paused

still nothing happening here. they said my progesterone is 7 and i should get a period soon. so i am a week behind. I am feeling more optimistic today and less angry than yesterday. i felt it, and i am moving on.  i am trying to keep perspective and accept the process.  today i forced myself to recognize inspiring things of beauty in the ordinary. after all, now is all there is. the past is a memory and the future is an illusion, and all there ever really is, is right now. that is our truth, what we know and accept as reality.  i took this photo in my kitchen, to capture the sun showing up in even the simplest details.

thank you to those few people who emailed me some very special words…
to lose patience is to lose the battle. – gandhi

a dark post

i am trying to stay calm. today i am frustrated and anxious. i can’t believe i have to carry on with my life outside of infertility.  i was supposed to get my period on day 10-11 of lupron.. today is day 13 and nothing. i called the nurse today to tell her a. i changed my healthcare and b. i am still waiting. she seemed concerned that i still haven’t bled and wants me to come in tomorrow for bloodwork. i hope this does not cancel this cycle.  i am so sick and tired of waiting. i have waited months for this cycle to start and i am 3 weeks away from my FET. I wait and wait. My life revolves around waiting.  i waited in the lobby of the car dealership this afternoon while they changed my spark plugs. i waited for my new pharmacy to call me to set up delivery of my new prescription. (they never did) i wait and i wait and i wait and i am so fucking sick of waiting. if my life were a painting.. it would be a circle of white.. and outside of the white would be beautiful purples and grass greens, blues the color of the city sky at dusk, intense oranges and reds… and where i live, right now, is right smack dab in the middle of the fucking white.

i called brian from the car on the way to have dinner with some friends. i was so not into going, but i went anyway. i am so frustrated. nothing is cooperating. i just want to throw down my needles and give up. stop all the appointments and the waiting. i am so tired of waiting. i know you are, he said. it’s been a long time. i miss the beginning of our marriage, when it was all about us, and we just lived our life.. and our problems were small problems. like someone left the ice cream out over night. i miss that, too, he said.

i have thought about stopping thousands of times. but stopping does not get me anywhere. it does not allow me to have a baby. stopping does not allow me the life that i so deeply want. the life that involves being a mom. so, i wait.

the needle lady

seems i have new friend in needles these days. doing all the shots for the last year and last week added some acupuncture into the mix. this wonderful soul, susan, is my 5 element TCM acupuncturist and in support of my upcoming ivf she needled my ankles, shins and belly. she has needled my eyes before, which provoked tears that i didn’t know were in there, and she filled my bellybutton with salt and burned moxie in it. it made the whole room smell like pot. she makes me laugh. i have read some positive things online about IVF and acupuncture and she has recently supported 7 people on their way to pregnancy. so, i’m hopeful.

i am feeling pretty good. i am feeling the vastness of the world. i am humbled by the devastation in haiti. i feel that i’m getting closer to my guts. i have had some interesting conversations with brian lately about the impermanence of our existence and rather than feeling upset and afraid, i am feeling that as long as i keep peeling back the layers and examining it all..  then i am closer to finding that peace that allows us to let go.

defeated

today is day 5 on lupron and i want to scream. i am just not myself.  i feel completely defeated.

i know it’s not me, it not my mind dishing out all the negative self talk, it’s the drugs, but it still feels pretty bad. i remember reading online, someone refered to lupron as “the personality killer”…  yeah. exactly.
this weekend was filled with junk food, working and housekeeping. maybe that’s why i’m depressed. I am doing my best to take some deep breaths and remind myself that it’s just the drugs… just the drugs.. just the drugs.

my dreams have been even more insane than usual. i have considered that sometimes while i sleep, i am being spiritually attacked. my mother (the most irish and catholic woman i have ever known) swears that those are not real and not sanctioned by the pope as existing and i am trying to take comfort in that. i have dreamed that i am being possessed.. that my body is being controlled, being taken over by evil spirits and there is nothing i can do but scream out. i have scared brian to death more than once by screaming out, i’m not dead! or what the hell is going on! even more intense is when i wake up standing up on my bed. my therapist thinks it’s because my life seems so out of control right now, that i have no control over my body and it’s not responding well to all the different treatments we have been through. i am not sure what it is, but i want it to stop. i am working on it. i am recognizing all the ways i am in control and trying to respect my body for what it can do instead of hating it for what it can’t.

the empty room

two days from now i will start on the lupron again in preparation for ivf#2.  this will be a frozen egg transfer. we have two embryos frozen and provided they both thaw ok we will use them both in this attempt. i am getting excited and i have hope that however this cycle goes i will keep grounded and not give in to the highs and lows of each day of the process. i feel that i know more about what to expect this time, and the fact that the donor is not involved this time helps… the less variables, the better. i am also going to compliment this treatment with acupuncture and reiki which i will start to receive weekly. i am also taking a kinder approach with my body, trading the running for yoga and giving up a few of the classes i teach to be able to get more rest, more time in bed, more time to care for myself, more time for brian. looks like the transfer will be 5 weeks from today.

i have been thinking about the empty room we have in our house.. the room that i have not brought myself to finish or decorate since we moved into this house 3 years ago. initially, it was just that we had so much to do on our home renovations lists, huge remodeling projects, new kitchen, structural changes to open up the floor plan, 3 new bathrooms, new dark walnut floors. the empty room right now contains a wood chest stuffed full of my great aunts quilts, and a 10 foot mirror. that’s all. when we moved in, we removed the wallpaper in every room and i picked a color palette of cool tones.. grey-khakis, greys, silver-purples and blues. i painted this room blue only because brian didn’t like the restoration hardware lavender i bought for our room so i was able to salvage it by adding some leftover blue to it to darken it up. 3 years later, the room is still empty and badly needs some attention. all the windows and door frames need trim and the closet needs some work. but i refuse to do any of it without purpose. in the last few years i started to visualize this room as a baby’s room and it got so that i couldn’t picture anything else in there. so it will stay empty until we are blessed with a little tot to put in there.  for now, i just go in there to get a full view of my outfit.

overheard in my kitchen

him: Whats that thing, that dance thing?
me: What thing?
him: ka-blam? ka- pow?
me: um, zumba?
him: yeah.

*laughter*

busy… with space

The last night of the year was very soft and quiet at our house… cuddled up on our big red couch as the sky turned dusk and the snowy woods turned to velvet. we watched the snow fall, made turkey & avocado paninis with balsamic dressing. we drank riesling, watched a movie and were both fast asleep by 11:30, only waking briefly to the *pop* bang! of the fireworks downtown.

I got up very early on the first day of the year and headed to a packed 2 hour yoga and meditation practice, setting the tone for the coming months. It was so heart opening and reminded me of who I am when I am not stuffed into the confines of my responsibilities… designer, cook, wife, daughter, patient.  I am consistently amazed at what yoga does for my body and mind, creating space in my joints, finding corners that I can release, let go, learn to live with ease. Let go of the thinking. The thinking, the thinking is what creates the anxiety. The thinking removes us from this moment, and it chases the past and it fantasizes about the future. The breath can keep us here, in this present moment. Take a long inhale, and a long exhale. Release the jaw and melt tension from your face. After class, as I was rolling up my mat and sliding on my hoodie a friend of mine said to me, “I like to keep busy… and busy is good for me, but what I like more is… busy with space” and I knew exactly what she meant.  In the midst of the struggle, the traffic, the meetings, the chores… enjoying space.

simple pleasures

the weekend before christmas we had a small snowstorm, hurling about 12 inches of snow all over connecticut. we stayed in, watched movies, made some homemade gifts and watched the world outside turn quiet under a deep blanket of snow.

Chocolate covered pretzels:

Homemade organic ginger-apple granola:

today is christmas. we got up, and had some tea and egg sandwiches… found a peaceful view of the backyard… watched the deer for a while.. and then headed over to my mom’s for lunch. brian and i had a very quiet chirstmas eve, got some dragon rolls and some miso soup from the local sushi joint, drank some champagne, hugged on eachother.
he got me a beautiful dark wood easel, so i can set up a studio in our newly finished basement. i had painted large abstract pieces quite often in college and have only done about 3 pieces in the last 10 years so i am very excited by this gift.  i loved the feeling of laying out all the colored paint, all the intensity of the raw hues, the roughness of the stretched canvas, smearing gesso across it like warm butter across a giant piece of zucchini bread. i am interested to see what inspires me, to see what comes out when i put the brush to the canvas, to see who i am, how i’ve changed, what i can be a part of when i am not trying to have a baby.

merry christmas!

a window opens

today, a little bit of the fog lifted. an addtional brick in our infertility wall is that in-vitro is not covered under our insurance plan. it is mandated by the state of CT that in-vitro is covered for all residents unless you are a) working for a company of less than 25 people or b) your place of employment is self insured. brian works for a healthcare company that, yes, provides their own coverage to its employees rendering themselves exempt from this law. this corporation was featured in Michael Moore’s documentary “sicko” (highlighting the injustices in the healthcare system) and when i watched it, i threw up in my mouth a little. and cried. the people that were denied coverages in the movie needed those procedures to live, so my whining about my denied claims pales in comparison, but infuriates me none-the-less. this issue alone cast my vote for obama.

so, painstakingly, we have pay out of our rapidly dwindling bank account for all our in-vitro/egg donation attempts.
cost of our last attempt: $32,500.00.. and yet, no baby.

fast forward to today, this afternoon. for 5 months i have been freelance designing in-house for a very very large corporation, and today they made me a full-time offer, including all the benefits that employees receive… most importantly fertility treatment. including in-vitro. there is a 20k cap and it won’t include the donor eggs, but it’s something.

on washing dishes

him:  these dish towels don’t dry anything!!

me: that’s because those are linen napkins.