One pill forward, two pills back

I have been trying to manage my chronic pain in ways that don't leave me zonked out 24/7. I've tried a specific old-school antidepressant that helps pain sometimes. I'm already on a couple other meds to manage my mental health so it had to be a balanced add-on since it could go toxic on me. As we increased the dose some of my nerve pain did go away. Great, right? Everything comes with a price. The last increase has made 3 hour afternoon naps a regular thing (along with a full night sleep) and it has become very obvious that it has increased my appetite, making my binge eating disorder more difficult to control. Fab. Just as I was thinking this med wasn't quite balancing out on the pro/con sheet I got a mildly frantic message from my doctor's office. Getting a mildly frantic message from your doctor's office...ON YOUR BIRTHDAY...is no way to round out the day. After a little phone tag I was told that my levels were too high on my last blood test and that the med could be moving into toxic levels. I needed to decrease today. Great. The thing about antidepressants is you can't just stop taking them. You need to slowly decrease. So I'm slowly stepping down off this med and my nerve pain is showing up again. To be extra whiny about this I will say that with the returning nerve pain I also still have the negative side effects of taking the med.

I hurt, I am sleepy all afternoon, I can't seem to CBT* my way out of the Halloween candy, and I have no idea if my blood levels are still high enough to be toxic. Fan-fucking-tastic.

All whining aside, I know that I have plenty of other good options to try. I have great support from my household and have learned how to deal with my pain in other ways. I see my doctor this week and we will discuss what else is available to me. I actually feel positive about trying something new. But you got to get the whining out somewhere and the interwebs are a vast space in which to dump all that whine!

*CBT: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy. A type of behavior modification that has proven effective in dealing with any unwanted behavior...like emotional eating.

Threading the Loophole

Same-sex marriage isn't legal where I live. Despite the two extremely liberal cities in my state, the haters managed to pass a constitutional ban. (Ptthhhhhht) We do have a Domestic Partnership union that gives us, in this state, all the rights and obligations of marriage. As we all know, this doesn't change the fact that, federally, Monkey and I are legally almost perfect strangers. (I say "almost" because, since I don't work, he gets a small tax deduction for financially supporting a "non-related" adult.)

This is all about to change though. Not, of course, because the federal government has changed the rules but because Monkey feels that he is less F and more M and figures he should make it legal. By changing Monkey's driver's license sex marker from F to M we are suddenly allowed to marry...a federally recognized marriage.

I've seen others stumble into this loophole but usually with people who are......making a more traditional transition. Monkey had breast reduction (not removal) years ago and has no interest in going through that again to remove the rest. He considered taking hormones but he already has some endocrine problems and some other chronic health issues that would make taking testosterone a very, very risky thing. Monkey is unusually short, curvy-hipped. and soft faced. Even if he did top surgery and T he would never, ever pass and he doesn't care. He is male-ish identified and is happy with his identity.

Even though the name and sex identifier change would have happened no matter what I can't say the loophole wasn't a tempting part of the decision. I'm not exactly sure how I feel about that. As a homemaker, it would be much better on our tax bill if we are federally married. And, as a person coming to realize that I'm more disabled that I like to admit, it would be a much safer position. But, what about the injustice of this loophole? The only thing that is changing is Monkey got a letter from a DMV certified therapist to make them change the F to an M. Now we have access to all the marriage perks? I'm personally thankful for this loophole as it will make things easier for Monkey and I but I still feel a little shady for exploiting it.

What is in a name?

Today Monkey changed his name. He changed his first name to what just about everyone calls him. He also changed his last name and, in doing that, changed my name as well.

First, a little back story. Monkey's paternal grandparents were immigrants with a very obviously Polish-Jewish name. His grandmother was having a seriously difficult time finding a job and suspected it was due to antisemitism. She chose to shift her married name, and her children's names, to something not so conspicuous. She found a job shortly after. Who knows it the name change actually worked but I know that this kind of thing was (and still is) very common among immigrants wanting to assimilate to the American culture. However, this assimilation and Americanization of Monkey's family name always bugged him, especially since the rest of the extended family stuck with the original name. When Monkey felt ready to do a legal gender change he decided to tack on changing to the original family name.

Several years ago, I changed my name. My mom had died and my dad had disowned me so I didn't feel very attached to my given name and only used it when I had to give the actual legal name. I chose a new first name and took Monkey's last name, the Americanized one. I knew it was possible that I would have to change my name again. That doesn't bother me. I can't say I won't get a giggle at the confused looks I might get when my extremely Irish looks are matched up with my new, extremely Jewish-Polish name. Funny thing, my given first name is a very Jewish name but my mom had no idea. I use it as my middle name now.

So soon there will be a flurry of activity changing the name everywhere. At least this time I don't need to go through the court order stuff. But that is another post...

An Obligatory Warning

I have had a few responses to my post about talking more about the more adult aspects in my life. All of them were positive which is wonderful (Thank you interwebs people!). I knew some would be fine with it, including one or two who are as kinky as I am. Yet, I still felt I need to do an obligatory warning before diving into a lot of poly, sex and D/s stuff. I can't figure out why that is. What am I afraid of? Hmmm. Perhaps, it is because I'm kind of edgy even in the kinky community. These things are a big part of my life but I haven't been putting them to the front of my mind. There is a backlog of things waiting to be dumped out of my head in a messy pile of sweat, lube and a few tears. 

Well, the obligatory warning is an easy thing to do and it will comfort me for some reason. I might as well do it and move past it. 

An obligatory warning: I am about to post more about some things about sex and kink.. This is to encompass more of what is important in my life. Just to give you a bit of an idea of what I will be talking about I figured I should describe a bit of my identity. I am submissive, a masochist, polyamorous, queer (in the broadest sense), and very sex-positive. I live in a D/s relationship with Monkey and Author. Monkey and I have had this kind of relationship for 12 of our nearly 13 years we've been together. Author and I have only ever had a  D/s relationship. I'm very service-oriented (when I'm healthy) but I am also into BDSM. I'm considered an edge player which means I do things that other kinky people might think are extreme. I am always surprised by this because Monkey, Author and I are very focused on being risk-aware about everything we do. It doesn't seem edgy when we have been so careful about possible harm. This is just a warning that some of my posts might include things that cause me to cry, be bruised, or bleed. This is just a reminder that all of this is completely consensual. 

So...that's it. The warning has been posted. I'll let this sit for a few days and then, hopefully, I'll have some time to talk about this other part of my life. 

The other things in my life.

I've been thinking....

This was never meant to be a ttc/infertility blog. I meant it to encompass all the different facets of my life. However, ttc/infertility hijacked my brain, hell, my life! I rarely blogged about anything else. Well, now that part of my life is coming to a close, most likely without me becoming a parent. I have been pondering what to do with this accidental ttc/infertility blog. 

To put it bluntly, I want to get back to writing about my commitment to living in a D/s relationship with Monkey and Author. (For those not in the know, an educational quickie! D/s is short for Dominate/submissive. This dynamic falls under the larger umbrella of BDSM practices. For a definition of that acronym, google it yourself as I haven't the time to do a Kink 101 class.) However, my blog is listed and pops up on searches for queer ttc. This means many people who may not be comfortable with overtly sexual and kinky subject matters, let alone a lifestyle 24/7 D/s relationship, may show up here. They may be surprised and disturbed by suddenly surfing to what they think is a ttc/if blog and finding themselves knee deep in the ramblings of a kinky submissive. 

On the other side of this, I am a kinky lifestyle submissive who was trying to get pregnant and deal with infertility. I don't like the idea of compartmentalizing my life into separate blogs. I've done it before and it felt very unnatural. It felt like I was hiding my submissive, kinky side. Like I should be secretive and ashamed of the way I am and the way I live. This, of course, is a load of bullshit. I am proud of who I am and the dedication I have to service. I'm not ashamed that I'm a masochistic either.

So here is my dilemma. Do I abandon this blog so that ttc/if followers and searchers don't get freaked out by the newer focus? Or do I continue my blog as it was first intended? A messy mash-up of my life as a kinky, submissive, poly, housemaker, hippyish, punkish, chronic pain suffering, infertile, depression-having, genderqueer. 

I put the question out to the interwebs. Dear readers (all 3 of you) and guests, what are your thoughts? 

Yesterday, Monkey and I talked...or I talked and he mostly listened. I told him it felt pointless to continue with donor inseminations. We've been doing this, off and on, for six years. We figured we have done at least 36+ cycles. We've tried different methods, different donors, acupuncture, herbs, Clo.mid, IUIs at home and in clinic. I've been tested up, down and sideways with nothing really wrong. If the polyps were the big problem I should have conceived by now and the polyps were definitely not there for the first couple years of ttc. I felt there was no realistic chance, after all this time, that I would get pregnant just by shoving sperm in me each month. Something is wrong in some subtle way that we can't detect. I wanted to quit the inseminations and reserve my energy for the two medically-directed cycles. Actually, I'm not sure I want to do even those but I couldn't take that small chance that forcing the system might actually work.

It was so hard to watch Monkey caught in a tug of war between his natural optimism and his logical nurse's brain. He knew I was right about our chances. He knew it was an energy drain with very little possibility of any success. He also really wants to believe that I could still get pregnant. In the end, logic and statistics won out but it hurt me to see his optimism fade. 

So, we have stopped trying until January when we will make one of our last two attempts at having a kid. This is it. We are coming to the end of our ttc-turned-infertility journey. After everything we have been through, no matter how it ends, I feel relieved.

Hoping for a bfn?

As the date of my expected period approached I had two wished. One, that it be late so I didn't need to deal with it while camping (it was) and two, that it would definitely arrive (it did). I actually was hoping to not get pregnant.

For the first time in six long years I've truly had enough. I still find myself sad when I hear that yet another one of my old group of friends has had a baby. I still mourn the loss of the experience of pregnancy and parenthood but even with all that I find myself more and more excited to start the life after infertility. A life where I can make plans without wondering if I'll have to cancel them because I'm pregnant or have an infant. A life where I can redirect all that energy back into my (ahem) adult interests. A life where I can put the sex and BDSM toys back on the freakin' walls! The different life that is waiting for me when we stop trying. I am 99.9% sure that I will never get pregnant and I'm finally okay with that. I'm ready to transfer all the energy it takes to ttc (tracking, sperm donor wrangling, inseming, testing) and move it on to other parts of my life.

So what now? Have I given up? Hell if I know. I only got back from my camping trip yesterday and CD 1 is today so I haven't really had time to talk with Monkey about my feelings. I suspect that, no, I am not giving up quite yet. Monkey isn't in the same place as me with this. I'm willing to keep going for awhile for him. At this point I'd be so shocked if we hit that 0.1% chance of pregnancy that it would likely take me a couple months to mourn the loss of the life I imagined without a kid! Ah, what a mind-fuck that would be!