Buried in Paper

I never want to see another official form again. Between the school and my certification program, I feel like I've spent the last two days doing nothing but paperwork. Sign here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here. I still need to get fingerprinted and do some (guess!) paperwork at the district office, and hopefully after that I'll be done for awhile.

Jasper seems to be holding up very well to my new schedule. He's never spent this much time in his crate before, but he doesn't seem to be overly anxious when I let him out after I get home, and he goes in willingly every morning. Given how well he's doing with the cats, I'd like to leave him out of the crate during the day, but I'm anxious about Arcadia escaping through the doggy door. So until we solve that problem, he's crate-bound on weekdays.

And with that, I'm going to leave you with the most beautiful thing I've seen in weeks--tonight's sunset over New Mexico.

Mrs. Who?

In short, my first day went great. I'm observing my classes until the end of the week, and will take over full-time on Monday. I spent the day torn between sheer terror and ecstatic joy, and overall I think I'll do okay at this teaching thing. The weirdest thing is that everyone calls me Mrs. M. It makes me feel 102, but I'll get used to it.

Not much else to report right now. With all the job hubub that's happened over the last 48 hours, I haven't had a chance to move forward with scheduling my RE appointment, and oddly enough I'm okay with that. There are only so many major changes/life events I can take at one time.

Breaking News of the HOLY SHIT Variety

Remember how I was so certain that I didn't get that teaching job? And how depressed I was about it? Well, I GOT THE JOB! The district called just before noon to tell me the news, and to tell me that A: I needed to hightail it down to their offices to fill out paperwork and sign my contract ASAP, and B: my first day is tomorrow. TOMORROW.

Somebody hold me.

I still don't know exactly what they're expecting me to do tomorrow. I can't imagine that they'd put me in front of a class since I don't even know what books the kids are reading yet, but suffice it to say, I'm freaking the hell out right now. In an ecstatic way, of course, since I want this job more than words can say, but still freaking the hell out.

Because of this, I know there are a few things I'm going to have to change about this blog. Obviously I can't blog about work, and I really can't have any of my students finding it. I don't know yet what exactly I'm going to do, but suffice it to say that there will be changes. Thank you all so much for your support, and rest assured that I will keep blogging.

Breakthrough?

While Jasper and I were in Utah last week, Codi and Arcadia spent a ton of time downstairs with J. This was notable because after we adopted Jasper in July, neither of the cats has hung out with us downstairs much. Codi comes down occasionally to play with Jasper, but Arcadia never shows her face unless it's late at night and she wants to urge us towards bed (where she gets to be the center of attention). With the dog gone, though, both cats re-established the main floor as their territory.

You can imagine my surprise, then, when Arcadia kept coming downstairs after Jasper and I returned home. It was like having a whole new cat. Something clicked in her brain, and she finally seemed to realize that A: Jasper's not that scary and B: she can totally mess with his mind and bend him to her will. Even though it's a little evil (right now her favorite hobby is standing on the coffee table and swatting at his head) we're encouraging it because we know how much happier she'll be if she just gets over her fear of being anywhere near the dog.

Well, this afternoon we seem to have made another breakthrough. I was outside doing some yardwork, and when I came back in, I saw this:



Not only was Arcadia in the same room as Jasper, but she was trying to socialize with him! Success!

I imagine that we'll take a few more steps forward and back with these two over the next few weeks, but I really do think that we've turned a corner here.

Thoughts on Anger

I think anyone who's been diagnosed with infertility has a good working relationship with anger. We're angry this happened to us. Angry that our bodies don't work the way they're supposed to. Angry that what comes so easily for completely horrible, abusive, and generally undeserving people is so hard for us. We get anger.

Back before our diagnosis, I thought I was managing my anger pretty well. Infertility made me sad, it made me frustrated, and it made me scared, but it rarely made me angry. Our assumption was that there was something chemically wrong with my body. That hormones (or a lack thereof) were causing my spotting, which was the root cause of our infertility. I was okay with that. I'd made a kind of peace with the knowledge that there was just something inherently wrong with my body. Then we found out that we were wrong. Yes, I do appear to have a luteal phase defect, but that wasn't why we weren't getting pregnant.

When I first heard what my doctor found during the lap, I wanted to cry tears of joy. If I hadn't still been coming out of anaesthesia, I probably would have. I was elated--it felt like the huge weight of "undiagnosed" had been lifted from my shoulders and that everything would be okay from here on out. What I didn't know then, and what I've been learning for the last three weeks, is that having a diagnosis comes with its own set of emotional baggage.

I found out that three years ago I had Pelvic Inflammatory Disease. I don't know if I've been that specific here before. I know that I've written "infection" but I don't think I've come out and said PID. There's a stigma associated with STDs that I wanted to avoid. I can't. It happened. Just a week after my wedding, I came down with an infection that permanantly impacted my ability to have children. Life is cruel that way.

Which brings me back to anger. Every day I struggle not to let anger take over. I'm angry that I got such a pointless, stupid disease. Angry that it happened to me of all people. Angry at the knowledge that this was preventable. That I didn't have to go through it. Angry that it was something I did.

I know that anger at this point is, well, pointless. Why waste energy being angry over something I can't change? Over something that I didn't intentionally cause? And yet, knowing and doing are very different things. The more I try to rationalize away the anger, the more it seems to bother me. It comes out in odd ways. A random comment by a (fertile) acquaintance about things she did before getting pregnant has me seething. Seeing article after article about pregnant celebrities (especially Anna Nicole Smith, who seems like the last person in the world who would be a good mother) makes my blood boil. Why me instead of them? Why did this happen to me?

So, I'm angry. I can only hope that it goes away as I come to terms with everything I've learned in the last month. We're heading to the RE. My OB/GYN wants us to wait, J would prefer to wait, but my gut is telling me that would be a mistake. Getting aggresive might not make the anger go away, but I think it's the right thing to do.

Cycle 19

Well, I'm done. It's official. For a few hours there this morning I hoped that I was pregnant (and sent a few panicked e-mails to friends about how I was worried that my monitor had miscalculated my ovulation date thereby causing me to totally screw up my cycle by starting the progesterone too early) but I'm definitely not.

I'd be lying if I said that I wasn't more crushed by seeing that one, lonely line on the test this morning than I have been in a long time. Even though I know the odds of a normal, fertile couple conceiving during any given month are just 15-20% (and we're not exactly a normal, fertile couple, in spite of the surgery) I had hope. Probably too much hope.

I know where I want to go from here. J doesn't agree. My doctor doesn't agree. I'm not sure what we're going to do.

Heh--Cheering Me Up

Dawn linked to this a couple of days ago, and now I've created my own. Piss me off, and I'll put you On Notice!



1) Scar Tissue--I don't really need to explain why scar tissue is number one on the list, do I? HAAAAAAATE scar tissue with the power of a thousand suns.

2) Centipedes--This one would have been lower except that they're starting to take over my yard and one came thisclose to biting Jasper yesterday. Very scary for both of us!

3) Unemployment--No phone call from the district today, and at this point I've accepted that I didn't get the job. I'm pretty sad about it.

4) Scorpions--They're back, and they brought babies. The baby thing alone shot them to the top 5--why can scoprions reproduce when I can't? We're only finding them in the garage right now, but I'm still terrified that the cats are going to find one and get stung.

5) Idiot Drivers--What is with drivers here? If they're not running red lights, they're completely ignoring right of way rules or driving WAY too fast in parking lots and school zones. I swear, they're even worse than the drivers in the DC area, and that's really saying something.

6) The CW --What the hell, people? You switched over three freaking weeks ago! Why aren't you showing Gilmore Girls or America's Next Top Model? I need my guilty pleasure TV! Shape up or I'll move you to the top of the list.

7) Dog Poop--Jasper still thinks that it's okay to poop in the house once or twice a week. I'm getting very sick of cleaning it up.

8) The Weeds in My Front Yard--Weeds are seriously taking over our yard, and nothing is helping. I spent hours weeding yesterday and today and there are still more to pull. There are ALWAYS more to pull.

BFN

I'm really struggling this morning. No news from the district (and at this point I'm assuming that I didn't get the job) and a negative HPT are combining to make this into one of the crappiest weeks in recent memory.

I honestly don't know exactly what to do now. I called my temp agency again to request work this morning, and they seemed optimistic that they would be able to find me a full-time admin position shortly. It's not teaching, though, and this late in the school year I'll be lucky if another position opens up. As for the pregnancy thing... well, it sucks. I'm sad and frustrated and very, very angry that this is happening to us.

Last week at my post-op appointment my doctor was very frank with me. He said that mine was one of the worst cases of scarring he's ever seen, and at least some of it will grow back. There's no way to tell where that would happen, though, or how long the regrowth process will take. One thing was clear, though, I cannot get pregnant if my tubes are blocked from my ovaries. If I'm not pregnant in six months he'll do another HSG and a lap to see what things look like. If it's grown back, though, he won't remove it again. Scarring that pernicious is just going to keep getting worse and worse. If we get to that point, IVF is our only option.

I know I shouldn't jump to the worst case scenario yet, but how can I avoid thinking about it when I know that we have a very small window in which to get pregnant, and with every month that passes, the window is closing? How do you just put something like that out of your mind?

No news

My phone hasn't rung once since I got two wrong numbers this morning. I don't know what this means. I know that the school was going to make their decision yesterday, but that the district would actually make the call to the candidate they selected. Is there paperwork to process before making that call? Is HR just really busy right now? I don't know. What I do know is that I have a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that they didn't choose me. That the other candidate got a call today, and I have to start the job search all over again.

I've decided not to call the school until tomorrow or maybe Thursday if I haven't heard anything, but at this point I don't have a lot of hope left.

Drained

The second interview went well. I'm one of two candidates for the position, and they're making their decision today, so I should know one way or another in the next 24-48 hours. I should also find out if this first post-lap cycle worked in the next couple of days, so you can probably imagine that my anxiety is through the roof at the moment. With all that's happened lately, I just feel drained. Emotionally, psychologically, and physically.

I know I shouldn't be thinking this way, but what if I don't get the job and I'm not pregnant? I could handle getting just one, and the idea of getting both both excites and terrifies me, but what if neither happens? Where do I go from there?

I am so not cut out for travel with pets

Jasper and I flew home from Salt Lake this evening, and Oh.My.God was I ever a wreck. See, Jasper is just a little too big to fit in a carrier that I can bring in the cabin with me, so he had to fly in the baggage area. That meant that I had to fill out umpteen forms with my name, address, and phone number just in case they lost him (but don't worry Ma'am, that hardly ever happens!) and then had to leave him with the baggage screeners after they patted him down for...something. Drugs, maybe? In case I'd taped them to his body? I really don't know why they had to pat him down.

Regardless, I was a basket case from the second I put him back in his crate and handed him over to the airline in Salt Lake to the second before a baggage handler brought him out to me when we landed. I read one and a half pages of my book during the 90 minute flight, and spent the rest of the time staring into space and obsessing over whether or not he was scared or cold or feeling abandoned. It was horrible.

Naturally, Jasper is acting like he's already forgotten the whole ordeal. As soon as we got home, he waltzed out of his crate and hopped on the couch just like it had been a regular day. I'm glad that he's not too traumatized by the airplane experience, but I sure am. No more flying with pets. Not for a long, long time at least.

In other news, it's T-minus 12 hours until my next interview with the school, and I'm getting very excited. This could be the start of a very, very big week!

Second Interview

I made it to Utah, and just had to pop on for a minute to share some exciting news. I got a call from the school I interviewed with last Monday--they want to see me again this coming Monday!!! That means I didn't totally blow it in my last interview, and that they're seriously considering me for the position!

Once again, any and all job dust would be much appreciated!

New E-mail

It's come to my attention (thanks Statcounter) that this site has been linked at at least one baby-TTC-fertility site, and I realized that my visitors don't have any way to get ahold of me if they want to chat about infertility or my experiences. This is also now linked in my profile, but I can be reached at thissortafairytale@yahoo.com. Please feel free to e-mail me anytime, though with my trip coming up tomorrow I'll be out of touch until this weekend/early next week.

Thanks for the link, whoever added it.

Job Dust Much Appreciated!

Well, the interview went pretty well. I met with the principal, vice principal, English department head, and another English teacher. I know I did well on nine out of the ten questions they asked (though I was really nervous at first and my hands were shaking) but kind of bombed the tenth. It was about lesson planning, and in spite of all the prep I did over the weekend, I could only think of lessons I'd done with younger kids back in college.

Ick. Even now I'm kicking myself over that.

Oh well, who knows what the other candidates did or said. Maybe they all bombed even worse than I did. I forgot to ask when I'll find out about the position, but if I don't hear anything by next Monday, I'll call them.

Job Dust Please

I have an interview at 10:30 tomorrow morning at a high school for an English position. I'm sooooooooooo nervous it's not funny, and after spending all weekend preparing, I feel completely inadequate and ignorant about what teachers actually do in terms of lesson plans, curriculum development, and standardized tests. I want this job so badly I can taste it, and have a sneaking suspicion that I'm going to be laughed out of the interview.

In other words, this is a shameless attempt for any and all positive thoughts you can send my way.

Wish me luck!

For this photo, he smiles

J got his new car today--he's a very happy guy tonight!

Like a double punch to the gut

As if the NBC story last week wasn't bad enough, this story ran today in the Washington Post.

Now, I don't have any experience with PGD. I've never done IVF, and if we do ever do it, there are no indications that we would need to use this procedure to screen for chromosomal abnormalities. Still, it doesn't take first-hand experience to know that this article embodies everything that's wrong with how the media handles infertility and fertility treatments.

The Stirrup Queen has written an excellent analysis of the article, and I'd encourage all of my readers to go read it.

For anyone who thinks that being a stay-at-home-something isn't chock full of excitement

Exhibit A (from my backyard):



That's my spade, that's my hand, and THAT is the gi-normous MILLIPEDE that I almost stepped on. So, um, yeah. I'm never going outside again.

All Better

Well, I feel almost completely back to normal now. My follow-up appointment with the doctor isn't until next Wednesday, but we sort of already know what he's going to say. The scar tissue is gone for now, but chances are that at least some of it is going to grow back within the next 4-5 months. That means that the cycles from now until Christmas may be our best (or only) chance to get pregnant without intervention.

Naturally, I'm itching to book an RE appointment now just so we have an IUI in the works for a couple cycles down the road in case we don't get pregnant by ourselves before then. Juan wants to wait. We'll see what my current doctor recommends and make our decision from there.

Overall though, I've got a lot of hope that we won't need any further medical help. It's a pretty great feeling.

Shut Up, NBC

I've written before about how frustrating being young and infertile can be. Doctors, fellow infertiles, and the general public seem very quick to dismiss fertility concerns in someone my age because I'm under 30. I have plenty of time to get pregnant before hitting menopause, so why am I so worried?

Given this, you can imagine how incensed I am by this report on NBC Nightly News. Go on, read it. I'll wait.

Apparently women in my generation are jumping into the fertility treatments game just because we want to be pregnant RIGHT NOW. We're alarmists who don't care that procedures like IVF cost tens of thousands of dollars. Reading between the lines, we're spoiled, impatient brats who just need to chill out. Maybe we should take a vacation or just get drunk and have sex with our husbands one night!

Gah. Aside from the fact that this article is demeaning to any twenty-something woman who has a legitimate fertility concern (which, hello, the woman in this story DOES IN FACT HAVE in spite of the fact that her anovulatory cycles are buried at the very end of the segment) it completely misses the fucking point. Do doctors bear absolutely no responsibility for "unnecessary" fertility treatments? Isn't it the job of the medical professional in these situations to be the voice of reason if a patient is jumping the infertility gun too soon? What kind of ethical doctor would perform IVF on a couple who doesn't need it?

Here's the thing--yes, I do think that there are a lot of women who get worried about infertility long before they should. I have no doubt that some of them seek out fertility treatments before they're appropriate. However, the burden is on the doctors in these situations to educate these couples about why they don't need ART yet. The doctor is the one who has the experience and expertise to know when fertility treatments are and aren't appropriate. If NBC's "one in four" women (and let me tell you, I'll believe that statistic when RESOLVE backs it up) my age are inappropriately seeking infertility treatments, where are the doctors who are performing these procedures? Why aren't they being accused of acting prematurely? Why don't they have a single interview with a patient who didn't need IVF or with the doctor who performed the procedure? I'll tell you why--blaming the young, scared couple who have understably bought into the millions of dollars worth of advertising hype that reproductive endocrinology clinics and fertility centers pay for every year is easier. It's more convenient. Blame the kids who have too much money and not enough patience.

I'm writing a letter to NBC. There is absolutely a story here, but it's not the one they've chosen to report.

***EDITED TO ADD*** So, I wrote an e-mail to the reporter who wrote this story, and she responded very quickly. I won't copy and paste the e-mail, but in a nutshell, she agreed that there's a story to be told about the doctors who are performing these unnecessary fertility treatments. Soooo... Okay then. I'm still not happy about tonight's story, but I'm encouraged that the person who was responsible for reporting it is willing to take constructive criticism and might be interested in doing a follow-up piece.

Some thoughts on where we go from here

Well, here we are. Scar tissue is gone. Spotting problem is solved. All of the pieces in our infertility puzzle seem to be coming together really quickly. To be honest, I'm still pinching myself occasionally. I still have trouble believing that I no longer have unexplained infertility. Still have trouble processing the fact that we're essentially starting this cycle with a blank slate. The last 17 cycles don't really count anymore because we know that my eggs weren't even reaching the fallopian tubes so there wasn't even a snowball's chance in hell of getting pregnant.

I'd be lying if I said that this hasn't thrown me for a bit of a loop.

Obviously, we're not going to go to the RE next month. Sure, we could spend money on IUIs, but why? Why go through more painful (and pricey) medical procedures when they're not needed? It doesn't make any sense.

For now we're going to keep trying and assume that our fertility problems have been solved. I'm not ready to declare myself fertile, but I'm not sure about whether or not I can (or should) identify myself as infertile anymore. It's an issue I'm going to have to do a lot of thinking about over the next few weeks and months. Where do I go from here emotionally? How do I reconcile the hell of the last year and a half with the sudden (and honestly unexpected) news that my infertility is probably cured? I really don't know.

One day past surgery, feeling pretty good

After I posted last night, J helped me up to bed where I promptly fell asleep for almost 12 hours. It was seriously the best night's sleep I've had in months. Today has been spent mostly sitting on the couch in my PJs while my mom pampers me. She leaves for home tomorrow morning, though, and I know that I'll really miss having her around.

Physically, I feel pretty good, but I'm still very sore and a little afraid to take off my bandages tonight. I've never seen stitches on my own skin before! I can walk and bend over with very little pain, though, so I've got high hopes that I should be able to drive and do light housework before too long. From everything I've read, I should start feeling more like myself by the end of the week and be completely back to my old activity level in two weeks.

I've also received a TON of e-mails and well-wishes from friends over the last 24 hours, and I wanted to say a public THANK YOU to everyone who's reached out to me. You have no idea what it's meant to receive congratulatory e-mail after e-mail about the results of the surgery. I don't know how I would have made it through the last 17 months without all of you, and I do know that I wouldn't be feeling this great about the events of the last 24 hours if I hadn't received such an outpouring of support. Thank you, thank you, thank you!

Explained

The lap went well. Really well. When they got inside, they found an enormous mass of scar tissue left over from an infection I had (and was hospitalized for) three years ago. Instead of a 25 minute procedure, it took my doctor over two hours to remove everything. He suspected that there could be some scarring when we first discussed the surgery, but from what J has told me about the report he and my mom got after the surgery was over, even the doctor was suprised at how much scarring there actually was.

When I was wheeled into recovery, still mostly asleep, I heard the doctor tell me that he had found "a ton" of scar tissue, removed it, and that we shouldn't have any problem getting pregnant now. Even though I was almost completely gorked out, I almost started crying. Now that I'm home and more awake, I still have to resist the urge to repeatedly ask Juan or my mom again if I'm just imagining this wonderful news. After pretty much resigning myself to being "unexplained", finding out that this was probably our biggest problem all along feels incredibly surreal.

I'll be recovering from the surgery for the next couple of weeks. We may or may not have to take this cycle off, depending on how I'm feeling. We'll obviously need to work up a completely new game plan for when (or if) I should make an appointment with the local RE. Since the scar tissue almost certainly prevented my eggs from even reaching my fallopian tubes during the last 17 cycles, we're effectively beginning again with a clean slate. Under the circumstances, I think it's unlikely that we'll attempt IUI or any other fertility treatment plan until we've tried on our own for at least a few months.

It's been an incredibly long day and I'm exhausted so I'll wrap this up now, but I just needed to share how well everything went today. While not finding anything would have been fine, knowing that there's an identifiable reason why we haven't gotten pregnant yet has lifted a huge weight off my shoulders.

In Memory

Today is the fifth anniversary of September 11. Other bloggers will be writing far more eloquently than I can about what this day means, what happened to them on September 11, 2001, and where our country is heading. All I can say is that I'm thinking about those who lost their lives and their families today.

Lap tomorrow

I have to be at the hospital at 6:00 in the morning (blech) but it's anyone's guess as to when surgery will start since I'm the second procedure of the day. If everything looks good, it should only take the surgeon 20-25 minutes to finish everything. If there are problems, it could take a lot longer. I'm really not sure exactly what I'm hoping for, so for now I'm just going to wait and see what my doctor finds.

Cycle 17

Well, I tested. Negative. I expect to start cycle 18 later today or tomorrow.

I'm suprised at how not-upset I am about this. Sure, I'm disappointed, but I'm not heartbroken. This was a good cycle. This was the cycle when we learned that my spotting is a progesterone problem, in spite of the blood tests that have continued to come back normal. I don't understand how that's possible, but the progesterone suppositories completely stopped the spotting. This has given me more hope for the future than I've had in a long time.

As I've said many times, my fear all along has been that we would stay undiagnosed. That they wouldn't be able to find out what was causing the spotting, and that it would undermine any treatment we attempted. Now that I know that we can stop the spotting with something as simple as progesterone, I feel like we have a shot at actually getting pregnant with an IUI or IVF.

Tomorrow I go in for my pre-op appointment for Monday's laproscopy/hysteroscopy. That's our last diagnostic test in the military system. Once it's over, we're going to start seeing a civilian RE again. Assuming that it takes 4-5 weeks to get my first appointment like it did last time, we could be doing our first IUI cycle as early as October. October!

Suffice it to say that in spite of the negative test, I'm in a pretty good place right now.

It's my blog and I'll cry if I want to

I'm having a bad day. Sort of a bad week, actually. It seems like everywhere I turn, something is bothering me, and I don't know what to do about it. Some things I just have to let slide--they're out of my control anyway. Other things I *should* forget about, since trying to resolve them would probably just make things ten times worse. Nothing has a clear-cut solution, and I'm tired of feeling so conflicted.

So, for the record, I'm having a pity party tonight. Juan is on call, I'm alone with the pets, and I think I'll order a pizza and gorge on the delicious pumpkin chocolate chip cookies I made yesterday. Drowing myself in calories won't fix anything, but it'll make me feel better just for a little while.

Okay, who are you and what did you do with my pets?

This is what's been happening in our house over the weekend. Codi and Jasper, playing together. All day long. No hissing (well, very little hissing) or growling, or anything. They LOVE each other! I really couldn't believe my eyes the first time I saw them like this, and frankly I'm still not entirely sure that this isn't all just a wonderful dream. For now, though, I'm just going to sit back and enjoy this amazing turn of events.

In other news, the ogersterone-pay is orking-way. Shhhh--don't tell anyone or you'll jinx it. I'm going to be a good girl and not test until Wednesday.

Oooh, book meme!!!

I've been tagged by the lovely and talented Megan, whose blog I read religiously (all those hits definitely aren't just from Juan!) for this fun literature meme.

You're stuck inside Farenheight 451, which book do you want to be?

This is a toughie, mostly because I don't think that I've read Farenheight 451 since junior high. I like Megan's answer about being one of the first books on the fire, so I'll steal it and move on to the next question.

Have you ever had a crush on a fictional character?

Oh yes. Yes, yes yes. Mr. Darcy from Pride and Prejudice (and, if I'm being completely honest, from Bridget Jones' Diary too) is one of my all-time favorite literature crushes.

The last book you bought was

The First Days of School by Harry K. Wong because it was recommended by a woman in my Curriculum Development class as a must-read for a new teacher.

The last book you read is

I'm in a trashy fiction phase, so the last book I read was Holding the Dream by Nora Roberts. It was a brainless read, and I loved it. Some English teacher I'll make, huh?

What are you currently reading?

I'm between books at the moment, but the next fun one on my list is Washingtonienne by Jessica Cutler.

Five books you would take to a deserted island

1) The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver because every time I read this book I get something new out of it.
2) David Copperfield by Charles Dickens because it's LONG and one of my all-time favorites.
3) The Eyre Affair by Jasper Fforde because it's just so funny and bizarre.
4) Truman by David McCullough because again, it's LONG and it took almost a year for me to read it the first time, plus it's an excellent biography.
5) Postsecret by Frank Warren because after all those thick, heavy books, a funny and thought-provoking coffee table book is exactly what I'd need.

Who are you going to pass the stick to, and why?

I'm going to tag two of my favorite readers--Kathleen and Kyt because they both love to read and have really interesting opinions about books we've read.

More on Bad Things Happening When C Cooks

Clearly everyone loves a good C-sucks-in-the-kitchen story (I know I sure do!) so here's my first, and probably most infamous, cooking disaster story.

It was 1993, and I was on my first babysitting job ever. I'd just taken the big babysitter certification class at St. Mark's hospital and I got a call from the mom of one of my sister's friends, asking if I could sit while she and her husband went out for an evening. Could I? YES!!! I was so stoked. I must have re-read every single Babysitters Club book I owned (and at that point I think I owned them all) in anticipation of my first real babysitting gig. What activities would I do with the kids? How would I spend my first paycheck? What would I WEAR?

You could say that I was very, very prepared for every contingency I could think of by the time the big day rolled around. I got the full tour of the house (even though I'd been there before) a list of emergency contact numbers, and instructions for how to finish up a project the mom had started with the kids earlier that evening. The project was making homemade potato chips, which was something I'd never done before. My dad left, the parents left, and suddenly I was alone. With the kids. The kids who I was now in charge of. For two or more hours.

I tried not to let them know how much I was panicking right then, and instead suggested that we finish making the potato chips so we could eat them while watching a video. Basically, the recipe called for slicing up thin pieces of potato (which the mom had already done), adding some seasonings, and nuking the chips until they were crispy. This should have been a piece of cake.

Emphasis on the should.

We had made maybe 2 or 3 plates of chips before things went wrong. First I noticed a slightly acrid odor in the air. I remember thinking that the chips we were making were probabaly burning, so I turned off the microwave and pulled out the plate. Even though they'd been in there for over 2 minutes, the chips were still cold and soggy. Now, please remember that I was 12 years old and not exactly a master of deductive reasoning. Adult C would have seen that there was something wrong with the microwave since it hadn't done a thing to these chips after 2 minutes. Teenybopper C just thought "Huh, that's weird," and put the plate back in the microwave. Teenybopper C made the wrong decision.

Maybe a minute after I put the chips back in, thick, black smoke started POURING out of the microwave. I flipped, and told the kids to get outside. The girl didn't listen (this would become a chronic problem during later babysitting adventures at their house) and grabbed a dishtowel to fan the smoke away from the smoke alarm, which had activated. I grabbed the little boy and the cordless phone, ran outside, and called my dad to tell him that he needed to get there RIGHT NOW BECAUSE THE HOUSE WAS GOING TO BURN DOWN AND IT WAS ALL MY FAULT! Then I grabbed the girl and made her and her brother sit outside with me while we waited for my dad.

To this day, I don't know why none of the neighbors came out to see what was happening. The smoke alarm was going off right next to the open door, everyone on the street knew everyone else, and people should have been home at that hour. Who knows. Anyway, my parents just lived a block away, so my dad got there in under 3 minutes, and somehow got the smoke to stop coming out. He probably just did something smart like unplugging the microwave.

I don't remember if we got ahold of the parents right away or not. I think not, since this was in the days before cell phones and they were probably at a movie. I do remember being really scared to tell them what happened when they got home. Fortunately they were understanding, and gave me an extra-big tip for handling things so well. I remember the girl got grounded for not listening to me when I told her to get out of the house.

In any case, I thought that I was done with babysitting for good after that. None of the members of the Babysitters Club had ever started a fire in their client's microwave and had to call their dad to come put it out. There wasn't a section of my Babysitter's Handbook (courtesy of my certification class) that dealt with explaining to parents why their house smelled like icky smoke when they came home.

I think my negative feelings about babysitting lasted a week or two. Then the family called again (they had bought a new microwave) and wanted me to sit for a few hours again. I said okay, and that was the time the little boy almost hung himself with the venetian blinds. I'm tired now, though (and craving some potato chips) so that will have to be a story for another day.

Ways to make sure your husband won't eat what you've made for dinner (thereby leaving all of the yummy leftovers for yourself!)

J started a new rotation this month which means that he won't be getting home until after 7:00 every night. Poor guy. Aside from the fact that this leaves me home alone with the dog and cats all day (who are still getting on really well, so YAY!) it also means that if I want to eat before, say, bedtime, I need to actually venture into the kitchen and cook something.

Under normal circumstances, I Do Not Cook. Bad Things Happen When C Cooks. I burn food, leave half a dish stone-cold while the other half is too hot to even attempt eating, and tend to leave out key ingredients until it's too late. Still, I like (love) to eat, so doing some cooking during months like this is essential.

Over the weekend I did the grocery shopping and picked up some easy, fool-proof meals that even I could make. Things like grilled chicken (okay, so J actually did the grilling), Bertolli meals in a bag, and the like. I was thinking quick, I was thinking easy, and I was thinking tasty. The grocery store was having a good sale on Rice-a-Roni too, and even though I've tried to stop eating it so much because of the sodium content, I bought enough boxes to fill up one of our cupboards because I'm a sucker for cheap stuff.

My plan tonight was to eat last night's leftover chicken, but since there wasn't a whole lot left, I cracked open a box of Rice-a-Roni for a side. Hey, it's better than making a late-night run to Sonic because I'm still hungry after dinner. So I browned the rice, poured in the water, and added the seasoning packet. Except, not all of the seasonings were dissolving. I stirred and stirred, and finally thought to take a look at the box to see if there was some key step (pulverizing the seasoning packet ahead of time?) I had missed.

Did you know that they now make Chicken and Mushroom Rice-a-Roni with pieces of real (freeze dried) mushrooms included? I didn't! And apparently I came home with three or four boxes of the stuff. Now, to me, rice and mushrooms sounds delicious, but J HATES mushrooms. Hates them passionately. We go through a little routine every time we're at a restaurant and he orders something with mushrooms in it. Every little speck of mushroom has to be removed from his dish (usually onto my plate) before he'll take a bite. This is a serious hatred, people.

Sooo... I guess I'm the only one who'll be eating the Rice-a-Roni tonight. Sorry sweetie, I really didn't notice that there were actual mushrooms in the box when I bought it! Tomorrow I'll make cheesy pasta, okay?

Making Barnes & Noble Very Happy

My big project this weekend (besides going to my first class, which I'll talk about later) was buying my textbooks. I went in to the bookstore expecting to come away with two or three books, and came out with these:



Yeah, I got a little carried away. No one can say that I'm not going to be prepared, though!

Class on Saturday was okay. Not great, but the instructor seems like she knows what she's talking about and my classmates are friendly and just as excited to be there as I am. Two complaints, though. The first is that the class apparently started last week. That's right, I missed the first day of class. Fortunately so did almost all the other students because the department told us all to come on the wrong day. Oops. The instructor didn't penalize us for not coming on the first day (how could she?) but I now have a boatload of homework to get finished this week.

My second complaint is that at the last minute the instructor decided to change the course format from all in-person to half in-person and half online. On one hand I wasn't really looking forward to spending all of my Saturdays until Christmas in class, but on the other hand, I wanted to take an in-person class for a reason. Oh well. Maybe next semester.

In non-school news, I think we may have reached a breakthrough with Jasper and the cats. Last night all three animals spent the evening in the same room, and there was very little growling or chasing happening. Hopefully this behavior continues!

It's really been awhile

I'm sitting up late tonight, poking around online because I can't sleep. Just for fun, I looked up a website I was addicted to last summer, Pee on a Stick. It's a fun reference site for those who want to know everything there is to know about pregnancy tests and ovulation predictor kits. I knew it had been awhile since I'd been to the site, but I didn't realize just how long it had been until I saw an announcement on the homepage. The site's creator had her second child earlier this week.

For some reason, this is really startling to me. I mean, I have friends who were pregnant with their first child when we started to TTC and who are now expecting #2. There are other friends who weren't trying at all when we started, and they have babies now. I know it's been 16 months since we started trying, but every once in awhile I'm reminded of just how long that really is. It's long enough for the woman who runs the POAS site to go through an entire pregnancy without my realizing it, because by the time she got pregnant I was no longer using checking her site regularly to make sure that there weren't any new recalls. By the time she got pregnant, I suspected there was a problem with me since I was spotting so much, and testing seemed pointless when I'd been bleeding for a week already.

It's time to get this show on the road. I can't wait another 16 months.

First Day of School Jitters

Tomorrow is the first day of class for the in-person course I'm taking this semester. I'd be lying if I said that I'm not a little nervous, or that (dork alert) I haven't already picked out what I'm planning to wear.

This isn't really my first day of school since my online class started on Tuesday (and yes, I did manage to figure everything out, so yay!) but there's a real difference between taking an online class and sitting in a room with other students and a professor. Plus no one can see my cute first day outfit over the internet.

In other school-related news, one of the local districts has an opening for an English teacher and someone from their HR department actually called me earlier this week to make sure that I applied for the job. I'm trying not to get too excited, but I confess to squealing and jumping up and down a bit after I hung up the phone.

Wish me luck!

Thumb-twiddling

In lieu of having anything interesting to say, here are some cute Jasper pictures. As you can see, he's very curious about the camera.

Confused by that Newfangled Internet Thingy

Remember when I decided to go back to school to become a teacher? And how excited I was about buying school supplies and paying tuition? Yeah, I'm getting over it.

I got a call from the university this morning to let me know that a class I really wanted to take had an opening in one of the online sections, and did I want to enroll? Of course I did! This was the one class I was really bummed about not getting to take right away, and while I had never taken an online class before I figured that at least this meant I wouldn't have to commute to campus more than once a week. Saving gas is good! The woman at the university gave me some kind of code (note: I didn't bother finding out what the code was for, just wrote it down in my day planner) and told me that she'd e-mail me more details about the online program.

Now, either she was incredibly busy this morning or I'm an idiot, because her e-mail made no sense whatsoever. It was an e-mail that had originally been sent to the course's instructor and said nothing specific about what a student had to do in order to navigate the online course software. One of the links in the e-mail seemed somewhat helpful, though, so I followed it to the massive, scary University of Texas System page.

Disclaimer: as a general rule, I think that I'm a fairly savvy internet-type person. I have a blog, I know a little HTML (watch how I can make my words bold or underlined), and I can order a pizza from the comfort of my laptop. I'm not an IT professional by any stretch of the imagination, but I tend to understand how to do things on a computer. I'm apparently not as knowledgeable as I thought though, because I have no freaking clue what I'm supposed to do in order to access my class online. I can't even figure out what day it starts!

After spending a good 45 minutes battling panic over not being able to figure out the stupid software (or even how to log in) I sent a mea culpa e-mail to the woman at the university who had originally sent me the supposedly "explanatory" e-mail, begging for some guidance. At the very least, I need to know what this stupid code means! I hope (fingers crossed) that the reason I'm having so many problems is that the university hasn't had time to formally register me for the class yet, so my usual logins and passwords aren't working.

In any case, I'm having flashbacks to my one recurrent college nightmare, in which I discover that I signed up for a class without realizing it, haven't been attending all semester, the final is TODAY, and if I fail, I'll ruin my GPA. I feel completely unprepared and clueless, and it's not pleasant.

Homeownership is FUN!

With all the rain here lately (we still have a leak in the garage and will probably be ripping out some drywall in the next few weeks to see just how bad it really is) the grass has been growing like crazy. I got a lawn service to mow it three weeks ago, but at $50+ a visit, it hardly seemed worth it to keep having them come out when we could get a perfectly good mower for under $200.

So we went to Lowe's. I like Lowe's, but we've been spending far too much time there lately what with buying landscaping rocks and dirt to help re-direct rainwater away from our foundation, weedkiller for those extra-persistent desert weeds, and various other home-related items. To be honest, I'd like to go two or three weeks without dropping over $100 there, but that may just be me. Between a coupon and a sale, though, we got a decent mower for a good price and even managed to fit it in our little Civic. We got home just fine, and brought the mower box into the backyard to put it away in our handy little shed.

J opened the door and was greeted by the sight of 50 or so termites having a nice snack in the southeast corner of the shed. Naturally, it's after 5:00 on a Saturday, so the earliest I can call the exterminators is Monday morning.

Oh, and did I mention that all this water and humidity is causing cracks to open up in the stucco exterior of the house, and that we have to find someone who can seal them up ASAP so we don't get major water damage?

Yeah, this homeownership thing is a blast.

Rested and Refreshed

I got back home last night, and even though I had a ball in Colorado, it's sooooo good to be back! There's nothing like waking up in your own bed after a full night's sleep and getting to play with your pets before breakfast.

The trip was great. We went to celebrate my parents 30th wedding anniversary, and in addition to a big party at my aunt's house, they renewed their vows at the same chapel where they got married. My mom even wore her original wedding dress! I can only hope that I'm still able to fit into my dress after 30 years. To be honest, I'm not sure I fit into it today, and our wedding was just three years ago!

We laughed, we cried, and at one point the big family joke was that we were all going to get bludgeoned to death on the streets of downtown Denver. My mom was laughing so hard that she almost choked. What can I say? You had to be there.

Aside from seeing my mom and dad so happy, the best part of the trip was reconnecting with my extended family. I have a wonderful family. I had such a good time that I was even able to forget about beng infertile for a few days. It was incredible to be able to forget about the biggest problem in my life for awhile and just concentrate on playing catch with my 11 year old cousin, listening to my grandma's stories, and gossiping with my sister.

Even though I didn't sleep much at all on the trip (my mattress for the last few nights was almost certainly older than I am) I'm feeling remarkably rested today. It's like a mental reset button has been pushed, and I've been reminded of why it is that we're trying so hard to have a baby. Family really is the most important thing in the world.

Operation Common Thread

Pomegranates, a longstanding symbol of fertility, serve as a strong analogy to those suffering through infertility. Though each pomegranate skin is unique in colour and texture, the seeds inside are remarkably similar from fruit to fruit. Though our diagnosis is unique—endometriosis, low sperm count, luteal phase defect, or causes unknown—the emotions, those seeds on the inside, are the same from person to person. Infertility creates frustration, anger, depression, guilt, and loneliness. Compounding these emotions is the shame that drives people suffering from infertility to retreat into silence.

The pomegranate thread holds a two-fold purpose: to identify and create community between those experiencing infertility as well as create a starting point for a conversation. Women pregnant through A.R.T., families created through adoption, or couples trying to conceive during infertility can wear the thread, identifying themselves to others in this silent community. At the same time, the string serves as a gateway to conversations about infertility when people inquire about its purpose. These conversations are imperative if we are ever to remove the social stigma attached to infertility.

Tie on the thread because you’re not alone. Wear to make aware.

This project (and the eloquent description above) is the brainchild of Stirrup Queens and Sperm Palace Jesters, and I'm proud to say that I tied on my string tonight. I'm urging anyone who is infertile or who has gone through infertility hell to buy yourself some embroidery floss (the color is #814) and tie it around your wrist. Let's all start doing something to raise awareness about infertility and to connect with people in our real lives who are infertile.

And on that note, J and I are leaving for Colorado tomorrow to celebrate my parents' 30th wedding anniversary, so I'll be away until Wednesday. Hope you all have a lovely weekend!

Slice Me and Dice Me

The biopsy results were normal, aside from a slightly lower-than-usual progesterone level. I have mixed feelings about this, but there's really not anything I can do about it so I'm trying not to let it bother me.

New OB/GYN Version 2.0 turned out to be one of the most helpful docs that I've seen during this process, and after talking about my other options (which basically boil down to trying on our own for X number of months or moving to the local RE clinic for IUI) we decided that the best next step is a laproscopy and hysteroscopy to rule out uterine problems that couldn't be seen during my HSG. The surgery will be on September 11, which gives us a cycle to start trying again and to see if the progesterone suppositories help with my spotting.

Oddly enough, for someone who's spent her life terrified of doctors and needles, the prospect of surgery really doesn't scare me. If nothing else, infertility has helped me conquer that fear. I'd rather be afraid of doctors than infertile, but at this point I'll take a silver lining wherever I can find one.

So, ultimately, yay! I'm feeling very good about the direction we're heading. Goooooo Team Surgery!

Unexplained

My appointment with New OB/GYN Version 2.0 is tomorrow afternoon. We'll find out the results of the endometrial biopsy and, I guess, talk about next steps. If the biopsy comes back normal I want to be tested for some blood clotting disorders. If it doesn't... This may sound crazy to those who haven't experienced unexplained infertility, but I hope the biopsy isn't normal. I hope there is a big, screaming red flag in those test results that will tell us what the problem is.

Fear of the unknown is largely what's kept me away from treatments thus far. Because we don't know what's wrong, I'm afraid to do an IUI because I'm convinced that it won't work. Why would it, when I have serious doubts that any embryo could possibly implant with my crappy lining? Why would I waste all that money on a treatment that, even if it manages to get me a fertiilized egg, won't do a thing for the one symptom I have that's telling me that something is wrong?

We're nearing the end of the road as far as diagnostic tests are concerned. It took some fancy medical talking by J to get Dr. F to do the biopsy. She didn't think it would tell us anything new, but was willing to do it because of the *chance* of endometrial hyperplasia. The blood clotting tests will be (would be, if we can once again sweet talk the doctor) looking for very rare disorders. Granted, infertility isn't exactly a run-of-the-mill condition, but it affects more women than the blood clotting problems I want to test for do.

I'm scared tonight. Scared that at the end of the day, all the tests in the world won't tell us what's wrong. Scared that our choices after tomorrow will be either taking Clomid (unmonitored) under the "supervision" of New OB/GYN Version 2.0, or moving on to the one RE in town for IUI. Not knowing what's wrong has left me feeling helpless and out of control. It may be time to accept that my unexplained infertility may always remain unexplained, and just try to accept that and move forward.

Empathy and Infertility

Today's post over at Stirrup Queens and Sperm Palace Jesters got me thinking, and rather than write a novel in the comments section, I decided to write a spin-off post here. To wit, what obligation does an infertile woman have to be (or at least act) happy when a friend or family member announces their pregnancy?

To be honest, I struggle a lot with this issue. In the 16 months since J and I started trying to become parents, more friends than I can count have had babies or gotten pregnant. Some went through infertility, and I wept tears of joy when I heard those announcements. Most of the others, however, had little to no trouble conceiving, and I didn't take their pregnancy news very well. Eventually I do put on a happy face in front of all of my pregnant friends, but I also start avoiding many of them. It's not the best thing for our friendship, but it's a necessary act of self-preservation when I'm just so sad about my own infertility that I can't stand to see them with their cute bellies and stories about bizarre food cravings. Who has the greater burden in this situation to be empathetic to the other person's needs, though? Is it me, the infertile, or my friend, the happily pregnant woman?

In my opinion, there are two answers to this question. If the friend doesn't know about my infertility, the burden would fall squarely on my shoulders to either explain the situation (that I was happy for her, but going through my own fertility struggles, so I might not be able to participate in all the baby-related conversations and events) or to just "suck it up and deal." In this situation, I don't think it would be fair for me, or any infertile woman, to break off the friendship without any explanation. A real friend doesn't do something like that.

In my case, however, almost all of my friends know that we're having trouble conceiving. So who does the burden fall on under these circumstances? I think it's on both of us. I have the burden to offer a newly pregnant friend my congratulations, but as my friend, she has the obligation to tell me her news in a way that is sensitive to my situation. This is where I think a lot of fertile/infertile communication breaks down because it's assumed that good news automatically trumps bad news or a bad situation. No matter how down in the dumps you are, you're expected to smile and be happy when something good happens to someone else. Any other reaction gets you a "bitch" or "bad friend" label. Friendship is about empathy and support, though, and if your friends can't be supportive when you're going through a major life crisis (like infertility) why should you have to be supportive when they're going through an equally major positive life change (like pregnancy)?

It seems so obvious, and yet it's something that so few people truly seem to understand. As I've mentioned before I frequent a number of pregnancy and fertility-related message boards. At this point I actually have a canned reply to anyone who dares to complain about how their infertile friend doesn't want to hang out with them since their pregnancy announcement. It shocks me that these "friends" can't see past their own noses for two seconds to consider that the person they're currently whining about is going through one of the biggest crises of her life. A crisis that calls into question very basic assumptions we all make about what it means to be a woman, what our goals for our future are, and to what lengths we're willing to go just to become mothers. What kind of a friend doesn't have empathy for that kind of pain? To use an analogy I recently heard, it would be like flaunting your engagement in front of a woman who's recently been widowed. No friend would do that, and no friend should flaunt her fertility or pregnancy in front of an infertile friend, or blame that friend for not being able to be overjoyed at the pregnancy news.

Most of the time, however, this isn't what pregnant "friends" of infertiles want to hear. They want to hear that they're right, that their friend is being selfish, and that even infertility shouldn't stand in the way of planning a BFF's baby shower complete with diaper cake. Some do listen, though, and those are the friends all infertile women wish we had. Those women want to be good friends, even if it means not being able to share the daily joys and sorrows of pregnancy with someone close to them. I'm fortunate to have a number of fertile friends who "get it", and I hope that when they read this they understand why. Friendship has to go both ways, or it was never a real friendship to begin with.

The sad thing is, this isn't the kind of issue that will ever really be resolved. There will always be "friends" who are just too clueless to realize how badly you're hurting, and ones whose knee jerk reaction when you don't jump for joy that they're having a baby after just one month of trying is to call you selfish and mean. All any of us can do is to try to talk about why that's really not the case, and to surround ourselves with only the people we trust to understand our pain and mixed emotions as well as possible. In the end, those are only friendships that are worth having anyway.

Happy Sunday

I can't remember when I last felt this relaxed and satisfied with the direction of my life.

-Grad school? Starting in three weeks.
-Job? Sending in applications to all the local districts tomorrow.
-Marriage? Very happy, especially now that J has weekends off and is spending MUCH more time at home.
-Pets? Not exactly best friends, but Jasper hasn't chased the cats in nearly 24 hours, so that's something.
-Weather? It hasn't rained all day.
-Infertility? My appointment with New OB/GYN Version 2.0 is scheduled for Wednesday morning.

All in all, life is pretty good at the moment. Of course, that's all subject to change at any point, but at least for the moment things are really going my way. I'm even a little optimistic that we've got a real shot at getting some answers this month about what exactly is causing our infertility. At the very least, we'll probably be able to make a decision about whether or not it's time to start treatments at a civilian clinic.

How does this make sense???

So, tonight J and I went back-to-school shopping. I needed supplies for my classes (which start on the 26th!) and he wanted to look at computer toys. It's tax-free weekend here because school is starting soon, and there have been ads everywhere about how you should do your school shopping this weekend because there are no taxes on the "essentials". I stupidly assumed that those essentials included school supplies, since pens and paper are sort of...essential when you get to the classroom.

Imagine my surprise when we got to the checkout and the clerk charged us tax on my notebook, pens, day planner, and post-it notes. I asked her about it, and apparently only clothing and shoes are included in the "essential" tax-free items.

I'm sorry, but WTF? If the true intention of this program is to help families afford all of the things they need when kids go back to school (and to help stimulate the local economy) doesn't it make sense to extend the deal to actual school supplies?

Anyway, that's what's annoying me tonight. In other news, downtown residents were allowed to return home today, and while there has been some more flooding due to an overflowing dam in another part of town, we've only had a little more rain, so things are maybe starting to improve.

More flooding

According to CNN downtown has been evacuated because city officials are worried that the dam could break. There are a lot of evacuations further south as well. We got more rain last night, but aside from the still-leaking garage ceiling, our house appears to be fine. We're not close to downtown (we're on the West side, downtown is Central) so I'm not concerned about being evacuated.

Please keep your fingers and toes crossed that we don't get more rain today, and that the dam doesn't break.

Taggy

I've been tagged for a meme by the lovely and talented blog-mistress of Stirrup Queens and Sperm Palace Jesters. So, without futher ado:

Four jobs I have had in my life:
1. Babysitter to two of the brattiest kids on earth
2. Bookseller at a major bookstore chain (a job I kept for six freaking years)
3. Hostess at Marie Callendar's (I lasted three days)
4. Manager of a national financial education campaign (a job I kept for three years and still sort of have in spite of the fact that I can't add)

Four movies I watch over and over:
1. Star Wars
2. Notting Hill
3. The first two Horatio Hornblower miniseries (not really a movie, but I've seen them approximately 9,000,567 times)
4. Where the Heart Is

Four places I have lived:
1. Salt Lake City, UT
2. Washington, DC
3. Germantown, MD


Four TV shows I love to watch:
1. Gilmore Girls
2. The Daily Show
3. Project Runway
4. The Simpsons

Four places I have been on vacation:
1. Greece
2. San Francisco
3. Williamsburg, VA
4. Moab, UT

Four websites I visit daily:
1. Amalah.com
2. washingtonpost.com
3. dooce.com
4. Yahoo

Four of my favorite foods:
1. mushrooms
2. mac and cheese (the real kind, with cream and shredded cheddar)
3. California rolls
4. Pad Thai

Four places I would rather be right now:
1. Tahiti
2. Washington, DC (so I could have lunch with my girlfriends)
3. at the doctor's office (how sad is this one?)
4. getting a pedicure

Four favorite bands/singers:
1. Pete Yorn
2. Ben Harper
3. U2
4. Howie Day

More Flood Photos

Here are a few pictures I took while running errands this afternoon. It looks like our neighborhood escaped severe storm damage, but clearly that's not the case elsehwere.


This is a brand-new Blockbuster Video store, and you can see that the foundation actually cracked in half due to the storm. I wish I'd gotten a wider shot of the store, becuase it's literally split in two.


This is the sidewalk on the other side of the Blockbuster. Just amazing.


A small landslide above our old apartment complex.


And finally, remember the dumpster from yesterday's picture? I think this is where it ended up. Right in the middle of the road.

Drying Out

The city is drying out this morning after yesterday's massive storm. I'm heading out to run some errands later today and will try to get some pictures. From what I've seen on the news, most of the streets are passable, and the DOT was out all night clearing debris from the freeway and major side streets.

I still can't believe how much flooding there was. Thankfully there don't seen to be many injuries, and miraculously there are no reported deaths in the city and only one so far further south.

The Great Flood of 2006

I figured that I'd start a new post with pictures of the flood since the last one was getting a little long. In short, the city is a disaster. There are reports of homes that were completely submerged earlier today, roads are crumbling into arroyos, and businesses all over are flooded. It's a nightmare. The National Guard is activating tomorrow to help with the cleanup, but we have rain in the forecast for the next 3-4 days.

Our home is still fine. The storm drain at the bottom of the street appears to be doing its job, and aside from the leak in our garage and some worrisome pooling around the foundation at the front of the house, we're just fine. J made it home around 3:00 and we've been checking up on friends for a good part of the afternoon. Quite a few of them have been evacuated or have serious water damage to their homes.

Some of the worst flooding has happened right in our old neighborhood. The photo below (taken off the TV, so apologies for the horrible glare) is of the main street our apartment complex was on, and this is just a half mile from that complex. The road just collapsed into an arroyo, taking the red truck at the bottom of the screen along with it. The driver was able to get out before it fell, but that's at least a 15-20 foot drop!



This is a series of pictures, also off the TV, showing a dumpster as it's swept away. This is right next to the grocery store where I bought groceries yesterday. Very scary.

Flood Warning

Monsoon season is unquestionably here. It rained all last night, and has been pouring all morning. It's not supposed to stop until late tonight, by which point I can't imagine what the city is going to look like. The main problem is that we've had rain for the last few days, so the ground is totally saturated. The news stations keep saying that this isn't normal monsoon season weather, which makes me feel a little bit better. I couldn't imagine having this much rain every summer for the next 3-4 years.

Thankfully we live at the top of a little hill, and our street is one of the very few that actually has a storm drain. I'm a little worried about some areas where the rain is pooling around our foundation, but there's not a whole lot to do about it at this point.

Here's a photo from our local newspaper showing a street on our side of town:



Keep your fingers crossed that we all stay dry indoors today!

***EDITED 12:05 pm--the garage ceiling is leaking, and I think it's coming in from the balcony off our bedroom. This storm is just crazy. Some streets have up to 5 feet of water right now, and the rain isn't stopping. We've gotten over 4.6 inches of rain in the last 24 hours, most of that in the last 12 hours. I'm officially freaked out.

***EDITED 12:45 pm--I just saw some footage of one of my favorite grocery stores on the news. The store is completely flooded with mud and water. I was just there yesterday! This is a crazy storm, and I'll be VERY surprised if J is able to make it home tonight. There are just too many flooded streets between the hospital and our home.

***EDITED 2:30 pm--J is coming home. He's going to go all the way up noth and then loop back around to the West side of the city where we live. I wish he'd just stay overnight at the hospital, but he's determined to get back here. NBC is reporting that the river has overflowed just south of the city.

Here are a few pictures I took of the newscast I've been glued to all day. We are so, SO lucky that our street has a storm drain. I can't even imagine how bad things would be otherwise.


This is actually just down the street from where we used to live--very scary!


One section of the freeway, not too far from here


One of the scarier images--this is a section of the freeway Juan takes every day to get to work. If he'd left a few hours later this morning, he would still be stuck right here.


Our backyard--you can see that we've got some minor flooding on the patio, but nothing near what we could have. I feel enormously blessed that we're not having more problems. Given how many inches of rain have fallen in the last 48 hours (nearly 6 inches!!!) it's amazing that this is as bad as it's gotten.

***EDITED 4:30 pm--Juan got home around an hour ago, and thankfully the rain has slowed down considerably. The streets are still bad all over town, and the news is predicting another 1-3 inches tonight, but the worst appears to be over. It's been 30 years since El Paso had a storm anything like this. All I know is that the last 24 hours have been worse than even the hurricane that we lived through in Maryland back in 2003. I never expected to see a storm like this after moving to the desert.

Project: Grad Student

I was formally accepted into a graduate program earlier today! I received my letter from the program last Friday but didn't want to post anything here until I'd gotten my acceptance from the university as well.

Part of me is intensely freaked out by what I'm doing. If things go right, I could be teaching in a classroom later this month and taking classes myself at night. Everything depends on whether or not a school really, REALLY needs a teacher with my expertise since I'm not certified yet.

Aside from the panic over not really knowing what the hell I'd do in a classroom as a teacher, I'm also a little worried about the possibility that I'll get pregnant before the program is finished. It's not terribly likely, but it is possible, especially if the results from the endometrial biopsy tell us anything new. If we weren't struggling with infertility and had gotten pregnant during the first year we tried, I wouldn't have applied. Part of me is tempted to call it fate, and think of this program as something I was meant to do before we have kids, but I'm not completely convinced that this is true.

In any case, it's sort of a moot point because I'm in the program, classes start soon, and I've got a stack of teaching applications to fill out. Mostly I'm just really happy about this and can't wait to begin. I've missed being a student, and teaching is something that I've been wanting to do since before I graduated from college. I don't know if I'm "meant" to do this or not, but it feels like the start of something exciting, and that's all I really need.

Definitely Not Worst Case Scenario

Well, I'm back! The appointment with Dr. F went very well. There were a few tears (mine) when she asked if we'd tried relaxing, but overall she was very sweet and understanding. She backed WAY off with the "just relax" advice after I told her that not only had we relaxed, but we'd gone on vacation, I'd done accupuncture, and we spent $400 on my mind/body therapy class earlier this year. In the grand scheme of things, I think we've given "just relax" a fair shot, and now it's time to "just get some damn tests already".

Dr. F didn't completely agree with our reasoning about the endometrial biopsy. To her, my spotting issues (and for those keeping score at home, I'm now spotting for 11-12 days during my luteal phase) just screamed low progesterone in spite of the perfectly normal progesterone levels at my last blood draw. She really wanted to write a prescription for Clomid and see what happened, but when I explained my concerns about taking Clomid unmonitored she agreed to let me take progesterone suppositories (don't Google that, Dad) instead. We'll do more bloodwork next month to see if I really need them.

This next part will forever enshrine Dr. F in my Awesome Medical Professionals Hall of Fame. Even though she didn't think it was necessary, she offered to do the biopsy because I wanted it so much. There was a free appointment at 1:00, and did I want to do the biopsy today?

I almost kissed her. This sort of thing NEVER happens in the military medical system. Most of the time you have to wait weeks for any type of appointment because the clinics are so overbooked that they just can't squeeze you in any earlier. She wrote a prescription for some Percoset, sent me upstairs to J's office to relax for an hour, and then she performed the biopsy.

It hurt. Not as much as my HSG, but it hurt. She got a nice, big sample, though, and I should have the results back sometime next week. Our follow-up appointment is August 9. Unfortunately it's not going to be with her because the Army is transferring her to another hospital. Oh well. It's disappointing that I found a doctor I really clicked with only to have her leave after one appointment, but I'll survive.

Now we're home, and I'm curled up on the couch with Jasper and feeling pretty good about things. I'm nauseous as hell from the Percoset, but that doesn't matter. What matters is that we're finally back on track to figure out just exactly what's going on. I'll take pain and nausea any day if it gets me just one step closer to having a baby.

Butterflies...

I'm getting really nervous about my OB/GYN appointment tomorrow. Best case scenario is that I love the doctor, he listens to our concerns, agrees that I need the biopsy, and can schedule it for sometime next week.

Worst case scenario is making me very anxious, though. What if this doctor is another in the long line of crappy medical professionals I've seen in the last four months? What if he's like the nurse at my old RE's office who was insulting and demeaning? Or the dumber-than-dumb internist I saw earlier this month? What if I hate him?

I know I shouldn't worry like this. If I hate him, we'll just find another OB/GYN in the practice, or even possibly go civilian. It'll cost more, but it's not like we're expecting to get out of this infertility hell with our savings intact. I just want to like him so much! I want to finally trust a doctor again. I want to have some hope that we'll get through this.

The appointment is at 11:30 tomorrow morning, so I won't be back with a report until 1:00 at the earliest. Any good appointment vibes you can send my way would be greatly appreciated!

The end of civilization as we know it?

Is anyone else totally creeped out by the ads for this refrigerator?



A TV? In the fridge? For the love of puppies and kittens, WHY??? What sick, twisted design team was trying to come up with a new gimmick to make people pay $$$ on kitchen appliances and came up with the idea to just put a TV in the door? More to the point, who's buying these things?

Maybe I've just been watching too much TV in the last couple of months, but every time I see this ad I get irritated. Whatever happened to family time at dinner? Whatever happened to having actual conversations with your spouse and kids? Conversations that don't include a running commentary on the latest episode of your favorite TV show?

There's just something very, very wrong here.

Moving Forward

Friday's the day we really start the infertility testing in earnest again. I have an appointment with an OB/GYN who supposedly has some experience with IF patients, although this is according to his scheduler so I'm taking it with a grain of salt. We're going to push for an endometrial biopsy to see if we can't figure just what the hell is going wrong every cycle and causing my luteal phase spotting.

I'm both excited and nervous. Excited because we've been in a holding pattern just waiting for this appointment since May, and nervous because I don't think I can handle another crappy doctor who treats me like a crazy person. I'm very glad that Juan will probably be able to make the appointment since I think it'll be harder for the doctor to blow me off with my very own MD sitting there next to me, pushing for this biopsy.

In the end, though, I can't wait for Friday to come around. I can't wait to start trying to solve this problem. I especially can't wait to start trying to conceive again. Our break this month has been great, and I've felt much more optimistic about life in general than I have in a quite awhile, but my arms are still empty and my heart still has a baby-shaped hole in it.

I'm ready to move forward.

10 Weird Things About Me

Taking a break from the pet-related posts, here are 10 weird things about me.

1) Back in college I had very specific things I ate for dinner every single day. I can remember which year it was based on what I was eating at the time. Freshman year it was broccoli and cheddar Lipton rice packets. Sophomore year it was microwave bowls of spiral mac and cheese. Junior year it was spaghetti. Senior year it was regular Kraft mac and cheese. I'm fairly sure that my roommate for three of those four years hates me a little bit for my OCD eating.

2) I pluck my eyebrows obsessively. If I feel a stray hair coming out, I'll rush to the bathroom to pluck it. Even if I'm in the middle of doing something else. The only time I won't do this is in public, but I have been known to do it at work.

3) I hate removing nail polish. HATE it. I have no idea why, but I still have polish on my toes from back in May. Before our move. I know it looks horrible, and I know I should at least take it off (and preferably put new polish on since I live in my sandals this time of year) but I just hate doing it.

4) I want to get pregnant and have a baby more than anything else in the world, but sometimes I wonder if I'm going to be a good mother. I doubt I could be as good as my own mom was. I worry about that.

5) For some unknown reason, I sometimes type an extra "e" at the end of words that don't end in "e". For example, I just caught that I typed "spaghettie" instead of "spaghetti" up above.

6) I love superhero movies. Love them. I have no idea why, especially since fight scenes bore me.

7) I once owned ever Star Wars novel ever published. Thankfully I grew out of that phase after high school and have whittled down my collection to just the "must haves". They still take up an entire shelf in one of my bookcases.

8) It took me two hours to pick which books I was going to put on the bookshelves in the guest bedroom and which ones I was going to put on the shelves in the loft. If we ever have a big party, I assume that people will hang out in the loft and I want them to think that we read interesting/impressive books. I don't think that my complete collection of Diana Gabaldon romances would impress anyone.

9) I didn't realize J and I were dating until we'd gone out 3-4 times. In my defense, those first few "dates" could have been just two friends hanging out. In Juan's defense, I was pretty dense about how much he liked me.

10) I'm a person with mixed dominance, which means that I do some things with my left hand and some things with my right hand. For example, I write and eat with my left hand, but throw a ball with my right. Because of this, when I try a new activity (particularly a new sport) I have to try doing it with each hand before I figure out which one works the best. I still have no idea which is my dominant hand when playing golf. I gave up after one lesson.

Blech Part II

Scratch that last post, I think I'm getting sick. That would explain the general ickiness and malaise I'm feeling. Plus I have a temperature.

Blech

I feel icky. Not getting-sick icky, and not dirty icky, just icky. I'm bored, I'm frustrated about a number of things (J's insane schedule and the BS our old apartment complex is trying to pull with our refund to name a few) and I just don't feel motivated or inspired lately. I'm fairly sure that this is just a passing ickiness, one that has happened before and will probably happen again, but right now I'm just stuck.

I'm also feeling a fair amount of guilt about how stressed out the cats seem. Arcadia spent all day yesterday (and all day today, from the looks of it) in the upstairs bathroom windowsill. I'm not even sure she had anything to drink or eat in spite of the fact that there's food and water for her and Codi on the second floor. She was so brave on Monday, coming downstairs to investigate Jasper and even hopping up on the bed for attention when he was in the bedroom. Now she just seems content to be antisocial, and I hate that my friendly girl doesn't want my attention.

So, blech. And ick. I know the cats will be okay. They'll cope. Heck, Codi's WAY better today than she was yesterday. And I'll be okay. Maybe I just need to drink more water. It helps to see how happy Jasper is to finally have a home and a family of his own. It also helps that J got his call schedule for August and discovered that he's not on call for the whole month. If that's not reason to celebrate, I'm not sure what is. For now, though, if I'm not posting much it's just because I don't have anything to say other than blech. And ick.

Jasper: Day Two

For a dog who was in a shelter yesterday, Jasper has settled right in to life here. He's currently snuggling up next to me on the couch, enjoying a belly rub. He was a perfect angel in his crate last night (minus one small accident) and hasn't made a peep when the cats come out to investigate. He watches them, but doesn't try to approach them or bark. From my perspective, this is a VERY good sign of how he's going to act when we let him off the leash inside the house.

The cats are somewhat less laid-back about Jasper's presence than he is about theirs. Codi has spent most of the day on top of the refrigerator and Arcadia is electing to live behind the washing machine. I can't say that I blame them for being freaked out, but hopefully over the next week or so they'll stop hiding and start relaxing a bit.

Tomorrow we visit the vet to make sure that Jasper's a healthy boy, and then get him signed up for some obedience classes.

And now for an obligatory AWWWWWWW puppy picture. This was Jasper and Juan, napping together yesterday afternoon.

Jasper

So, remember this post? Well, I'd like to introduce you to someone...



Meet Jasper!

J and I had a long talk yesterday and decided that we'd start looking for a dog. Our original plan was to wait until October, but we realized that:

A: we're essentially settled in the house already,
B: the cats are NEVER going to be ready for a dog, so there's really no point in waiting on their account, and
C: I'm not going to be working from home forever, and at least now I can spend all day with the three animals, sorting out any conflicts and making the newest member of our family feel at home.

Then today J's attending physician told him to leave early because he worked too many hours last week. After he got home we both had the same thought--head down to PetSmart to check out their weekly adoption fair. The first dog we saw was Jasper, and we both fell in love. He was quiet but friendly, and when all the other dogs started barking at a terrier that was walking by, he stayed quiet. Interested, but quiet. His foster family listed him as good with cats and kids, and after spending some time with him, we were both sold. An hour later we were dog owners!

So far, so good. The cats are reacting about as well as can be expected. They're still in pretty heavy denial that anything unusual is happening, but are starting to sloooowly approach him to investigate. For his part, Jasper perks up when they're around, but so far hasn't made any moves towards them. My guess is that a week from now he'll be letting Arcadia boss him around just like Codi does.

I love this little guy so much already!

The cats now hate me very much

The official verdict from the vet is that Arcadia is a PITA, but she's a healthy PITA. Thank goodness. She's also a healthy PITA who now has a microchip embedded between her shoulder blades. If she or Codi (who also got 'chipped) ever escapes, any Humane Society in the country will be able to locate us through the tracking number on the chip.

It's pretty cool when you think about it, and given how much we'll probably be moving over the cats' lifetimes, it was something that needed to be done. Plus it's the law here.

I'm a big fan of the microchip, but the cats were slightly less impressed with it when the vet brought out the big ass needle that is used to embed it under their skin. It was probably the biggest needle I've ever seen, and they were not happy about it. Codi hissed at me and the vet, and Arcadia just whipped her head around and looked accusingly at me as if to say, "YOU'RE the reason my life is so hard!"

We're all home now, and both the cats are doing their best to pretend that I'm not here. Good for them. Personally, I would be only too happy to go another year before I have to wrestle them into their carrier again to visit the scary vet.

Free to a good home

Anyone want a cat?

Apparently the novelty of having me home all day long has worn off for Arcadia, and she's driving me nuts. Specifically, every night at around 5:00 she decides that she's bored downstairs and wants to hang out upstairs. She's not going to go up there unless *I* go up there, though. Every day I decide to indulge her by going upstairs for awhile, usually waking up Codi (who would be perfectly content to never, ever leave the windowsill in the master bathroom) so she can entertain Arcadia for awhile. This works for maybe 20-30 minutes and then Arcadia is back downstairs with me, crying her head off.

She doesn't want to be petted. Doesn't want to play fetch even when I break out a fresh bottlecap. Doesn't want to do anything except sit right next to the couch and cry. She's driving me crazy, and aside from letting my cat force me to spend my day upstairs in bed (which, no) I don't know how to get her to stop doing it.

It's occurred to me that maybe she misses J. He's been pulling some really late nights at the hospital, and the transition between him not working at all to him being gone almost 24/7 has been rough on all of us. If that's the case, she'll just have to get used to it. I'm also SLIGHTLY concerned that she might be having bladder crystal problems again. We haven't gotten in to see a new vet yet, and this is kind of similar to what she was doing a few months ago when all of the couch peeing started. I'm really hoping that this isn't the case, and part of me says that we haven't had any "incidents" yet so I think it's unlikely.

Ugh. WHHHHHYYYY? Why must such a cute little kitty be so annoying???

Mission Accomplished

I've had a VERY productive day. This morning I had my doctor's appointment, which was mostly a big waste of time since the sole purpose of the visit was to get me a referral to OB/GYN so they can start my infertility testing again. I did get the referral, though, and one of the nurses even gave me the name of an excellent local RE that she and her husband went to when they were having problems conceiving.

From there I finally went over to the university to drop off my application for the teaching program. I should hear back from them sometime this month. If I'm accepted I'll need to spend a week observing a classroom and then can start my own classes and look for a teaching job.

Speaking of jobs, I GOT ONE!!! My old boss from DC called me late last week and asked if I'd be interested in some part time contract work. I jumped at the opportunity, and can now officially call myself gainfully employed! It's only going to be 10-15 hours a week, and won't last forever, but at least it's something. I also applied for a position at Barnes and Noble today, which I should be a shoo-in for since I worked for the company for many, many years in high school and college.

From there I ran all over the mall to pick up odds and ends that we've been needing, and am now lounging on the couch at home waiting for Fed Ex to arrive with a packet of materials I need to start working. I'm just so happy that things are starting to fall into place.

Officially on a break

We're taking a break this month. I'm tired of thinking about infertility, J's tired of thinking about infertility, and after 15 months it's time for us to give ourselves some time off.

Tomorrow is my first doctor's appointment to start the IF testing process again. Cross your fingers for me that she doesn't make me wait another month to see an OB/GYN before I can get the endometrial biopsy. I'm afraid to get my hopes up that this doctor will be as wonderful as my PCP back in Maryland was, but she can't be worse than the craptastic REs who treated me during our last two months in DC. All I really want is to make it thorugh the appointment without bursting into tears (thus labeling me the crazy patient who can't keep her shit together in front of her husband's colleague) and for the doctor to be sympathetic to our situation and want to help us figure out what's wrong.

Invasion!!!

THERE IS A SCORPION IN MY WASHING MACHINE!!!

Apparently last night's storm has brought them out in droves, and now I'm running my machine with Oxy Clean, Tide, and maybe a little bit of tequila in a (hopefully successful) attempt to kill this thing. Bleach would have been better, but alas, we have no bleach.

I have a feeling that our exterminator is going to be making a LOT of money from us in the next few months. Damn you, West Texas, and your lethal household pests!


***EDITED TO ADD: The exterminator soaked our baseboards in scorpion-killing-stuff (which is pet safe once it dries) and told me that while our neighborhood is "known" for scorpions, his company has had a lot of success in getting rid of them completely with monthly treatments.

Wait, are we back in DC?

Ho-ly crap. We had quite a downpour today. Actually, it was more like a flood.

Juan and I were out running errands all day and started driving home around 5:00. It's usually around a 20-25 minute drive to our home on the West side of town from where we were on the East side. It started raining as soon as we got in the car and this is how the roads looked 20 minutes later:


Photo courtesy of KFOX

Excuse me??? This is THE DESERT! Dry, high desert, where it costs a small fortune every month just to keep your grass green! I guess freak weather happens everywhere (the 1998 tornado in downtown Salt Lake City comes to mind) but I had no idea we'd ever have rain like this here.

At least we got off the roads fairly quickly and didn't have the problems that some people had. This picture was taken outside of town around the same time we finally made it home:


Photo courtesy of KFOX

At any rate, we're fortunate that there was no flooding in the house and no damage in the yard. And at least I won't have to drag out the sprinkler for awhile!

Status Quo

I'm here, there's just nothing much going on lately that's worth writing about. My first doctor's appointment to start figuring out what's wrong with my body isn't until Monday, so until then I'm just twiddling my thumbs.

In non-thumb twidding news, I should be able to hand in my application to the teaching program next week when my last letter of recommendation arrives (thanks, Sharon!) so hopefully I'll be able to find a job quickly since I'm sure I'll need most of August to figure out just what the heck I'm doing in a classroom.

J had a good first week of work, but it's been exhausting. He leaves the house around 6:00 am and doesn't get home most nights until after 8:30. This month he's working in an intensive care unit, though, so next month when he's in an outpatient clinic the hours will be better. Today is his first day off, and I fully expect that he'll sleep through most of the day.

We're getting our ducks in a row for the trip to Denver next month for my parents 30th anniversary party/vow renewal, and I can't wait to see everyone. It's been years since I've been to visit my mom's family, and while I've seen all of them at weddings and various trips since then, I haven't seen my grandma's new condo or my cousin's new cats yet. The best part is that Juan was able to get a weekend off for the trip, so we'll be able to go together.

I guess this post has no theme except for "things that are happening sort of right now" so hopefully I'll be able to think of something vaguely interesting to write soon. Until then, hope everyone had a nice 4th of July!

Low

It's another crappy evening. I'm tired, I'm hurting, and it doesn't seem like any of my support mechanisms are working at the moment. Part of that is my fault--sometimes I forget that other people can't read my thoughts and know when I need them to reach out to me. Part of it is this move because it's thrown so many things in my life into disarray that I have much more time to sit and think about my situation. Part of it is that I'm just mad and sad and hurting.

How do you tell someone that you need more support? That what they see as "being supportive" I see as "not putting in any effort at all and expecting me to tell them exactly what to do all the time"? I have no idea. I WANT support, I NEED it right now, and lately it's like all I'm getting is assvice and half-hearted attempts at empathy. Don't get me wrong--my friends and family have been great through most of this process, but it's fairly clear that a lot of them are just sick of hearing about it. Sick of me breaking down over seemingly random things. Sick of blog entries like this.

I think that what it really boils down to is that they're sick of me.

And I don't know how to fix that. Therapy? Paying someone to listen to me bitch and whine? My past experience trying to explain all of this to a therapist resulted in some of the assiest assvice I've ever received. I'm not interested in experiencing that again, and quite frankly I don't think that I'm clinically depressed. I'm situationally depressed, but I don't need therapy for that. I need the people in my life who love me to do a better job of loving me. To try to understand what I'm feeling. Because I would do it for them. Because I HAVE done it for them, and now it's my turn.

I don't even know if I'm going to post this.