And here we go....my first swimming lesson...

So we finally had our very first appointment with a R.E. We were on 

a waiting list so it took us 3 months to see him, but I was happy the 

wait was finally over, and we were starting to more foward. The day of our

appointment we woke up and had our early morning tea ('cause

of course coffee is no longer in our diet...we miss you coffee!!) 

during this time I put together my Questions for the R.E. After years 

of being a Doula, I have grown quite skeptical of the Medical Field and 

know that a good patient is a prepared patient :) I also know that many of 

the Dr's I have met in my life have not always had their patients best 

interest in mind, more often then not they are concerned with their ego's 

and their wallets. I know this sounds so pessimistic, but as a child I was

operated on the wrong side of my body, so I feel like I have the right. 

While I sat researching and preparing my list, my husband was psyching 

himself up for making his "sample". It was decided a few minutes later 

that It would be better for me to go down to the local coffee shop and wait 

for him to do the "deed". I was surprisingly nervous while I sat in the coffee 

shop, I wondered what my husband was thinking, what this was doing to 

his pride, if he was doing ok and what if he wasn't able to do this on 

demand....but soon as he came strutting into the coffee shop I knew he 

was successful and that he had a good sample tucked securely under his 

arm. 

When we finally got to the Dr's office things began to fall apart. 

Its started out well enough, the R.E seemed nice and let us know 

about the clinic and what thought of our situation. He let us look at the 

sample under a microscope and I was SO happy to see the little spermies 

swimmin' around, of course they were not olympic swimmers, but they 

swam and I was happy!!! The R.E. told us that there was defiantly enough 

sperm to get pregnant, but the count was normal to low. There was also 

a lot of white blood cells in the sample which could be a sign of an 

infection, one that would be easy to treat if that was the problem. 

Not bad news, I thought. 

Then we started talking about my role in this process, after reading my 

intake form it was clear to him that endometriosis may be playing a big 

role in all of this. He asked me where my pain was on a scale of 1-10 when 

I have my period. I really didn't know how to answer this, if 10 was 

breaking your arm and still playing an inning of baseball 

(which I have done) then 11 is my answer. I knew he wouldn't go for that 

so I said 8 - 9, painful enough that I cannot work. I was actually happy 

to be telling him this, I have been curled up in the fetal position 

complaining about this for 17 years and no one has seemed to care at all

.....at least he was going to test to see why I was having so much pain, 

again....not bad news. 

This is where it all seemed to fall apart. He let us know what our 

next steps would be and as he was standing up to let us out the door he 

asked "do you have any questions?" I knew I wouldn't be able to get in all 

my 15 questions so I picked the two that were most important to me. 

Me: "Are you ok with me doing my own research?"

R.E: "Yeah, sure, I don't see the harm"

Me: (handing him my color coded, cycle charts complete with temperatures, 

cervical mucus and OPK's) "well it looks like I ovulate on day 18 on a 27 

day cycle, so I may have a Luteal Phase issue, would you like to see?"

R.E. (with a smile) "No, I don't want to see those, we have done research

and we know that most of the time woman have no idea when they ovulate"

Me: (blood begins to boil....I worked REALLY hard on those charts, but 

decided to drop it for now) "ok, well how do you feel about alternative 

medicine, I have been working very closely with a Naturopath about 

my fertility"

R.E: "Well, you can do what you want but Naturopaths give you all these

herbs that actually make it harder to get pregnant, She's probably making 

it harder for you to conceive" 

Me: (thinking in my head....ARE YOU SERIOUS?!!!??...do you really think

that is true, WHAT????) "thank you dr, I will see you soon"

And with that I left, we both should have just kept walking out the 

door but instead I booked the appointments for my Cycle Monitoring,

my SHG ultrasound and my husbands next sample test. I know it was 

fear that lead me to do this, to just keep going on with this R.E. that 

is not a good match for me. I just can't bare the thought of waiting 

another 3 months to see a different Doctor that may be exactly the 

same.....I want this hell to be over, and if this is what we have to do 

to find out what's "wrong" with us, then I guess we will have to do it. 

swimming in the sea of baby bumps

This is my first post, please bare with me as I learn the lingo used

in these TTC blogs. I have been reading several blogs over the last few 

months but have never felt the need to post until now. I kept thinking 

(beyond reason) that I shouldn't post because I will probably get 

pregnant next month. 

Well I never did and each month it gets harder, so now I think it's time. 

It's time I put myself out there, talk to others who know how I feel, 

who know that the reaction to the arrival of my AF is not "over dramatic" 

I want to be able to talk to those who at least know not to say 

"If you would just relax it will happen" or "just go down south, 

thats how my cousins, aunts friend got pregnant"

or my personal favorite "I really hope this baby is a girl, I don't want to 

have to keep trying for one" (yes someone did say that to me, shortly 

after I told them about my first appointment with my R.E.

So, what brought me to post now? after 14 months, well it was in fact, my 

first appointment with an R.E. a few days ago. Right after the appointment 

I still did not post, I had heard stories of those who miraculously found 

out they were pregnant just after this appointment, so of course, I hoped 

this would happen to me. Today though, it is clear that this is not the story 

I will be telling my children or grandchildren, today my AF is here. Looks 

like all the tests the R.E. had asked for us to do over the next 5 weeks are 

still going to happen. There will be poking and prodding, there was no 

miracle here. 

So here I am, blogging, I feel like i can no longer burden the happy 

people of the world with my monthly AF depression, instead I will turn to 

my computer for the thoughts and prayers of perfect strangers, ones I hope 

will one day be friends. I look forward to writing more, but for now I have 

to leave for work, teaching fitness to pregnant woman and their cute little 

baby bumps. Somedays, like today, it is really hard to smile through that 

class. Although I love all the woman in my class, and adore their little bumps, 

its hard for me to feel the twisting pain in my stomach as they giggle about 

the movements and hiccups going on in theirs. I guess I will write more 

about this in my next post, but for now I will just say that somedays being 

a prenatal fitness instructor, doula & childbirth educator is the best job on earth....

but not today. Today it will be hard to try and swim in the sea of their baby bumps