I have been thinking a lot this week about transitions.
The chew-your-nails-off-with-terror transition that signifies the progression of labour from the, I believe, comparitively quite tranquil first stage, to the second (IE: the part where vulnerability, pain and anxiety are at their peak, all the while the alien being inside you claws, rips and tears its way out of a tiny hole in your genital regions).
I am really quite frightened about that. Because it is so unknown. I cannot micro-manage that...because I do not know what hormone-induced emotions will surface, nor how they will manifest physically.
I never forget the woman in a reality birth documentary series on TV who was so zen about her meditative birthing experience. She had her support person whispering mantras to spirit the pain away during contractions, whales moaned via loudpeaker in the background and she looked very stoic as she closed her eyes while the muscles peformed their inevitable, automatic clench. Occasionally, her lips would purse, but it was the only giveaway that things were not completely normal and fine inside her skin.
Some edits later and Regan from The Exorcist had replaced zen woman. She was bellowing and writhing and sporting wild, white eyes of panic as she yelled abuse and orders to her clearly-rattled support people. It was terrifying.
Will that be me?
I am also anxious about the transition I will undergo from working professional to stay at home mum.
That thing that has own its own acronym: SAHM.
OMG.
I have been working full-time as a journalist since 1996. For five days a week, sometimes more, that is what I have been.
Hard-working, sensible, professional, thorough, doing my job. A job I became qualified for after three years at university.
I go to work and I have full knowledge of what the day will bring in terms of what is expected of me, what I need to achieve to feel fulfilled and ensure my job is done properly. It is very satisfying.
I am about to switch, not only jobs, but entire careers, mindsets, time zones, body clocks, routines and physiological functions.
I am about to become a new person with a new, incredibly important job. A job that does not come with a degree or any opportunity for pre-preparedness study.
It is scary to think about. But then, of course, we went through the same thing before J was born.
And we muddled through.
It’s what most rational, sane, adult people do.
I just wonder how rational and sane you can really be at 2am when you haven’t slept for three days and your baby is screaming for no apparent reason.
We are now down to seeing our OBGYN weekly, the baby’s room is set and ready to go and our ante-natal classes finish this week.
It feels like the end of things, the tying up of loose strings.
It’s incredibly exciting but also bloody daunting.
Our lives are about to change forever.
Intellectually, I know they will change for the better. Of course.
But I wonder how much of me will mourn the loss of the life we lived before.
Showing posts with label pregnant. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pregnant. Show all posts
Monday, January 16, 2012
Thursday, November 3, 2011
Calculate this
I stopped maths at Year 10.
I had hitherto been doing what was commonly called “veggie maths”; as in, the maths you do when your brain is essentially a vegetable when it comes to calculating any sum trickier than five plus five.
And, the fact that I managed to squeeze in the word “hitherto” in the previous sentence should give you some clue that words were/are more my thing, not numbers. And we all know humankind is broken into two distinctly different parts: those who can write and those who can calculate without the aid of a product from Casio (showing my age, they have calculators on mobile phones now, right?).
But beyond Year 10, there was no veggie maths on offer, so it was time for me to skip merrily off into the garden of wondrous humanities, gleefully shunning Venn diagrams, long division and fractions.
By the way, algebra proved confusing. Lo, what’s this, said my brain? A stream of maths that actually uses letters? This should be a cinch.
Sadly, A plus B equalled wrong and I could never, ever make those stupid letters-dressed-as-numbers make sense. They walked like ducks and sounded like ducks, but weirdly were not the ducks I had come to love. It was quite shocking.
The reason I am waxing so lyrical about my mathematical ineptitude is to tell you how floored I was to suddenly realise this week that I am six months’ pregnant.
Six months. That is, like, almost the end.
The problem is you get so caught up in talking in weeks, that you forget to count the months. And while most people can easily (or I think, by some magic) work out the weeks and months equivalent within seconds in their heads, I cannot.
I have not been sleeping much lately thanks to wake-up calls from either intensely weird dreams, my sore back or my knee pillow slipping off the bed or up my shirt (must get some velcro for the inside of my knees to stop that problem). So I have had lots of time to think about random things.
Like how many months pregnant I am.
Six months.
I feel great. Apart from the lack of sleep making me extremely Snappy Tom (we do not have a cat) and ready for an enormous cat nap at about 3pm EVERY DAY.
I am really popped out now and trying to figure out how to function with a bloody big belly (must buy more slip-on shoes).
I am sitting on the fitball at night to get the lower ab and thigh muscles moving a bit, as well as trying to do my pelvic floor as often as possible and contemplating the awful reality of perineal massage.
Frankly, I would prefer just a back massage at this point. Must get onto that as well.
All is well and our little girl is moving around like crazy. Last night, I thought she was trying to get out, so low were the kicks.
I have figured out she likes chocolate, as she jerks around the most in the minutes after I eat some.
So, whatever baby wants...
I had hitherto been doing what was commonly called “veggie maths”; as in, the maths you do when your brain is essentially a vegetable when it comes to calculating any sum trickier than five plus five.
And, the fact that I managed to squeeze in the word “hitherto” in the previous sentence should give you some clue that words were/are more my thing, not numbers. And we all know humankind is broken into two distinctly different parts: those who can write and those who can calculate without the aid of a product from Casio (showing my age, they have calculators on mobile phones now, right?).
But beyond Year 10, there was no veggie maths on offer, so it was time for me to skip merrily off into the garden of wondrous humanities, gleefully shunning Venn diagrams, long division and fractions.
By the way, algebra proved confusing. Lo, what’s this, said my brain? A stream of maths that actually uses letters? This should be a cinch.
Sadly, A plus B equalled wrong and I could never, ever make those stupid letters-dressed-as-numbers make sense. They walked like ducks and sounded like ducks, but weirdly were not the ducks I had come to love. It was quite shocking.
The reason I am waxing so lyrical about my mathematical ineptitude is to tell you how floored I was to suddenly realise this week that I am six months’ pregnant.
Six months. That is, like, almost the end.
The problem is you get so caught up in talking in weeks, that you forget to count the months. And while most people can easily (or I think, by some magic) work out the weeks and months equivalent within seconds in their heads, I cannot.
I have not been sleeping much lately thanks to wake-up calls from either intensely weird dreams, my sore back or my knee pillow slipping off the bed or up my shirt (must get some velcro for the inside of my knees to stop that problem). So I have had lots of time to think about random things.
Like how many months pregnant I am.
Six months.
I feel great. Apart from the lack of sleep making me extremely Snappy Tom (we do not have a cat) and ready for an enormous cat nap at about 3pm EVERY DAY.
I am really popped out now and trying to figure out how to function with a bloody big belly (must buy more slip-on shoes).
I am sitting on the fitball at night to get the lower ab and thigh muscles moving a bit, as well as trying to do my pelvic floor as often as possible and contemplating the awful reality of perineal massage.
Frankly, I would prefer just a back massage at this point. Must get onto that as well.
All is well and our little girl is moving around like crazy. Last night, I thought she was trying to get out, so low were the kicks.
I have figured out she likes chocolate, as she jerks around the most in the minutes after I eat some.
So, whatever baby wants...
Thursday, June 23, 2011
How to retrain the brain. Seriously, how?
The internet should and must be avoided at all costs, except for blog reading.
We lost our baby at 16.4 weeks last September and I am now three weeks pregnant, the first time I have been pregnant since that horrible time.
I cannot begin to list the emotions racing through my heart and head at this point.
Lurching. That’s a good word. I am lurching all over the place, from a diluted type of joy and happiness that doesn’t last long once the anxiety and palpable fear takes hold.
And it takes hold 98% of the time, both in my conscious and sub-conscious.
Everybody tells me I will be ok this time and I have to believe it will all be fine, and that’s great. But that’s exactly what everyone else told me last year. I even believed it.
And look how that turned out.
You can’t know, you can never know for 100% sure that things will turn out well, not well or in between.
I get that, but I really do need to know this time and it’s not fair that I can’t.
Coupled with all of these emotions is another feeling, or rather, a distinct lack of feeling. I don’t feel overly pregnant. I know that’s perfectly normal, but it does not help mitigate the anxiety!
When you go through IVF, you are keenly aware of times, dates and places. You know when the embryo went in, you know exactly when you can get a blood test and you are in permanent count-down mode.
As soon as I was able, I tested – both at home and at the path lab. And as soon as I was able, I knew. We knew. Most people at work knew.
So when most other women are blissfully ignorant of the tiny being forming inside them – happily consuming vast quantities of coffee, wine and soft cheese (bitches!) - I am trudging drearily to the kettle with my decaffeinated tea bag in hand.
I know, I shouldn’t whinge...I am drinking decaf tea and shunning leftovers for a bloody good reason. A bloody fantastic, happy reason.
Back to the internet. I started reading the What To Expect book a little and had some awful flashing back at the part about testing for abnormalities, Down Syndrome etc. I read and re-read the lines that said abnormal results were extremely rare, or complications were almost unheard of in most women and mentally crossed my fingers.
At work I have been distracted these past few days with internet sites that show foetal development week by week.
On one I read today, was this: Do not panic if you do not have pregnancy symptoms, although you should contact your care provider if you suddenly lose your pregnancy symptoms.
That sentence is two things: written by someone of Irish persuasion and THE VERY DEFINITION OF AMBIGUITY!
Read it again. If you can make sense of it, please comment below.
I shall now stop time-wasting internettery and keep counting down until our first scan on July 11.
After then, no doubt the count-down will be until our 12-week nuchal scan, and after then, a new count-down will take its place, and so on. Little milestones along the way.
I can’t get too far ahead but that doesn’t mitigate the anxiety in between each one!
And the whole time I feel scared that the stress will harm my baby and worried that I am somehow sending it a biochemical message that I am ungrateful because I am spending far too much time freaking out as opposed to enjoying this wonderful news and enjoying the fact that it is there and growing.
For the first time since we found out, I actually felt tingles of warm excitement as I was going off to sleep last night, about how cool this was going to be. The first time.
It has been like I cannot allow myself to fully let this great news wash over me completely. I’ve got glad wrap over bits of me that I need to protect and keep dry.
I’ve used duct tape and plastic bags to waterproof my heart. Which is stupid, because this is good, it’s great, it’s amazing. Why wouldn’t I want this all over me, drowning me?
Simple. Because it might not last. It might not last. And no one can tell me that it will or it won’t.
But I have to accept that and just hope for the best.
So far I have been too focused on the stress and the fear and telling people “hopefully everything will be alright this time” to stop and respect how incredibly lucky we are.
Lucky for now, at least.
I told our little boy’s day care lady and another mum this week. Instantly both of them put their hands up to their faces and sort of held their breath while twisting their faces into a worried sympathy.
No congratulations, no real broad smiles.
It must be said that these two women were also there last year when I collapsed in tears while picking up my son, as it was just after we had the awful news confirmed.
They no doubt had that raw memory in mind. As I do.
My mobile rang at work today. It was a nurse from the fertility clinic following up on the transfer.
“I am pregnant,” I told her.
“Oh, that’s wonderful! You needed that good news, especially after...well, you’ve had a hard life, my dear,” she said, no doubt casting a glance at my file, sitting open on the desk in front of her.
We have to hope for the best. What is the alternative?
We lost our baby at 16.4 weeks last September and I am now three weeks pregnant, the first time I have been pregnant since that horrible time.
I cannot begin to list the emotions racing through my heart and head at this point.
Lurching. That’s a good word. I am lurching all over the place, from a diluted type of joy and happiness that doesn’t last long once the anxiety and palpable fear takes hold.
And it takes hold 98% of the time, both in my conscious and sub-conscious.
Everybody tells me I will be ok this time and I have to believe it will all be fine, and that’s great. But that’s exactly what everyone else told me last year. I even believed it.
And look how that turned out.
You can’t know, you can never know for 100% sure that things will turn out well, not well or in between.
I get that, but I really do need to know this time and it’s not fair that I can’t.
Coupled with all of these emotions is another feeling, or rather, a distinct lack of feeling. I don’t feel overly pregnant. I know that’s perfectly normal, but it does not help mitigate the anxiety!
When you go through IVF, you are keenly aware of times, dates and places. You know when the embryo went in, you know exactly when you can get a blood test and you are in permanent count-down mode.
As soon as I was able, I tested – both at home and at the path lab. And as soon as I was able, I knew. We knew. Most people at work knew.
So when most other women are blissfully ignorant of the tiny being forming inside them – happily consuming vast quantities of coffee, wine and soft cheese (bitches!) - I am trudging drearily to the kettle with my decaffeinated tea bag in hand.
I know, I shouldn’t whinge...I am drinking decaf tea and shunning leftovers for a bloody good reason. A bloody fantastic, happy reason.
Back to the internet. I started reading the What To Expect book a little and had some awful flashing back at the part about testing for abnormalities, Down Syndrome etc. I read and re-read the lines that said abnormal results were extremely rare, or complications were almost unheard of in most women and mentally crossed my fingers.
At work I have been distracted these past few days with internet sites that show foetal development week by week.
On one I read today, was this: Do not panic if you do not have pregnancy symptoms, although you should contact your care provider if you suddenly lose your pregnancy symptoms.
That sentence is two things: written by someone of Irish persuasion and THE VERY DEFINITION OF AMBIGUITY!
Read it again. If you can make sense of it, please comment below.
I shall now stop time-wasting internettery and keep counting down until our first scan on July 11.
After then, no doubt the count-down will be until our 12-week nuchal scan, and after then, a new count-down will take its place, and so on. Little milestones along the way.
I can’t get too far ahead but that doesn’t mitigate the anxiety in between each one!
And the whole time I feel scared that the stress will harm my baby and worried that I am somehow sending it a biochemical message that I am ungrateful because I am spending far too much time freaking out as opposed to enjoying this wonderful news and enjoying the fact that it is there and growing.
For the first time since we found out, I actually felt tingles of warm excitement as I was going off to sleep last night, about how cool this was going to be. The first time.
It has been like I cannot allow myself to fully let this great news wash over me completely. I’ve got glad wrap over bits of me that I need to protect and keep dry.
I’ve used duct tape and plastic bags to waterproof my heart. Which is stupid, because this is good, it’s great, it’s amazing. Why wouldn’t I want this all over me, drowning me?
Simple. Because it might not last. It might not last. And no one can tell me that it will or it won’t.
But I have to accept that and just hope for the best.
So far I have been too focused on the stress and the fear and telling people “hopefully everything will be alright this time” to stop and respect how incredibly lucky we are.
Lucky for now, at least.
I told our little boy’s day care lady and another mum this week. Instantly both of them put their hands up to their faces and sort of held their breath while twisting their faces into a worried sympathy.
No congratulations, no real broad smiles.
It must be said that these two women were also there last year when I collapsed in tears while picking up my son, as it was just after we had the awful news confirmed.
They no doubt had that raw memory in mind. As I do.
My mobile rang at work today. It was a nurse from the fertility clinic following up on the transfer.
“I am pregnant,” I told her.
“Oh, that’s wonderful! You needed that good news, especially after...well, you’ve had a hard life, my dear,” she said, no doubt casting a glance at my file, sitting open on the desk in front of her.
We have to hope for the best. What is the alternative?
Thursday, June 16, 2011
News - on the day the Dalai Lama visited my town
I am pregnant.
WWWWWWWWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!
I found out just after 1pm today. My HCG is 300 and something and I am pregnant.
I am still a bit numb and not quite sure it's real yet.
Our little boy wet the bed at 2am so, as we were up, we decided to do the test then.
It showed two lines after an eternity, but the second line was quite faint and I went back to bed not thinking anything of it really. (And also preparing myself for bad news.)
I had always said whatever the home test result, I wouldn't place too much weight on it, and wait for the blood instead.
Then morning came, the sun rose, and I noticed the lines were a little darker, but still not conclusive. Then I read the bottom of the box, it expired in April.
I started to allow myself to feel some glimmer of hope again.
I had a blood test and what would normally have taken literally three minutes took me 35 minutes as the universe conspired to put four people suddenly ahead of me in the queue. And then when it was finally my turn, this crazy old lady's wallker wheel thing was blocking my way and it took, oh, about 17 YEARS FOR HER TO MOVE IT. I was quite breathless with nerves and anticipation by this point. Particularly as I wanted the test to be done ASAP, so it could get on the earliest courier to Brisbane so I could get the results, um, ASAP!
The blood guy looked sceptical as he wrote Urgent on the form and said the results normally take a couple of days. My face dropped, I told him that I was sure he could appreciate that we would be sweating on these results.
He circled the word Urgent, but I could not relax. I scurried back to the car, thankfully warmed from its morning chill after being parked in full sunlight, and burst into tears.
I think I had been counting down so fervently to this day, being 14 days and all, that I expected a result as soon as the sun rose. And to hear that I may have to wait another day, or even through the weekend...well, it broke my heart.
I went to work, tried unsuccessfully to concentrate and watched the clock tick over every hour.
At 1pm, I couldn't stand it any longer and took a punt by calling the doc's office in Brisbane.
"Hi there, I know this is a long shot, but just wondering if you have any results back yet." Wait, expecting a dismissive "Oh no, we wouldn't see those results on a Thursday until at least 3, maybe later."
But instead, a curt "Yes, we've got something here."
I held my breath. What followed was five minutes of utter confusion on my part, but I imagine total jaded going through the motions on behalf of the doctor's receptionist. She started going on about my HCG number, how they hadn't sent the progesterone results with the HCG results and wasn't that strange, did I still have enough pessaries, let me just put you on hold while I check with the doctor... WHAT????!!!!
She came back on hold and continued with this gibberish until I stopped her, exasperated and said point blank: "Sorry, am I pregnant or not?"
"Oh yes," she said, sounding temporarily self-conscious. "The doctor is quite happy with those numbers and we will see you for a scan in three and a half weeks."
I could barely utter goodbye before I crouched to the floor near a remote exit at work, where no one could see me, and cried my heart out.
Oh, my, god. Thank god. It has happened. What a relief, what a joy, what a fright, what a brilliant bloody result.
Each night for the past 14 terrible waiting nights, I have laid in bed just before I went off to sleep and placed my hand on my lower belly. In the still and the quiet, I have repeated the same words over and over in my mind: "Stay safe, healthy and strong, all the way to the birth and beyond."
Please god, make it so.
WWWWWWWWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!
I found out just after 1pm today. My HCG is 300 and something and I am pregnant.
I am still a bit numb and not quite sure it's real yet.
Our little boy wet the bed at 2am so, as we were up, we decided to do the test then.
It showed two lines after an eternity, but the second line was quite faint and I went back to bed not thinking anything of it really. (And also preparing myself for bad news.)
I had always said whatever the home test result, I wouldn't place too much weight on it, and wait for the blood instead.
Then morning came, the sun rose, and I noticed the lines were a little darker, but still not conclusive. Then I read the bottom of the box, it expired in April.
I started to allow myself to feel some glimmer of hope again.
I had a blood test and what would normally have taken literally three minutes took me 35 minutes as the universe conspired to put four people suddenly ahead of me in the queue. And then when it was finally my turn, this crazy old lady's wallker wheel thing was blocking my way and it took, oh, about 17 YEARS FOR HER TO MOVE IT. I was quite breathless with nerves and anticipation by this point. Particularly as I wanted the test to be done ASAP, so it could get on the earliest courier to Brisbane so I could get the results, um, ASAP!
The blood guy looked sceptical as he wrote Urgent on the form and said the results normally take a couple of days. My face dropped, I told him that I was sure he could appreciate that we would be sweating on these results.
He circled the word Urgent, but I could not relax. I scurried back to the car, thankfully warmed from its morning chill after being parked in full sunlight, and burst into tears.
I think I had been counting down so fervently to this day, being 14 days and all, that I expected a result as soon as the sun rose. And to hear that I may have to wait another day, or even through the weekend...well, it broke my heart.
I went to work, tried unsuccessfully to concentrate and watched the clock tick over every hour.
At 1pm, I couldn't stand it any longer and took a punt by calling the doc's office in Brisbane.
"Hi there, I know this is a long shot, but just wondering if you have any results back yet." Wait, expecting a dismissive "Oh no, we wouldn't see those results on a Thursday until at least 3, maybe later."
But instead, a curt "Yes, we've got something here."
I held my breath. What followed was five minutes of utter confusion on my part, but I imagine total jaded going through the motions on behalf of the doctor's receptionist. She started going on about my HCG number, how they hadn't sent the progesterone results with the HCG results and wasn't that strange, did I still have enough pessaries, let me just put you on hold while I check with the doctor... WHAT????!!!!
She came back on hold and continued with this gibberish until I stopped her, exasperated and said point blank: "Sorry, am I pregnant or not?"
"Oh yes," she said, sounding temporarily self-conscious. "The doctor is quite happy with those numbers and we will see you for a scan in three and a half weeks."
I could barely utter goodbye before I crouched to the floor near a remote exit at work, where no one could see me, and cried my heart out.
Oh, my, god. Thank god. It has happened. What a relief, what a joy, what a fright, what a brilliant bloody result.
Each night for the past 14 terrible waiting nights, I have laid in bed just before I went off to sleep and placed my hand on my lower belly. In the still and the quiet, I have repeated the same words over and over in my mind: "Stay safe, healthy and strong, all the way to the birth and beyond."
Please god, make it so.
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
Friend, I miss you
I have a friend.
We share a raft of uncanny similarities and often call each other doppelganger. Actually I call her doppel, she calls me ganger.
Not all the time.
Actually, not very often at all.
Maybe it was once, and I initiated it, and therefore think it to be funnier and a longer-lasting joke than it actually was. Leos can be like that.
Whatever the official statistical facts on the term’s usage, the point is the foundation reason why we/I decided upon such a term: we are very much alike.
We have not been friends very long, maybe a year, but we realised pretty quickly that a “clicking” was underway, and complete, within about three emails between us (she worked in an outer office of the newspaper where I work).
In-jokes, the crafting of a new pseudo-language, outrage over grammatical faux pas, tears of laughter over a random assortment of YouTube clips, primarily from the 1980s, tales of woe from our respectively mental family units, tips on tweaking our blogs: we have shared them all in rapid succession.
In my more vain moments, I may consider it plausible that we look alike in a sisterly way, although she is stunning. Well, we are both brunettes and tall, and that’s good enough for me.
We might not see each other very often, or talk all that regularly...but when we do, we slot as neatly into a rhythm of candour and affinity as a Scalextrix car into its tracks.
The spooky, mirror-imagery of our relationship reached a peak about six months ago when we became pregnant at almost exactly the same time.
There were, in fact, seven days separating our due dates.
Seven days.
It wasn’t planned, it just happened that way. And it was accepted as yet another example of two lives in parallel.
In those early months, before we lost the baby, I was so overjoyed to have strengthened our connection in such a freaky way.
What are the chances?
I told someone at work how great it was. “It’s like having a mother’s group before you’ve even given birth,” I said, smiling.
Smiling, and anticipating all the wonderful times we’d have complaining about being bloated while slurping mocktails and shoving her home-baked cookies into our endlessly-starving gobs.
Crying together when the hormones just got too much, laughing at the insane changes in our bodies and falling into that inevitable, non-malicious tit-for-tat dance all mothers – expecting or not – get into: have you felt the baby kick yet? No, I heard it won’t happen for another few weeks. How are your ankles? Huge! Same as my boobs. And will I ever stop going to the toilet? I know! Are you feeling sick at all? No, but really really tireddddddd – I barely had the energy to finish typing that word. Yeah, me too and I cannot sleep. I am eating so many almonds right now and heaps of tea. Be careful of the types of tea you drink – have a look at this website. Thanks, have you checked out baby paraphernalia yet? There are some great forums and product tests at this site. Good one, when is your 12-week scan? This week, Friday.
This week, Friday.
And that is pretty much where all the good stuff stopped. That’s when the beauty and colour went out of the world for a while.
That’s when bleak was an understatement. When tragic seemed a cliche not dark enough, or sufficiently devastating, to describe what we went through.
But I am lucky to be able to write that sentence in the past tense now, and realise that today, exactly three months on, things are slightly better.
Some hesitant watercolour brushstrokes are gradually bleeding into the stark white parchment of our lives (and I use the term bleeding both figuratively and literally...more on that later).
What picture are they painting? I don’t know yet, but I am grateful it is starting to take shape, and in living colour no less.
So what has it been like seeing her in the three months since?
There is no easy answer to that question.
I don’t mean to sound vague, but it has honestly been an equal and intense mix of heartbreak, elation, jealousy, joy, sympathy, sadness, anger and delight. The good feelings outweigh the bad ones. They have to, for sanity's sake.
Of course, when we see each other, I am not the type of person to let the bad stuff out face to face. It’s not as if I sit there drinking tea with her, seething and picturing myself slamming her head into the table.
Actually I must admit I don’t even have that thought when I am not with her.
I will admit, however, that in my quieter moments – often when I am going off to sleep at night or driving in the car – I feel a physical pang of what must be jealousy. But it is more about me wishing so desperately to be still pregnant, rather than me wishing she was not.
I would never dare think that. I am worried, in fact, about even writing it down.
I cannot deny it is hard sometimes seeing pregnant people, or mums with kids. I am such a bitch that I actually have flaring flashes of white-hot anger when I see some feral, disinterested teenager with two toddlers already hanging off her tattooed arms, pregnant and whining to her B-Boy wannabe boyfriend about the price of chicken nuggets or two-minute noodles or something. How dare she. She doesn’t deserve it. The baby, I mean. Everybody has a right to two-minute noodles.
It is easier to direct those sorts of feelings, fleeting though they are, to people I will never know or talk to. But I am not someone who would even contemplate feeling that way about my pregnant friends.
The fact is, good always beats evil with them, because I care for them deeply. Our friendship gives me an in-built cut-off switch for any of that bad stuff. But it’s a switch that never moves anyway. It’s taped stuck in one direction. That’s why, I think, we are friends in the first place.
Again, I am sensible and mature enough to know that hanging on to those toxic kinds of feelings will only contaminate your soul.
Yes you are allowed them for a while when life deals you a truly shitty hand, but letting them rule you day-to-day does nothing but leave a permanent and very ugly stain.
Perspective.
Attitude.
Outlook.
Every individual has one very powerful thing when crafting their own: choice.
I choose to recover from this. I choose to concentrate on all the wonderful things in my life more often than the bad shit that has happened. I choose to let myself grieve and remember and never forget, but I also choose to move on. I choose to feel whatever my hormones, environment and thoughts make me feel. But I also choose not to get too carried away by extremes. I choose to realise that having a purpose gives me the strength to push the darkness away. I choose to take refuge in the unconditional love I am so fortunate to have as my constant cloak. And I choose to make the effort to make good, not bad, on this short life.
What alternative is there?
So, friend, I love you. But I miss you almost as much as I understand why you are sometimes absent from my life. Please don’t worry about me or for me. Don’t ever feel you have to run and hide your big old pregnant self from me.
Tell me everything, keep me in the loop. Don’t anticipate or wonder how I might react. Just know that I will react, and 99% of the time I will be filled-to-overflowing with happiness for you.
If I’m not, if that 1% creeps in, well that’s my cross to bear; but it’s one I am trying to shuffle off.
I won’t be that type of crucifixed martyr.
I choose not to be.
We share a raft of uncanny similarities and often call each other doppelganger. Actually I call her doppel, she calls me ganger.
Not all the time.
Actually, not very often at all.
Maybe it was once, and I initiated it, and therefore think it to be funnier and a longer-lasting joke than it actually was. Leos can be like that.
Whatever the official statistical facts on the term’s usage, the point is the foundation reason why we/I decided upon such a term: we are very much alike.
We have not been friends very long, maybe a year, but we realised pretty quickly that a “clicking” was underway, and complete, within about three emails between us (she worked in an outer office of the newspaper where I work).
In-jokes, the crafting of a new pseudo-language, outrage over grammatical faux pas, tears of laughter over a random assortment of YouTube clips, primarily from the 1980s, tales of woe from our respectively mental family units, tips on tweaking our blogs: we have shared them all in rapid succession.
In my more vain moments, I may consider it plausible that we look alike in a sisterly way, although she is stunning. Well, we are both brunettes and tall, and that’s good enough for me.
We might not see each other very often, or talk all that regularly...but when we do, we slot as neatly into a rhythm of candour and affinity as a Scalextrix car into its tracks.
The spooky, mirror-imagery of our relationship reached a peak about six months ago when we became pregnant at almost exactly the same time.
There were, in fact, seven days separating our due dates.
Seven days.
It wasn’t planned, it just happened that way. And it was accepted as yet another example of two lives in parallel.
In those early months, before we lost the baby, I was so overjoyed to have strengthened our connection in such a freaky way.
What are the chances?
I told someone at work how great it was. “It’s like having a mother’s group before you’ve even given birth,” I said, smiling.
Smiling, and anticipating all the wonderful times we’d have complaining about being bloated while slurping mocktails and shoving her home-baked cookies into our endlessly-starving gobs.
Crying together when the hormones just got too much, laughing at the insane changes in our bodies and falling into that inevitable, non-malicious tit-for-tat dance all mothers – expecting or not – get into: have you felt the baby kick yet? No, I heard it won’t happen for another few weeks. How are your ankles? Huge! Same as my boobs. And will I ever stop going to the toilet? I know! Are you feeling sick at all? No, but really really tireddddddd – I barely had the energy to finish typing that word. Yeah, me too and I cannot sleep. I am eating so many almonds right now and heaps of tea. Be careful of the types of tea you drink – have a look at this website. Thanks, have you checked out baby paraphernalia yet? There are some great forums and product tests at this site. Good one, when is your 12-week scan? This week, Friday.
This week, Friday.
And that is pretty much where all the good stuff stopped. That’s when the beauty and colour went out of the world for a while.
That’s when bleak was an understatement. When tragic seemed a cliche not dark enough, or sufficiently devastating, to describe what we went through.
But I am lucky to be able to write that sentence in the past tense now, and realise that today, exactly three months on, things are slightly better.
Some hesitant watercolour brushstrokes are gradually bleeding into the stark white parchment of our lives (and I use the term bleeding both figuratively and literally...more on that later).
What picture are they painting? I don’t know yet, but I am grateful it is starting to take shape, and in living colour no less.
So what has it been like seeing her in the three months since?
There is no easy answer to that question.
I don’t mean to sound vague, but it has honestly been an equal and intense mix of heartbreak, elation, jealousy, joy, sympathy, sadness, anger and delight. The good feelings outweigh the bad ones. They have to, for sanity's sake.
Of course, when we see each other, I am not the type of person to let the bad stuff out face to face. It’s not as if I sit there drinking tea with her, seething and picturing myself slamming her head into the table.
Actually I must admit I don’t even have that thought when I am not with her.
I will admit, however, that in my quieter moments – often when I am going off to sleep at night or driving in the car – I feel a physical pang of what must be jealousy. But it is more about me wishing so desperately to be still pregnant, rather than me wishing she was not.
I would never dare think that. I am worried, in fact, about even writing it down.
I cannot deny it is hard sometimes seeing pregnant people, or mums with kids. I am such a bitch that I actually have flaring flashes of white-hot anger when I see some feral, disinterested teenager with two toddlers already hanging off her tattooed arms, pregnant and whining to her B-Boy wannabe boyfriend about the price of chicken nuggets or two-minute noodles or something. How dare she. She doesn’t deserve it. The baby, I mean. Everybody has a right to two-minute noodles.
It is easier to direct those sorts of feelings, fleeting though they are, to people I will never know or talk to. But I am not someone who would even contemplate feeling that way about my pregnant friends.
The fact is, good always beats evil with them, because I care for them deeply. Our friendship gives me an in-built cut-off switch for any of that bad stuff. But it’s a switch that never moves anyway. It’s taped stuck in one direction. That’s why, I think, we are friends in the first place.
Again, I am sensible and mature enough to know that hanging on to those toxic kinds of feelings will only contaminate your soul.
Yes you are allowed them for a while when life deals you a truly shitty hand, but letting them rule you day-to-day does nothing but leave a permanent and very ugly stain.
Perspective.
Attitude.
Outlook.
Every individual has one very powerful thing when crafting their own: choice.
I choose to recover from this. I choose to concentrate on all the wonderful things in my life more often than the bad shit that has happened. I choose to let myself grieve and remember and never forget, but I also choose to move on. I choose to feel whatever my hormones, environment and thoughts make me feel. But I also choose not to get too carried away by extremes. I choose to realise that having a purpose gives me the strength to push the darkness away. I choose to take refuge in the unconditional love I am so fortunate to have as my constant cloak. And I choose to make the effort to make good, not bad, on this short life.
What alternative is there?
So, friend, I love you. But I miss you almost as much as I understand why you are sometimes absent from my life. Please don’t worry about me or for me. Don’t ever feel you have to run and hide your big old pregnant self from me.
Tell me everything, keep me in the loop. Don’t anticipate or wonder how I might react. Just know that I will react, and 99% of the time I will be filled-to-overflowing with happiness for you.
If I’m not, if that 1% creeps in, well that’s my cross to bear; but it’s one I am trying to shuffle off.
I won’t be that type of crucifixed martyr.
I choose not to be.
Monday, August 9, 2010
Miriam Stoppard, you is crazy
Memo to Dr Miriam Stoppard:
You say in the early chapter of your pregnancy bible that it is unlikely for a woman's belly to protrude much in the first trimester.
You, lady, are off your tree.
I am 10 weeks and one day - not that I am counting - and I have a distinct bulge. Actually just last night I noticed it was firmer that the word bulge implies and felt quite, I don't know, fibrous...
Not like when your spare tyre visits Beaurepaires without you knowing and ends up transforming into a large car size with racing tread, instead of the small-to-medium with all-weather tread you have been sporting throughout your 20s. No, this type of stomachal protuberance is decidedly firmer than that. For a split second, I kidded myself it was my spectacular ab muscles being pushed forwards by an ever-expanding uterus. Yeah, then I smelled the coffee, almost vomited on the spot thanks to the nausea, and woke up to myself.
Yes, nausea...and tiredness...and constant trips to the loo. The holy triumvirate of the first trimester. Seriously, I am considering getting my office temporarily relocated to cubicle one of the ladies loos. Although the acoustics would be shocking...
See, they don't tell you about the constipation - so there's that, which I am trying to combat with lots of fibre and plenty of water. Plenty of water, plenty of toilet trips.
There's some annoying but apparently necessary hormone called progesterone coursing through my body right now. It is to blame for the tiredness, the constipation and the distinct inability to construct sentences on every alternate day. Apparently it slows everything down...your brain, clearly, as well as your intestines. So the longer "it" takes to exit stage left, or south, the more water is extracted and the harder it is to, well, you know.
Plus I have found my fibrous little expanda-uterus is decidedly bigger by about 4pm. All of a sudden that skirt I put on that fitted fine in the morning is riding up high enough to make a Melrose Place Heather Locklear blush and that top that shaped to my body quite nicely at 8am is suddenly bursting buttons Incredible Hulk-style. (Seriously, that has happened.)
Part of me feels like a third party watching this happen to someone else. It is completely freaky seeing your body change so much. Then there is the weirdness at something so tiny being able to so dramatically alter your every moment - making you more emotional, more puffed while just walking (what?), more tired, more forgetful. And, what's more, it's something you cannot see.
For christ's sake, if god or whatever was going to make the creation of a life so damn miraculous, you would think he/she could at least put a window on the belly during pregnancy. Oh! Imagine that! No internal scans...just a magic window you couldd peep into at any time.
Perhaps you could add a personal touch and make your own little curtains, or Venetians for the retro-lovers, a chic Roman blind or plantation shutters. Sure your jumpers may catch on them, but it would sure save so much stress and heartache!
Oh and by the way, I turned 34 since my last post - hooray - and cannot believe that at my next birthday, I will have a five month old.
You say in the early chapter of your pregnancy bible that it is unlikely for a woman's belly to protrude much in the first trimester.
You, lady, are off your tree.
I am 10 weeks and one day - not that I am counting - and I have a distinct bulge. Actually just last night I noticed it was firmer that the word bulge implies and felt quite, I don't know, fibrous...
Not like when your spare tyre visits Beaurepaires without you knowing and ends up transforming into a large car size with racing tread, instead of the small-to-medium with all-weather tread you have been sporting throughout your 20s. No, this type of stomachal protuberance is decidedly firmer than that. For a split second, I kidded myself it was my spectacular ab muscles being pushed forwards by an ever-expanding uterus. Yeah, then I smelled the coffee, almost vomited on the spot thanks to the nausea, and woke up to myself.
Yes, nausea...and tiredness...and constant trips to the loo. The holy triumvirate of the first trimester. Seriously, I am considering getting my office temporarily relocated to cubicle one of the ladies loos. Although the acoustics would be shocking...
See, they don't tell you about the constipation - so there's that, which I am trying to combat with lots of fibre and plenty of water. Plenty of water, plenty of toilet trips.
There's some annoying but apparently necessary hormone called progesterone coursing through my body right now. It is to blame for the tiredness, the constipation and the distinct inability to construct sentences on every alternate day. Apparently it slows everything down...your brain, clearly, as well as your intestines. So the longer "it" takes to exit stage left, or south, the more water is extracted and the harder it is to, well, you know.
Plus I have found my fibrous little expanda-uterus is decidedly bigger by about 4pm. All of a sudden that skirt I put on that fitted fine in the morning is riding up high enough to make a Melrose Place Heather Locklear blush and that top that shaped to my body quite nicely at 8am is suddenly bursting buttons Incredible Hulk-style. (Seriously, that has happened.)
Part of me feels like a third party watching this happen to someone else. It is completely freaky seeing your body change so much. Then there is the weirdness at something so tiny being able to so dramatically alter your every moment - making you more emotional, more puffed while just walking (what?), more tired, more forgetful. And, what's more, it's something you cannot see.
For christ's sake, if god or whatever was going to make the creation of a life so damn miraculous, you would think he/she could at least put a window on the belly during pregnancy. Oh! Imagine that! No internal scans...just a magic window you couldd peep into at any time.
Perhaps you could add a personal touch and make your own little curtains, or Venetians for the retro-lovers, a chic Roman blind or plantation shutters. Sure your jumpers may catch on them, but it would sure save so much stress and heartache!
Oh and by the way, I turned 34 since my last post - hooray - and cannot believe that at my next birthday, I will have a five month old.
Monday, July 19, 2010
Moments
I have just filled out the application form that will see my name on Jay's birth certificate. *Like*
Momentous doesn't even cut it.
There I am, next to the sub-heading "parent". I cannot tell you how meaningful it is to go from nobody to somebody, even if that transformation exists simply in the clinical world of a Births, Deaths and Marriages filing cabinet.
If this is what equality tastes like, I want seconds please.
But it made me think of lots of other stuff. I am already a parent. A mum. Of course I am, have been for more than two years.
But it's funny when you are the "co-mother"...you feel a kind of infinitesimal distance from your own family. Kind of like a stepmum, or a dad who cannot break that umbilical bond between birth mother and child. Don't misunderstand me, this has not plunged me into a massive depression and it has done absolutely nothing to taint my relationship with Jay or T...but no one can deny that I have no biological link to this fabulous little person.
So what? I know. There are stepmums and carers and foster parents and single mums and single dads and all manner of definitions for the word parent. I know that. I am just telling you how a miniscule part of me feels.
But something like this birth certificate, as inconsequential as it sounds, is really quite profound.
So I am a parent, have been for more than two years. But I have never given birth.
So while I won't be a total wide-eyed innocent freaking out at every turn (much), my pregnancy will undoubtedly be different to T's...d'uh, it's mine, not hers! Haha.
The delirium in those first few months with our newborn will be tempered somewhat because I have been there before. To a degree.
Hell, when you are going through something as potentially scary as this, it pays to cling to whatever preparation you can get...it may be a flimsy piece of alfoil, but it's a kind of armour nonetheless.
Momentous doesn't even cut it.
There I am, next to the sub-heading "parent". I cannot tell you how meaningful it is to go from nobody to somebody, even if that transformation exists simply in the clinical world of a Births, Deaths and Marriages filing cabinet.
If this is what equality tastes like, I want seconds please.
But it made me think of lots of other stuff. I am already a parent. A mum. Of course I am, have been for more than two years.
But it's funny when you are the "co-mother"...you feel a kind of infinitesimal distance from your own family. Kind of like a stepmum, or a dad who cannot break that umbilical bond between birth mother and child. Don't misunderstand me, this has not plunged me into a massive depression and it has done absolutely nothing to taint my relationship with Jay or T...but no one can deny that I have no biological link to this fabulous little person.
So what? I know. There are stepmums and carers and foster parents and single mums and single dads and all manner of definitions for the word parent. I know that. I am just telling you how a miniscule part of me feels.
But something like this birth certificate, as inconsequential as it sounds, is really quite profound.
So I am a parent, have been for more than two years. But I have never given birth.
So while I won't be a total wide-eyed innocent freaking out at every turn (much), my pregnancy will undoubtedly be different to T's...d'uh, it's mine, not hers! Haha.
The delirium in those first few months with our newborn will be tempered somewhat because I have been there before. To a degree.
Hell, when you are going through something as potentially scary as this, it pays to cling to whatever preparation you can get...it may be a flimsy piece of alfoil, but it's a kind of armour nonetheless.
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Hmmmwelllgoodevening
Yes, that's a perfectly respectable title I think.
It has been a little while, hasn't it?
Why?
Shit, are we going to start that weird-ass Greek chorus thing again?
I don't know, are we?
Why are you answering a question with another question? That's a sign of...
Why are you persisting in asking questions?
Who is speaking here?
Who are you?
What?
It's in the freezer, isn't it?
Yes, yes, 17.
Am I going mad?
Too late.
No need for a question mark on that one. Yes, it is too late. My sanity went the way of Elvis loooong ago.
Well, bbrrrrr, now that I have blocked that scene and succcessfully arrived in character of Blog Poster Number 4...let's begin.
It has been a few days since my last post because I had an instant worry as soon as I fell pregnant that the very raison d'etre for this particular blog had all but disappeared.
Here I was thinking TTC sequels, book deals, a telemovie script and a three-part special investigation on Oprah and it turns out the best I could manage was a 30-minute pilot.
Gash! Failure! I can hear you yelling it right now. Please stop. Haha.
You step on that cliched IVF rollercoaster and because you are so in the moment, and so focused on one cycle at a time, you never really think about the end. Of course that's what you are working towards, that's what you are doing it for...but for very complicated reasons of self-preservation, you don't allow yourself to think too much about the "prize" at the end. Because you may just not get it.
Today, I am three weeks' pregnant. What do I do now? It's too early for an OBGYN appointment. Too early for a scan.
The clinic nurse rang me this morning to see how I was going (lovely) and I shared the good news. "Oh, well done you," she said, surprised, and sounding disarmingly like a Jennifer Saunders character, perhaps an uppity politician's wife.
"What happens now?" I asked, anxious.
She explained that the doctor would want to do a six-week scan to see if there is a pregnancy still, looking for a "sac" (what?) and a heartbeat. And apart from that, it's just a case of keeping healthy and calm.
I think I have healthy down pat: I have been consumed with an intense obsession with full cream milk. And I have never been a milk fan. I slather it all over my cereal in the morning and lap it up like a cat who's got the cream. Ooh! Cream! Must put that on the list.
Everything becomes about the pregnancy. I went for a walk the other night along a busy-ish road. Lots of cars flew past, many of them spewing exhaust smoke into the air and up my nostrils. I suddenly felt the urge to hold my breath to keep the toxins away from my teeny blasty (it is a blastocyst at this stage...I prefer to disregard the "cyst" part of that word, thanks very much Mr Medicine). Because I am sure restricting oxygen to little blasty by holding my breath is going to be a whole lot better than breathing in a few carbo-mono-whatevers.
A lady at work was using a glu-stick and I remarked that I hadn't seen one since primary school, before immediately rushing up to take in a big whiff of the gluey end to gauge whether it still smelled the same as my memory. Red flag unfurled and raised itself too late. "Stop that! Think about the baby. The baby, Jerry."
Alcohol is off the menu, along with all those other potentially dodgy things: soft cheese, seafood, leftovers, BBQ chickens, pre-prepared salads, alfafa and a whole lot of herbal teas that I thought were safe, but come with lots of scary stories online. Google, are you here to help or hinder? I wonder sometimes.
I am also trying desperately to reduce my caffeine intake. Coffee has followed Elvis and my sanity out of the building, but I cannot - cannot - give up my English Breakfast. I won't. And I think I will be ok.
I am actually eating a lot more than I used to...but smaller amounts more often during the day. In fact, I feel like I am always eating there at my desk. Goodness, people will talk!
While the clinic nurse was on the phone, I took the chance to ask her about our six little embryos sitting in their cryo-home.
"Don't even think about that until your baby is at least one year old," she said.
Call me a cynic, but that then prompted me to enquire as to the cost to store those embryos. $225 every six months.
Hmmm. Was she targeting my deepest core emotions to perform a simple up-sell? I am a cynic. Fifteen years in journalism will do that to you, I'm afraid.
I'd like to think she wasn't chanting Tom Cruise's famous Jerry Maguire line in her head as we talked. Whatever her motivation for picking "one year old" as a good time to consider whether to donate or, I guess terminate is the word, those embryos...it is something we will have to deal with.
Eventually.
Apart from that, I feel alright. Not as tired as last week and kind of bloated (d'uh!). I am in a constant state of "fuzzy in the brain" and will often forget what I am doing/saying even though I am in the middle of it. Quite disconcerting, really. But I am not sick and I am doing ok.
Hope it stays that way!
It has been a little while, hasn't it?
Why?
Shit, are we going to start that weird-ass Greek chorus thing again?
I don't know, are we?
Why are you answering a question with another question? That's a sign of...
Why are you persisting in asking questions?
Who is speaking here?
Who are you?
What?
It's in the freezer, isn't it?
Yes, yes, 17.
Am I going mad?
Too late.
No need for a question mark on that one. Yes, it is too late. My sanity went the way of Elvis loooong ago.
Well, bbrrrrr, now that I have blocked that scene and succcessfully arrived in character of Blog Poster Number 4...let's begin.
It has been a few days since my last post because I had an instant worry as soon as I fell pregnant that the very raison d'etre for this particular blog had all but disappeared.
Here I was thinking TTC sequels, book deals, a telemovie script and a three-part special investigation on Oprah and it turns out the best I could manage was a 30-minute pilot.
Gash! Failure! I can hear you yelling it right now. Please stop. Haha.
You step on that cliched IVF rollercoaster and because you are so in the moment, and so focused on one cycle at a time, you never really think about the end. Of course that's what you are working towards, that's what you are doing it for...but for very complicated reasons of self-preservation, you don't allow yourself to think too much about the "prize" at the end. Because you may just not get it.
Today, I am three weeks' pregnant. What do I do now? It's too early for an OBGYN appointment. Too early for a scan.
The clinic nurse rang me this morning to see how I was going (lovely) and I shared the good news. "Oh, well done you," she said, surprised, and sounding disarmingly like a Jennifer Saunders character, perhaps an uppity politician's wife.
"What happens now?" I asked, anxious.
She explained that the doctor would want to do a six-week scan to see if there is a pregnancy still, looking for a "sac" (what?) and a heartbeat. And apart from that, it's just a case of keeping healthy and calm.
I think I have healthy down pat: I have been consumed with an intense obsession with full cream milk. And I have never been a milk fan. I slather it all over my cereal in the morning and lap it up like a cat who's got the cream. Ooh! Cream! Must put that on the list.
Everything becomes about the pregnancy. I went for a walk the other night along a busy-ish road. Lots of cars flew past, many of them spewing exhaust smoke into the air and up my nostrils. I suddenly felt the urge to hold my breath to keep the toxins away from my teeny blasty (it is a blastocyst at this stage...I prefer to disregard the "cyst" part of that word, thanks very much Mr Medicine). Because I am sure restricting oxygen to little blasty by holding my breath is going to be a whole lot better than breathing in a few carbo-mono-whatevers.
A lady at work was using a glu-stick and I remarked that I hadn't seen one since primary school, before immediately rushing up to take in a big whiff of the gluey end to gauge whether it still smelled the same as my memory. Red flag unfurled and raised itself too late. "Stop that! Think about the baby. The baby, Jerry."
Alcohol is off the menu, along with all those other potentially dodgy things: soft cheese, seafood, leftovers, BBQ chickens, pre-prepared salads, alfafa and a whole lot of herbal teas that I thought were safe, but come with lots of scary stories online. Google, are you here to help or hinder? I wonder sometimes.
I am also trying desperately to reduce my caffeine intake. Coffee has followed Elvis and my sanity out of the building, but I cannot - cannot - give up my English Breakfast. I won't. And I think I will be ok.
I am actually eating a lot more than I used to...but smaller amounts more often during the day. In fact, I feel like I am always eating there at my desk. Goodness, people will talk!
While the clinic nurse was on the phone, I took the chance to ask her about our six little embryos sitting in their cryo-home.
"Don't even think about that until your baby is at least one year old," she said.
Call me a cynic, but that then prompted me to enquire as to the cost to store those embryos. $225 every six months.
Hmmm. Was she targeting my deepest core emotions to perform a simple up-sell? I am a cynic. Fifteen years in journalism will do that to you, I'm afraid.
I'd like to think she wasn't chanting Tom Cruise's famous Jerry Maguire line in her head as we talked. Whatever her motivation for picking "one year old" as a good time to consider whether to donate or, I guess terminate is the word, those embryos...it is something we will have to deal with.
Eventually.
Apart from that, I feel alright. Not as tired as last week and kind of bloated (d'uh!). I am in a constant state of "fuzzy in the brain" and will often forget what I am doing/saying even though I am in the middle of it. Quite disconcerting, really. But I am not sick and I am doing ok.
Hope it stays that way!
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
This is it
No, this blog post has nothing to do with Michael Jackson, even though, alright, I might have stolen the title.
But I hear MJ is making more billions dead than he is alive, so I don't think his people would even worry about suing my people. Hell, I don't even have people. Well I have people, just not people.
ANYWAY.
We are not here to talk about Michael Jackson.
Here is how my day went...
Pitch black.
Dark.
Awake. Cold nose.
"What time is it," I think to myself.
"Can I be bothered actually lifting my head from the pillow to check the clock?"
Yes. Yes, of course I can be bothered.
I need to do my pregnancy test.
ZING. SNAP.
Triple awake. Ready.
A glance at the red, glowing numbers.
4:48.
Damn. Too early. Too early?
I do need to go to the toilet. Should I get up?
No.
Jay's stirring. I can hear him moaning, talking to himself. Is he cold? It's 4:48, I don't want to get up and risk waking him at this hour by turning a light on.
No. Stay in bed and try to go back to sleep. Yeah, right.
I am now busting to go to the loo by this stage. If I get up, I cannot just get up and go to the loo. If I get up, I will be doing the test.
Um. Ah. Um.
Should I. Shouldn't I.
I do. I can't wait any longer. I wee into the cup and praise the Lord for the outstanding pelvic floor muscles that enable me to not spill a drop, even at this groggy hour.
I dip the stick in and count to 14. The instructions in the box said 10 seconds, but I make a four-second adjustment to account for my impatience. 14 of my breathless, anxious seconds is roughly the equivalent of 10 normal, 1-1000, 2-1000 seconds.
I am freezing as I rest the stick across the cup, so I go back to bed knowing that the test needs five minutes.
I glance at those red numbers once more.
5:28.
By 5:33 I will know.
The time actually flew. T and I shared nervous glances a few times as the twilight cast the day's first blue light on our faces.
I sat propped up on an elbow so I could see the clock clearly - no obstructions. I saw every number flick over.
5:29.
5:30.
5:31.
By the time 5:32 came around I got out of bed and went to get a pessary from the fridge. Even if the test was negative, I was still going to pop those final four pessaries.
By the time I was back nearing the bathroom door, it was 5:33.
I peered around the door and took cautious steps inside, where the light better illuminated that little stick resting on a little plastic cup.
Two lines.
There they were.
Two lines.
Good god. Two lines. It is positive.
I whipped my hand to my mouth and my body around in T's direction.
She flew out of bed and later told me she did a classic Flinstones cartoon run between the bed and bathroom - her feet did not touch the ground, even though her legs were moving a million miles a minute.
We started crying and hugging each other.
"I knew it," I said as I gripped my arms around her back and snuggled in, so grateful to be able to share this unforgettable, tender moment with her.
"Me too," she said. "I was going to say something last night, that I had a feeling, but then I thought twice about it."
"And Jay knew all along," I said. All month, at odd intervals, Jay has pointed at my tummy and said "baby in there". Sometimes we would initiate it by asking him playfully, wishingly, if there was a baby in there. Other times he would just say it out of the blue.
Pregnant.
I am pregnant. And so bloody lucky.
Thank you - every one of you reading. I know your prayers and thoughts helped make this happen. You contributed to the energy that made this happen. You were so important in keeping me positive when the darkness threatened victory. I don't have the words to describe the feeling I had when reading your comments of encouragement...but then, the kindness of strangers will always be confronting in a thousand magical ways. It has such a delicious power that has truly floored me. Suffice to say, you are wonderful.
Today I feel exhilarated, exhausted, overwhelmed, relieved, powerful, back in semi-control, healthy, vital, excited, worried and incredibly blessed.
Fortunate. Special. I feel special. What an awesome, special gift.
How precious.
How precious.
Thank you.
But I hear MJ is making more billions dead than he is alive, so I don't think his people would even worry about suing my people. Hell, I don't even have people. Well I have people, just not people.
ANYWAY.
We are not here to talk about Michael Jackson.
Here is how my day went...
Pitch black.
Dark.
Awake. Cold nose.
"What time is it," I think to myself.
"Can I be bothered actually lifting my head from the pillow to check the clock?"
Yes. Yes, of course I can be bothered.
I need to do my pregnancy test.
ZING. SNAP.
Triple awake. Ready.
A glance at the red, glowing numbers.
4:48.
Damn. Too early. Too early?
I do need to go to the toilet. Should I get up?
No.
Jay's stirring. I can hear him moaning, talking to himself. Is he cold? It's 4:48, I don't want to get up and risk waking him at this hour by turning a light on.
No. Stay in bed and try to go back to sleep. Yeah, right.
I am now busting to go to the loo by this stage. If I get up, I cannot just get up and go to the loo. If I get up, I will be doing the test.
Um. Ah. Um.
Should I. Shouldn't I.
I do. I can't wait any longer. I wee into the cup and praise the Lord for the outstanding pelvic floor muscles that enable me to not spill a drop, even at this groggy hour.
I dip the stick in and count to 14. The instructions in the box said 10 seconds, but I make a four-second adjustment to account for my impatience. 14 of my breathless, anxious seconds is roughly the equivalent of 10 normal, 1-1000, 2-1000 seconds.
I am freezing as I rest the stick across the cup, so I go back to bed knowing that the test needs five minutes.
I glance at those red numbers once more.
5:28.
By 5:33 I will know.
The time actually flew. T and I shared nervous glances a few times as the twilight cast the day's first blue light on our faces.
I sat propped up on an elbow so I could see the clock clearly - no obstructions. I saw every number flick over.
5:29.
5:30.
5:31.
By the time 5:32 came around I got out of bed and went to get a pessary from the fridge. Even if the test was negative, I was still going to pop those final four pessaries.
By the time I was back nearing the bathroom door, it was 5:33.
I peered around the door and took cautious steps inside, where the light better illuminated that little stick resting on a little plastic cup.
Two lines.
There they were.
Two lines.
Good god. Two lines. It is positive.
I whipped my hand to my mouth and my body around in T's direction.
She flew out of bed and later told me she did a classic Flinstones cartoon run between the bed and bathroom - her feet did not touch the ground, even though her legs were moving a million miles a minute.
We started crying and hugging each other.
"I knew it," I said as I gripped my arms around her back and snuggled in, so grateful to be able to share this unforgettable, tender moment with her.
"Me too," she said. "I was going to say something last night, that I had a feeling, but then I thought twice about it."
"And Jay knew all along," I said. All month, at odd intervals, Jay has pointed at my tummy and said "baby in there". Sometimes we would initiate it by asking him playfully, wishingly, if there was a baby in there. Other times he would just say it out of the blue.
Pregnant.
I am pregnant. And so bloody lucky.
Thank you - every one of you reading. I know your prayers and thoughts helped make this happen. You contributed to the energy that made this happen. You were so important in keeping me positive when the darkness threatened victory. I don't have the words to describe the feeling I had when reading your comments of encouragement...but then, the kindness of strangers will always be confronting in a thousand magical ways. It has such a delicious power that has truly floored me. Suffice to say, you are wonderful.
Today I feel exhilarated, exhausted, overwhelmed, relieved, powerful, back in semi-control, healthy, vital, excited, worried and incredibly blessed.
Fortunate. Special. I feel special. What an awesome, special gift.
How precious.
How precious.
Thank you.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Bun in the oven
I am pregnant.
There.
I've said it.
I am pregnant.
How does that sound?
That sounds just amazing...incredible, scary, beautiful, wonderful...all of those things.
But how long will it last?
God.
Who knows?
But I've got a hell of a lot of hope and enormous love around me to make it very possible.
WWWoooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!
I am now part of a very select group of people on the planet who know the exact time of conception. Well, not exactly conception, but pretty soon after...
2.15pm on Wednesday March 31.
The scientist came in and had a chat to me before the embryo transfer happened this afternoon.
Of the 16 eggs harvested, 12 fertilised - I think I mentioned that last time - and by today, eight had kept on dividing and showed signs of life (four started dividing, but didn't continue for a range of reasons).
So I had one very healthy one returned to its womb-y home today and we have seven others "on ice".
Apparently that first cab off the rank was an A-grade double-divide cell or something jargony. I asked what it meant and was told it was "near to the top" in terms of quality.
So, then, in it went...
Doc and the nurse had done 16 other embryo transfers today thanks to the pre-Easter rush, but they still managed to be genuinely happy when wishing me well - and wishing me pregnant. I could see it in their eyes...
So much so that I broke into tears as soon as I was in the change room with the door closed.
But I put my hand on my belly and said a little prayer for my little one and just told it to be strong and make a nice home there for the next nine months (and to, please, not make me too sick) - and now I'm crying again just writing about that moment!
Momentous...overwhelming...awesome.
Now, a strange assortment of emotions has descended upon me.
Firstly, I am afraid of being upright for too long...and have in fact been lying on the couch for about the past two hours and will have to return there soon in case gravity works some evil trick.
Similarly, I am quite worried about going to the loo, walking or lifting any heavy objects for fear that tiny little embryo might suddenly shoot out into oblivion.
I did in fact consider calling for a wheelchair as soon as the transfer happened...and hereafter for the coming nine months, but then realised I hadn't really thought about the associated logistics (or prepared my arm muscles for the strength required).
Of course, completely irrational thoughts...but ones that nonetheless exist.
Apart from that, I am filled with total wonder at how it all happened - and so quickly - and again for what will happen next.
I am pregnant.
Please let me stay that way.
There.
I've said it.
I am pregnant.
How does that sound?
That sounds just amazing...incredible, scary, beautiful, wonderful...all of those things.
But how long will it last?
God.
Who knows?
But I've got a hell of a lot of hope and enormous love around me to make it very possible.
WWWoooooowwwwwwwwwwwwwwww!
I am now part of a very select group of people on the planet who know the exact time of conception. Well, not exactly conception, but pretty soon after...
2.15pm on Wednesday March 31.
The scientist came in and had a chat to me before the embryo transfer happened this afternoon.
Of the 16 eggs harvested, 12 fertilised - I think I mentioned that last time - and by today, eight had kept on dividing and showed signs of life (four started dividing, but didn't continue for a range of reasons).
So I had one very healthy one returned to its womb-y home today and we have seven others "on ice".
Apparently that first cab off the rank was an A-grade double-divide cell or something jargony. I asked what it meant and was told it was "near to the top" in terms of quality.
So, then, in it went...
Doc and the nurse had done 16 other embryo transfers today thanks to the pre-Easter rush, but they still managed to be genuinely happy when wishing me well - and wishing me pregnant. I could see it in their eyes...
So much so that I broke into tears as soon as I was in the change room with the door closed.
But I put my hand on my belly and said a little prayer for my little one and just told it to be strong and make a nice home there for the next nine months (and to, please, not make me too sick) - and now I'm crying again just writing about that moment!
Momentous...overwhelming...awesome.
Now, a strange assortment of emotions has descended upon me.
Firstly, I am afraid of being upright for too long...and have in fact been lying on the couch for about the past two hours and will have to return there soon in case gravity works some evil trick.
Similarly, I am quite worried about going to the loo, walking or lifting any heavy objects for fear that tiny little embryo might suddenly shoot out into oblivion.
I did in fact consider calling for a wheelchair as soon as the transfer happened...and hereafter for the coming nine months, but then realised I hadn't really thought about the associated logistics (or prepared my arm muscles for the strength required).
Of course, completely irrational thoughts...but ones that nonetheless exist.
Apart from that, I am filled with total wonder at how it all happened - and so quickly - and again for what will happen next.
I am pregnant.
Please let me stay that way.
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