Good grief.

Husband and I were sitting on the couch with our fancy beers enjoying the fresh air coming through our open sliding glass door. Then, out of the corner of my eye I saw a small dark blur head for the glass door and then a loud thump. When I got up to see what or who was attacking our home, I saw the little guy lying outside in the ivy. I watched this little bird die and take its last breath. After the wings relaxed and the tail folded in, Husband gently scooped him up and carried her into the forest where her body could go back into the earth. I felt an enormous sense of loss and was reminded of all the human losses that we all have endured over the year.

The next day was Mother's Day. And, we found ourselves sitting on the upper deck outside our bedroom. Suddenly, I noticed the repetitive bird call that had been going on for some time already. When I finally saw the little singing bird, it became clear that this call was a call to its partner. A desperate call looking for the little bird that died the day before. I quietly wondered when the bird would give up and go forward to raise the chicks safely tucked in their nest, on its own, all alone.

Updated to add: Just when I thought it was safe to check my email, I get one of those emails. You know the one. Friend from grade school sent me her ultrasound photos, plus photos of her recent trip to France, plus her new address. She just bought a home where she will be starting her new faculty position.

You know when they tell kids that if you do well in school and follow all the rules that good things will happen. Well, that's the biggest lie we tell children today.

Two down, one to go.

After finals, my brain has the mental capacity of a turnip. It's not pretty. In fact, it's so bad that I am a little afraid of writing this post. I have trouble escaping the feeling that everything I write is being graded. On the upside, I am officially two-thirds of my way through this educational hell that they call l@w school. Two years down, one to go.

Dear Aunt Flo is busy packing her bags. While I am absolutely thrilled that AF finally paid me a visit after the D&C, I am anxious about this cycle. Going virtually unmedicated for bipolar in order to try to conceive is not fun. And, I am sure Husband would say the same. He misses those meds even more than I do. Although, he really is a mighty good sport about it all. So, I have the usual anxiety that you are all familiar with when staring at the potential of this cycle. But, I also have the anxiety of wanting to be off my meds for as little time as possible. I am constantly doing calculations to determine "how much longer if". How much longer will I have to be off my meds if I conceive this cycle? How much longer will I have to be off my meds if I don't conceive? And then there's the really sad one. How much longer will I have to be off my meds if I conceive and then miscarry again?

Before I sign off so that I can go comment on all the blogs I have missed for the last week or so, I would like to give a mention to Amy at "A somewhat ordinary life." She has an article published in her newspaper that I think deserves a good look. It's a courageous writing called "Dear Everyone: What to say to a childless couple." Thanks for writing it Amy!

This side of normal.

When the nurse called yesterday, I admit that I had a bit of an attitude. And when she said that everything looked "normal", I became even more irritated. Normal? Exactly what is normal? So, I asked about my beta, and she replied that it was so low that I need not be concerned. I need numbers though, I am a scientist at heart and I need quantitative data, not qualitative. If I wanted qualitative, I would have stuck with the pee-sticks.

I should note that as soon as the call ended, AF came a knockin'. AF has her standards apparently, and doesn't come to my house until I am ready to pull all my hair out. Bitch.

Now, I suppose I really will have to concentrate on studying now. Two more finals, one on Monday and one on Tuesday. I will still be stalking your blogs, but am less likely to comment until finals are done. Until then, I am thinkin' of you all.

Compost

Husband called me outside over the weekend to check out his treasure. (Get your mind out of the gutter.) Peering into the bucket, I saw black gold. Not the oily kind; it was the soily kind. He had turned over the compost pile and screened the compost to get a healthy layer of absolutely beautiful compost for our Spring plants.

I just stared at it and could hardly believe that something so nurturing and positive could come out of the nastiness that we threw into our compost pile. For the most part, we have a compost pile just so we don't have more garbage to throw out. (We pay per bag, here.) And, we don't have a working garbage disposal so there's a lot of waste that can go into that compost pile.




And because I am pretty cheesy, I couldn't help but see the lesson in it. With a lot of time, the stuff you really want no part of because it smells bad, and looks bad, and feels bad, turns into something more valuable and lovely than you could ever foresee in the garbage it started from. I wondered whether that's how everything works. One giant cycle. And I stuck my hand in that compost soil and felt the qualities that would give life to the plants in my garden.

In other news, I have a date with the dildocam today. My lower back and cramp like pain has finally registered some concern with my doctor. Also, I get a gratuitous beta today as well. Let's hope that they don't make me insert the dildo myself again. That's just a little too close to having a technician watch me play with myself. Any self insertions are for me and Husband exclusively, no audience please.

Updated 5/3/07 @ 11:30pm: Sorry no results to report. Apparently, I am the last on the call back list for my doctor. Am I being a bad patient if I am torqued that I haven't heard from them on the beta and ultrasound results, yet? Wait, don't answer that... I am running out of painkillers, and I am entirely too unmedicated for even the most constructive of criticisms.

8.0

Just a quick update to let you know that I finally got my HCG results, after 4 phone calls to my doctor. It's 8.0. I am pretty upset at this whole process and feel continuously insulted by my body. I want a period or a pregnancy, everything else can go fuck itself. I just want to cry, I am getting nowhere with all of this.

I will be absent for at least 24 hours, because I have a final tomorrow. So I need to study and forget this whole procreation thing. Actually, both studying and procreation send me into sadness. It's entirely possible that I will fail at both.

Simple need not apply

Because I like to torture myself, I peed on a stick yesterday. Perhaps you are wondering why a woman who still hasn't even had her period since the D&C would do such a thing. I am over four weeks past the procedure, and I was starting to get concerned. Of course, we all know that I should give it a few more weeks before I start to worry that my uterus may have initiated a revolt. But, I was a bit curious as to whether an HPT could detect any HCG still clinging to my body. The problem is that I didn't really anticipate what I would do with the results.

If you squint or applied the magic of super contrasting analysis, there were two lines. Either way, seeing a line didn't really help me. If it were totally negative then I would wonder where AF is, as I would erroneously conclude that I had no HCG in me and that indeed Ute was pouting. If it were totally positive, then I would be concerned that either I was pregnant again (way too soon btw), or that my body was waging an all out war against me and using the HCG as its weapon of mass destruction. With a kinda-sorta-positive or negative result, I am left with only one alternative...total mass confusion and being really really pissed off.

Thankfully, I have been well educated by the trials of others, so I got my doctor to draw blood for a quantitative HCG evaluation. That was yesterday, the results were supposed to be in today. And since simple and straight forward need not apply here, the results are delayed until Monday. So the question exists whether it is safe to have a gin and tonic this weekend and whether that Gorgonzola in the fridge is going to make it into my stomach. I am going with the safe assumption, as I have no symptoms of being pregnant. (God knows I have been obsessively checking.) But if I am pregnant, then I guess I would be good company to that smoking pregnant woman while I enjoy my gin.

To be continued...

To be continued once I am able to screw my head back on...

...hmmm, now where did I put my drugs?

P.S. Thank you for your comments on my last post,"WWBD". You may notice that I have removed it, but I promise to repost it in due time. I am just feeling very vulnerable at this point. But, I greatly appreciate everyone's candid and raw responses. Compassionate honesty is a sign of trust and friendship. For that, I am grateful.

Updated 4/26/07: I continue to be vulnerable, but I put the post back up. The last group of people I ever want to hide from is you all. Somewhere in this world, I need a spot to be genuine, and this is it.

WWBD?

Updated 4/26/07: Please know that the following post may get your panties in a bunch. I acknowledge that I am an angry, evil, nasty person right now. I am in no way saying that one must to do certain things to deserve a baby. Everyone deserves to be happy. I'm just not right now.

Sometimes when I am going through my day, I ask myself an age old question-What would Bloggies do? Perhaps you are wondering why I don't ask what Buddha or Jesus would do. Well, I already know what those two would do, and I also know it's not likely that I will choose to do what they do. So instead I ask what others with somewhat similar struggles would do in a particular situation. What would Aurelia, or Ultimate Journey, or Serenity, or Sara or Oneliner, or Lady in Waiting, or OHN, or Bumble, or Marie-Baguette, or Adrienne, or My Reality, or Sara, or Casey, or Megan, or Anns, or Nadine, or Berrybird, or Becks, or Barbara, or Renee, or Katy, or Carrie, or Caro, or Emilija or Mands, or Jane, or NSLS, or Diane, or Colette, or The Road Less Travelled or any of the other many Bloggies do in my spot? (by the way, if you comment I will add your name to the above list with a link to your site; yup shear desperation for friends, well that and I have no shame)

I had an appointment with my OB/GYN on Friday for my 1-month post-D&C checkup. Because they were running late and because all possible inconveniences insist on making their home in my life, I spent a fair amount of time in their waiting room. While doing time in OB hell, I desperately searched for something to read that didn't have the words "baby", "pregnant", or "parents" on the cover. Once I realized that this was too tall an order, I attempted to soothe myself by staring out their picture window at the cathartic sight of a parking lot. Looking back, I would have been better off counting loops of yarn in the waiting room carpet.

So, while I carefully studied the parking lot, an enormous pregnant woman comes into view. I would guess that she was around the 8th month. Instantly, I start to tear up and feel that boulder in my throat. When I caught sight of the next detail, I almost fell out of my chair and most definitely let out an audible gasp. This woman, who is lucky enough to still be pregnant was surrounded by cigarette smoke. Then, I realized it was coming from the cigarette in her hand. She was fucking smoking! I was livid. Just as I was about to march out to the parking lot and give her some of my mind blowing wisdom, the nurse called me in. I made a mental note to glare at the pregnant lady with the cancer stick when I came back out.

So the nurse saved this woman from my unmedicated, hormonal, post-miscarriage wrath. I still don't know what I was going to say, but I would venture to guess that it would have been along the lines of "What the fuck is wrong with you, lady?" or perhaps "Would you like a beer to go with that?". Let's be honest though, I am way too wimpy to have actually said anything to a woman with that much weight behind her. Scary.

So here's the ultimate question, what would you do?

Exercises in Futility

Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, EMDR, is a relatively new form of therapy that is used to treat post-traumatic stress disorder, in addition to many other psychological issues. I am not going to attempt to sum up this form of therapy, because I am sure I will not do it justice. Well, that and the fact that I find depression has killed my ability to form coherent sentences and thoughts. I highly recommend this therapy for processing difficult events, emotions, or problems in your life. It's a powerful and relatively simple technique, that when used correctly in conjunction with a therapist trained in EMDR, can help you move past trauma and its fallout.

Last Friday, my therapist had me use EMDR to help me work through my miscarriage and my anxiety about returning to school. Sometimes, EMDR will help me make connections that I would not have otherwise made. During this brief session, I progressed further than I thought I would. While focusing on the moment where I saw the pregnant student in a lecture hall and the feelings that went with that event, I watched my therapist's hand move from left to right, repeatedly. My mind kept jumping back to an article I had read in The New Yorker a few weeks ago.

The article was about a tribe of people in the Amazon who are strikingly different than modern culture in their thoughts and language. Thus, they are the subject of a lot of study in linguistics. The prominent theory of language seems to be challenged by the existence of this tribe. Researchers who have gone to their village are continuously confounded in their experiments. Each time they go to their settlement, they attempt to put the tribe members through a series of tests. These tests are designed according to the theory, and are pre-tested on undergrads. Every test is a monumental failure. Why? Well, because all of their tests are designed according to our cultural norms, instead of theirs. Just to give you a sense of how different they are, check this out. They have no words for numbers except for one, two, and many. They do not have a story of creation because it is just a story, and they don't relate to anything they haven't experienced themselves. They do not have names for colors, but instead refer to a particular color by what other things have that color. For instance, if you asked them to describe the color of a green object, they would say that it looks like a leaf. Ask about a brown object, and they will refer to bark or the color of their own skin. They do not value the abstract, and thus time is irrelevant as far as they are concerned. They live in the moment more than any other society I have ever studied by far.

What's interesting is that the researchers feel exceedingly discouraged and frustrated by their utter failure to make this society conform to their theory of language. And instead of coming up with a new theory or challenging their theory, they call this society primitive, ignorant, and useless. Indeed their experiments and their forced theory application are really just exercises in futility.

To some degree, that's where I am at. I am perpetually engaging in futility. My anger, sadness, and frustration at seeing another pregnant woman is really just an exercise in futility. I apply my expectations, my experience, and my approach to others and expect them to conform. They never will. Comparing myself to others, in the same way that comparing American theory to this Amazonian tribe, is the ultimate exercise in futility.

Not everything is as it seems.

Thanks again for all of your kind comments. Honestly, in addition to my husband, it's what keeps me marching through the days, hours, and minutes.

So last week, I met with the Dean of Students for the l@w school; let's call her Dean. I have met with Dean numerous times before and I have confided in her about my struggles with bipolar, my pregnancy, and then my miscarriage. Specifically, I had to talk to Dean about my options for finishing the semester. Together we determined that I would drop my seminar/writing class and try to finish the semester with the remaining three classes. It was an immense relief, to say the least.

In our discussion about the difficulties of managing the emotional fallout of a miscarriage, Dean revealed her own struggles to have children. Now, she is in her late 50's and a mother to 2 daughters. Her daughters are 16 years apart. She has been through 6 miscarriages and a stillbirth during her efforts to get to child number 2. I found her story particularly compelling.

After the stillbirth, she went to an appointment with an OB specialist. In the waiting room, she found herself surrounded by new mothers and their newborn babies. Outraged, she let loose on the doctor. Her anger and pain led her to scream at her doctor about how insensitive they were to schedule her at the same time as all of these new mothers. Apparently, the doctor quickly excused himself and brought in their staff counselor to help mediate the emotional outburst.

The counselor quickly apologized for the poor scheduling and reassured her that she was right in her outrage. After a compassionate discussion, the counselor added one detail which altered Dean's outlook on the situation. This doctor specialized in neural tube defects specifically. And so, all of the newborns that she saw in that waiting room were babies with severe neural tube defects and other related problems. While this little detail certainly did not invalidate her feelings of anger and pain, this new information added a whole new perspective on the grand struggle to bring a child into this world.