The Best News I’ve Heard All Day

Posted on December 6, 2013 by imfluffyowl

My clinic just called me with the results of my thyroid levels and for the first time since I really don’t know when, my levels are normal. I spent a year and a half with my clinic trying to regulate my thyroid and at least 7 dosage changes.

My TSH is resting nice and comfy at 1.2.

1.2

The best number.

This may also be the only time I’m happy with being “normal”.

It doesn’t seem like much, but our entire infertility journey and any hope of moving forward was waiting on my thyroid levels to return to normal again.

1.2

A number with so much hope.

1.2 doesn’t mean much to you, but to me it means moving forward…finally.

Spring Shed: Week Five

Posted on April 20, 2013 by imfluffyowl

Welcome back to the Spring Shed! I had a week off due to Brownie camp. By the time I got home and back on my feet after camp, it was almost time for the next leg of the Spring Shed so I just decided to just double up this post. I also didn’t bother to post yesterday out of respect to everyone affected by what’s been going on in Boston. So lets get caught up, shall we?

Living a healthier life in 2013 in preparation for “Future Baby B”.

What have I learned about March and April? That most of my friends seem to celebrate their birthdays in this 8 week period. Because of this, I’ve had a lot of dinners out, cake and a lot of unhealthy stuff that I’m not used to having now. But I’ve done my best to keep my portions small and limit how much sugar I’m taking into my body. Sometimes that includes me pushing food around my plate to make it look like I’ve had more than I actually did.

Because of the craziness going on the past two weeks, including camp, I didn’t get to the gym as much as I normally do, but the workouts I’ve had are longer than normal and I’m upping my workout a bit. I now average a mile and a half on the treadmill each time I go and I just recently added the stationary bike to my workout and I’m already topping 4 miles on the bike alone. Plus I’m still doing the full curves circuit on top of the rest of my workout.

Camp weekend was interesting for my eating habits. I’m not used to snacks between my meals and I’m definitely not used to bread with my meals anymore. Meals for camp are pre arranged and while it was healthy, it was also much higher in carbs then I’m used to. I went from dropping bread almost entirely from my diet to having bread with every meal. I’ve been struggling a bit with getting my meals back to a sense of normal and I’m trying to stop myself from carb loading at night, again. And while I didn’t get to the gym the weekend of camp, I was on my feet all weekend. You get no rest as a Brownie leader and I still feel like I got a decent workout without the gym.

To make progress towards resolving our infertility.

Nothing new to report here. Things are at a standstill until I get my blood work done and get those results back. I’m currently waiting to see if I’m actually ovulating this cycle or not and if I am in fact ovulating, then sexy fun times will have to happen.

To work towards making our house a home.

Mia is about to have puppies, so we are trying to get ready for that. And while I was away for camp, my husband completely cleaned the downstairs for me. I came home to a sparkly kitchen and living room. We also got all of the laundry in the house done once I came home from camp. We started to straighten up one spare bedroom and I’m starting to organize my craft room.

To make more time for myself.

It’s been a busy two weeks so I haven’t had much time for me lately. I had a busy week prior to camp, then camp and then recovering from camp. But finally over the past couple of days, I started to make some time for myself. I read a couple of short stories, went to bed as soon as I got tired and even took the dog geocaching when I went with my husband. I’ve also started taking Mia for walks and I just talk to her the whole time while she looks at me with those big, sad beagle eyes. Its become less about the exercising and more about the getting out and enjoying the spring air and letting myself just relax. Mia is a great companion for that because she just wants to be around you, no matter what. You never feel unloved around my dog. She’s just one great big bundle of love, just giving it away for free.

I hope that everyone is doing well and I look forward to getting back on track!

Love and hugs to my fellow Spring Shedders!

Spring Shed: Week 1

Posted on March 26, 2013 by imfluffyowl

Hey everyone!

First my apologies to my fellow spring shedders for the late post. You ever have one of those weeks that you just wanna walk away and say, I give up? Well, this past weekend that was me. I had to house sit at my parents all weekend. The first night, we got a massive early spring snowstorm. Because my parents live on the outskirts of town, we get plowed later but they did every street in the area but moms and waited til after midnight the next day to clear it. While that was going on, I was suppose to have a get together for my husband at my parents but no one could get up the street. And while I was trying to get ready for the get together, just hoping we would be plowed in time, I get a call from my grandmother telling me that I may need to call an ambulance for poppy. Because she can’t hear me on the phone, I couldn’t get the information I need, my parents were on the other side of the country, my cousin was MIA and my uncle was away and didn’t bother to let the family know. I couldn’t get in touch with anyone, I’m in a full on panic cause I can’t check on them or track ANYONE, even a family friend, to go check on them and I can’t get the car down the road.

Needless to say, I called my mom in a complete breakdown, unsure what to do. I hated that my grandparents care was left in my hands because no one had the thought to plan ahead for everyone being away. Then Saturday, it was cookie day for girl guides. We picked up the 45 cases of cookies for our Brownie group. By the time I got home from that, I needed to run around for my mom and get a workout in. I was so overtired that I did not sleep (plus I find it so hard to sleep without my husband) and I was up til 7am before I finally got some shut eye. A few hours later, I was woken up by my aunt in Ontario calling asking me to go to my grandparents and call for an ambulance because poppy was having a lot of difficulty breathing. So I spent the rest of the day and well into the evening at the hospital with a grandmother who can’t hear and a grandfather who can’t breath. Then today, finally after a night of being home, I was left to take poppy to his doctors appointment. I really don’t mind helping out, but today is my husbands birthday and I had to reschedule stuff with him just to get poppy to his appointment. I sometimes wish there was more help with the grandparents. I do what I can but I’m only their grandchild. I have to ask my parents to keep me in the loop about their health yet I’m walking into doctors appointments where I have no answers for the doctors because no one tells me anything. I feel bad when all I can tell the doctor is, “I’m sorry, I don’t know. They don’t keep me up to date but I’m the only one available to help right now.Do you want me to call my mom or aunt?”

So yeah, that’s why my first post of the Spring Shed is late. I haven’t had the time or energy to post til now.

But let’s get back on track! This week, I’ll highlight my new goals, then compare them to my old goals and track this weeks progress. As always, if you are interested to follow along, please click on the Spring Shed picture either in this post or to the right of this post under “i’m a proud member of” and join this wonderful group of ladies. Like last time, the whole point of this exercise is to set realistic goals for ourselves, track our progress, provide support and encouragement for each other and mostly to help ourselves become accountable for our goals by publicly acknowledging them. The Winter Shed helped me through the winter months, and it was wonderful to check in and track my progress with the other women. Thanks in part to that, I’m down 30 pounds!

Living a healthier life in 2013 in preparation for “Future Baby B”.

I want to keep this goal the same. It’s well rounded and while its been wonderful so far, it still encompasses what I wish to accomplish. While there are many things I’m doing towards this goal, no one thing is more important than the other. My end goal was and is to live a healthier life. Since the new year, I’ve worked towards changing my diet. Smaller portions, less takeout, no pop, more well rounded meals and I plan to keep at this the same as I’ve done so far. I’m also working out. I joined a 24 hour gym and I’m enjoying the work outs. I also do other things to promote a healthier life. I still occasionally do yoga at home when I can’t get to the gym. And as the weather turns nice and the snow and ice melt and disappear, I plan to start going for walks outdoors with my friends. While I do aim to lose weight, I’m not putting too much effort, energy or goals into this because at some point I will plateau and I don’t want to get discouraged and as long as I keep at my lifestyle change, the weight will do its own thing on its own time. My end goal is still to work towards a healthier Kim.

This past week, I’ve missed a couple of days at the gym but when I do go, I make myself make time for it and I stay longer at the workout when I know that I may miss one. This weekend was a bit of a cheat weekend with Chris’s birthday and me at my mom’s. But today I’m back to my regular eating and I plan to get back to the gym tonight. I’ve noticed over the past couple of weeks that my legs are stronger, I’m lasting longer on my workouts before exhaustion hits and the aches and pains that were always there after a work out are not as bad. Last night when I got into bed, I felt the muscles in my legs tightening but in a good way. I have more energy after my workouts and I’m still adjusting to the gradual loss of sugar and salt coming out of my system since I started to cut down. I find greasy food leaves me feeling gross and like I have a dead weight in my stomach which is helping me keep away from it. My portion control has also dropped. Still resting at 30 pounds lost but people are really starting to notice the weight loss now and it makes me feel good.

To make progress towards resolving our infertility.

This one I plan to keep the same as well. This will be a work in progress until we have a child in our arms to call our own. This goal is forever changing so to set a goal to constantly make progress towards it is as fair as I can make it. I will always be waiting for a report, blood work, test results or for medication to do its thing. But my goal is more so to stay on top of it. To be vigilant with follow ups. The only thing I would add to this goal would be to be more proactive in the community side of it. Get back into commenting and my daily interactions with the infertility community. To get back into ICLW. And to work towards communicating within my own local community of infertility friends. I tried to set up a support group but got no response. I don’t think we are ready for that yet here in Cape Breton. At least not at the level I want it to be. So for now, I want to be a safe space for people to talk to if they have no one else to talk to about their infertility. I’ll talk and share info 1 on 1 until I see the need for more.

This week, I helped a friend who just got a bad diagnosis from her first appointment with her infertility clinic. She hasn’t told anyone but me and she just really needs someone to get her through the down parts of a bad diagnosis. We talk regularly on facebook message and we are planning on having a lunch/tea date just the two of us. I don’t have all the answers, but I can be a good friend and listen. A couple of other friends came out to me about their struggles and I’m doing my best to be a supportive and helpful friend, sharing what I know and I hope that its helping them.

Otherwise, my HSG was last week and my uterus has been declared “clear and perfect” by my gyno! My blood work is showing that I didn’t ovulate the past two cycles but (potential TMI warning) the past couple of days, I’ve noticed that my CM (cervical mucus) is moving towards the desperately wanted EW stage. I haven’t had this in a while so it may be a step towards ovulation getting back on track. I’m gonna purchase a OPK when I’m out later with my husband and see what I get. If I am in fact ovulating, it may also be a sign that my thyroid may be getting back on track. I got my slip to check my thyroid levels from my fertility clinic and I will be going for that blood work next week. So fingers crossed for good results because once those levels are normal, I can re-do my cycle testing again.

To work towards making our house a home.

I want to keep this one much the same. But my goals within this goal are changing a bit. Right now, my goals are to move towards getting the two spare rooms set up and keep my house in a functioning order. Staying on top of the chores. Once we are full into spring, I’d love to paint but it won’t be a priority. I just want to be able to have a clean house so that if anyone drops by for a surprise visit, I can be proud of how the house looks instead of apologizing for the mess. So that’s my end goal. I will also track any projects on the house as I complete them whether it be a pinterest project success or hitting any hurdles with decorating/reorganizing. But the big thing is, I won’t be hard on myself if I don’t hit the extras. This feels more realistic for whats going on in my life right now.

Since I haven’t been home much lately, I’ve only been able to do things like load and empty the dishwasher. But I wasn’t home much. Now that I’m back home, I plan to give the house a good once over in the cleaning department and then when I have the time, to move towards other stuff in the house. I want to make a dog bed for Mia, but time, money and resources will determine that for me.

To make more time for myself.

While this one was originally to read more, I’m going to make a change to it. I love reading and crafting equally and I’ve had to little time for both lately. My goal this time around is to simply make more time for me on a mental level. I’m a member of a woman’s dart league on Monday’s and I’m a Brownie leader, but otherwise, I find I don’t take time to give myself a mental break. So I want to put the iPad down a bit more and take more time to read, craft and do things that will help me relax.

This week proved difficult because my time really wasn’t my own but today and yesterday I was already able to commit a bit of time towards reading and crafting.

I hope that everyone is doing well! I’ll be back later this week with a regular post.

xoxo

Kim

Winter Shed Week 10

Posted on March 16, 2013 by imfluffyowl

Hey guys,

Here it is, the last week of the winter shed. Next week I’ll be joining up for the spring version of this. I’ll adjust the goals here I still plan to work on and add new ones as I feel it. I will spend the week determining my goals I want to accomplish.

If you want to join in on the spring shed, I’ll have the icon and link set up next week when sign up is set.

But since its the last week, I want to look back, not only at what I accomplished this week but what I accomplished overall and if I considered it a success or not.

Living a healthier life in 2013 in preparation for “Future Baby B”.

Last week, I joined the gym. Its a 24 hour gym and so far I love it. i tend to be in a 2 days on, 1 off while my body adjusts to working muscles its not used to working. I weighed myself on Tuesday and found out that since my first weigh in in November, I’ve lost 30 pounds! I feel wonderful and my clothes are loose on me. People are starting to notice the weight loss. This makes it much easier to continue my lifestyle and diet change. I consider this goal both successful and still a work in progress. I don’t want to give up this healthier lifestyle now that I’m getting into a routine with it.

To make progress towards resolving our infertility.

Today was finally the day of my HSG test. While I never want to do that again, I am pleased to say that Dr. D proudly announced with a smile on her face that my tubes and uterus are “clear and perfect”! So she thinks that my biggest hindrance on my end at this point is my thyroid. I’m about 2 weeks out for my 6 week thyroid level check in. My family doctor is still on vacation so I called my fertility clinic and asked if they could mail me a requisition form for my thyroid levels. The secretary is sending that out first thing Monday and she told me that my last progesterone level results are in but she doesn’t have the ok to share it with me. But she will have one of the doctors call me first thing Monday to go over the results with me. So right now, everything is going smoothly in the testing area. I’ll just be happy when my thyroid levels are normal again.

I consider this one a success and a work in progress as well. Things were completed but there is still lots to go in this goal.

To stop making people a priority in my life when I’m not even an option in theirs.

The passion party was great. I was sad that some people said they were coming and then didn’t bother to show or even let me know that they wouldn’t make it, but people will always do this regardless of how much you plan. But for the people that came, we had a great night.

Overall, I consider this resolved. I accomplished everything I set out to do.

To work towards making our house a home.

The house continues to stay functional. But the big news here is that we finally got a dog!

I’d like to introduce you to Mia:

We had this perfect alining of events that led us to finding her. Hubby always wanted a beagle, we needed a dog that was already at least partially house trained and worked well with cats. Chris’s uncle was looking for a dog for himself and seen the ad with this beautiful girl. The owners were moving, she was a year and a half old, house trained and great with cats and free to. A good home. We called that day, went over an hour later and came home with her. She is possibly the friendliest dog I’ve ever met. All she wants to do is cuddle and sleep curled up to us. She won’t lick your face, doesn’t jump all over you, but if you invite her up on your lap she will jump up and sleep there til you want her to get down. We are madly in love with her and in 3 days she’s already a staple in our life. Me and a friend went out and got her a pretty collar, name tag and some jackets. She sleeps with us every night and the cats are slowly coming out of hiding even though they are still hissing at her if she gets too close.

Having Mia has made our house feel more like a home than anything else we’ve done. I consider this goal only mildly successful. I want to revisit this and maybe make some adjustments to this goal.

To expand my reading collection.

I’m gonna claim this one as a failure but possibly adjust this before next week. I want it to incorporate more of my need to alternate between reading and crafting as they are something I do equally.

It’s been a great couple of weeks and this shed had really helped the winter months fly by. Each week I had a goal and it really helped stop the winter blahs from taking over my life.

I hope everyone else is doing well. See you next week for the start of the Spring Shed!!

I Can’t Seem To Find The Words

Posted on March 8, 2013 by imfluffyowl

I have something to admit.

Lately, I can’t seem to find the words. I’ve read every post in my reader. Sometimes more than once. And each time I read something, whether its good news, bad news or just random updates, I can’t seem to find the words to comment. My mind goes blank. I had my comments all worked out as I was reading, processing what they (you) wrote and also weaving my response in my head, but by the time I finish reading and I click on comment, the words disappear and I’m sitting there staring at the screen wondering how to form the simplest of responses so at least my IF friends know I’m still there, reading and rooting for them.

This has truly started to mess with me. I don’t know what’s caused this block but its worrisome and I miss leaving thought out responses. I feel like I’ve lost my courage to respond, but even typing that out seems wrong because that simply doesn’t encompass my “problem”. Is it even a problem? It’s not that I don’t want to comment, it’s not that I’m caught up in my own world, it’s not that I don’t care, it’s simply that I can’t find the words. How do I find the words again?

A blogger who I consider probably one of the closer of my blogging friends just had her FET and I sat in front of her post today. Trying to find the words to share my excitement and hope for her and I still don’t know what to type or how to type it. Is it possible to have commenters block? If its even possible, then I’ve got a doozy. So this is my way of saying sorry to those that I always check in with. I don’t know what’s wrong but I’m here, and I’m reading everyday, but my commenting is broken or lost and I’m trying to find it.

In other news, I finally have something good to share.

I’ve never hidden the fact that I was overweight. In the new year, after both my RE and my Gyno suggested that shedding some weight could help make this process go a bit smoother, I decided to finally do something about it. I didn’t want to do a crash diet that would leave me quitting after a binge, I decided that I wanted to change my lifestyle. Start slow and gradually make changes. I didn’t set a specific weight goal but I did set little goals and hurdles along the way. I gave up takeout, cut out pop and high sugar drinks, slowly started to ween myself off sugar and salt and move towards a healthier lifestyle. I’m still not entirely weened off sugar or salts, but I’ve almost entirely cut fast food and pop out of my diet. I make all of our meals, go for healthier options of foods we like and cut down my portions. I started doing yoga at home when the weather was bad and I was stuck in the house. Myself and 2 of my friends would opt to bring healthy snacks for each other on dart night and bring our own bottled water so we wouldn’t be tempted to have chips, pop or beer. Those 2 girls are the first people I’ve trusted with my original starting weight in November (which was a wake up for me, I wasn’t happy with that number).

I’m not perfect, I have my cheat days. Today I had a poutine and a slice of pizza. But where I would have eaten most of it, the dog ate more than half of my poutine before I left for Brownies, and I only ate about half of that slice. The last time I had a box of smarties (this week), it took me the better part of the week to finish it, a few here and a few there. That’s all I had the craving for. And my one glaring problem seems to be breakfast. I try to eat breakfast, but I get queasy thinking about it when I first get up. I want it, but my stomach is yelling no way. The most important meal of the day, and I’m forever struggling with it.

Then of course the big thing was yesterday when I finally joined a gym. A woman’s gym that is opened 24 hours. My first day was yesterday and I went again tonight after Brownies. But while I was changing into my workout clothes at the gym, I weighed myself for the second time since my fertility appointment in November. At my last weigh in late-January, I lost 7 pounds. As of tonight, I’ve lost 22.3 lbs! I knew that if I planned to change my lifestyle versus dieting with a set weight goal, I’d have an easier time keeping up with it. But now that I treat the weight as a secondary goal, I don’t worry about it and its coming off fairly quickly. I won’t feel discouraged if my weight hits a plateau (which it inevitably will) and just keep up with my new lifestyle instead.

So now, when I finally meet with my doctors again, I can honestly say that I’m working to make myself healthier and that my weight is down. Because if it means that it may help us have a higher success with fertility treatments and to finally let me be a mom, I will do whatever I have to do.

And as a side note, we finally got the agenda for brownie camp! The weekend of April 12th, I’ll be spending it with a bunch of other leaders and 80 girls split up over the course of 2 nights. I can’t wait!

So despite my problem finding the words with my blogging friends and their posts for the past while, I’ve still had a great week. I hope everyone else is having a great week too!

Love and hugs!

All The Things!

Posted on February 22, 2013 by imfluffyowl

Lots of little updates:

Infertility Wise:

~Still nothing from my gyno’s office. But that secretary is a bitch so I’ll call the second I start my period (despite time of day) and demand that she schedule me or I report her and the office for their practices. Enough is enough.

~AART called me earlier this week and told me that CD21 bloodwork was ordered for me again. They are mailing me the form so I can go in for blood work. They still want to check for ovulation while my thyroid meds kick in. I’ll know if they are also testing my thyroid when I get the form in the mail. If not, I’ll either call them for the form or set that up through my family doc and just have the results forwarded to AART.

Everything Else:

~We were hit with a sudden storm last night. Not fun. We got enough snow to need to shovel. But the best part of today was when I got up, prepared to at least shovel out enough to get my car out only to see my neighbor going through it with his snow blower. I know he doesn’t mind doing it because we let him keep it in our garage, but damn it if I’m not beyond grateful to see it done and save myself some exhaustion.

~I’ve decided to bake for him and his wife to show my gratitude. Plus I’m told I’m an amazing baker.

~Brownies was tonight. The girls continue to amaze me at how amazing they are. Around late October/early November, we taught the girls about the 4 world centers of guiding. We assumed that because their attention was wandering despite our best efforts to make it extremely exciting. Tonight we talked about World Thi.nking Day which is the birthday of both Lord and Lady B.aden-Po.well. We talked about WAGGGS (Wo.rld Assoc.iation of Girl Gu.ides and Girl Sc.outs) and we tested them on their knowledge of the world centers. The girls amazed us when they actually got most of them right along with their locations. It’s so wonderful to see that they are taking something away from our time together. That things we are teaching them, are in fact, staying.

My inner self was totally doing this.

While my outer self was totally giving the girls two thumbs up.

~I came home tonight with the intention of pricing a guiding poncho for camp in mid-April so I have something to put all my badges and crests on. I ended up getting caught up in with all the guiding stuff. I now have a very expensive order on the go with clothing and fun stuff. Stop me before I buy all the guiding things. I NEED ALL THE THINGS. The site is so shiny and pretty and has fun things I want. It’s the place my wallet goes to die.

I’m trying my best to justify everything on this order. Hey, maybe I earned this treat? Right? Anyone?

And after all this. I’m not even getting the poncho. I realize that it would be cheaper to buy the materials and make it myself or ask Grammy to help me make it. *sigh*

~I finally watched The Lucky One when it popped up on my OnDemand menu. I don’t like Nicolas Sparks books, but I tend to love them when they are turned into movies. I have a soft spot for romantic and sappy girly movies. But can someone tell me when Zac Efron got so freaking hot?! I turned it on expecting a sappy movie with a man that was OK to look at and sorta let it play in the background while I read. Well as soon as Zac came on the screen, I glued my eyes to the screen and they never looked away, not even when hubby came to bed. Damn he got hot.

~I’m finally eligible for my phone upgrade and my shitty iPhone 3gs is finally going to be upgraded to a newer iPhone. I don’t know if I’ll do the 4s or go right to the 5. Depends on the contract. Since I got my iPad, my iPhone usage has dropped dramatically, so it doesn’t matter to me either way. I just desperately need a phone that doesn’t shut off at 60% battery. Especially considering that we don’t have a home phone, just our own separate cell phones.

~Tomorrow is also the next installment of taking the Brownies to a hockey game. We only have 2 girls going along with all 4 leaders which will make it much easier than last time when we had 15 girls to 2 leaders. Mom is coming with me, along with the other 3 leaders, their husbands/boyfriend and one of them is taking their oldest child. So we might get to watch some, if not all, of the game this time.At least bathroom runs will be much easier.

~Saturday is shopping with Grammy. I’m actually looking forward to it. I really enjoy shopping with my gram. We also have some plans in the evening with some friends.

~Sunday, I’m hoping to have a home day where I can actually get some baking done. My father in laws birthday is on Tuesday and I promised to bake for him. I’m also getting a care package ready to send up to Aunt Moe and her husband (the people we stayed with for my last AART appointment). She has MS and she got a less than stellar report last time so I wanted to send up some snacks that I know the two of them would enjoy. They loved my Christmas package that I sent up. I also wanna take a stab at making bread again. If it works out well, I’ll send some over to my awesome neighbor.

~I’m also trying to get the house ready for the beginning of March. I decided to host a passion party and the response has been amazing so far. So much so that I may have to move it from the living room to the basement just to be able to hold everyone. I’m just looking forward to having my friends come over. Some I haven’t seen in awhile and it would be nice to see them.

~Also, I still haven’t used my gift certificate for my hot stone massage. I don’t know why. Have I lost my mind? I have two gift certificates here waiting to be used. It’s not like I haven’t earned it. So I’m gonna call them tomorrow and see when they can take me next week. I think this will help me with the winter blahs and the bit of envy going through me over recent pregnancy announcements and the pending arrivals of others both in and out of the community. Take some time for me to realize that I may be dealing with infertility but infertility is not the whole of my life and to relax and remind myself that its OK to be both happy for them and envious of them at the same time and that at least those in the community get that and take no offense to my less than happy side. You know what? Maybe I’ll even splurge for a pedicure!

~And a completely random but still fun thing…me and Chris decided on our Halloween costumes. I know its really early and we don’t even have anywhere to wear them yet, but we are so excited. Now its just time to get everything ready as I will have to order some things online and talk to my friend about doing my makeup.

CD2 Blood Work, Rocking It Like A Superstar

Posted on January 4, 2013 by imfluffyowl

Happy New Year to all my blogger friends out there. New Year’s Eve was possibly the worst one I’ve ever had but I’m not ready to talk about it just yet. If I ever talk about it, I don’t want my anger and bitterness to affect the words that I type.

At midnight, with tears in my eyes and hubby holding onto me, I took a page from S.I.F.’s play book and wrote my wishes for 2013 down on a piece of paper and at the stroke of midnight (after our kiss) we went onto our front step and I lit the folded piece of paper on fire and my husband held onto it until the fire reached his fingertips then let it go. My wishes weren’t for extravagance and money but instead a wish for our true dreams to come true. I’m not one to believe in this stuff but I’m willing to put a little faith in the unknown and see what may come. I’m grateful that my husband did not mock my need for this, but that may show just how out of sorts I really was last night and how much he just wanted to make it better. Here’s hoping our wishes are answered.

But now that we are into the new year, I have a confession to make. I’m TERRIFIED of needles. I have been since I was a child. I know, odd for a girl who has multiple tattoos with plans for more. I had traumatic childhood memories of getting my shots for school and my mom and two nurses having to hold me down so that they could give me my shots. Apparently even as an infant, I bit my doctor while he tried to give me a shot. I didn’t believe that until my doctor confirmed that. I once full on kicked my doc when I was 13 and then as I got older, I switched out the screaming for weakness and just passing out. So my fear of needles run very deep. The idea of blood work and possible shots for treatments simply terrifies me and leave me queasy at the thought of it.

Knowing that, I used the move and upcoming holidays as an excuse to get out of my first round of CD2 blood work. But last week while waiting for my period to start I knew I had to bite the bullet. We simply can’t move forward without it and I would regret it. Last time I went for blood work, I went by myself, passed out mid way through and spent a half hour trying to prove that I was fine before they would let me drive home and only under the agreement that next time I came for blood work I bring someone with me or else they won’t let me leave until someone comes to get me. Yeah, I know, that’s pretty bad.

So this morning was CD2. I woke up early and got Chris out of bed and dragged him to the hospital. It was now or wait until next cycle. I chanted over and over “this is for our future child” to keep myself on track. Our hospital staff is sometimes less than wonderful to deal with and I worried that they would give me problems because the blood work slip came from the IWK Children’s Hospital in Halifax (who my fertility clinic primarily deals with). While a friend and her husband visited us last night I mentioned my fear and friends husband flat out told me, “don’t worry, not only do they accept it, but the IWK sorta makes every other local hospital their bitch”. I laughed it off thinking, ah yeah you’re just saying that. So imagine my surprise today when we landed at the hospital and we clearly had an hour and a half minimum wait time for blood work. So I grab a number and wait to be registered. My number is called, I ask Chris to hold my purse and the girl registering me does all the normal stuff then double checks everything on the list, asks if I’m on thyroid meds then runs off my stickers for the vials of blood. Then instead of making me go back and wait, she tells me to bypass everyone and go right in for my blood draw. When you go in the actual blood collection room, a tech meets you and takes your slip. He looked at it, said he would be right back and while everyone else received just their stickers back, I get mine back paper clipped to a neon tag and I’m taken first. All I can think is, wow I guess every other hospital really is the IWK’s bitch. I’ve never been taken care of so fast before. I guess I was upgraded to VIP status.

So I go to see my tech and as she says hello and confirms my name and DOB, I tell her directly:

“I need to tell you a couple of things before we start.
1. I’m petrified of needles and prone to passing out.
2. Passing out is not as bad when I’m laying down from the beginning.
3. If I do pass out and you need my husband, his name is Chris and he’s in the waiting room.
4. If I do pass out, I’m generally fine after it and you can complete your blood draw after I’m back to my senses. Otherwise I’m doing my best to keep calm.”

I had my tech in stitches. She clearly knew that this was not my first time. So she laid me as flat out as she could in the chair, closed the curtains around me for privacy if I did pass out, talked me through everything and 5 vials of blood and a constant exercise of deep breathing later, I was done and I hadn’t passed out! After laughing, being congratulated by my awesome tech for not passing out and having a cold glass of water just to be safe, I was on my way home and Chris was wondering why I needed him in the first place especially since he thought i was still registering. When I got home, I took my first multivitamin and folic acid that my RE wanted me to start (*note to self, take with food or lose liquid breakfast…again*) and considered today a complete success.

So I was a trooper and I’m quite proud of myself. But the other thing that left me light hearted and happy was the fact that I was taken care of. No worries, no fighting with people to do stuff for me, nothing. It’s so uncommon for me to have anything go smoothly when it comes to our infertility and treatment of it that when things go well, I’m left shocked. Most people have this blood work and work ups done as soon as they see their doctors when they have trouble conceiving, yet we are almost at the 4 year mark and we are just getting to this point. So it’s really no wonder why I’m almost expecting the bottom to fall out of everything and shocked when it goes smoothly.

Getting Back On Track

Posted on December 31, 2012 by imfluffyowl

It’s hard to believe, but this is the first real time I’ve had to sit down, relax and really process my thoughts so that I could write. And honestly? I’m exhausted. 100% physically and emotionally drained. December has been a complete write off. Beginning of the month I helped my parents pack/move/unpack just to pack/move/unpack ourselves a week after that. My mother had a hard time with the move. She was incredibly overwhelmed by all of it and moving is one area that that I’ve become more comfortable than I ever wish I had to.

Our official move date was December 9th. Nothing like waiting as long as possible to move. While the guys were unpacking the U-Haul, I stepped out to make an appearance at a friends baby shower. She is the sister of my fellow IF’er friend so I wanted to be there for emotional support for my IF close friend plus the pregnant friend is very understanding of both me and IF friend and our struggles with trying to get pregnant. She left it in my hands as to whether I was comfortable enough to come. So the shower was easier than I expected. Plus she asked me for help and put me to work which was great cause then no awkward questions from strangers cause I’m too busy being put to work.

Upon returning home, our friends doing the heavy lifting were already gone home because everything was in the house, Chris was snoozing on the barely cleared off couch because he was exhausted and the only thing that was done was the groceries were put away and the bed and dressers put in the bedroom. So I started unpacking and didn’t stop. My cousin came down after work and helped me organize my kitchen which was wonderful because if not I’d still be trying to organize it, I worked on the living room and got all but a few boxes unpacked because the cable and Internet guy was coming the next morning and he needed the access to that part of the living room.

The next day was my appointment with my local gyno that I’ve been trying to get since our appointment with the fertility clinic in March. In one word, Dr. D is awesome. She is very hands on and prefers to be the one to run the tests versus letting some random tech do it. She’s used to working in connection with our fertility clinic, wants to be cc’d on every test result and told me that she’s worked with multiple couples who used donor sperm and had successes with all of them. She’s also going to be the one to do the dye test and talked me through it. Right now, the hold up is my own body. I wanted to wait til the move was over before I did my CD2, CD21 and CD23 blood work because I didn’t want the blood work to land on any holidays because I’m known to have luck like that. Right now I’m 15 days late and already took a test and it told me negative so now I just want it to hurry up and get here so my testing can happen and I can call and set up my dye test.

After that, it took me about a week to get the downstairs completely unpacked, organized and get rid of the boxes. I got our bedroom and the two bathrooms as functioning as possible but left the two spare rooms to hold what I didn’t have time to unpack. Then I decorated. The tree, the lights in the windows, the decorations on the inside. It’s not as elaborate as I usually go, but can you really blame me? The next day I started my baking. 3 double batches of eggnog cupcakes plus a double batch of that icing, a full recipe of gingerbread cookies, 2 double batches of eggnog cookies, a double batch of gingerbread truffles, 2 different batches of tree bark, and a double batch of my icing, all from scratch with 90% of it going towards gifts and care packages.

By the time I was done with that, it was the week before Christmas and the few gifts that I had to buy, I had to face the craziness of the malls to get them. I did that over the course of two days. Then proceeded to get ready for the holidays. A girls night Christmas party with some of my girlfriends where we had a Secret Santa on the 22nd and the 23rd I spent wrapping gifts. Christmas Eve was spent with our families. We spent the day with my in-laws and the evening with my parents. Mom was down in the dumps because my brother didn’t make it home from Edmonton for Christmas. Christmas Day I went to my parents for me and dad to do the yearly tradition of us making our big breakfast. After breakfast, Grammy, Chris and I started a puzzle while mom started making her turkey supper. We got home late that night just to sleep get up and have our big turkey dinner at the in-laws.

But the big surprise this Christmas was that even though my brother told us that he wasn’t getting home, he secretly flew across country all Christmas Day, spent the night at Halifax airport and then flew into our local airport Boxing Day morning, had his friend pick him up and show up at my parents first thing in the morning on Boxing Day to surprise my mom. My mom went from crying for two days because her baby boy wasn’t home to crying for joy because he was suddenly there. I was woken that morning by a phone call from my mom crying that Mike was home and Mike in the background just pleading with mom to stop crying. I spent the 27th with family and hanging out with my parents and brother. The 28th was the get together with my fellow Brownie leaders (who just happen to be my cousin and two of my close friends) to do our gift exchange. We decided to have a house party at my place, we invited all our men to tag along and we spent most of the night playing board and card games. So yesterday and today happened to be the first day in weeks that I let myself relax.

Sure I still haven’t put away our clothes, I haven’t tackled the two spare rooms filled with boxes, I haven’t done a dump run yet for the mountain of garbage bags building up in the garage from the move and I haven’t taken down my Christmas decorations yet, but these are things that I will slowly get to in the new year. I’ve earned this break, I’ve earned the right to stay in my pjs all day and watch tv and play on my iPad, maybe do some reading and update my blog and read the large list of posts that I’ve barely touched since the move. Tomorrow I get back to life. I’m hosting a small New Years get together here at the house tomorrow. Board games, beer, and then go outside and bang pots and pans at midnight. All from our new home. Then of course, the first day of 2013 will be spent taking down the Christmas decorations and baking goodies for my brother to take back with him to Edmonton on the 5th. Apparently, I’m quite popular amongst my brothers friends, or rather, my baking is loved by a bunch of boys living away from home. So they stroke my ego a bit and they get baked goods from the east coast. It’s win/win in my book. Then finally, I might finish unpacking. Maybe. Cause I really want to set up the spare room and my craft room to my liking.

I have to say, I walked into this Christmas expecting the worst. I really expected the move to throw a wrench in the holidays and my holiday spirit. I waited for everything to go wrong but it didn’t. As exhausting as this year was, it was also one of my best holidays in years. Everything went so smoothly, even the move. We got to visit with friends and family, no one asked about our infertility or our lack of children, and this is the first Christmas in years that I did not receive any pregnancy announcements. Some Facebook friends were incredibly annoying with stupid creative announcements telling everyone whether they were having a boy or girl but I just ignored them. Though if I admit, I really miss the unsubscribe feature on Facebook. I was also lucky enough to avoid any and all family drama, stupid fights and general nonsense. I was really grateful for that. Then it was topped off by my brother coming home. What more could a girl ask for? Well other than a pregnancy? You know cause I’m working on that…

I hope all of you had a wonderful holiday season that wasn’t near as hectic as my own. I hope you all have a wonderful start to 2013 and I’ll start getting my New Years post in the works.

Love and hugs to you all!

Kimberly
xoxo

The picture descriptions in order of appearance:

~Welcome to our brand new home (in a winter wonderland)!
~My new wonderful, big, cupboard crazy and baker friendly kitchen!
~Our new living room is livable!!
~Baking gingerbread cookies in my new kitchen!
~The care packages for the family we stayed with during our fertility clinic appointments.
~The blanket going up for Baby C along with the care packages.
~Our Christmas tree.
~Mom’s dog Duke scared of the new remote control car that dad got as a gift. He took refuge on moms lap for protection. Mind you if Duke walked on that thing, he would break it.
~Christmas morning breakfast with my parents, aunt and grandparents.
~The pup is pooped.
~And finally a picture of me with my cousin and two close friends during our gift giving/board game Christmas get together.

A Quick Update Before The Move

Posted on December 7, 2012 by imfluffyowl

Hey everyone,

Just stopping by for a few minutes to give updates. I’ve been completely MIA lately. There’s been a lot going on and I haven’t had the time, patience or ability to sit down and write. I miss it.

I’m in a fresh wave of self pity lately because of our IF and while its no ones fault and just one of my down periods on this infertility roller coaster, coming on here and reading my blog roll has been a bit more difficult now. While I’m incredibly happy for all of my IF girls, about 80% of the blogs I read and comment on lately either just gave birth, about to give birth or are pregnant. It’s hard sometimes to come to my “safe place” away from the fertile world just to read about pregnancies and see baby bumps, newborn pics, pregnancy tests and a handful of people making the decision to move to a new blogging spot for a “fresh start” while others just disappeared from the blogging world after they got pregnant or had their babies and I find myself feeling a little left behind because at my lowest points it feels like everyone but me is pregnant. I know its not true, but irrational thoughts are irrational for a reason, right? So I’m backing away a bit so that I don’t hurt anyone or myself accidentally. Have my pity party for one, then dig myself out after the holidays and move forward. You understand, right?

Otherwise, things are CRAZY. I just spent the past 2 weeks moving my parents into their new home with a mother who hasn’t had to move since I was 4 (and she was in the hospital giving birth to my brother while dad took care of that move) and is now feeling completely overwhelmed by the thought of packing up 26 years of stuff. Needless to say, she’s collected quite a collection of stuff and doesn’t have room for all of it at the new place. For once this is something I have more experience in than my parents. Now that they are settled I’m in a mad rush to finish packing, tracking down boxes, organizing for the move which is a mere 2 SLEEPS AWAY. Can we take a moment and say holy shit! I’ve been anxiously waiting for this for months.

We move on Saturday, I have to rush to unpack just so that I can at least get the tree and some decorations up in time for Christmas. Plus I have to take my grandmother shopping on Friday, come home to finish packing, move on Saturday, pray that my friends keep their word and help us move and unpack. Then on Sunday I have a friends baby shower to go to. Which I’ve decided to go to because when she first planned it she asked if I could handle it and left it completely up to me. I asked if I could be put to work and she said yes and I’ll be attending it with a fellow IF’er, who happens to be the pregnant friends older sister and my childhood best friend. Support in numbers, right? Cause if anyone can keep the other sane during this and be able to cover for each other, it’s the two of us, together.

Then on Monday morning, I finally have my appointment with Dr. D, who is the local Gyno I was suppose to be referred to in March. When AART took over my file from Dr. G, shit started moving fast. And I’m also waiting for CD1 to hit so I can do my CD2, CD21 and CD23 blood work. I decided to wait until this month and cycle because as soon as I landed home, I started and honestly couldn’t find the time to do my CD2 blood work amongst my other obligations. Monday will also be the day that our cable and Internet will be hooked up. So between Saturday and Monday, I’ll be MIA and then probably sporadic at best until it slows down after the holidays because once we are unpacked and decorated, I have to make my Christmas gifts, most of which are just baked goods. So yeah this girl is gonna be swamped. This might be the first Christmas I’ll be happy to see come to an end. Two years in a row of moving mid-December and rushing to set up for the holiday is really hard on me, especially when I normally take my time and start organizing and decorating for Christmas by early to mid November. Next year I vow to enjoy the holiday season whether we’ve started treatments or not. So fear not if you don’t hear from me or I don’t/haven’t commented as much as I normally do. I’ll try my best but sometime all I have time for is some quick skimming of posts just to see where everyone is at and catch the big updates. I’ll be back at full capacity soon, I promise.

My last bit of updates actually ends up being pretty awesome. On Saturday, I received a pretty sweet gift. My friends and hubby threw me a surprise 30th birthday party. My friend told me that she was coming over to give me a mani/pedi as a birthday gift from her so I had no reason to suspect anything was up. I took a power nap knowing that she would let herself in. I woke up to 10 or so people hollering surprise, holding a cake and all the doings for a party. It was a great night of well needed laughter and fun. I found out later that literally everyone in my life knew about the party and hid it from me successfully (my parents and in-laws included) The party went til about 3am and it was a great night. Hubby’s gift was a pair of hot stone massage gift certificates for me and a friend. I’m giving the second one to the friend who planned my birthday cause she rocks. I look forward to using them in January, the perfect way to relax and come down from this hectic holiday that’s made me its bitch. Then of course I officially turned 30 (ugh) on Tuesday. My in laws gave me a gift certificate for my favorite craft store. My parents bought me the Tassimo T Discs I wanted that will go with the Tassimo machine they bought me and are giving me for Christmas. And despite them planning my surprise party and making my birthday cake, they gave me a cute snowman cake pan. So now I have a cake pan for each of my obsessions, cupcakes and snowmen.

I hope everyone is doing well. I’m thinking of you all and sending my best. I’ll hopefully be back into the full swing of things soon, but until then have a great holiday season!! ❤

The First CD1 To Look Forward To

Posted on November 14, 2012 by imfluffyowl

Things have been a bit hectic, but I finally have a few minutes to sit down and write about the trip.

Thursday afternoon we took off for Halifax with my MIL in tow. Chris was having a very bad day so MIL offered to make the trip and surprise her best friend (who we were staying with anyway) with a visit of her own, and really, just to be there as emotional support for me and Chris. The trip up was both wonderful and terrible. MIL is awesome, easy to be around and is very little fuss so traveling with her is awesome. Chris spent most of the trip asleep in the back, just trying to sleep through the worst of his breakdown. What is normally a 5 hour drive at most turned out to be a 7.5 hour trip because of the heavy rains for most of the trip. At points, the rain was coming down so heavy that I just kept the brake lights of the guy in front of me in my vision and hoped that he didn’t go off the highway or I was gonna follow. I must’ve done something right because my MIL is still talking about how great of a driver I am. I guess I hid my fear of losing control well…

We stayed with “Aunt Moe” (the mother of the guy we stayed with in March) who is my MIL’s childhood friend. They are best friends and essentially their kids grew up together. They are family in every way but blood. Moe has MS, but is still able to get around and incredibly stubborn. She was determined to have us stay with her. I love her dearly and she spoiled us from the moment we walked in the door. MIL shocked Moe with her impromptu visit and we all got an earful for hiding the surprise from her. Thursday was an early, quiet night. We relaxed, caught up and watched TV. My nerves were a little on edge for the appointment.

Friday morning, we were up early to get ready for our appointment. We were staying about a 40 minute drive from our appointment. Moe’s husband offered to be our chauffeur for the day and refused to let us drive into downtown Halifax for the appointment. He drove us to our appointment and since we landed almost an hour early, we walked up the street to my favorite cupcake shop (that sadly only exists in Halifax) and I bought some yummy cupcakes. Then we went to AART for the appointment and let Moe’s husband go do his own thing with a promise to call when we were ready.

When we got to AART, we were early, so we signed in and had a seat in the waiting room. While waiting, a girl who clearly worked for AART came out and poked her head into the waiting room. She said, “Kim?” and instantly I knew it was Kendra. Kendra, the wonderful secretary who literally bent over backwards, listened to me cry in frustration, tracked down doctors and even when our appointment for that day had to be cancelled because our doctor had a family emergency, begged other doctors to take our appointment because of how long I was waiting for this appointment. The same girl who refused to call and tell me about the appointment time change until she confirmed another doctor and then apologized profusely for the time change. When we saw each other for the first time, we were both big smiles and she sat down to talk to us for a few minutes, asked how our trip was, and it felt like i was talking to an old friend. It quickly eased my nerves and she told us that she would come and get us as soon as our doctor landed, he was on his way from the IWK.

Dr. Murphy was wonderful. He made us feel at ease almost immediately. He took our family history, mine and Chris’s medical history, and went over the basic questions that we already filled out on the questionnaires. Explained the basic causes of infertility and a run through of how you actually get pregnant medically. Chris was attentive, but I already knew all of this mostly due to my time in this group. He was surprised to hear that I had found and embraced the help of an online community. He asked some questions about this ALI community, more so to pass onto his other patients, and applauded me for looking for support and embracing it. From there, he asked what tests I’ve had to date, tracked down my last round of blood work, told me that before I left the office, he wanted another pap test run. He is sending Chris for another semen analysis through our local hospital just to check to see if there is any change since the last test in March. They had no explanation for his low count, so they are hoping that there’s been a change. From there, he started with sending the referral for me to get that lovely dye test on my uterus, set up a referral for a local gyno, and a battery of blood tests. I have CD2 blood work to check EVERYTHING, literally, EVERYTHING. They are even taking over tracking the levels for my thyroid and any changes to my thyroid meds will come directly from AART. They are sending me for more blood work on CD21 and CD23 to check my progesterone levels to make sure that I am, in fact, ovulating. Dr. Murphy seems confident that with my symptoms and the length of my cycles and my periods that I’m ovulating normally but he wants the tests to back up his thoughts. He didn’t seem too concerned with my handful of long or longer cycles but he said if anything is wrong, we will know after the tests. He wants every i dotted and every T crossed. And thankfully, to cut down on travel, they will arrange to do results via teleconference to limit my travel time and expenses.

While there, he asked us if we had an idea what we were looking to do as he assumed I knew my options when I walked in. I told him that if Chris’s count was not high enough for IUI, we were willing to move forward with donor sperm. He told me that he’s not surprised that we have an idea of what we want considering how informed I am and considering how long we’ve been waiting to get to this point. He gave us the stats for each, broke down what we would need to do for each and then gave us information folders on IVF, IUI and Semen Donors. We are not really ready to start treatment right now, but since we clearly have some idea of our direction, he wanted to give us more information to look through and to prepare questions for our next official visit to the clinic post-results. Then doc sent Chris to the waiting room where his mom was babysitting my cupcakes and the nurse on staff did my Pap smear.

After the Pap smear was over, the doctor was talking to me and answering any last minute questions. I kept on thanking him throughout the entire appointment and finally after I thanked him again, he asked me why I kept on thanking him over and over again. I laughed at him because I didn’t realize how much I was doing it and then apologized. I told him that I’m really not used to having doctors do so much for us. We’ve been trying to get pregnant for 3 years and 8 months. Almost 3 of those years were spent convincing our doctors that something wasn’t right. I always had to look up what our next step was. Chris had to beg his doctor to send him for a semen analysis. Chris had to track down those results of the semen analysis himself. Nothing was offered after the results. I had to find that out on my own. Chris had to demand for the urologist’s referral. Chris had to check on the status of that referral. We had to fight for that referral to be sent to the right doctor 3 times. We were never contacted about that appointment and ended up missing the first appointment because of it. If I didn’t stay on top of that secretary, we would’ve never gotten the information needed for the second appointment. It’s new to us to have staff that actually try to do stuff for us, to have a secretary not only check on something, but to call us back in a timely fashion. And to finally be at an appointment where things are happening (ALL THE THINGS!!) without evening asking. I can’t help but be thankful and thank everyone who does it.

Upon hearing this, the doctor looked at me with the most honest look in his eyes and said, “You don’t have to beg doctors to listen to you anymore, we’re listening to you. No more worries, we want to help.” *cue the tears*. Every bit of weight on my shoulders seemed to collectively lift and I found myself at ease for the first time in our infertility journey. The rush to move forward seems to slow down and there was comfort just knowing that we were in the right hands. Competent hands. Then the appointment was over, I got to thank Kendra and Dr. Murphy again and we grabbed lunch and did some shopping. By the time we were back at Aunt Moe’s, I was relaxed, laughing and ready to spend the evening with all of Aunt Moe’s kids and their families.

Before we knew it, Saturday morning was upon us and we were heading home. Thankfully no rain but sunny and bitterly cold. By the time we hit Cape Breton, we were driving through snow flurries (the first of the season for us). Now it’s time to get back to normal. Blood work tomorrow morning and for once, this is the first CD1 I’ve looked forward to since before we started trying. Here’s to moving forward…finally!