Twisted Ovaries

Understanding This May Get Harder

I should be at home cuddled on the couch with Aidan, blissfully relaxed and having just dropped off the kids at the airport.

Instead he's just dropped off the kids.

I'm in the hospital, having been admitted late last night and am not entirely sure when I can go home.

You might say I knew I had a problem last night at the premier of 'The Simpsons Movie' when I had to pee like a racehorse but nothing came out. Or possibly you'd say it got serious with the bleeding and blood clots. Me, I knew we had a problem when I was writhing in agony every time I attempted to pry water from my rock-like bladder.

We all thought cystitis, but no-the Lemonheads have given me the gift of hydronephrosis (those sweet little sods), which has led to a rip-roaring kidney infection. Kidney infections can trigger labor, so along with mega-antibiotics and fucking paracetamol (about as much use for the pain as a fart in a colander but they won't give me anything else), I'm on steroids to help develop the babies' lungs as fast as possible.  My cervix and mucus membrane are solid, so this is the scariest 'just in case' I know of.  The Lemonheads are checked often-they're a-ok and very active.

More later-still no answer on how they want to address the hydronephrosis (medication or to go in and drain my kidneys).  Antibiotics beginning to work inasmuch as bleeding gone and some wee does come out now, even if I still feel like I'm peeing razorblades to get it.   Rubbish keypad here, full ward but lovely midwives, and Aidan is being a rock star.

A Series of Firsts and My Virtual Tour

So I'm now at 25 weeks and a series of firsts has occurred:

1) Week 25 has been hit and is a milestone because, well, I'm at 25 weeks. But also according to work anyway, should I deliver now and the babies not make it (god forbid, I know) I would still be allowed maternity leave.  This may seem macabre, but in typical IVF veteran fashion I brace myself for the worst, just in case it happens.  If I lost the babies, I would need the leave because I would be curled up in a fetal position under the bed for the forseeable future, so not something that looks good on the CV.

2) But I've no reason to think that anything bad will happen, especially as for the first time ever, the Lemonheads woke me last night with their kicking.  Honestly.  Usually it's just the girl who's up to much activity, I have a feeling that when they're born the boy will be laid back and the girl will be climbing the walls.  But both of them were practicing their kung fu fighting at 3 am, to the point where I woke up actually wondering if they'd poked a hole out of my stomach yet and would be waving cheerfully.  The books say babies kick for only 20 minutes at a time.  The books would be lying.

3) I got on to a packed tube the other morning and a guy gave me his seat.  Seriously.  In London, where we're all too busy reading our Metros and dreading our days, a guy gave me his seat.  I thanked him a hundred times and took it.  And it happened again yesterday (so it's a first and a second, really).  A teenager (!) got up and gave me her seat.  I thanked her too and took it. 

4) I now weigh more than I ever have before.  I'm up 10 kilos now (22 pounds).  I'm hungry a lot but I can't eat very much, so I just graze a lot.  I try to make the grazing as healthy as possible, so let's pretend that double chocolate muffin I had yesterday was just a small slip-up.

5) Symptom-wise, I can't complain.  I am very tired in the evenings lately, and apart from the re-appearance of tiny bladder-dom I sleep through the night (and, of course, barring the little Rocky Balboas in there.)  Headaches are back and I find heartburn appears from time to time, but otherwise (surprisingly) I can't complain.  Next week marks the start of the 3rd trimester.  I never thought I'd get here, but here I am.

And now, the virtual tour courtesy of Patience, whom I love.

We live in Hampshire, about 45 minutes train ride outside of London.  We work from home most of the time (we both work for the same company) which is a huge plus, but we do commute into London a few times a week (Aidan's already gone and I'm off to London myself shortly.)  You can click on the below pics to embiggen.

This is our house.

The dirt patch in the front is because Aidan just constructed the fence, and we still need to plant grass seed on one side of the fence and trailing red roses on the other.  Our house has a name (which I've blurred out) not a number, and I love that about it.  You can see our bouncing idiot dog in the shot, too.

This is the back of our garden (yard).  It's massive and the place used to be owned by a professional gardener.  She would weep if she knew how badly we've fucked up her garden with our total incompetence.

This is the patch of woods by our house.  Once a year they get covered with bluebells, which are heavenly.

And when we commute (which we do) we go into London Waterloo.

We then walk into the office (which I won't show as then you'll know who I work for!)  But we have an incredible view while we walk, and both of us - even that hardened native that Aidan is - loves the view. That honestly is the view from the bridge we walk to get to the office.  Some of it should look familiar to you!  We have lots of nice views like that.

And when we have to go into London we always have to take an umbrella to prepare for the famous weather here.

I'd post more pics but Typepad is being a  whore and won't take the photos and put them in the right place. I hate Typepad.  I apologize that the formatting is all over the place with this, but it's whipping me and I have to go to work.  Welcome to my little world, though.  Hope you liked.

We're off to Scotland with Aidan's kids for a week.  See you next Thursday.

Book Tour - "The Kid"

So the latest book tour just read "The Kid", which I have to be honest - I loved.  I loved it so much I've ordered a few of the author Dan Savage's other books, which isn't fun because he's not known over here and thus I'm still waiting.  Thanks, Amazon. 

It's not often you get a book that discusses adoption, fertility, loss, or something like that and yet uses "put someone else's dick in my mouth" on page 1 of the book, which I admit caught me off guard.  The fact that they're two men adopting really didn't impact me at all except to see things from their eyes, which offered an interesting perspective in terms of how they viewed adoption, children, families, etc. (as in the case of their discussion about the point of sex.  The author believes heterosexuals primarily do it for procreation while homosexuals have sex for fun.  I don't actually agree with that - he should stop by our house some time, especially during a Reindeer Games session.  Or actually that's weird.  He should probably wait until we've put the ties away again.)

So, the questions:

Dan makes a point that straight infertile couples have something in common with a same sex couple who are, by definition, "functionally infertile" and draws an analogy between coming out as gay/lesbian and "coming out" as infertile. This got me thinking about the issues of donated gametes, and how this approach to building a family has long been accepted by lesbians, of course, while the huge growth in egg donation has now begun to make donated gametes quite mainstream. But while a lesbian or gay couple have no choice but to be open about the making of their family (as Dan points out, the child will eventually realise he wasn't born of two dads) it seems common for straight couples using donated eggs or sperm to keep it a secret.  What's your take on all of this? If you have used donated gametes, do you see your family as non-conventional? Do you have an ongoing relationship with the donor? Do you plan to be open about the donation?

I think it's up to the couple, actually.  I can see pros and cons for telling the children about the donated eggs/sperm.  Pros - it's open, honest, hopefully let's the child know how much they were wanted (not like that was in doubt, most likely), and in case of inherited conditions maybe in some ways it wipes the slate clean-if they know that there are issues with Huntingdon's or balanced translocation in the family, maybe it would be a comfort to know that they haven't necessarily inherited those conditions when it comes to potentially making their own families someday.  Cons - what happens if it makes the child feel disillusioned or "incomplete", or they go seeking a biological parent for closure they may never have?

Although it's not an issue anymore, we were potentially prepared to tell our kids that they may or may not have half-siblings out there, other than the two kids of Aidan's that they will grow up knowing.  We were probably going to be ok about telling them we donated, as oppposed to we used donated gametes.  Had we used donated gametes, I think we would've been truthful about that at a point we felt the children were prepared to handle the information. 

The idea of a convential or non-conventional family isn't really relevant anymore, I don't think.  Aidan's kids from his previous marriage are, in many ways, my kids, too.  Our kids together will be his kids' siblings and I have no doubt that the "half-brother/half-sister" idea won't apply.  They're just brothers and sisters.  Most family situations I know of are unconventional - I have nothing to do with my sister and that's completely and totally ok with me.  Instead, Statia is like a sister to me, because while blood may be thicker than water Philosophy shower gel is even thicker than that.  To me the notion of a nuclear family that's held in convention is an ideal that has changed and shifted with divorces, estrangements, fertility treatments and more.  A family is simply composed of those you love.

On p. 164, Dan is terrified of bringing baby items into the house before the adoption is finalized.  Will you (or did you) bring items into the house before a birth or an adoption?

If it were up to Aidan we wouldn't have a damn thing before they're born.  If it were up to me, we wouldn't have absolutely everything but we'd have some semblance of stability.  Aidan truly, completely feels that buying goods before birth could jinx things.  I truly, completely feel that with twins we're going to be spinning our wheels when they arrive so having some things in order is essential.  We'll have the basics, really-cots, pram, baby car seats, baby onesies, bottles, formula, and some diapers.  I have also bought two swings from ebay as the prices were great and I know we'll be using them at some point.  That may be all.  I'm pushing for painting the room, too, because I want the place to be familiar and stay familiar, but I'm not sure I'm going to win that one. 

What do you think DJ will think when he reads this book down the line?

I  honestly think he'll get a kick out of it.  He will probably know his household to be humorous and easy-going, which should be reflected in the way he reads it.  Maybe he'll want to have his dads around when he does read it-I'd feel insecure about the parts written about Melissa and her choices, perhaps that will need sensitive treatment.  But it sounds like he'll have a childhood with two well-balanced adults, which I think is a great start. 
 

Guilt Should Be a Four-Letter Word

In IVF-land you come across women using donor eggs.  It's happening with more and more regularity, and it's something I fully support.  But I come across the topic from a different angle to anyone else I've read here.  Instead of being the donee, I'm the donor, and it's a strange position to take when you read blogs of women who are using donated eggs.  You want to tell them what it's like to be a donor, how you view the world, what makes you tick, but you know that's not your place.  You should just hope for them.

On our first egg share cycle in the UK I had 19 eggs, a bumper crop by UK standards.  Clincs here like women to get 8-12 eggs, so my clinic worried I was over-stimulated.  I produce eggs at the same rate that hillbilles produce babies, all you have to do is look at me and my ovaries go into overdrive.  In Sweden, for my first cycle, I had more eggs than 19 and a mild case of OHSS to boot.  In the UK although I didn't have OHSS, I had many eggs all produced on the absolutely minimum of drug dosages.

My 19 eggs were divided between the other woman and myself.  She got 9 eggs and I got 10.  Neither of us got pregnant. 

I look back on that cycle and cringe with all the mistakes that I made.

On my resulting FET I did get pregnant but miscarried. 

The other woman remained pregnancy-free.

Complete fucking washout for both of us, then. 

I felt so guilty, too.  I really did.  This woman put all my eggs in her basket and they all failed.  True, I don't know the nature of her infertility, it could be male infertility is a factor, too.  But she'd been on the donor waiting list for ages and when her shot comes up, she gets a complete loss.  Using my eggs not only got her nowhere, but got her put to the bottom of the list again if she is to try again.  And a part of my mind thinks-What if my eggs failing was the point where they decided to give up?  What if I was a part of a cycle that crushed her just a little too hard? 

I know what those negative test results feel like.  I wouldn't wish one on my worst enemy.  In some ways I wish I could just let her know how sorry I am, how much I wish it were different.

This last cycle, the one that produced the Lemonheads, was a complete fiasco.  It was an examination into bad cycles.  We had problems early on-I was kept on suppression for a long time because the other woman wasn't responding to the meds.  When we were finally ready to stim I'd been on supression longer than I ever had before.  The doctor has admitted this might be a factor on why I had the worst cycle I'd ever had, I was under too long on the down-reg. 

I didn't respond well to the stims.

When they realized my usual bumper crop wasn't forthcoming I was put on double-doses of stims.  I was going mad worrying that I wouldn't produce enough eggs, that I would let me and the donor down.  I couldn't believe my body's response to the meds, it was as though I was injecting orange juice instead of sophisticated synthetic hormones. 

When egg retrieval finally came, I got 8 eggs, of which only 4 were good quality.  They were split down the middle, we got 4 each.  And my guilt this time was even greater - the donor had paid a fortune, waited 18 months, and all she got were 4 eggs, 2 of which were crappy quality.  She must've been really pissed off.  I would've been really pissed off.  I felt I'd let us both down in so many ways.

Unbelievably, my 2 average quality eggs became 2 average quality embryos.  The doctor assured us twins were extremely unlikely.  Hindsight and all that.

We decided to find out on Friday how the donee got on with her 4 eggs.  It shouldn't have been a surprise to us, but it was.

"Hi!" chirped the egg share nurse.  "Right, so the good news is, no one will come knocking on your door in 18 years trying to look you up.  The other woman didn't get pregnant."

I'm not sure I felt relief at that.  Truthfully I didn't necessarily want any children I helped to create look me up, but only because I had absolutely, completely no doubt that I am not the mother.  They have a mother who wanted them very much.  I just donated some gametes, I'm nothing in the development of this other person.   If they wanted to look me up and find out about family trees and tell me about their childhood, that'd be great.  But they have a mother, one who would've invested 18 years into their wellbeing. 

I did feel terrible, though.  I guess some part of me figured the odds of the other woman's pregnancy weren't great.  But then, my odds weren't great either and I have two extremely active Lemonheads percolating in there.  I just felt that I had hugely let someone down, she had such dreams and I couldn't help them.  Some part of me knows that I helped someone try to achieve their dream and that there's merit in that, I just can't get past knowing that I was unable to be there, that it didn't work.

If you're doing a donor cycle, you maybe wonder about the woman who's donated her eggs to you.  I can't know all cases, but let me tell you how it is for some of us who donate - we want so much for you to succeed.  Honestly.  We are ordinary women with ordinary lives and ordinary dreams.  We keep you in our minds the entire time we go through things.  We want this for you more than I know how to say with a keyboard and and bright sparkly pixels.

I have my unborn Lemonheads whom I love at 1,000 miles per hour.  I feel so incredibly bad for the other two women who never got their Lemonheads from me.  I want to tell them I'm sorry, that I wish for them, and that's all I know how to say.

Perfection

We had our 24-week midwife check yesterday.  Aidan came with me as he always does (he's good like that, he's not missed a single doctor appointment yet).  It was actually the first time we've been to the local midwife for a check-up.  It's a screwy system we've got-scans and such are done by our hospital but they don't do things like blood pressure, weight, measurements, checks for pre-eclampsia, etc.  That has to be done by the midwife, even though I'm not giving birth with this midwife because:

1) I'm having twins, which therefore means "hospital birth" in the UK which therefore means hospital midwives.
2) I want drugs.  Lots of them.  Extra ones because I'm a wuss and I don't want to hurt.
3) I'm probably having a C-section.
4) See #2.

But I have to go to a local midwife anyway because my hospital doesn't do the usual checks for me.

I see loads of scope for saving NHS money here.

Anyway, the midwife has cancelled on me a few times because she's overworked, underpaid, and pretty much constantly delivering babies in people's living rooms.  I do really like her, she makes me think of a 50+ year-old Mary Poppins, so I don't mind seeing her and I don't mind her cancelling, either because she's so nice it wouldn't be appropriate to get upset with her.  It'd be like wanting to clean Elmo's clock. 

She did the usual things that I think midwives do-checked my urine (we're all clear in there - no high levels of proteins, so signs of infection, and whew!  Those illegal performance-enhancing anabolic steroids aren't showing up on the old pee tests now!  Hallelujah.)  Blood pressure was taken and I'm at 120/64 (which means I'm to the left of normal, heading for "does she even have a pulse?"  This is ok with me.  The rest of my entire family has blood pressure so high they're pressure cooking their arteries.)  And then I got checked out.

My bump is measuring 28 cm from the middle of my ribcage (where le uterus is) to the pubic bone (I really have no idea what 28 cm means.  Seriously.  I'm so woefully lost on most of this pregnancy stuff.  I just eat fruit and mourn the loss of my beaver, which I have now lost sight of.)  She listened to the heartbeats which she found readily.  The girl has a heartbeat around 148, the boy around 140.  She explained that both are normal, and that in her experience boys tend to have lower heartbeats than girls.  I wonder if that's because chicks are busier thinking about heart-y kind of stuff.  You know-My Little Ponies and deep romance and Valentine's Day and what Bruce Willis might look like with his shirt off.  Those kinds of profound emotional things.

The midwife looked at my stomach, which has now gained 9 kilos (20 pounds).  "You have one of the neatest bumps I have ever seen," she muses. "It's all packaged so very well and tidily, it's really perfectly shaped."

I smile.

I am proud of my uterus for this exact reason, because unlike boys who have their bits hanging outside, my bits are strung up inside in a handy little Ziploc bag.

"You should see my table displays," I reply.  "I make a killer dinner napkin swan."

Maybe I should make up a T-shirt for myself that says: "I went through IVF and all I got was this tidy bump."

I'm thinking no one would laugh but me.

PS-if you want to see what my 24 weeks looks like, the picture's in the extended entry.  You can click it to embiggen.

Choosing Toppings

Although the blogging world is enormous (what are we-6.5 million, the last time I saw?  More?  Less?  Who cares?) it doesn't mean that everyone in blogging agrees.  Hell, when I get my team together for a lunch meeting we can't even get a consensus on what kind of topping to have, and we're only talking pizza for Christ's sake.  My other blog once blew up in my face when I dared have an opinion about something political so I stay away from politics now.  Similarly this blog, this site, is here to discuss where I am in one area and one area only - fertility treatment and now pregnancy. 

There are a lot of fertility blogs out there.  At any given moment someone is pinching an inch of skin and sticking the needle in.  As I type this a hopeful woman is waiting to hear back about a blood test.  And you never know-as you read this, it's likely that someone is peeing on a stick and offering up prayers to whatever god they claim. 

This does not mean that all of us in the same boat row working with the same paddles.  While there isn't a single infertile blogger that I actually hope doesn't succeed, there are a few I don't really get excited about.  It's the way it is, they're the pepperoni to my vegetarian cheese pizza.  Maybe I have a problem with a blogger who put back 6 blasts and is actually hoping for sextuplets, maybe I have a problem with another blogger whose religion seems to me to be enough to raise the E2 levels.  There is a medium-sized infertile blogger whose writing bugged the shit out of me, so I just stopped reading her.  I don't wish her lack of success, but I don't particularly feel very sympathetic either.

But there's a theme I've noticed in infertile blogs.  A division, a Mason-Dixon line, that line you do not cross in the sand.  It is the haves against the have-nots (not how I view it but how I feel it's viewed.  Am not making judgement calls here).  If you get knocked up you become a have.  If you get knocked up and miscarry, you fall back into the have-nots.  If you have a baby?  You're a have-r.  No baby?  Failed cycle?  Your ovaries crawled out of your body and making their way down the Interstate?  You've urinated on anything remotely resembling a home pregnancy test (including bic pens and corn cob holders) and still no double line?  A have not.  This is how I feel the situations are presented.

I think this happens by the very nature of what we're all doing-you're either going to succeed or you're not.  There's no third option here.  If you're in infertility treatment it's black or white.  While the results of the treatment may vary - children, childlessness, adoption, fostering, etc., the process itself has one of two ways of ending.  It would be nice to know that we're all going to be a team together while we get there, but that's not possible.  After all, how am I supposed to get along with the stuffed crust gang, what with me being a pan crust kind of girl?

Maybe it's human nature.

But there is a harder edge to the infertile crowd I think.  A line of rawness that's too much to ignore, the very nature of our vulnerabilities a little too easy to be ok with being a have not about.  I know you're probably saying It's easy for you to say all this, you're pregnant.  Yes I am.  But for many years (and many cycles) I wasn't.  I felt huge bitterness.  I couldn't read blogs of women who succeeded around the time that I did.  I couldn't bear all the pregnant women that appeared when I miscarried.  I was hugely raw inside. 

I saw the bitterness when we got pregnant and found out it was twins.  Twins, of course, being Aidan's worst nightmare, and it's right there on our doorstep.  I had women emailing me and blasting me.  I had comments zooming me into the stratosphere.  I had some even tell me their marriages were the least of their priorities in all of this, and how dare you, you ungrateful cow!  At least you HAVE a baby, said the women in treatment, what the fuck do you have to be upset about?

There is more than one line in the sand, then.

I see the battle lines everywhere.  Bloggers who were infertile and went on to have a baby are really apologetic and embarrassed.  I'm really sorry to blog about this, but my kid has diarrhea coming out around her ear holes.  I know.  I have a baby.  I shouldn't complain.  I'll shut up now.

I see them amongst those of us who are actually pregnant now.  I don't mean to sound ungrateful, but pregnancy is really hard on me.  I swear I'm not complaining.  I am so thankful. 

But Jesus-you just moved on in the process, it doesn't mean you can't bitch about things.  When we were all going through the IVF cycles, it never crossed our minds to not complain that we are swollen or moody or tearful or any other host of horrible ailments the treatment brings on.  Complain away!  You earned it!

But it's always with dismay that I read when someone who has gone on to have successful treatment gets turned on.  Take the Redbook Infertility Diaries debacle, the one where apparently motherhood means you no longer get to be part of the Infertile Fan Club (it's a fun club.  There's a secret handshake and everything.  I can't wait until we get our matching T-shirts.)  One of the hosts had successful treatment and now has twins, so clearly she has no right to associate with being infertile, right?  Right?  She's now an ungrateful bitch, right?  She's a have-r, so she should meekly attempt to inherit the earth, yeah?

WELL, SCREW THAT.

She had the needles.  She had the tears.  She had the extractions.  She knows.  Just because she's a mother now doesn't mean she's forgotten how she got there.  What, something bursting out of your loins means you're suddenly fertile?  Is that how it works?  Because if so, I would've used a lot more tampons in my life, my friend.  If you were infertile and had a baby through ART, then you are a successful infertile Mom.  Simple as that.  The labels don't change, the PCOS doesn't disappear, the endo doesn't vanish, the tubes don't reconnect.  You succeeded, yes, but after you have a baby you couldn't have another one naturally if you spent the night at a Navy ship that'd seen 16 months at sea.

I for one know that even once I have my babies - despite the sleepless nights, despite their giggles and laughter - I will never forget what I went through to have them.  Never.  I will never begrudge them or remind them of it either.  But I will know just what it was like to get from A to Baby.  I bet that's how it is with every woman who finally gets a positive.

Yes, maybe if you just had a failed cycle the last thing you want to read about is a mother coping with IVF twins.  If that's the case, click off the page.  Same with my site, or Barren Albion's, Karen's, or anyone who has two pink lines.  But here's the thing, the thing maybe I should've thought about when I was clicking off pages of knocked up people after one of my failed cycles-the person I'm reading knows what it's like to feel like I do.  If someone cycling wants to email me and vent about it, I'd love to talk about it, listen, help, whatever.  Because one of the things I've been learning (and I admit, I still suck at) is it's good to have a team of people around you of all shapes and sizes and cycles.  If you're cycling and need support, I'm here.  If you have cankles, I'm here.  If your baby has colic, I'm here.  If you got pregnant naturally and just want to talk, I'm here.  Hell, if you've decided to start the new Daisy Hill Puppy Farm, I'm here.  Isn't that the way things should work?  We need different people at different times, but why cross someone off as the enemy during the times you don't need them?

The infertile world, man.

More clique-y than Sweet Valley High.

Maybe we should sit down and agree to order breadsticks if we can't decide the toppings.  At least that way, we'll know that we're not alone.  None of us are, no matter where we are in our cycles. 

(Sorry if this comes across as very harsh.  I'm back in that "I'll be there for you if you'll be there for me" stage.)

23 Week Update

I thought I should probably give some kind of update as to how things are going.

So...*ahem*.

I'm now up about 20 pounds, and am 23w1d.  I figure that's not too bad, most of the weight is in my stomach with a fine line of cushioning developing on my inner thigh.  I think this means I am rapidly approaching the point of thigh rub, which I am not looking forward to.  I may not have a perfect body but my legs and rump have always generally been ok, so this is a bit of a shock.

I have also had to resort to maternity underwear, although luckily I found some from Jojo Maman Bebe that resemble some modicum of "I could be hot in another lifetime if you squint your eyes and channel anyone but Whoopi Goldberg".  I now know why maternity lingerie exists.  I had thought I could get by with wearing my normal knickers worn below the bump throughout my pregnancy, but no one warned me (I'm talking to you, people who have been pregnant before, books that try to put the pregnancy fear of God into me, and films that glamorize pregnancy) that when you get knocked up and you start to gain weight, you get labia rub.

Might be too much info, but someone needs to break the seal of silence on this one.  I don't see why any other first time pregnant woman needs to go around feeling like she sandpapered her crotch just because no one tells you that not only does your stomach swell, but your pink taco does too.

Sorry.

I've had other symptoms, too.   I'm suffering from some impressive carpal tunnel in my right wrist, which I understand is another pregnancy side effect.  I am still constipated, and after my aqua aerobics class today I have a hot date planned with a bag of prunes (I wasn't too interested in showing up and acting like the human jacuzzi during class, so I decided to wait until after the class to address the issue.)  The nausea is back to some extent, as is that other first trimester pain called Frequent Urination.  Apparently progesterone can keep the bladder from completely draining, so sometimes I have to go literally 5 minutes after I just went, and it's always a disappointingly small amount.  You'd think something that has me hopping up and down like Elmo would make it worth my while, but no.  My other first trimester buddy The Migraine has started coming back, too.  It's all deja vu fun and games here.

Sleeping has gotten difficult, too.  I'd purchased some pillows which I use to prop up my back, but my hips were killing me.  I bought myself one of these and have nearly wept with pure, unadulterated love and gratitude for it.  I love it.  I may leave money to it in my will.  I use it under my growing stomach and between my upper thighs, and it keeps me aligned and on my side.  I had been finding I'd roll over onto my back when I slept, and I would wake up with my legs numb and my stomach an incredibly hard mass.  As soon as I rolled off my back, both would return to normal.  Hopefully the twins don't feel like they've been caught in a wave machine.

I don't have hot pregnancy hair.  That kinda' fucks me off.

Also restless leg and leg cramps are back.  And there's nothing funnier than a pregnant chick leaping out of bed screaming from a leg cramp, that's true camp comedy right there.

I have none of that "special pregnancy cravings" business.  I do tend to want juice all the time, although I make myself alternate between juice and water.  I eat loads of fruit.  I don't want things in particular, but I find that I can go right off something while eating it.  I wish I had funny stories about craving steak with pomegranate sauce or sponges or Nutella on avocados or of sending Aidan out in the middle of the night to track me down some double double fudge ice cream (which he wouldn't do.  If I woke him up to beg him for ice cream he'd tell me to pick up the shattered pieces of my life and move on, which is fair enough because really, what would I expect at 2 am?), but I really don't. 

I do get Braxton Hicks as well.  Whoever said they're not painful was either:

1) Male
2) Built like a Russian Cossack
3) On crack

because they do hurt.  Or not hurt exactly, but they are very, very uncomfortable.  I don't get them often but they do come up and I don't enjoy them. 

I am in that stereotypical nesting stage, too.  I want to clean, rearrange, buy, and change everything.  Everywhere I look is something that needs Mr. Clean attention, and the house is getting tidier than it has in a long time.  We're not slobs, Aidan and I.  Really.  We don't have 10 years of newspapers piled by the front window and we don't have science experiments growing in the crisper drawer of the fridge.  But we're a bit bad about using the dining room table as the post office sorting center, and I tend to leave books all over the living room.  I do find that if I overdo it the Braxton Hicks and the round ligament pain come in and kick my ass a bit, so I have to try to start dialling it down.

The Lemonheads, as far as I can tell, are just fine.  They are very, very active youngsters, which fills me with fear about what's going to happen when they arrive (surely infant sleeping pills will be legal soon*.  Surely.)  Books tell me that they tend to be active when I'm still as the movement of my walking puts them to sleep.  This would align with their behavior, because I think every time I sit down I get a "Hey!  Woman!  We're bored in here, get up and do something!  Make that dog bark, we like that!  And while you're at it, how about some juice?"

So yeah.  Moving along, really.

*Yes, I am kidding.  This is not a Carrie Fisher novel, I know one does not give a child sleeping pills, no matter how much they're crying.  The mother crying, that is, not the child. 

Back in Time

So we got a thank-you card the other day from the posh nursery in our area.  Said posh nursery - which we'll call The Very Poshy Nursery from hereon - is one that the company we work for offers a 10% discount if you send your baby there.  Of course, the company failed to mention that the nursery is the most expensive nursery in the area by quite a margin, so thanks, company!  So helpful! 

We toured the nursery a few months ago, and added our name to the waiting list.  There is such a dearth of child care in our areas that women are adding their babies to the waiting list while they're still TTC.  There I was, a few months pregnant with twins, actually prepared to provide proof that reproduction had at least taken place, and I signed up for the waiting list.  And paid £100 for the privilege of doing so.

There are now two nurseries we have our names down for - both approved by the government website Ofsted, with good ratings, qualified help, and clean facilities.  One of them is run by the county council, so it's smaller, has less activities, is located on the premises of a local school, and for the first few months the Lemonheads go to nursery they can only take them three days a week (but this is ok with me-I want them to go to nursery only max 4 days a week anyway).  The other nursery is The Very Poshy Nursery, which will cost us significantly more money, is further away from our home, and when we went there we had no fucking clue what they were on about most of the time.  Every single day and activity is structured around some kind of learning plan based on the esteemed methods of schools of Western thought who deduced that the Maharini Armstrong Method of Inter-Structural Play is best for the development of baby's posterior cerebellum and cortex, or some such shit.  Aidan and I nodded dumbly at most of it, and wondered if they ever gave the baby something as easy as, oh, I dunno, a wooden block to gnaw on for a while when they were teething, or if the babies were instead presented with a civil engineering blueprint in order to increase and abet mastication. 

Aidan is keen on The Very Poshy Nursery.

Vanessa and her eye on being able to ever buy a tube of mascara again are keen on the council run nursery, although she admits the infant facility of The Very Poshy Nursery is better than the council one, but can't see too much difference once they get to toddler age (although the poshy nursery does things like take the toddlers on field trips to a bread-making factory.  I can't imagine what a 2 year-old gets out of that, but what do I know, I don't have a degree in baby education.  Clearly.)

The Very Poshy Nursery sent us a card the other day.

It reads:

Dear Vanessa and Aidan,

Thank you for registering the twins at The Very Poshy Nursery and for returning the registration form and fee.  Please update us when the twins arrive so we can amend their form.  Good luck on the rest of your confinement.

Kind Regards,
The Very Poshy Nursery.

OK now.

My "confinement"?

What the fuck? 

Edith Wharton called, she wants her time period back. 

My confinement?  Seriously?  What's next - will I start suffering from the vapours?  Am I in a delicate condition?  Am I in danger of swooning?   

I felt like writing The Very Poshy Nursery back.

Dear The Very Poshy Nursery,

I am writing to acknowledge receipt of your kindly distributed epistle.  We look forward to further social intercourse with yourselves upon the advent of our nestlings.  Upon their genesis, perhaps we can ascertain with some degree of certitude the possibility of their attendance at your fine establishment.

Very Kind Regards,
Vanessa and Aidan

Postscript - we don't do confinement in this household unless you're talking about what we do with Aidan's ties on Sunday afternoon, but that involves lubrication and blindfolds.  We don't really call it "confinement".  Let's think of it as Mommy and Daddy's Reindeer Games, shall we? 

Confinement.

Sheesh.

My Grass Isn't Greener, It's Just My Side of the Fence

I ran into an old neighbor the other week.  She's a good friend as well, but someone who I sometimes struggle with.  I had to go to the village we used to live in to get a refill on my Cyclogest - my GP and my midwife are still there, and the village is only 5 minutes away.  I was walking to the pharmacy to fulfill my prescription.  I had a magazine in hand and it was a rare June day where the rain had yet to burst through, so the sun was warm on my face.

I saw my friend on the sidewalk, walking towards me.

"Hello, Billie," I said, smiling. 

"Hello Vanessa," she said, looking immediately at my stomach.  I saw her flinch.  Her lips tightened.  I know all about this.

Billie and her husband - who has 4 kids of his own from a previous marriage - went through 4 rounds of IVF.  They did ICSI every time.  She never got a positive result, not once.  They gave up when they realized they couldn't afford to keep trying, as shortly after their fourth try he had a heart attack, so they gave up their high-powered jobs for much easier careers that wouldn't endanger his health anymore.  This took a huge toll on their finances and put an end to her dream of being a mother.  A side result of this new life has been her problems with alcohol and financial woes.  I've tried to be there for her.  I love her, but it's not always easy.

I remember her once crying on my shoulder when she had to go to one of her husband's grandchildren's christening.  Her bitterness was palpable.  I knew how that ache she had inside felt.

I told her about the pregnancy at the last book club we held.  Billie, myself, and one other woman all cannot have kids, while the other two women in the book club are at different stages - one woman has a grown son while the other woman says she's not ready for kids yet.  Billie knows I did IVF, we discussed it.  She herself went to the expensive London clinic, the one that has the best success rates, while we went to a local clinic with good rates but less of the crunchy-granola huggy feeling.  Telling her that I was pregnant was so hard, and I felt so shit about it, but she hugged me and congratulated me.

I lick my lips.  "I'm sorry if this-" I put a hand on my stomach - "bothers you, Billie.  I can go, if it helps you.  I really do understand, honest."  And I do.  It's a fun game, this board game called Desperately Wanting a Baby While Being Reminded That I Haven't Succeeded.  I've played it many times.  I absolutely know how she feels, to be the one wondering about a future she's convinced she'll never have.  I am honestly ok with her telling me to bugger off and walk away, if it would help her.  Sometimes when she's really pissed she's honest that she's jealous of my life - a house, loving stepkids, Aidan, money.  We're not rich by any stretch of the term but we have more money than she does, and it's something she remarks on.  I always hug her when she brings it up.  I don't know what else to do.  Maybe telling me to bugger off would be best.

"No, it's ok," she says.  Her eyes look exhausted.  I can smell cigarettes and alcohol on her breath, and it's only 11 am.  "I'm over it.  I've passed feeling upset I can't have kids," she says, looking away.

Liar,  I think.  I don't care who you are, running into another pregnant woman hurts.  If you've known every hour of how it feels to be on a two week wait, if you know what it's like to wake up from egg collection and immediately want to know how many they got, if you know what it's like to cry with ache because of someone else's christening, then you just don't get over it like that.

She asks lots of questions about the babies.  I answer them, but then try to change the subject.  I don't want to be the blunt instrument she keeps throwing herself against, I know how that feels, too.  In the end she wishes me well.  She hugs me and says she'll see me in a few weeks at the next book club meeting.  Then she goes off into the pub.

And I feel horrible.  I've become one of those Flinch-Worthy women.  I am now visibly pregnant, so those who long for babies flinch when they see me.  I feel it in blogland, too.  Not like it's all about me or anything, but it's true-I do have that guilt you read about when people get knocked up. 

People do disappear from the blog when you get pregnant.  And the weirdest thing is, the hardest part to admit because I feel ashamed for admitting it is this: When you get pregnant, you need people way more than you do when you're measuring out your Lupron doses or counting your antral follicles.  That part of the IF game you know, you have no doubt where you'll wind up on the board when you throw the dice-you're in an IVF cycle.  It's famliar. 

But pregnancy...I'm going to be honest and say that pregnancy is really fucking scary.  Every little thing could go wrong, there are so many horrible stories out there, and it's a whole new territory.  You have never played this game, or if you have you never lasted very long against the contenders of Mother Nature or Genetics.   Every bump, twitch, change, feeling...you feel so scared.  And because you crossed into another area, you're supposed to be tough, to not complain, to not find a single moment of it unpleasant or uncomfortable or intimidating.  You got pregnant!  You don't get to be scared!  You got a positive test result!  Stop looking a gift horse in the mouth!  This is without question the scariest thing I have ever been through, and I have seen some scary shit.  Yes, it's what I want and yes, it's also wonderful.  But I can't just go about skipping and singing and acting like one of the women who are one with nature and their bodies, who spend their time talking about how full of the essence of life they are.  Instead, I'm on the reality side.  I'm having twins.  I'm happy.  I'm scared.   

Because that's the truth of it.  You're happy and terrified and delirious and nervous and so many other things that don't come with the monotony of an IVF cycle for a longtimer like myself, where you know what your body is doing, where it's familiar territory.  I'm sorry if this hurts anyone, but I just wanted to say - it's scary going through fertility treatment.  It's also scary if you succeed.

I want to chase after Billie and tell her that I know it's fucking hard to be around me.  I know it's weird. I know you look at me with hope and jealousy and all of that, because I looked at other women that way, too.  I wish we could be in the same boat, I wish you could be pregnant too.  I'll be there for you if you can be there for me, because maybe we both need each other.

But as someone who has been in her shoes, I know that's not the right thing to do either. 

In this game, there never is a right move.  It's all a throw of the dice.

Step Ball Chain

You're Invited!

Who:  Your hosts, the Lemonheads!

What:  The wildest dance party this side of the placenta!

Where: Vanessa's Uterus!

When: Between the hours of midnight and 5 am!

What to Bring:  We've installed two new bouncy castles, one called the Bladder and one called the Lung!  Bring football shoes, golf shoes, hiking shoes, or any shoes with cleats on them for a bouncy good time!

R.S.V.P. today!

Yeah.

Not sleeping so well lately.  The babies think the hours of 4pm - 9 pm and then midnight - 5pm are the best hours to recreate the magic of the Solid Gold dancers.  That, and the reflux has me freebasing Tums (luckily I have had an ulcer for years and am used to the feeling.  This may be the first and last time I've been pleased I have an ulcer.)

I have 15 more weeks to go.