Hair Today, Goon Tomorrow!

Got my hair cut today - wanted to do something nice for myself, as my therapist suggested. Well, actually she suggested a pedicure or manicure, but I'm not into that, and the first thing that popped in my head was getting my hair did. I have been SO hot all the time, and I finally realized it was my hair making me hot. I had about 8 inches cut off! This is a picture-blog...

BEFORE

AFTER

Shark Week Clarification

In clarification on my Shark Week post, I want to add that, while I DID personally take all the photos in that post, the photo of the shark was taken at the Waikiki Aquarium, where the shark was on one side of the glass and I was on the other. A couple of my favorites from the aquarium are below.

Things to remember if I'm ever homeless

Since I work downtown, I see quite a few homeless people. They are often asking for money, spare change. Recently, signs and fliers have been popping up around downtown that say "Don't Give Where it Can't Help" in an effort to stop aggressive panhandling, especially from people posing as homeless people. After some criticism, they now have signs that say, "It's OK to say no."

Whenever someone visits me downtown, or if we're downtown for a performance or sporting event, people feel obligated to give to the panhandlers. I do not. As I say, if I gave to everyone who asked, I would be giving every day!

One time, as I was driving home, I saw near an overpass, in some trees and bushes, a makeshift shelter with a blue tarp. It got me thinking, what would I do if I were homeless?

Now I should point out that I know I will never be homeless. Even if I hit some serious financial troubles, I know there are people who would take care of me. And I am VERY grateful to know that I will never be hungry or homeless.

First off, I would not be homeless in Cleveland. I would do anything possible to get to a warmer climate - walk, hitchhike, jump on the back of a horse-drawn wagon as in days of old.

I would want to be homeless by the beach, preferably in Hawaii. There are actually homeless people in Hawaii. We saw them hanging out in a grassy area under banyan trees near the beach.

If I couldn't get to a warmer climate, I would build a shelter for myself someplace deep in one of the nearby parks, where hopefully no one would find me.

I also have a brilliant scheme for getting money without begging. I was in the drive-thru a couple of weeks ago and the person in front of me dropped some change, left it, and dug for some more. I bet if you periodically checked by drive-thru windows, you'd find some serious change. I've done it before, and because it's so tight there, you usually can't open the door to get it, so you leave it. Cha-ching!

A Reason to Go On...

Finally, a reason to climb out from under the blankets of self-pity and gloom:

SHARK WEEK!!!

I don't know what it is, but I love Shark Week on the Discovery Channel! I was never that into marine life growing up, but ever since S. studied marine biology and worked in Florida and Lake Erie at marine labs, I've found it fascinating. And then, on our first trip to Hawaii in 1999, we went snorkeling, and that was it for me. I was hooked. Still a little scared about being swept out to sea or being attached by a barracuda, I feel braver than I think I am when I get out there.

For me and S., snorkeling is like bird watching. We try to find good snorkeling beaches, hope for bright sun (even though it burns our backs, it makes the underwater world easier to see) and dive in. I usually use an underwater camera if possible and try to capture the different fish we see, including the elusive state fish of Hawaii, the humu­humu­nuku­nuku­āpuaʻa (which I've been thrilled to see on several occasions!). Like bird watching, we don't take anything away with us but the photos and the memories. And then we lie on the sand and look in our Hawaii Fishes book to identify the fish we saw.

We bought snorkel gear before our 2007 trip to Hawaii in eager anticipation. 2007's snorkeling did not disappoint. We saw many fish we had not seen in 1999, including 2 eels, one of which I hovered over as it tried to catch a fish - like watching the Discovery Channel live and in person!

In 1999, I had an "encounter" with a large puffer fish that had me screaming underwater and heading back to the beach - it came right at my face and it was large and freaked me out. I say I was "attacked" by it, but I wasn't, of course. While I was on the beach, Sean went back out in the water and ended up swimming with a couple of sea turtles, how cool is that?

In 2007, I made peace with the puffer fish. At the same beach where the first encounter happened (apparently a good hangout for the puffer fish), a puffer fish and I stared into one another's eyes for what seemed like 20 minutes (but was probably only about 1 minute). I realized then that they were just very curious and not skittish like the other fish who darted away from you. I felt like the puffer fish experience had come full circle, and I think the puffer fish smiled at me.

I love Shark Week, because it debunks the myths that sharks are evil and out there to attack people. This is, of course, not true. Sharks are often in the water with you anytime you are swimming in the ocean, and they rarely come near, let alone attack. The National Safety Council says that you have a 1 in 4,473 chance of dying from falling out of a bed, chair or other furniture. Shark attacks didn't even make the list. You are more likely to be attacked by hornets, wasps, bees and dogs.

I'm fascinated by the undersea world and, while sharks are not my favorite undersea creature, I do find them intriguing. I should also point out that I have never personally seen a shark in the water while snorkeling. S. has, however, been swimming with sharks numerous times, and would be in a tank with them in order to clean the tank at one of the marine labs. He has never had an incident.

Ever since I've been with S., I've discovered new things that I never thought I would like, and now I enjoy them and am relatively knowledgeable about them. Now, I actually watch ESPN, The Food Network, and The History Channel when he's not around (although mostly I watch them when he is around). I think it's interesting how I'm more into "learning" than I ever was growing up. It helps when you find something you are interested in, but at the same time, it's equally fun to learn about something that someone else is interested in.

Note: All of the photos in this posting were taken by ME!

NPY

Not Pregnant Yet.

Sorry to not have posted until now. I've been feeling pretty down the last 2 days and am trying not to write here when in the throes of depression. Besides, I hardly had the energy.

Sunday, I started spotting. It was just a very little bit of spotting, so I wasn't too concerned - implant bleed can cause spotting, and so can the progesterone suppositories. I actually thought it was a good sign.

It continued until Wednesday, when it started increasing. By Wednesday evening, I was pretty sure I was getting my period, but it was still pretty light flow. I had the busiest day at work and then had a meeting after work from 5:30-9:30. I whined to S., "I think I'm getting my period and I don't even have time to wallow in the disappointment!!!"

Thursday I was an emotional wreck. While the flow was still pretty light, I was still pretty sure it was coming. I was very crampy. I talked to my mom on the phone and cried (she's so supportive, and a great listener). I texted K. and Depressionista (both as disappointed as I was) and cried. I talked to my boss (also a wonderful support and cheerleader) and cried.

Mid-morning, I was in the bathroom, and passed something. I wiped and inspected the TP. There was some purplish-grayish matter. I sometimes have clots - this was not a clot. My heart sank. It looked like a vein or sack, some sort of tissue. After that, the flow picked up and was quite heavy.

I called my doctor and left a message. I was so emotional, I wanted to talk about options, about taking a break, about whether or not I should be concerned about the tissue material. I came home with a headache and took a nap. Of course, the nurse called back after 5:00, while I was napping and their phones went straight to the answering service.

I got up after 1/2 hour and went to Cracker Barrel with S. and my mom and my brother and sister-in-law and nephews. Some of my favorite people AND Cracker Barrel (one of my favorite places to eat) was a good way to get me out of my funk.

Unfortunately, I ended up crying there, too. Geez.

Full flow today, and the nurse called me back this morning, too. From what I described, she said it sounded like an early miscarriage. She said we would want to make sure the HcG levels were lowering and I could come in for a blood test or do a pregnancy test. I decided to run across the street to CVS to get a pregnancy test. She said if it was positive, they would have me come in for blood work and then they would want to make sure I didn't have any residual tissue (which would require a D&C). If it was negative, hopefully that meant everything was happening naturally.

At CVS, I got some more pads (I had stocked up on panty-liners, but was out of pads), and a pack of pregnancy tests (I'm sure that looked interesting - preg tests AND pads), and a GIANT Hershey's bar with almonds that looked so glorious I thought it might have a golden ticket inside.

The nurse was surprised that I would do the test at work. I was like, "We do have stalls with doors in the bathroom..." So, I took my CVS bag to the bathroom, did the test and waited. It was negative.

I went back to my office and spent the rest of the day just doing my thing. Toward the end of the day, the nurse called back to see how I was doing. I thought that was really nice. She said I didn't need to call if it was negative, but she still wanted to check in. She said to call them right away if the flow didn't start tapering off over the weekend, or if it got worse, or I felt sick, crampy, or feverish.

It occurred to me later that this was very much the experience I had when I miscarried in March 2004 at about 8 weeks. I spotted for about a week, then it started picking up, I passed the sack (I'm not sure what to call it), then the bleeding increased, but stopped in a couple of days. At that time, I had done a pregnancy test at home that was positive, had one done at the doctor's office, and had an ultrasound after I started spotting. The ultrasound showed that there was no heartbeat and no fetal pole, and that it looked like the embryo stopped developing at 5 weeks. They told me I could have a D&C or wait and see if it passed on its own. If there can be a silver lining, it's that my body seems to take care of things like that and I haven't had to have a D&C.

S. and I stayed up late last night and had a good talk. I am emotionally spent. I want to weigh our options and just take a break. S. was pretty much OK with whatever I wanted. So, I told the nurse this afternoon that we were going to take a month off and that I would schedule a consultation with my fertility doctor to figure out what we want to do next.

Thanks to all for the support and understanding and positive thoughts and comments. I hope you'll continue to send them. I just believe I'll be a mom someday, one way or another.

And you know what else? I didn't even take one bite of my glorious chocolate bar. It's still in pristine, Wonka condition, awaiting the next crisis.

Tingle's Tip of the Week

Even if you washed your hands after eating hot chicken wings, wash them 10 more times before putting in your vaginal suppository. Trust me on this.

My Humps, My Humps

My boobs are killing me! I barely bump them and I wince. This hormone thing has been hard on my breasts. Anytime I've been on Clomid I've experienced extreme breast tenderness. Some months it's worse than others. It has been more noticeable lately with the addition of the hormones and such.

It's really bad when I sleep. If I turn over or bump my breast, I wake up in pain. Even the shower can be awful. Since I have a fear that I will be strangled by my bra if I sleep in it (I wear underwires), I tried sleeping in a tight tank top. That worked OK, but more smooshing of the boobs than I'd like.

Since I had really sore breasts when I was pregnant with Eroll, I decided to by a "leisure bra" a few months ago. I figured it would work to sleep in while I'm hormonal, and it would still be useful when I get pregnant. It's been working pretty well so far, actually.

My lovely lady lumps - just another bump on the road to parenthood.

Presenting: My Uterus!

Wednesday night, I spent 3 hours working on my "Shiny Happy Uterus" collage to work on a more positive attitude toward my uterus (and my body). I know, 3 hours is a luxury many don't have. But it was a very therepeutic time for me. I wasn't sure what I wanted to do or how I wanted it to look, so I started out with just cutting out a pretty pink uterus with falopian tubes and cute little purple ovaries. Then I started going through magazines and books and pulling out whatever gave me a feeling of:

• fertility
• loving my body
• success/optimism

At first, I thought about filling the uterus with pictures of dollhouse furniture or something - giving the impression of a warm, inviting place for an embryo to come to rest. Then I thought about putting lots of pictures of babies. But the baby pictures were hard to find. I was using my "Conceive" magazine, which I thought would have lots of pictures of babies, but it really doesn't, and after I thought about it, I thought that was a good idea because seeing babies can be painful for some couples who are trying to conceive. Besides, those babies weren't anywhere close to as cute as the babies I know personally!
So, I just went with things that moved me. And finished it off with GLITTER! I am really pleased with how it turned out. I hope the picture gives you a good idea of what it looks like, although I know some details won't come through very well. The center is a picture of a statue of a woman with cradled arms, and in her arms, I put a little fetus picture from a biology book. And the little fetus is very glittery and happy!
So here, I reveal.... MY UTERUS!!!

The things we go through...

I forgot to mention that as of the day after the insemination, I've had to do supplemental progesterone.

Progesterone is important in supporting the ovaries after release of the egg and progesterone helps the uterus build a better lining to receive the (hopefully) fertilized egg. For some women, this helps make a pregnancy "stick." If I end up being pregnant, I will need to continue on the progesterone. Around the 10th week of pregnancy, the placenta takes over on the progesterone production for the baby.

There are generally 3 ways to take the progesterone - orally, injection (into the muscle), or suppository. I guess they prefer the suppositories because it's easier for most women. I appreciate not having to do more injections - the progesterone injections would be a lot harder since they go into the muscle with a big old needle, not the little sub-cutaneous needle I've been using for the other injections.

The oral version is not as effective, so they didn't even offer me that option.

So, I get the suppositories! When I got my prescription, they told me I need to put them in the refrigerator. No biggie - all of my meds need to be refrigerated to keep them potent, so I didn't think much of that. But the real reason they have to be refrigerated is becayse they MELT.

Twice a day, I get to push one of these white, bullet-shaped pellets up in there. Since I've never had a yeast infection or anything, the whole "vaginal suppostiory" thing is not something I have in my skill set. Sure, tampons are one thing, but those have an applicator. No applicator with these. So, there's been a bit of a learning curve to keep it from "sliding" out. I'm afraid of damaging myself if I put them too far up there.

Once I get it in there, I'm supposed to lie down for 15 minutes as it does its thing. Did I mention these things melt? Are you taking the journey with me? My nice warm hoo-ha, at a toasty body temperature, melts them quickly. And then they leak. All day.

I was told by several folks that I should wear a panty-liner all day. It hasn't been that bad, but I don't usually go through so many panty-liners. I feel like I should take out stock in Kotex. Now I regret getting rid of our Sam's Club membership!

Other lovely side effects include:

• headache (check)
• breast tenderness or pain (yes, very much, check!)
• upset stomach (check)
• vomiting (check)
• diarrhea (check)
• constipation (nope)
• tiredness (hell yeah, check!)
• muscle, joint, or bone pain
• mood swings (goodness yes! check!)
• irritability (see above)
• excessive worrying (since worrying is a hobby for me, I wouldn't know if my worry was excessive)
• vaginal discharge (I'm assuming this means the melty stuff)
• problems urinating (thankfully no)

In looking for a photo of these puppies, I came across another blogger who says her husband said, "Can't they give you some kind of plug?" Good stuff.
So, today my "Today I feel..." magnet on my office door was switched to "bitchy." I felt so annoyed and irritated by everything. By my third voicemail I was dropping F-bombs. Luckily, most of my coworkers stayed away from me and it let up a bit after lunch. But I'm still REALLY tired.
Sometimes I think all of these tests, poking and prodding, are just really cruel tests to make sure I really want this.

Shiny Happy Uterus!

We did the insemination yesterday. It went pretty well. We continued the Follistim shots until Monday night (I did every one of them myself this time). Monday, we went to the doctor, and things were looking good, so they had me come back on Tuesday, and there were 6 follicles looking just about ripe. They seemed happy about that and about how my uterine lining was looking (the ultrasound tech said, "Beautiful!"). Apparently, I'm really good at making eggs. They had me do the trigger shot Tuesday night and go in for insemination on Thursday morning.

The trigger shot, as last time, was uncomfortable. I had a hard time getting it right, so S. ended up doing it for me - for the trigger shot, we have to mix the solution with powder and load the syringe ourselves. I couldn't get all the fluid into the syringe without a giant air bubble. S. saved the day.

It burned going in and still is sore there, but not too bad. On Wednesday, after Depressionista and Lil Cherie left (we had another awesome Girls' Weekend in Cleveland!) I slept most of the day. My abdominal region was feeling crampy all the way around from my gut to my back. It's kind of like painful constipation, but in a different region. Anyway, it wasn't that bad, just tender. And I was so tired!

Thursday, we got up early and S. did his part at 7:30am, then we went for a bagel, took a nap in the car, and then went back in for my part at 9:00am. It went pretty smoothly. It's never comfortable, but this time wasn't as painful as last time.

Came home and guess what? Slept again for most of the day. Got up for my 2nd appointment with my new therapist later in the day.

It was a good appointment. We talked about my self-esteem issues. She said she was surprised to hear I had self-esteem issues because I put forth a very confident persona.

This led to talking about how disconnected I am with my body. My self-talk to my body has always been negative. I've always been a "larger" person and I've always been self-conscious about my looks. I love myself in many ways, but I do not love my body.

This, of course, took on another dimension when we lost Eroll. My baby was perfect, but my body was not. It was my body that failed.

My therapist asked me to try being more positive about my body - telling it, "I know you've failed in the past, but it's not going to happen again. We know what went wrong and how to fix it." She also suggested I visualize a perfect happy egg meeting with a strong healthy sperm and to even visualize the fertilized egg dividing. I thought this was an interesting idea, and it also felt like a meditative and soothing thing to do. I sometimes visualize the ocean and just watch waves go in and out in my mind to help me sleep. Watching an egg divide and divide and divide could have the same effect for me.

I then realized something. I've been trying to visualize a pretty pink uterus, and I've been asking everyone to send me happy warm uterus thoughts. But, I haven't been having my own happy uterus thoughts. So, I'm changing that. I've started thinking about all of my girlie parts as pink, shiny, and glittery. I'm thinking of working on a collage of girlie parts (ovaries, uterus, etc.) and just covering them all with magical glitter.

I really feel good about this month. I'm feeling uber-positive and happy. Who knows what will happen, but for now, I'm riding the wave of positive thinking and I'm going to believe it worked this time.