The Inconvenient Truth about Eggs. August 31, 2006

The IUI today from Dr. Poor Social Skills sucked ass.

Touchy Feely Midwife and Dr. Poor Social Skills were both there, a long with LM, becuase we couldn’t find a sitter at 9 frickin am. So we are all jammed in the room, and
Touchy Feely Midwife can’t get the catheter in, so Dr. Poor Social Skills, says “We need to use the teneculum, this might hurt a little.”

A.little.my.ass.

S is yelling owwwwwwww, owwwwww, and grimacing, and LM is like “mama hurt?” and I’m like back the fuck off my wife. Then, the catheter went right in, easy as pie.

But when she removed the speculum there was blood dripping off it, onto the crinkly bottom sheet, onto the floor.

So there is S covered in her homemade drape (this time it was orange not floral), looking sad, and I just wanted to say “what the fuck just happened???”

Instead we asked some questions and were assured that this procedure, unlike some things they do to cervixes, leaves no scar and no permanent damage.

Still an explanation would have been nice, a lead in, a are you ok with this, anything other than “this may hurt a little.” Doctors are idiots.

Then, while we are discussing what to do next (i.e. do we do another IUI tonight, or vag insem late tonight, or another IUI tomorrow morning?) I say “well, can we do an IUI later tonight, not at like 11pm or anyth….”

At which point Dr. Poor Social Skills cuts me off: “Certainly not. These happen during business hours only. The latest I can do one today is 4:30.”

I try to mumble an apology of sorts like “No, I meant 6pm or something not late,” blah blah. The conversation went on, and I felt really shitty and shut down and misunderstood.

Now granted both of these women came in on their day off to do this insemination, and have been very accommodating. I know they will even come in on a Sunday.

Honestly, I have no idea what the norm is, and I believe doctor’s practices vary greatly in terms of how they do IUIs. I just think she should have told us nicely what her protocol is.

I don’t want to be made to feel guilty, or pushy for asking about an evening IUI. And I hate the fact that most clinics and doctors, to some degree, seem to find our cycles INCONVENIENT. And try to squeeze us into NORMAL BUSINESS HOURS. This seems insane. Insane.

If you are a clinic or a doctor, or a midwife who decides to perform IUIs, please be flexible and patient, and AVAILABLE.

Babies don’t arrive at convenient times, and eggs don’t either.

Buck up, Dr. Poor Social Skills.

Thanks for listening to my rant.

If S wakes up tomorrow and her temp has not spiked, we will do another IUI in the morning. I think that her poor cervix is too traumatized to have me poking around with a speculum and trying to get the sperm in the cervix.

We hope it works, I think it probably didn’t and this is a lousy way to begin the TWW.

Bri and Wes’s baby died. August 31, 2006

I posted earlier that they lost their baby. But Bri hates that term, and so I post my revised statement: Their baby died. I’m still sad about it, and it sucks ass, even with the right words. But I know that the right words really do make it ‘not worse’ which is saying a lot.

Clear Plan Fertility Monitor August 30, 2006

We got a PEAK.

This is a new fangled device where you pee on a stick every morning and it reads them for you, testing for estrogen (when that rises you move from Low to High fertility), and LH (when it detects your surge, you get a PEAK, reading, which includes a small icon of an egg. Cute.)

Last month, we had an impossible time reading the OPKs. And this time the OPKs are being equally frustrating, but the monitor says peak, so we are going for the insem tomorrow. We will only know if it is well timed if we get a temp spike on Friday (indicating ovulation actually happened on Thursday).

Oh the drama and excitement of it all. And the stress.

I hope the frigin monitor is right.

P.S. S just got a clear positive regular OPK.

Freakin out!! There is all this waiting. And waiting. And waiting. Then BAM. Holy. I need to calm down.So what do we do???

When do we inseminate?? We have two vials. Our doc can do 9 am and afternoon tomorrow.

I’m Sad. August 30, 2006

Bri, at unwellness, lost her baby.

Go send her some love if you want, because she’s funny and smart and a great person, and this sucks ASS.

No heartbeat.

What a fucked up world this is.

Any Questions? August 29, 2006

Just wanted to let you know that I am happy to answer any questions you might have. About anything. Ask away. But maybe I’ve already explained everything about myself in 900 ways.

Anyhoo, we are preparing for Insem #2, on Friday. S ovulated last month on CD 16, but we are expecting her to ovulate this month on CD 15, but you know, anything could happen.

In toddler news:

LM has started labeling everything, and asking what everything is. Usually this is fine, and cute, but he is moving into scary territory.

The other day he looked at a VERY mannish woman (you know what I mean, even I had a discernment pause) and pointed right at her said loudly “What’s this?”

I mumbled something like “uh huh,” because that is how articulate I am…

But then dear readers, my lovely boy said “That’s a lady!”

Needless to say, we have never been more proud.

You know how there are different types of intelligence, like emotional intelligence, or artistic intelligence?

Our smarty pants has homo intelligence.

Silly me. August 26, 2006

**Note: I name the club wrongly before, hence some confusion, but it has been corrected. I called it Those-Who-Are-Pregnant-Who-Already-Have-Children instead of Those-Who-Are-Pregnant-OR-Who-Already-Have-Children (TWAPOATWAHC). “OR” being an important part. Now I know why folks thought I was pregnant. Silly me. See post below.**

The Club August 25, 2006

There is a club, and if you are not a part of it you may not know it exists, or you might be painfully aware of your exclusion. This exclusive club is for Those-Who-Are-Pregnant-OR-Who-Already-Have-Children (TWAPOATWAHC)**

Now, I am a member of this club.

While I was pregnant, I began to get the nods, the knowing looks, and the questions. When you are pregnant they ask when you are due, how you are feeling. When you have a newborn they ask how you are sleeping. When you have a one-year-old they ask if he/she is walking. When you have a toddler, they ask a myriad of questions about potty training and obedience. There are the competitive leading questions where moms talk about how hard it is to have such accomplished children. There is the advice giving. But mainly it’s nice. It’s communal.

Nice right?

Mostly.

But only if you are in it, and even then…

DO I want to be part of a club where any of the following conditions are excluded or offered a partial membership.

‘The Adopting’: Bummer for you. Your entire ‘waiting for a child’ period is completely invisible, and you only get invited in once you have said children. Unless…

‘Your Child is a Different Color’: You are kinda invited, but people might think you are the nanny, or be too freaked out to ask whether that brown (or white) baby is, in fact, your child, and if so how did you get such an exotic baby.

‘The Two Mom or Two Dad Deal’: If one of you is alone with the baby, maybe you get invited. But when you are strolling in the park on a lovely blue-skied day, no one thinks “what a cute family” and no one gives you the subsequent nod.

‘The Fat’: Unless you are skinny with a bump, people don’t want to ask you if you are pregnant. You might miss the whole pregnants-get-attention thing.

‘The Butch’: If you are a pregnant butch, or a butch mama, no one really knows what to do with you.

“The Single”: You are granted full membership, until they find out that you don’t have a man. Then you get some amazement and pity, and you get demoted.

Once folks talk to you, and find out you are pregnant and not just fat, or find out that you are in fact a woman, you may get a pass. A temporary card.

And for folks like me, who mostly fit perfectly into the club (except the whole lesbian thing I am tall and attractive and thin and feminine), I sometimes want to run away screaming.

I want to run over to the woman in the park covered in tattoos, and pull my pants down to show her the giant tattoo on my ass, and say “I’m a rebel too.”

I want to wear a sign to the park that says: “my wife is a Dyke.”

Sometimes while some boring normal suburban women is talking about her stupid boring life and her stupid boring kid, I want to say “I’ve had a threesome.”

I want to be part of the weirdo club. The club of the infertile, the gays, the adoptive folks, the single moms, the biracial families, the trans dad who used to be a mom (shout out to wellness).

I belong with you, on the outskirts of the club, smoking outside the gym (ok, maybe drinking half-caf at a coffee house now that we are all old and stuff), dressed in all black.

I want to fit in with you. I want to be myself.

You all are my people. Fuck the club.

The Reply Email August 20, 2006

Ignore the date of this post, I just needed to post the email in a placeholder on the blog.

FTW,

This IS shutting both of us out (we are writing this together as it affects us both). And it is making all of us, Charlotte, your husband, S and LM pay for your mistakes. Before your most recent mistake, we were all moving on and feeling way better. A natural separation had already happened and if we hadn’t had to cancel the camping trip after the revelation of your breach of trust, we would have made even more progress in normalizing all of our relationships. How you come to the decision that a complete break is the best idea is beyond us. You and FPKD were already focusing on each other. With this decision, you’re just further damaging your relationship with us.

Prior to your last email, we would have been happy for us as a group to decide to take some clear amount of time off, probably just not doing dinners for a few weeks would have felt good to everyone, but this pattern where you decide for all of us to sever ties indefinately feels really terrible. You did this before in [the State you were living in a few months ago] with crappy consequences…most notably, we had no idea how shitty you felt about the whole donor thing so we didn’t call it off.

The unpleasant traits that are coming out are undoubtedly less due to your relationship with us than to the fact that you have had such an emotionally devastating separation from your husband, are faced with giant upsetting baby emotions that you have never experienced before, surprised yourself with your huge resistance to donating and FPKD’s grief about it, among other issues.

Cutting off all contact, on your terms, isn’t about being a good friend to us. Since you didn’t specify ANY timeframe, we have to assume this means we will have nothing to do with helping you guys move into your new home and you will have nothing to do with finding out if we’re pregnant or not…and that’s just sad and not the sort of thing one can easily repair not being a part of.

S and Charlotte

Rechanneling August 20, 2006

I am attempting to rechannel my energy to getting clients (for my job).

We are handling the not pregnant thing, and moving on. Trying to prepare ourselves for the possibility of many of these to come. We had a sad and interesting talk with our former PKD couple friends, but I’ll post more about that later.

I am currently entering a job where I need to create a client base (folks who are going to come see me as therapy clients). I am hoping to see queer couples and individuals, and especially folks who are dealing with starting a family, or postpartum issues.

I’m not sure why I am posting this.

I think I am needing some advice/help/ideas about how to get my name out there as a therapist specializing in queer issues, and infertility issues. I am going to the local GLBT resource center, and will try to find other queer professionsal like doctors and lawyers to network with .

I also think I can see clients (in an informed capacity) queer and hetero who are struggling with infertility.

Any ideas are welcome. I am so bad at marketing myself.

Not Pregnant August 18, 2006

S got her period.