Suspended Animation

Still here. Still no baby. Baby boy is showing us that he has a mind of his own. F has been pg 4 other times, and each of those times she has never gone past 39 weeks. Until now. Yesterday was 39 weeks. Today is (obviously) 39w1d. And Baby Boy is apparently happy as a clam, moving and squirming but making no move to emerge. I feel a mixture of pride and irritation that our baby is the one to break the cycle; at the same time I fear what that might indicate about his personality and will :-)

It's a weird feeling because I don't know what to do with myself. When I left work on Friday, I left feeling good about where I stood in regards to any outstanding tasks. I had finished all the major stuff. We had a busy weekend putting the house in order and by Monday, we were very pleased with our progress. Baby things washed and put away. Clothes back in our closet. Flooring tools put away. We looked at each other and said, "We're ready!"

When I left work on Friday, I felt myself disengaging from the office. I knew that even if I were at work this week, it would likely be for only a short time, so I returned to work on Tuesday feeling calm and detached. Unfortunately, as the week has progressed, I've somewhat lost those feelings of detachment and calmness. Will he ever come out? Will they make us wait 3 more weeks before inducing us? And F feels great! She has a lot of energy and even thinks her appetite has increased.

It's a little frustrating because I know I need to think of these unexpected extra days as a gift and treasure them. Read. Eat good food. Cuddle with Husband and kitties. Try to sleep. But instead I'm an anxious, stressed mess who just wants the next day to come b/c Baby Boy might make his appearance. Oddly, it feels a lot like it did between cycles when all we did was wait for the next appointment or chance.

I know I'm whining. He will come out eventually, I know that. Our next doctor's appointment is tomorrow, and she could easily tell us she wants to get the show on the road. It's just interesting to me that I'm back to waiting impatiently. At this point, I've decided I'm going to plan on planting flowers on Saturday because I really don't think he'll be here by then!

One Week Down

One week down, one week to go. And it's been the longest week ever! I don't think it was only because I am antsy to know what the outcome will be. Of course that is part of it! This week was the first week in a while where I didn't have appointments or anything. Plus I'm worn out and just wanted it to be the weekend since, oh, Monday at 8am, and I had a lot of meetings; most of them were grueling and required a lot of energy. I guess there was sort of a let-down too. It's like returning to work after the holidays.

Yesterday we received the bill from the clinic for ICSI and a few other things. Funny how they can be so poor at communicating cycling details but so prompt at sending us our bill ;-) However, I did notice a possible item of interest: we were charged a cryopreservation fee. Does that mean we had embies to freeze? It's a bit odd b/c the date of that charge was 9/13, which was transfer day, and I know they were going to culture them until Monday at least. We were charged $300 for something, however. I'm going to file it under "something to think about later that might mean possible good news."

Out of Sorts

This has been a frustrating week. People at work have been stupid and most of my time has been spent putting fires out instead of making progress with projects. Or it might be more accurate to say that mini-projects keep appearing from nowhere and jump to the top of the list. And it seems like March is DRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAGGGGGGGGGGGGING. I think it's because my mind is already focused on April and May, and it's a surprise when I look at the calendar and realize that it is still March. I felt the same way in February last year after we booked our IVF cycle. Poor, short little February suddenly became the longest month ever because all I wanted to do was get to March which was filled with doctors appointments, bloodwork, med ordering, etc. In other words, progress.

I've been trying to take things one day at a time and have been doing pretty well. I understood and accepted that that there were impediments to our cycling with our surrogate immediately: gave birth in early December, lactating until mid-February, need cycles to resume and then have 3 cycles, etc. Nothing I could do to speed things up. But this week I just want to bang my head against the wall. We hadn't heard anything from the attorney on the contract, which sort of surprised me since I thought that she was going to send us some questions or info soon after our meeting. And even better, I received an email yesterday from our surro telling me that the one day of bleeding/spotting she had two weeks ago was NOT cycle 1, and that AF arrived for real on Sunday, pushing out our the potential start date by 2 weeks. I know 2 weeks isn't that big of a deal, but I am so tired of waiting. I feel like I have been twiddling my thumbs since September, and I want to get started. I want to cycle again. I'm ready to get back in the game. Argh. I think all this has really gotten to me this week because we are SO close to being able to start our testing and then cycling.

I'm feeling better today, though. Husband called the attorney yesterday, and she thought her assistant had emailed us already, so she was going to check on that and email us. Yay! Even better, Husband sensed how stressed and tense I was last night, and we got rather tipsy. It felt very decadent getting tipsy on a Tuesday night, but hey, we can. We might as well enjoy that perk of the child-free life while we can :) I do have a slight hangover today I'm embarrassed to admit. 30 years old and slightly hungover. Oh yeah, that's something to brag about! I feel calmer and more serene. I can only affect what's in my control and very little of this situation is. I'll repeat the Serenity prayer over and over and over until I believe it.

Oh, Husband and I have a new love: Apple's iPhone. He has been wanting one for a couple of months, and we checked them out at the Apple store last Friday. And now I'm in love too. It surprises me b/c I am a very low-tech cell phone user. I call no one but Husband. I don't text. I don't even know how to check my voicemail. But I want that iPhone. I had been skeptical of its claims ever since it came out, but no more. I'm just so surprised by this Apple love I'm having lately. Sure, I love my iPod. What's not to love? But an iPhone? I didn't feel cool enough for it. But now I don't care. We're going to wait until the next model comes out later this year and get them then.