In the grand Festivus tradition...

...it's time for the airing of grievances.

Everything hurts. I can't sleep because everything hurts and when I do get to sleep, I wake up four times a night to pee. I'm retaining so much water that I'm getting the equivalent of carpal tunnel in both elbows, so every time I bend my elbows for longer than a minute or so, my forearms go numb. The sciatica is awful - I don't think I've felt my right thigh since October, and I frequently feel like I'm being shanked in the right rear buttock. Not to be left out, my left side has decided to pull a muscle or something mid-back. And that's not even beginning to address the swelling in my ankles or my creaky ass knees. I thought about asking a stranger to carry me up the stairs in the subway today. And then I thought about just renting an apartment near a subway station that has an elevator.  I've gained 16 pounds and my doctor is totally going to yell at me.

I have a weird growth on my gumline that is apparently a "pregnancy tumor." When my belly isn't itching, the ligaments are complaining about all the stretching. Forget tying my shoes; I can barely put on my socks. My skin is dry everywhere except for my face, where it's so oily I keep expecting Halliburton to declare eminent domain on it. My husband forgot to bring home the Carvel ice cream cake I specifically requested and I cried.

Pro: my hair is growing quite rapidly. Con: it's all gray.

Recent panicked Google searches: "I can't feel my cervix" "broken water or pee" "fetus vibrating?"

Despite all of this, I know that I'm lucky as hell to be 26 weeks today with a beautiful, healthy, wiggly little guy. But I am 99% sure that he is going to be an only child.

24 weeks, 5 days

Pregnancy is amazing. I'm hungry all the time, but between the sciatica and the heartburn, I can never haul my widening ass out of the house long enough to purchase and consume all of the food I want to eat. Kind of perfect how it works out that way!

Achievement unlocked: 20 weeks!

I've made it past the halfway point now, with a belly full of wiggles and kicks, and it's really feeling - well, real. There are real movements, real back aches and sciatica and heartburn, and real people getting up to give me their seats on the subway. (Though it's way more common that folks glance at my belly and then suddenly become very interested in their newspaper/magazine/Kindle. New Yorkers, you guys are a bunch of jerks sometimes.)

Our anatomy scan is tomorrow, and the teeny tiny little post-traumatic-stress voice inside my head is like, "Don't get too cocky until after tomorrow! Don't forget all of the things that could still go wrong!" But honestly, I have a feeling that everything is fine - so I'm just going to go with that.

I went to the Big City Mom's Biggest Baby Shower last week, and came away with quite the haul of baby supplies! Their gift bags were ridiculously good - I think I have seven or eight bottles now, and scads of pacifiers, bibs, infant toys, diapers and one super soft baby blanket that I can't stop rubbing on my cheek. Besides the full size bottles of stretch mark oils, mom-friendly lotions and "boob cream" that I've been lavishly rubbing all over my body, the contents of the bag have been tucked away in the closet where my superstitious husband can pretend they aren't there. He also doesn't know that I've been secretly adding sweet little baby clothes to the stash. How could it possibly be bad luck to stumble across the cutest little knitted sweaters at 75% off, right?

17w5d

I just got a raise at work, so I decided to make today Treat Yo Self Day!

Since mimosas are out for obvious reasons, and I'm all set in the fine leather goods department, it was time for a prenatal massage. I'm pretty loyal to Bliss Soho, not because the massages are anything spectacular, but because the whole experience is so relaxing. I always get there early so I can stake out a good spot in the relaxation lounge, snuggle into my comfy oversized robe, sip peppermint tea and leaf through the latest copy of Self. And after the treatment, the sauna and rainfall showers are pretty dope, too. It's best to go on a weekday, when you have the place pretty much to yourself and you don't have to be embarrassed about slathering on every product in the ladies' locker room twice. (Hey, that body lotion is expensive! I'd fill my pockets up with it if I could.)

But today, the prenatal massage was the star of the show. I was worried I'd have to lay on one side for most of it, but they had this magical set up with pillows everywhere, and after some scooching around to get my baby belly in the proper position, I was in heaven. It's unreal how good it feels to lay on your stomach after not being able to for a month or so! Then when it comes time to flip over, they raise the upper part of the bed so that you're not flat on your back. Between the warm, fuzzy blankets, the sweet-smelling baby oil they rub you down with and the super talented masseuse (who did this crazy stretching and flexing thing with my legs that made my eyes roll back in my head - like someone doing yoga for you) I was really in absolute bliss. No pun intended.

It wasn't cheap, so I know I won't be able to go back as frequently as I'd like (i.e., daily) but I definitely want to get back there at least one more time during this pregnancy. I've been feeling really achy and mis-aligned lately, and I feel absolutely wonderful right now! I hope it lasts. :)

Hello, sixteen weeks and three days!

Currently hanging out in my obstetrician's waiting room, doing my three hour blood glucose test. What I wouldn't give for a ham sandwich right now! Later this afternoon we'll get to hear the baby's heartbeat again. I'm a teeny bit nervous but mostly super excited.

And now that we know it's a boy, I think we have a name: Leo! It's my great-grandfather's name, and I think it's awesome.

Fourteen weeks, two days

And all of these things that make this pregnancy so different from the first one.

Like the perfect twelve week scan with a beautiful, wiggly little guy flailing his tiny arms and legs and doing flips in my uterus.

Like a terrified late night rush to the emergency room which ended in tears of joy rather than tears of sorrow, after a scan revealed a perfect baby with a perfect heartbeat.

Telling people. Saying it out loud, making it official. Watching my body sprout the beginnings of a baby bump.

And finally being in the second trimester. It's such a relief. I kind of never thought I'd actually be here. Now, I just can't wait for April so we can meet our snuggly baby boy. And this time, I actually believe that we will.

All made better by the sound of your heart.

Today's ultrasound was perfect. Baby was measuring right on, with a strong heartbeat that was the most beautiful sound in the world. And afterwards, I dragged my husband into Pottery Barn Kids. (Because I felt that he hadn't been sufficiently terrified by the forty-five minute wait for the doctor to come in and do the scanning; the poor guy really needed to see his wife drool over $35 elephant-shaped baby slippers to reach maximum anxiety.)

Relieved doesn't even begin to describe it. I won't unclench entirely until after the first trimester (oh, who am I kidding? I won't unclench entirely until the kid is retirement age) but I am really letting myself feel optimistic now. In a couple of days, maybe I'll even be hopeful enough to buy some elephant-shaped baby slippers. (Dear Lord, they were adorable.)

Seven weeks, five days today and I had my first ever pregnancy-induced barfing episode. I've been feeling queasy for weeks, but this morning I actually lost my cookies. (Or bowl of Crispix, actually. Cross another one off my list of "foods that don't make me feel sick.")

It's also the first time I've ever felt a rush of joy with my head in the toilet. Since morning sickness can be an indicator of a healthy pregnancy, surely achieving an actual ralphing session must mean good news is ahead! (Either that, or I got food poisoning from my mother in law's birthday cake last night. I knew it wasn't a great idea to leave it in the backyard while we went to dinner.)

Anyway, with my first ultrasound on the horizon (Tuesday!) I'll take any reassurance I can get - even if it's of the holding-your-hair-back variety.

Patience has never been my strong suit. I skip to the last page of every book I read before I'm halfway through. Before I see a movie, I look up the plot summary on Wikipedia. When I was a kid, I found Mom and Dad's Christmas present stash every year - and hell yeah, I peeked! So it is completely amazing to me that I haven't broken down and called the OB's office yet, begging for an early ultrasound. After all, I am the ultrasound junkie...

Most of the time, I feel like this is good practice for parenting. I'm sure that the worry never really stops, and I'd better learn to deal with my anxiety now before there's a little person here for me to project it all onto. Someday, be the good Lord willing, this little baby is going to be going off to school... Learning to drive... Going to college... All kinds of terrifying stuff. I don't want to be the crazy anxious mom in tears every time her kid takes a step towards scary, scary adulthood... I want to be able to feel the feelings and let them go. So that's what I'm trying to do here - to trust that even when I can't see it with my own eyes, everything is going to be okay.

But then there are the moments where I'm convinced that this is all going to go south, and I just don't want to know. I want to soak in the joy of being pregnant for as long as possible, and I worry that the next ultrasound will once again be the beginning of the end. And then I squeeze my boobs to see if they're still sore, and I imagine eating chicken to see if I'm still nauseous, and I wonder if anxiety is intuition and then I wonder if it's a self-fulfilling prophecy.

One more week from tomorrow.

Counting days...

Today I'm five weeks and two days along. It's my first thought when I wake up in the morning: I've made it one more day. And then I rush into the bathroom, half-expecting to see blood every time. 

So far, so good though, and most of the time I feel completely serene and accepting and peaceful. This pregnancy just feels so different from the first one. I'm not really sure how, exactly, other than the fact that my every waking moment is not consumed with panic and terror like it was the first time around. This time, I know that worrying won't change anything, and anxiety can only rob me of the joy of being pregnant. But still, sometimes I catch myself googling things like "recurrent miscarriage statistics" and "miscarriage stats by week" and I really have to check myself. 

The first ultrasound isn't until eight weeks this time around. It's only nineteen days away, but it kind of feels like forever. I thought about calling back and begging to come in earlier, but something is holding me back. I want to really try to practice being patient this time. I'd really like to just trust my intuition that all is well. 

To my son, in heaven

Dear baby,

   The Buddhists say you stopped by on your way to nirvana for one last round. You came so you could be there for the incredible moment when tiny fingers blossomed from the rosebud of your shape. So you could be loved one last time in a warm place with no suffering. Your feet never touched the ground; I carried you everywhere you went. I loved you from the day you were made.
   The scientists say that us mothers carry our children's DNA with us, in our blood streams. They tell me what I already knew, which is that I will carry you in my heart until the day that I die.
   Today is the day you were supposed to arrive. I know you're in a better place, baby, but I sure do wish you were here.
   I carry you in my heart, baby boy, and I love you so much.

Mama

I PREG!!!

("I PREG!!!" reference from this amazing post: http://www.stfuparentsblog.com/post/16528378462/tease-reveal-preg-edition)

On Saturday, my husband and I drove up to see our brand new baby nephew, and it was just as wonderful and easy as I thought it would be. We both got to hold him and snuggle with him and look at his teeny tiny feet and itty bitty fingernails. And then later on that night, we drove over to bring some extra supplies to the new mom and dad, and I got to have a really nice one-on-one chat with my brother. He said that he knew this might be a little rough on me, but that he was so happy that we could be there to love on our nephew (and his older sister!) and that he knew we would be wonderful parents ourselves whenever it happens. I told him that visiting them had made me realize how much I already was at peace with everything that's happened, and that I knew our baby would get here one way or the other, and that I finally was really, really okay with being patient until that happened.  We gave each other a great big bear hug, and then my husband and I took off to head home.

On the way, we stopped by the store and I saw early result pregnancy tests on sale. I had been planning on waiting for a missed period to test, but I tossed a pack in my cart anyway. I really was at peace with everything, and ready to face the answer on the pee stick.

We got home, and I took it and placed it on the counter to wait for the results. I started reading one of my mom's magazines and got so engrossed in one of the articles, I actually forgot to check the stick. But when I did, there were two clear, beautiful lines.

My husband was waiting in our bedroom. He gave me a thumbs up with a questioning look. I nodded, grinning. "Ahh, I knew it!" he said, wrapping me up in a great big hug.

So, for now, I preg. I hope this is our rainbow baby, but I'm trying not to get too attached until our first ultrasound in three weeks. I know from experience there are a million ways this could go south, but... I actually feel really optimistic. I've been having a little bit of cramping today, and I know it's totally normal but it scares me anyway. But hopefully the storm has passed, and our rainbow is on its way.

In some ways, it feels like there's a lot riding on this cycle. It's my last chance to be pregnant on my miscarried pregnancy's due date. It's our last natural cycle before moving onto Femara and monitoring. And if we actually conceived this month, my due date will be my best friend's birthday. Seeing those two lines next week would just be a huge sigh of relief in so many ways. But I'm strangely calm this week, and I'm not sure whether it's the careful attention I've been paying to my health, an answered prayer for peace and tranquility, or just a sign of absolute surrender. One can only grieve at a fever pitch for so long, I suppose. It's like a baby crying - eventually they tire themselves out and just relax into sleep.

My nephew is scheduled to arrive on Friday - his mom had a c-section with my niece, so they've planned a second c-section for this little guy. My husband and I are driving up to see them the day after he's born. I have to say, I have dreaded this day for so long. I felt like -how am I supposed to see and hold and love this baby, knowing that - had things been different - I would have been enormously pregnant right now with his would-be cousin? How do I congratulate my brother and sister in law when I'm just seething with jealousy? And how am I ever going to be able to put on a happy face for this whole thing?

But now that he's almost here, I honestly don't feel anything but joy. My tiny, lovely nephew is a completely different baby than the one that I lost. He's not a symbol of everything I don't have, or everything that might have been - he's just a baby. And I really can't wait to meet him. I can't wait to be his auntie and give him snuggles and kisses and spoil him rotten. I'm so excited and happy that, just like with his adorable and sweet older sister, I'm going to have the privilege of being his aunt. It's going to be awesome, I just know it.

In the meantime, I've been thinking about what I want to do to mark my would-have-been due date on August 1st. I know I definitely want to write a letter to the son that we're missing, but I'm also feeling a need to have some sort of ritual. I could go to church and say a rosary... spend some time in the botanic gardens... go to the beach and dip myself in the ocean and contemplate the infinite. None of that stuff really feels right, though. So I'm hoping it will come to me. Until it does, I'm just so grateful for this newfound sense of peace. I hope it lasts for a very long time.

A few nights ago, I had a really vivid dream that I was asked to read an essay I'd written about my miscarriage to a convention of mothers. As I was walking into the convention hall, a volunteer stopped me and asked me how many children I had. "Oh, none," I said, "I'm not a mother, I'm just here to read this story about my miscarriage." "Honey," she replied, "you might not have any living children, but you're still a mother. You belong here just as much as any of the other mothers do." Then, when it was time for me to go on stage and read my story, I couldn't find it - but my husband showed up, and a bunch of my friends, and they were all telling me to just go up there and wing it. "Just speak from your heart," one said, "and trust your instincts. You'll know what to do. The words will come."

Today is cycle day 20 and I just got my first ever completely positive OPK this morning. I'm a little worried that I seem to be ovulating later and later every cycle, but this will be our last natural cycle before moving on to Femara anyway, so I'm not stressing about it too much.

I'm also really enjoying my new health kick! I don't know whether I've lost any weight yet, but I definitely feel good. Nourished, peaceful... open.  

The appointment with the fertility doctor went really well - I liked him a lot, actually. He seems pretty willing to be as aggressive or as relaxed as we want... With the caveat that I need to lose thirty pounds before he brings out the big guns. To that end, he referred me to the center's nutritionist, who I called to set up a consultation and then found out that she charges $395 for the first visit. Three hundred and ninety five American dollars. Yeesh. If I visit her, I'll definitely be losing weight... Because I won't be able to afford food.

But, you know, everything seems like it's going okay. I'll be starting a monitored Femara cycle next month, and hopefully along with whatever weight loss I can muster up, our rainbow baby will be on the way before we know it.

Today's cycle day 3, and I went into our lovely new fertility center for some blood work before my appointment next week. It made my husband wonder about how he'll have to go about providing his own, uh, sample:

And of course, he wanted to check up on me and see how everything went:

I'm a lucky, lucky girl.

(And I just realized that the burger chain is actually just "Five Guys," not "Five Guys From Brooklyn." I think I was mixing it up with the produce stand, "Three Guys From Brooklyn." I should probably clear that up with my husband, too, because now instead of being a funny joke, it just sounds oddly specific... Ha!)

No dice

Let's Make a Baby, Season 2, Episode 4: yet another big fat negative.

"Oh man," my husband said, "all that work for nothing!"

Thanks, honey.

I know it's still pretty early, but the statistics get pretty depressing from here. According to my new favorite book, The Impatient Woman's Guide to Getting Pregnant, the great majority of women under 35 who are having well-timed intercourse will be pregnant at the end of four cycles. It's not exactly the kiss of death that I'm not knocked up yet, and it's way too early still to use the "infertility" word, but I do think it's time to get the ball rolling on figuring out whether we'll be able to achieve a healthy pregnancy without intervention. So I made an appointment with a well-respected fertility doctor for the end of next month, and I have to say, I feel incredibly relieved already. If there's something capital-letters WRONG, he should be able to figure it out - and if there's not, then I'm okay with baby-dancing away the next six months on our own, knowing that we should hit the jackpot eventually. Also, my former due date is rapidly approaching - as is the birth of my nephew a few days before said due date - and I would really like to be able to approach those dates with as much optimism and positivity as possible. Having a plan of action and knowing that I'm literally doing everything within my power to get myself preggo will really help, I think.

My husband asked how I decided on this particular doctor. First, it's because he takes our insurance, and second, it's because his rock-star colleague didn't have any openings for new patients until October - but most of all, it's because I really like his blog. In one entry where he was discussing some of his own medical history, he called a doctor an asshole. I wanted to reach through the computer and high-five him! Anyone who can give it to you straight like that is bound to be pretty awesome.

Apparently, there's a rumor going around my office that I'm pregnant - three people have come up to me in the last few days to say, "Congratulations! I didn't know that you were expecting!" Argh.

The first two times, I just said, "Huh? No, I'm not, but thanks - I'll let you know when I am." Finally, this morning, I pulled the congratulator aside and said, "I'm not expecting. Can I ask where you heard that?" She told me, and I said, "I was pregnant, but now I'm not anymore and it's difficult for me to hear that. Would you mind letting folks know that the rumor isn't true so that I don't have to hear it anymore?" She was really sympathetic and told me she'd set the record straight.

I suspect that the source was one of our receptionists - in December, I had a bunch of packages delivered from maternity clothing stores, and whoever signed from them probably assumed that in a few months, it would be public knowledge. Unfortunately, rather than being eight months pregnant right now, I'm... just not.

So until the news makes it's way through the grapevine, I'm trying to figure out what I can do so that everyone knows I'm not knocked up. Here's what I've got so far:

- Walking around the office swigging from a bottle of tequila. (Pro: will be nice and drunk for any more awkward congratulatory incidents. Con: might get shipped off to rehab for openly boozing during work hours.)
- Throw a "Soft Cheese and Tuna Salad Party" in the conference room. (Pro: delicious snacks! Con: everyone will hate me for stinking up the joint.)
- Post my Fertility Friend chart on my office door. (Pro: everyone will know they should be extra nice to me during PMS week. Con: everything else.)

Any ideas?

I guess I really am an ultrasound junkie...

Wednesday afternoon, I started feeling a stabbing pain in my lower left abdomen - right around where I usually feel ovulation pain but way too early to be ovulation. It got slowly worse as the day progressed, and by the time I got home from work, I was doubled over in pain. I called my aunt, who is an ER nurse, and asked her what she thought I should do. She asked me a couple of questions and then said I should head to the emergency room just in case it was ovarian torsion or - unlikely, but because my last period was pretty short, a horrible possibility - an ectopic pregnancy. (Spoiler alert: it was neither.)

I went to the nearest hospital and was seen almost immediately - I guess they don't fuck around when it comes to possible ectopics. Pretty quickly, they ruled out pregnancy with a pee stick followed by a blood test and then the doctor ordered an ultrasound to see whether or not my ovary was about to explode. They wheeled me up to the radiology department on my stretcher - I volunteered to walk, but no dice - and then I got to watch as the technician scanned me and found two perfectly normal ovaries and a nice, plush uterine lining. It was such a relief to have a normal ultrasound result for once. Usually, looking at one of those black and white screens is the immediate precursor to some bad news, but this time it was all good.

The doctor thinks it was probably something gastro-intestinal, and told me I could either stick around for a CAT scan or just go home and follow up with a gastroenterologist. I chose the latter. As long as my reproductive organs were not on the verge of explosion, I was happy to hang out in my own comfy bed until the pain passed. (Which it did, sometime the next morning.)

Going through the panic, though, really strengthened my resolve not to do any more unmonitored Clomid cycles. It just makes me too anxious that something is going to go wrong. And since my ovaries looked pretty good on their own, maybe I really won't need it after all.

Well, I am quite emphatically not pregnant yet again.

I went out to dinner with a friend last night who asked, "So... anything new and exciting to report?!"
"Nope," I said. And then I thought, not unless you're counting the crime scene in my lady garden.

One of the (many) awful parts of this whole thing is feeling like you're constantly disappointing people. I know my parents are holding their breath for me to be pregnant again so they don't have to keep feeling guilty about celebrating my sister in law's upcoming baby. (Due a week before my former due date, yay me!) My friends want me to stop being so sad all the time, and I'm sure my husband would love a respite from the monthly rollercoaster of emotions. (CD 1: I'm so sad! CD 2: Well, it's a fresh start. CD 7: I have a good feeling about this month! CD 12 - 18: OMGOMGOMGOMG inseminate me! CD 21: Is it too early to test? It's probably too early. Well, I'll test anyway. CD 22: Shit. Negative. I'm never going to get pregnant. CD 23 - 27: Negative. Negative. Negative. Hmm, maybe I should try a different brand of pregnancy test? CD 28: Still negative. I'll just be taking this bottle of wine and retiring to bed for the rest of the day. I'm so sad.)

This month, I'm trying not to try. I'm going to do my best to stay away from the basal thermometer and Fertility Friend and the thrice-daily "oil check" for fertile cervical mucus and all of that. I don't think it's any more likely to make a baby, but I think it's a lot less likely to make me crazy. So there's that.

Testing, testing...

Today is 10 days post ovulation, the magical day when your results on a First Response Early Results test are more likely than not to be positive if you are, in fact, knocked up. I went to sleep last night thinking, "Okay, in the morning, it's test time."

I woke up bleary-eyed and full-bladdered, shuffled into the bathroom and peed on a stick. Waited three minutes, held the test up to the light, squinted at it and tilted it to view every angle. Negative. Tossed it in the trash and went back to bed.

As I drifted back to sleep, I noticed the time on the clock: 11:30 pm. What the fuck? So basically, instead of testing with first morning urine on 10 dpo, I tested with a ninety minute hold on 9 dpo. Brilliant.

So now I'm back to holding onto my last shred of hope for this cycle, and feeling like this:

Not sure what the source of this image is, but it's obviously someone pretty brilliant.

I like giving up. There's a particular sort of pleasure in just saying "fuck it." It's the perfect defense mechanism - "I'm not getting pregnant? Fine! I don't care! I don't even want to be pregnant anymore! How do you like them apples, universe?" Giving up on something difficult feels good - it's the chocolate chip cookie at the end of three weeks of salads and grilled chicken, the lazy evening on the couch when you're supposed to be at the gym. I mean, in the long run it definitely sucks, but that first swooning moment when you just throw up your hands and say I don't want to do this anymore, it's too hard is kind of delicious.

Which is probably why I'm feeling the way I'm feeling right now. I'm nine days post-ovulation and I'm pretty sure this cycle was another failure. Today also happened to be a follow-up visit with the doctor who performed my d&c. When we made this appointment, I remember thinking, "Four months? Oh, I'll probably be pregnant again by then!" No dice, of course.

I'm just feeling so overwhelmed and worried about how much more I can take. It's this awful cycle of anxiety and stress about whether we're getting down enough in the fertile window, followed by two weeks of anxiety about the results of the cycle, followed by a couple of days of heartbreak as the parade of negative tests begins. This month has been a little bit better, but when the anxiety comes surging back, it still hits hard. And it's all caught up in the grief, too. Having to watch the glowing women with the huge bellies in the waiting room this morning just killed me. I should be all gigantic and uncomfortable right now, too!

I just want to stop feeling so awful all the time, and I wonder if throwing in the towel here would do the trick. I know it hasn't been that long, but the level of anger and resentment I'm feeling on an incredibly frequent basis just can't be healthy. On the other hand, isn't it way too early to give up? Lots of people take a while to get pregnant, especially at my age - maybe our baby is just around the corner?

Oy.

An Ovulation Story

This will probably read like Greek to anyone who doesn't chart their basal body temperature, but I'll try to keep it interesting.

Despite having PCOS, my cycles are fairly predictable - I'll get a big dip in my basal temperature the day of ovulation, followed by a spike up to 97.1 degrees the day after. I'm usually pretty consistent about taking my temperature at 7:30 am, so it's always been easy to see a nice, ovulatory pattern. Two days ago, I got the dip; yesterday, I got the 97.1. "Yay," I said, "I've ovulated!" My husband and I went out to dinner to celebrate, stuffed ourselves with pork and whiskey and then dragged our bloated asses home, content in the knowledge that we'd already done all the baby-making we could do for that cycle.

Yesterday, though, I started getting awful ovulation pains, and this morning some regular old menstruation-type cramps came to join the party. I started worrying that maybe I didn't really ovulate on day 16 and the pains were a sign that I was gearing up to ovulate for real. I figured today's temperature would reveal the answer - if it was low, then clearly I didn't ovulate, but if it was another high temp, I was right about day 16 being the lucky day.

Of course, this morning had to be the morning that my pain in the ass cat woke me up at 4 am by knocking everything off the nightstand. I scrambled to get the thermometer into my mouth without too much motion, waited through the little beeps and... 96.8.

Fuuuuuck.

The teeny tiny Captain Optimism in my brain swooped in just then. "It's three hours before your normal temping time!" he said, "Go back to sleep and temp again when you wake up!"

So I did, after evicting the pain in the ass cat from the bedroom. I woke up again at 8 am and stuck the thermometer back in my mouth. This time? 97.8.

"Whoo hoo!" cried Captain Optimism. "You ovulated on day 16!"
"Nah," Admiral Pessimism chimed in, "You can't trust the 97.8 - it wasn't after a full night's sleep!"

They are still debating.

And now here we are - it's been four months since the miscarriage, and we're in the middle of our third cycle trying to get pregnant again. The first cycle was natural; the second one and the current one are both Clomid cycles. It's been really tough to see the negative tests in both of those failed cycles. I got pregnant so quickly the first time - why not now?! 

Six weeks after the miscarriage, I went back to the doctor for a follow-up appointment. They'd gotten the results of the genetic testing - our baby was a boy with triploidy, a fairly rare chromosomal abnormality. The doctor said it was random and unlikely to happen again in future pregnancies. "These things just happen," he said. "But your body is back to normal, and you can start trying again whenever you're ready."

"Oh, I think I'm ready now!" I said. Truthfully, I'd been chomping at the bit for weeks at that point. I knew that getting knocked up again wasn't really going to make the grief go away, but I couldn't help hoping that it would. The first two rounds of "trying again," I approached sex in the fertile window with an addict's zeal, chasing my husband around the house while screaming "inseminate me!" (Pro tip: desperation is not exactly sexy. This approach was as likely to end in tears as it was to end in attempted fertilization.) 

I'm trying to do it a little differently this time around. Tonight, I'll be heading home with a bottle of wine and some raw oysters, and I'll spend a few minutes in the bathroom trying to arrange my face into a seductive expression. (Not that easy, considering the fact that my acne has been borderline horrific on and off since the miscarriage. My dermatologist was like, "It's like playing Whack-a-mole! We get one pimple under control and another one pops up somewhere else!" Thanks, body, for that added bonus...) 

Hopefully, the wine and oysters will do the trick - considering how many of my friends have made babies while intoxicated, I'm starting to believe that booze actually makes you extra-fertile - but even if it doesn't, I think my husband will be happier to be presented with a drunk wife trying to do a sexy dance than one who is sobbing, "I'll never be a mother if you don't get it up RIGHT NOW!" (Can you believe that line didn't work?!)

Oh yes, the joys of attempting to conceive! 

My parents drove down the day before the surgery so they could drive us to the hospital in the morning. They picked us up at a quarter to six and I felt like it was some otherworldly version of that Ben Folds Five song, Brick. Except, you know, just a d&c of a baby that had already died, not an abortion exactly. Or not an elective one but one that was elected for me.

We drove through the darkened city streets, arrived early. The hospital has valet parking and the parents were impressed. "This is why you pick a hospital on the Upper East Side," I tell them. "It's the little things that make a difference."

We went to the ambulatory surgery floor, where I was presented with a hospital gown (ties in the back), too small pants (skip em), a slightly too small robe (theoretically ties in the front... Am I the first pregnant woman they've ever had? I know I'm not the biggest) some non-skid socks and the famous mesh panties. Parents went down to the waiting room while my husband helped me into my ensemble and waited for the pre-surgical testing with me. They brought warm blankets and I snuggled up in the vinyl recliner to await my fate. The husband and I spent a lot of time just looking at each other. I loved him then more than I ever have before.

The nurse who came over to install my IV port and go through the pre-surgical questions had no sense of humor, it seemed. Or maybe my gallows humor just doesn't play so well in the hospital. She screwed up my IV port and there was blood all over the place. "It's okay," I joked, "I'm a criminal defense attorney. Once you see crime scene photos, a little blood is no big deal." "Oh, that must be am interesting job," she replied, in a tone that said she couldn't care less. The best part was when she asked "what does excellent care look like to you?" Mom says she was probably expecting answers like "respect my privacy" or "answer my questions promptly" but I went blank. My husband and I looked at each other and shrugged. "Come out alive?" I said, laughing. "Don't perforate my uterus?" "Good snacks in the recovery room!" he chimed in. The nurse didn't crack a smile, scribbled something down and left, giving us her packet of papers to add my signatures.

"Oh my God, look," my husband said, "she actually wrote down 'come out alive'!" We laughed our asses off.

At 8:30, they came for me. "Feels like walking to death row," I said. They made me leave my glasses with my parents, so the walk to the OR was mercifully blurry. I could make out a few compassionate smiles above the blurs of green scrubs. The OR nurses were so sweet. They got me pillows, stacked up blankets to make my back more comfy, gave me a special blanket with warm air running through it to calm me down and warm me up. My doctor came in, squeezed my hand and said, "next time we are here, it will be to have your baby."

And then the mask, and deep breaths, and sleep.

When I woke up they were lifting me onto the bed to the recovery room. I was sobbing for my baby. My body was sobbing even without being awake. It knew without me having to tell it what it had lost. I sobbed all the way to the recovery room. I could feel the sobs in my soul, in my toes, through my whole body. But then there was the kindest nurse, and more warm blankets tucked around me, and then there was my husband stroking my hair, and I felt the weight lifting. The storm was over. The rainbow would come soon.

I had to pee, and the nurse said she couldn't unhook me from the EKG and IV and all the monitors just yet, so she brought over a bedpan. "Well, there goes the last shred of my dignity," I joked, grinning at her. She looked at me and whispered, "you know what, honey? You've been through enough today. I'm gonna unhook you and walk you to the bathroom if you promise not to lock the door, okay?" And she did. We shuffled ten steps to the bathroom with her holding my arm, I peed in glorious peace and then we shuffled back and she brought me ginger ale and my mom.

The second recovery room was much more fun. They had sandwiches and graham crackers and I could sit in a chair with just my IV pole still attached. Both of my parents and Ed were there and Ed was munching on some saltines and was like, your insurance probably paid thirty bucks for these crackers.... I'm getting their money's worth! And I laughed, and we all knew once I could laugh that everything was definitely going to be okay eventually.

Recovery at home was remarkably easy. No pain, barely any bleeding. I was on on modified bed rest for a few days, which was fine by me. I wouldn't have minded staying there forever, honestly. I was scared about the future, about what would happen when life went on again without my child.

But I knew that would be okay eventually too. On the day the baby had probably died, according to the doctors, I was walking to work and I saw the most beautiful thing. It was a tree full of red breasted robins. You never see those in the city - pigeons of course, sparrows here and there but never robins. And the tree was just packed with them, and in that moment I just knew it was my bird-loving grandpa who died when I was fourteen telling me that he was here, and that everything was going to be okay. At the time, I figured it meant the baby would be okay... Would live, thrive, grow. But now I know he meant a different kind of okay. I'm here, he was saying, I will take your baby in my arms and fly him up to heaven. And you will see us again, if you know where to look.

Right now, it's in my heart. I can see it - Grandpa Ed cradling our tiny thing in his big, strong, kind and loving arms, with Grandma Rose peeking over to pinch its cheeks and Grandpa George trying to convince the baby he has eleven fingers.("See, on this hand I have ten, nine, eight, seven, six... and on this hand, one, two, three, four, five... five plus six equals eleven!") I carried my son when I could, and when I couldn't anymore, they took over. That's family. That's love. Just like the friends coming by to just sit with me and listen, my parents saying prayers in the waiting room, my husband being strong enough to watch them poke my vein over and over while just giving me his strength through his gaze and his hands. That's family, that's love. It's everywhere now.

My next appointment was at eleven weeks. My husband and I both took the day off from work. The appointment was early in the morning; we figured we could go out to lunch afterwards, hang out in Manhattan for a bit, maybe check out the Yayoi Kusama show downtown. I was feeling strangely optimistic - I'd made it to eleven weeks, I wasn't bleeding or spotting, and I could feel my uterus beginning to pop up through my pelvic bones. I was nervous, sure, but I honestly expected good news.

We waited for the doctor forever. I joked with my husband that if he didn't get back soon, I'd just turn on the ultrasound machine myself and take a peek. He laughed. It would have been his first time seeing the baby live on the screen, and I was excited to show him how amazing it was.

The doctor came in, finally. He was in a good mood. "Let's say hello to the baby again," he said. I laid back on the table as the nurse dimmed the lights. My husband stood near my head and we all watched the screen together, holding our breath.

We saw the baby right away. It wasn't moving. The little flicker that had been there before wasn't there. The doctor fiddled with the instruments, and we waited for something to happen. It had taken a few moments to find the heartbeat at the last scan, and I prayed that the doctor was just having trouble finding the right angle to see it. We were all quiet.

Finally, I said, "There's no heartbeat, is there?" Even asking that, I was still optimistic. I was sure that he would tell me to just be patient, we were getting there, not to worry and so on. Instead he said, "No, there isn't. I'm sorry." My husband stroked my hair and we looked at each other. I was grateful for him in a way that I had never been before.

We went back upstairs to the big machines for a second opinion. I texted two of my best friends. My husband called his mom. They took us into another dark room, did a vaginal scan, then an abdominal one. The ultrasound tech brought in the radiologist, who looked over the images and then said to me, in the kindest voice, "I just want you to know that I'm so sorry, and that this isn't your fault. There is nothing you could have done differently."

They left us alone for a few minutes so we could be sad in privacy. A dark room, illuminated mostly by the pictures of our fetus-who-was-no-longer. I sobbed and grabbed onto my husband like we were on a sinking ship. I remember thinking, at least I still have you.

We went back downstairs to wait for the doctor in his office. It was full of pictures of babies he had delivered. Someone's birth plan was on his desk, full of demands for their perfect delivery. Fuck you, I thought. They could have sliced me open from head to toe if I got to take my baby home afterwards. And fuck them for making us wait in this baby-filled office. 

After we'd scheduled the d&c for five days later and I'd collected all of the paperwork and prescriptions and notes for work and condolences from the doctor and his assistants, we left the hospital in a sort of daze. Wine and food, we said. Wine and food will make it better. We walked downtown and stopped at Dylan's Candy Bar, where I filled up a couple of bags with enough chocolate to ride out the next few days in a cocoa-induced coma. Then we went to my favorite restaurant in midtown and ordered some expensive Sauvignon blanc and huge, rare, bloody roast beef sandwiches: all of the things I'd craved and couldn't have over the last couple of months. We mostly sat in silence. There was very little to say, and of course the worst was still yet to come. I still had to figure out how to go home, how to tell the people we still had left to tell and how to get through the night without falling apart entirely.

My best friend came over to sit with me after my husband fell asleep that night, exhausted. I told him that I was afraid of having the surgery, mostly because it would mean my baby was no longer with me. I knew he wasn't alive, but just knowing that his teeny little body was still inside of me gave me some strange comfort. The d&c would be the beginning of the road to recovery, but the end of the link between my body and my child's. I wasn't sure I was ready for it. But of course, it had to happen anyway.

I started spotting after we got home from the doctor's office. As if I wasn't worked up enough already, of course. The doctor had told me to expect a bit of bleeding, since he'd been fiddling around in there quite a bit between the Pap smear and the ultrasound and everything, but seeing it sent me over the edge anyway. First thing in the morning, I called the OB-GYN's office and begged to come in for another ultrasound to see if I was miscarrying. 

My husband had to work, so I made the journey myself. This time, I was bypassing the doctor's office and heading straight to the ultrasound lab. Maybe their machines were better, I thought. Maybe they'd take a look and say, "Oh, honey, your baby isn't behind... the doctor's portable machine just couldn't give him a clear look! See, here's your healthy little bean. And wow, what a heartbeat!" 

In reality, the news was a little more mixed. The bean had caught up an extra day - it was now measuring 6w1d when it should have been 7w1d - and his heartbeat was relatively strong at 115 beats per minute. They couldn't figure out where the bleeding was coming from, but my cervix was closed and everything looked fine, so they sent me on my way. I was starting to feel pretty optimistic. The bean was catching up, his heartbeat was in the normal range... maybe this would turn out okay after all. 

Around the middle of my ninth week, I started to feel like my pregnancy symptoms were fading. I didn't have a lot of the classic ones - I felt a little queasy in the mornings and evenings, my boobs were sore and I was pretty tired, but compared to many other pregnant ladies, I had it really easy. So when I realized that my boobs felt totally fine and I wasn't even a teeny bit barfy, I started to worry. The nurse at the OB-GYN said, "It's pretty normal to have fluctuating symptoms, but if you'd like to come in for a reassurance scan, we can fit you in this morning." 

"Yes, please," I said. I never say no to an ultrasound. 

I got there a little bit early. It was a nice day out, so I walked around the neighborhood for a bit and talked to the bean. "Okay, buddy," I said, "It's time to get your picture taken. I want you to stretch out really big and show everyone how big and tall you are! Get that heartbeat going, too! Come on, kiddo, let's do some jumping jacks!"

This scan was even more confusing than the last one. The bean was still there, still alive, but now he was measuring ten days behind... and his heart rate had fallen to 111. 

"That's not good, is it?" I asked the ultrasound tech.

"Well, sometimes they rest," she said. "Your doctor will call you to discuss everything soon." 

My husband had left work early to come meet me, but he hadn't arrived until after the scan was finished. I met up with him outside the subway and relayed the news. He was much more optimistic than I was. "The baby is probably just sleeping," he said, "It'll be fine, honey. Our kid is a fighter." 

"It's very small," he said.

My heart thudded in my chest. They'd made me wait back here for nearly an hour, perched on the edge of the examining table in my surgical gown and socks. The doctor had an emergency, the nurse explained as she wheeled out the portable ultrasound machine yet again. She brought me a magazine to pass the time, but it was one that I'd already read on the subway ride up to the doctor's office that morning. I tried to read it again, and then I gave up and just started praying. And waiting.

Finally the doctor came in. "How are you?" he asked. "Terrified," I said. "Oh, I'm sure everything is just fine!" he said, "Let's take a look now, yes?"

Ah, the internal ultrasound - the first of many, as I'd later discover. The nurse adjusted the screen so I could see, and there it was - the tiniest little blur with an even smaller flicker in the center. The heartbeat.

"It's very small," the doctor said.

I knew it right away - there was something wrong. "Too small?" I asked.
"I did not say too small," the doctor said, in his melodic, accented English. "Very small. But they all start very small, and then they become big. It is the miracle of life."

I was not buying it. I continued to interrogate him as he continued the exam. "What does it mean if it's very small? Is it supposed to be bigger? Have you ever seen a case like this where the baby turned out okay?"

"All the time," he assured me. But it was too late - the joyous "pregnant, pregnant, holy crap PREGNANT" chorus in my head had started singing a different tune. This time it went, "you're fucked, you're fucked, you are soooo fucked." The baby was measuring eight days smaller than it should have - I was seven weeks exactly, and the baby only measured five weeks and six days.

My husband and I left the office and headed straight to a cafe, where I ordered everything on the menu involving chocolate and began furiously searching the internet for a more satisfying answer. I liked my doctor, but I was certain that he was bullshitting me. It just didn't make sense - how could it be normal for the baby's growth to be so far behind?

"Honey, the doctor said it was fine," my husband told me, "so I'm sure everything is fine. Please, stop driving yourself crazy and eat this Nutella thing before I do."

"It's not fine," I said, stuffing the Nutella thing into my mouth, "I just know it."

"You said the same thing about getting pregnant," he reminded me.

"I know," I said, "but this is different."

Looking back, I don't think that I actually had any sort of real prescient knowledge about the situation. Even a broken clock is right twice a day, and when you go through life convinced that everything is going to go wrong - well, eventually, you're going to be correct. But that was the last day that I really allowed myself to walk around with the "pregnant, pregnant, pregnant, yay" song stuck in my head. For the next four weeks, the song was more like, "pregnant, pregnant, pregnant... maybe... for now."

This is a blog about trying to have a baby.

I haven't had a baby yet. I've had one miscarriage and two cycles of trying but failing to conceive again. This is not an infertility blog - I know that we haven't been trying for nearly long enough to claim that title. We are relatively young, healthy more or less - I suspect our time will come sooner rather than later.

This is a story about being totally fucking impatient, and about wading through grief, and how those two things come together.

I'll start from the beginning.

I was diagnosed with Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome in my early twenties, after reading a magazine article that felt more like someone had written my biography. Irregular periods? Check. Overweight, and an apple shape with that sort of "is she or isn't she pregnant" belly? Yep, folks have been offering me their subway seats for years now. A touch of cystic acne and stray chin hairs? All present and accounted for! So I headed to the endocrinologist, who pretty much took one look at me - and my ovaries - and confirmed what I suspected.

"You will probably have a difficult time getting pregnant," she said, "Stay on birth control, start taking this Metformin and come back to see me when you're ready to conceive."

I wasn't too worried about it, since I'd always planned on being a barren spinster anyway. (Yes, fellas... chunky, hirsute and pessimistic! Can you believe she's still single?) So for years, it was just another sad thing I'd resigned myself to. I am probably infertile. I should just get used to it. And then it turned into: forget probably. I'm totally infertile. I just know it in my heart.

But then, nearly a decade later, I met my husband. We fell in love and got engaged and talked about "starting our family," and then it was time to get back to an endocrinologist. The doctor prescribed some things, ran some tests and decided that we should try a cycle or two without medication so they could test my ovarian response. "But I want Clomid NOW!" I thought. "Doesn't he know I'm INFERTILE?!" 

Impatient was more like it. In October of last year, my husband and I took a trip to New Orleans. We went on a six-day bender full of raw oysters and cocktails and debauchery. Then we came back home, pulled the goalie, and - in a blissfully hungover post-Nawlins haze, and despite my pessimistic conviction that it was totally never going to work - we made a baby.

Spoiler alert: It didn't work out.

I had a bad feeling about it from the beginning. My progesterone was low at 7 days post ovulation, and I was getting negative pregnancy tests at 10, 11 and 12 dpo. The packaging insert promised the tests were 99% accurate by that point, so I was like, "Yep, I knew it! Not pregnant. Probably because I'm totally fucking infertile. Obviously."  Based on my progesterone level, the doctor prescribed me 50 milligrams of Clomid for our next try. I went to the drugstore to fill the script and pick up a giant box of tampons. Clearly, I'd be needing them soon.

But then day 13 came and went, and day 14 and finally I figured I should probably take a test again. And this time the second line was there. It was faint, but there.

I was pregnant. Holy shit, I was pregnant! In that moment, my biggest, longest held fear about myself was shattered: I wasn't infertile after all. I ran out to buy a cute little onesie and then rushed home to tell my husband. "See? I told you it would be easy," he said.

I spent the next three weeks in a state of total bliss. "Pregnant, pregnant, pregnant!" my brain cried, "We're SO FUCKING PREGNANT, can you BELIEVE it?!"

And then, at seven weeks on the nose, it was time to see the doctor.