the sperm and I will deal with..well..the labor ::chuckle:: plus everything else that goes along with the whole pregnancy package. As a result of this deal I'm not involved in the first few screenings of potential donors. When we use frozen we have so little control that we actually don't care who we get as long as they have a history of pregnancies. Known donors are a lot more complicated but there are other advantages. The one time I actually did get pregnant (I miscarried) was with a known donor. I wish we still had access to him. Damn dream job offer in the UAE. Pttht.

Anyway, Monkey is on the lookout again starting this weekend. We aren't counting on finding some one for summer inseminations so I have a back up plan. We have two Clo.mid cycles left with my NP. She will only do them if I go for monitoring and do a trigger shot. I think it is time we took those last couple tries. We'll use frozen and do the IUI at home. (Yay for having a nurse practitioner for a partner!) I'm aiming for the cycle in mid-July. August has too many concerts and out of town things so that will be my rest cycle between medicated cycles. If by some amazing chance we have a donor by then, well, we may just do one anyway but with fresh.

I'm so tired of this. I just wish I knew what the result would be. I wish some one could tell me "Keep trying! You will be a mama bear yet!" Or "It is time to hang up the speculum and move on to accepting that you won't have a baby." I guess since I'm not so tired of ttc to give up then all I can do is keep trying until I get that pregnancy.

Some things don't change

In a previous post I talked about how my new combo of psych meds had made some surprising changes in me. I also listed some basic things about me that haven't changed. This point in my life seems to be all about discovering things that were buried under the fog of sub-clinical (for me) treatment of my depression and anxiety. Even the things that are just truly me, not my illness, are discoveries.

There was one thing that I always wondered if it was just me or if it was my mental illness. I have never been a particularly engaging person. I am curious person and I like to watch people but I'd really rather not interact with them. There are notable exceptions, some situational and some universal. Monkey is a universal exception. I always feel comfortable with him. After a bit of "getting to know you" time with Author (and accepting that I can not read him at all) I found that he is also a universal exception. Past lovers and a couple friends have been situational exceptions. These are people I am temporarily comfortable engaging with. Those ones come and go depending on situation and my mood. Beyond that I'd rather be left to my watching.

Some things don't change. Though my tolerance for crowds and stimulation has improved it seems I'm still the classic non-engaging introvert I've always been. Check that off the list as a truly Bear characteristic. I still like watching people and, now, I can do it for longer and in more varied situations. I would still rather they not talk to me and I have no interest in talking to them. I have no drive to find more friends or spend more time with people I already know. I'm interested in going to more events (queer, leather, Jewish, concerts) but I don't hope for interactions or socialization there. I just want to watch...like I always do.

With everything that is changing for me it is kind of comforting to find the things that are the same. It is nice to know that my identity as an introvert is real and true.

Getting impatient.

After 4 1/2 years of trying to get pregnant I think I'm finally getting impatient.

That isn't entirely true. I haven't really been patient by choice during that time. If we had the resources to get my ass into a fertility clinic I think we would have. If our insurance covered more infertility treatments/IVF or we could have gotten into a study. We could have the resources if we wanted to change our lifestyle and choice in work. Monkey could go work for some private clinic than only takes rich or over-insured people. I could go back to work full or part time to bring in more cash. But we like the way we live and what we do. Some people will pay any price, monetarily or emotionally, for a shot at having a baby. I guess Monkey and I have lower line. Life is too short and too unpredictable for us to make choices that would mean we'd be miserable.

Anyway, back to the main subject. Impatience. I'm ready to give those last two Clo.mid/monitor/trigger/IUI cycles a try. This isn't much of a big deal to a lot of infertility people but for me it is big. This will be the most intense thing I've done. I've done 4 Clo.mid/IUI cycles before but we didn't monitor or trigger. We plan on doing it in July/August.

We keep looking for a known donor. Well, we are kind of on hold until Monkey stops working 50+ hours a week. That should happen in 2 weeks. He'll get back to it again then. The summer cycles will likely be frozen sperm though.

::sigh:: I'm feeling a little hopeless...and very, very impatient.

Who are you?

There is a common argument against psychiatric medication that we are using them to change people's personality. I hear it over and over again "I don't want to pop a pill to change who I am." (In fact, I heard almost exactly that on the latest episode of Glee.) My partner, a Psych Nurse Practitioner, hears this from his patients constantly. I never really understood this argument because I never experienced a huge change in behavior from taking psych meds....until now.

I've always identified more with the dark places. I've always been pessimistic. My music and art of choices tended to be more about the emotional agony that life sometime contains. I've even, without really admitting it, leaned toward the stereotypical dark-colored clothing. I never celebrated these aspects of myself. I knew that a huge part of my affinity to this kind of stuff was my faulty biochemistry. I did accept it though, assuming that nothing could ever change it.

It seems I was wrong. My latest psych drug therapy, along with a good dose of cognitive behavioral therapy, has started to show signs of changing my taste in some things. I've started buying and wearing bright colors. I own a teal hoodie now and a growing collection of bright spring-colored t-shirts. I've also found my usual goth/industrial/angry punk music to be getting less rotation. Instead, I've created a Daft Punk station on my online radio that plays a constant mix of electronic dance music. (My fave has been Daft Punk's Tron Legacy soundtrack.) I enjoy doing yard work. I look forward to sunny days. I smile more. I'm more likely to think things will work out rather than believing every situation will crash and burn. (The one great exception is ttc/infertility. No amount of pills or therapy can lessen the pain of 4 1/2 years of trying to get pregnant and continuing to fail.)

So am I going to be one of those people who say that the pills changed who I am? HELL NO! I've got a bold line between my disease and my identity. I still wear my black t-shirts, choose skull patterns in decor, enjoy a good rain storm and Nine Inch Nails will never leave my iPod, ever. There is room for change and growth in my interests. That room wouldn't exist without the meds and the therapy. My teal hoodie is a trophy of successfully managing my illness. My veggie patch in the yard will be my own kind of victory garden.

This is who I am. This is who I was meant to be if my brain biochemistry hadn't gone haywire. I'm a skull button on a teal hoodie. I'm blue-haired, freckled, kinky, hippie, freak armed with knitting needles and a belief that I can change the world for the better just by being healthy.

(Glee fan side note: I was rather impressed that Glee went on to draw the same line I do between identity and illness. Yay for talking about and properly addressing mental illness without shame.)

Monkey's new job

Monkey is a day away from starting a new job. This job will be a lot less stressful on him and will bring in a bit more money and regular increases. Though the extra money will be nice it isn't what I am most excited about with his new work arrangement. What thrills me is that he will have support staff.

Monkey when into his last job shortly after graduation with no support staff and supervisors fully admitting they have no idea what he does. There were no policy and procedure written and they had not hired any other medical team, including a medical director. That is one hell of a way for a newbie NP to jump in! I'm proud of how Monkey handled it all. He was stressed and overwhelmed but eventually that medical team grew and now things are much better than when he first arrived three years ago. However, it wasn't good enough to keep him. The leadership still didn't really get what he did or what a current NP pay scale was nowadays. When he asked to be brought up the the bottom of the current pay scale he was turned down. (Keep in mind that this was the bottom of the pay scale for community health, that is low. Monkey works out of love but he still deserves compensation for his skills.) There were other things that went wrong there, bigger issues, but the pay raise was the last straw.

(After looking for a replacement for a month, they realized that their pay scale was a load of crap that even pre-graduates wouldn't take. They are now offering well over what Monkey asked for as an increase so that they can actually get a warm body with a valid licence to practice into that office. I'm well aware that this is terribly spiteful of me but I take great joy in this.)

I am so excited for Monkey to start this new job. He will have full support staff, a supervisor who is actually trained in his field and established P&P so he knows what is expected of him. To top it all off, it is all out-patient. No more late night on-call situations. No more worries that reception on the phone is spotty and they won't get through with an emergency call. He can now go to the movies without worrying that his phone might go off and he'd need to dash out! Emergency calls are still possible, that is the nature of medical work, but they are much more rare with out-patient situations.

Things just keep getting better!

Deserving

One of the comments I hate the most on ttc/infertility communities is "you deserve this." It is used to absolve any guilt people have of getting lucky and leaving the rest of us behind. It is a good thing to elevate guilt, especially in the infertility community, but the flip side of this statement is troubling. It implies that somehow those of us who haven't gotten pregnant don't deserve it yet. That we haven't suffered enough or we aren't good enough. That we aren't deserving. That disturbs me.

I've been striving, working, suffering for a pregnancy for the last four years. I've been taking care of my body to the best of my ability. Eating well, taking vitamins and cutting back on alcohol and caffeine. I have tracked my cycles, agonized over donor choices, coordinated schedules and read every conception, pregnancy and parenting book I could get my hands on. If this concept of "deserving" is true then what have I done to not deserve this? Why do good people, who have gone through a hell of a lot more than I have, not deserve this? Why do drug-addicted criminals with no interest in improving their lives get knocked up wily-nilly, keep doing drugs and living crazy deserve parenthood?

The answer is that deserving doesn't come into getting pregnant. There are great people, caring and dedicated to becoming wonderful parents, who never have a child. There are horrible people who only care about themselves, are abusive and hateful, who have a gaggle of kids. Even adoption isn't really about deserving, even though the system tries to say it is. (Trust me, I know enough adoptive parents to have seen that "deserving" only gets you the application.) Becoming a parent is a huge amount of luck. Maybe it is bad luck if you didn't want to be a parent or maybe it is the best luck in the world when you've been trying for 4 years and thousands (or tens of thousands for some people) of dollars of treatments. But ultimately that luck, that element of chance, is the biggest factor in whether or not you become a parent, deserving or not.

I am deserving. Monkey and I will make wonderful parents. We just have to hold out for our luck to change.

New Possibilities

Monkey and Author met with a potential donor last night. I will call him "Fixer," not only because he is an engineer, but because fixing problems seems to be a core of his identity. Fixer's wife was a surrogate for a couple they are friends with. He was very inspired by her gift to them and decided he should become a sperm donor. He also recently took a class on gender and sexuality that opened his mind to all that queer people have to deal with in a straight-based society so he decided that helping a queer family would be where his help was most needed. This is a problem he could help "fix."

It is actually kind of a sweet motivation and one that makes sense to me. The fact that he participated in helping his wife go through the surrogacy means he has seen the kind of legal hoops that are not nearly as involved as ours would be. Our sex and std rules all make perfect sense to him, as does our contract and our legal needs. (He loves our contract. Everything is spelled out. It is pretty detailed.) He is older than our past donors, early 40's, but in good health. I think this is why he isn't just donating to a sperm bank. They can pretty narrow on the age thing. For me age matters less. I always put the line at 50 because that is pretty standard. After that you really see a statistical spike in issues. He has kids, his youngest is about 6, so it hasn't been that long since he produced a kid.

Monkey and Author think this has an 80%-85% chance of working out. He doesn't live locally but is in our city every weekday and will happily commit to a schedule. He is very enthusiastic about this and very positive that this will work for us. I've decided to be hopeful.

So here is to hoping that next cycle I'll have a new donor and, hopefully, a positive pregnancy test not long after.

On a lighter note...

As sad and painful as the subject of my last post was my life goes on. I worked hard for this life so I'm going to enjoy the little happy things when I have them.

So, on a lighter note...

I'm lighter again! I've reached my latest weight loss goal. I have now lost 10% of my starting body weight. Studies have shown that, if you are overweight or obese losing 5%-10% of your body weight results in markedly improved health. Even if I stopped here I will have added years to my life. Of course, I'm not stopping here. I'm on a roll! I'll never be what is considered "optimal" weight for my height/age, I've done too much damage to myself to get that low again, but I can get much closer than I am now.

It is crazy how much my life has changed over the last six months. The proper medication treatment for my depression and anxiety have given me a completely different quality of life than I ever thought possible. My cognitive behavioral therapy program for my disordered eating has worked better than I could imagine. The WW program has been simple to adjust to and given better results that I expected. My family is doing well. My pets are healthy. We have some good potential donors and, if those don't work out, I can still go back to my old donor boy. I keep looking around in awe at how freaking good my life is. Some of it is chance, dumb luck, but some of it I've worked damn hard on to change. I'm proud of myself. ::does a happy little bear dance::

::whispering:: shhhh...i don't want to say this too loud or think about this too much but i also know that, sometimes, losing 10% of your body weight if obese results in increased fertility. there are a lot of studies showing that unexplained infertility in obese women mysteriously resolve when they lose about 10% of the original weight. could i be that lucky? could this actually make the difference that we can't seem to find any other way? this isn't why i chose to lose weight but it would be the best unexpected side effect. ::crossing fingers::

Those left behind.

When you lose some one to suicide the news of another suicide, if you know the person or not, brings up the emotions of the original loss. (Background: My mom committed suicide in December 2005.)

Sadly, it has happened twice since she died. The first time was a year after her death. We were regulars at a family owned and run coffeehouse in our neighborhood. They shut down for a week and we found out then that one of their adult sons had committed suicide. I had never met this man but it doesn't matter. Suicide is always a tragedy, whether you know the person or not. A couple weeks later I overheard another son, who worked regularly at the coffeehouse, telling the story of his brother's death to a friend of the family while sitting in the cafe. I started to cry thinking of the pain my brother and I went through with our mom's death and knowing that this family was going through the same thing.

It has happened again and I am feeling the same heartache. This time the person is on the other side of the world. I never met him or even ever replied to anything he said on social media but I followed one of his twitter accounts because he was funny, snarky and a part of the Nine Inch Nails fan community. He attempted suicide a couple months back and tweeted his goodbyes before doing it. It triggered a world-wide response from his NIN fan friends, some of whom knew local family that could act. He was found and saved. He seemed to be getting better. The word has gone out in the community that he succeeded in killing himself two days ago. Watching the community respond with confusion, sadness and anger is like watching my thoughts from my mom's death scroll by on Twitter.

You never really heal from a friend or a family member committing suicide. It is always a part of you. My heart aches for this man's children, his family, his friends and the whole close-knit NIN community. We are all scarred when some one commits suicide.

If you have stumbled on this post and are in a dark place please get help. Go here: www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org or call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255). It is free and always available. If not for yourself then for the people who love you and, trust me, some one loves you. There is hope on the other side of depression. I've been there, I got help, I found a way out of the darkness. You can too.

If you lost some one to suicide and want to talk to people who understand I suggest here: www.afsp.org. It continues to help me deal with the issues that come up about my mother's suicide. You never really get over it but you can learn to make peace with being one of those left behind in the aftermath of suicide.

Stranger in the mirror

Sometimes changes happen so fast you can't help but notice them. Sometimes changes happen so slow you barely notice...until suddenly you notice it all at once. I think the slow changes are somehow more shocking.

I was wearing a pair of last year's shorts for the first time since losing weight. I had smaller jeans in my wardrobe that I've started wearing as they fit again so I haven't noticed really baggy jeans. My shorts are replaced each summer so I only have the size I wore last spring. (I'm very hard on my shorts and they aren't exactly made to last.) The size I have is a couple sizes too big now. The two pairs I have left from last summer just happened to be slightly smaller in the waist than most of my old shorts and so barely stay on without a belt and hang off my hips.

I was rushing passed a mirror in a grocery store bathroom when I saw myself out of the corner of my eye. I did a double-take. The fabric at my butt was sagging so much I checked my button and fly to see if it had come undone. I knew they were loose. I knew that shorts shopping this year would involve smaller sizes but I didn't really know it. I'm not sure how else to describe it. Seeing my ass, or more precisely not seeing my ass, in that mirror really brought it home to me. My body is changing. I'm smaller now than I've been in years and I've barely started. It makes me wonder what it will be like when, in October, I pull out my winter clothes that I'm packing away now. Will I be just as shocked as I slip into a sweater and find it sagging off me?

Of course, maybe I'll be lucky and next October I'll be searching for the biggest items I have to accommodated a growing baby belly. One way or another, my winter clothes will be fitting differently. Though I am enjoying being a smaller size, I really hope that winter finds me shopping for maternity pants rather than smaller jeans.

Donor Disappointment

There is nothing that drags me down like looking for a known donor. Every time we do it we have to wade through a swamp of horrid responses but those aren't the worst. The really terrible responses are actually kind of entertaining and, at the very least, are easy to spot and discard. Next are the responses who are outside our, clearly mentioned, age range (20-45) or are not in our area. Then we usually are down to a handful of people we will actually contact.

This is where I really end up getting my faith in people tested. There is always one who thinks that asking if some one is disease-free equals practicing safer sex. Then there is one who is just now realizing that the part of the ad where we say "you must be willing to sign a legal document to relinquish your parental rights to the child so the non-bio partner can do a second-parent adoption" that we really do mean you are expected to sign a legal document...with your name. No, you can't just not tell me your name. My kid needs support and health insurance that Monkey can provide but only if he is allowed to adopt the damn kid and he can't do that unless you sign away your claim of parental rights! (Can you tell this last issue is the one that we ran into last night?) These two are the most common issues we run into. Usually, it wipes the list clean and we have to start all over again. However, things can get stranger. I had one potential donor crossed off because we go.o.gled him (yes, we go.o.gle all our donors) and found out he was convicted of a felony and lots of shady dealings.

::Sigh:: There are still a few guys on the list that might pan out. I'm not terribly hopeful.

This is our last cycle out of the game. If we don't have a new donor by my next CD1 then we are going back to donor boy and his severe lack of communication and very limited schedule. I suppose I should be thankful I even have that. I just really miss my first known donor.

The real poly experience.

The other day, while driving my family to their respective work places, we experienced a communication cluster fuck. It happens in every relationship but in a poly household they can get even more tangled than in a two person relationship. Thankfully, it was a scheduling confusion rather than anything with much emotional investment but it was a perfect example of real poly household life, made a tad more complex by sharing one car for three adults. It was a very "who is on first" kind of moment. Some of it was from me forgetting to talk about car arrangements then more confusion as the "reply all" button was not hit on an email thread about Monkey's schedule.

Actually, now that I think about it, I was the weak link in this particular cluster fuck. Oops. To redeem myself I did completely change my plans to accommodate my screw up. In the end it worked out better for everyone! I love it when that happens. :)

After it was all worked out Author said, laughing, "This is what people should think about when they think of poly!" We all cracked up. As long time poly people, we had all dealt with the misconception that poly is all about sex, often, with everyone. This little tangled knot of car use, work schedules, grocery shopping and the "reply all" email function is the real daily poly life.

It isn't all about communication issues and scheduling though. It is also about having diverse ways to deal with each other. Like the fact that Author catches me when I slack off from my meditation practice, even when I'm rationalizing it like a pro. Also, he found the perfect motivation to get Monkey back into his workout routine. Monkey has a great eye for world-building inconsistencies and grammar and typos in Author's rough drafts where I am more in tuned with possible character issues. Monkey knows me well enough to step in when I need to readdress my mental health issues and he knows Author well enough to be just the right combo of sympathetic and encouraging when he is freaking out about is writing career. Author and I like to shop for household things and talk about organizational supplies. Monkey and Author like to go to arcades and deconstruct movies. Monkey and I will go to truly crappy movies together and laugh the entire time. We each are something more for each other than any combo of two could ever be. That is the real poly experience.

And the sex is fucking awesome. :)

25lb smaller

I have lost 25lb in the last 10 weeks. This amazes me. I'm in awe that this is actually working.

::Background note: I'm obese, with no related diseases, and have almost always been fat to some degree. I have binge eating disorder. Back in 2005 I recognized and accepted that I had a severe eating disorder. I started to address it. Back in January of this year I found a cognitive behavioral therapy program that is, obviously, working really well for me. I also joined WW to help with the portion control and general lifestyle changes.::

I'm still losing a little fast, even though I'm constantly evaluating my food and exercise to make sure I'm not doing some sort of eating disorder flip side behavior. Monkey (who is a medical professional) is also keeping an eye on me. He is comfortable as long as I'm eating a balanced diet (I am) and not losing muscle (I'm not.)

As for ttc, my doctor and my women's health NP both agree that I can continue trying while losing weight as long as I'm being very careful about my nutrition. Also, as soon as I get a positive pregnancy test I'm suppose to stop following WW but I can keep up with the CB therapy because that isn't about food. It is about emotional relationships with food. (WW has a way to put it on hold for pregnancy and return when you are 6+ weeks post-partum. They adjust your plan to allow for extra calories for nursing parents.)

It has been a long time since I've lost weight. I don't think I've ever done it in such a healthy way. I feel like it may actually be possible to live without being constantly overwhelmed by my eating disorder. That is my ultimate goal. I will likely never be in my ideal BMI and I certainly will never be considered thin but I feel like I'm getting healthier every day. I feel like I may actually get out of the "obese" range someday. It is a very hopeful feeling.

Passed and Lapped

One of the hardest things about infertility is being passed and lapped by people you really want to be happy for. Friends and acquaintances who have tried long and hard to get pregnant finally do and you want to celebrate but it is like a knife in your heart that you have nothing to celebrate. People who are taking joy in the babes they worked so hard for and you want to be happy that they are enjoying parenthood but all you can think about is the possibility that you will never feel that joy.

I've been passed so many times. I honestly don't know how many times I've been lapped since I tend to wander off from people once they've gotten securely pregnant. No one I know personally has tried for as long as I have. No one I know has taken the limited intervention road that I have either. I didn't really choose this road. I have limited coverage and we are bogged down in student loan debt so those expensive interventions are mostly out of reach anyway. Time keeps ticking by, my eggs age, my body gets less "prime" and I feel more hopeless.

When I was 35 years old, and had been trying off and on for 3 years, I decided that 37 years old will be my reconsideration time. That is now 7 months away. Granted I didn't know I'd be taking a 10 month break in my 35th year, but I still think it would be good to reconsider where I'm going. I'm not willing to say I'll give up then. Maybe that will be when I toss financial caution to the wind and attempt to do some sort of infertility intervention extravaganza. Maybe I'll decide to put off deciding for another year. I promised myself that I'd quit by 40 years old but I left the last 3 years of my 30's open to whatever I thought I could handle. I don't want to leave this road without a baby but I also don't want to spend 10+ years obsessing over this. I'm hoping I never have to make this choice but I won't avoid it forever. I want a baby, desperately, but I also want a life that isn't defined by a constant quest for something I may never get.

Oh, fuck. Why can't I just get pregnant?

A break is as good as a rest.

I've found this ttc break to be exactly what I needed.

TTC fatigue is real, ask anyone who's been trying to get pregnant for more than a year (more than 4 years in my case.) You just get to this "fuck it" point where all the extra things you've been doing to supposedly help the process (but isn't obviously) becomes too much. Every prenatal pill that you've been taking for years without being, you know, actually prenatal becomes a reminder of failure. Other supplements, pills and potions are some sort of infertility punishment rather than hope. Every decaf latte you drowsily sip becomes a futile attempt to pretend you could be pregnant...this time, but you don't really believe it.

But, of course, you still do it. You keep swallowing those prenatals. You keep taking Chaste Tree Extract, False Unicorn Root, extra iron, DHA, Ume Plum Pills and anything else that seems to help some one else get pregnant. You keep ordering your coffee "decaf" and avoiding booze at least the second half of the cycle, if not entirely.

Taking a break relieves you of all that responsibility. You can stop taking all those vitamins and extracts. You can have a double mocha. You can have a glass of wine, a rum & coke, a martini without checking which cycle day you're on.

For the last 3 weeks I've been on a ttc break. I've had booze and caffeine. I didn't take my prenatals and skipped my extracts. I was so very much on break that I thought my period was due this weekend. I was shocked to check my tracker and find that I still wasn't due for another week! It felt so good to not be counting down the days from ovulation to period. I plan on taking next cycle off as well.

The funny thing about taking a break is, now that I've had a few weeks, I have found myself starting up with the prenatals, extracts and pills again. I still go for the caffeine-filled coffee and you better believe that a martini will be made this weekend but I don't feel as bogged down by the rest of the routine. It just seems usual.

I'm hoping that, when we start up again, I will have a feeling of newness. It will be fully spring, I'll be healthier than I have been before in body and mind, we will (hopefully) have a new local donor and Monkey will be in a new, less stressful job. Maybe we will get new results. Who knows! Stranger things have happened.