I was so sure I was pregnant. At my Wellness group, someone asked how I could stand the wait, how could I keep from home testing? I explained that my brain is so untrusting, such a thing would send me to Crazytown - no matter what the test said, I wouldn't believe it until the official blood test, leaving me to suffer through days of worry or false joy. But, I had a plan. I tested myself at home the morning I was scheduled to go in for my blood draw. I guess I really had this urge to pee on a stick...

It was about 5am, most of the world is still asleep, and I'm watching my pee activate a pregnancy test strip. Not once, but twice - negative both times. I somehow got myself dressed and went out to buy another test - surely my tests had been hanging around too long and had gone bad. I had my hoodie up, sunglasses on, tear streaks on my face, and still the checker cheerfully asked me about my day. I couldn't believe how chatty he was. I couldn't believe he wouldn't shut up and wither and die before my eyes. I still can't believe I didn't reach over and cause him physical harm.

Home again, and another failed test. I cried and cried and cried and cried. I somehow lived through the hours until it was time to wake up Eric to take me to the "real" test. He did his best to console me and keep hope alive. At the clinic, they kept us in the waiting room for an eternity. Seriously, it was the longest wait we've ever had there, and all we were there for was to give some blood. Did I mention there was another couple waiting, and I was spontaneously breaking into tears every other minute?

The lab tech did her best to console me. And she seemed genuinely surprised that no one had told me not to self-test because those tests were so unreliable. I kept to myself about the fact that it was 3 tests, and all those commercials they make about how home tests are "just as reliable" as blood tests these days.

I went home and straight into bed. Eric was the one who took the call. He was miserable coming to tell me, but I already knew. I wasn't pregnant. It didn't take.

"It didn't take."

This is the official phrase used by the clinic, my husband, the notifications we emailed.

It is not the phrase used in my head. If I allow myself to be honest, I had a miscarriage.

I was pregnant. An egg was fertilized by my husband, the embryo was implanted inside of me. Even if the loss occurred that very day, the fact remains that I had an embryo in my uterus. I had a baby in my womb. But the embryo was gone. The baby was dead.

The first 48 hours were the worst. I called my mother to ask her to tell me that I was wrong, trying again wouldn't be murder. Because all I could think about was the idea that now I knew my body couldn't support a pregnancy, wouldn't introducing a baby into that body constitute knowingly putting it to harm? Or, in my mind, a death trap. She told me no, that wasn't true. We talked about all the babies still in some lab, waiting to be born. They were already there, waiting for me. I couldn't walk away from them.

In the end, that was what made my decision. 17 embryos sitting in a frozen vat somewhere, waiting to come to life. I had made the decision to have them created, and it was up to me to do right by them. 17 possible babies.

The past few months have been unimaginably hard. Not only because of the sadness and loss and grief, or the gravity of the decision on what to do next, or the feeling of limbo as if my life is pointless until the next implantation, but the realization that my definition of life has shifted. This is big. Like realizing I didn't think god really existed big.

Because I didn't just have a procedure that didn't take. I had a baby in my womb. I had a baby that went away.

When did this happen? How did this happen? Such an extraordinary change in mindset. I had no idea it was possible, that this was in me waiting to happen. How on earth did I go from the belief that an embryo is just a packet of cells to eliminate when necessary, to the belief that on day one I had a real live baby inside of me?

There is a certain politician on the presidential campaign trail who is using her story of miscarriage to explain the evils of abortion. I understand her in a way that I couldn't have before. And yet now she and those that share her belief are even more alien to me. Because knowing there is a baby inside you and deciding to have it aborted is officially the hardest decision a woman can make. And yet, these people still think I'm incapable of making that decision on my own.

I have changed so much, but I am still the same.

Last week I was told that I am basically (but not completely) infertile. The chances of having a "natural" pregnancy are microscopic, will likely have complications, and there will be a 1:35 chance of Down's Syndrome. We are currently learning about the process of IVF with donor eggs.

The first day was incredibly difficult. One of my first thoughts was that when I have a child, she won't look like me. I don't need a baby clone, but the thought that I'll never be able to look at the baby and see my nose or eyes or smile or hair... that's rough. I've noticed that I have an eye for seeing this in other's people's babies. I don't go looking for it though, it's always some random moment, in the right light, the right position, and POP! "wow, she really has her father's eyes!". Hopefully the randomness of it will mean I won't dwell on it for my own child.

I was very happy when I decided I was going to go forward with IVF instead of adoption, but as the week has gone by before this afternoon's appointment to learn more, my confidence has disappeared. Mostly, I am afraid of the complications. I will still have a higher likelihood of complications, like miscarriage. I try not to think about that, but it's niggling in the back of my brain too often.

So many thoughts going through my head those first few days, but never surprise, or blame. It would be easy to blame me, but there's no point. I could be selfish and blame Eric for putting this off for so long, but I agreed with him all the way every time we re-examined the decision on when to start a family. And a very large part of me does not think it would have made a difference.

Because it wasn't a surprise. I was expecting it. I've been using ovulation predictor kits for a year now, and have NEVER gotten a positive result. My Basal Body Temperature tracking was occasionally optimistic, but mostly was sporadic and inconclusive. For the 3rd month in a row, I have had NO temperature shifts at all to even hint at ovulation. This is while I'm on Clomid, which is supposed to make sure you ovulate, and there was never any indication it ever happened. Going to the Fertility specialist a few weeks ago for the first time, I was convinced they would tell me I was in pre-menopause, infertile. Despite my misgivings, no one has ever suggested that to me. But when she did an ultrasound to look at my ovaries, she couldn't find one, and the other she couldn't see well enough to get a good idea of its condition because it was tucked behind something else. She didn't say this was bad at the time, but it certainly seemed like a bad sign to me. Last week she told me the "invisible" ovary probably had no follicles or eggs to be seen.

But there's more. My history of horrific periods that started when I was 8/9 and only ever got worse. No one could ever tell me why, they just ran tests that revealed nothing. Over the years, I have developed a tolerance for tylenol, then ibuprofen, and finally aleve. I am currently taking prescription Tylenol+Codein, 1 every 4 hours, with 2 aleve every 4 hours. And it is usually enough to keep me from screaming, but not to feel well enough to leave the house. The pills take too long to kick in, and then wear off sometime between hours 2 and 3. The codein makes me sleepy. The constant adding of medications that doesn't do enough for the pain builds up until sometime during day 2 I begin to get really sick from having too much drugs in my system.

I was told to either remove or scar my uterus if I wanted any kind of relief. For years we tried to suppress my periods through special birth control pills that are known to make women stop having periods after a few months. Not me. I tried an IUD for the same purpose, and was in constant pain for over 3 weeks until I finally made them remove the thing. 3 weeks of feeling like I'm having day 1 menstrual cramps and pain relievers didn't help at all. It was a nightmare.

So came the laprascopy, which finally showed that I did indeed have endomitriosis - something doctors had been testing for and getting negative results for for years. I was told the type I had, which grew within the walls of the uterus, doesn't usually affect fertility. She found my ovaries, but didn't examine them except to see that they didn't have growths as well.

Also, this doctor diagnosed me with Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS) without telling me - a new doctor going over my notes mentioned it and freaked me out.

That's a lot of stuff stacked against me. Now throw in the fact that most of my high school sex life was unprotected. I wasn't promiscuous, but I was... very, very active. Zero teen pregnancies. No pregnancies later in life despite the requisite condom rupture "oh-my-god-oh-my-god-oh-my-god!!!" moment that Murphy has declared everyone should experience AT LEAST once in their life.

All of these things are separate facts, not necessarily linked at all. It's not very scientific to think all this adds up to guaranteed infertility. But I've been living this for almost 30 years now. It seems impossible to me that I wouldn't have fertility issues. I was just holding out a little hope that it wouldn't be actual infertility.

So, here I am, waiting for my 3pm appointment to learn more about IVF. It's been just over a week since I went in for a follow-up ultrasound that never happened because of bloodwork results.

It was for a "Clomid Challenge". I had been on Clomid 4 times, but never done this challenge. They draw blood on day 3 of your cycle to measure your FSH (follicle stimulation hormone) levels, put you on clomid days 4-9, take your blood again on day 10, and do an ultrasound on day 12. I was told on the evening of day 10 that my FSH was abnormally high. Low numbers are good, somewhere around 10-15 on day 10 of your cycle. Mine was 28. I found some alarming information online, but waited until that ultrasound appointment to actually talk to the doctor.

I was told that indeed it was bad. It meant that if I had any follicles/eggs left, they were likely unusable. AND that my FSH score combined with my age meant that my eggs were likely too fragile to harvest for IVF - they would be destroyed during the process. The ultra sound was cancelled. I was given a packet of info on IVF, and made the appointment for today to go over specifics.

And that's that. I'm just kind of empty right now. Where did my confidence from this last weekend go? I was so sure of my decision to use donor eggs for IVF, so happy there was going to be a next step that could lead to pregnancy. Today, I'm just feeling very dull, almost numb. I fear I have already made a bad association with the clinic and the doctor that triggers panic. As I get older, I've developed a few panic-attack triggers, and now I seem to be collecting them.

I told my brother-in-law last night that it is scientific fact that physical and psychological reoccuring stimulations cause a person to develop a tolerance to them. The more drugs you take, the less affective they become over time. The more you run, the easier it becomes to run the next time. The treatment of phobias is desensitizing, showing the arachnaphobic patient spiders over multiple sessions.

However, there is a contradicting response when food is involved, called food aversion. In a controlled experiment, if you shock or cause physical pain to an animal every time they try to eat, the animal will keep trying. Maybe not as gung-ho, but the animal needs to eat, so it continues to try. But if you put something in the food that makes the animal ill, it will develop an aversion to the food, something that will easily last a life-time. Cancer patients are told to eat the same thing every time they're about to have chemotherapy. Something small that they don't love to eat. Like LifeSavers. Because they've discovered that the nausea and vomiting following chemotherapy causes very strong food aversion. Personally, I got really sick after having too much cherry pie when I was a kid, and it took me over 15 years to try another cherry pie after that.

For some reason, I develop aversions to actions and events as well as food. My tolerance for pain gets lower and lower, I now get panic attacks at the MENTION of blood tests needing to be done. I cannot go to a dentist without first taking valium. I can't be in the same room with my father. When I'm depressed, I have social aversion - the thought of using the telephone or email makes me nauseated.

And now I have a new one. Involving a small fertility clinic in Kirkland, the office staff there, and my doctor.

Awesome.

ps: maybe you noticed that anxiety affects my ability to spell?

I keep meaning to post an update on the pregnancy quest. I was feeling very negative about the whole thing a few weeks ago when I realized we've been trying for 12 months. Plus all the weird symptoms making me think I was pregnant that last 3 out of 4 cycles. Plus the fucking temperature taking has had ridiculous results - my results were more consistent in the first months AFTER the Pill - It's been a year, I should be all "normal" by now! So glad I went to the Gyno two weeks ago.

I went into her office feeling like the quest was over, that it wasn't going to happen. I left with a feeling of hope and a plan: try Clomid for up to 2 months (helps stimulate ovulation), have sperm tested, come back in 2 months if not pregnant to schedule a "dye study". They will shoot dye into my hoochie and look at it on xray or ultrasound (can't remember what she said exactly) to see where the dye goes: if the dye just stays there it means there is an obstruction of my fallopian tubes, if my tubes are good (open tubes = egg can travel to get fertilized and implanted in the uterus) then the dye will start to "leak" through and out the ends of the tubes. The dye is delivered by some small something that is inserted in your uterus, so we both knew I was going to try the clomid for a bit to see if the test could be avoided.

Unfortunately, by the time I got home that night with my prescription, I had somehow decided in my mind that she had said we would try Clomid for the first time next month. On day 5 of my cycle, I thought about it again and realized there was no logical reason to wait, so I must have remembered wrong. I was supposed to start the clomid on day 3 and go for 5 days, then start testing for ovulation 9-10 days later. However, the prescription bottle said to start on day 5, so that's the day I took my first dose. I think I may have messed up further by not taking them as close to 24 hours apart as I should have: some nights 6pm, some nights 11pm - midnight for most.

So lets get on to Cycle Day 9: 97.4* (down from 97.9* previous day) last day of Clomid, Negative OVulation Test, small cramp on the left from my uterus, nausea, felt foggy and exhausted all day, bloated and slow, back to bed from noon to 5pm

CD 10: 98.1* (spike!), negative OVT, some light nausea, good energy day

CD 11: 97.8* (another drop?!), neg OVT, stomach upset from previous night's homemade lasagna, nausea

CD 12: 97.7*, neg OVT, woke @ 4:40am with severe nausea, right side cramping, and gas. By 10am stomach was better, but nausea persists and cramps were worse - tempted to take pain medication. By late afternoon the cramping was so bad I took a nap after crying in bed. Realized that latest bought of nausea (every day at least one slight episode) is accompanied sometimes with a slight dizzyness if I turn my head too fast when walking, and also that the nausea starts a few moments after standing. I feel fine laying down or sitting up. Feeling of being really full and/or bloated persisted all day - scale thinks I gained 5 pounds over the weekend!

CD 13: forgot to test for Temp, negative OVT, woke @ 4am with severe cramping, nausea, and that bloating that makes me feel like an enormous, waddling beast. Google produced results that this can be a symptom of 1st few weeks of pregnancy, and some women feel cramps off and on during their pregnancy. Kind of freaked out now, since I thought I was going to get 9 months of relief while pregnant! Feeling real anxiety over not being able to take pain medication.

So what now? We're doing the Clomid + OV Testing because we think I'm not ovulating regulary. And yet on clomid my temps are still wacky, and I haven't ovulated yet. Thing is, the test is supposed to be negative TWO DAYS before you ovulate. So I'm cramping and sick and not even 48 hours within ovulation??

I'm not feelin' the love, uterus. Can we call a truce?

ps: I should add (because I think K will be reading this) that I didn't reread the fertility book like she suggested, which is dumb of me because I could easily have gotten things muddled in my mind about how this works. The only reason why I didn't was because I was going to stop taking my temperature completely. But when GYNO gave me the Clomid prescription that brings on ovulation, I thought it would be a good chance to compare my temperatures with the positive OV Test. (un)Lucky me, no positive test yet!

pps: forgetfulness persists - when my sis-in-law asked what I got her mom for Christmas, I totally blanked. She had to remind me that she had suggested I make mother's jewelry and that's when it came back to me that indeed that's what I was working on doing. Hand dexterity/weakness/pain persist - did 10 minutes of wire wrapping last night before giving up - with only one earring about 85% done.

ppps: I made 2 sales yesterday!! After the 2 week dryspell - woohoo! Subtract yesterday's Showcase advertisement and the one last week (that gained me no +Fav or sales), and the sales just about cover the cost of materials used in both pieces. If you sell on Etsy, do NOT use the item-specific jewelry sections - as I suspected, who is going to take the time to do 2nd level search when they can just look at Jewelry with one click. Also frustrated with Etsy for what I think is poor placement of the links to showcase, and general lack of advertising them.

pppps: if anyone reading this sees Bryan, let him know I said happy birthday - for once I'm not envious of him being a month older than me! It's tempting to do it myself, but I'm taking a break from FB right now.

Overwhelmed with frustration, this has not been a good week. Maybe chiro tomorrow will help?

I thought I would be blogging regularly about trying to conceive, but I haven't been blogging much of anything at all anywhere - even my business blog has fallen by the wayside. Not enough motivation/energy (surprise!). Also, NOT thinking about it has been keeping me going. Well, not dwelling on it anyway.

Saturday was Halloween and it was great - saw my neice & nephew, spent an hour putting on a bad vampire make-up job, gave out lots of candy ("a whole bag?!" they all cried), watched some TV with hubby, then hit the hay early. Oh, and my temperature spiked at 98.5! Woohoo!

Sunday morning I was so tired. And my temperature was 97.8. Un-woohoo.

Yesterday I woke up miserable and more exhausted. Temperature was 98.0. The fertility journal page announced that this was Week 1 of Month 12 for trying to conceive (TTC). I went around the house scarfing anything and everything, and wishing I could just let go of the niggling sense of hope and responsibility so I could get really fucking drunk. I slept a lot too. Went online and checked out some fertility websites/forums, not much really stood out. So in my journal I wrote to myself:

"Thanksgiving is coming
Christmas follows too quickly
and then I'm 37 and closer
to menopause and/or imperfect
eggs = Down's Syndrome"

This is a sad, frustrating milestone for me, and I feel like it's time to go in and get more testing done. But when I suggested this about two months ago, Eric was very negative. I thought at first it was because I said I wanted him to have his sperm count done - a threat to his manliness or something. He insisted it was just because it was unnecessary at this early stage, and he was frustrated I was taking it too seriously. Once again, it seemed Eric was rolling his eyes at me when I try to convey that I think something is wrong with me. He doesn't seem to know how hurtful that is. But I've gotten better and just shoving that down and forgetting about it - that's just Eric. Let him have his way, a few more months of trying before testing won't hurt, right?

At least that's what I told myself after the arguing was done and the tears had been wiped away. He told me he thought it was too early to be concerned because to him, we had "only just started being serious about trying". What did he think all the temperature monitoring and timed sex was about? He said that if we were serious, we would be following the method of every-other-day. I was dumbfounded. I had made him read highlighted sections of a fertility/conceiving tip book, and here he was quoting it back to me like it was gospel and the only way. I did not have him read about the temperature taking and how much more accurate it is, because it's just so freaking complicated and since he's not doing the charting, does he really need to know or care how that process goes? I tried to explain to him that "quality is more important than quantity", that having more sex isn't what's helpful, but timing the sex is. He didn't really believe me, and that's when I gave up.

He just has no idea what this is like for me. We're having more sex these last few months, so conceiving is on his mind more often. But conceiving is on my mind EVERY MORNING when I wake up. For hours at a time when the temperatures change. Constantly in the last 4-5 days of my cycle. Every trip to the bathroom when I check the TP swipe.

My body has been my enemy for such a long time, I do myself not to let it get me down, because it has a huge impact on my mood - for years now I have spent most of my therapy time talking about my physical conditions because of how miserable they make me. But having proof every morning of what's wrong? Seeing my cycles shift from month to month. Temperatures drop and rise at unexpected times. Temperatures slowly stepping up or down, which is an indication of non-ovulating problems. How it feels to ignore that evidence on the day there is a real drop or spike in temperature, because surely THIS is the true result, right? I can be ovulating on day 22 of my cycle, right?????

I have a form of Endomitriosis that is not supposed to affect my fertility - no real scarring because the endo. cells have intertwined with my entire uterus. So painful periods that surgery can't help, but supposedly won't change my fertility.

I remembered something yesterday. When I was 11 and started my novel, the main character - me - was infertile (and resistant to hangovers!), it was just a plot convenience. But then in high school, once I lost my virginity, Richard and I weren't exactly careful with sex, not using condoms very often, depending on the "pull out method". No pregnancies. My 2nd boyfriend was actually worse - I don't think we used a condom EVER. No pregnancies.

So many people getting pregnant, having abortions, having babies, dealing with teen motherhood and sucky teen fathers. And here's me having unprotected sex day after day with NO repercussions.

Have I actually been infertile all along? I never did go in to get the results of the Day-3 blood work - I assumed if it was unusual, they would try to contact me. When I took a home fertility test, the results were iffy. Unlike Yes/No for pregnancy, just turning pink isn't good enough - if it's too light or too dark, that's a problem. WTF? How am I supposed to tell what is too light and too dark??? So of course I ignored it.

When we started this process, I was slightly concerned that we'd waited so long. Slightly more concerned when I found out that every year after 35 increases my chances of having a baby with Down's Syndrome. But not REAL concern. I'd never been fond of the idea of being pregnant anyway, so if it didn't happen, there was always adoption. I have since changed my mind about the pregnancy itself. Reading magazines and books and websites and my journal's sidenotes has gotten me excited to actually experience pregnancy.

I remember being so calm. Excited, but calm. I was not going to freak out like "those women" who stress constantly about not being pregnant. And I was doing a pretty damn good job until 2 months ago.

All those weird symptoms, I was so nauseated for the week running up to my period, I knew it had to be positive. I started my force-of-will voodoo thinking to make the baby a girl (shut-up, a girl has to keep some ridiculous hopes to stay sane!). I picked out a girl baby name years ago, so suddenly my uterus and its passenger had a name. I knew this was stupid at the time. But everything in my body was screaming I was pregnant. And then I had my period.

And now it's happening again. The nausea isn't as strong, but there has been a lot of cramping. The temperature did some small step-laddering, but then there was a recognizable fall. Stepladder up, to a recognizable spike. More nausea & cramps. Temperature crash on Sunday could only mean I'm not pregnant. Monday was confirmation. But then today it's another huge spike? WTF? My cycles have finally become normal enough to be 28 days or very close. But my temperatures are all over the place? What gives?

This morning I was frustrated that I hadn't heard from Apple about my computer. Went online and saw that my computer had been fixed and ready to pick up LAST FRIDAY. Zero phone calls. Zero emails. No contact at all. Which is exactly what happened 2 years ago when it broke. And I'm pretty sure it was a hard drive problem then too. The store employees were wishy washy with their apologies. I didn't want apologies. I didn't want concession or money or glory. I want accountability. I want a mark to go on the store's record. So the next time they fucked with a customer, another mark would go in and there would be a pattern and Apple would have reason to actually DO something about the ineptitude.

Calling Apple today gave me a big run around of nonsense. Apple seems to have no way to collect feedback on their people, practices, or services. Just their products. Their website. Their forums. Their online store's glitches.

Thanks for making this day that much more pissy Apple. Truly, you deserve a break today. I'll bring in some cupcakes when I arrive hysterical at the store. That will teach them. Yelling at mindless drones because my wandering womb* is fucking with me. How very satisfying.

ps: *it has come to my attention that sometimes when I think I'm making clever word-play, no one has any fucking clue what I'm talking about. The term "hysterical" comes from the condition of "hysteria", described by the Greeks as female instabilty caused by her womb wandering around her body keeping her from getting pregnant and just overall properly feminine. The inclusion of such phrases seemed kind of a no-brainer to me given the circumstances. But when I sit down depressed and remark "I discoverd this morning that I'm un-pregnant. Yay." in a fake happy voice, this does not mean that I have changed my mind about getting pregnant. This means that I started my period today, I have 5 days of sheer pain and drug-addledness to look forward to, and oh yes, there's another month's hopes for parenthood down the drain of my fucking toilet.

Well, it's official - I have now started freaking out about not being able to conceive. I truly believed I could do this and not be one of those women who worries herself to death wondering why she wasn't pregnant yet. But now my body is just pissing me off.

Starting in January, I've been trying to track my Basal Body Temperature to determine ovulation days. My cycle has always been wonky, so I knew coming in it wouldn't be the best way to do this, but it is the simplest and cheapest. Last month I noticed my cycle was exactly 28 days, and I got excited. I counted out when I "should" ovulate if I had another 28 days cycle, and announced that there would be some sexy-sexy on the date.

Bad migraine or something that day, but we had "I" the day before. Then we had "I" the next day after "ovulation day". Also, on O-Day and the day after, I had these tiny pin-point pain/cramps. On O-Day it was just to the right of my lady parts, the next day it was centered over my lady parts. Ovulation can be "felt" by some women, so I assumed that was going on, and did a little cheer that maybe we had finally gotten the timing right this time. The little pains were very minor, and didn't last very long.

Fast Forward exactly one week - day 21 of cycle. Nausea started around 10pm, stayed until I went to bed. Woke on Friday day 22 exhausted with mild headache, mild cramps, and nauseau - all but the nausea disappeared within an hour. Nausea stayed all day. Including at the wedding for one of Eric's buddies. The reception was sheer hell. After the food being 1.5 hours late, I gorged myself in hunger, which finally tipped the nausea over into overload. We went home immediately. Sunday took The Test - negative. Figured it was too early (which it was once I did the math), but I had concluded that if there were enough hormones to make me this sick, it would be enough to run the test, right? Wrong. My punishment was bad nausea that finally sent me back to bed. Woke up 1.5 hours later, nausea gone, but another headache and exhausted. Nausea soon came back and stayed all day - but only while standing or walking.

Nausea all day Monday, afraid it would ruin the Depeche Mode concert. Once we found our seats, I realized the nausea was gone. Did not return until Tuesday morning, but by afternoon it was gone and I felt rejuvenated - really energetic for the first time in weeks. Did a bunch of cleaning/organizing. Next day (Wed, Day 26) woke nauseaus again, went back to bed from noon to 4:30.

Thursday no nausea, but really exhausted when I woke up, yet unable to go back to sleep. Finally, Friday - Day 28. TODAY. Took The Test at first wake, despite discovering spotting at 12:30 am when I went to bed the night before. Test negative, more spotting, some nausea.

As I write this, nausea has been competing with mild cramps. Cramps won - just a matter of minutes until I run to take pain medication. Went online to figure out what could cause all that nausea only to end in not-pregnancy, with no help. Chalk it up to Swine Flu? I did find a cute little site, theMomCrowd.com, with an interesting blog entry about fake morning sickness.

So what's going through my mind right now? The fact that I have a bunch more stuff to do for Heidi's baby shower tomorrow. Worrying about driving Michelle to Port Orchard in the morning when I will most likely be hopped up on drugs, and wondering if Eric will wake up early to take us. Wondering if I should avoid my T3 w/ codeine and pot and alcohol in case this is a mistake - despite seriously wanting to go on a bender right now. Normally, at the first sign of cramps or bleeding, I down some pills because waiting until the cramps rev up is stupid - they go from full-on to on-your-knees-screaming in 5-10 minutes, which is sooo not enough time for drugs to kick in.

So yes, worrying about not harming the not-there baby. Griping at myself for doing same. Telling myself to get off my butt to finish baby shower stuff. Seeing the irony in learning I'm not pregnant the day before the shower, but too numb to really emote. Really pissed at my body for having one more thing fucked up about it. Questioning whether it's Eric's plumbing - Big "I" day before and day after estimated Ovulation, so what gives? What's next? A fertility watch?

On the plus side, the party favor packets are looking soooo adorable!!! I am a genius with paper apparently. I even figured out how to use watercolor pencils. I always did think I had an eye for color. Soooo glad I stumbled upon the idea of a jungle theme - if I hadn't, I don't think there would be a theme, just a mish-mash of "It's a Boy!" stuff and nothing to inspire this kind of creativity. I owe it all to the Giraffe stamp I bought at Paper Zone. On display was the cutest little card with a giraffe stamped on it, and the most interesting, delicate coloring I'd ever seen. I was told it was from watercolor pencils. I circled the shop anyway, but of course came back, grabbed the stamp, and now everything is Safari themed with focus on Giraffes and Lions. So awesome!

Would it be tacky to put out business cards at the baby shower? Just got the new ones, so really excited about them!

And to think I thought I was coming down here to cry my eyes and sneak some pot. Good thing I didn't rent that pregnancy romantic comedy last night. Good thing I forgot to buy myself a copy of "The Waitress" to celebrate. Good thing I was already calling the not-there baby by her name.

PS: *giggle/snort* one of the websites talking about nausea and pregnancy was a forum where everyone had quotes about GOD in their signatures. And another where sound medical advice was given by someone trying to counsel someone whose symptoms seemed to be caused by stress and not pregnancy - and then she had to throw in the part about praying. The NOB I'm over that bullshit. This is the kind of crap that makes you doubt religion. I'd hate to be going through that right now on top of everything. Although... maybe if I seek out the GSM, he will bless my womb with his noodley appendage and I will miraculously conceive. Or maybe he can fondle Eric's bits? Couldn't hurt, right?

I am a germaphobe - just ask my husband! The media's over-attentiveness to disease and virus outbreaks has just made it worse (ie: swine flu, avian flu, MRSA, ebola, the Hanta virus, flesh-eating bacteria). So have signs in the bathrooms of restaurants and medical buildings - you've noticed that places like this have signs telling you how to wash your hands, yes?

I really started paying attention to those signs when I was working in a daycare and there was a sign right at eye level over the sink showing the correct way to wash your hands, provided by the county health department. It includes using a paper towel to turn off the tap, something I now do religiously. In fact, my need to be sanitary and my urge to conserve frequently have a battle in my head when I'm washing up: is cleanliness worth wasting water and paper towels? I say yes. But... do I leave the tap running in order to grab a paper towel and dry my hands before turning off the water? Or do I grab a paper towel to turn off the tap right away, throw away the towel, and then grab another one to actually dry my hands? Which resource is more precious, water or trees? What's more expensive, an extra 30 seconds of water usage or 1 paper towel? Welcome to the wacky world of mysie's brain everybody!!!

So now I've pointed out that I'm a germaphobe and I hate to be wasteful, let's throw in the fact that I want to have a baby. A healthy baby. A baby without disease, autism, or my knocked knees. Have you heard that there is mercury in childhood vaccinations, and there is a very vocal group convinced this is the main cause of autism? Merde.

March 2008: Federal Officials Say Vaccines Worsened Condition That Led to Autism Spectrum Disorder in Georgia Girl

February 2009: Vaccine Court: No Merit to Claims That Thimerosal in Vaccines Contributed to Autism

Today the Seattle PI.com ran an article about environmental factors in autism: Autism: It's the environment, not just doctors diagnosing more disease

Looking for more information, I found an article about autism rates now that mercury has been removed from (most) vaccines: Autism Cases Still Going Up As Vaccine Mercury Removed

This statement in the PI had me particularly worried: "Household products such as antibacterial soaps also could have ingredients that harm the brain by changing immune systems..." So I tried to do a search on that, and didn't come up with much. However, when you type in "antibacterial soap" into Google, before you can type "change immune system", you are presented with Google's favorite searches for that first phrase. A scary-sounding option comes up: "antibacterial soaps unnecessary risks no benefits".

Apparently, there are a growing number of people that believe that not only are antibacterial soaps no more effective than regular soaps, but that they are also harmful. Including the Centers For Disease Control (CDC): Antibacterial Household Products: Cause for Concern.

So what now?! How on earth is a die-hard germaphobe and baby mama wannabe supposed to live without antibacterial soap??? Somewhere (sorry, lost the link) I read that alcohol-based antibacterial formulas are not a problem, but whether or not that's true seems to be swept under the rug by the public's growing concern over the entire antibacterial products market. Then there is the sinister plan of Tuft University researcher Stuart Levy, as posited by foxnews.com's Junk Science columnist Steven Milloy:

"no mention was made of Levy’s affiliation (vice-chairman, chief scientific officer and co-founder) with Paratek Pharmaceuticals.... Paratek is well positioned to develop [antibacterial] products to serve this non-hospital consumer product market."

Can you hear me rolling my eyes? I am no fan of media sensationalization every time a new health study is published. Nor do I think it's particularly helpful to get all of your health news information from green/organic/eco-friendly groups - they are awesome at pointing out things that you should further study on your own, but too often come up with their own conclusions without any scientific process or study. But calling Stuart Levy's research (backed by the CDC) junk science is just crossing the line. I disagree with his assessment that the new study lets antibacterials off the hook, but I understand how easy it is to interpret the study to mean that.

It happens all the time - media tries to come up with interesting headlines and soundbites, which require summarizing massive amounts of data into a short, easy-to-understand format for their audience. This is how you get competing headlines when it comes to studies: "Alcohol is bad!" vs. "Red wine is good for your heart" vs. "Wine makes no difference to your health".

Then there is the tendency to translate statistics to support your own conclusion. If a study reveals a statistic... oh, let's say "40% of autistic kids have higher-than-average mercury levels in their blood", then it is correct to say "The majority of children with autism do not have high levels of mercury in their blood. But is that a responsible thing to say when you're a public figure with a large audience? What about the results that showed "75% of non-autistic children have less than 2% of the mercury content found in autistic children." Put those facts together, and you've got this: Mercury doesn't necessarily cause autism, but there is evidence that it plays some role."

Yes, I made up all the statements in that last paragraph, but misinterpretations of statistics happen all the time! The media and the average lay-person have such small attention spans that they demand an obvious statement to sum up research, rather than digging for the complexities of the truth to be found in most studies.

And speaking of irresponsible, here's a great (re: terrible) example: "Antibacterial Soaps: Unnecessary Risks, No Benefits" posted at divinecaroline.com. Remember that google search I mentioned? Well, this article is the #1 item returned by google in that search. On the surface, this is a very eye-opening, well-written, and easy-to-read article. But did you actually read what she was not saying?

"Many experts believe that," "shown resistance to S. aureous", "nearly 80 percent of all liquid soaps", "antibacterial agents promote strains of bacteria", and "If that’s not enough, the bacteria-killing chemicals go down the drain and into our waterways, harming wildlife and potentially ending up back in our bodies where they can present health risks."

Can you guess what she's leaving out? Hint: Check out the statements on page 2 that are much better.

"According to the Food and Drug Administration and the American Medical Association", "In one study", and "A 2007 study detected".

Congratulations Sarah Krupp, you've just discovered the concept of citing your sources! What would be even better would be actual links to or publication information for her source materials. Still, she got better. I'll try to keep in mind that she wrote this piece for a non-scientific website where anyone can say anything.

But: her article is the #1 source on the internet when looking for the risks of antibacterial soaps. I have no idea how many searches a day google handles, or how many searches of that particular phrase, but there it is at the top - proving its popularity with readers (Google's search results are ranked by how often each link from a search is chosen by the searcher - ha, there's my Quasi-Citation!) But my point is, when your audience is this large, it's time that responsibility and journalistic integrity play an important role in the wording of your article. The average reader is just too eager to read a group of claims in one article and decide that the entire article is fact.

So, in my OPINION:

1. statistics rarely show definite conclusions
2. statistics are very easy to interpret incorrrectly
3. purposely interpreting statistics incorrectly to disseminate to an audience is morally reprehensible
4. it is morally imperative that a journalist, even a web journalist, only state facts that can be cited
5. when most people read something well-written with a lot of reasonably stated ideas presented as facts, they too easily trust that these facts are mounting evidence, and thus everything stated must be correct
6. it's YOUR responsibility to research claims that affect your life
7. I have to start eliminating anti-bacterials from my life - and the germaphobe inside of me is terrified. I'm totally screwed.

Isn't science fun?!

Eric and I have decided to make a baby. We are waiting until January to start trying, for various reasons I'll probably talk about later.

Right now I want to talk about why we made the decision. Well, really, the timing was up to me really because of my endomitriosis. So after years of wavering, back and forth and back and forth, I made the decision. There have been so many pros and cons weighing on me, and all of them are still there - guilty hopes and terrible warnings.

But in the end, I found 2 positives that together weighed over everything else.

First, there is this desire to have another person to love in my life. Someone to give all my love to, and know that it will be returned for at least a little while. Then there is the teaching, the imparting of wisdom, instilling values, seeing proof that I have changed the world in some small way by creating another person who shares some part of who I am and what I have been and what I stand for. But always this connection, no matter how strained the parent/child relationship. I'm very, very aware that parenthood is not all happiness and rainbows - terrible warnings, remember? But even if things go wrong, I will always have my memories and the knowledge that I have created something amazing to add to the world.

Secondly, I've spent all my life feeling like I'm meant to do something - everyone feels this, yes? Apparently its typical for adolescents to have a bit of a god-complex, a sense of invulnerability, all tangled into this feeling of purpose. This could so easily devolve into a dissection of the place of religion in society, but that's just not my point. My point is that I've been searching forever to do something that matters. As the years have gone by and I've floundered around, I have built up this nest of things to please me - love, marriage, pets, home, possessions. But there has always been this feeling of emptiness, of something not fulfilled, some promise not yet kept. It has always revolved around children - wanting to protect them, to educate them. But my attempts have failed. So many treasures have been laid at my feet, and I have not been happy enough with them, it drives my depression, I'm sure of it. So I have over the past two years come to this belief that having a child will matter. And then everything will change. Everything. Again, I'm very aware that although babies are miracles, life-changers, it is not all for the best. My history has proven that I'm not good with change. But I need it, I really do.

No matter how I say it (or write it), it comes out sounding selfish, doesn't it? But in my head and in my heart, there is a sense of right-ness to it. A moment of the universe revealing some tiny secret to you. Not the enormous "this is what it's all about", but some hint that you might be getting closer to seeing some universal truth and understanding it.

I'm currently reading a book, The City at the End of Time by Greg Bear, and it's all very high and mighty. End of the world physics and metaphysics and final revelations, but all very vaguely discussed (more like hinted at) with big words to entangle the mind deciphering the code rather than understanding what was said. Anyway, it's rubbing off on my writing style right now, so I really, truly apologize. I feel like I'm being just as vague. Bah!

Yes, Dr. Gregory House had a small nugget of wisdom to impart - mommie's immunities protect baby for the first 6 months. So if mommie was vaccinated as a child, great. If not, not so much great. Anyway, reason #1 to go ahead and decide to vaccinate. Also, weird, mutated measles spore stuck in your brain and waiting to explode until you're 17 is... bad. But apparently, not fatal!

I got to visit with Heather last weekend, and play with her gorgeous girl Kenadie. I wanted to save some of the things she had to say about pregnancy:

♥ that scene in The Waitress, you know the one: where she holds her baby for the first time and she's suddenly deaf and the whole world changes - well, it's true

♥ do not fear the epidural - tough it out naturally if you are so inclined, but don't base that decision on fearing the pain of the epidural itself - you're in so much pain already, you won't feel a thing. And then you really won't feel a thing

♥ the epidural can be quirky, only numbing part of the area intended, and/or wearing off too quickly - Heather had to have 2 shots to get everything, and even then there was a section on one side that was not completely numb. She actually relished this because the numbness of her legs, etc. was disconcerting

♥ childbirth is nothing, forgotten once you have your baby in your arms - and then the real work begins

♥ feed your newborn when (s)he's hungry - they can't over-eat in that first year

♥ breast milk is great, but if breastfeeding isn't going very smoothly, seek out help - and don't let people treat you like your nuts - Kenadie's little mouth could not cover the nipple enough to make a good seal, so there wasn't much suction. Combined with being told "2 and a half ounces, no more", and the little thing was losing weight instead of gaining.

♥ try to numb your nipples during your pregnancy - rub them with a washcloth every time you shower

♥ snobby mommies who won't let their kids play with your kid are evil and should be admonished, loudly