trying to conceive

False Alarm

Posted on May 21, 2012 16 Comments

This morning I thought I was pregnant. This afternoon I know I’m not thanks to the gift of a highly accurate pregnancy test.

I didn’t even know what I was hoping for when I did the test. I really want to be not pregnant for New York. Somehow not being able to drink at all and feeling deathly ill are just not high on my agenda.

But I can’t ever conceive of doing a pregnancy test and wanting it to be negative.

Pregnancy tests are evil. Trying to conceive makes me absolutely insane. Even when I’m not actually trying to conceive it would seem.

And the pregnancy test was negative. And my head was relieved, but my heart was sad.

And then this afternoon I did another test. Which is so dumb. Because my levels would be lower being the afternoon anyway. Because I’ve already done a test and it was negative. As I said pregnancy tests = evil and me + trying to conceive = freaking crazy.

So now I have an afternoon of feeling grossly nauseous and it’s for no good reason. Unimpressed.

The only thing that was good about this is knowing that this standing up type of baby will not have to share with a newborn blob type of baby quite so soon. She can just keep on being the only baby for a bit. I don’t like pregnancy tests. I don’t like trying to conceive, even when we are not and it was kind of like trying to conceive by accident. But I do like the idea of holding on to just that little bit more of the Squishy’s precious babydom.

7 Months

Posted on November 11, 2011 Leave a Comment

Piper is motoring around now. She looks like an adorable baby octopus with limbs flailing everywhere as she moves with alarming speed across the floor. And no matter how much I vacuum she still looks like a human duster. I like how when I go to pick her up she tries to keep crawling up my legs, like she could somehow get there just that teensy bit more quickly.
I’m terrified of leaving her in 9 months to go overseas. I try not to think about it too much. But I do. I wonder how she’ll cope. I wonder how I’ll cope. We are so connected between breastfeeding her, wearing her and co-sleeping with her I can’t quite imagine what that separation is going to feel like, or maybe I just don’t want to. But I’m trying not to think about it. It’s working so well, isn’t it?

7 months went by so fast. Too fast. But you just can’t do anything about it. It just goes. But I try not to mourn the passing of the time too much, just like I try not to wish the time away in the first place. It’s easy to do both. Spend too much time obsessing over how quickly she’s growing up or an equal amount of time wishing her forward in time to when she can just do . . . whatever. Ok, I’ll admit I do bit of obsessing over how quickly the time goes. But mostly I love to be in the moment. This moment. Where she is snuggling on my chest, or when she finds a way to communicate that she wants to be fed (by a method other than crying) or when she clutches at my face as she goes to sleep.

The other night she didn’t go to sleep until about 10:30 at night. So she’d probably been up for 6 hours straight and I really just wanted a break. And that’s when it clicked in my head. What a gift that trying to conceive period was. I never thought I’d say that.

Saying that is like admitting that all those people who said ‘everything happens for a reason’ when I was trying and I wanted to kill, maim and destroy them for being such assholes, were kind of right. Which is incredibly annoying. At the time you know what it sounded like to me? That I should just accept crap and like it.

But now, on the other side of it, I can see the blessing of it. I can see how it made me a better mother. If I can still feel grateful with a sleep allergic baby, well that’s a real gift. I don’t know how many time Piper wakes up at night. I don’t know how many hours of sleep I get. I just know that I’m grateful.

242/365 Sleep Deprivation

Posted on October 16, 2011 1 Comment

I used to be able to just put the Squishy down at 6 every night and she’d be off without a protest until around 10:30. But lately she’s been hard to get to sleep, particularly at night. At first I try her in her bed. That usually doesn’t work and I lie down with her for a bit in our bed. Sometimes this works, but mostly it doesn’t and I often rely on the hugabub to get her asleep before taking her out and popping her into bed.
Sometimes when I’m lying in bed with her, trying to coax her into sleep and she’s looking decidedly not like sleeping anytime soon it occurs to me how this is normally a situation I would find frustrating. But I don’t find it frustrating anymore. I’m lying in the same bed where I cried my heart out every time I found out I wasn’t pregnant. Lying in that same place, with my baby, I don’t feel like I should feel lucky, I just know that I am.

Side Note: I didn’t realise it when I posted that but on Cycle 8 I was actually pregnant.

Being Unprepared

Posted on August 12, 2010 25 Comments

I was reading The Feminist is Breeding and it resonated with how I’ve felt being pregnant and no longer trying to conceive. After 9 months of trying, I stopped even thinking about being pregnant. It was just all about getting a positive pregnancy test. I didn’t think about baby stuff or doctors appointments or making sure I ate a healthy diet or any of those things. Because after so long, it was all about getting pregnant, not being pregnant.

And so when it happened, I was not really prepared for it. I was just overwhelmed with relief that we didn’t have to try anymore.

And because I was so convinced I wasn’t pregnant I’d allowed a smoking relapse to continue. So when I found out and I had to quit it was all a bit of a rude shock. And adding withdrawals to pregnancy hormones is not really something that you want to try, trust me. And although I don’t want to be a smoker, I prefer my life as a non-smoker and I don’t want my children to pick up my bad habits (or even worse get sick from them), I have to admit it is hard. Very hard. You’d think that being pregnant would make it easier. And in some way it does, because you have that much more motivation. But it’s not magic, you’re still an addict even when you’re pregnant. An emotional, hormonal one. Who is without the one thing that she usually does to push her emotions down from the surface. I know, such a healthy, balanced approach.

It’s something I’ve struggled with my entire adult life. It was extraordinarily difficult to give up when I was pregnant with Riley and most likely because I felt so ambivalent about giving up back then I went back to it pretty much as soon as she was born. So feel free to yell at me for breastfeeding and smoking at the same time, but I guarantee you won’t be saying anything to me that I haven’t already said to myself.

And all it takes is one tiny moment of weakness to blow the whole thing. Which is not that easy to come by when your husband still smokes a few cigarettes a day. Which is a whole lot better than my pre-child pack a day habit. But still, that packet of cigarettes is just sitting there, ready to take advantage of one tiny moment of wavering.

But so far, so good. I just have to keep telling myself that in the life I want for myself, I am not a smoker.

The End of Surreal

Posted on July 25, 2010 17 Comments

My 8 months of trying to conceive was long, gruelling and emotionally harrowing. And really, by comparison to the length of time it takes some people who suffer with secondary fertility it is a relatively short period of time. And yet, there’s nothing about it that seems short. I have an infinite respect for other people who go through the trying to conceive turmoil for only a small amount of time or an unbelievably long amount of time. After 8 months I was wondering how many more months I had in me. I can’t imagine how people feel after two years.

For a while the pregnancy test was sitting on my kitchen bench. I would look at it every now and again for reassurance because the whole thing just seemed so surreal. After months of expecting to get pregnant, I’d crossed over into struggling to believe that it would ever happen. I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop, for something bad to happen. And although it’s only been a few days, I’m settling into it, just a bit now.

I’m not waiting to get my period. I’m figuring out ways to get more nap time, and making sure I take my vitamins and taking extra care of my teeth (first pregnancy resulted in about 12 cavities. Yes, 12! I’d rather not do that again). And most importantly, I’m reminding myself that no matter how tired I am, or how uncomfortable I get, I will not complain about it, because I am so grateful.

Part of the reality is that there are all sorts of things I haven’t let myself even think about for a really long time. I haven’t bought anything even remotely baby, even though at times I was sorely tempted. I also have not done any of the things that I swore I would do before I got pregnant. Like get back to a more comfortable weight, get back to exercising and get fit, paint the house and redo the floors, convert the garage into a playroom so I have a fighting chance of getting a dining room table and encouraging some actual table manners. Just to name a few. And all of a sudden that seems like a really long list. Really long. But i don’t care, at least I can buy onesies now.

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The Arch Nemesis

Posted on July 22, 2010 69 Comments

Yes, the pregnancy test is my arch nemesis. I don’t think it’s weird at all that I’m almost phobic about an inanimate object. For months, pregnancy tests have tortured me with cold, hard, horribly accurate negatives. I hate even the idea of taking one. Because as much as I hate not knowing, it still has the element of possibility to it. I bought these tests a few days ago. They’ve been mocking me from the corner of the lounge room for all of those days. Despite my disdain for limbo, I was not tempted to take one. Josh and I had decided that we would take one this morning, when I was officially four days late. Which for me is unheard of. But still, I was dreading actually doing it more than anything else.

This morning, I crept out of bed at 4am. The munchkin was on one side and Josh was on the other. I gingerly hopped out of the lovely envelope of warmth and they both continued to snuffle a bit in their sleep. I was incredibly nervous, waiting for the ultimate disappointment.

And then, there it was, two thin pink lines. And although I was too excited to go back to sleep, what I felt most was relief. Relief that I wasn’t broken, relief that my body was capable and relief that this part of my journey was over and a new one had begun.

Confusion, Denial and Cycle 8

Posted on July 20, 2010 12 Comments

I spot the day before my period at 1pm. That’s how it’s been for the last 6 months. It may be longer and it’s only recently that I’ve noticed. It’ hard to say. It’s how I know that a cycle is a bust. There have been other months where I’ve held out hope after the spotting, but it always ends badly for me. Always. So when my body was talking to me I decided to listen to it.

The day I wrote Cycle 8 was the day I got my spotting and I knew it was over for this month. I grieved for it. I wrote about it. And I got it out of my system.

It’s three days later. No period. My body or the universe or something is doing my head in. I don’t want to go into maybe. Maybe is the beginning of hope. For the last couple of days I have a running commentary going on ‘maybe it is . . .’ / ‘SHUT UP’ / ‘But maybe . . .’ / ‘Seriously Shut Up.’ I’m so tired of it. I just want this to be over and done with.

I want to fast forward this bit. This bit where I’m confused. Where I’m trying not to lapse into denial. And I’m trying really hard not to hope. I don’t think it’s working. I can’t take another pregnancy test. I can’t see another negative. Which leaves me no other option, except to wait. Wait for the fog to clear, wait for things to return to normal.

It’s one of the quirks of trying to conceive. As disappointed as a period makes you, it’s still a relief, because it’s freaking over.

And the fact that I had a leg spasm last night? The kind that I only ever recall having when I was pregnant or really drunk? Is not freaking helping (I wasn’t drunk). It’s not definitive it just feeds into my confusion. Through all of this the one thing that I’ve been able to rely on is that I’m pretty regular. My cycles are pretty much like clockwork. And now even that has abandoned me. Screw you, body!

In the meantime I’m going to try and ignore everything for a few days. I don’t anticipate success. But I do not want to grieve for this pregnancy twice. Once was enough.

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Cycle 8

Posted on July 17, 2010 20 Comments

I lie there.

Riley is next to me, in the big bed. I wait to see if she’ll go to sleep. She fights naps now, which probably means she’s ready to give them up, but I hold on to them still. I have my back to her. So she won’t see me crying. And I try to minimise the way my body shakes with it.

Josh comes in. Trying to help. He doesn’t see the tears either. Because I don’t want him to. ‘Do you want puzzles?’ he asks her. I say, No. She won’t go to sleep if she has puzzles to play with. She chants puzzles for awhile after he leaves. She turns towards me for awhile and I roll over. She doesn’t notice that I’m upset. And I’m grateful. ‘Mummy’ she says and gives me a big grin. I feel immeasurably better and immensely worse all at the same time.

I take her clothes off, because she likes being naked to sleep. I rub her belly for awhile and eventually she rolls over and I just stroke her back. My hands width is as wide as her back. And her skin is soft and relaxed. And I know how lucky I am.

As she drifts off. I let myself cry again. I feel the great emptiness of my swollen womb. Which seems so vast. I want to crawl into a hole. I want to not want it. I wonder at how I can be so disappointed when I no longer even see each month as a possibility. But it feels like a broken promise. I lie there for awhile. Swollen and empty and sad.

I lean over and kiss her soft shoulder and soft cheek and for a brief moment I’m not wallowing in self-pity.

And I get up.

Emotions Run High

Posted on July 16, 2010 6 Comments

Today was not a good day.

PMS arrived with a vengeance, proving beyond a doubt that I’m not pregnant. And even though I kind of knew that, there’s nothing like disappointment and back pain to dampen your mood. Thinking that the best thing to do would be to combine my two favourite things – chocolate for me and buying clothes for Riley I headed off to the local shopping centre. Where I watched in horror as things went from bad to worse.

Riley is normally pretty well behaved in public. It’s something that I’ve been fairly lucky in so far. She’s usually so excited about being out and about that the usual tantrums take a back seat. It started off well enough. We went to the clothing store first. She kept taking things off the rack, but was happy enough to put them back. And I was suitably impressed when we lost a shoe from her Dora doll and she found it herself underneath one of the clothing racks. Eyes of an eagle. Next stop. Chocolate shop. She kept putting her hand into one of the open buckets of chocolates. There is no way I can fault her for that. They were right there. Ready for the taking. So I bought her one and we headed into Kmart.

All was going relatively swimmingly until she ate the chocolate and I was so busy making sure she didn’t touch anything that I didn’t notice what was going on in her mouth. Instead of eating the said chocolate, it was kind of just sitting there in her mouth and suddenly she started letting little bits of masticated chocolate fall out of her mouth and onto the floor. Normally she’s a little bit phobic about mess. But apparently not today. So I attempted to clean it up as quickly as possible, wondering why this feral child had replaced my daughter. At which point she melted into a full blown tantrum because the osh-late was GONE! The tantrum was quickly followed by a refusal to hold my hand for the rest of the trip.

I realise that I have one child. One. And plenty of people go shopping with two, three or four children. I am in awe of you. Seriously. And I was a very relieved person when I got home. But matters were not helped by Riley asking for everyone else under the sun today but yelling at me to ‘GET AWAY’ at every opportunity. At least by the end of the day I had convinced her to say ‘on my own’ instead and to stop pushing me.

To top it all off, I’d planned to take my sister to see a musical for her 40th (which is not this weekend but next weekend). I’d planned it for the weekend following her birthday. She was visiting and mentioned that a good friend of hers was taking her out for her birthday tomorrow. Innocently, I asked what they were doing. Going to the very same musical was the answer. Colour me devastated. I had to tell her of course, that I had the same plan. Mainly because I was thinking I would have to sell the tickets on ebay or something and kicking myself because I decided in all of my wisdom that I wouldn’t need event insurance which would have only been $6. 6 freaking dollars. But oh no, I didn’t need it. Bless my sister’s heart, she still wants to go.

I’m well aware that the vast majority of this drivel is the PMS talking. So let’s ignore that nastiness for a moment and talk about the good things today.

1) Riley has her name spelled out in her room and today she spelled it out all on her own. That was pretty damn cool.

2) I enjoyed my chocolate gorging while Riley was having a nap

3) Riley giving me directions on the way to the shopping centre and singing along with me to some music in the car.

4) I had a nap. I love daytime sleeps. Perhaps too much.

5) Husband was a pillar of strength and cuddles as per usual.

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The Way Things Are

Posted on July 3, 2010 10 Comments

So I might have said something recently about not blogging about trying to conceive. And I might be going back on that already. A girl has the right to change her mind, right? I could rationalise that I’m still not blogging about the two week wait, just pregnancy in general. But really, that’s one of the things that I love about my blog is that I have the ability to be completely inconsistent on a whim.

I mostly feel right with myself as far as the whole trying to conceive thing goes (other than the two week wait when I’m a bit of a mess). I’ve accepted that our baby is just not ready to be born yet. That given enough time and patience things will happen in their own time. I’ve done what I can do to make sure there are no problems that are physically stopping us from getting pregnant. And while I might have been secretly disappointed that there wasn’t a physical impediment (something fixable) – it does ease my worries somewhat. I’ve gotten to the point where I can really appreciate all of this one-on-one time I have with Riley, and that there are many things to like about being the mother of an only-chid.

You can feel the but, can’t you? It’s just sitting there, waiting for me to stop rambling. And there is a but, a rather large one.

I have always liked the idea of having a large family, not 3 kids large but 5 kids large. I have always (of course) reserved the right to change my mind. Knowing full well that we might have 2 children and decide that we were done. But that was my dream. Josh stopped short of 5, settled on the idea of 4 – but again had a we’ll see kind of attitude. And therein lies my problem with trying to conceive. It’s not that this baby is taking their sweet time to make an appearance, it’s what that might mean for the future.

Does it mean it will always take me 12 months+ to get pregnant? I’m 32 now. In some ways I still have loads of time. In other ways if there’s a 2-3 year gap between pregnancies would I be ok with having a baby at 40? Or is my big family dream something that I will just have to kiss goodbye. Of course, next time around we won’t be waiting to try and get pregnant. But I also don’t want to stop breastfeeding early in the hopes of getting pregnant.

I know that it’s pointless to think about all of these hypotheticals, particularly when I’m not even pregnant with our second baby yet. But still, I do. And I don’t think I can change that. At least not anytime soon.

I would like to be able to live in the moment, right now, all the time. And be completely grateful with what I have, instead of thinking about what i might not have in the future. But I’m just not there yet.

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False Alarm

7 Months

242/365 Sleep Deprivation

Being Unprepared

The End of Surreal

The Arch Nemesis

Confusion, Denial and Cycle 8

Cycle 8

Emotions Run High

The Way Things Are

The Vault

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