The State Of Me

This is resonating with me. Both that tumblr and the one it's referencing contain copious F-bombs and other language, so before you click the link let me explain. It's a tumblr started by a fiction author whose blog I sometimes follow, dedicated to following her progress as she figures out how to run her life like a grown-up.

Anyway, it's resonating with me because hi, I'm going to be 39 in six weeks. This is distressing for two primary reasons, one of which you can probably guess if you've been following along here, which is the one where I really want to have a baby before I'm 40, but that seems to be becoming less and less likely to happen. The other reason is simply that 39 is only one year away from 40, and people in their forties are supposed to have their lives much more together than I do. I mean, seriously. I had every expectation that, by the time I reached this stage of my life, I would have figured out how to act like a reasonable adult human being who can manage her finances and keep a clean house and wake up before 10 AM and not call changing from pajama pants into sweat pants "getting dressed." EXPECTATION: UNMET.

Sigh.

So, it's been a while. How've you been?

I've been vacillating between okay and not so okay, but mostly, I've been okay. I mean, I haven't been posting here because the baby project and the diet project have both been hung up in limbo, the baby project because we have to make some major improvements to our finances before we can even go there, and the diet project because I can't just do dieting in the winter. Although I have managed to maintain my weight loss, so I'm pretty proud of that. But now that the weather is warmer and the days are longer, I'm starting to work out regularly again, and I've got my eating habits mostly back to where they were pre-holidays, so I'm starting to lose again, little by little. My current goal is to be down to a size 10 by my birthday. But when nothing is moving forward, there's not a lot to say about it; and the parts of my life that have had movement are covered over at my Profeshunal Writur blog. On a personal blog focusing mainly on getting healthy and battling IF, there's really not much to say when nothing is happening in those areas and everything is pretty much okay.

Except, of course, when it's not. And there are plenty of days when it's not. For about a month I managed to not think too much about having to put off TTC and to just be okay with it, but that's getting harder to do, and the not okay moments are increasing. There are moments like today, when we were on our way home from a mild spending spree at Target, the first time in months that we've been able to loosen our belts a bit and buy a few small wants instead of strictly needs, thanks to Husband's student loan money. And it's fun to spend on wants, even small ones, especially when you haven't done it in so long, and today was a beautiful day, and we were both in a great mood. And then Matt pointed to a truck idling next to us at a stop light, a really nice truck, and started talking about how he'd like a truck like that some day, and I just became overwhelmed with this absolute certainty that our financial situation will never improve, that we'll never get to have nice things, we'll never be able to afford to start a family, we'll never get out of debt, and we'll spend the rest of our lives just scraping by and struggling to hang on to the little that we do have. And even though I don't particularly want a truck of any kind, I became suddenly angry with Matt for showing me nice things that are so completely out of our reach that they might as well be on another planet, and it was all I could do not to burst into tears on the spot.

So yeah, there are times like that.

I'm out of work again, which isn't helping. Things were going great for a while -- I had some steady support clients, and although I was undercharging for my services and therefore having to work my butt off just to make ends meet, at least I was working, and the ends were indeed meeting. But then all of my clients left me at once, for various reasons, as always happens. Projects got wrapped up, in-house employees were found to possess my same skill-set, other freelancers were found who charge even less than I was charging. And while things were still going so well, I raised my prices and changed my business, and Matt and I decided that he would be my partner and be in charge of sales and helping me drum up business. Except we haven't managed to drum up any yet. And while I've only been out of work for a week, and Matt and I are still strategizing about the best way to approach potential clients, and we're going out tomorrow to introduce ourselves to some leads, and I know that these things take time and I knew that it wouldn't turn around overnight, I'm still having to fight the urge to panic and give up and undo all of the changes and go back to not charging enough to earn a decent living.

Anybody need some web design work done? Or know somebody who does? Because I'm available, and I could use the work.

But I'm mostly just thanking God that the gigs all dried up right when we got Matt's student loan refund, so we've got a bit of a cushion, and really, there's no reason to panic. And I'm doing my best to trust that the work will start flowing in again when we really need it to, which is what it's been doing without fail for the last three years. And I'm really, really grateful that we've been able to hold onto our house and pay all of our bills and keep the 'fridge stocked, and I know that we're so incredibly blessed just to have everything we truly need. But, man, you guys, just once, it would be so nice to be able to get ahead, to have the money not dry up, to not have to rely on cushions and to be able to make some actual progress paying off our debt, to be in a position to help people and give to charity without a second thought instead of feeling like a charity case.

But mostly, I just want to be able to afford to get pregnant and have a baby. That shouldn't feel like so much to ask.

Christmas Blues

So it's been a while. I haven't blogged here lately because, well, I just haven't felt like talking about my struggles to get through this time of year. But the truth is that it is something of a struggle, for Matt and I both. Today is the anniversary of my mom-in-law's passing (we think, since we're not sure exactly when she passed away; but it's close enough), so there's that. We miss her, and Rob, and our holiday traditions that revolved around them. This month also marked the second anniversary of my first MC, and the fact that we're still childless is weighing on us and making it really difficult to get in to the Christmas spirit. We trimmed our tree over the weekend, and that was mostly an exercise in tears and grief, as every ornament I hung either reminded me of a loss or of what we don't have.

To make matters worse, although my business has thankfully picked up, we racked up so much credit card debt during the lean months that we're still just treading water. So not only is Christmas shopping extremely limited, but we're also asking ourselves hard questions about whether it's smart or responsible to start TTC in January as we'd been planning to. I really don't know what to do. Where we're at right now, we would qualify for state aid for my medical care if I became pregnant, but we're not really comfortable with that. We don't know how we'd afford it out of pocket, though. I know we should take some time and try to pay off some of our debts before trying to have a baby, but my clock is ticking away and I'm feeling desperate to hurry up and get started, as every year older I get the greater the risks to both me and and any babies I manage to conceive, not to mention the more difficult it becomes to conceive in the first place.

So that's where my headspace is at right now -- a big mix of past grief and an uncertain future, facing the prospect of putting our dream on hold even longer. I'm praying my way through it and doing my best to trust God, but even so it's not helping me to feel very merry or Christmasy. I think the past two Christmases have us both too primed for grief and to expect badness to be able to just relax and enjoy this time of year.

Thinking Out Loud About Project Baby

I've been feeling run down and blah the last few days. I'm realizing that this happens every month and I'm just now beginning to wonder if it has something to do with my cycle. I really need to educate myself about how all of that works and how to track everything. I never bothered in the past, because GETTING pregnant was never the problem--STAYING pregnant was. But it did take almost 9 months to happen after going off of birth control the first time, and as I inch ever closer to 40 I realize that there are no guarantees, and with my PCOS I really should get to know what's going on with my oven. I want to get the book Taking Charge of Your Fertility, which has been recommended to me often, before we start Project Baby.

I think we've decided to wait until the holidays are over to start that. As slim as the chances are that I'd get pregnant right away if we started before then, after the last two tragedy-filled Christmases I just want to get through one Christmas without either worrying or mourning. I also want to be able to relax and enjoy the holiday food without worrying about every single thing I put in my mouth. So I'm trying to get my weight down to at least 160 before Thanksgiving, and then I'll just focus on maintaining for the rest of the year. Once I go off BC I should still have time to lose another 10 pounds or so while I wait for it to get out of my system. I want it to be low enough that I won't have to worry about pregnancy weight gain pushing my glucose back up into the unhealthy range.

With all of that said, I'm actually really looking forward to the holidays this year, in spite of the sadness that's built into it. I feel extremely hopeful that this will be our last childless holiday season--that by next Christmas, if we don't actually have a baby yet, at least I'll have a healthy bump. So I feel like, if fate allows, we should do our best to relax and enjoy what could possibly--God willing--be the last holiday season where it's just the two of us and our furbabies.

Three cheers for optimism!

Project: Oven Repair Is Working

Here's some good news: I decided to test my blood glucose levels today for the first time since June, and there is definite improvement. Back then, my fasting glucose level was 102 when I tested it in the morning before breakfast--that's in the range for insulin resistance/metabolic syndrome. When I tested it before breakfast this morning, it was 93--down nine points and NORMAL!

I've lost about ten pounds in between the two tests, and while it's tempting to be a little discouraged that I've only lost ten pounds since June, I did take that month-long break from the diet, during which I actually gained a few pounds. So this is actually great progress, and the important thing is that the numbers are all moving in the right direction.

I'm feeling really positive about what this means for my chances of a healthy pregnancy, although I'll be more comfortable if I can get my fasting glucose level under 90 before we start trying again. I also need to lose 5-10 more pounds before the height/weight charts stop telling me I'm overweight. More importantly, I need to lose about three more inches of belly fat before I'm fully out of the "at risk" range.

I'm really glad I decided to test and measure everything today, too. I've been feeling really discouraged about all of this lately, and this is just the encouragement and motivation I need to keep going.

I'm almost there, y'all.

PS for those of you who also need to watch the glycemic index of the foods you eat - I've got a Low GI Recipes pinboard on Pinterest. Some of the recipes are already there and some of them look like they just need a bit of tweaking to get there. I'm planning to start experimenting with low GI baking once the weather finally cools down enough to start using our oven.

Pale-No! Or, Project: Oven Repair, Take Two

With anniversary celebrations out of the way, today is the day I get Project: Oven Repair back on the rails. When I said a couple of weeks ago that I was taking a break from said project to protect my sanity, I mentioned that I was considering trying the Paleo Diet when I was ready to resume P:OR. If you don't know what the Paleo diet is, it's basically the way humans are believed to have eaten prior to the advent of agriculture, and involves foods that can, in theory, be either hunted or gathered, even though these days most folks do their hunting and gathering at the supermarket. In short, the rules pretty much boil down to, "Eat like a caveman."

And now I have "Captain... CAAAAAVE maaaaaaaaaaaan!" running through my head. If you recognize that then congratulations! You're old like me. And now it's stuck in your head, too.

You're welcome.

But back to the diet. At first glance, the Paleo diet sounds like it might be a good idea for battling PCOS. It's low-glycemic, and gluten-free to boot. There's even a variation called Paleo Zone, a mash-up of the Paleo diet and my current eating plan of choice, the Zone diet, which involves eating Paleo-approved foods in Zone-approved proportions. Sounds good!

Except, did you know that dairy products are considered "agriculture"? Apparently, cave men didn't milk livestock and turn said milk into delicious things like cheese or yogurt. Also, peanuts, along with other legumes, are an agricultural product, since they have to be planted and nurtured and grown and harvested, and can't simply be found on trees like actual nuts, and are hence verboten.

So, let's see: on the Paleo diet, I would not be allowed to eat cheese. Or yogurt. Or peanut butter.

To which I say: Pale-NO!

I could give up yogurt, I suppose, if I had to. I could even see myself conceivably going for a while without cheese if I must. But peanut butter? Only if you pry it from my cold, dead, Smucker's-coated fingers.

So clearly, the Paleo diet is not for me. Moving on, I also considered trying the first phase of South Beach. From what I understood of the South Beach diet, it's basically a rip-off of very similar to the Zone, the primary difference being that South Beach is marketed as a weight-loss diet, while the Zone is touted as more of a nutrition plan for combating chronic illnesses. The other difference is that the South Beach plan involves "phases" -- a super-strict Phase One and a semi-strict Phase Two that lead you to the pretty-much-identical-to-the-Zone Phase Three; the idea being that the first two phases kill your sugar and carb cravings and stimulate weight-loss.

A more strict version of the Zone sounded like exactly what I needed. But after doing a little more research, I realized that Phase One of South Beach is, essentially, the Atkin's diet. And I've had my experiences with the Atkin's diet, and they were not pleasant.

So here's a thought, Jean: why not just stick with the Zone diet, but be more strict with yourself about limiting non-favorable carbs?

Huh. It's so simple, I wonder why I didn't think of that myself.

So starting today I'm back in the Zone, but I'm planning to go at least a week (and to try for two) without any bread or grains (except for steel cut oats, which are low-glycemic and too nutritious to give up completely). And of course I'm also putting the kibosh on sugar (again). I think the reason I kept plateauing last time and couldn't break that 165 lb. barrier was because I was eating way too much bread. Although I had cut down on it and was sticking to whole grain varieties, it's not the best choice for controlling blood sugar, and I was eating a lot of sandwiches and breakfast toast, basically depending too much on bread to round out my daily carb allotment.

Of course, this was partly because bread is so cheap. In preparation for a week of eating sans bread, I stocked up on plenty of fresh produce, and I'll just say that I'm thankful neither Matt's nor my eyes popped out of our heads or permanently froze in the size of saucers once we saw the total at the checkout counter.

Because of this, I'll probably be gradually working sandwiches back into the meal rotation after this initial week to help get all of the bad carbs out of my system. But from now on I'll be opting for lower-glycemic varieties like rye and pumpernickel, and I'll probably be limiting it to the weekends.

So here's the plan:

• 1 to 2 weeks without any bread, sugar or alcohol,
• after which I can have low GI bread on occastion, and one or two glasses of wine or beer on the weekends (until we're actively TTC, at which point it will be verboten).
• After the first month, I can resume the occasional "cheat" night two times a month to keep myself from feeling deprived.

And during all of this I'll be walking (and eventually wogging) 45 minutes every morning, six days a week, and alternating cardio-kickboxing, pilates and yoga in the evenings.

And if that doesn't knock out this last twenty pounds and make my body baby-ready, then I don't know what will.

Lackadaisy

First, some book news for those who missed it (and care): Restless Spirits is 50% off at Smashwords with coupon code SSW50 throughout the month of July. Also at Smashwords, last week I released my flash fiction collection, Fragments & Fancies: Ficlets, Flash Fiction & Shorts as a FREE download. So go check it out. Oh, and also, I added a Books page to this blog, so you can keep tabs on my current and upcoming publications there. Or you could always just follow my writing blog.

Other than that, the big news is that there is no news. Except that it's hot. It's so, so very hot that I have no energy and I never want to leave my air-conditioned house and I'm suffering from a serious case of ennui. Hello, First World Whine.

But that's pretty much where I'm at right now. I haven't been posting because there's nothing new to say. I'm still writing, I'm still working, I'm still working out, and every day is just like the one before, and did I mention that it's OH EM GEE HOT?

I did finally start taking NAC (I think I actually mentioned that already -- see? There's nothing new to say), and I don't know whether it's a direct result of that that I finally broke the 170 barrier. The last time I weighed, the needle on the scale hovered between 168 and 169. I'm wearing the heck out of my size 12 shorts, even though they're still a skoch tight, but they look better than my baggy-butt size 14s. And I only have 18 or 19 more pounds to go until I'll feel safe to TTC -- presuming that 150 will be low enough to get my insulin resistance under control.

I also recently came to a fairly monumental (for me) decision, but I haven't decided whether I should blog about that yet, so I'll just go ahead and be obnoxious and tease y'all about it instead.

Oh, and we're still -- STILL! -- waiting to see the specialist about scheduling Matt's gallbladder surgery. That appointment's been rescheduled twice already, the second time after we waited in the doctor's office for two and a half hours before they told us that the doctor got called into surgery and sent us home. So maybe we'll know something by Friday. It's sure a good thing he's not actually suffering any symptoms.

Of course this means that we still can't plan our camping trip, and with his classes starting in less than a month, it's starting to look like we might not get our summer vacation this year. Which I don't even want to think about right now, because I need this vacation so badly. We both do. Even if it's just for a weekend.

Oh, and again -- my 20 year high school reunion is happening this weekend. I'm not going. Originally I declined mainly because Matt's surgery was (and is) still up in the air and we're trying to keep our schedules open; but when I saw that they actually felt the need to write "No Fighting!" at the bottom of the invitation... I can't say I felt too heartbroken about missing it, and also, that pretty much sums up my entire high school experience right there.

How about you guys? Are you managing to beat the heat, or do you live in some magical wonderland where the weather is pleasant and mild?

PCOS, I Has It

I finally had my annual checkup to renew my BCP today, and as much as I griped about it, I'm glad I went. When I asked the doctor for information on testing for PCOS, she went over my symptoms and told me that I meet enough diagnostic criteria that I don't need any testing. Then she went ahead and made the diagnosis official.

But then she also told me that PCOS doesn't cause miscarriages, which, a whole lot of Internet sources and women in the RPL community beg to differ. And then she went on to say that the only treatment for PCOS is the BCP, which, all of the holistic web sites where I researched PCOS said that traditional doctors always say that, and when I asked her about controlling or reversing it through a low-glycemic diet, she said that it wouldn't cure the PCOS but it would cure any insulin resistance that would be causing it. Which may be a case of same difference, but: this might be one of those areas where sometimes the Internet knows more than doctors.

Anyway, she wanted to do a glucose test, but since I'm uninsured she left it up to me. I checked the cost with the lab and it's only $42, and if I get it and it confirms that I'm insulin resistant, then she said we can talk about putting me on Metformin. But she also said that if I just keep up my diet and keep losing weight and getting in shape, I'll most likely turn it around without medication.

So I'm a little torn. The whole plan for Project Oven Repair was to do just that--turn my (rightfully) presumed PCOS and insulin resistance around with diet and exercise. Now I have confirmation that I'm on the right track. But, I've read really promising things about Metformin preventing miscarriages. As much as Matt and I both prefer natural remedies over medication when possible, if I have an opportunity to start taking Metformin, should I seize it? I just don't know.

Right now, I think my feeling is that I should just stick with the diet, and let that do the work of turning all of these complications around, and then TTC again after I reach my goal weight. And then if, God forbid, I have another MC, I'll try the Metformin route for our fourth (and most likely final, regardless of what happens) attempt. Of course, if it goes that way then I'll end up hating myself for not taking the Metformin right away.

And this is where I get angry and frustrated at how unfair it is that just thinking about trying to get pregnant has to be so confusing and complicated. Bleah.

At any rate, they finally renewed my BCP prescription. I'm going to wait until the next cycle begins to start taking it again, which gives Matt and I a little longer to decide if that's really what we want to do. We had a heart-to-heart about it yesterday, and he's not as sure that I should stay on it as I thought he was. But I'm also not as sure that I'm ready to go off of it as I thought I was. I think probably the wisest thing is to keep taking it until I reach my goal weight, which should also give us some time to stash some money in the bank to cover the inevitable days (or weeks) when I'm too overcome with pregnancy fatigue to get any work done.

All in all, I came home from the exam feeling good about things, and hopeful for the future of my oven. Chalk today up in the WIN column.

365: 17 and The Pill Saga

On my way out to waste a trip to the drug store:

Stats:
Weight - 176 :(
Mood - Just fine until I got there.

I didn't lose any this week, but I can't say I'm surprised. Before I continue with this post, I should probably warn those among you with more delicate sensibilities (i.e., the dudes) that I'm going to discuss icky girly TMI business throughout this post, starting with the next sentence. That said, this week I had my period, so my cravings were off the charts and my will-power was at an all-time low. Twice I caved in and binged on Easter candy and Cheez-its. The food of the gods, indeed. My energy was also really low, and between that and the rain, as already mentioned, I barely worked out all week. All things considered, I'm just glad I managed not to gain.

It's weird, though--I still feel like I lost. Maybe I lost some inches (or probably more like centimeters), if not pounds. Although I suppose it's more likely that I was just carrying excess water weight during my visitation from Aunt Flow and she took it with her when she left.

The birth control saga continues. To back up, I needed to renew my state Family Planning coverage before I got my prescription renewed, which I did last week. But then I kept forgetting about renewing the prescription until Wednesday, when I called the same clinic that did my thyroid test and renewed that prescription for me a few weeks ago. They were actually ready at that time to write me a new BC scrip, and told me I wouldn't need an exam since I had one last year (more like a dozen, actually, between my two pregnancies and losses). So I stupidly assumed that it wouldn't be a big deal for them to renew it over the phone.

I started calling on Wednesday to ask whether I could indeed renew it over the phone, or if they needed me to come in. When I asked the front desk, they transferred me to the nurse, and I got her voice mail. I left a message asking that very question, and waited for her to call back. She didn't. I called the next morning and got a voicemail message saying that I was calling during clinic hours, yet the clinic was closed, and I should leave a message. So I did. And again nobody called back. So I kept calling, and finally got through, and finally got to talk to the actual live nurse, who said she would ask the doctor and then call me back. Which, she didn't, and I wasn't able to get a hold of her again until Friday morning.

At which time she told me the doctor wanted me to come in and have a pap, and that they couldn't get me in until Monday. Except Matt needed to take our only operational car to his campus to take a test on Monday. So we'd have to do it Tuesday, which would cause me to miss two days, which would screw up my cycle and cause me to spot and bleed and cramp all month long. Yay. I pointed that out, and I also asked if, had somebody called me back and answered my question on Wednesday when I first started asking it, they'd have been able to get me in this week, and she said yes, but so sorry, now it will have to be Tuesday.

By this point I was so upset that I hung up without bothering to make the appointment. Then it occurred to me -- and I don't know why I didn't think of it sooner -- that I should try calling the OU Women's clinic, who handled my last pregnancy and MC and wrote me the prescription in the first place. Maybe they'd be willing to just call it in without seeing me first. So I did, and HALLELUJAH, they were! I still had to make an appointment to get a pap, but they said to just have the pharmacy contact them to hook me up with a temporary renewal in the mean time.

Which I did, and I gave them a whole 24 hours to fill it. And of course, when I went to pick it up (without calling first, natch), they were still waiting for a renewal response from the clinic, and of course they won't get one before Monday.

Grumble grumble cuss.

So now, best case scenario, I'll get it filled Monday and will only miss one day, and maybe that won't screw me up too badly, although knowing my body, I'm still sure to have some breakthrough bleeding for the next couple of weeks.

But as much as all of this has been a pain in the rear, the most frustrating thing about it is that I don't want to renew it. I want to stop taking it. Last time I went off of it, it took me eight months to get pregnant, and I feel strongly that if I stop taking it now, my body will finish adjusting to being off it around the same time I get my BMI to a healthy place and get my PCOS under control. The only reason I'm bothering to renew it at all is for Matt, because he's afraid I'm wrong, and that it's too much of a risk that I'd get pregnant immediately, before I've finished Project Oven Repair and before we've managed to get our finances on an upswing.

I know he's right, but that doesn't make it any less frustrating. Which is why I came home from the drug store and crawled into bed and cried for twenty minutes, frustrated that getting this prescription refilled is such a hassle and just pissed off at the entire crappy situation that requires me to keep taking it. And also sad and angry that we're in a place where such a simple decision has to be so fraught with emotion and pain.

But after I cried it all out, and then prayed about it, I feel better. I'm trying to see this as an exercise in patience, and to trust in God's timing and His plan for us. I know it won't do any good for me to try to wrangle the situation by the horns and force it to go my way. I also know that, if we're meant to have a family, God's not going to allow a little thing like disagreement over when to go off the pill keep it from happening. And I know that the longer I give my body to heal and regenerate (within reason, seeing as how I'm not getting any younger), the better my next baby's chances of survival will be.

Oven Progress, Week 3

Let's talk about my diet, aka the most positive thing happening in my life right now. This is the end of the third week of Project Oven Repair, and I think I've lost about six or seven pounds so far. I say I think because I forgot to gauge my "Before" weight when I started. But I seem to be averaging about two pounds a week, which makes sense. Doing the Zone diet alone, you can generally expect to lose about a pound a week, and I've been combining it with regular exercise, so two a week sounds about right.

I've increased my workouts from three or four days a week to five or six days. Three of those days, I combine walking and jogging, and I've increased my jogging intervals to 140 paces (I started out at 100). I plan to keep increasing that by 20 paces every week until I'm jogging the entire distance. The other days, I either just walk the whole way, or I do Pilates or some combination of weights and calisthenics.

Well, that is I plan to do Pilates. But right now my house is so cluttered that the only place I can spread out my mat and do them properly is in my back yard, and I don't fancy having my neighbors watch me doing them. So I keep chickening out. I need to get over it, though, because they're about the most effective thing I've ever done for strengthening and toning.

According to my scale, I've got 15 to 20 more to go before I reach the high end of the healthy BMI range for my height. Of course, my scale usually registers about ten pounds lighter than doctor's office scales, which means it's probably more like 25 to 30. So if I keep on at this rate, I'm probably looking at about four more months before I really start to see a reversal in my insulin resistance and PCOS symptoms.

But in the mean time, I'm feeling better and my clothes are already starting to get baggy. Last year, before I realized that my size was causing so many health and plumbing problems and I decided I was perfectly happy being a size 14, I went through my closet and pulled out all of my "skinny" size 12 and 10 clothes to give to charity. Thankfully, I never got around to dropping them off, so they're still bagged up and sitting in my garage. I'll probably need to dig them out in another month or so.

I've also managed to cut my coffee intake back to two cups before switching over to white or green tea for the rest of the day. I think starting Monday I'll go ahead and try reducing the regular to decaf ratio from half to one quarter, and see how that goes. I'm also weening myself off of ginseng, and I've already cut out all sweets and alcohol, except on special occasions.

My secret weapons are taking my fish oil with my supper, and pistachios. I'd read in one of our many Zone books -- pretty sure it was Toxic Fat -- that taking fish oil with your evening meal will reduce late night carb and sugar (and chocolate) cravings, and I'm hear to tell you that doing this pretty much eliminated those pesky cravings for me. When I do get a craving, it's usually for something salty, and that's where the pistachios come in. They're satisfying and they also take work, so a small handful of them also takes care of the whole needing to occupy my mouth and hands while I watch TV thing. Plus they make a pretty healthy snack in small doses, so I have nothing to feel guilty about.

All in all, this is all helping me feel like I'm doing something for any future oven occupants, to prevent said oven from being a death trap instead of a place to grow life. And I keep telling myself that if I'm wrong about the PCOS and it turns out that all of this does nothing to prevent another miscarriage, at least I'll be healthier and I'll feel better, and that will better equip me to deal with whatever our future holds.

See, this right here is why the ASPCA gets all my support.

This week the Infertility Community has been up in arms, and rightly so, about PETA's latest campaign in which they're having a contest to give away a free vasectomy to a man who has his pets spayed or neutered. What everybody is finding so offensive about it is that they're claiming that this is in honor of the upcoming National Infertility Awareness Week.

Because obviously infertile people want a free vasectomy.

I think I'm way too jaded by PETA's media-hogging shock tactics over the years to be shocked by this. Mostly I'm just flummoxed. How does a vasectomy giveaway support the infertility cause again? The who with the what now?

PETA's response to the backlash is to basically say that human overpopulation is just as bad as animal overpopulation and so nobody should be having babies anyway, but so sorry if that upsets you.

But wait. A couple of years ago they ran that whole Save the Whales campaign -- because if there's anybody more okay to make fun of than the infertile, it's the overweight -- that urged fat people to go vegetarian so they would live longer. So which is it, PETA? Do you want to save the world from overpopulation, or do you just want to save it from unsightly fat? And whatever happened to the days when you were all about saving animals?

So apparently PETA wants us all to be thin and live longer AND stop reproducing.

Well, PETA, I hate to break it to you, but I'm a fattie who's losing weight just so I can have a baby. I'm going to live longer AND reproduce (hopefully x2). I guess I'm just throwing off the whole balance of civilization, aren't I?

38

You guys have no idea how much I wanted to be able to write a positive post today, about this being my new New Year and starting over with a clean slate and looking forward and blah blah blah happy birthday cake.

But instead today I'm full of grief and sadness. One of the first things I did after I got up was to burst into tears in the kitchen, standing there bawling over my coffee while my husband is at the other end of the house, oblivious to my little breakdown. I finally had to log in to blog about it because that was the only way I could get myself to stop crying.

Part of the problem is that, for some reason, Matt decided to get me up at nine. I stayed up till two this morning and was counting on being able to sleep in till at least 10, because it's my birthday. He said he thought I'd want him to get me up because we need to start turning our sleep schedules around so we can start going to church again, but BIRTHDAYS ARE NOT DAYS FOR DOING THAT! I'd have dealt with it better if this wasn't the third or fourth night in a row that I didn't get more than six or seven hours of sleep, but it is, and it's all catching up to me and making me feel really fragile.

And part of it is that it hit me that I didn't get my yearly birthday card signed "Mom, Rob & Bobo," and that I'll never get that card again, and my mom-in-law won't be calling me to wish me happy birthday and make plans to get together to give me my gift. That's actually a big part of it. I miss my in-laws, and their cat, and I hate hate hate that they're all gone, that half of our family just doesn't exist anymore.

Of course, the bulk of it is simply that birthdays are hard when you're over 35 and you're having reproductive problems and you want kids more than anything else in the world. Every day that you're not pregnant you're aware of that clock ticking away, that little whisper that you're running out of time, and birthdays are the stroke of twelve on the clock, the big bong clanging in your ear and screaming that your risk factors just multiplied and your chances of having a healthy baby before time runs out completely just went down a percentage.

I keep reminding myself that my mom had my little sister at 38, and everything was fine. But mom didn't have my history, and she'd already had three healthy children by that point, which keeps that from being as comforting as it could be.

I see birthday messages piling up on Facebook. It's helping me feel cared for and loved, but it's also making me feel bad that I can't say, "Yes, I AM having a happy birthday, thanks!" But maybe it's not too late for that. Writing all of this has already helped me feel a little better. I was going to do some work on my blogging course today, but I think I'm just going to take the day off and read a book or something. I haven't had time to read a book in ages. We've been debating whether to do my birthday sushi night tonight or wait for the weekend, but I think I'll push for tonight. And maybe later I'll take a nap and then work out, and then my outlook will be better, and I can get to that Happy Birthday New Year Clean Slate place. Maybe.

Emma Grace

This ultrasound was taken one year ago yesterday, and it's all we have of our second child (but at least it's something. All we have of the first one are memories). I remember like yesterday how the technician (who was awesome, by the way) told me that she wasn't technically allowed to tell me the results of the ultrasound herself, but that I'd know by the look on her face if she found a heartbeat; the anxious and tentative hope I felt when my baby appeared up there on the screen; and the gutted feeling when she looked over at me and gave me a slight, grim-faced shake of her head. And then she quietly left the room to give my mom and I time to hold each other and cry our hearts out, and came back a while later with this print-out.

It shows a fetus about 7.5 weeks along. Much too early to be able to recognize facial features, and we know that that hint of an eye and nose and cheekbone are tricks of the light and shadow, but that doesn't stop Matt from insisting that she looked like me.

I never told anyone that her name was Emma. Emma Grace. I didn't tell because we had no idea whether "she" was actually a she or a he, and because it was far too early to discuss names, and if she had gone on to be born there would most certainly have been disagreements and compromises made on the naming front.

But in my heart, this was my daughter Emma. Named for my grandma, Erma, which is a variant of Emma and much too old-fashioned and grandmotherish for a baby girl. Middle name Grace, because I knew it was only by the grace of God that she'd actually be born.

If I ever do go on to have a healthy daughter, she'll probably keep Grace as a middle name, if not a first name. But this name, as a whole, belongs to this baby, whose heart apparently gave out at only 7 and a half weeks, uniting little Emma with her namesake in Heaven, unbeknownst to Matt and I, who believed all was well.

I was 9 weeks along when the miscarriage symptoms started, and I had the ultrasound. They sent me for a D&C the very next morning, which was one year ago today. April fools.

My mom and sister went in together for a frame for the ultrasound photo. Mom took me to Hallmark to pick something out to remember Emma by. It was hard, and I broke down quietly in the back of the store, but ultimately I was pleased with my selection. The poem beneath the picture is a Chekov quote that reads:

We shall find Peace.
We shall hear Angels.
We shall see the sky sparkle
like diamonds.

Your mama misses you, Emma.

Project Oven Repair

I spent the better part of Friday afternoon researching natural and homeopathic remedies for PCOS. I made a shopping list of vitamins and minerals and healthy foods and things I would need to get started down this path to a healthier, PCOS-free, me, and then on Saturday I went to Akin's and the grocery store and stocked up on supplements and vegetables and sea food. The sea food's more for my ADD, since I can't really afford the 10 grams per day of purified pharma-grade fish oil I'll need to take to keep it under control.

I guess I should back up and explain why I'm so sure that PCOS is the source of all my baby woes. I've had symptoms for years, but none of my doctors--GPs, OBs, gynecologists, internal medicine specialists--have ever suggested that these symptoms might add up to PCOS.

Until my follow-up appointment at the women's clinic after my D&C, with an OB/GYN I'd never seen before, who looked at my history and my symptoms and asked me, "Have you ever been treated for PCOS?" When I said no, she went on to describe the symptoms, and it felt like a light bulb went on, shining its light on exactly what the problem is.

She wanted to do a hysteroscopy to verify the diagnosis, but we couldn't get it scheduled before my insurance ran out. We DID get my thrombophilia workup done before it ran out, though, and it ruled out any blood-clotting disorders. And since she was almost sure enough to make the diagnosis without the hysteroscopy, and since my symptoms line up with PCOS like dominoes, I'm operating under the assumption that this is what my problem is. And if I'm wrong, it can't really hurt anything, other than giving me a sense of misplaced hope.

For the curious, the skeptical, and those who just like to read TMI, these are my symptoms and co-indicators:

• I'm overweight.
• I have middle-age acne.
• I have hypothyroidism.
• I have mild hirsutism (i.e. unsightly, whisker-like chin, neck and chest hairs; I've always just tweezed them, told myself they were probably normal and then got on with my life, but now I know better).
• My periods have only ever been regular when I'm on BC, and even then there's occasional variance, and they're always, ALWAYS painful.
• I have classic symptoms of insulin resistance (overweight, foggy brain, chronic fatigue and sleepiness, irritability and nausea if my blood sugar gets low, etc.), which is a root cause of PCOS.

Clearly, these aren't factors that tend to make for a healthy pregnancy. Fortunately, most, if not all, of them can be remedied with a healthy lifestyle. So if I want to have a healthy pregnancy that ends in birthing a healthy baby, I'm going to have to become a health nut and completely overhaul my lifestyle.

Here's my plan of attack:

• Stick to the Zone diet, and be strict about it. This means getting most of my carbs from low-glycemic fruits and veggies instead of, y'know, just having some protein with a yummy slice of pumpkin bread and calling that a "Zone-balanced meal."
• Increase my sea-food intake, and take as much pharma-quality fish oil as I can afford on top of that.
• Work out at least 4 times a week.
• Transition from the ADD-focused multi-vitamins I've been taking (e.g. Mega Mind, Higher Mind and/or Mental Edge, all from Source Naturals) to a quality pre-natal multi with high doses of Chromium, Magnesium, Zinc, and B-vitamins.
• Add in a Co-Q10 supplement.
• Ween myself off of caffeine, ginseng and sugar (including all processed and high-glycemic carbs).

There are also some herbal remedies that I'll add to the mix eventually, but it's not a good idea to take those while I'm still on BC. If you're interested, I got most of the supplement and natural remedy info here and here.

Whether or not I actually have PCOS, if I can stick to this plan I'm sure it will probably fix at least 90% of what's wrong with me, including the ADD, low energy and depressive tendencies. Not to mention the insulin resistance and all of the problems that stem from that.

So basically, I just have to start treating myself like I'm diabetic, and all of my hormones and body chemicals and brain chemicals and what-not should fall in line, balance out, and start behaving properly. I guess if my acne clears up and I stop having to tweeze those weird hairs, then I'll know I'm on the right track.

At any rate, this is the one area of my life I actually have control over, and I'm ready to grasp it by the horns and show it who's boss. Hopefully, the success of Project Oven Repair will coincide with the success of Project Make Some Money, Dammit, and then we'll truly be ready for another round of TTC.

Baby, Baby

My birth control prescription runs out of refills after April, and I'm secretly contemplating not renewing it and seeing what happens. Except now it's not so secretly anymore, although I haven't talked to Matt about it yet. I want to make sure I really want to before I bring it up to him, because if he's ready to start trying again, I don't want to get his hopes up only to disappoint him by freaking out and changing my mind. Of course, if it turns out he's NOT ready, then this will all be moot. We have to both be on board with this for it to happen, and it's totally understandable if he needs more time to recover from losing his parents before dealing with another round of baby craziness. Heck, I'm not so sure that I don't need more time to recover.

But I keep thinking: I'm going to be 38. If we wait until conditions are perfect, we might be waiting forever, and we don't have forever. It will be a giant leap of faith, but maybe that's the whole point. Part of me is totally ready to move forward on this and wants to be pregnant again, damn the consequences.

The rest of me remembers how miserable my last pregnancy was--just the fatigue and uncontrolled ADD and not being able to drink coffee or take my energy supplements or my focus vitamins, not being able to work for more than a few hours a day because I just COULD NOT focus on anything for any useful amount of time--just that part was a big challenge, let alone the fear and anxiety, the fist of dread in my stomach every time I went to the bathroom and pulled down my pants, praying I wouldn't see that tell-tale red spotting that told me it was all over. Until I actually saw it, and part of my soul died.

Am I really ready to put myself through that again? Am I a masochist for even thinking any part of that might be a good idea?

Of course, even if I go off of BC at the end of May, it would most likely take several-to-many months to get pregnant (the last time I stopped taking BC it took us 8 months to conceive), so it's doubtful that I'd get pregnant right away, and we'd most likely still have time to adjust to the idea.

But the only way I'm going to do it is if I treat myself like I'm pregnant from day one. That means no ADD supplements, no ginseng, no caffeine, eating a strict PCOS-friendly diet and taking prenatal meds. I'd have to triple-up on fish oil to help mitigate the ADD, and purified fish oil is not inexpensive. I know that if I do this regardless of whether I stop the BC I'll be healthier in the long run, but it will be torture, and I'm not sure I have the will to endure it yet.

So that's where my head's at on the baby front. I'm praying about it, and sometimes I have peace about it, but sometimes the thought of getting pregnant again almost gives me a panic attack. I won't do it unless I have total peace about it. And, of course, if Matt's 100% on board.

***

UPDATE: Well, I had the talk with Matt. I just couldn't stand not talking to him about it anymore, and we were outside enjoying the weather and having a good moment, and it seemed like good timing, so I spilled everything I was thinking. And he's on board emotionally, although he understands if I decide I'm not; but in typical man fashion, he's more concerned that we're not ready financially. Whereas I'm more worried about the emotional impact if things go badly, and have faith that we can make the finances work if things go well.

Of course he has a point. He's been wanting to start doing part-time freelance photography, but first we need to get a better camera, and he needs to take some classes. He'd like to get that off of the ground before I become pregnant again, so I'll be able to cut back on my hours.

So right now we've agreed to both keep praying about it, and to keep talking about it, and to wait and see where our finances stand when my prescription runs out before deciding whether or not to renew it. And there you have it.