Thursday 28 August 2014

I see the light...


I see the light, and it makes me happy. After many days of crying, I can finally see the light. I don't have the answers, nothing has changed in our plans or our lives, but I can see it now.

I am finally doing what I love. Went back to the piano and even started learning Portuguese. I feel like doing things out of the house, and even clean! I don't have to wake up to go to the doctor every day, don't have to take pills and the thermometer is away in a drawer. I have no idea what day of my cycle is or if I'm ovulating. I just see the things I like to do and the people I love.

I don't see one light, I see many different possibilities. I have a safe line to a counselor anytime I need it. I have my wonderful husband that told me in those bad days that it was ok to cry, that it was ok to be sad for as long as I needed to, as long as I came back to him happy in the end. As long as I got it all out of my system in a good way, processed everything and came back to being the happy person I am, that sees the little things in life and thanks for them.

I am going back to church, taking care of my plants, cooking things that takes mixing of more than 3 ingredients, letting go of the things that didn't make me happy. Even the water of my water lilies is looking clearer, and my house is feeling more like a home than ever.

I blame it on the drugs. I do want the same things, and I will go back to the drugs if that's whats needed, but for now, I see the light and I'm happy. I can say it this time not to finish my blog in a good note or to convince myself, but with all the conviction behind it. I am happy.

Wednesday 20 August 2014

It's a negative

I can't even think of a title for this post, although I am sure I'll come up with something before publishing. The IUI didn't work. Got the call a few hours ago, heard "It was negative" and made an appointment to see the doctor in a month. We are going to take a break of trying for a while, save some money and try an IVF.

I am happy we have a decision. I am happy we are taking a break and getting my body back, being able to wake up whenever I want to, being able to forget about medicines and injections. I am happy we are going to try something with a little more success rate in the future.

I am not happy it didn't work. I am not happy that we'll have to spend more money. I am not happy that we still don't know if I can get pregnant. I am not happy that I have to wait. I am not happy to tell everyone that it didn't work (so I told 2 people besides J and they can help me spread the word to the immediate family and close friends).

During my last two months this was my itinerary:

  • Day 1: Call the clinic and tell them I am having my period (yeay!?)
  • Day 3: Go to the clinic with a full bladder and have an ultrasound, empty bladder and have a vaginal ultrasound, get blood work done.
  • Day 3 - Day 7: Take Letrozol pills every day at the same time.
  • Day 6 - Day 9/10 (Until follicles are mature and oestrogen levels are good): Vaginal ultrasound, blood work and Gonal injections every day in the morning.
  • Day 9/10: Inject HCG at night to induce ovulation.
  • Day 10/11: Vaginal ultrasound and blood work.
  • Day 11/12: (36 hours after HCG): Vaginal ultrasound, blood work, and intrauterine insemination is done.
  • Day 12/13: Vaginal ultrasound and blood work
  • Day 12/13 and for two weeks: Vaginal suppositories of Endometrin 3 times a day.
  • Day 19/20: Blood work to check Progesterone levels.
  • Day 26/27: Blood work to check for Pregnancy.
  • Day 26/27 and until I get my period again: Get my negative result, decide what to do, repeat again?.
This next month: whatever we want, whenever we want it.

I don't have to worry about the food I eat, or the type of exercise I do. I don't have to worry what day it is and I won't be taking my temperature first thing in the morning every morning. I will try to forget we are trying to conceive and will enjoy our time, our health and the people and things we have. I will probably read about IVF and will still probably have a few sad moments thinking about this, but at the end: I'll go back to seeing the happy things in my life and continue walking.

Tuesday 19 August 2014

Chiquitita


This song is absolutely perfect. (The translation is not perfect though but good enough :-))

Let me tell you all the things that make this song so perfect for me:

1. I remember growing up with this song. Didn't know what it said in English, but I knew "chiquitita" and it sounded like a very happy song. I also kinda remember my parents calling me this a few times before.

2. After telling J what the title meant and how much I like this song, he told me he wishes he can one day call his daughter chiquitita.

3. After listening to the song and the lyrics a good while ago, I already thought it was a really nice happy song that could be applied in many situations.

4. This song makes me cry and makes me smile now. I can sing it to myself, I can sing it from God's perspective, I can sing it from anyone to me and make me feel better.

I sing it when I want to make me smile and look at the sky shining above me.

I sing it when in my eyes there is no hope for tomorrow and I want to tell myself to try once more.

I hear the piano and the instruments and it makes me dance once more.

Even when the tears are rolling down my cheeks I can tell myself "try once more like you did before. Sing a new song, Chiquitita", and know I am not alone and many people are singing this for me.

And my hope for tomorrow? That there is a chiquitita growing up inside me.

Monday 18 August 2014

Yesterday I cried

And the record didn't last the whole cycle!. Saturday night I had a dream, all I can remember is the shortest dream. Me, holding a toddler, and not wanting to let go. Hugging her/him tight and saying "I don't want to let go". I then woke up, not wanting to let go.

I think it was caused because I told J that I was thinking of giving up, maybe adoption is the way to go. He said again he didn't want to talk about it, and I reminded him that he never wants to talk about it. He always has hope and I love him for that, he always hope that this treatment will work, this will be the one. I am never so sure. At the end he talked, he said "I am not ready to give up". It broke my heart and put it back together with those simple words "I'm not ready to give up". I shouldn't be either. I thought I was, but clearly the dream showed me I wasn't.

So, I woke up, kept having off and on dreams, forget about it and start my day. Then all of a sudden, during the morning, the dream comes full force. I want to cry but J is not here. I made a deal with him years ago, I'm not allowed to cry by myself. I am alone at the moment. I go out of the house, seat in the heat of the day, in front of neighbours so I don't cry, I wait for him. As soon as he gets home he knows. He asked me "are you ok?".

I cried.

I cried and cried and told him about the dream. I told him I wasn't ready to hear the news this Wednesday. I don't feel pregnant and I don't want to hear another negative. I cry some more and he does what he does best. He hugs me the whole time, he kiss me, he says all the best things and one or two jokes on the perfect spots. He makes me smile, and feel better and we go on.

The day goes by and everything is fine, but I keep getting in a bad mood and don't know why. It's almost time for bed and I had decided it was time to make plans for the week (we need to have a Wednesday night plan, celebration or feeling bad for ourselves, always have a plan), and we should talk about what to do if it fails. Another IUI? IVF? Rest?. I am ready to talk, and then I'm not. I can't even open my mouth. J gets worried. I make myself say everything, not a conversation, just a speech about all the things I wanted to talk about and not longer want to even mention.

And then I cried. I cried and cried some more. I don't want to know. I want to know. I don't want to take a rest because it might be better to just do another one in a row. I want to take a rest because this hurts too much. I cried because it was the second time in the day crying. I cried because I don't think is going to work. I cried because I didn't have any plans for Wednesday. I cried because I should be happy I have a healthy family that loves me and I love, and I should not be asking for more. I cried because I want this too much.

I cried because each tear is part of my love. I love her/him too much.

Today I wait. Tomorrow I'll wait some more. Wednesday will be another story.

Thursday 14 August 2014

The famous 2 weeks wait and my sanity


Last month, going through my first IUI, I found this article by Dr. Sigal Klipstein: Tips to help you stay sane while waiting for your pregnancy test results.

It helped me a lot and it keeps helping me. Reading that my crying outbursts won't hurt our chances, or that the jump I did in my Zumba classes is not going to hurt the pregnancy if there is one, or that I'm not a bad person for not wanting to talk about it with friends and family if I don't feel like it.

When you are going through something like this, and specially during those 2 waiting weeks, you can drive yourself insane thinking anything you do could affect the pregnancy chances.

Last week I had a horrible headache and I just left it all afternoon because I didn't know if I could take Tylenol. By the moment my mother in law saw me, asked, and told me to please take the Tylenol because it would be fine, I was even looking flushed. Not taking the pills and staying with the pain might even be worse, but here I was, making stuff up about what might be harmful and trying to be in a glass bubble just in case.

Go out, live your life, cry if you want to, exercise. It will be OK! What is meant to be will be, even when is so hard to believe :-)

Wednesday 6 August 2014

77 million... or one


Already had my second round of Intrauterine Insemination (IUI) with a count of 77 million inseminated, and hoping for the one guy to make it through.  I got to hear that two follicles ovulated so, does that mean we have double the chance? Now the waiting game starts. I don't have to go every day to the doctor and my arm has a chance to heal. I start taking Progesterone 3 times a day so I don't forget about it, and have to behave as a pregnant woman would do (no sushi!!).

I will look again for the one post I found about the 2 waiting weeks that saved my sanity and share it here. What's allowed and what's not? How can I manage the stress of the wait? Did it work? Would I do it again if it didn't? Does it increase my chances that this is the second time in a row?

We take it one day at a time, and hope for the best. Maybe this is our time, maybe this time it will work.

Tuesday 5 August 2014

Talking myself out of it

I debated posting this after the love one, but at the end decided it shows perfectly the two faces or ambivalence of this process.

The thing is, when I like something, if I see it's something I want but I cannot have, I talk myself out of it. I find the little things I don't like, all the reasons it would not work, or I actually convince myself I really didn't like it that much. It's funny but it has worked for as long I can remember.

Not being able to get pregnant yet has made me do this. I catch myself sometimes thinking that I don't want to change diapers, or that I can go to Europe if I don't get pregnant, or I can sleep and play video games all I want. Feelings get all mixed and fumbled because I get really divided between "I want to have children", "having children would be hard and maybe I don't really want them" and of course, the inevitable "if I even think for a second that I might not want children, it may make it happen and I won't be able to have children, stop thinking like that!".

I become a complete mess when this happens and normally causes one of the famous crying outbursts I have. Does it happen to you? Convincing yourself that you might really not want it that much? The material things and trips are easy. I can convince myself and move on, but this? I cannot convince myself of moving on with not having children, I want them too much, but it's almost like a defence mechanism at this point. From time to time I will put up the defences and think I don't want this, and then I have to work on tearing them down easily, so as not to break myself in the process.

My defences have been down this week. I am fighting for this as much as I can, and so far I have a no-crying record of 2 weeks! :-)

Monday 4 August 2014

Love...


There are not many words I can use to describe the love I feel for someone that still doesn't exist. Loving someone so deeply and with so much yearning, someone that still doesn't exist, someone I am still searching for. I can understand the parents that say they know a love bigger than themselves; loving someone more than yourself.

The people that really know me can believe I already know that love. I already love my "Amanda" more than words can say. It's a love a long time coming and a long time waiting. It's what drives me forward, what makes me try one more time, what makes me cry so much, what makes me dream so much.

I'll keep loving, dreaming and searching. Because Amanda and Miguel are worth it.

Friday 1 August 2014

Don't ask, don't tell

I have a policy with the family members that know about our fertility/infertility adventures: Don't ask.

We haven't told many people because I don't want them asking me how everything is going. I don't want too many people know month to month if a fertility treatment failed, and I don't want to be reminded of it when I am blessed with the few minutes of day of not torturing myself thinking about it.

Friends even more. Those years ago I told friends and I got too hear too many times the famous "It was really hard for me to get pregnant too, it took us 3 months!". Yeah, 3 months vs 5 years, sure, lets talk about how bad you felt during those 3 months. Or the wonderful "Oh, I wanted to have a kid in December so we planned it just right and and (s)he was born almost the day I wanted and just one week different than my niece! so now they can play together". Wow, you got to decide which month you wanted to have the baby and even coordinate with someone else. Thanks for reminding me that I probably don't know what I'm doing, because it sounds too easy and I am still trying.

So that's the new policy, "don't ask, don't tell". I know it's really hard for our parents. My mom has me calculated to the day, "how are you honey?" comes in as a text the exact days something big is happening during the treatment. And my mother in law has been more quiet but you can still see it in her eyes that she wants to know. They are supporting us, they are there for us, and I appreciate it immensely. I know I can talk with them any time I need, but for now, radio silence is more comfortable. Telling the world anonymously, at my time, when I need it, it's much better than those 2 minutes of bliss interrupted by a "how is the fertility treatment going?".

In time I'll tell.