Then Comes the Baby in the Baby Carriage

CONCERTS

I love music, concerts are a wonderful thing to look forward to. My mom recently bought us tickets to see Juanes - a Colombian musician who writes his own music, plays the guitar and his general message is of love and peace. The concert tour was having a sound check contest on Facebook where the winner would go to sound check in their city, meet the band, and meet Juanes one on one. I WON! I never win anything! I could not believe it, and I still can't believe it! Here is a picture of Juanes and I this past Sunday 3/20/11. Amazing evening it was!


TRAVELLING

I love travelling but we all know how expensive that can be. To make things more difficult we have three poodles. We don't live near any family so "who are we leaving the dogs with" is always an issue. It's a big part of why travelling is not so doable for us. I've come to the conclusion that we can start making small trips and to locations that we can drive to. I have seen most of California but there are still some places I have not seen. We're taking the opportunity to take a small trip in May to Palm Springs and bring along some great friends, four couples ala "Why did we get Married" style. I'm really looking forward to it. We've always talked about doing a trip like this but have never done it. I'm in a take-action mood lately so I'm pushing for this to finally happen.











***UPDATE*** April 18, 2011
Went to Las Vegas for almost one week! Had such a wonderful time! The above picture sums up my relaxing week.

VOLUNTEER

I know how rewarding donating time can be, and I wanted that for myself. I want something to feel good about, where I can get immediate satisfaction. I went to my first volunteer job on Saturday with Feeding America. I loved it! I plan on doing this once a month. What a great way to spend a Saturday, hubby and I were up early did something great with our morning and had the rest of the day to harvest our positive energy!
***UPDATE*** April 18, 2011

Just went to my second volunteer opportunity this past weekend and it was just as rewarding as the first time. I'm really glad I'm doing this. 

KNITTING

I like to teach myself how to do things. On one bored evening I started looking at how-to videos on YouTube. Suddenly -ping- I got the idea of teaching myself how to knit. After taking on this endeavor in November I have knit five scarves and am ready to do more technical stitch-work. I love giving out my work as a gift and it keeps my hands busy and my mind occupied.


READING

Since I can remember reading has been my getaway. I love getting lost in someone else's world for awhile. Again a good way to keep my mind occupied and a great stress reducer. Plus I love learning about everything. I tend to stick to crime/mystery novels but here and then I venture out to alternate reading and I just recently joined an all lady book club. We meet about once a month. I just went to the first one last week and absolutely had a wonderful experience, and I believe it will be a great way to get out and meet new people.

***UPDATE*** April 18, 2011
I've joined a book club, it's through meetup.com and I meet up for which ever books I'm interested in reading and discussing. I've gone to one meetup and enjoyed it so much. I loved spending some quality time with strangers who share the same love for reading, I met some interesting people, had good conversation and decided this is definitely for me.  My goal is to do one meetup a month.

COOKING

I love to cook! There something very rewarding about slaving in the kitchen for three hours and getting the "oohs" and "ahhhs" about my food. I have to say I'm pretty proud of myself because I am Mexican i should know how to cook but I didn't get the natural cooking gene, so again I've taught myself and I am a recipe junky. I don't think the hubster minds either. Keeps things interesting for dinner.

Why is it that not only everywhere I go I see pregnant women but in every magazine I read, and every time I watch TV it feels like another celebrity is pregnant.

I believe my recent angst of pregnant celebrities is because of Natalie Portman. She is every where right now and so is her pregnant belly. She is a constant reminder to me of everything I want and can't have. She seems so happy, she has the "glow", I want that too! I'm so jealous of her sometimes it shocks me. If I would see her I would be like, "Give me that baby bump, and while you're at it toss in that Oscar" I'm not an actor but who wouldn't want an Oscar, right?


The point is I feel surrounded by pregnancy and babies everywhere I go. Learning to live in this world is something so new to me, the feelings and emotions are so raw, so real, so scary. The jealousy I experience is at times so strong it scares me. Instead of smiling when I see a pregnant belly or baby I scowl and turn the other way.  I know this will only get harder, especially the more time goes on, I'm still without baby and friends begin their parenthood adventures.

Just the other day I finally decided to start hiding Facebook posts of those friends that have babies or are pregnant, when it's not an ultrasound picture it's a gestational week update, or their first steps, first smile, first anything. It took me a while to realize and accept that I cannot handle those posts day in and day out. They torture me.

Seeing these things dig this awful hole I have inside my heart deeper and deeper.

I can only hope that there will be a point in time where I can just be okay. That's all I want, to be okay. Hurting so much likes this actually hurts, its exhausting and draining. Little by little I feel like I'm turning into a person I do not know. I do not want to go there.

My goal is to have faith and believe I was put on this treacherous journey for a reason whatever it may be. I hope to find that reason somewhere along the way as well.

So far I have learned that when and if the day comes that I become pregnant I will not post it all over Facebook, not flaunt it to everyone I see and know because I never want to be that pregnant person that inflicts such pain on a person having trouble conceiving. I don't wish this pain on anyone.

Smile

That has been my motto for the past week. Ever since AF showed I've been reminiscing about the song my mom dedicated to me. It's helped me refocus and somehow find the strength to feel better.

As Charlie Chaplin once wrote . . .

Smile though your heart is aching
Smile even though it's breaking
When there are clouds in the sky, you'll get by
If you smile through your fear and sorrow
Smile and maybe tomorrow
You'll see the sun come shining through for you

Light up your face with gladness
Hide every trace of sadness
Although a tear may be ever so near
That's the time you must  keep on trying
Smile, what's the use of crying?
You'll find that life is still worthwhile
If you just smile . . .



So with that in mind I'm trying to keep my smile and not get lost in this IF world of gloom.

I have my days, hours even, but when I start to feel down I have my iPod handy and I play the song. It serves as a constant reminder to stay true to myself and have a positive attitude.

Also in pattern of my positive attitude and positive thoughts . . .
I was watching Desperate Housewives last night (I always feel I'm sent hidden messages when I'm watching shows). This particular message was during a scene in which Bree (recently lost boyfriend, business, and feeling let down by the world) is meeting with reverend Sykes. She's looking to get spiritual advice because she's been feeling a lot like "Job". The reverend responds and says he understands what she's feeling but that, "Looking at what has been taken from us is a bad way to go through life. Looking for what we can give to others is far better."

Could this have been more of a slap in my face and wake up call! Yes.  I have to admit that many days I hold a pity party for myself, and I keep thinking of everything God is not giving me, and I have a constant feeling of punishment from all of this. So, I'm trying to make it a goal for myself to, well just forget about myself and my pity parties and focus on what good I can do for others (at least for now). I've decided to volunteer one weekend a month at my local food bank. I feel this will be a good opportunity to get out of my cave and out into the world of giving. I feel it will be a good opportunity for me to meet new people and a great way to give back to the community.  I need this. I need something positive to focus on. I need something to feel good about.

This post may seem a little all over the place but I have a lot on my mind . . .



I went to get my blood drawn on Friday for my CD3 blood work. It was a bit of a mess. I arrived at the clinic and the Doctor's office told me that the clinic would have the blood work request in their system. Well they didn't. They told me they couldn't do anything unless they had the request from the doctor.

I started to panic a bit since these labs were so time sensitive to my cycle. I was lucky enough to still catch my nurse on a Friday afternoon at 4p.m.! She was able to fax the request over to the lab so I could go through with the testing. I was happy . . . aside from that one minor hiccup.

Needless to say I had forgotten how painful it is for me to get blood drawn. They can never find my veins! Aren't I lucky? It just reminded me how awful it will be to start infertility treatments where they'll be taking my blood left and right. Left the lab with a slight throb and what later turned out to be a bruise!

Fast-forward to Monday morning at 9 a.m. I get a call from the doctor's office. My blood test results are in and . . . they found nothing. You would think I would feel relieved but I don't. I asked the nurse so many questions. . . but nope I'm good, everything is normal. Except for the minor fact that they found I'm not immune to chicken pox and I've never had it before therefore I need to get the chicken pox vaccine. I don't know how I feel about this but I will do everything I have to do. The doctor doesn't want me to be at risk of getting chicken pox if I become pregnant.

I also knew I was being tested to see if I was a cystic fibrosis carrier. Well, oops they forgot to request it as part of the labs! Wonderful! So off I got to get more blood drawn next Monday, another bruise.

Working with the insurance company has been a pain. I'm waiting for the request and approval of my HSG exam. My clock is ticking here . . . I'm already on CD6, I only have about four more days when I can have this exam done. I'm KMFX. Thursday morning the hubby goes in for his SA.

I hope we'll have more answers soon. Since we've began testing I thought we would have definitive answers, a problem, something to fix. I don't know how I feel about the fact that they may not find anything wrong. We would be the lucky winners and getting the unexplained infertility label. Yah not really the answer I was looking for. I need something to fix, something to set a goal to. Why can't we get the right kind of luck and not have this problem!


 Here's to hoping.

This week has been such a low. This was our last cycle before beginning blood tests, HSG test, and semen analysis. I was really hoping to avoid all of this specially since we gave this month everything we had.

I took mucinex to make sure the mucus was "loose", ate pineapple core for five days after ovulation, and still nothing. The worst part of it all is that I was having a good day. My cycles are usually 31 days, I was at 27, so I thought I at least had almost one more week of being hopeful. But no! She had to show her face, and say "Hello, I'm here to torture you again!"

At least that's how I felt. I was absolutely devastated.

Sometimes it amazes me that I can be so hopeful and devastated all over again month after month. I told my husband that it feels like I'm experiencing the death of a loved one month after month. The pain is always the same if not worse.

I decided it was time we come out of the infertility closet to our friends. I know we have a long road ahead of us and only a small part of our family knows about our infertility. We don't live near our family and therefore only have our circle of friends. I finally realized and accepted that I need help from them, emotional support.