Finally! A Bit of Sunshine to Break Up the Coulds and Rain!

Posted on September 29, 2011 by imfluffyowl

So, working at the horse track all those years, I had to deal with things that most people take for granted. For instance, medical coverage. We didn’t have it. Vacation pays, we had it but we were paid it on every pay. Which really sucked when it came time to take time off. The longest stint of not working for me, was the two weeks I took off in 2009 to, you know, get married. And I only took a full two weeks cause I really needed it and the monetary gifts we received would hold us over if we needed extra funds.

But now that I work for dad, its been a pleasant upgrade. We are in the process of getting medical coverage. This is the first time I will have coverage since I was last in university. It will be a relief to not have to pay out the ass for prescriptions. But when it came to vacation pay, I honestly never thought about it. I never had to for 6 years. But dad wants to go retroactive and put away 10% vacation pay per pay period and let me build it up and then put it towards any potential fertility treatments. It might not be a big deal for others, but honestly, it is for me. Funds that I didn’t know about are going to be building up towards our potential treatments without doing anything extra.

Which leads up to the oddest part of today. While dad and I were waiting for mom’s appointment to finish up at the hospital, I had a “heart to heart” about our infertility with my father. My Father… It was a little weird. Dad knows through mom that we are having difficulties but not the details. It was weird to talk about it, it was weird when he asked me questions and it was really weird trying to talk about sperm count results without saying sperm cause I couldn’t make that word come out to my dad and my dad scrunched up his face when he knew I was gonna say it.. Dad was happy with our overall game plan and what steps we were taking. He was surprised at my knowledge of each area of treatment. It was nice to have his support and I was grateful to not get lectured over it. When I get a lecture from my father its because he wants the best for me and he thinks that the choices I have made are not the best choices. Its always the case. So no lecture means that hes happy and I’m doing something right in his eyes.

While we are on the topic of my father, I should mention that he hates tattoos. He is of the old school frame of mind that tattoos are for bikers and prison inmates and not the works of art that they can be. He doesn’t know that I got my fourth tattoo on the 16th and this is the first time that he has been home since I got inked again. For every tattoo I have, I have a lecture from my father to go with it. Its a beautiful day today so I didn’t bother hiding it under a long shirt. Whats the point, really? I’m not trying to actively hide it, I just wanted him to see it in person before I posted pictures online. This is the first of my tattoos that I can’t easily hide if I’m wearing anything other than a long sleeve shirt. So today, while talking to dad, I expected him to comment on it. He didn’t. I know that my tattoo was visible while I was drinking my tea with him. He didn’t say anything, he didn’t acknowledge that he even seen it, which is entirely possible because hes pretty jet-lagged right now. I figure he hasn’t processed what he has seen. The lecture is coming, its just a matter of when. I figure I’ll get it tomorrow while doing payroll, month end, and quarterly. You know, just when I don’t have the time to deal with it.

For now though, I’m off to make supper for some of my girls. They are coming over for supper and pampering. I’m making them my rather popular meatloaf, my baked spirally potatoes and salad with pumpkin whoopie pies for dessert. I hope they like it!

Today’s song is Maroon 5’s “Moves Like Jagger”, Adele’s “Cold Shoulder”, and Marvin Gaye’s “Got To Give It Up”.

Cloudly with a Chance for Emotional Breakdowns.

Posted on September 29, 2011 by imfluffyowl

If you had a choice between dealing with an emotional breakdown randomly when it hits or scheduling said breakdown for a more convenient time, would you actually prefer to schedule it knowing that you still will eventually have to deal with the breakdown?

I asked myself this question yesterday and my answer is simply: YES I would prefer to schedule a breakdown over it just hitting me randomly. I would want to prepare for it. I would schedule it in like a doctors appointment:

Friday: Work til 5
Pick up kitty litter on the way home
go to drug store before it closes
Pay power bill
come home and make supper for hubby
9pm: have epic emotional breakdown,
Midnight: Go to bed.

You could see it right? If you could control such things, would you do it? I’m simply curious. Maybe I’m mad for wanting to postpone the inevitable to more convenient times. Cause instead of working up to something you don’t like, you can make sure you have all the Kleenex, blankets, Advil and support. You can turn off your phone in anticipation for it. I would totally do it.

So where is this coming from, you ask? Well Saturday was a cluster fuck and I had a complete and utterly disastrous emotional breakdown. The day was fairly blah, but nothing extreme to give me any indication of what was to come. It was about 6, I hadn’t had food all day and I had a UFC fight I was going to at 10. So I went to make myself something to eat, go sick of seeing the kitchen in the mess it was in and started cleaning to try to keep my depressing mood at bay. I opened the cupboard but apparently not all the way and the door started to close without my knowledge. I reached down to pick up something that had dropped and when I stood up suddenly, my head bashed into the corner of the cupboard door. Apparently this was the exact catalyst that I needed to explode into an emotional breakdown. I screamed in pain and then proceeded to cry and scream some more. Chris came running into the kitchen and every time he tried to touch me, check my head or comfort me, I just cried louder and harder. I was so upset and had such a hard time controlling my emotions that I started throwing stuff around my kitchen. Thankfully Chris grabbed my phone and my glasses before I could chuck them around the kitchen.

After that, I simply went to bed and sobbed out my pain for the remainder of the night. And every time Chris tried to lay down next to me or comfort me or do anything really to try to ease my pain, I simply sobbed harder and louder and curled deeper into myself. But I’m grateful that he didn’t give up. I finally calmed down for a bit, scrubbed the kitchen, stared off into space from the couch and then declared I was going to bed. Chris knew that I didn’t have any food in my system so he wouldn’t let me go to bed til I ate. I got some food in my stomach and then we laid in bed together while I went through this breakdown all over again.

Needless to say, we didn’t get out for the fight and we had an early bedtime. Chris held me all night as I went through rounds of tears all through the night.

I really hate when this happens. I hate that I have no control in changing all of this. I broke down like this because of our infertility. I realized that even if fertility treatments fail, they may not grant us an adoption because of Chris’s anxiety issues. And that thought just broke me. All I want is to be a mom. I can’t even begin to imagine how empty our life would feel like if we were unable to have kids in any way. If we had to live a life like that, I don’t know how I would make it through each day. And if you tell people this, they tell you not to worry about the future and what you can’t control. But I have to worry about the future. What if we can’t put away enough money for treatments? What if we can’t afford adoption? What if they say no to adoption? What if we can only save up for one round of treatments and that treatment not work? The possible answers to these questions leave me with a very dark and empty feeling deep inside of me. And with every pregnancy announcement, or belly shot or ultrasound picture, I’m reminded of each of these facts. So its not the person who is pregnant that I hate, its the reminders that come with seeing that person pregnant that hurts me.

What if we never get the chance to be parents? I don’t know if I could live that life.

Halloween, Here I Come!!

Posted on September 20, 2011 by imfluffyowl

So my Halloween’s are always the same. Me and mom pass out candy, I sometimes dress up and afterwards I go to visit my cousin and her family for a bit and have some tea and candy. I love halloween. Everything about halloween. I love having a reason to dress up. I love to visit friends and have a halloween party to go to. But with most of our friends, who all have children of the trick or treating age, we don’t get to do things like halloween parties and dressing up and doing things together. But while away for my tattoo with Crystal, she talked about the idea of dressing up and going out somewhere. Preferrably to a halloween party. Whether it be something at the bars (which I would rather avoid) or a halloween party at a hall. Get a group of us to go and have a fantastic time.

So because we are on the lookout for a get together to dress up for, I have started the planning process of my halloween costume. I think this year I’m gonna go as Cruella Deville from 101 Dalmations. This year, I have the hair length to be able to pull off the look without a wig. I’m just gonna get the colored hair spray to spray half of it white and half of it black. I have the back outfit for under the coat. I have the makeup. I just need the jacket, the holder for the smoke, the purse and pointy shoes. Crystal plans on dressing up as the medic from Team Fortress 2. I’m trying to get Chris to do the Heavy costume from TF2. But for once, I may have something to look forward to for halloween.

Speaking of halloween, I broke down and started watching my halloween movies today. I used to have a lot more of them but they have dwindled down over the years. I can’t find my Garfield halloween one. I can’t find Hocus Pocus, and I’m always on the lookout for all the halloween movies (both horror and young adult/kids), tv shows, specials and made for tv shows and movies. I’m on the search for new shows. So I have a request from everyone that reads: Please give your suggestions for shows, movies, made for tv specials, halloween specials of your favorite shows or anything on dvd that you love to watch. You can even post annonomously if you don’t want me to know who you are, just share the shows that you love. I plan on downloading and burning a lot of the shows that we loved as kids (the halloween tree, beetlejuice) as well as new ones that I want to be introduced to. So please share your favorite movies, shows and specials!

Todays song is “This Is Halloween” from The Nightmare Before Christmas.

I Still Can’t Believe I Read That…

Posted on September 20, 2011 by imfluffyowl

So, I’m at my mother’s today doing paperwork and filing everything in our new filing cabinet (yay, finally!) and I’m watching HLN with mom cause shes been watching HLN regularly since that damn Casey Anthony case starting airing on there. While watching, I heard a story about a 25 year old girl who was pregnant with twins, did not get any medical attention, had both babies in her bathroom and smothered them to death because she didn’t want her parents to hear them and know that she was pregnant. So what does she do when she is done? She puts them in one of the clothes hampers and her father finds one of the babies the next day.

I kid you not, this seriously happened. I wouldn’t have believed it if I didn’t watch it. Then to confirm it, I looked it up, just to be sure this wasn’t some sick prank. Seriously folks, shes up on two counts of murder.

What angers me about all of this? Well, everything. As a woman who will have to face very costly medical assistance in the hopes of ever getting the chance at getting pregnant, I’m pissed for very clear reasons. Reasons I have spouted on here time and time again. But other things about this bug me just as much. This is a 25 year old woman. A 25 year old woman who not a week prior to this, stood in her friends wedding. She did not tell anyone that she was pregnant, her best guess is that it happened in January or at least thats when she figured out she was pregnant. She knew she was pregnant and took them to term. She did not, in this entire time frame, seek medical care or prenatal care. She told no one. She wanted to hide it from her parents. This isn’t a 13 or 14 year old who really doesn’t know better, this is a grown woman who still lived at home (she is a mere 3 years younger than me), and didn’t want her parents to know.

Now there are two situations that she could fall into because the article and news story doesn’t explain her family life other than she lived with her parents and they seeked guidance from a religious figure in the community once this all happened. Scenario 1: She was a spoiled brat living off her parents enjoying the good life. Her parents weren’t aware of her sexual activities and she probably got drunk off her ass and hooked up with some random guy that resulted in a pregnancy she decided to eventually notice and then ignore, hoping it would go away. Scenario 2: Her family is super religious and instead of talking to her about safe sex they assumed their daughter to be perfect and they preached to her about how sex is wrong and that they only way to have safe sex is to not have any sex at all. Not having a proper education on safe sex and the sexual reproductive system, she was ill prepared for this. Scenario 3: Shes batshit crazy, in the she should be locked up in the looney bin long ago crazy.

Those are my theories. I’m not saying that they are right, but its the only way that I can wrap my head around it. What grown woman would do this? There are safe haven laws to protect women like her. If she didn’t want the babies, all she had to do was drop the babies off at any emergency location (hospital, fire department, police stations, and emergency healt services) and leave. She would not face any neglect charges, she would not be up for murder. This law was put into affect to help save children and give them the necessary medical attention if they are brought into the world like these babies. Then these babies are put into the system and a family is found for them that will love them like they should be loved. Then of course there is adoption, or heaven forbid, pregnancy termination if you really don’t want to carry the babies. There is absolutely no excuse for what this woman did. You are not a bad person for using ANY of these options, but you are a bad person for killing your babies cause you didn’t want your parents to hear them.

I’ve just been rendered speechless over it all. How many families out there would have adopted these two boys and brought them into loving families? We would in a heartbeat. Yet all I can see is that woman holding her hand over their mouths as they took their first breaths and cries in their life. What a useless waste of life. Part of me hopes that that state has a death penalty, and part of me hopes that they take her life the same way she took the life of those two babies who couldn’t protect themselves. I cried for those two babies tonight and I cried over the life they will never get to have. Shame on you Lindsey Lowe.

The Importance of Getting Inked, or How Kim Found Strength From a Word

Posted on September 17, 2011 by imfluffyowl

My Grandmothers source of strength during treatment.

So today went from being a girls day out with a very close friend to a day of me finding strength in the early stages of a strong depression.

So we’ll go back to May. My dear friend Crystal finally found someone who could do her large floral arm tattoo exactly how she wanted it. The artist is from Ontario but she came down for the tattoo festival in Halifax. Crystal sat through 5 hours of the work at the tattoo fest. The artist told Crystal that she would be down again in September and she could finish it then.When Crystal made the plans, she told me that she might need someone to make the trip with her up to Havre Boucher to Sacred Temple Tattoo to finish off the tat and asked if I would go with her. I’m always up for a day trip so we planned for it. Fast forward to today and me and Crystal made the trip up. When I got in the van, I was still feeling down, depressed and I had puffy eyes. So I vented then we got caffiene and we headed out. Half hour into the trip I was already starting to feel better. Crystal just seems to have that effect on me. By the time we got up there, I was feeling much better and just enjoying the day free of husbands and her children.Crystal spent about 3 hours in the chair before she was finished. But the finished product was amazing.

At the beginning of the year, I made a list of goals. Six goals that I thought were acceptable goals to set for myself that gave me a bit of a challenge but didn’t go so far that I couldn’t reach them:

1. Get Pregnant.
2. Buy a house.
3. Finish Chris’s “Home Sweet Home” cross stitch in time for his birthday on March 26th, 2011.
4. Stop Smoking Completely
5. Get at least one of my 3 planned tattoos.
6. Start and complete at least 5 new books. Finish at least one that falls under the category of “classic literature” cause I just don’t read enough classic literature.

Out of the six, I have only now completely 2 of them. One of them is in the works but won’t be completed til mid-year next year and one clearly was made before we got Chris’s results and the lack of contact from any medical professional that should be dealing with us. Today, I completed #5.

My source of strength.

While my grandmother was going through cancer treatments and my grandfathers health was steadily declining, my grandmother put one of those word decals on her wall. The word was “Believe”. Its prominently displayed on the wall above her rocking chair. While sitting with my grandfather one day, the power of the word hit me like a ton of bricks to the face. My grandmother used this word to remind herself that if she really believes and fights, she can get through this cancer and they can get through this. This resonated with me. Deeply within me. I found myself clinging to that word for hope and strength even with her less than stellar diagnosis. I just had to remind myself that I have to believe that this will get easier, believe that I can get through this and be strong for my grandparents and that if we believe, then we will one day finally become parents. We just have to believe that we can get through it. So my goal was to one day have that word tattooed on my wrist so that I can look at it when I needed the strength to get through the bad days.

Lisa Dowling was the artist working Crystal’s tattoo. When she was done, I asked if she would be able to do my tat and since it was so small and she said no problem. So I sat down and had her tattoo that on the inside of my wrist. I love this tattoo. This tattoo holds so much meaning. Seeing it on my wrist brings tears to my eyes because I sincerely believe it. We will get through this. Not only does this tattoo serve as a tribute to my grandparents and their health struggles, but its a reminder of our own struggles with infertility and that this is not a permanent problem and that if we fight and believe in the fight, one day we will get the chance to become parents and to give our love to a little bundle of joy.

I think Crystal said it best on the drive home. She looked at me and said, “now every time things get difficult, you can look at your wrist and it will help you find the strength you need to get through it.”

Why?

Posted on September 16, 2011 by imfluffyowl

Why do pregnancy announcements just rip me apart? Why can’t I just be happy? Why is it that the only feelings that I have are jealousy and gut wrenching pain? I want to be happy. I want to smile about it. But I can’t. Instead, I cry. I jump on that pity me wagon and just cry my fucking eyes out. I was 5 days late on my last period. I got hopeful. I tried not to, but I did. It can’t be helped. You tell yourself not to think about it and its the only thing you can think about.

And its funny. Cause I always know. I know before I click on links. I know before people say the words. I just know. Before anyone talks about anything, I just know. I get this feeling. A feeling that can be described as the feeling you get in your head when you are under water just a second longer than you are comfortable with. That weird feeling you get in your head. You forget to breath, like you are literally holding your breath waiting for the announcement that you just know is about to be unleashed. I feel this and my stomach does the uncomfortable butterfly thing too. And then its like free falling, you have nothing to hold on to, but you reach out anyway and fall to the inevitable pain.

I want to feel happiness and joy, but instead I feel like that. I feel like I’m free falling into pain. Why can’t I make it stop? It’s not like I don’t want these people to have babies. Or experience this wonderful joy. In fact, I feel like absolute shit that I cannot feel the joy and happiness I should automatically feel. I can’t help the pain, its a freight train that hits me head on every time. No warning, its just there.

Why is it that everyone else can get pregnant right away? I just want the urologist to fucking call us and see us! I want to find a fucking part time job so I can bank all that money so we can afford just one fucking chance at fertility treatments. I WANT TO FEEL A BABY GROW IN MY BELLY! I want to feel a baby kick from inside. I want to feel it grow inside of me. I want to be a mom. I want a child to call me mom. I want the sleepless nights because of fussy baby. I would do anything to be kept up all night with a crying baby and go to work the next day. I would do it with a smile because I finally got my chance.

And no matter how many times we fuck. No matter how well we time it. We will never have this naturally. Someone told me yesterday that they pray for those trying to conceive and hope that we find God’s path for us because clearly he has a purpose for us. You know what? Fuck God. If this is God’s path for me and that there is some deep great purpose to it, then I’ll have some pretty nasty words for God when we finally meet up. Fuck God, fuck his plan and fuck all of this. If there is a God, why would he make people suffer like this. I’ve done everything according to his word. I got married before we tried to have a family. We didn’t move in together til we were engaged. Yet hookers and whores and druggies and stupid 16 year olds can get pregnant. Huh God, where’s the fucking justice? Where is there lesson? What are they doing to prove their worth? Fuck God. Fuck it all.God isn’t going to help us, fucking science is what is gonna fucking help us. And it makes me so angry. And when that anger melts away because I can’t stand one more second of it, the pain rolls in for round two where it proceeds to kick my ass. Yet I endure pregnancy announcement after pregnancy announcement and just try to survive it. I now hate the sight of a woman with a pregnant belly. Its the complete picture of everything we struggle to have. And the only people who understand this pain are those that suffer with me. My friends try to understand, but they have no fucking clue what I feel. And I would never in a million years wish this upon them.

I just…I don’t know. I don’t know how to deal with all of this. I don’t know how to deal with the announcements or my pain and jealousy. I don’t know how to deal with any of it. I feel lost. I feel worthless and pathetic. I feel like I’m drowning in all of this and all I want is one clean clear breath as I break the surface but I can’t find the surface to get the breath I so desperately need. So I’ll go cry myself to sleep and get up tomorrow and try to move past all the pain and suffering again. I’ll bury my feelings and try to move on. But each time it gets harder. Each time I try to bury my feelings, the pile gets bigger, and soon you can see the large mound of pain and the dirt barely covering it. And eventually the dirt is gonna give way and show all of my pain. I don’t look forward to that day. That might be the day that I finally break down from all of this…

B-B-B-Benny and the Jets!

Posted on September 15, 2011 by imfluffyowl


Me and Mom waiting for the show to start.

Tuesday night, I had the ability to cross something off of my bucket list. Me and mom lucked out and got tickets to see Sir Elton John at Center200 on Tuesday night. It was one of the most amazing experiences of my life.

Coming from a small Island on the East Coast of Canada, we are not usually graced with awesome performers. The highlight of my concert going experience are the yearly Celtic Colors Festival and Sarah McLachlan. Snoop Dogg performed last year but that was only after some decent concert promoters were hired to bring in decent acts. At the end of June, the radio stations were announcing a big concert coming to Cape Breton. The youth of the area wanted another artist like Snoop Dogg and the rest of us wanted something geared more for the rest of us to enjoy as well. Rumors started spreading, like they do in any small town/city, that Elton John was the big concert. No one was denying it but no one was confirming it either. I wanted to go if it was Elton. I’ve been listening to Elton John all my life. My mother listened to him and was a big fan, so naturally it rubbed off on me. I’ve always been heavily influenced by my parents music. How else do you explain my love for Elton John, Fleetwood Mac, Rod Steward, and an unending but slightly annoying love for the song “Black Velvet” By Alanna Miles (yeah, dad, thanks for that one…) By the way, my ability to listen to a song on repeat until I’m sick of it? Yeah, that’s from mom.

They said 6,600 people were there for the concert. I believe it.

It was finally announced that Elton John would be performing on Tuesday, September 13th, 2011. Tickets would go on sale the day of my yearly pubcrawl. My mother was giddy at the prospect of being able to see Sir Elton John perform live in concert. She told me to order 2 tickets (cause she would be traveling that day to Halifax), one for each of us. Normally ticketmaster takes care of all tickets, but for some stupid reason, Center200 set up their own servers to handle the ticket sales. Because this is such a big concert for our area, EVERYONE and their dog decided that they were gonna try to get tickets. Radio stations were told to announce that its best to get your tickets online instead of going to the venue to line up for tickets. The tickets were set to go on sale at 10am. There were so many people trying to get into the site that we crashed the servers for over an hour and a half. When the site was finally up and running, I had tickets but timed out 5 times. I walked away from the computer because we were dying our shirts for pubcrawl and gave up on getting tickets. It simply wasn’t meant to be. I even called mom and broke the news to her. We did all pubcrawl prep at my friend Angela’s this year and I am still incredibly grateful for the fact that they just let me take over their computer in an attempt to get tickets. When I came back upstairs from dying the shirts, I gave it one more shot I told Ang I’d give it one more shot. I expected them to be sold out at this point. I got through, and with 2 tickets! I even had Angela confirm that I actually did get the tickets and then we jumped up and down in celebration. I called mom with the news and I could hear her cheering wildly while driving. It was in the nosebleed section, but we didn’t care, WE WERE ACTUALLY GOING!! We were on the side, we were close to the stage, just high up. A lot of problems stemmed from the server crash. Some people were charged on their credit cards for tickets they didn’t finish the purchase on. Many were angry that they kept getting kicked out til it was sold out while other people were buying tickets and trying to sell them at a higher price. It was a mess. But we thankfully got our tickets.

So fast forward to this past Tuesday. Mom comes over to my place (thankfully I live within walking distance of the venue) we go grab a bite to eat and get to the venue early. We buy shirts, a program and mom gets an Elton canvas bag. We take our seats and wait for the show to start.

We were in the nosebleed section but we still had a great view.

And what a show it was! Just Elton and his piano. He started with “The One” and continued to play non-stop for 2.5 hours. He stopped long enough between songs to thank us for coming out, dedicating a song to the Cape Breton AIDS Coalition and he bowed to all corners of the venue between songs. He played all of his hits, Daniel, Your Song, Benny and the Jets, Tiny Dancer, Nikita, I Guess That’s Why They Call It The Blues, I’m Still Standing, Rocket Man, Candle in the Wind, Yellow Brick Road and Levon, just to name a few. It was a night filled with the classics that made him a superstar. He played one new song on top of all the hits and it was just as good as the others. After playing for 2.5 hours and finishing off with a version of Crocodile Rock that had everyone on their feet singing along with him, he came back out and signed autographs for some of the people that stormed the stage and then finished off his encore with a mash up of Can You Feel the Love Tonight and Circle of Life. Not gonna lie, I might have cried during the encore.

I was completely blown away by his performance. It was the best 3 hours of entertainment that I have ever witnessed. For someone with hits spanning 5 decades, Sir Elton still knows how to rock out an audience.

Thank you Elton, please come back to Cape Breton again!

My advice to anyone who stumbles across this blog: If you ever get the chance to see this man in concert, please don’t hesitate. It is worth the cost of the ticket and more. I would pay double what I did (I paid 100.00 for the ticket) to see him again. I spent more time on my feet dancing and cheering than I did sitting in my seat. Hes an amazing performer. For those that complained about why Elton John was chosen to perform here, you really don’t know what you missed. And for those that missed it but wanted to be there, I wish you could have been there. It was simply amazing.

So in honor of my Elton John themed post, my songs of the day are all by Sir Elton John: Benny and the Jets, Crocodile Rock (which I have a new found appreciation for), I Don’t Wanna Go On With You Like That, and Your Song.

I’d Rather Sleep on the Couch Than Sleep Without You

Posted on September 12, 2011 by imfluffyowl

This weekend, my parents asked me to house and pet sit for them while they took a trip up to Halifax. This is a fairly regular occurrence when dad is home. At least once every other month. I stay at the parents for the whole weekend. I eat their food, spend time with the pets and watch lots of movies in high def. It also gives me a chance to do some of the paperwork for the business in peace without mom over my shoulder asking me what I’m doing every two minutes.Like this week, I caught up on the week I was off and finished month end deductions in complete peace and quiet. Chris will usually come visit me cause its 20 minutes away, but he usually doesn’t stay the night because we don’t like to leave the cats alone all night.

But the downside to this is that I’m away from home for the entire weekend. And honestly, I miss home. Chris and I made a place for ourselves, its our stuff and its us. I miss it all, the kitties, the apartment and Chris. I missed Chris so much this weekend. We’ve been together for 8 years. Four of those years we lived together. So now, I find it difficult to go to sleep without him. I have seen me go to bed at 9pm exhausted and stay awake til 1:30 when Chris comes to bed and I just pass out once hes next to me.

Its gotten to the point that when I go to my parents, I can’t sleep in the double bed because I reach for him in my sleep. If hes not there, I have a restless sleep and I wake up exhausted the next day. So I crash on the couch at my parents all weekend. And by sleeping on the couch (regardless of how comfortable it is- and it is comfortable) I have a less than stellar sleep all weekend.

Then I call hubby telling him that I miss him and I wish he was here with me. And I find out that because I’m not home, hes sleeping on our couch. With my pillow. Because he missed me and he would not get a good nights sleep in our bed alone. I take comfort in that. Its the little things that make me grateful for Chris and its the little things that always remind me just how much I love him. I’m pretty lucky.

I Love My Family

Posted on September 9, 2011 by imfluffyowl

Today was spent at my parents. Tonight was the joint Anniversary BBQ celebration for us and my grandparents to mark our second anniversary and my grandparents 62nd anniversary. Since the anniversaries are on the 5th and 6th, mom and dad waited until dad flew home (he got in at 2am last night) and we had a full BBQ with steak, and all the fixins. The food was great, my stomach was full and my brother is home all this week as well.

I will say one thing, I love my family but they continue to provide endless hours of amusement for me. My brother and his friend Jamie were there, my husband was there, my cousin Jen was down. Dad and mom were there along with Grammy and Poppy. Its been proving to be quite the bit of amusement all day. Mom was running around like a chicken with her head cut off. Dad was exhausted cause he flew in at 2:00am but he was out manning the BBQ. I was trying to finish my last bit of paperwork for the business before supper was served and Mom kept on hollaring at me til I went out in the kitchen every 5 minutes to help her but when I got out there, she had it done or I watched as she did exactly what she just asked me to do. Grammy and Poppy are both very hard of hearing. They are yelling at each other, but not yelling mad, just yelling to be heard. From the kitchen I can hear my grandmother yell, “Grandfather, you shouldn’t have another beer.” Poppy comes back with “It’s not deer season!” Mike and his friend take to the back step with a couple of beers in hand. My cousin Jen is lecturing Grammy about getting after Poppy and Grammy doesn’t hear a word. My husband is playing around on the work computer laughing at the whole state of events. Dad asks for a volunteer to go to the liquor store and I’m tripping over myself to go just to get out of the house. Then I spend all of supper dropping everything that entered my hands. I dropped the butter dish, which knocked the salt and pepper all over poppy, I dropped the sour cream, knocked stuff our of the fridge, dropped my dinner rolls and eventually gave up on utensils. Duke took to waiting out food under my feet because I dropped most of my salad on the floor.

But the food was amazing. Man, my father knows how to BBQ a steak.

In other news, I’m on a reading kick and recently finished another book. Just finished “Untold Story” By Monica Ali. While the book wasn’t terrible, I think I walked into it expecting more. It was in a format that usually keeps my attention easily (narration for each chapter rotates between 3 different characters) but still, I found myself pushing through it so I could start my next book instead of flying through it because I enjoyed it. It was also on a subject that I have always found fascinating, Princess Diana, and it was an alternate story of “what if she didn’t die in that car crash but instead faked her death to get away from it all”. Reading about the story, it sounded awesome, I couldn’t wait to start it. But it left me less than satisfied.

I’ve moved onto “The Help” by Kathryn Stockett and so far, I absolutely love it and can’t seem to put the book down. I read last night til sunrise this morning. I looked up and it was 5am. And I was wondering where the time went.

Otherwise, things have been rather calm around here. I find myself (lately at least) taking news of pregnancies a lot easier. I’m not as emotional. I’m still down about said pregnancies, but I can generally hide that behind a smile. And when talking about it becomes too much, I generally just keep quiet, smile and nod where I should. And then I just breathe until the feeling passes. Friends continue to give me advice I already know about, but I smile and genuinely thank them because they are so concerned that they are looking up information for us. I don’t know, but for some reason, my snark and pain seem to be at bay for now.

I don’t know why, but it may be because I have finally found some support online that is helpful and useful. A great group of men and women who are just as affected by infertility as we are and we are able to talk openly about our struggles. I have been following some prominent infertility bloggers Keiko Zoll at Hannah Wept, Sarah Laughed, Melissa Ford at Stirrup Queens, and Elphaba at Yolk: A Blog About Eggs and Sperm, who through their blogs have introduced to a whole slew of strong infertile women who blog about their feelings and dealing with infertility. I have also found an active facebook group for people struggling with infertility and they are all about working together to find the positives in each day. The facebook group is a light group, mostly filled with a lot of people who think they are infertiles because they have had no success in 3 months of trying, but there are some great girls on there and their daily posts asking everyone to share the good and bad parts of each day helps and I find myself looking forward to sharing my good and bad parts of the day, free of judgement. Its a bit of light fluff mixed in with all the other serious bloggers and seriousness of the issues at hand out there.

Regardless, its nice for once not to be consumed with hate and anger and jealousy. It’s exhausting to constantly have that weighing you down. So its nice to come to a bit of a break from it all. I know its not permanent, I know we will have a point where we will enter that “dark time” again, but for now, I’ll enjoy the good while we have it. And right now, I’m gonna go check out my fellow bloggers, then get my ass to bed. I’m house and pet sitting this weekend at my parents starting tomorrow.

Today’s songs are The Fray’s cover of Mahna Mahna, and Alkaline Trio’s cover of Moving Right Along. I just discovered The Muppet’s The Green Album and I already love it. ❤

A Reflection

Posted on September 5, 2011 by imfluffyowl

So after a very nice supper at The Bras D’Or View Restaurant, we ended up at Groves Point beach. Neither of us are prepared to go swimming (much to Chris’s disappointment “I’ll swim in my underwear if I have to” “Chris there are kids here” *pouty Chris*). It’s a gorgeous day, mid 20’s and the sun is shining brightly in this early evening.

It’s beautiful to see. No picture really does it any justice. All the green of the mountains, the high winds making the water dark and choppy. Sitting here makes me realize how small we are in the scheme of things. I feel tiny and insignificant. I’m just one person, one person against nature. What purpose could I have?

But the thing is, as small as all this makes me feel, it also gives me power and strength. The waves crashing along the beach remind me that working alone will not get me far, but as a group, if we try hard enough we can be those waves pressing on against the shore. Speaking up for what we need to do, as a group and fighting regardless of what we are told, we can make that splash, we can force ourselves upon the shore. It won’t happen right away and it most definitely wont be easy, but over time, we will move in like the tide. We will be the wave that pushes the tide in. I’m ready to make that step. Others are ready. We will stand up and be that tide. And no one or thing will tell us otherwise.

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