Alive

It's official. Going back to work this week has kicked. my. butt.

No. Work has kicked my ass, dragged it through the mud, up a rocky slope, and thrown my body down a cliff.

In other words, Man. I am exhausted.

Somehow, in my attempts to distract myself about whether or not I was pregnant, I managed to distract myself from the fact that school was just about to start. Sure, I knew it was coming, but I was so far into denial that I was practically in shock Tuesday morning when I had a room full of bright eyed teenagers staring at me. I kept asking myself how this was happening. Ha.

I'd get home every night and barely manage to stay awake until Is.aac would get home before I'd crash on the couch for a couple of hours. It happened regularly enough that Ja.son started to tell me I couldn't sit on the couch and would physically take my blanket away and hide it if he saw me with it. It was sad!

But, I made it through a week, and we are all still living. The boys only had frozen waffles once for dinner because my brain was so fried I couldn't think of anything else. All in all, I call that a success.

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In pregnancy news, I am 8 weeks today! Whoot!

I had some spotting on Wednesday. It was slight and a dark tan color, but as you can understand, it freaked me anyway. Had a tiny bit more on Thursday. I have wracked my brain as to the cause (stress? residuals from the suppositories? Lovenox? infection?) although nothing stands out as the major culprit.

I started the suppositories last Friday night. Can we just say that those suckers are just plain gross? Eww. Unfortunately, my insurance company started being all pissy about medications, so it won't cover the suppositories because they are fertility meds. It is cheaper (by quite a bit) for me to just stay on the PIO shots, so I went back to them on Sunday night. My ass has not forgiven me, either.

The only good thing about the switch back (um, if you can call this a good thing) is that Is.aac is freakishly enjoying being part of the process again. Plus he is happy to have an "excuse" to stare at my butt for ended periods of time on a regular basis. Isn't that just wrong!??!

I've had other issues with the insurance company over covering Lovenox. I think I've spent about three and a half hours on the phone with various people this week trying to get my prescription refilled. All the crap the pharmacy told me in the beginning about covering 14/23 days has turned out to be utter rubbish. I've had to pay full price at the tone of over $700 since that initial fill. It looks like I'll have to pay out of pocket again on Monday while I continue to wait on the "specialty pharmacy" I now have to go to gets its shit together. Oh, and this is all just to get the prescription there. I still don't even know what will be actually covered! Grr. So frustrating.

I have my next scan on Thursday after work. I am nervous and excited. I hope everything is still going well in there. I am wildly afraid of not seeing a heart beat on that scan. Even though the m/c rate drops to around 5% after a heart beat is detected, that 5% still worries me.

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Remember my neighbor who had the twins in July? Baby B, who is still in the NICU, was transferred to a larger hospital an hour and a half away from home this week. At that point, he was still stable, but they wanted him to have access to a pediatric nephrologist at the hospital.

My neighbor and her family were going to try to stay at a Ro.nald M.cD.onald house this weekend to be near the baby.

I was sad to read her text today. The baby's kidneys have completely failed and he will need to start dialysis. Things are not looking good.

My heart is breaking for them.

If you have it in you to send some good thoughts into the universe for Baby B, little No.ah, please do. I know the family would greatly appreciate it.

Yesterday

Sorry about that. It wasn't my intention to leave you guys hanging.

I think I just lost 24 hours of my life. It seems I may have come down with some sort of nasty bug, which timed its appearance at about 4 yesterday. Since then, I've spent loads of time sleeping and being a couch potato. Not fun.

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First, let me welcome all you ICLW'ers! Thank you for stopping by my little blog. Here is the brief history: 3 IVFs and a crappy pregnancy = my sweet twin boys. 2 FETs and 2 more IVFs = current P word status. Today I am 7 weeks. Yeah!

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Okay. Now for yesterday's appointment!

I have to say that I was a nervous wreck on the drive over to the clinic. It didn't help that they had called and moved my appointment an hour and a half earlier. I had psyched myself up for an 11:00 appointment; the last minute change sent all of my mental preparation out the window!

The waiting room was filled with patients, like it always is, but they took me back almost as soon as I signed in. We were led into the SAME exam room we had on that fateful day last year. I did my best not to panic, but I was close to the edge. I even had the start of my lovely hives on my arms and neck from the stress.

Then the RE entered the room. He sat on a chair and opened my chart--all ten inches of it. He quickly looked at my numbers and told me he had a good feeling about things. He looked up my due date and asked me how I felt. I told him I felt pretty crappy (which is apparently not the norm to feel crappy after feeling zero morning sickness during a twin pregnancy--go me yet again!). I also told him that he was not allowed to find anything but a nice strong heart beat on the ultrasound. He smiled and again told me he felt like it was going to be there this time.

I closed my eyes when I saw there was a sac on the screen. I couldn't look at it. A split second later he said he saw it...a nice, strong heart beat! I looked at the screen. Nothing. I couldn't find the flicker. And then...the most beautiful little sight I have seen in a long, long time. I think it was then that I finally breathed.

She is there. All 9.8 mm of her. Her sac looks good. Her heart beat is strong and steady (no actual numbers but he said it was normal). She measured a day ahead.

Of course, I know that I am not out of the woods, but he said that most things that will go wrong will have done so by this point. I am clinging to those words, and for once I hope we don't fall on the wrong side of the odds. We've done that too much in our lives. This time, I want to believe that we will get to be the lucky ones.

It is time for the crap fest that has been our lives for so long to make its exit. (Hear that, universe?)

I got dressed, and then Is.aac and I met the RE in his office. He hugged us, telling us how excited he was for us. We talked about new medications (no more PIO shots for me--suppositories here I come!) and our next appointment.

But the thing that I am still thinking about is that he told me he admired my attitude. He said that my "glass is half full" approach to all of this madness was something he didn't see very often, especially in someone who has been around as long as I have. He said I reminded him of his favorite sister in our approach to life.

Wow.

We said our goodbyes while he handed my file to one of the nurses. She took us to her office to write the scripts and set up our appointment time. And then it happened again. She said she admired my attitude also! Dude.

I haven't felt like a positive person throughout this process, especially with this cycle. I've cried more tears than I want to admit. I have felt like there was no hope. I've wondered why I was doing this to myself and my family. Yet, they admire me?

Have I fooled them so totally that they didn't seem my doubts? Have I been so hard on myself that these feelings I've had are "normal" and I'm not the horribly weak person I think I am?

I haven't quite decided how to process that. It is something to think about, though.

You can be sure that I will be doing lots of thinking about what they said. While I am at it, I am going to marvel at the fact that I am pregnant. :-)

Thank you, everyone, for all of your support and kind words. I am incredibly blessed to have found you all.

Incredibly blessed.

Houston, we have a heartbeat!!!!!! Due 4/8/11. Over the moon and so relieved! More later! ;-)

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Let It Be

2 more sleeps.

All thoughts of keeping myself occupied so I didn't have to think about Friday have gone out the freaking window.

I have cleaned about everything in the house that can be cleaned.

I have organized.

I have shopped.

I have Facebooked.

And now...there isn't a whole lot more to do but wait.

Ahem.

As you know, I don't do waiting well. Waiting brings out the crazy in me. Ha. Who am I kidding? The crazy has been here the whole time.

I am beyond excited about Friday. The possibility and hope of what could be--that I so very want to be is enough to make me cry.

Yet at the same time, I want to run from Friday and never look back. This ultrasound fills me with such an intense, paralyzing fear.

We are checking for viability. There is the chance this will not be my happy ending once again. For someone with my history, I'd say the chance is pretty good. I think about last year and remember that dead screen, the look on the doctor's face, and the sad tone in his voice--I know how it can be. I am so afraid of how it can be.

I am trying to not think that way, and I certainly try not to dwell on negativity, but the thoughts are there nonetheless.

Sigh.

2 more nights.

2 more mornings.

Approximately 36 more hours.

And then I'll know one way or the other.

Let it be this time...please let it be.

"Let it be, let it be
Let it be, yeah, let it be
Whisper words of wisdom
Let it be

And when the night is cloudy
There is still a light that shines on me
Shine on until tomorrow, let it be"

WTF?

I am in total disbelief.

I think I am experiencing some sort of morning sickness!

I carried twins for 28 plus weeks and never once felt like getting sick. Ever.

Um.

For the last six or so meals, I've felt bad after every. single. one. Like ugh, I over ate (but didn't) bad. Like please don't even mention food or it will throw me over the edge bad.

Like throwing up bad.

Thankfully, I haven't thrown up (because I do everything in my power not to), but I have this feeling that it is coming...

Ugh.

I am not sure that I like this new little development!

Sigh.

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4 more sleeps until the big u/s (at 6w6d).

Operation Distraction Continues...

For those of you keeping track: 5 more sleeps until u/s. Ugh.

Operation "Mind Distraction" is in full swing. We (okay, I) made sure to have a busy weekend planned to keep our (okay, my) minds occupied and away from the black chasm of fear that is so easy to find. I am happy to say so far, so good on the plan.

We (okay, I) have been successful. Mostly. Ahem.

But, this is me we are talking about; we all know my mind is one of the more challenging minds to distract.

We had a blast at the fair on Friday. Sh.awn loved the livestock animals, and I swear he spent a good 5 minutes mooing at one of the cows. The cow was gracious enough to repeatedly moo back at him , making the whole scene hilarious. Ja.son was more interested in the little petting zoo they had. He pet and talked to every animal there with the exception of an over zealous deer who kept eating Is.aac's shirt every time it got the chance. That deer was freaking crazy. Sh.awn didn't care much for the petting zoo. Ja.son didn't care much for the bigger animals. (We're talking MAJOR meltdown when a bull was rude enough to look him in the face and snort. It didn't help that a train happened to time its passing at that exact same moment. Ja.son. lost. his. shit. Poor guy.)

On Saturday morning, we opened up what we jokingly call "Mommy's Hair Salon o' Terror a la Flowbee" again and gave the boys hair cuts. (Is.aac affectionately calls the salon "de Hair 'em, Scare 'em.") It is a necessary evil, but the boys absolutely hate the entire process, which in turn makes us hate the entire process. Their hair looks great, although you would have thought we were cutting off random body parts while we were doing the cutting.

Saturday evening, Is.aac and I went to The Melting Pot. We loved it. It was so much fun. (Oh, and you were totally right about the jeans. It was fairly casual.) I don't think I have ever eaten that much food at one time in my entire life! We didn't do the dessert plate first, but I made sure to have enough room to enjoy it. Mmm...I can't wait to go back at some point. :-)

Today was spent lazing around the house, playing with the boys. We had plans to go to Tar.get but somehow never made it. In fact, I am still in my pajamas, so I couldn't have been that set on going in the first place. I did some laundry and cleaned, too. (My cleaning frenzy is starting to make me think I've lost my mind. Seriously. I am not a housekeeper.)

So that leaves us at tonight. Is.aac is in the shower. Once he is out, we are finally going to get to open our anniversary gifts for each other. I can't wait!

eta: I only got a card. Boo. Apparently something is in the works, but he hasn't received it yet. Not sure what it is, so I'll keep you updated when I find out what it is.

24 Hours of My Life

Alternately known as "What is keeping my mind occupied so I don't go crazy in the next 9 days."

Some of the highlights from the last 24 hours:

Last night at dinner, Ja.son pulled his glasses down off his nose and into his mouth. Is.aac told him to get the glasses out of his mouth, reached over to move them back on his nose, and said, "What did you do?" I headed into the kitchen to find Is.aac sweeping Ja.son's mouth with his finger. Apparently Ja.son ate the plastic nose piece off of his glasses. I have no idea why. Sigh.

TMI alert: I am a lot wetter than usual. This has of course prompted approximately 438 extra trips to the bathroom to check that all is well. It has been. Thankfully. That's where I was when Ja.son ate his glasses.

I got my official "Welcome Back to School" letter from my district today. I almost cried. I start back to work in twelve days. Where did my summer go?

Speaking of school, I have to go back sometime within these next ten days and set up my room and get my lesson plans together. I have left everything to the very last minute. Sadly, I may just pay for that. Blah.

Sh.awn has been visiting the "naughty chair" a lot this week. Personally, I think he is on the verge of a milestone or something because he has been like a different child. He will eat anything and everything within his reach (except his glasses!) and has been much more attitudinal than usual. Anyway, his new favorite thing is to go to the naughty chair and knock it over and push it across the room. The entire time he says, "Uh oh. What happened to the naughty chair?." He'll finish by leaving the chair in the corner, turned upside down. Think he is trying to tell me something?

Why won't both of my children eat the same food? I swear. If one likes something, the other acts like I've tried to feed him acid. Ugh. It is so frustrating. I hate cooking as it is. It is even worse when I have to try to please two picky eaters.

Ja.son was telling me about a cartoon he watched earlier today. The characters went to outer space on a "spay-shit" as he put it. I laughed so hard I cried. He couldn't quite figure out what was so funny though. :-) I haven't corrected him either. Bad mommy.

I have a cleaning bug. I cleaned my granite counter tops until they sparkled this afternoon. I also cleaned the kitchen and living rooms. I think the bed rooms and bathrooms are tomorrow. Note to self: don't wait so long before you do this crap again. Seriously. A person should not have cobwebs in so many corners of her house. It's gross.

Sh.awn is on a drinking strike. He is eating like a freaking pig, but he has dropped way down on what he is drinking. Like by half. He is peeing and all of that, but it sort of freaks me out nonetheless, so much so that I've been tempted to give him a bottle to get him to finally DRINK. My better judgement has won the battle so far, but dude. My resolve is quickly fading.

At 11:00 last night, I had to have a Carl's Junior Jalapeno burger, french fries, and ranch dressing. It was heavenly. Mmmm. Today I was reminded why that wasn't such a good idea. Unfortunately, I didn't learn my lesson because I am craving another one tonight. If only I could get Is.aac to go get me one...

He won't. Not cool, Is.aac.

This weekend Is.aac and I are going to go to the Melting Pot for our anniversary. I've never been before although I've always wanted to go. Has anyone been there? Did you like the food? Better yet, is it dressy or will my nice jeans work? (I love my jeans...) Anyway, our SIL will be here at 5:30 and then we are free to enjoy dinner and a movie. Wow. It has been ages since we've done that.

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If you could, stop by and give One Day some extra love. Her beta decreased. :-(

The Date

When I was pregnant and ultimately lost it last year, I promised myself that I would celebrate another pregnancy if I was lucky enough to get the chance. I am struggling with that promise, though. Much of the time I am doing my very best to NOT think about it. I can't even label these posts anything other than "IVF #5". Isn't that sad? I tried so hard to get to this very place, yet now I am pretending that I am not. I know it makes no sense whatsoever, but I can't seem to help myself.

It helps a little that I was outed at my conference last week and now so many of my friends/coworkers know (6 to be exact--yikes!). They are excited for me and talked about my life last week like there was no alternative ending. I would have a baby.

Me.

A baby.

9 months from now.

Their excitement was somewhat contagious, which was good even though it made me a tad uncomfortable.

Is.aac walks around like he is sure that everything is going to work out in our favor this time. How he can be so sure after the crapfest we've been dealt is beyond me, but I am trying to at the very least not rain on his happy parade. Sometimes, I am even able to jump into his vision of the future and talk about it myself.

Sometimes.

But not often.

Not yet.

I was asked when I would be comfortable to just relax and enjoy what was happening. I was forced to pick a mental date for when I would no longer be afraid--a date that would signify a new beginning of hope--a date that was before the actual birth.

I said I would start to enjoy being the P word if once when I saw a heart beat. At that point, I will let the fear go as much as I can. It will no longer rule me.

The pretending will stop.

The celebration will begin.

Maybe in as little as ten short excruciatingly long days from now.

Should I see that precious heart beat, I think I will finally believe...

finally feel officially pregnant...

and that would be really, really fantastic.

Well Slap My Ass and Call Me Sally

(Well, on the other hand, please don't. It hurts too much. Let me just say that giving yourself a shot in only one cheek every day for a week because you can't seem to get twisted around enough to shoot the other cheek means you'll have one sore ass at the end. Ouch!)

Anyway...

I just might be that P word after all.

Beta was 1455.

Doubling time is 43.33 hours (or 1.8 days).

Ultrasound is scheduled for August 20.

Holy cow.

Home

I'm home! I'm home! I am so excited to be home with my wonderful family and nice comfy bed!

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So, while I was using the hotel's super slow Internet, I somehow had my google account hacked. Google suspended my account because of "suspicious activity," blocked access to my email, and freaked me out by removing both the blogs from the Internet.

Can we say panic? Cuz, um, dude did I panic. A lot.

All is okay now. From what I could see when I was reconnected, I had about 50 strange emails sent to my account from who knows where. I was able to take care of that without much problem. More importantly, the blogs are back up, which makes me breath a huge sigh of relief.

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I go in tomorrow for my repeat beta. I am nervous. Very, very nervous.

I have not tested this week, so I have no idea if the pee sticks would show that comforting darker line. Instead, all I have to go by is the sore boobs and the fatigue I've been feeling. There isn't much else happening.

By my calculations, if my hcg was 99 on the 31st, it should be somewhere around 1200 (or preferably higher) tomorrow.

That is a pretty high number.

I'm going to let myself sleep in a bit before I head down to the clinic. My guess is that I won't know one way or another until the early afternoon. I'll be sure to let you know as soon as I get the results...

wish me luck.

Conference Day 4

Still here at the conference. Internet service is super slow at best. I'll take slow, though, over the more numerous times the receptions is spotty and I can't get/stay on the net. Oh well.

Things are still...the same as they were, at least as far as I know.

Since I was outed, my coworkers have been extremely sweet. It still makes me a little worried that as many people know about what as going on (my roommate has a big mouth, too!), I really do work with some good people. I hear "Are you okay?" just about ever other minute. It cracks me up.

Saturday can't get here fast enough. A little reassurance that things are progressing as they should at this point is looking really nice right about now...

Conference Day 2

Got here yesterday. Things are going fine. Thankfully, I am having fun. We went to a show last night, which I loved, and have been eating a lot of food.

I have been outed when my roommates walked in on me giving myself a shot on the bed. So, I am choosing to live in the now and celebrate the possibility.

For now, I am that P word. I have let my slippery friend, Hope, into the picture.

While I don't know what Saturday will bring, I am feeling that things may be going as well as they can be now. My boobs still hurt enough to have to wear a bra to bed. Plus, I am tired earlier than my norm. I have quite a bit of crampy/uterine activity which has sent me running to the bathroom with the fear that I am just about to start my period. I always feel so relieved when there is nothing there.

I did have a tiny bit of tan spotting yesterday. There was nothing at all today. Maybe the spotting on Saturday and yesterday was implantation bleeding? Maybe it the Lovenox? Who knows?

I am trying not to think about it, really.

The hope I feel is not going to affect the future, but it sure does make living in today a whole lot easier.

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Today was my 8th wedding anniversary. We talked and sent text messages to each other throughout the day. We have had a wonderful anniversary--at least it was as wonderful as it could be when we separated by 5 hours of driving! :-)

The boys have asked for me all day, but they are surviving just as well as their mom. My mom is finally home from her trip from Alaska, so they are also getting extra loving from grandma during the day to tide them over until I get home.