It's not always pretty

I have debated writing this post for several days because I know that some readers out there who don't really know me will probably think the total worst about me. After much thought, I have decided to write it...not necessarily for me but to let others out there know that they are not alone. I welcome comments but any hateful, rude or just plain mean ones will be deleted. Suggestions, questions and support are welcomed.

As y'all know, we got custody of the babes. They are here with me and we are adjusting. I also started lu.pron in preparation for IVF 1.0 next month. P is still in Afghanistan. Life has not been easy for the past couple of weeks.

I want to believe that my feelings that I am about to share are because of the lu.pron. I really think that they are, and so does my husband as well as a close friend of mine. The only way I will ever really know (I guess) is when I finally get off the lu.pron.

We went from having no children to having a 2.5 yr old girl and a 1 yr old boy. We'll call her SB and him JM. I love them, I think. Yeah, I know-the vast majority of y'all probably want to smack me right now. Trust me, that's better than what I though about doing to myself. I'm having trouble bonding to them....especially to SB. Note *I* am having troyble bonding, not that they are having bonding or attachment issues. I don't know what it could be, other than my hormones wreaking havoc on my emotions and mind.

Last week I actually told my husband that I thought we made a huge mistake by getting the babes....and I also said that maybe I am not supposed to be a mother and maybe we shouldn't go through with IVF. I mean HOW could I be meant to be a mother when I was considering giving back the babes when I have never even considered giving back one of our dogs or cats? I wrote him an email, in tears...kind of like now while I'm typing. I didn't know who else to talk to other than him...I feared that anyone else would yell at me or tell me that I was stupid or worse yet, tell me that I was right....that I was not meant to be a mother.

I Googled "problems attaching with adopted child" and found a blog post about a mother who had problems attaching to her adoptive daughter. It's like she was typing what I was feeling. *relieved sigh* I'm not alone. I talked to another friend about what I was feeling (she also happens to be a therapist) and she listened, without judgment. She reminded me that things would get better, this was probably due to the lu.pron and reminded me that I can call her any time and tell her anything (I cannot explain how wonderful and relieved that made me feel.)

So here we are, days later after my breakdown. I still feel....I don't even know how to describe it. It feels like depression; like all I want to do is stay in bed all day and sleep. But then again it almost feels like I feel nothing at all...all I know is that I don't like it at all.

Of course, we are not giving the babes back. They are ours. I am working diligently to bond to both of them. I am figuring out ways to especially build an attachment to SB...I truly think that I have the more difficult time with her because I have never wanted a daughter nor pictured myself with a daughter. I've always wanted boys. And no, it's not due to some f'ed up relationship with my mother-I actually have a fucking fantastic momma. I don't why it is that I've never pictured myself as having a daughter. Maybe I need to explore that in therapy.

So there you have it. The babes and I are making it day by day and learning to be with each other and love each other.

Updated Dec 31, 2010
Wow, I cannot express to y'all how much your love and support means. Seriously, I have been in tears (happy ones) over all the messages of love and support. Thank you <3

Im back, kind of

I've been super busy lately, but for good reason. Today, we got my SIL's babies <3 I picked them up & they are now in their forever home. We are officially parents!

Once I get this whole time management thing down, expect some posts on co sleeping, healthy toddler eating, gentle discipline & parenting a child with delays. I. Am. Super. Stoked.

Oh, and I start IVF meds on the 19th :)

IVF 1.0 starts TOMORROW!!!!

To my male readers who do not want to read about bodily fluids unique to females, too bad :-D

So remember how I met with Nurse Awesome (that's her new nickname, I've decided) in October and we figured out that if AF stayed regular, we'd have to push IVF to the end of January? (The reason for that is because the embryologists have down time around the end of Dec for the holiday season.) Well, AF was late last month (which was incredibly frustrating for me since there was no way I was with child) and she was right on time this month (incredibly heartbreaking since it was our last natural TTC cycle). So I called Nurse Awesome to let her know that CD1 was yesterday since they want to keep track of that before IVF. She called back and left a message about calling in birth control for the next 2 cycles for a January IVF. I called back, left a message and said "that's fine" and told her what pharmacy I use. Then she called back with fan-freaking-tastic news :)

She double checked the calendar and realized that if I start bc tomorrow, and continue taking active ones through December 24th WE CAN START STIMS ON THE 26TH!!!!! This is a whole month ahead of schedule which is freaking amazing and it's the original time that P and I decided that we wanted to do it. I am excited and nervous and full of HOPE that this will work for us.

So I now have roughly 4 weeks to get in the best shape possible-I CAN SO DO THIS. Tonight I am having my last bottle of wine for what I hope is a very long time ;-) Tomorrow I will be heading to the studio for Zumba and TRX, which will continue until the doctor says I need to slow down. Tomorrow I will also be getting my bc pills, Metformin refill, Folgard refill and Prenatal refill. Oh, and I'll be setting a therapy appointment tomorrow!

For real, I am stoked for this. I really am. I am determined to remain hopeful and optimistic through this process. We WILL be parents <3

Menu Plan and Meatless Monday, sort of

I fail miserably whenever I try to formally plan out all my meals for a week. I just cannot do it. There are nights when I just want cereal for dinner...there I said it. And cooking for one SUCKS in my opinion.

So this week, I'm going to try something a little different. Rather than spelling out what I'm going to eat every single day at every single meal, I'm going to make it simple. I WILL NOT EAT OUT THIS WEEK. That's it. I commit to eating what I have at home (or what I buy at the grocery store) rather than eating out at all. What that will most likely translate into is cereal and fruit for breakfast, soup and or sandwich for lunch, and who knows what for dinner. It will NOT involve restaurants, fast food or delivery. I expect you people to keep my honest with this.

I will start my week with a Meatless Monday dinner. I have left over cooked veggies from making shrimp fajitas the other night (y'all know my love of all Mexican food); to those I will add black beans and maybe more veggies. I'll put those in a tortilla topped with guacamole, hot salsa sour cream and cheese. To make it vegan you could use vegan cheese and vegan sour cream, or just leave them out. I'll serve my veggie fajita with a side of vegetarian refried beans and brown rice.

For those who don't have a clue about making fajitas, here's what I did:
* I start the first 3 and let them cook while I do the veggies*
Heat about 1 Tbls of veggie oil in a large pan
Cook your rice
Heat refried beans
Rinse, drain and heat the black beans
Add sliced veggies (I used green peppers and a yellow onion; I might add red peppers the next time) and cook to your liking. I like my wilty and not really crispy
Heat a tortilla (or however many you want) in the microwave
Put the black beans and veggies in your hot tortillas (that sounds kind of dirty...I like it) and top with whatever you'd like.

Do you have a vegetarian or vegan recipe that you like? If so link it in your comments!

Meatless Monday

The countdown to IVF 1.0

Well, R&R is over (please read my deployment blog for details) and I am not miraculously pregnant. We both knew it was a long shot but I had so many good signs of ovulation...*sigh* Guess tonight I'll finish off the beer and wine in the house to drown my sorrows.

If AF decides to stay on schedule, IVF 1.0 will happen in late January. That gives me 2 cycles to get my body in tip top shape for baby making. Between all the eating out and drinking we did over R&R, I have about 15 lbs to lose before starting the IVF medications. The clinic did not tell me to lose weight but I want to lose it because 1) I need to fit into my clothes and 2) I will put on weight with the stimulating medications. I have been a total slacker in the fitness area due to a 4 week long respiratory infection (I *hate* viruses) and then 2 weeks of having P home. Starting tomorrow, I'll be back on track with Zumba and eating. I'll also be back in therapy to help me deal with all the stress and anxiety caused by IVF, deployment and work.

So, to all my lovely friends out there who have done IVF-do you have any advice for me? Here's what I'm currently planning/doing-continue with the FertilAid and FertiliTea (you can order those here); exercise, including prenatal yoga; therapy; and possibly acupuncture. With our IUIs the only injections were Follistim and then the trigger shot. If you did others, what meds were they and did they hurt? In short, HELP PLEASE :-p

Dear Anonymous,

I know that your IP address is in Leesville, LA so I assume that I know you from Ft. Polk. Identify yourself and I will publish your comments on here. They went to my SPAM comments rather than my real comments so you're lucky that I bothered to read them. BTW-as a rule, I don't publish comments from folks who don't have the courage to put their names on their comments.

I truly have no idea who are and if you knew me on FB or Twitter, you'd know that my husband has been home on R&R so I haven't been bothering to blog or check my blog....I had more important things to do ;)

Confession time......

Last week I went to the "coordination of care" meetings at the IVF clinic. I met with the financial person, embryologist and my nurse. I was quite informative and answered lots of my questions but y'all.....I AM FREAKING OUT NOW. Not like all the time but when I stop and think about it doing it without P being here (thank you deployment), that's when it really gets me.

I'm not scared of giving myself injections-I injected myself 99% of the time when we did IUIs-but I'm anxious about not having the in person support of him. I have great friends here IRL and in cyberspace, but nothing can replace the feeling of having my best friend, my soulmate home and emotionally supporting me. Having him hold me at night while I cry out my worry of never getting pregnant, no one else can do that.

And that brings me to something else....what if it doesn't work? My team of people at the IVF clinic are confident but we all know that it not working is a definite possibility. Gah, I can't think about that right now....I will lose it if I do. I haven't been to therapy in forever...I really need to call her.

I put on a good front most of the time because with P being gone, I have been able to NOT focus on getting pregnant. Now that's all gonna change....and I might be a crazy hormonal person again *sigh*

Of course, if we get naturally pregnant over R&R (and I stay pregnant) then I'll be the happiest woman EVER!

What happened to....

basic manners and treating others as you'd like to be treated? I mean, I know that I am a tree hugging, animal loving, recycling pacifist but seriously, some people in cyperspace make my skin crawl with their lack of basic human decency.

There have been nasty comments on friends' blogs and bullying via Twitter. I've had "friends" talk about me on FB and Twitter (thinking I wouldn't catch on) and it hurt my feelings. Granted, the ones on Twitter I am better off without but why talk about me? Why not just stop following me? And no, I am NOT perfect and there are times I vent about people but I make a concerted to not gossip about people or make fun of people.

For example, I am part of a message board of military wives. On this board we have rules about what and how much can be in our signature. Well a relatively new member had a signature that was messing up people below like-like after she replied to a post, all of the replies after her were way small or set to the left. Rather than, I don't know, let one of the moderators know about it, an older member decided to call the member out and basically yell at her to fix her signature. Why? What purpose did that serve other than to embarrass that new member? When I saw the post calling out the new member, I was embarrassed for her. She is a nice, quiet girl who doesn't demand attention. I could NOT believe that an older, seasoned member would do that to her.

At times it discourages me when I see the cyber bullying and nasty comments....and then I go back to my Twitterverse. My little bubble where my friends are supportive and build each other up. Where we cry together, laugh together, send virtual hugs and have virtual wine parties.

And even in real life, I am shocked sometimes by the basic lack of general kindness to people. What happened to please and thank you? What happened to the Golden Rule?

Meatless Monday

With P being gone (read this blog for that story for the next year), I've been slacking on cooking and eating real food. I am trying to get better about that so I will actually be cooking *gasp* supper tonight.

Tonight's Meatless Monday supper will be cocktail shrimp, hushpuppies (the cooking part), steamed veggies and maybe a few fries. I haven't made hushpuppies in MONTHS but I am craving them today.

So, yeah....there is my simple boring Meatless Monday :-p Maybe next week I'll have an interesting tasty recipe. But for the record, I heart shrimp and hushpuppies-it reminds me of our time back in Savannah, GA :)

My newest blogging venture

If you have dogs or love dogs, please check out my newest venture! I am doing it with a friend and if you are interested in blogging with us, please let me know :)

Protect Your Dog From Things

So check out the site, comment and psread the word!

MilSpouse Friday Fill In

Thanks again to the creator of this Wife of a Sailor :)

1. What is the longest road trip you’ve ever taken?
Probably my college graduation trip to Colorado from Alabama. I had a BLAST and completely fell in love with Colorado during the week that I spent in Estes Park.

2. Do you collect anything? Tell us a bit about it.
I collect shot glasses from places that I've been as well as places that my friends/family visit. My Daddy built a collection case for me and I will soon be asking to build another one.

3. What is your favorite part about being an adult?)
Being married! Seriously, I love being married to my best friend and sharing a life with him.

4. What song brings a tear to your eye?
Glitter by P!nk, Bubbly by Colbie Caillat (we danced to that at our wedding) and More Time by Needtobreathe

5. Describe your first plane ride (how old you were, where you were heading, etc).
Hmmmm, I am really not sure. I remember flying to TX and NV to visit grandparents when I was 16 years old but I am not sure if that was my first plane ride or not. Nonetheless, I enjoy flying and actually flew to Japan on my own to see my brother while he lived there.

Now it's your turn My MilSpouse friends :)