Weekend with the Elephant

This weekend it seemed like the Elephant in the room followed me from place to place.  I got that look yesterday at my friend’s birthday party for their 2-year old.  As couples would enter the party, we’d ask “how are you?”  and “look at little sarah…, etc.”.  They’d light up then look at us dumbstruck.  I’ve gotten so used to the face I feel like I can read their mind.  They see that we are not pregnant and remember we have no kids and draw a complete blank.  Since they can’t ask us how OUR kids are doing they just smile and move on like they saw a ghost.  It’s all very awkward.  I know some people are able to make jokes about it, or will even cough up to “we’re trying” or “we’re hoping soon” or something like that.  I haven’t been able to do that.    The best I can think of is, “we’ve been trying for over 4 years and have unexplained recurrent pregnancy loss”.  It sounds way too depressing, so instead I say “we’re doing great”.    When I was first married, the question would have been “are you planning to have kids?” or “when are you going to have kids?”  Now I just get the uncomfortable look of confusion & pity, like they don’t know what box to put us in.  Since we are not parents, what else is there to talk about,  oh, look, is that someone I know over there? let’s see…

After that I went off to acupuncture at this special fertility acupuncture clinic and the elephant followed me even there.  Only this time I was in a waiting room full of people with various fertility problems.  This time we are all avoiding the elephant with eyes averted and focused on our phones and magazines, almost pretending we aren’t there.  Meanwhile we can hear the receptionist talking on the phone with a patient about her upcoming IVF cycle and retrieval.  I find myself looking away.  I know that is why I am there, but somehow I found myself feeling embarrassed and awkward as people’s fertility issues were so casually and graphically explained within earshot as if they were commonplace.

We had our follow up ultrasound this morning with my IVF doctor.  Good news!  We have about 18 follicles growing, which is in line with what was expected based on my age and PCO diagnosis and everything seems to be going ok.  My stomach continues to be the pin cushion for “stabby time” (my lovely name for med time 2x day).   They still need to do some more growing as they are 10 mm and they need to get to 18.  If all continues on track we will be scheduled for retrieval this coming Friday.

Mr. Star got to have his big moment today giving his “sample”.  This was the first time he had to do it AT the clinic.  As if it is not awkward enough, the nurse came into the waiting room with other couples and announced “ok, we are ready for you to give your sample now”.   Dutifully no one looked up, even though we all knew what that meant.  I guess we are all used to this by now.  After it was all over he gave me the report.  Apparently the “sample” room has a sofa with animal print pillows and a TV with a VCR and DVD player.  It included a surprisingly exotic collection of porn videos that featured mostly Asian women and anal sex.  It made us wonder about the demographics they were going for and made for a good laugh on the drive home.    Points for Mr. Star for doing the deed.  I can’t imagine having to do that at the doctor’s office.  Instead I get to get my parts extracted next weekend ;  )

For fun on the drive home we stopped by the cat shelter.  Since our cat died in December we’ve been thinking about maybe getting kittens and I’ve lately been feeling SO ready to adopt.  Apparently we are a few months early though, kitten season is a few months out still.

Putting Kitty to Sleep

Thank you all so much for your support!  It helps to hear your comments.  Despite all our losses this is one of the most difficult losses I’ve ever had to experience.

We saw the vet once again today and made the very difficult choice to put him to sleep this weekend.  We have only two more days with him before he goes in.  We planned for Sat. morning so we could have some alone time to mourn on the weekend.  It is going to be really really hard.  In the meantime we are trying to spoil him with all his favorite treats and spend as much quality time together as we can.  He deserves it.

A new start (back to TTC again) and going on year 16 with kitty

Now that last month is officially awash I am back to square one.   Like magic I stopped taking the progesterone and my cycle started up.  Today is cycle Day 1, a fresh start.

This round I am going to try and take better care of myself- cutting back on caffeine (switching to decaf, or half-calf), doing weekly acupuncture, squeezing in at least 1 yoga workout a week, exercising more and even doing some meditation.  Last month I felt like I let myself go, barely working out, drinking way too much caffeine and just being a stressed lazy mess.  While I love my morning coffee, I think I am more addicted to the sweet kick and am going to try to have a fruit smoothie instead.  Yoga is one of those things I mocked for feeling like it was just a waste of time and didn’t make any difference.   I just went to a class this afternoon and my body (and brain) can feel the difference.    I can dust off my Anji  meditations and try to do a few of those, or just some non-fertility related ones on days that I need a stress break.  The beauty of yoga and acupuncture is they have meditation components built in, so it’s almost like a meditation bonus.

Another stress I need to manage better is my cat.  I LOVE LOVE LOVE my cat, but in his old age he’s become quite high maintenance and more difficult to care for. Do they make diapers for cats?  If so, that is exactly what we need.   The poor guy, 16-years old, diagnosed with lymphoma has a lot of issues and one of those is randomly peeing.  Just now he jumped on my lap for love and I put the laptop aside so he could have my full attention.  As I was stroking him he relaxed and then jut let it go, right on me!  He’s peed in weird places before, but not usually ON us.  So I jumped up and ran him to the litter box and meanwhile had to clean myself up and deal with  getting the stains out of the chair I was in.  Clearly he didn’t mean it.  He is just losing control there and we are playing defense trying to catch him before he stains another rug or quilt. I feel pretty helpful to do much about it.

Despite his peeing habit he is doing much better, even gained 2 lbs!  He went from almost 6 lbs up to 8 lbs and 3 oz. in about a month.  I am so glad to see his weight up.  Watching him waste away was so painful.  Managing all his needs is a handful from daily meds to weekly blood tests at the vet to special food.  We do it because we are in denial that he’s going to leave us, but it is going to take a turn and pretty soon we will have to let him go.  Knowing we could lose him any day I’ve taken on the care, but it’s not easy.