adjustments

The adjustment period of moving into my mom's has been relatively easy. in fact, I don't really feel like there's been much of an adjustment at all. After the initial shock of having to move and all the change, I think maybe the fit is just right. I miss the kids but at the same time I don't miss being around 24/7. One of the luxaries of being an aunt is being able to enjoy your nieces and nephews without feeling too much like a parent. The past two years have not been like that. The Monkey and I have been more like second parents than an aunt and uncle. We shared in the responsibility of doling out discipline, helping with school work, and plenty of other parenting duties. It's not that either of us minded, but it really affected the dynamics of our relationship with the kids. I want that to change. I don't want them to look at us so much as second parents anymore. I want to be Auntie Lissa and Uncle Monkey again. And while I don't want them to lose respect for us or think that we won't discipline them if we need to, I want them to think of us more as the ones they come see when they want to be... you know, spoiled.

You'd think with my BIL having gotten his way his attitude would have changed a bit. Yeah, not a chance. This weekend we rented a U-Haul to move our stuff into a different storage unit and get the majority of our things out of Michele's. The Monkey's brother came over and helped and we knocked it out in like three hours. While we were at Michele's, The Monkey and and his brother pretty much had to tackle all the big stuff by themselves. So rather than sit out in the heat, I retreated into the house to talk to my sister and meet my nephew's new (tattooed and pierced!) GF. It was crazy hot on Saturday. Even though we got started early, it was already well into the upper 80s by the time we got to my sister's. So when I went into the house I went into the kitchen cabinet and got a cup and helped myself to some icewater from the fridge. Whoever had ice before me had put it on crushed. I don't care for crushed ice so I switched it to cubes. Still, when I pushed the lever, the fridge spewed out some crushed ice first. Some missed my cup and a few bits landed on the floor. Oops. I picked up the bigger pieces but I wasn't overly concerned about hunting down ice on the linoleum kitchen floor. I mean, really. If I'd spilled Kool-Aid or iced tea or soda or even a large amount of water I would have mopped it up diligently, but a few pieces of crushed ice? Give me a break. I went to the living room and sat down to talk to my sister and my nephew. While my sister was engaged in a conversation with Becca, my nephew's girlfriend, I hear my BIL in the other room make some off-hand remark about "damn ice on the floor" in the kitchen. Oh. My. Freaking. God. Are you serious? Like this doesn't happen a zillion times a day with the kids! Mostly I thought it was funny because I knew he was trying to get to me. But here's the thing. He can pick at me all he wants. He can try to make me grovel at his feet for "all he did for me" until the day he dies. Until he acknowledges that HE benefited from The Monkey and me living there as much as we benefited from living there I have no reason to thank him. I have given thanks where thanks is due and that is to my sister. He is not going to stop me from coming around to see her or the kids. I don't give a damn what he does. I still have a key to the house because my sister told me to keep it. I will not relinquish it until she asks me to and he will not make me feel bad about using it whenever I damn well feel like it. I have a good mind to remind him off all the hell he put her and his children through over the past two years. I can't imagine what it would have been like for them had The Monkey and I not been there. All those nights my sister sat up and cried. The nights the kids came running to the garage during their screaming fights. So, whatever. I told my sister that she and those kids are HALF MINE too and he's just going to have to get used to it. And that's that.

In spite of everything, I really like being here at my mom's. It feels so much more permanent. So much more like home. I spent all day Friday hanging and rearranging and organizing all of my mom's clothes. This may sound like an easy task but the woman has more clothes than you can imagine. Enough that she fills FOUR closets. And this is after downsizing. Um, that's not including dressers. Or other folded clothes. Like t-shirts, tank tops, sweaters, and jeans. What can I say, the woman likes her variety. Aside from the throbbing pain I had in my neck afterwards, I mostly enjoyed myself. When my mom got home from work, she literally started crying. She's so adorable. I really don't think she ever thought it would get finishd. I kept telling her it would! I try to keep myself busy because the house is so quiet and empty during the day and that gets pretty lonely. Well, it's empty except for the five cats and the dog. That's pretty exciting. Which is kind of silly because we had five cats and a dog at Michele's. But our cats were trapped inside a box. Now all of our animals are together. We have four girls and two boys. The Chihuahua, Frankie, is my little side kick. He pretty much follows me around all day long. We're working on getting him fully house trained which is a bit of a pain. Little dog, little brain and all that. Most days he does pretty well; especially when I take him out regularly. I bought him a leash and harness to take him on walks but the little spaz reacted badly to being on a leash. (He basically freaked out and cowered and refused to move.) So there goes that idea. The cats are pretty hilarious. My boy (whose official name is William but answers to Fat Cat, Fat Boy, and Little Kitty) thinks he's a pimp. He's taken to chasing all four girls around the house at random which really pisses them off. Especially my mom's two, Muffin and Cupcake. Olivia is really happy. I honestly think she was starting to get cabin fever. She was starting to act really strange at Michele's. Jasmine has taken up residence in my mom's room. Which has also pissed my mom's cats off because that was their spot. There's something really endearing about waking up at 2:30 in the morning (which I've been sadly doing quite a lot) and finding a different sleeping cat on each of the sofas.

I have three active pills left in my pack of birth control. I'm considering going out on payday to buy a new basal body thermometer and starting up charting again. I need to start my essay for the IVF sponsorship or at least start jotting down my ideas. I'm going to need to schedule bloodwork and my yearly with my RE soon. I'm pretty sure I need a new prescription for my Synthroid. And I suppose we can talk about getting back on the TTC rollercoaster. I'm looking at starting off very slow. I think I just want to chart for now. Maybe see if my cycles are even remotely regular and if I'm ovulating on my own at all. That's probably the logical first step anyhow even though this raging case of baby fever I have wants me to being doing an IUI cycle yesterday. Must focus on more important things. Must focus on The Monkey's health. Must focus on losing some more weight (198 as of today, by the way). Must do what is necessary to better our financial situation (which is looking more and more like my filing bankruptcy). But, in the meantime, it will at least be nice to get out of this incredibly long holding pattern.

So it goes, so it goes.

a long December

A long December and there's reason to believe
Maybe this year will be better than the last...

December. What a month. A month that most view as joyous, exciting. A month that most long for; a month full of hope, wonderment, anticipation.

You'd think I'd be among the "most" being a December baby and all that but I look forward December with all the enthrallment of looking forward to an annual gynecological exam. A necessary evil; an unavoidable annoyance. It's not a fear of getting older; it's not the stress of the impending holidays. I think it is, more or less, the year coming to an end. Another chapter of my life closing without my permission. It's a time of reflection on the year passed and wondering what could've been had you done something just a little differently.

The smell of hospitals in winter
And the feeling that it's all a lot of oysters, but no pearls...

December grew to a new level of suck-tastic-ness last year. Being infertile makes you acutely aware of you body. It's inevitable, really. You learn your body's quirks; learn how and when to react to impending ovulation. Where most women go "Huh. I missed my period. Maybe I should take a pregnancy test?" there are those of us that research which home pregnancy tests register the lowest amounts of hCG so we can test days before our period is even due. In such, if we're fortunate enough to see two lines on one of those wretched pee sticks, we can immediately calculate where we are in our pregnancy, and thus, our expected due date. The guess work is all but completely removed. We know the exact day, perhaps even the hour, that we ovulated and thus can predict when to expect the arrival of a little bundle of joy better than any nurse or doctor on the face of this earth. This is a blessing and a curse. A blessing for those who go on to have happy, healthy, normal pregnancies and actually end up bringing home a new baby roughly 36 weeks later; a curse for those of us who only experience the joy of a new pregnancy fleetingly.

December 30, 2007. That was my due date. From the moment I saw those two glorious pink lines I began subconciously mapping out pregnancy milestones in my head. By summer, when I planned to attend my best friend's bridal shower, I would be around 15 weeks. I had visions of my west-coast buddies poking my [maybe by then] protruding tummy and giggling. I pictured myself waddling around the streets of San Francisco with a few of my good friends in tow; smiling in the sunshine of my favorite city. I saw myself in a costume on Halloween that would make my belly the center of attention. I saw myself happily helping myself to seconds at Thanksgiving dinner because I really and truly was still hungry. And then I saw myself in December. Oh glorious month of December; month of hope and happiness and anticipation! I saw myself struggling fruitlessly to bake Christmas cookies and my family chastising me for doing so. I saw myself on Christmas day hoping that I wouldn't disrupt the holiday festivities by going into labor a few days early. I even saw myself on New Year's Eve, still full of baby, wondering how much longer I'd go overdue.

It's not like I was doing any of this purposefully. I knew, long before I found out I was pregnant, that having PCOS carries with it a higher risk of miscarriage. I'd been around the infertile [online] community long enough to know that just because you got pregnant did not mean you were going to stay that way long enough to bring home a baby. However, the subconcious mind is not a rational creature. It is the part of our collective conciousness that thwarts the more rational and endlessly more predictive (and stable) concious mind. It betrays us at every turn. Our concious mind builds up these nice, safe walls of logic and certainties only to have our subconcious mind push us off the ledge of those walls with a little nudge of unwanted hope. A quiet utterance of but what if? But I've come to realize that it's all but impossible to keep my subconcious mind under wraps. Try as I may -- and believe me, I DO try -- I just can't seem to do it. It was my subconcious mind that put all these thoughts into my head thus setting me up for eventual failure.

Five weeks, two days pregnant and it was over. All those subconcious fantasies gone up in smoke in the instant the nurse returned to my ER room and muttered the words "I'm sorry. Your beta dropped." Those words left a gaping hole in my chest; in my heart. While the hole has healed a great deal in the past 19 months, it is still a hole underneath. When poked, the surface reopens revealing a fresh, unhealed wound that takes days, weeks, months to reheal. It doesn't help that I have a daily, living, breathing reminder of the hole. My niece was born a mere month before her cousin should have been born. As much as I love my sister, watching her pregnancy progress along the 'natural' course was like hearing those words over and over and over again. And now, every milestone my niece passes, I watch with mixed emotions. I watch with the pure, unadulterated joy and unconditional love of the aunt that I am. And I watch, simultaneously, with the raw emotion of a should-have-been parent; of an infertile.

I do still have some inkling of hope that, someday, I will not dread December. That the end of another year will not mean another year that we failed to get (and stay) pregnant. That one December, someday, will mean our baby's first Christmas. And if it doesn't happen I still have hope that someday, some December will not mean agonizing over what could have -- should have -- been. That someday, some December I'll find that the hole isn't so much a hole anymore.

And it's been a long December and there's reason to believe
Maybe this year will be better than the last
I can't remember all the times I tried to tell my myself
To hold on to these moments as they pass

The Changeling

So much is changing. I've spent the last five years of my existance focusing on having a family; making a baby. I'm not as focused on that anymore. I'm more preoccupied with my next mood swing and will it be destructive like the last few have. Meh.

I'm adjusted on 1200mg of Lithium daily now. I'm also still taking 15 mg of Abilify and 1/2 a mg of Xanax PRN and 10 mg of Ambien PRN. I seem to PRN my PRN drugs a lot more than I should. Double meh.

I'm not completely done/given up TTC. In fact, I fully intend on having sex tonight in an effort to maybe catch a miracle egg. My hopes are not high but ideas are soaring through my head. What would it be like to get pregnant without any assistance. Without needle pokes and visits with the dildo cam? I imagine it would be nothing short of miraculous. But I am about to ovulate according to my OPKs and my body signs (not to mention the wicked ovulation pain I had yesterday afternoon). Perhaps this will be my lucky egg... perhaps not.

I'm trying to work on my tan. Jergen's "Natural Glow" is lending me a hand. Fake tanning is a trip. I just want that "healthy" looking glow. It's working, too.

Tony and I will be starting back on the South Beach Diet next week, also. I need to lose at least 25 pounds by summertime. The first 10 should come off rather easy it'll be that second 15 that'll hold me up. But I'm going to try, I have to try.

Mother's Day this weekend. The thought of it makes me want to slit my wrists.

5 years and the journey ends

Five years ago today Tony and I threw out our condoms and decided that we were going to have a baby. I didn't expect it to happen immediately but I never would've imagined I'd be sitting here childless five years later.

The whole thing makes me sad, angry, jealous, and bitter.

I don't want to be finished but we are and that's that. I need a new hobby.

life sucks

And I'm completely out of Ambien.

Tomorrow is my fourth anniversary. Which is now "overshadowed" by the anniversary of my miscarriage 10 days later. I hate this. I hate being back on Lithium. I want to try again. But I can't and we won't and it's over. I wish I could erase it all from my memory and not want a baby anymore.

I really wish I had some Ambien.

Sanity vs. TTC

After 5 years of this bullshit I don't even really know 100% for sure that I want kids anymore. If it was meant to be, surely it would've happened by now. Ugh. I hate this indifference.

My biggest issue right now is my mental health/instability. I'm going crazy on a daily basis. I'm headed to my pdoc in about 15 minutes where we'll probably decide to put me back on Lithium because I need some sort of mood stabilization and I need it now. Lithium is completely contraindicated in pregnancy so the question remains... sanity or TTC?

I think I'm going with sanity for now. Like I said, I can't even say for sure that I want a baby/kids anymore. The big problem here is that Tony does know 100% for sure that he wants kids.

I'm afraid my marriage is falling apart and it's all because my body doesn't work the way it's supposed to. I don't know what I'll do if I lose the love of my life because I'm infertile and/or crazy.

Life sucks, understand?

be kind, rewind

Let's recap. In the past five years I have been through seemingly endless treatments. I've done rounds upon rounds of Clomid - no success. Then I started treatments with an RE of my very own (Dr. Honea) and was diagnosed with Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome and insulin resistance - something I knew I had long before I was officially diagnosed. Then I had my first of three HSGs at which time I was diagnosed with a blocked tube. Then I had a laparoscopy/hysteroscopy to remove polyps that were blocking said tube. Everything looked fine elsewhere. Two months later I experienced the most heartbreaking event of my life - the miscarriage of a baby I just knew I was meant to have. A year later we hadn't had any further success despite using stronger and more effective fertility drugs (injectables). Then I had my first of two SIS procedures, the second of which revealed the regrowth of the polyps I'd had removed just a short year ago. A week ago I had my annual physical at which time it came to light that I have hypothyroidism. Now I'm on Synthroid and Glucophage on top of my meds for bipolar disorder. Yesterday I had my second laparoscopy/hysteroscopy during which polyps were removed and a D&C was performed. My tubes are both open, which is a small victory, but they discovered Stage II endometriosis - another diagnosis to add to my ever growing list of diagnoses.

Five years. Five long years and I have nothing to show for it except a long, long list of diagnoses and procedures that I now have under my belt. And a gaping hole in my heart that my little Buttefly was supposed to fill.

I'm tired but I'm not ready to give up. I'm in pain but I have to remember it's going to be worth it. Someday.

I'm not sure how long it's going to be before we can start trying again. Probably at least one cycle. So that blows our chances for a 2008 baby. But I'm happy with the increased chances of a 2009 baby.

Post-op appointment is on the 27th. Hopefully we'll know more about our chances then.

another diagnosis

This morning my RE called and told me that my TSH is elevated. They are starting me on Synthroid immediately. It wasn't terribly bad, just slightly above normal (somewhere just over 3.0), but they treat anyone 3.0 and above so lucky me.

This is not a bad diagnosis, in fact, I'm pleased. Lately my weight loss efforts have been thwarted on every turn. In the past, I could diet (cut calories) and lose weight fairly easily. Granted it was never much weight (10 lbs or so) but it came off rather easily when I put my mind to it. So recently I started walking and cutting back on my calories and I maybe lost three or four pounds. The thought "muscle weighs more than fat" came to mind but my clothes weren't fitting any differently, either. It's nice to know that my thyroid could be the culprit. I guess we'll see. I start Synthroid today and am hoping that I see results rather quickly.

In other news... only three days left until surgery! Hoorah!

one last chance

Pregnancy can be so contrite. Why does it have to take so darn long to cook a baby anyway? I was examining the calendar today - something I should really avoid, to be honest. My surgery is March 14th. I am on birth control until then so there's not even a chance of a "surprise!" pregnancy between now and then. (Not that I was really expecting that anyway, but really.) So, surgery on the 14th and then I can throw out my birth control pills and wait for the witch to show her ugly face. I'm guessing it'll take five to seven days for her to show. We'll say somewhere around March 21st is CD 1. Oh goodie. Provided everything follows my mock timeline perfectly (and we all know it won't) I'm hoping to trigger around the 2nd and get my IUI around the morning of the 4th. (I'm basing my dates off my last injects cycle which went remarkably well.)

In a perfect world, I would be pregnant and due December 26, 2008. One last chance at a 2008 baby.

This hardly seems fair to me at all.

sitting, waiting, wishing

It has come to my realization that my chances for a 2008 baby are dwindling faster than I can possibly catch up. I'm on birth control until after surgery day and then I'll have to wait until AF shows up before I can start a new cycle. Hopefully that won't take long but there's really no telling.

The anniversary of our miscarriage is approaching and I so hoped to be pregnant before then. It seems so odd because that day is still so fresh in my memory. It's like a wound that hasn't quite healed. How can it already be a year later? How can it already be a year later and I might not even get a chance to try again before then?

It would be pretty spectacular to be due in December again. I was excited about having a December baby. I remember imagining myself at Halloween, Thanksgiving, and Christmas - big belly protruding past my feet; not worrying about how much food I'd eaten at Thanksgiving dinner. Planning Halloween costumes around a big pregnant belly. Helping my sister bake Christmas cookies and stealing bits of cookie dough. I have a very active imagination, ok?

That longing that I'd gotten rid of for a while has returned. That aching; that yearning to be pregnant and nothing else. I really hope surgery fixes everything and I can get pregnant as quickly as I did last time. And stay pregnant, of course!

In the mean time, my main focus/goal in life is to LOSE WEIGHT. No surprise there. I'm obsessed with my weight! [sigh] My short term goal is to lose 15 more pounds by the time I have surgery. It's a lot but I'm sure I can do it. I've been doing pretty good with my eating. I was naughty and skipped exercising yesterday, though. I will NOT be doing that tonight. My midterm goal is to lose 20 more pounds by June which will put me around...eee gads...190. My long term goal is to get back down to 150 at the most. We'll see how things go. Right now, I'm focusing on the short term goal. 15 measly little pounds. I can do it! Must drink plenty of water, too. Hrrmph.

Wait, is this 2007 or 2008?

So yesterday's SHG showed that I do indeed have polyps again. And possibly some small fibroids. The answer? Of course! Surgery. AGAIN.

This is starting to be about as good as 2007 started. Meh.

The good news is I'm treatable. AND my BFF is coming to visit for the procedure. Yay!! She's flying all the way from California just for me. :)

I teeter between tired... and really, really tired...

Yesterday was not a good day. I suspected something wasn't exactly right when my period decided to up and leave after having been present for three whole days. What I didn't expect was to see a pocket of fluid trapped in my uterus on my baseline ultrasound. The results? Canceled cycle.

Well screw me blue, will ya?

I'm so tired of the bullshit that comes along with TTC. It's getting really old and it's getting there fast. I'm sick of the waiting game, y'know? It's one thing to be in the thick of it but this sitting around waiting for tests and procedures just kills.

So the plan is a repeat SHG on the 7th in Birmingham with my RE. This actually doesn't upset me the way it should. I have to drive three and a half hours for a fifteen minute procedure. It hardly seems fair, right? But it's really no big deal because I love seeing my RE and I love going to Birmingham. It's a win/win for me. Now if I can just get good results on the SHG I'll be a happy camper. I'm not expecting it, though. In fact, I'm prepared to hear "You need surgery," again. Such is the life of me.

In the mean time, my focus is back on the weight loss thing. And the health thing. I started back on vitamins and so did Tony. Plus we're both taking Glucomannan as a dietary supplement to help us lose weight and lower cholesterol. And I'm excercising (walking) every day and that feels really good. I just gotta stick with it. If I can stick with it for longer than a week, it'll become habit and that'll be good. I'm sick of being fat. I'm sick of being lazy. I'm sick of being the way that I am. So I'm going to change it. As much as I can, anyway.

And that's that.

it's a whole new you, Charlie Brown

So I finally got AF today after waiting 40 days. 40 days is a long time! Interestingly enough, I started today, which is the 1st of the month. I think this is a first for me! Hah!

So Monday I go to Montgomery for my baseline appointment. Hoping all will be well inside. Then, hopefully, on Wednesday I'll be heading to Birmingham to see my RE personally to have my SHG repeated. My mom and sister are going to be going with me so we can go shopping afterwards.

So far AF has been good to me. Hardly any cramps to speak of. The only precursor was a wicked-bad migraine yesterday which I had to call in sick because of. No big, though.

I'm hyper. Thinking of starting acupuncture courtesy of my BFF. Nervous and excited about this cycle. Not sure what to expect, really. Worried about DH's counts for some reason. Worried that I have polyps again. Just worried in general.

[sigh]

ever the defeated one

Sometimes I feel like I'm never going to get pregnant. Like I'm chasing after something that's just NOT meant to be.

And it makes me so very sad.

Sad because I'm losing hope. And sad because I don't deserve to be going through all of this. And sad because I am tired of being so bitter. And sad because I am tired of feeling so guilty for wanting to live a life that doesn't revolve around TTC.

And I'm just so sad about all of it. And I don't have anyone (IRL) that really understands how I feel.

therapy 101

So my session yesterday wasn't too bad. I really wasn't feeling particularly down anymore and it's so hard to say "I was feeling depressed two days ago, but now I feel okay." without feeling like a complete moron. But I told her anyway and, if necessary, we'll look at shifting some meds around. I'm hoping restarting the Topamax will be the ultimate "boost" that I need to stay moodswing free for a while at least.

We also discussed TTC. She stays up on that because that is the primary reason I started going to therapy. I was just tired of being so bitter towards other women. Anyhow, we talked about a few different things and then she brought up that she has another patient that has been TTC for about seven years. So now she's looking into starting a support group for infertile women! I'm very excited! It may take a while but the prospect of meeting people that are going through the same thing I am is really encouraging. Not that I'd wish IF on anyone, but it's nice to know you're not alone. I have all my online friends and I love and appreciate you very much, but nothing compares to having someone to talk to IRL. (If I lived closer to Birmingham, this wouldn't be a problem. [le sigh])

In other news, school is stressing me out to no end. This class is a lot harder than I expected. Hmmph. Programming can bite me, I just want to get to the web developing!! My next class is going to be my second and final math class. That should be a nice eight weeks. (It's all self-paced so I could finish it in two weeks and have six weeks off! Or something similar, you get the picture.) Following that I'll be taking either Biology or Astronomy. I haven't decided which. I'm leaning more towards Biology because I'm good at Biology. But Astronomy seems so interesting and I love looking at the stars. So I guess we'll see.

I also need to do my FAFSA which means I need to file our taxes. Tony and I both got our W2s back so it's time! If the 2007 H&R Block Tax Estimator is right, we'll be getting around $4,000 back this year. w00t w00t! This excites me to no end. We are going to get a new mattress and box spring, pay off the WaMu credit card and still have some money left over. Hooray! I'm really looking forward to being mostly debt free again.

revisiting TTC

Last night I arbitrarily asked Tony whether or not he ever questioned wanting kids. He said 'Absolutely not. I want kids.' So that's that. If there were ever a doubt in my mind that we shouldn't have kids, it's pretty much out the window now. My husband really wants one and I want one (most of the time) so it's settled. Back on the TTC train we go.

Next stop - injects with IUI. I'm not sure if it'll be this cycle or after we get our taxes back. I'm thinking tax season is a better bet (so we don't drain our savings). Part of me has considered financing a few IUIs. I guess we'll see how things go.

My next step is a repeat SHG with my RE. Last time I had it done in Montgomery with my nurse practitioner. They saw something by my cervix but couldn't really decipher what it was on the ultrasound photos. So my RE wants to do it herself so she can see it firsthand. Which means I have to drive to Birmingham in the next few weeks. (Not that this bothers me. I love Birmingham!) I'm hoping I don't need surgery again. I'll be pissed if I do. Only time will tell.

In the mean time, I am taking prometrium for 10 days to induce AF. Good times, good times.

ooh loook! a little plastic castle

There's a song, forever and ever a favorite of mine, that refers to a goldfish's memory (or lack thereof) and how the little plastic castle is a surprise every time. I feel like a goldfish today. I can't concentrate on anything for more than a few minutes. I have this big project looming over me all ominous and threatening like but even that isn't motivation enough to get it done. Oh wells. I'm sure I can finish it Monday (when I'll hopefully be more focused).

I blame myself, of course. I know for sure I forgot to take my meds last night. (The storms and everything threw me off.) And I think I might've forgotten them the night before. Grrr... hiss. I know I'm okay with the anti-depressants because Prozac has a half life of like six days. So I'm good there. But I'm not sure what the half life of Abilify is. Hrmm. Must research. Noted: 75 hours. So I should be okay there too. I guess it's the caffeine that's made me all loopy. Anyways.

Something wonderful happened to me today. My niece SMILED at me for the first time! That gorgeous little baby grin just melted my heart. She did it repeatedly, too, so I know it wasn't a fluke! She's already gotten so big. If I don't see her for a week she's changed so much by the time I see her again. Amazing.

All my TTC stuff is on hold. I'm planning on drinking again this weekend. I figured fuck it, right? What do I have to lose? If I don't live my life now and I still don't have a baby five years down the road I know for sure that I will regret it. I still plan on doing injects and IUI but I'm not going to stress myself out about it anymore. It's just gotten to be such an unhealthy thing to immerse myself in. Instead, I'm focusing on me (and Tony) in the here and NOW. And I feel much, much better! I've also decided that my meds, no matter what unknowns may be, are a must. They have to stay, TTC, pregnant, or not. The risks are too great. I was in such a bad place just a few weeks ago. I can't go to that place while I'm carrying a child - or even now! It's not a fun place to go, I promise. Just so it's made clear, bipolar disorder is a disorder that cannot be fixed or treated (very often) with just therapy. I knew this when I stopped my meds but I wanted to give it a go anyway. It just doesn't work. At least not for me. Bipolar disorder is chemical - my brain (not mind) doesn't work right and when those chemicals go wacky, consequently, so do I. So that's that.

I'm very eager for this day to be OVER so I can go home, finish my homework, and start my freaking weekend!

girls' day out

I spent the better part of my day today shopping with my mom, sister, Madison, and David. We started in Old Navy and somehow my mom and sister managed to keep us there for an hour and a half. Sheesh. I think that's the longest I've ever spent in Old Navy in one "sitting". Oh well, I wound up finding a new vest (I'm totally into the vest look because it hides my tummy) and two long-sleeved t-shirts to go with said vest. After our adventures in Old Navy we went to Ulta. Ulta is quickly becoming my new vice. In the last couple months I've had to have spent a good $200. Probably more. I'm sure it's more. The problem is eyeshadow. I've quickly become addicted to eyeshadow since finding some great tutorials on You Tube. I used this tutorial and wound up with this kickass look:





Yep. I know everyone loves seeing my big mug REALLY up close like that but I love my eyes. If I was given the opportunity to modify my body I would not change my eyes. It's the one feature I have that I know other people admire and that I love about myself. At least it's something, right?

At any rate, I came home with six new eye pigments by Loreal High Intensity Pigments (they were buy one get one free... who could resist??) two shade sticks (one black, one white), and a purple shimmery eyeshadow by NYX. I did my best to steer clear of Urban Decay. Eeek!

In other news (though I'm sure this is just wishful thinking) I felt a peculiar wetness down below this afternoon and arbitrarily decided to check my cervix. Definitely soft, somewhat open, and pretty high. So I took an OPK on a whim and there's a destinct line there. It's not real dark but I've definitely had lighter. I was going to start progesterone supplements to get ready to induce AF but I think I'll wait a few days. I need some "on time" at work before I go rushing off to appointments in Montgomery every other week anyhow. Wouldn't it be some shit if I wound up pregnant this cycle. If that happens I'll never hear the end of it. (That whole "in God's time" speech. Ugh.) Still, it would be pretty crazed. I think I'll boink my husband for the hell of it every other night this week.

Also, my meds are starting to work their magic. I'm going to start back on Topamax this week, I think. But, yeah, Abilify rocks my world! It gives me energy, focus, and it curbs my appetite like crazy! w00t w00t!

so much to so little

Christmas is almost over. I wasn't really feeling it this year. Last year I baked cookies and slaved over pies. I pitched in with dinner. I was so...holly jolly it was cliché.

Not this year. I guess I'm just tired. Tired that my life is so fulfilling but I can't appreciate it fully because of what I lack. I hate being like this. It's not a healthy way to live but I really can't seem to get past wanting a baby. (More like, wanting a family with my husband.)

It all sort of hit at once. I was successfully suppressing everything. I had a few too many Tom Collins this weekend with my brother-in-law and my dad. (Tony was DD so I could drink.) I relaxed. Or at least I tried to. I drowned everything in a overflow of material things and family comraderie. It was working until this evening when I went to make the "rounds" on the Internet and read my LJ friends' page and saw a pregnancy announcement. Needless to say, I bawled. It's not that I'm not happy for her, because I am, but some pregnancy announcements just sting quite a bit more than others. Any this time of year are going to be extra-sucktastic. Throw in the recent negative beta, starting my period the day before Christmas, and my expected due date coming up and I was really just bound to implode.

I said this last year and I hope it's a lot truer this year than last... 2008 has got to be better than 2007, right?

Maybe I'll get a nice raise this week.

For now, I'm going to take as many muscle relaxers as my body will feasibly tolerate and sleep, sleep, sleep.

fuck it all

At 10 DPO in April I had a BFP instantly on a good HPT. Nothing today. So I'm pretty much over this cycle. I'm so sick of my body. Sick to death of it.

I'm going to go take a Demerol and hopefully sleep for a few days.

I hate the fucking holidays.