Second Anniversary

Tomorrow will my our second wedding anniversary. I'm amazed at how much this date hurts--far more than Poppy's due date did. But I guess it's not so surprising, when I think about it.

Two years ago, I thought that I would be very pregnant by our first wedding anniversary. When our first anniversary did roll around, I was in the midst of beginning treatment, and I was very hopeful that I would be very pregnant, or maybe even have a newborn, by our second anniversary. This year, I have no such hope. Oh, sure, part of me is hopeful that the immune treatments will do the trick, and I'll stay pregnant the next time we try--that's why we're spending some much time and money on them, isn't it? But I don't feel the level of certainty that it will work that I felt last year. I've had too many losses to feel sure of anything now. I hope, but I also fear.

And I ache for the loss of the babies I might have had. For the first dream that my first pregnancy would be smooth and uneventful. For the fleeting hope that my first miscarriage was a fluke. For the confidence that finding so many treatable problems in my first appointments with Dr. R. meant that our next pregnancy would surely result in a baby.

All that is gone now. I still have hope, but it is measured against the reality that my third, fourth, and fifth miscarriages all occurred in spite of my doctor's optimism that he had found and treated all the necessary issues. The question still lingers in the back of my mind. Will these immune treatments be enough? Will they be the right ones? Or do we have more years of struggle ahead of us before we are finally parents of a living child?

The loss of the future I had imagined, paired with knowing that what happens now is entirely out of my control, leaves me emotionally vulnerable right now. I've been crying at the smallest excuse the past few days, especially today.

Luckily, we celebrated yesterday, before the emotional tole of this anniversary really hit, so I was able to enjoy our date night. Tomorrow, I have my music classes to keep me busy. And in a little less than two weeks we have our first LIT treatment . . .

I Never Know When the Pain Will Hit

Today, I was having a good day. In fact, things have been good for the past few weeks. Ever since I started thinking about fighting for a baby, instead of fighting against having RPL and that meaning I'm infertile. Then I open a post in my reader to see that one of the bloggers I follow is celebrating her second wedding anniversary. And she already has a baby in her arms, in spite of RPL and clotting disorders. And The Mister and I are coming up on our two year anniversary next month and not only am I not pregnant, we aren't likely to be in a place to even be TTCAL again until the beginning of next year.

I know everyone's story is different, and usually other people's stories bring me hope, but I didn't realize that this particular blogger's time in the land of IF had been so, comparatively, short, and suddenly, I envied her. It opened all my old wounds, and I find myself, once again, asking why I couldn't have just had FVL like my cousin. One simple clotting disorder, with a simple treatment, and then a healthy pregnancy or two. It really sucks to have so many effing things wrong with me, and to feel like I will never really be certain we have found them all. I will always be waiting for something else to go wrong, and for them to discover another undiagnosed problem.

No matter how hopeful I am, I can never be certain. I can never be sure.

Accepting that this is the Path We're On

I've realized, over the past couple of days, that I really have accepted that IF/RPL are now and forever a part of my life. I've stopped fighting the facts and started fighting for a baby. The difference between fighting against what is, and fighting to get what I want is huge. It makes this whole experience easier to live with.

Not that I'm glad to be a habitual aborter (don't you just *love* that phrase?). Knowing that, without medical intervention, my body will efficiently kill off any baby I manage to conceive is a major blow to my self image. But constantly saying to myself, "I don't want this to be my life," doesn't get me any closer to my bigger goal of being the mother to at least one living child. Resisting immune testing and treatment because I don't want to have to deal with the inherent risks and costs doesn't get me any closer to having a live baby, either.

As I accept that I need medical help to stay pregnant, and as I accept that the risks of an untreated condition are worse than the risks of a treated one, then the process of getting diagnosed and making a treatment plan becomes more hopeful than scary. My hope of having a full term pregnancy that results in a live baby is now in modern medicine. And I am ready to pursue every option that might reasonably increase my chances of meeting that goal.

"We Want Your Story"

The organization that runs the music program where I'm a docent wants to collect their docents' "stories" for an advertising campaign. I wonder if they want mine . . .

I saw an advertisement to become a music docent the month after my second miscarriage. I was looking for alternative ways to bring children into my life, since creating them in the usual way wasn't working so well for me, so I signed up. The training was one of the best and worst experiences I have every had. Learning to teach music, pretending to be children, getting to actually *play* the games and sing the songs we'd be teaching, was wonderful! I had so much fun with that part of it. The problem was that my fellow trainees were all either mothers (or grandmothers) or bright-eyed naive young women with children of their own "sometime" in their future. I wasn't talking about my miscarriages freely. I was too afraid of getting overloaded with unsolicited advice. So I didn't make any connections, just felt bitter and envious of all these lucky mothers I had to spend several hours a week with for 2.5 months.

I made exactly one friend, and she was the docent coordinator. She was sympathetic, and having her know my situation helped me through some rough parts of getting started in the classroom. That was the other complication. The teacher of classroom I was assigned to was ill for several months, and I ended up having to work with 3 or 4 different subs during that time. Communications were sometimes difficult, and I never knew who to expect when I showed up. At least the teachers communicated with each other, so they usually knew to expect me, but one time, even that message didn't get through!

In the midst of all of this confusion, I had my third miscarriage and missed a few weeks of teaching due to that, and then having the flu. The kids were the reason I kept going. Teaching them was a joy, partly because I love music, but also because it gave me 30 minutes out of my week when I wasn't thinking about my infertility, when I felt worthwhile and valued. It also was a wonderful way for me to stay in touch with why I love children and want some of my own. When I see kids with their parents at the supermarket, I focus on the parents. I see the kids almost as possessions or status symbols that I don't have and they do. But when I am in the classroom, I see the children as the individuals they are. I got to know the children in my class. I tried to pay attention to each of them, to help the rowdy ones participate appropriately and the shy ones come out of their shells.

I was able to bring music to 20 children who might not have had it otherwise, and to see their smiling faces every week kept me going through the rough times. Now I've had a total of five miscarriages, and I'm hoping that new testing will yield new information to create a better treatment plan. I hope to stay pregnant the next time I try. But no matter what happens on my family building journey, I'm going to keep teaching music, because it brings a ray of sunshine into the darkness that is my current life.

I don't think that's the kind of story they are looking for. They want to hear about the music, and the cute things kids say and do. They want to inspire other people to become docents. But for me, the experience was so much more. It was a challenge and a lifeline all rolled into one. The music was a vehicle for me to interact with children in a scenario that was emotionally safe for *me*. And their request inspired me to tell my music docenting story, even if I don't end up telling it to them.

Quick Update

• Things are wonderful. I'm very focused on life in the real world, and it's really helping my mood--hence my silence on the blogs. I'll probably continue this way for a while, as it seems to be better for my mental health.
• Finally had my follow up with Dr. R. and got cleared to start TTCAL immediately. Full steam ahead for this cycle!
• I'm on a full-out anti-inflammatory protocol including diet, supplements, and a steroid once I'm pregnant.
• Feeling very hopeful and trying to focus on the positive, rather than everything that could go wrong.
• To those who asked where we vacationed, the pictures were taken at various spots along the Northern California coast.

Grieving for Ember

This week has been hard. I was blaming it on some frustrations with the end-of-year performance I have to put on with my music class, but last night I realized, that's not really it. It's Ember. I'm grieving for her. Today marks one year since she slipped out of my life. Yesterday was hard because I miscarried on a Wednesday. I spent the day in a fog, not aware of being sad, just numb. It wasn't until the end of the day that I figured out why I couldn't function.

Finally, this morning, the tears came. At home, and later at therapy, I cried my heart out. I miss my baby. Ember is the only one of my angles that I spent enough time really imagining for the ghostly presence of her loss to really haunt me. It was her phantom pregnancy that I mentally tracked all last year, and she is the one I imagine when I think of the baby I might have had by now. She would be 4 months old. I cannot forget that, but that's not the whole story.

Losing Ember was bad enough, but that miscarriage was the turning point. My whole life shifted course that day. I couldn't see it at the time, but now I do. It wasn't just the death of my baby, it was the death of so many of my hopes and dreams and plans. I have changed my very view of the world and myself, not to mention changes in diet, lifestyle, etc. This past year has been full of transitions and paradigm shifts and internal earthquakes. I have made choices that feel very close to selling out on my previous values. I have learned to better accept my powerlessness to chose my fate. Certain things are irrevocably outside my control.

I have also learned that I do not want to be bitter and angry forever. I have learned that hope is stubborn and keeps returning. I have learned that I can choose to feed either bitterness or hope. I am trying to learn to feed hope. I want to embrace my present life, and reach for my future through hope. I want to find a way to fully live again.

I think that Ember would not want me to become stuck in her memory, in the phantom image of what might have been. I will always miss her and all she symbolizes, but pining over lost hopes will only make me bitter. Although the smooth pregnancy and easy home birth I anticipated will probably never happen for me, I do have a very good chance of having a full term pregnancy with the help of modern medicine. I will take that chance and use it to feed my hope that someday I will have a living child to call me "Mama".

Today, though, I am torn between grief and hope, and I need to give the grief some space to come through. I know it won't drown me. So I will let myself grieve, and then I will move on.

Hope Returning

Thanks everyone for all your support on my last post! It really helped! I am feeling much better and much more hopeful for my own chances of a healthy pregnancy, soon.

Gwyn was very sensitive to how difficult her news might be for me when she told me, even telling me that if I needed to spend less time with her for a while she would understand. I won't go into details, but she has had her own fertility journey and is somewhat of a mentor to me (she already has one living child). So my worries weren't so much about the immediate future, as about the long term, if I don't have an ongoing pregnancy, soon, myself. I know I won't have to worry about conversations suddenly turning pregnancy-only, and that Gwyn really understands what it's like to be happy for someone else and sad for yourself.

In other news, The Mister and I have started talking about names. It feels like a really hopeful thing to be able to talk about names and consider them. In fact, I'm feeling really hopeful, overall. Some of the optimism and hope I felt a year ago, when we were first planning to get pregnant, has returned. Of course, that doesn't mean I'm no longer affected by grief or envy, just that it is now tempered with more hope. I'm allowing myself to feel hopeful, to daydream a little bit, to imagine a baby again. I'm tired of living with my heart closed. It just makes me miserable in the present. So I'm trying to enjoy the present by hoping for the future. (That sounds really strange, but it's the best description I can give.)

I also had my first Mayan Abdominal Massage session yesterday. I went, mainly for some digestive issues, but I know it will help with making sure my reproductive organs are optimally positioned, as well. It felt really good to have someone touch me like that. I used to get massages regularly, but since I've been spending so much money on acupuncture, I stopped. I think this will be really good for me, on a lot of levels.

Oh! and I also wanted to mention that (as many of you probably already know) Blogger went nuts last week and I lost a few comments. I did read them, before they disappeared, but I don't know how to reconstruct them. So if your comments didn't appear to publish or seem to have gotten deleted in the past couple of days, it's because of Blogger. I didn't personally delete anything.

It's Complicated in Here

In my head, I mean. So many things I'm trying to deal with and figure out. I'm suddenly feeling hopeful again. We'll be TTACL again soon and right now I have hope for a full term pregnancy and live birth. That hope makes it a bit easier to bare small children popping up in unexpected places. That and my new mantra. It's a song I learned in my wannabe-a-midwife days. I always thought of it as a labor song, but yesterday, I figured out that it is equally, if not more apropos to struggling through the land of IF.

I am a bold woman
I am such a brave bold woman
Walking right into the dragon's mouth alone (This line makes me think about how much inner strength it takes for me to go into situations where it is likely that I will see parents with their children.)

I am a brave woman
I am such a brave bold woman
Seeking love and beauty I go on my own
I go on my own (For these lines, I think both about how isolating IF/RPL are in general, and also how, by choosing to try RI, I am a accepting new, unproven treatments, and that isolates me as well, but I am still going for it--seeking the love and beauty that a child will *hopefully* bring into my life.)

Seeking love and beauty
On my quest I go
No matter what my happen I know I will grow
Yes I will grow (This verse seems to be about how I will be changed by the experience of IF. I hope it will make me a better person. I will try to let it mold me into a more compassionate and open-minded person. But like it or not, it will change me, and growth and change go hand in hand.)

That got me through some sticky moments yesterday around a woman with two toddlers. It reminded me that coping with infertility and RPL takes courage. And somehow, I didn't feel so resentful towards that particular mother.

But then there is the other side of things. The complications of finding an RPL group, and really liking the other women there, but feeling very inhibited by not being allowed to talk about my treatments because of the policies of the sponsoring hospital. (Gripe, grumble, groan.) The meeting left me questioning Dr. R.'s and Ms. Bird's strong recommendation that immune treatments are my best hope at a healthy pregnancy, since nearly everyone else there attributed their losses to egg quality (whether or not genetic testing had been done). One of the women said that chemical pregnancies are usually chromosomal abnormalities.

Hearing that left me very confused (neither Dr. R. nor Ms. Bird has brought up egg quality), yet I was never able to voice my concern. I tried to bring it up to facilitator after the meeting, and was talked down. She was so busy explaining why she couldn't allow me to bring up immune treatments and trying to convince me that the other types of emotional support offered would make up for that restriction, that she never stopped to really listen to me. More than anything, her inability to listen to or acknowledge my frustration and confusion was what turned me off. It's too bad, because I did really like some of the women there, and I really would like more in-person connection with other RPL-ers, but I'm not sure if it will be worth biting my tongue on the immunology issues.

Also, I am being required to have my kinder music class put on an end of year performance. I'm sure the parents will enjoy it, and I know that the generosity of the parents is a big part of what keeps the music program going, but I don't think the kids are ready. I think the kids would get a lot more out of continuing our regular classes. I'm frustrated, because there isn't much time to rehearse them, and I have not been focusing on perfecting songs up till now, but I don't want the last few classes of the year to be all work and no fun, and I don't want to put a whole bunch of pressure on the kids. Plus, it means I will have to meet the parents. I don't want to socialize with a bunch of parents! Someone will surly ask if I have kids, and then what will I say? "No." "Not yet." "None living." "Three in Heaven." There is no good answer to that question.

Back on the upside, Ms. Bird worked some magic at my last acupuncture session, and I've been feeling much more relaxed. I tend to clench my teeth, and she needled the muscles in my jaw and they let go! I can't remember the last time my jaw was this relaxed. It feels weird, but good, and I'm sure I'm walking around looking half dazed, with my mouth hanging open, just because it feels so good to have a loose jaw.

Also on the upside, I've been getting up early this week and doing my exercise first thing. Mostly by walking The Mister to the bus. He started taking public transit to work because his company badge gets him a free pass and gas prices are through the roof. It's maybe a 10 minute walk to the bus stop, and another 10 back, and it's very early in the morning, when all is still quiet and the sun is barely rising. It gets my day off to a much better start, and I actually have time to get things done in the morning. It also gives us a little more time together, which is nice, since he gets home a lot later when he takes public transit.

So, like I said, it's complicated here in my head. I'm not sure whether I'm on an upswing or a downswing, but I think I'm coping fairly well. It just is so helpful to get it all out here, in a safe place. Even if finding more IRL support is proving more difficult than I had anticipated, I know that I can always come here. You guys are great! You keep me floating and make me smile with your supportive comments. :-)

What Is Hope?

Two recent posts (here and here) have combined with my own feelings of melancholy to get me thinking about what hope is and how it works.

I do not feel hopeful right now about our chances of having biological children. I look back at my three pregnancies and worry about how none of them even made it to the hcg starting gate so to speak. I don't know if I would have more or less hope if I had seen a BFP or a heartbeat, but I know that, the way things stand right now, it is very hard for me to envision myself ever staying pregnant.

And yet, we are still moving forward as if that is our goal--as if it will happen. As I type, The Mister is at a specialty clinic to give a sample for testing. Tomorrow, I will make an appointment to discuss the results of all our recent testing with Dr. R. We will probably be TTCAL again in June. But I have no hope for a positive outcome.

Instead, my mind runs on other possibilities. Will we try to adopt? What if we find an agency we like, but have to wait to even apply because we've only been married a couple of years? Will we keep TTCAL again and again and again in the meantime? When will we stop? How will we know enough is enough?

And yet, I sometimes imagine myself pregnant with a second or third baby. I can't really imagine being pregnant with the first one, but I can imagine having been pregnant and given birth--does that make sense?

My mind turns again, to all the risk factors I have learned about. I hope that knowing about and treating so many things ahead of time: PCOS; MTHFR; thyroid issues; possibly immune issues, will lower my risks back down closer to normal. I hope, but no one can tell me for sure what the outcome of a pregnancy that continues will be.

Still, I want that experience. I want to find out. It is still worth the risk. Is that hope? I don't know.

My mind turns also to foster care. Right now, it is the option that I am most drawn to. Heart wrenching as I know it must be, I think I would prefer that type of involvement with children. Teaching is a way to have contact with children, but I would rather be the parent at home, sending my children to school (even if they are foster children) than the childless teacher who comes home to a quiet, adults-only house. If we cannot stay pregnant and adoption becomes too complicated, I think I would prefer to be a foster parent than to live completely child-free. Who knows, we might someday even be lucky enough to adopt through the foster system.

Is my willingness to go on moving forward, even though I cannot imagine the outcome I long for truly happening, a form of hope? Or is it something else? What is hope? Have I lost it? Or is it simply more quite and devious right now, circumventing my melancholy and pessimism to keep me moving towards a dream I really don't want to give up on?

Coping (or Not)

Thing have gotten hard again. Not as hard as they were *before* my amazing breakthrough, but hard, nonetheless. It's hard even to write about what's hard. I'm not a puddle on the floor, but I'm also not happy. The Mister is having issues, which are affecting me. Mostly, his issues are unrelated to baby-making, and TBH, it pisses me off that he can get so worked up about something else, and yet show virtually no emotion about all the $#!t we've been dealing with for the past year. Plus, these current issues are probably going to take on a higher priority in his mind than getting his test (a Sperm DNA Fragmentation Test) run.

In my mind, this test for him has taken on gargantuan proportions. Not because I think it's going to be the magic issue, the reason for all our problems but because, if I am going to take the immune treatments (which I can get my head around, although I am still not happy about having to use them) then I d@mn well want to be sure that The Mister's contribution is high quality. The problem, for me, is that the suggested treatments take 90 days to take effect. Which means that just when I'm getting to the point where I'm emotionally ready to TTCAL again, we may have to go on another enforced break. So the longer The Mister puts off getting the initial test run, the farther the end-date of that enforced break gets pushed back.

I promised him I'd be patient with him, because he was so patient with me while I was trying to get my head around doing the immune testing. But he has outside interests. He can forget about all this crap, at least for short periods of time. I'm consumed by preparing to TTCAL again. Every time I prepare a low GI meal, I remind myself that I'm doing this so my body will support my next pregnancy. Every day, every minute, that future baby is on my mind. It is very hard to act patient when I feel so impatient.

I cannot face another useless loss. Our next pregnancy *must* be planned. I still hold a lot of anger about the way our third pregnancy happened. Part of me still wants to believe that it was because of starting the meds at 11dpo, instead of 1dpo, but I am not willing to try again without more tests. I don't want to spend my hope without a higher chance of success. (It feels a bit like hope is a currency, and with every loss, my hope-account will deplete a little bit more. I don't want to risk the level of hopefulness I have managed to rebuild since Poppy's loss on something with a low chance of success. I want to stack the odds in my favor before I play pregnancy roulette again.)

On top of everything else, my cycles have gone haywire, and I am beginning to worry about whether we will continue to be able to get pregnant easily. This whole journey sucks so hard.

Oh, and Astin's Angelversary is coming up next week. That doesn't help, either.

Wordless Wendesday

What's Been Helping

The past 5 days my mood has been on the upswing. It feels like a nearly 180* shift. It's been wonderful. Of course, there have still been rough patches, but I've been very good about acknowledging them and using the new techniques and resources that Dr. Black has taught me. In fact, I've been consciously giving myself opportunities to feel sad for short periods of time on a daily basis, to make sure things don't get stuck. But I started doing that shortly after my third loss, so it's not exactly something new this week.

There are several other things I could credit with the change, however.

1. Acupuncture. This is where I've been inclined to give most of the credit. I had a fairly detailed discussion with Ms. Bird about where I was at, emotionally, before she needled me on Monday. She was telling me about what she felt in my pulses, and when she described my heart pulse she said, "It feels like your heart is trying to be here, but really isn't." It was a perfect description of how I had been feeling for the previous four weeks. I was trying very hard to be in the present, but I wasn't. I couldn't envision the immediate future, at all. So, Ms. Bird did a bunch of points, including some for grief, and since Monday, I've been feeling hopeful again. I can actually think about the fact that we are going to be TTC again as soon as we have the result on all the tests we're having done. That could be as soon as next cycle. And I'm excited about it. I've even been thinking about the possibility that, with immune treatment, I might even stay pregnant. This shift in mental perspective is wonderful, and it feels really good. This path is so much easier to walk with some hope than with only fear.
2. NAC. N-Acetyl-L-Cystine. A supplement that is supposed to help with a broad spectrum of PCOS related issues. I have a theory that, by balancing my hormones, it just might be boosting my mood. No proof, of course, and I haven't had the time to research it, but it is certainly a possibility . . .
3. Exercise. I may have mentioned that Dr. R. told me to get more exercise--a minimum of 30 min 5x/wk. With the flu and other things, I have been a bit lazy, but this week I decided I needed to make exercise a daily priority. If I'm planning to do it daily, than an occasional miss will still leave me with at least 5 days of exercise every week. So I've started getting up a bit earlier and doing about half an hour of something every morning. Some mornings I do yoga, others I walk, but in any case, I am getting significantly more exercise than I was a week or two ago, and I know that it is helping my mood. I can definitely feel it having a good effect.
4. Emotional Support. This is not exactly something new, but it is certainly a big player in my improved mood. I talked to someone who is a sort of "fertility mentor" to me earlier in the week. She runs a support group that I missed this month because of being sick (one of the reasons I tried the other group I mentioned in this post). When I e-mailed her that I wouldn't make it, but had gone through another loss, she offered to be available to talk on the phone before the next meeting, and I took her up on that. It made a really big difference. I also had a nice chat with a local friend who has experienced some fertility issues. And of course, since it's ICLW, I've had lots of support here on my blog. You all really helped hold me up this week. :-)

So the long and the short is that things are very good right now. I am also very busy, and hope to post about some of the things I've been up to, soon, just as soon as I have enough of a break from them to get at my computer again!

Pregnancy Envy

I'll admit, I feel it. Even with fellow IF/RPL-ers I feel it. The initial announcement can be such a sucker-punch. Somehow, even when someone is cycling and posting regular updates, I never quite expect the gut-wrenching level of my initial reaction, when she gets a positive.

Of course, I'm happy for her. I know that it is good news. Most of the bloggers I follow have had a loss or two (or more), so their pregnancies give me hope. Still, it hurts. Even on cycles when we're not trying, because we're waiting to get everything in place, it hurts. Marie blogged about this recently. How, even when you're not trying, and there is zero chance of getting pregnant because you're actively preventing, it can still sting to see another BFP announcement from someone who is trying. I sometimes envy the fact that some people get to try every month, while I have to wait and plan.

Here's the thing, though. I may feel a flash of jealousy at first. I may feel a sting, or even a gut wrench that someone else is pregnant and I'm not, but it doesn't last. At least not with the ladies who have been through previous losses. Because, following on the heals of the BFP comes the anxiety. The watchfulness of milestone after milestone. The small sighs of relief followed by new anxieties and worries.

It's not that I want them to feel that pain. I wish we could all go back to the happy, naive state of first-time-pregnant-never-had-anything-go-wrong-so-there's-no-chance-it-will-happen-to-me magical thinking. (Actually, it's not magical for most people--for most people it's just true--but that's a rant for another day.) I would take away all the hurt of pregnancy after loss if I could. It's just that it is easier to go on supporting my on-line friends who get pregnant after loss, because they aren't smug and confident. They're dealing with a level of anxiety that I wouldn't wish on anyone, and I genuinely want to help them get through it.

As time goes on, posts become more and more pregnancy oriented, but I don't mind. I begin to enjoy following their stories. I have, occasionally, stopped following a blog when someone got pregnant, but usually it was a blog that I only just found. If I'm invested in the blogger, if I've been following her story for several months, then watching her pregnancy is also less painful. Because I know how hard she struggled to get here. So I go on reading. I learn about what I have to look forward to. I make mental notes about what helps others when anxiety strikes.

I take every continuing pregnancy as a sign of hope that, if she can carry a pregnancy after loss, I can, too. Someday, it will be my turn, and I hope my readers will continue to follow and support me when it is. And I hope that, no matter how happy I may be for my own success, I will always remember to look back and offer support to my friends who are still in the trenches. I hope I will be able to break the news with sensitivity. And I hope that, in sharing my story, I will be able bring hope to others.

ICLW and a Pity Party

First, if your visiting for ICLW, welcome!

Unfortunately, you caught me in a downswing. I'm currently recovering from my third miscarriage and the flu. I'm physically and emotionally really down right now (for more on that, check below the fold). You can read my story and learn more about my journey in the tabs above.

Who am I outside of RPL?

• Wife to a wonderful man, The Mister, who can usually make me laugh in spite of myself, no matter how angry or sad I may be. :-)
• Volunteer Music Docent at a local public school--I teach one 30 minute lesson per week to a class of 20 Kinders.
• Volunteer Sunday School Teacher at my church--I teach as part of a team of five, so each of us prepares a lesson about once a month, and acts as an assistant at least once a month.
• Volunteer Community Gardener--I'm in the process of exploring a new garden to work at where there *hopefully* will be less likelihood of running into parents of preschoolers. My previous garden had become a hive of the moms-of-under-fives set.
• Craft Artist--I love doing handwork, although I don't have any current projects going. See my Projects Page for pics of some of my creations over the past year.
• Cook--I actually spend 20+ hrs/wk in the kitchen, making most of my/our food from scratch. The Mister generally eats out at work, but we eat at home together most evenings and on the weekends.

There, I don't think any of that is "identifying". ;-) But since I blog anonymously (Hope isn't my *real* name) I'm not going to tell you where I live or how many siblings I have, or anything like that. Sorry. :-)

Disheartened

That's the most accurate word for how I've been feeling the past few days. In spite of the hope provided by modern medicine. In spite of Dr. R's and Ms. Bird's reassurances that many, many women carry to term with immune treatments. In spite of a part of me that still has abundant hope and will keep plodding on, I feel disheartened by this third loss.

The odd thing is, I keep skipping ahead in my mind. I can picture myself with a toddler, pregnant again, with my second healthy pregnancy. So I must have hope for a first healthy pregnancy (since it's not a vision of pregnancy after adoption). But I can't let that hope in right now. I think I am afraid of what it will do to me to be hopeful that our next pregnancy will end in anything but loss.

It is as if the first healthy pregnancy is, in my mind, the ultimate hurdle. Some part of me believes that once I get through that, once I have a living, biological child, the rest of my dreams for myself and my family will fall into place. I can picture myself some unknown number of years in the future with one living child and another on the way, so I must have hope that these immune treatments will work, but I can't allow myself to feel it.

The hope is there. It's sneaking in through the cracks, finding sly ways to enter my heart. Invading the territory of fear with dreams of a far future. It's only when I try to picture myself 6 months or a year from now that I draw a blank. Then I come up against the fog of self-protection that won't allow me to dream of anything so tangible as a baby resulting from our next attempt at pregnancy.

The push and pull of hope waring with fear for space in my heart leaves me disheartened and dull. So I plod on and pretend there is no immediate future. I live minute to minute and try not to think about trying again.

P.S. I hope you don't think me greedy for still wanting more than one child. So many people with primary infertility narrow their focus to that first child, but I cannot yet let go of my dream of a large family. I know that I may not get to fulfill that dream, and even if I do, I certainly cannot dictate how and when each child will come into my life, but I need to allow myself some hopeful dreams. It keeps me going on this painful path.

Watching as My Dreams Slip Away . . .

For years I have watched, helpless, as the winds of time tear my dreams to shreds that fall about me and blow away. I should be used to this by now, but I'm not. It still hurts.

First to go was my plan to have my first child by the time I was 23, closely followed by my desire for a minimum of five children. The number of children I hoped for diminished slowly from five or more to three or four. When The Mister first broached the subject I told him I wanted at least three children and that home birth was a given. He willingly agreed, and "my plan" became "our plan".

More than two years later, we were (finally) ready to start our family, and everything looked good. Our family doctor said we were both in good health, and we got pregnant right away. I had read lots of birth and pregnancy books, joined MDC, and chosen a midwife. Even our first miscarriage didn't shake my confidence. I told myself it was a fluke and that the next pregnancy would be fine. Then, the second miscarriage came, mirroring the first, and I went into shock and denial. I refused to search for answers for months, clinging to my dream of midwifery-model prenatal care and home birth. We decided to wait at least three cycles before trying again, and I made some dietary changes. I believed that eventually a pregnancy would stick.

Over the ensuing weeks and months, the denial slowly slipped away, to be replaced by a grief so deep I couldn't fathom trying again without answers. What I eventually learned was that several, treatable conditions had contributed to my miscarriages. With the help of modern medicine and a special doctor, I have a good chance of carrying to term. This news brought hope flickering back to life, even as my plan to stay out of the obstetrician's office and the maternity ward disintigrated.

Now, I begin to dare to dream again of bellies and babies. While it can be comforting to allow myself to hope, there is always the risk that events won't unfold according to plan. Though the realities of pregnancy loss have shaken my illusions of control, admitting that I can neither predict nor direct the future is terrifying.

Losing Astin and Ember shattered my sense of self, along with most of my dreams for the future. I still cling to the vision of the woman I thought I would become, even as she slides out of reach. Without her, I am a lonely husk, facing a sea of fear and despair. I cannot bear to be that woman or face that sea for long. Instead, I turn away and incubate dreams so fragile, they crumble to shreds at the slightest touch of reality. Dreams and reality are incompatible right now, yet hope still flickers in my heart, calling me to discover my future.

Reassurance from Ms. Bird

On Monday, I had an important conversation with Ms. Bird before she needled me. I bring a list of questions every time I see her, but usually they are about current stuff, and the answers aren't earth shattering. This week, though, I had some future questions about what to do once I get pregnant. Specifically, I wanted to know about her experience treating women with MTHFR.

My protocol from Dr. R. is to continue on the Fol.gard and BA I'm already taking and start Love.nox just after ovulation, continuing through week 10 (assuming I get pregnant and stay pregnant that long). After 10 weeks, Dr. R. thinks that Fol.gard and BA will provide enough protection on their own for the rest of my pregnancy. This was worrying me, because I haven't seen any other MTHFR ladies on-line who discontinue Love.nox that early, although I know some don't take it at all. In fact, most who do use Love.nox seem continue with it throughout pregnancy. So I asked Ms. Bird if any of her other patients with MTHFR had gone off Love.nox at 10 weeks and had a healthy outcome and here is what she said:

• Yes, she's had patients go off Love.nox as early as 10 weeks.
• None of them had late term miscarriages or stillbirths.
• She has had very few late term miscarriages and stillbirths in her practice, and those few have all been in women who had no diagnosed issues.
• Did you get that? Let me say it again: Ms. Bird has had no late term miscarriages or stillbirths amongst her patients with diagnosed issues, regardless of their western treatment protocol.

This gives me an incredible sense of relief. Of course, there is a first time for everything, but now it seems that my chances of carrying to term are actually higher than I was imagining. My confidence in Ms. Bird's skills just rose dramatically. I'm starting to feel hopeful that, if I get can past the first trimester the next time I get pregnant, my chances of a take home baby will be really good.

Okay, maybe I'm a bit too optimistic, but I need some hope to cling to right now. January has been a really hard month, bracketed by two would-have-been due-dates as it is. I'm really missing my babies these days. (This results in a powerful longing to hold a baby, any baby, but I don't know anyone with a baby I can borrow, so I hold my doll . . . it helps some.) I need this shred of hope to brighten a really tough time.

Five Months

It's been five months since my second miscarriage. I notice the monthly anniversary of my second loss much more than my first. It's not that I loved Ember more than Astin, or that I had more dreams for her. It's more that her loss signified so much more. I knew that one loss was relatively common and didn't mean much in terms of whether I'd eventually carry to term. The second loss was more significant in that respect. If I'd stayed pregnant with Ember, I wouldn't have started worrying about FVL unless I developed other symptoms. I'd be planning a home birth right now instead of looking for a specialized OB. I'd be nearly 6 months pregnant. And I probably wouldn't ache so much over missing Astin. I might never have even named him if it hadn't been for miscarrying Ember as well. I probably wouldn't be blogging here, anonymously. I'd be blogging publicly under my own name.

This hurts so much. I ache. I am empty. I have some hope, but it is hope for an entirely different future than the one I planned and expected to have. Life isn't just a matter of planning and following the program. The road curves and we get surprised. Sometimes it looks like the road goes on, and it's not until the last minute that we see the detour sign. I feel like I'm sailing in uncharted waters. I don't recognize the stars anymore. Forget about landmarks--there is no land in sight right now.

I miss my babies. I miss the woman I thought I was. I'm trying to find a way to love the person I'm becoming, the life I've been given. How can the death of my babies be a gift? God? Are you out there? What comes next? Can you please give me a sign--show me a hint that my life will have some good in it again someday? Please?

Why do I have to be so painfully aware of what should have been? Will I ever be able to simply enjoy what is? I hope that someday I will find the silver lining in this cloud. Sometimes I get glimpses of it. I am becoming a more compassionate and accepting person, less judgmental, less critical of others. I'm learning that ideals aren't reality, and reality is often messy and complicated. I didn't want it to be this way. But I'm starting to accept that these are my lemons. Now, where did I put my sugar so I can make lemonade?

A Breather **UPDATED**

Thanks so much for the supportive comments on my last post. It really helped to read them. And today, I woke up feeling much better. Yesterday was awful: lots of emotions and crying and just feeling dead when I had to be in public, which was far too much of the day. I was running around doing errands on my bike in the morning before it got too hot, then home to make 3 days worth of meals so I won't have to cook today or tomorrow, then out again (this time in the car) to the lab for the blood draw for my tests. I should know the results by Friday--Monday at the latest. (I'm actually crossing my fingers that I have FVL, & that it's the only thing I have, so I can get treated and have a good chance of a healthy pregnancy.) Then home briefly for dinner and out again for my Music for Minors training class. I got home last night completely exhausted. I was in bed by 10:30 & asleep by 11 (that's good for me, I haven't been sleeping well the past week or so) & I woke up this morning feeling refreshed.

I think part of it was the dream I had last night. We'd had a baby. The birth wasn't part of the dream. For some reason I hadn't been conscious for the birth itself, and the dream was about meeting the baby for the first time. He was a boy, and big and healthy. I was so happy to have him. We were still in the hospital with him, and getting ready to take him home. I kept having to send DH to get things like a going home outfit for our son and his car seat. And then I woke up.

Even though the dream was fairly short, it left me with a feeling of peace and hope. I think part of what I realized in the dream is that having a healthy baby will be worth the challenges of an increased risk pregnancy. I'm starting to believe that I'll be able to handle this new twist in my life. And that feels really good.

I'm glad I'm feeling more at peace today, because I'm going to observe an experienced music docent teaching her class in a few hours and then talk to her after her class is over. With this whole training, I'm really enjoying the music part, but most of the other trainees are moms with kids, and several are pregnant. It's hard to be in a room with them, and I've been avoiding making friends. Teaching the kids will be fine. It's being around parents that's hard for me. So when I found out that the docent I'm observing wants to talk to me after the class, I got worried. What if she asks if I have kids? The way I was feeling yesterday, I thought I'd probably lose it. But today, I think I'll be able to handle it. It won't be easy, but I'm not on the verge of tears the way I was yesterday. I'll let you know how it goes.

~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ Update ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~ . ~

The class went well. No chit-chat about personal stuff, just business & learning. Turned out I was there for her first class of two, so there wasn't as much chatting time as I had feared, and I did learn some things--like how Kindergartners really behave and what it really takes to teach them a song or keep them focused on the activity at hand.

Falling Into Place

That's what things finally seem to be doing. This is how I felt last fall, too. Like everything was falling into place just right. Will it all just get swept away again? I don't want to think about that possibility right now. Right now, I am in a place of hope.

This morning, after a shopping trip where I saw too many babies too many times, I went to a local park where I had seen a Tai Chi group on Labor Day. I wasn't sure of the time, so I arrived late, but I was able to join for the second half. Apparently the first half is actually Qigong. The group meets every Monday and Friday morning & best of all, it's free, and just a few minutes walk from my door to the park. The only drawback is that all the others there are senior citizens. But I guess I can live with that.

Even though I only participated in the second half, it was wonderful and by the end I could really feel the energy moving as I moved my hands. It felt very healing for my whole system. This is definitely the right type of exercise for me right now. I am focusing on engaging the energy in so many ways right now--the Munay-Ki Rites, Pranic Healing, and now Tai Chi.

I guess I haven't mentioned the Pranic Healing yet--it's something another friend is doing for me. I'm really excited about it. I'm not sure how to describe it, except that it involves healing the body on an energetic level, working with the Chakras and with specific organs. It seems to be a pretty well developed system--they even have a specific protocol for preventing miscarriage.

I have a really strong intuition that I need to engage the energy first, before I move on to more physical levels of healing. Although I think that there might be treatments out there that could keep me pregnant, I'd like to do my best to fix the underlying problem, so my body can carry a pregnancy on it's own. I'll consider other treatment options if these ones don't work, but I want to start with these options. If these energetic techniques allow me to stay pregnant, I'll feel more like I did it myself.  I want to stay as independent as possible through this whole process. If it's not to be, I'm coming to terms with that possibility. But at least I want to try.