Brought To You By First Response

I'm pretty sure I'm not pregnant this cycle. Scratch that. I'm not fucking pregnant. And not being pregnant is pretty hard to think about.

DPO after DPO - and nothing. I hated coming to this blog with nothing to write about.

My boobs aren't sore.
I'm not bloated.
I've got just as much gas as I would any other day of the month.
No metal taste in the mouth.
No implantation cramps.
No implantation bleeding.
My cervix is like a yo-yo- there's no rhyme or reason to that damn thing.
Cervical mucus? Hell I think I always have cervical mucus. 

Two BFNs. One at 10 DPO and one at 12DPO. 

Not. Fucking. Pregnant. 

This message brought to you by First Response. 

First TWW 1 DPO: Continued

From 9:30 am to 2:30pm the symptoms are as follows:
Boobs: nothing
CM: dry
Cervix: High, soft, closed
Temp: I don't temp
OPK: I think I'm done testing
Cramps: Twinges every now and then

NOTE: Yesterday I had a headache and tons of the right kind of CM around 12:30pm. 

Conclusion: no symptoms.

Look I'm not an idiot, I know there's like zero chance of having any pregnancy symptoms at 1 DPO. But I've got to do something to pass the time. 

First TWW: 1 DPO &....Mars

Officially in the first Two Week Wait. Meaning, I had a surge, we BD'd, I think I O'd yesterday, so today is Day 1. 

No, I don't temp. Not yet. And yes, we only BD'd  once this cycle. The day I got the positive. We were at my mom's okay, stop judging.

This is going to be, hopefully, a running commentary full of what I'm sure will be a crazy symptom spotting, boob squeezing, mucus checking, dialogue with myself. And today is Day 1. 

I woke at 8:30 am. Sunday. I woke up tired. Okay. I fixed breakfast (pop tarts- I know, go me), cleaned the kitchen, and started a load of laundry. 

9:30 am. My husband walked into the kitchen with his plastic Star Wars cup that he uses as a coffee cup. Yes we have coffee cups. We have a ton of coffee cups. He just likes that cup. 

He walked into the kitchen and popped out the old K-cup. We have one of those cool at first then later impossibly annoying and expensive Keurig coffee makers. I mean, $10 for a box of 10 coffee K-cups! He popped in a new cup, snapped the lid shut, and punched the button. Our Keurig coffee maker sounds like it's lifting off when it's fixing a brew. 

BRRRBRRBRRBRRBRRBRRBRRBRBRBRBRBRRGLGUGLGUGLUG g guggugugugg guzzle hiiiiiiisssssssssssss.   

Steam curled off the top of Obi Wan's head and I saw the plastic cup melt a little. No, he doesn't care that he's melting a perfectly good one dollar plastic cup from the Dollar Store. Nor does he care about  the flecks of paint and plastic melting into his coffee.   

"We're in the two week wait," I said to him. 

No, he doesn't know what that means.

His response? He found evidence of life on Mars. 

How does a wife react to a husband who seriously thinks he discovered life on Mars? 

"That's nice." 

"You don't believe me."

Well no... "It's not that I don't believe you... I just don't...," care, "...think it's that big of a deal." 

If the NASA rover discovered a stash of Martians planning a Martian New Year's Eve party I wouldn't give two shits so long as I was still getting BFN's. 

"You'll see," he said, "When NASA makes the announcement, I was the first one to know!" 

"Okay hun." ....Meanwhile....Oh my god my boobs feel sore! 

Cycle Day 6

I've been googling OPK stuff and I found a great website with some interesting FAQs.

POAS - OPK FAQ

To date I've pee'd on 5 OPKs. This is cycle day 6.

I've slowed down on the baby forums. I started seeing a lot of the same posts and since I don't have anything new to report bodily function wise it was getting a little boring. I'm done with my period, and now I'm waiting for the smiley face.

Waiting! Ugh. I hate the waiting.

And if you don't know, Clearblue digital ovulation predictor kits give you a smiley face when an LH surge is detected. And if that sentence gave you more questions then answers then let me rephrase. The smiley face means HAVE SEX! (For those TTCing).

I'm worried I'll get my smiley face on Thanksgiving, at my mother's house, five hours away. I can just imagine us excusing ourselves from the turkey and sneaking off to the blow up mattress in the spare bedroom. EW!

Cycle Day 1 - Again

I started my second cycle November 13. I woke up to it. It was a nice little, whoa before my morning coffee. It was five/six days early. 

Before my D&C I had pretty regular cycles, 28/30 days. Nothing crazy. Now, I have no idea. It's like I'm 13 and starting my period for the first time. 

BUT since this marks the beginning of my second cycle it means we are free to start trying again! Whoo hoo! 

That wasn't an accurate expression of my true excitement. I say again: WHOOOOOOOO HOOOOO!

And let me just say, In my experience peeing on an HPT is like taking your car to the car wash. Want rain? Wash your car. Want a period? Pee on a stick.

Eating With the Dead

My two previous ramblings about the Indian Funeral had a point. And that point is, the tribe of my husband believes that in the hours after the burial the dead will share with the family a last meal, a feast.

We shared a meal with my husband's grandmother, after her family took up shovels and rakes, took off jackets and hats, and buried her themselves. The men dispatched by the county to take care of such things stood in the background in their faded denim, watching the family take up their shovels.

Grapes of Wrath dirt makes a terrible lonely and hollow thud when it hits a casket 6 feet deep. Being Baptist, I'd never heard such a sound. Baptists don't usually bury their dead. We don't eat with them either...

But my husband's tribe does. And during the feast, while I sat behind my husband, spouses can't sit beside the blood-kin, I thought about our little one, gone too soon. The family probably wondered why the white girl was crying on her fry bread.

I didn't just eat with his grandmother. I ate with my baby too.

The Effect of Not Knowing

I'm putting myself through agony. My husband and I BD'd November 1 and November 8. I O'd somewhere in between those days.  

I've counted from October 22nd to today, and to yesterday, and to the day before that. I've counted so many times I have to count again to make sure what day this is. And still I'm not sure. Is it 8dpo? Or 6? Or 7? 

And every online ovulation calculator, calendar, chart, etc says something different. I might as well not even waste my time relying on those. But I will. Because I can't help it. The process is such a mystery, so uncontrollable, so stealthy, so secretive in my own body that it doesn't even seem fair! 

Why is my body keeping secrets from me! Or did it tell me, and I wasn't listening???  That's the real agonizing question. And then I started wondering, was that cervical mucus stretchier than I thought it was? Did I feel twinges the other day? Is this stuffy nose trying to tell me something?

When I'm lying on the bathroom floor with legs spread and feet on the counter and finger in my yoo-hoo up to my knuckle and I'm thinking, is it open, or closed...open...it feels soft, what does hard feel like..am I even touching my cervix...-Okay that's when I know this baby making thing has gone beyond rational.  

But whatever. When I go to the bathroom at work I don't care if  my co-workers wonder why I'm taking so long in there. I check my panties, I look at the toilet paper, I look for mucus. I pull my shirt up and look at my boobs, are they bigger, is that a vein, are my nipples sore, are they tender, do they stand out more? 

And then the following day I think...was my cervix soft yesterday? Or did I imagine that. 

Ovaries Are Saying Yes. I'm Sure They Are.

Right now I'm thinking about sex. 

I think sometime this weekend I either ovulated or am about to ovulate. Sometimes women just know. Besides, it's CD14. (remember the abbreviations).  If we had sex today I think it would happen. 

"IT" should be obvious. 

I think it would. 

Damn that doctor and her Two Cycle Limitation. If I bring it up to my husband I think he'd say no. I think he would not want to have unprotected sex. Even though we had unprotected sex three days ago... 

Do I ask him if he wants to have sex, to TTC? Or leave it alone... It's frustrating. I honestly think two cycles is dumb. There's so much conflicting information about how long to wait. I also honestly am afraid to go against doctor's advice.

Anyway, I send this question out into the internet void. 

November! Finally!

October is over. I'm still tense, waiting to see if November will hit us with the force of this past October. We've had so much going on the last thirty days.

It's the second of November and so far the remaining pets are still alive, no one is sick, no one is dead (again), and we got paid. Although we do have to go to a funeral Saturday. My husbands grandmother died October 31st. I guess that was the creme de la creme - in other words, the icing on the cake, the straw that broke the camels back, the cherry on top - and every other corny phrase that basically means:

"can't shit just get better already?!"

It has to be better because my husband and I BD'd for the first time since the end of September. When we found out the baby had no heartbeat October 4th it was just weird to think about "doing it" with you know...yeah....

Then after the surgery I  was on two weeks of "pelvic rest" - no tampons, douches or penises - Doctor's own words.

November 1st we did "it"! Without a condom. Which is a little nerve wracking because... well if you've been reading you know the because. If you not, let me fill you in: Missed miscarriage in October at 10 weeks, then D&C, then first cycle October 22nd, then we were told wait another cycle to start trying.

I'm only 22 days from the D&C. I've had one cycle. I'm scrounging around baby bump forums reading about others getting pregnant after a D&C. There is sooooo much conflicting information out there.

For today I've decided to take the "if I'm ready it will happen if I'm not it won't" approach. Because after all, what the hell else can I do?

6 Weeks

"Try again in December." That's what the doctor said. "It'll go by fast, with the holidays."

My husband said, "It's a little over one month. It's not long." 

This is exactly how long it is:
It is 4,205,648 seconds
It is 70,094 minutes 
It is 1,169 hours
It is 48 days
It is 6 weeks

What am I going to do for 6 weeks? It feels like an eternity. 

This may sound dramatic, but you can't look at someone dying of thirst and say, "wait 6 more weeks, you'll be fine. Just focus on something else for a little while." Does that person just stop being thirsty? No. I wouldn't think so.

How Stupid

How stupid was I? To think I could get pregnant again, so soon after the D&C. 

We discovered no heartbeat October 4. I was 10 weeks pregnant. The baby measured 9 weeks. I was sent home, told to wait. In my older posts I talk about the wait, and the decision, and the surgery. 

After the D&C my first cycle started October 22. I thought we could start trying again. I thought we could be carrying the news home for Thanksgiving. I thought this could be the week.

The doctor sat down in front of me today. One of her eyes is a little...off. Sometimes it rolls a bit, not much but enough to notice. I always try  not to stare, to focus on what she's telling me. It's only the third time I've seen her so, I haven't gotten over the initial- shock is too strong a word, lets call it "awareness." The initial awareness that something's not quite right with one eye. 

Anyway, she looks at me with her eyes, both of them this time, and asks what the plan is. "Um, well...I started last Monday, my first cycle. Bled for five days..." At this point see I was still thinking we would be back in the baby making sack by Saturday. I was thinking she was going to agree with me.  

"We're ready to start right away." I said that last bit positively, with certainty, this is what we want. 

My doctor looks like a grandmother. With a lazy eye. She's older, she feels maternal, she even sounds like a grandmother. Her speech is soft and a little slow, and she punctuates every bit of her bad news with a smile, a smile that says it hurts now but wait, it won't hurt long.  

"Well," she says, "you know when a woman gets pregnant so soon after something like this there is a 50/50 chance, " and I KNEW she was going to say "they get pregnant again." I was ecstatic! I had built this moment up in my head, I KNEW what she was going to say. 50% chance we'll be pregnant again, I'll be eating turkey for two by Thanksgiving. I knew she said that. I knew it. 

So stupid. 50% chance of being pregnant again? That doesn't even make sense. Where did I get that? 

"There's a 50/50 chance of another miscarriage." That's what she really said. And when you read in books that common little phrase, "took a minute to sink in," ha, I know exactly what that feels like. 

For the first time in my whole entire life something "took a minute to sink in." 

Did she just say that? Why? She's telling me to wait. She's telling me its safer. She's telling me she wants to monitor my progesterone. She's telling me it's better to do it this way. 

I don't believe her. And I'm angry. And I feel stupid. 

The Heron

My husband and I had to attend a democratic thing. A dinner. No, correction. A "roundup." 

"What's a Democratic Roundup?" My husband asked the girls in the front office. That's what we call them, The Girls. Even though one is old enough to be our grandmother. They giggled at him. They always giggle at him. Even when he's throwing a tantrum - which sometimes happens. 

"It's where you wear your best cowboy boots and hat," the youngest of The Girls said. Only she said it where the word "hat" sounded like "haaaiit." You know, fake country, long and drawn out. "Then you eat BBQ and cornbread." Again, fake country. Long and drawn out. 

Turns out she wasn't far off. There was a "Best Dressed Cowboy," and "Best Dressed Cowgirl" award for the night. And we ate brisket with BBQ sauce. 

Driving to the "roundup" the two lane blacktop curves around, hugging what is like a wet meadow. Standing in the glassy water was a heron. I was driving, and caught just a brief glimpse as we sped past. I would not have seen the bird at all if my husband hadn't stirred in the seat beside me. "Here lately I've seen that bird every time I come through here." 

"I don't remember ever seeing that bird," I said. 
"I do, I've seen it every time lately."
"Maybe it's just you."

He laughed, "I'll call it Cooper." 
"Good ol' Coop," it was my turn to laugh.

Later, after dinner, thinking about the heron I Googled "heron symbolism." 

Apparently Native Americans believe herons represent the ability to move forward, they also represent lessons in patience.

Coincidence? Maybe. 

Then again, my husband is Native American.  

CD2

I have never been so excited see AF.

All the melancholy, morose feelings were gone. Thank you Jesus. I'm normal.

I'm officially counting now. Monday was the day. The real first cycle day. And today is CD2.

If you don't know what AF or CD2 means, let me explain. If you do know, were you as shocked as I was to learn all the acronyms and abbreviations on the internet for women TTC'ing, or, in other words, trying to conceive? It's a whole new language!

Some of my favorites are:
CD - Cycle day
O- Ovulation
AF- Aunt Flow
DPO - Days past ovulation
CM - Cervical mucus (gross I know, but you get surprisingly wrapped up in what your mucus looks like during the TWW)
TWW - Two week wait (that painfully agonizing two weeks post ovulation before you can get your BFP)
BFP - big fat positive
BFN - big fat negative

Those are just a few, there's a whole host of baby bump related letters. I'm a pregnancy forum stalking junkie.

I'm Being Selfish Today- On Purpose.

Turns out, I may not be having my cycle. After the initial bleed it stopped. And nothing else happened. Today there's nothing. 

Last night I wallowed in self pity. I made a playlist of sappy songs. I cried. I stayed up too late. Had one too many rum and cokes. And fell asleep on the couch. I woke up this morning with gummy eyes and a bad taste in my mouth. And I smelled bad. 

And to top off that late night pity party- I'm being selfish. I'm purposefully skipping out on a baby shower today. As I am typing the expectant mommy is probably drinking pink punch and laughing at melted snickers in diapers. 

I can't do the fake poopy game today. Not today.

First Cycle Day?!

Am I having my first cycle day since the D&C?! No way. It's way to soon. But when I looked again, it was still there!

Shut. Up.

D&C on October 12th. Bled for three-four days. Then nothing. And today, October 20th- Hello! It's been exactly one week since my D&C. 

TMI? I'm sorry. Go find another blog, we're trying to get pregnant over here.

I see the doctor for my post-surgery check-up October 29th. I could be back in the game!