Inside My Brain.

Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God.

Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!! Grow, Spirit Baby, grow!!

Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God.

What if…No! Hope! What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope! What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!What if…No! Hope!

Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God. Please God.

Where The Hell Is The Damn Cabin In The Woods?

When we first started trying to have a baby, I did some reading about the spiritual connection between father, mother, and child. I came across the book Spirit Babies and was instantly caught up in the narrative of the author. Makichen explains his experience communicating with souls/spirits/ghosts from an early age, and then he breaks to his discovery of Spirit Babies.

Upon vacationing in a cabin in the redwoods of California, Makichen became aware of a confluence of Spirit Babies. So much so that he couldn’t ignore their presence. When it came time for him to depart, he learned from the innkeeper that this particular set of cabins within the redwoods was notorious for begetting pregnancies. The author could only surmise that this was due to the fact that it was a natural meeting spot for Spirit Babies.

Who wouldn’t want to congregate here?

I’ve held this nugget of information in the back of my head for well on two years, now. I’ve pretended as if it was my ace in the hole. If worst came to worst, Big Guy and I could find that damn cabin in the redwoods. I went so far as to email the author, and I spent countless hours googling for that damn cabin in the redwoods. As luck would have it, I realized that I would be ovulating during our Northern California road trip, but I couldn’t track down any information on that damn cabin.

We slept amongst the redwoods, we communed with the redwoods, we hiked and traipsed amongst the redwoods, and we even hugged the redwoods. I never did find the location of the Spirit Babies cabin, but I think we hit almost every grove from Sonoma County to Humboldt County. I called for that damn Spirit Baby at every opportunity. If our Spirit Baby is in Northern California, the odds are good that we got close. Perhaps this will make it easier for our Spirit Baby to find its way back to us.

One can only hope.

Oh, Progesterone! You Trickster, You!

It is remarkable how much progesterone suppositories mimic early pregnancy symptoms. I carefully guard my heart by keeping a stern grip on my hope. Hope is seductive and dangerous.  Too much hope results in cycles of devastation and despair. Too little hope robs one of joy and…well…hope.  As one commentor once said, If we don’t have hope, why are we doing this?

So, I like to walk the tightrope between pragmatism and hope, but these suppositories are making me keel starboard onto the side of hope.  I don’t like it.  Early pregnancy symptoms are a pain in the ass. No one likes a racing heart and hypoglycemia. At 8 DPO it would be way to early to begin feeling these sensations as a result of a pregnancy.  That’s the pragmatic voice speaking up.  However, the voice of hope started whispering incessantly in my ear to POAS early this morning.  ”Do it! Do it! Do it!”, was the chant echoing through the empty vaults of my unused brain.

The chanting was so persuasive, despite my pragmatic self reciting a litany of reasons as to why the test would be negative, but I became hopeful.  ”What if? What if? What if?”, she screamed. The cacophony was so loud that I could not be dissuaded. So I tested with diluted mid-afternoon urine at 8 DPO. Of course it was negative.

I’m hoping to steer clear of hope’s siren song by not testing again until Friday at 10 DPO with FMU. Wish me luck.

Hope.

Hope is such a seductive and intoxicating thing. Prior to Lucky Cycle #10, I had lost all hope.  I was convinced I was in it for the long haul.  The Cyster forever relegated to the barren and infertile side of the chasm.   Which, I might add, is a bit dramatic given that twelve months of ttc as a women with PCOS isn’t that bad.  See Lucky.

This week I’ve been experiencing some strange patterns in my BBT chart.  After almost 18 months of charting, I’ve begun to think I’m really good at it.  My temps dropped just three days ago, after my fair share of hot flashes and night sweats.  This is a standard BBT presentation post-D&C.  Fantastic, I thought, I’m on my way.  I did a cleanse, my hormones are regulating, I’m going to ovulate in a short period of time – say 4 weeks from now. This morning? My temperature spiked.  This was coupled with two days worth of EWCM.  WTF is with the EWCM?!

Big Guy and I happened to have sex at the right time.  Good sex – not the “I think I’m ovulating and I think we should get this done, even though you just worked a fourteen hour day” type of sex. Sex that is a reminder that we are in love with each, appreciate each other, and want to be intimate with each other.  The type of sex that had begun to fade to a distant memory with the perfunctory, mandated, timed intercourse.

This EWCM combined with the positive and loving sex makes me hopeful.  No matter how hard I try to tramp it down, ignore it, shift it to the edge of my consciousness, the hope exists.  In fact, it isn’t just seductive and intoxicating, hope is dangerous.  If you are devoid of hope the pain, the disappointment, the drudgery, none of it is a surprise.  As a result, it ceases to be as painful.  The peaks aren’t that high and the lows aren’t that low, because the expectations just don’t exist.

But, today, I’m hopeful, and that scares the shit out of me.  Hope and I are strange bedfellows.  It is not my natural inclination, and, given my past experience with inevitable ttc let-downs, I am not welcoming the hope with open arms.  I am wary and cautious, guarding my heart carefully.

I’m sure that the temperature spike was an anomaly.  I’m sure that I did not ovulate.  I’m sure that, even if I did, I will not get pregnant.

But, what if?

Go away, Hope.

 

Lucky Cycle #10

After 13 months and ten cycles, Big Guy and I managed to conceive.  That was super fun.  I like to analyze this in different ways.

1) After 13 months, nevermind the multiple infertility diagnoses, we definitely fit the bill for an infertile couple.  On average, 90% of couples will conceive within the first 12 months.  We exceeded that window.

2) Technically, I only cycled 10 times in 13 months, so we still fell below the 12 month window.  This is based upon the assumption that the data is weighted heavily by women with cycles within the “normal” range.  I have a hunch that these statistics would look a  bit different if the time frame wasn’t in months, but individual cycles.  For example, one would say that 90% of women conceive after 12 ovulatory cycles (instead of within 12 months time).

3) I started the Metformin in May and Lucky Cycle #10 was actually my 7th cycle on the Met.  I think it is important to consider this because a regular, cyclical, ovulatory pattern is good for a nice hormonal balance and healthy, happy eggs.  Nevermind the ability to do the deed at the right time.

4) My right tube was blocked with mucus.   It wasn’t cleared until December of 2011.  Therefore, assuming alternating ovulating ovaries, the cycle count in 1-3 is cut in half.  Not too shabby, not too shabby at all.

Why does this really matter?

It doesn’t.  In fact, my therapist of old would encourage me to stop analyzing and process my emotions.  However, this is related to my emotions! I promise!

See, I like scenario #3.  Seven cycles to conception isn’t so bad.  Let’s ignore the three wonky, weird, pre-Met cycles where our intercourse was haphazardly timed, at best. (But let’s also give a shout out to those of you on Fertility Friend with a chart that looks like this:

You know who you are.  Kudos, ladies, kudos.)

Also, let’s not put a time frame on it.  My cycles don’t conform to a monthly schedule, so I don’t want to be timed by the calendar year.  I cycle every 32-35 days on the Met.  This is really good! Thirteen months be damned!  I like to think we conceived after 7 cycles.

Here’s my prediction hope:  We will conceive again within the next six cycles.

So, this post isn’t about analyzing and thinking, but really about hope!