It's Been Too Long, and Things Are Changing

I haven't posted (or logged in) in 2 years.  I always wish I did, because so much happens and I no longer record any of it (unless you count Facebook statuses).  It's just hard to find the time.  Seriously, as I'm sitting here trying to type this post, Noah is standing beside me and won't stop talking to me ("Imagine if we had to walk to the cottage?  Can you imagine how long that would take?  Do you think we're ever going to make videos on YouTube? I think we will.  If we did I think I would...").  It makes typing coherent sentences a little difficult.

I'm hoping that will change for the next little while, because.... drum roll...

I'M PREGNANT.

What?  I know.  We did it all on our own this time, no fertility treatments.  It's something I always knew could happen, but I thought it would happen when I was, like, 40, and definitely didn't want any more kids.  We WANTED this baby.  And I'm only 31.

We'd been trying.  For over two years, actually.  It felt pointless, but I just couldn't make myself call my clinic.  They've got completely new staff and my doctor is no longer practicing, so it would be like figuring out a completely different clinic.  Plus it's an hour away and would be so time consuming and emotionally consuming.  The idea of going there was giving me anxiety.  I had almost resigned myself to the fact that we would only have two kids.

We only did it ONCE the cycle I got pregnant, because we've been dealing with a LOT of illnesses in our house.  The one time we did it we probably shouldn't have, because Justin was just starting to get sick.  But we wanted to, so we did.  And it happened to be the day before I ovulated.  And after 8 years of never using birth control and trying our hardest but never getting pregnant, that one fluke time that we basically did it just because we wanted to and not because we didn't want to miss ovulation, I get pregnant.

I was SUPER sick when I found out.  Sicker than I had ever been in my life.  I couldn't swallow, I couldn't even talk.  It was the day I was supposed to get my period (I always get it at 12DPO).  The two days beforehand I had gotten a tiny bit of brown spotting on a few occasions when I wiped, so I was kind of thinking that my period was REALLY wanting to come.  So I figured I'd have it right away in the morning.

It was 5am and I still didn't have my period.  No big deal, I still had all day to get it.  But the spotting the last couple of days, and the fact that I had that but my period hadn't arrived yet made me think I should test.  I hadn't slept all night anyway because I was in too much pain. 

I started by taking ovulation tests, because that's what I do.  Two different brands, because one of them is more sensitive than the others.  Neither of them was actually positive.  The more sensitive brand was maybe getting close, but the other brand definitely wasn't.

Still, I felt compelled to use an HPT.  I dipped it in and sat there watching it with my iPhone flashlight.  I don't know why, but I was expecting it to turn positive.

And then it did.

And I just sat there staring at it like "Are you kidding me?"  I was surprised, but I wasn't surprised.  I always thought we'd get pregnant on our own one day, but at the same time I never thought it would happen.  My mind has always been filled with a dichotomy of thoughts on the topic.

Anyway, it was 5am and Justin was still sleeping (he cosleeps with Noah, I cosleep with Isaiah).  He gets super red eyes if he wakes up too early, and I didn't want to wake up Noah, so I just texted him to let me know when he was awake.

In the meantime I texted two girlfriends, Corey and Kayla.  Corey was up nursing her baby at 6am so she was the first person I told.  Kayla was shortly after.

Justin woke up around 7am and texted me that he was awake and going to the bathroom.  So, super sick me hobbled to the kitchen and waited for him, sitting in a chair.  When he came out of the bathroom he said "What's up?) 

I had no voice, and no energy for any fanfare, so I just whispered, "I'm pregnant." 
He said, "Whatever." 
I whispered, "No seriously, I'm pregnant." 
He said, "No you're not." 
I whispered, "Yes, I am."
He said, seriously, "Why are you messing with me?"
I whispered, (and it was extremely hard to whisper this many words) "I'm not messing with you, I am actually pregnant.  Here's the test."

And then he had his hands on his chest saying, "What?!  How?!  We only did it once!!  Oh my goodness!! You're pregnant?!"  He was insanely excited and I was just sitting there, feeling like I'm dying, wishing I could muster together enough energy and enthusiasm to act really excited.

It took a little while to sink in, but I definitely has.  I'm 5.5 weeks pregnant now.  At 4 weeks pregnant I had a flat stomach and a 6 pack.  This was me in the MORNING on the day I turned 5 weeks (I'm much bigger in the evenings).  I hadn't even showered yet, but I wanted to see how my maternity jeans fit.

Just like with the other two, I am growing insanely quickly.  I don't really understand why this happens to me.  My uterus does get big very very quickly, but I don't get why I immediately get so much bloat higher in my abdomen as well.  It never disappeared with my other two pregnancies, so I don't expect it to this time.

Because I haven't been seeing a fertility clinic, this pregnancy doesn't have the same level of monitoring that my previous pregnancies have had.  Because of that I've taken like 15 pregnancy tests, and as of this morning the lines are still getting much darker every time I take a test! 

As for symptoms - at 5.5 weeks my big symptoms are major fatigue, bloating, and very sore boobs.  I had a lot of aversions last week, but they're not so bad anymore so I think it might have been a strange symptom of my illness.  I'm still getting over it and it's been 2.5 weeks since I got sick.

So, this is why I'm back.  I documented by first two pregnancies very closely, and I've enjoyed being able to look back at what happened when with both pregnancies.  Hopefully I can pop in once in awhile to record what happens with this little Bambino.

And Then I Knew

A couple of days ago a friend/distant relative revealed to me that she recently found out she was almost 10 weeks pregnant.  It was a surprise pregnancy.  Long story short, but she actually went to the ER about nausea and stomach pain, and that's how she found out.  She has a 4 year old girl and a little boy who just turned 1 in August.

And then I knew.  For the rest of my life, pregnancy announcements are going to bother me.

Hello, I am 35 weeks pregnant with my second child.  This entire pregnancy has basically been hell.  I have felt like total crap since I was 6 weeks pregnant.  I've been in constant (and increasing) pain since I was 7 weeks.  I would give almost anything right now to just be able to sit on the floor to play with Noah.  Or go outside with him for any other purpose other than going in the pool.  But I can't, because I'm in too much pain.  And that is not a recent development; it's been like this for months.  I no longer enjoy being pregnant, and I wish that I could just never do it again.  At some point I will, because I really do want to have more than two children.  But I have no idea when I'm going to be physically and mentally ready to put my body and my family through this again.

This is my reality.  And yet, this pregnancy announcement bothered me!  She's not even someone who it should bother me for.  You know how there are people who you just can't stand to find out are pregnant?  My older (by 19 months) brother and his wife are one of those couples for me.  But this friend - she tried for awhile to get pregnant with her second baby, and had a miscarriage in that time.  It was a strange fluke, because her first child she got pregnant with her very first cycle trying, and then this baby they weren't even trying.  But it's not like she just pumps out kids like crazy.  And I don't wish fertility issues on her (or anyone).  But I was still bothered.

It was so dumb.  If I was bothered by a pregnancy announcement from her while I am 35 weeks pregnant (and physically miserable), I am going to be bothered by these announcements for the rest of my life.  It will never stop bothering me that other people can "accidentally" get pregnant.  Or even that they can plan to get pregnant.

I've also gotten to the point that it really bothers me that most people don't have as physically painful pregnancies as I do.   I actually don't know a single other person who does.  None of my friends or acquaintances have such painful pregnancies. 

I am just mad.  I am mad that it's not just infertility that will affect how many children I have.  It really friggin' sucks that my body's inability to be pregnant normally affects my husband and kid(s) so much that I can't bear to do this to myself or them again in the foreseeable future, and that it will most likely stop me from having any more than three children.


I'm fine.  I just had to complain.  Hopefully by the time I'm, like, 40, pregnancy announcements won't bother me anymore.  It wouldn't surprise me if they still did, though.

Also,for the record, I do feel guilty that I no longer enjoy being pregnant.  I feel like after dealing with infertility and having to jump through hoops to get pregnant, I should be able to maintain a special appreciation for actually being pregnant.  I was able to do so during my first pregnancy.  I often said "My body doesn't like being pregnant, but I love it."  Well, no longer.  I don't like it.  Sometimes I think it might be best that I have to jump through those hoops, because if I got pregnant easily and had these kind of pregnancies I can't imagine how much I would detest being pregnant.

I do feel really guilty for feeling this way.  But my Mom said something the other day that made me feel a little bit better.  She and my Dad were recently out West for my cousin's wedding, and many people asked how I was doing, because I'm pregnant.  My Mom's answer was, "Well... not great.  She really doesn't do pregnancy well.  But she sure does love her babies, and she couldn't be a better Mom or put any more of herself into her parenting."

It's true.  I no longer enjoy being pregnant, but I sure do love my kids.  And I do everything humanly possible to parent them in the best, most loving way I possibly can.

More Ultrasounds

I had my midwife appointment this morning.  Things are fine, but I'm going for another ultrasound next Thursday.

I should probably do a brief background here.  At my 7 week ultrasound I was told I had ovarian cysts and an "implantation bleed."  No other information about those things.

At my 9 week midwife appointment my RE's office still hadn't sent them my 7 week ultrasound report.

At 13 weeks I went for another ultrasound.

Fast forward to my 14 week midwife appointment.  She had received my 7 week ultrasound, but not my 13 week ultrasound, even though it'd been a week and a half.  We discussed the minor amount of spotting I'd been having since 9 weeks (just scant, brown spotting about 4 times a week).  We weren't really worried.

Fast forward to my 18 week appointment, the day before my 18 week ultrasound.  Christine, my midwife, STILL didn't have my 13 week ultrasound report, despite numerous requests for it.  I had still been spotting, and we looked at my 7 week ultrasound report in detail (as much detail as you can when it's a very undetailed report).  It said I had those cysts, a subchorionic hematoma (which was actually what the "implantation bleed" was, I have no idea why the stupid doctor - not my RE - dumbed it down instead of calling it what it was), and a uterine fibroid - which was never mentioned to me.

At my 18 week ultrasound I specifically requested that the tech look at and report on the presence or lack of presence of the subchorionic hematoma, cysts, and fibroid.

At 20 weeks Christine received my 13 week u/s, but not yet my 18 week one.  The 13 week u/s was useless - said nothing about the SH, cysts, or fibroid.

This past Monday (almost 22 weeks), my midwives' office had STILL not received my 18 week ultrasound.  I called the RE and made them send it.

So today was anothe rmidwife appointment, 22 weeks.  The ultrasound report from my RE's office seemed very... vague.  Again.  There is nothing wrong with the baby, but even though I requested an update on the SH, cysts, and fibroid, we did not get one.

What we did get was a very brief mention of the fact that I have marginal placenta previa.  Awesome.  From what I understand, as my uterus grows the previa should clear up.  But we don't have any information other than "marginal placenta previa."

The spotting has continued from 9 weeks until my current 22 weeks.  We're now pretty sure it's because of the previa, but we would still like an update on the hematoma, since that could be causing spotting, too.  It's quite possible it resolved itself, but we would like that to actually appear in a report!  Not mentioning something makes it seem like it's been missed or overlooked.  We would also like a little more information on the previa!

Apparently my RE's office needs to stick to getting people pregnant, not doing prenatal ultrasounds.  Seriously, you should see the reports.  Where I live, ultrasound reports are a page of typed information, organized into paragraphs.  Specific information is addressed.  The reports from my RE's office are forms with handwritten checks on them.  Heart?  Check.  Kidneys?  Check.  Bladder?  Check.  If there is any specific information to add, they do it by hand.  Therefore, it is quite often illegible due to handwriting and short form.

If the previa hasn't cleared up by next Thursday, I'll be going for another ultrasound around 28-30 weeks.  The very last thing I want is an OB transfer and a c-section, so it better clear up!

This is annoying.


(Edited to add: my ultrasounds form here on out will be done at the hospital, not at the RE.  I didn't realize I hadn't made that clear).

10 DPIUI

(Yeah that's right, you're getting a boring obsessive day by day play by play of this whooollle process.  Aren't you glad?  If you don't want to hear about pee sticks, scroll down and there's a post about how I manipulate my toddler.)

Oh for frick's sake!!! I really can't tell what's going on with this test! There might be the faintest hint of a line, but it's so ambiguous!!  It was just barely there at 5 minutes past taking the test.  After overanalyzing that evap line yesterday I don't trust my stupid brain! I think maybe there's a hint of a line, but seriously, it's really really faint. Considering the obviousness of the evap line yesterday, I can't consider this to be positive.  At the 5 minute mark the test was 2.5 or 3 feet away from my face and I couldn't see the line. I think I should be able to if it's really positive.

The line is getting darker as time goes on, and I can maybe see the line from 2.5 to 3 feet away (in crappy lighting, mind you) but it's 17 minutes past when I dipped that sucker.  So I can't take anything the test does now as proof of anything.

Oh my gosh, this stupid test is so mean! I wish I bought the ones that were sensitive to 10mIU! I just didn't think I'd be so obsessive and testing everyday. I never did that with Noah when I was doing treatments because I HATED seeing negative pregnancy tests.

I guess it's another day of suspense, waiting until tomorrow morning!

I Want to Go to Bed!

This morning I took a test.  I knew it was most likely way too early for anything to show up, but I just needed to know if it was positive.  If it was positive, I could be super excited.  If it was negative, at least I wasn't spending the whole day wondering if it would have been positive if I had taken it.

So I took the test, and it was negative.  But within about 10-15 minutes it had the most CRAZY evaporation line.  It was such a strong line that it got me excited.

Now, hear me out.  I know my test was negative.  It didn't have a pink line within the 5 minutes of reaction time. I'm not an idiot.  But I have never had an evaporation line like that.  Never.  It came so quickly, and it was so obvious.  There were 2 lines on my test!

In my life I've spent 25 cycles trying to get pregnant, and have only seen 2 lines on a pregnancy test in ONE of those cycles.  So seeing two lines on that test, even if one of them was an evap line, still felt encouraging.  I'm one of those crazy POAS-aholics right now, thinking, "Well, maybe there was just the smallest hint of HCG and that's why the evap line was so dark??  It wasn't enough to turn it pink within 5 minutes, but it was enough to cause a dark evap line?"

And that is why I want to go to bed.  I am excited to wake up tomorrow morning and maybe, just maybe, have a positive pregnancy test.  It's still only 10DPO tomorrow morning, so a negative won't be definitive.  But hey, it might be positive!

8-9DPIUI Blather

I need time to go faster.  Tomorrow is only 9 days post IUI... way too early to test.  I just really want it to be Monday or Tuesday.  I JUST WANT TO KNOW!!!  If it's negative I just want to move on.  I'm finding the mental games of the past 9 days to be so excruciating.  It's not fair that I can't even know if one of the eggs got fertilized.  Maybe none of them even got fertilized, so obviously then there's no way for a pregnancy to occur, so then I'm just waiting for my period to come.  I'd rather know that none of them fertilized than still be waiting.

If this cycle is negative, I don't even know if I really want to do an IUI next month.  Seriously, this is exhausting.  It's mentally and emotionally exhausting.  I don't know if I want to do this again already next month.

I never ever would have taken a break when doing treatments with Noah, because I was desperate.  But now that I'm not desperate, I can understand how people going through infertility take breaks from trying.  I couldn't understand it before, but I do now.  It would allow me a mental and emotional break.  Before Noah, it would have eaten me alive because I would have had NO chance of pregnancy, and some chance of pregnancy was better than NO chance of pregnancy.  But now that I'm at a different place in my life and I already have a child, the burden of doing treatments might be just as bad as knowing I have no chance of getting pregnant that cycle.

I don't know what we'll do.   It's also going to be February and possibly really bad weather.  Doing our IUI last week during that awful snowstorm was stressful.  I was 20 minutes ahead of a 28 car pileup where 2 people died.  It's scary to think of what might have happened.  Maybe we should wait until it's nicer weather.

I guess we'll see how I feel when we find out for sure whether this cycle worked or not.  Justin will go along either way.  Obviously the two week wait is a lot easier on a man than a woman.

Waiting...

I have to admit, the past 2-3 days have gone very slowly.  I thought time would pass more quickly, since I have Noah to distract me from the waiting.  Well, it hasn't.  It's only been 2.5 days and it feels like it's been a week.  Granted, the wait is not nearly as emotionally difficult as it was the first time around, but it is still v.e.r.y. s.l.o.w.

I've been finding myself captivated by Noah, lately.  I think maybe it's because we're going through the same process that got us pregnant with him, visiting the same clinic, and just generally trying to conceive another baby. It's kind of a sense of deja vu, and it's awe-inspiring for me to watch him, this little person, and remember that at one point we were doing this in order to have him.  He didn't even exist.  3 years ago, when we were first visiting our clinic, Noah didn't even exist.  How is that even possible, that in the span of 3 years Noah went from being nothing, months away from being conceived, to being this amazing child, almost 2 years old?  He's just so gorgeous, so smart, so funny, so silly... I sometimes still can't believe he's mine.  


For the past couple of weeks I have had many moments where I completely lose myself looking at Noah.  We'll be talking and playing, and it's like I become dumb-struck.  I look at his beautiful face, listen to the words coming out of his mouth, and I seriously can hardly believe we are where we are.

Yesterday I was watching home videos of Noah from when he was a newborn and an infant.  How is it that it can feel like that was just a few months ago, but at the same time feel like it was ages ago?  It makes me so excited to experience that again with another child.  I still get nervous about having to split my attention between multiple children, but mostly, I can't wait to add to our family and make Noah a big brother.  I can't wait to go through it all again.  (Well, not all of it. I wouldn't mind skipping over all the sleep struggles.)

I'm so excited.  For the next 10 days or so I will be pretending to myself that I'm pregnant.  I'm not sure whether I'll test or not.  I probably will.  I never did when we were doing treatments for Noah, until that last cycle where I was late.  I felt like I was cursed to never see two lines on a pregnancy test, and I didn't want the disappointment of a negative test before I was starting my period and actually moving on to a new cycle.  I even took an OPK before taking an HPT, because a negative OPK is not a definitive answer, and I didn't want a definitive answer.  But I think I might test this time.  I feel more optimistic, and I know I won't be as utterly crushed as I was when we were trying for our first baby.  Don't get me wrong - I'll still be disappointed.  But I think I want to know earlier than a missed period this time.

I guess we'll see.  I can tell you this, though - I won't be wasting time on a beta unless I get a positive HPT.

By the way, my ovaries are feeling much better.  They were feeling better already on Friday, which was great.  I still can't believe how painful it was to mature and ovulate 6 eggs.  I'm not looking forward to doing that again if this month doesn't work.

IUI #1 (Second Time Around)

Ovulating 6 eggs is hard work!  I am in so much pain, I can't even stand up straight.  I am just lying in bed groaning and holding my breath.  I thought I should try and update the blog in between groans.

First of all, why in the heck did Winter have to choose today to finally make it's appearance??!!  The drive is normally an hour there, an hour back, but today it was an hour and a half there, 2 hours back.  And the highway was closed on our way back, so we had to take backroads.  Apparently there was a 26 car pileup in the lanes I was driving in on the way there, about 20 minutes behind me.  Man, am I glad I missed that!

Now, onto the IUI - there's not much to speak of, except that we only got 6.7 million sperm.  We are both disappointed with this, but there's not much we can do about it.  Hopefully at least one of them will function properly, find one of the SIX MATURE EGGS I have, and create a baby.

The nurse was so sweet.  She was really young, probably mid twenties, very pretty, and the whole time she was doing the IUI she kept asking if I was okay, if there was any pinching, warning me that there would be pressure, that I might feel cramping, etc etc.  She must have asked me if I was okay 5 or 6 times.  I finally said, "I pushed a baby out of my vagina without an epidural... trust me, this is nothing."  

Okay, I'm in so much pain, I feel like I should have asked for an ultrasound to check my ovaries while I was there.  I'm starting to worry about having OHSS or something.

Sidenote: it's 2:40pm and Noah is in his crib, but NOT sleeping.  He didn't sleep at all in the car either.  That sure made the harrowing 2 hour drive home super fun.  Thank goodness I bought a portable DVD player for him this past weekend.  I don't know how we would have handled it otherwise.

First and Only Monitoring Appointment

Today was my first (and only) monitoring appointment for our first IUI for our second baby.

Or maybe for our second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh babies.

There is a very good reason this is my only monitoring appointment.  I went into the ultrasound this morning and Holy Guacamole, that was a lot of follicles!

A follicle of 16mm or greater almost always contains a mature egg.  Some clinics say 15mm, my clinic says 16.

On my right ovary I had 4 follicles at: 22, 18, 12, 12

On my left ovary I had 6 follicles at: 19, 18, 17, 15, 10, 10

Um, yes, you counted correctly, that would be FIVE mature follicles.  And that 15mm follicle?  Well, that was at 11am.  By this evening it is probably 16 or greater.

My uterine lining was 12.8.

So, I guess there goes my "poor responder" status.  In the past I have been on a combination of Femara, Clomid, and Injectables.  In one cycle I got one egg, in two cycles I got 2 eggs, and in one cycle I got 3 eggs (I got pregnant in my fourth cycle when I had two eggs, for the record).

This time, with 5mg of Femara CD 4 - 8 (started a day late), and 150IU of Bravelle CD 6 - 10, I had 5 (possibly 6) mature follicles on Day 11.

I was (and am) pretty excited.  But at the same time I am pretty freaked out that I might end up pregnant with higher order multiples.  There is a very thin line between "Oh frick, only 2 follicles??  Let me go to my car and cry"  and "Oh yay, 5 follicles!  Oh shit, we might have quadruplets."

Then again, we've done an IUI with 3 mature eggs and lots of sperm and didn't get pregnant with even one baby (which is probably why this cycle isn't cancelled or converted to IVF).  I feel like it's going to be all or nothing.  Either the sperm will get 'er done and we'll have several babies, or it'll suck and we'll have no babies, despite having 5 or 6 eggs waiting.  I hope I am wrong and there is a happy medium.

Like I said, I am triggering tonight, and we are doing our IUI on Thursday morning.  Wish us luck!  Pray for us!  I would prefer to have just one baby at a time.  I could deal with twins.  But please, please, no triplets!  And I'm sure it goes without saying, no quads, quints, or sextuplets either, please!!!

Here We Go Around Again

My appointment today went really well.  Everything went exactly how I was hoping it would go.  I'll break it down.

Medications

Dr. Martin said what they normally do right away with repeat patients is "what works." When I got pregnant with Noah I was on 7.5 mg of Femara on Day 3, 100mg of Clomid on Day 3-7, and 75IU of Bravelle (the FSH injections) from Day 6 on (it was supposed to be day 6-10, but I always had to continue the injections past day 10).  

I wasn't very happy with my reaction to my protocol the first time around. You're supposed to mature 3-5 eggs with that protocol, but I would only get 1-3 (I only got 3 once).  So for that reason I was up for a change.  But beyond that, I didn't want to take Clomid this time because of some of the negative effects it has. It dries up your cervical mucus; it can affect your uterine lining negatively (mine was always nice and thick, but there was no way to know how great the quality was); and it causes hot flashes and night sweats.  Not fun.  Plus they give it to some mothers right after they have babies in order to stop their milk from coming in, so I didn't want to risk losing my milk supply.  

Femara works to induce ovulation in a similar way to Clomid (it blocks the production of estrogen, while Clomid just blocks the estrogen receptors), but for some reason Femara doesn't have any of those negative side effects, so my hope was that I could go off the Clomid and just take Femara.

Dr. Martin went right along with taking me off of Clomid and adding more Femara.  He also thought we should increase the injections this time around, as well.  I agreed.  I was supposed to take 5 injections of 75IU each last cycle, but I could never just take 5.  Some cycles I ended up continuing the injections for up to 10 days because of a poor response.  I was actually hoping that I could go on a higher dose right up front, but I hadn't even mentioned it yet when Dr. Martin brought it up (seriously, we were so on the same wavelength during the whole appointment).  So instead of being prescribed five 75IU vials, I was prescribed fifteen 75IU vials - 2 per day for 7 days, plus an extra one.  

This raises my medication costs considerably.  My medication cost per cycle right now is $1200. I only have $15000 lifetime coverage for fertility drugs, so hopefully we can get pregnant with this baby quickly and have enough insurance money left to have another baby (or two) without having to pay out of pocket.

My new protocol is: 

5mg of Femara on Day 3-7, and 150IU of Bravelle from Day 6 on. Then I'll do a trigger shot when my follicles are mature, and an IUI after that.

Infertility Investigation

I am very thankful that I don't have to do an HSG test (checking to see if your tubes are open) this time around, because I was allergic to the dye last time.  Apparently it's not even in their normal protocol to do an HSG right away the second time around.  They just go right to doing what worked the last time, and if you're not pregnant within two cycles, they test the tubes in the third cycle.  We are going to do two IUI cycles, and if I'm not pregnant by then we will do the basic infertility investigation again.  I got my Day 3 bloodwork done today, and we will have SA's done with our two IUIs, so all that investigation will entail is doing a saline sonohystogram to check my tubes, instead of the HSG.  They can do that right in the clinic instead of going to the hospital, so that is much more convenient for me (even if it is an hour away).


Nursing

I was adamant (to anyone who asked) that I would not be weaning Noah in order to do fertility treatments.  I have looked into it extensively, and I am sure these medications are safe for me to be on while breastfeeding a toddler.  Clomid is sketchy while nursing, so I won't be taking it this time (unless the Femara alone doesn't work).  My RE, and my clinic in general, are incredibly supportive and accommodating, so I didn't anticipate that this would be a problem.

It wasn't.  Noah was pretty unsure of things when we went into Dr. Martin's office (he hates doctors, especially since he broke his leg), so he asked to nurse.  When he couldn't be distracted with toys or food, I went ahead and nursed him.  Dr. Martin didn't bat an eye.  It wasn't even mentioned.


Success?

Dr. Martin said half of their repeat patients are pregnant within the first two cycles. BUT they're doing what got them pregnant in the first place. We are trying something different, but he thinks the changes we made are for the better.  Hopefully they are.  

However, half of their patients probably don't have to deal with male factor infertility, so I don't really consider their chances to be the same as ours.  I'm hoping we will be pregnant within 4 completed IUI cycles, like last time.

Extra Thoughts

Everything went really well, exactly the way I hoped it would. Noah was really well behaved, and everyone was excited to see another "SOFT baby," especially Dr. Martin (SOFT is the acronym for my clinic's name). We were supposed to send them a birth announcement and take him in for a visit, but we never did.  I always felt bad about. So this was the first time they've seen him.

Dr. Martin said they would be quite happy to have us do an IUI with them this cycle. They are so nice at my clinic. They really feel like it's their PRIVILEGE to help you get pregnant, instead of like they're doing you a favour. I love them.

I was saying to a friend the other day that even though I wish we didn't have to do treatments to get pregnant, I really do love my clinic.  You know how you kind of fall in love with your OB by the end of your pregnancy?  Imagine how you'd feel about the people who finally got you pregnant in the first place!  I just want to gather up everyone in that office and give them a huge hug.

Overall we feel much more excited and optimistic this time around.  We are very hopeful we will get pregnant again, and that it won't take years.  We aren't depressed and scared like we were last time. We have Noah, and know exactly what we're looking forward to.  Justin was in a funk this weekend, but I think he's over it and just looking forward to getting pregnant, even if the journey is incredibly inconvenient.

T Minus 6 Days

Well, things are clipping along at a much faster rate than I thought they would when I first decided to call my RE.    I decided on December 13 to stop making excuses and denying my baby fever and just call.  About a week later I wrote about finally making the call to my own doctor to get a new referral (since it had been over 2 years since our last visit) but by then my clinic was closed for Christmas - the only days of the whole year they are closed.

They opened back up on the 3rd of January - yesterday.  All day I was thinking I should call them to make sure they got my referral and to schedule an appointment (referrals happen faster when you make follow up calls), but just hadn't brought myself to do it.  I was just too nervous.  But then my phone rang, and it was my family doctor's office.  The nurse was calling to find out if I knew about my appointment NEXT TUESDAY.  As in one week from the day she called.

I was very surprised.  I mean, once she called I remembered that's how it works at my clinic - they call your referring doctor to give THEM your appointment time, and the message gets passed along to you.  So that's not what I was surprised about.  What I'm surprised about is how freaking quickly we're getting in.  When I was trying to get pregnant with Noah, it was a 3-4 month wait to see Dr. Martin (the head of my clinic).  I got in a couple of months sooner by asking to see an associate instead.  I regretted seeing her, but at least I started doing treatments earlier than I would have if I waited, and I DID end up getting to see Dr. Martin a couple of months sooner than I would have, because we discovered my messed up hormones and annovulatory status (at the time, anyway).

This time we're getting in basically within less than 2 weeks.  We called for our referral on the 13th of December.  Their last day of work was on the 16th.  When they opened back up on the 3rd, we had an appointment for the 10th.  I wonder why it's moving so much quicker this time.

I am kind of freaking out, both with excitement and with nervousness.  I'm sure that most parents with an infertility past can relate to those feelings regarding adding to your family.  Deciding to have a second child is probably a little nerve wracking even in simple situations, but add in the 2 hour round trip 7+ times a month, the drugs, the invasion of your lady parts, and trying to juggle all that with a toddler.  And remembering my crappy pregnancy with Noah certainly makes me feel nervous about being pregnant again, because I have to deal with the crappy pregnancy while I already HAVE a 2 year old.

I know it will all work itself out.  But it still makes me nervous.

However, I am CRAZY excited as well.  My consultation appointment is going to land on Day 3 or 4 of my cycle.  And my clinic likes to start treatment ASAP, so most likely we will be doing an IUI within this month.  Or, at least attempting an IUI this month.  I may even make it to the consultation in time to start actual meds this cycle.

It's just crazy.  It's happening so fast.  I'm going to try and keep my expectations low, though.  I wouldn't be surprised if we attempted to do an IUI this month and ended up not being able to for whatever reason, because that's what happened to us 3 years ago.  I don't want that to crush my spirit.  So I'll just try to stay realistic, but optimistic at the same time.

And of course, there's still the hope that this cycle I'm currently in will knock me up and the appointment will be unnecessary:)

My Wish for 2012

2011 was an amazing year.  In fact, yesterday I said the same thing I said a year earlier: Today is the last day of the best year of my life.

Noah's growth and development was as drastic in 2011 as it was in 2012.  He went from being a baby to being a little boy.  I still catch glimpses of my baby, but they are few and far between.  It is my absolute joy to watch him grow up each and everyday, but it also makes my heart ache.  My heart aches because I can never go back.  I can never again experience him as he was as a newborn and infant.  That time is gone.

I am so thankful that I have been a stay at home mom all this time, so I didn't miss anything.  I spent as much time as possible with him through every stage.  But the days do blur together.  And more often than not I am too absorbed in everyday life to remember to take pictures to aid in my recall all of these days.

From the day Noah was born I have been saying that I wish I could PVR my life.  But more than that, I truly wish it was possible to actually go back and experience those little moments again, in person, however brief.  I wish it was possible to go back to the moment I gave birth and Noah was placed on my chest.  I wish it was possible to go back and nurse my tiny newborn Noah.  I wish I could go back and hold my little baby, scrunched up on my chest.  I wish I could snuggle and kiss Noah when he was 3 months old, rejoice over him learning to sit up at 5 months, and cheer when he fell over backwards.  I wish I could go back to when he first started crawling at 6 months, the first time he pulled up to stand at 7 months, his first steps at 10 months.  I wish I could go back and experience it all again.

There are things I sometimes say I will do differently with the next baby.  Like trying to get him to sleep through the night at a much earlier age.  Or putting him down for naps and nighttime when he's awake, so he's not so dependent on me and I have more time available for other things.  Actually, pretty much the only things I would change are sleep-related.

But now I don't know.  I don't regret a single thing I did with Noah.  Yes, I got up in the night to nurse him for 18 months.  And sometimes it was frustrating, because I often couldn't fall back asleep afterward.  But that was the fastest 18 months of my life, and now it's over.  And I don't regret it.  I loved holding my sweet, sleeping son, carrying him to his crib, and kissing his cheek before lying him down.  If it is possible to be able to do all that and still have a baby to who will go to sleep on his own, that would be my perfect situation.  I guess we will see.

I really want another baby.  I want to give Noah a sibling.  I want to add to our family.  I want to experience that newborn love again, and watch another child - my child - grow up to become a real little person.  I am very ready.  And I hope that 2012 is the year that fulfills that dream.  Chances are that the actual baby won't come in 2012, but I sure would love to be growing one:)

I Finally Made the Call

Last week, right after writing this post, I called my fertility clinic.  I was hoping I could just get an appointment, since we were already diagnosed and determined to be infertile (ugh, that sounds so ugly).  But it had been over a year since I was last a patient (27 months, in fact), and because of the health care system here in Canada, I needed another referral from my doctor.

The nurse sounded excited for me, which made me feel a little less sorry for myself and a little more optomistic.  They're nice like that at my clinic.  I was told they were booking for the head RE (who is the one I really want to see) in late January.  So I called my family doctor, who luckily does not require any appointments to get referrals to specialists.  The nurse there took down my information and said she'd send the referral away.

Referrals take time, so I told myself to wait a week, and if I hadn't gotten a call for my appointment, I would call them myself.  I knew that my clinic closes for 2 weeks at Christmas time (the only time they are closed through the entire year), but I figured the closure would line up with the school breaks, and the schools are still open through the end of the this week.

A couple of days ago I went online to double check the closure dates and the phone number, and unfortunately, they had closed on December 17, and are closed until January 3.  So I have to wait until January to find out 1) if my referral actually made it, and 2) when my appointment is.

I'm not going to lie, I am feeling a little antsy.  It was exactly 3 years ago that we found out about DH's less-than-super sperm, and got a referral to a fertility clinic (a different one than the one we actually used).  I am feeling a slight sense of deja-vu.  The Christmas season... actively trying to get pregnant... about to make the leap into treatments...

However, my life is very different than it was then.  I have Noah, who I get to spend all day every day with.  I am not allowing myself to obsess over getting pregnant this time.  It's not necessary, and it's not fair to Noah or Justin.  I have a child.  Despite my strong desire to add to our family, if I never had another child, I wouldn't hate my life.  I'm sure I'd find a way to get over it, even if people's pregnancy announcements continued to make me cry for years to come.

It really is different this time around.  Although I say I'm "not allowing" myself to become obsessed, I can say with absolute certainty that I didn't "allow" myself to become obsessed last time around.  I couldn't help it.  Some people really want children, and some people really really REALLY want children.  I get annoyed at the people who think that we all have that kind of control over our emotions in that area, like we can stop ourselves from spiralling into depression over our infertility.  Some people can, and some people can't.  The first time around, I was one of the people who couldn't.  Now that I'm going through this process again, I can understand the other side - the people who do want children, but for whom that desire doesn't take over every part of their life.  Because that's me this time around.  I could allow myself to obsess and get depressed.  But I won't.  Last time, however, it wasn't a choice.  It wasn't something I could control.

So, I made the call.  In some ways I can't believe I did it.  I'd been hemming and hawing over that phone call for so long, never knowing when I would actually bite the bullet and do it.  So I guess, as painful as it was to find out my best friend is pregnant, I should thank her.  She forced me to confront how I really felt, which gave me enough of a sense of urgency that I finally took steps in the right direction.

Sad:(

This morning I got an email from one of my best friends, one who had a baby three weeks after I had Noah.  We talk (usually through email) every day, multiple times a day, so getting an email was just normal.  I was just skimming it, and then the second paragraph punched me in the stomach.

She's pregnant.

For some reason she thought I already knew, but just hadn't asked her about it.  She thought that because she hadn't mentioned getting her period in awhile, I must have known.  Funny, last night I DID think about how it seemed like it had been a really long time since she had her period, but it never even occurred to me that she could be pregnant.  She's already 11 weeks.

I am happy for her (okay, not going to lie, only a little bit happy), but I am sick to my stomach.  Reading her email caused such an emotional reaction in me that I randomly let down, which hardly ever happens to me anymore.

We've been trying to get pregnant again for almost 11 months.  Obviously we haven't been successful.  And I don't expect to get pregnant without fertility treatments.  But still, I can't let a month go by without trying.

I should really just make an appointment with my RE to get treatments going.  But he's an hour away, it's the beginning of winter, it's such a disruption to our lives to have to drive there all the time... getting pregnant is something I really want to happen, but I really want it to happen naturally.  I just don't want to turn my life upside down right now.  I don't want to have to jump through all those hoops.  If my RE was closer, I'm sure we would be doing treatments already.

I am constantly thinking about it, though.  Last night I was telling my husband that we should start treatments again in the early spring, when he isn't as busy with coaching, when the weather is nicer for driving, when Noah has turned 2, etc.  This means I should be calling my RE now to get an appointment with him.  That can take a few months.  And I should get some day 3 blood work done next cycle (I'm on day 7 right now, so too late for this month), and maybe the next, so we know what my hormones are up to, since it's been 2.5 years since the last time I did day 3 blood work.

Sigh.  This is hard.  For awhile now I have been at the point where hearing someone is pregnant really bothers me, especially if their kids are Noah's age or younger.  But I have two friends who I am close to, whose kids were born 3 weeks before and 3 weeks after Noah, and I knew when those friends got pregnant, it would really hurt.

And it did.

Cycle #5

I'm late in posting this, of course.  Writing about cycle info just isn't high on my list of priorities when I have a rambunctious (but wonderful) 17 month old toddler running around.  However, this is my most reliable place to store information, so here it is.

Cycle #5 was very different than my previous cycles.  I ovulated (or appeared to ovulate) much earlier than I have been.

-It was a 31 day cycle.

-CD 1 was Tuesday, July 5.

-I had EWCM from CD 15 to CD 19 (July 19 - July 23).

-I had very sore nipples on CD 19 to CD 21.

-My period came on Friday, August 5.

-I think I ovulated on CD 19, July 23.

-My luteal phase was 12 days. I think.

So this cycle was 8 days shorter than my last two cycles, but my LP seemed to be one day longer.  I found it interesting that that change happened so quickly, instead of my cycles gradually getting shorter.  Also interesting is the fact that Cycle #6 seems to be following along in Cycle #5's footsteps.  EWCM on the exact same cycle days.  The difference this month is that I haven't had the super painful nipples.  Just slightly painful on CD 19.  This makes me doubt whether I really ovulated or not.  Not that I can really know for sure anyway.

I should be getting my next period just in time for our new pool to be open.  Because let's face it: despite all our efforts, we are not going to get pregnant by ourselves.  Stupid male factory infertility.  My body may appear to be fixing itself, but you just can't overcome MFI without ART.

Cycle #4

Cycle #4 has come and gone.  It was incredibly similar to cycle #3, which is guess is probably encouraging.  I'm hoping this means that despite the fact that I now have very long cycles, my reproductive system is, in fact, working.

-It was a 39 day cycle.

-CD 1 was Friday, May 27.

-I had EWCM from CD 25 to CD 28 (June 20 - June 23).

-The one OPK I took on CD 28 was extremely positive.

-I had sore nipples on CD 29 and 30.

-My period came on Tuesday, July 5.

-My luteal phase was 11 days (this is assuming that I actually ovulated, which I'm guessing I did since my body gave the exact same signs on the exact same days during cycle #2)

My nipples didn't hurt quite as much during this cycle.  The three cycles before this the pain was excruciating, although the number of days with excruciating pain was less each cycle.  This cycle I was sore, but it wasn't terrible.  I think I probably neglected to write down some of the sore days because of this fact, but it probably doesn't really matter.

We really tried this month, and felt fairly optimistic.  However, I was not surprised that it didn't work out.  I'm pretty sure I'm ovulating, but we still have crappy sperm to contend with.

I'm still not sure at what point we will be moving on to fertility treatments.  However, I have an idea that would be easier for us to implement.  My clinic usually has everyone come in on CD 11, no matter what, and then the size of your follicles determines when the next time you come in is.  If your follicles are all small, you take two days off and then go in for another ultrasound.  Rinse and repeat until something shows up or they put you on BCPs to start a new cycle.

Well, I'm not having any fertility signs until CD 25, so this would be a big waste of time for me.  I was thinking it might work for me to wait until I have EWCM, and THEN go in for an ultrasound, and if I was actually ovulating we could just do an IUI with a natural cycle.  This would mean I wouldn't have to stop nursing and wean Noah before he's ready in order to take the fertility drugs.  I would much rather weaning be a natural process that's led by him.

So that's what I'm thinking at the current time.  Although despite that plan, I'm still not ready to rush to the RE.  I'm not looking forward to another HSG, more appointments, long drives... I'd be more than happy to get pregnant naturally at this point, but I'm not ready to jump through hoops yet.  I'd rather Noah be older before I start with the hoop jumping.

I May Have a Touch of "The Fever"

Baby Fever, that is.

For most of Noah's life so far I have had zero desire to have another baby.  I knew in my head I wanted more children, but I didn't have that burning desire like I had the first time.  I thought that was weird, because Noah was becoming a toddler, and I thought I would want another baby soon.  When he was born I thought we'd be doing treatments again when he was a year old.  But I just didn't have the yearning.  I didn't know when it would come, or if it would ever come.  I actually thought we might have to just try for another baby without actually having that strong desire.  I couldn't imagine when I would get to that place.

Well, as the days go by, it appears that I am creeping closer and closer to that place all the time.  Whereas before I would occasionally have a desire to be pregnant or have a newborn, now that desire is becoming more frequent.  That desire is becoming stronger than my desire to not.  More of my time is now spent wanting another baby than not wanting another baby.

I'm not sure how I feel about this.  Ideally I would like Noah to be a bit older before I get pregnant.  Or even a lot older.  I would really like to nurse him until he's at least two, for many reasons, one of them being that 2 years old is the recommended minimum.  Using fertility medications to get pregnant could quite possibly put a wrench in our nursing relationship.  Furthermore, getting pregnant could mess it up.  You can nurse when you're pregnant, but it's fairly common to experience a reduction in your milk supply, and many women have very sore nipples and breasts during pregnancy, making nursing very uncomfortable.  I know what this feels like every month while I'm ovulating, and it's a toe curling, teeth gritting kind of pain that makes me dread every latch.

Not to mention the fact that Noah still nurses overnight, and he still very much needs his Mommy at this point in his life.  I know that if I got pregnant now, by the time I would have the baby he would be almost two, or over two.  But morning sickness happens right away.  I couldn't imagine how I'd deal with morning sickness and Noah.  And my pelvic issues were happening before I hit 30 weeks... how would I be a cripple with a 20 month old son?  What about me only getting 3-5 hours of sleep every night because of being pregnant and uncomfortable.  What about having a newborn and only getting 1-2 hours of sleep in every 24 hour period?  The thought of the sleeplessness alone has kiboshed any real desire to procreate again anytime soon.

Until now.

The thing is, those things seemed insurmountable a month or two ago.  Now they seem like something I would be willing to tackle.  They don't seem quite as scary.  Up until now I have felt unwilling to purposefully change Noah's life in order to accommodate another baby.  Now I feel like I might actually be ready to do just that.

I'm getting a little freaked out by this feeling.  I don't want to have that desire again right now.  I'd rather wait another 6 months, or 9 months.  But the fact is, I do have that feeling.  And I'm not exactly sure what to do about it.

We are definitely trying naturally.  I'm pretty sure I am actually ovulating now.  My body acts like it is, and it never acted like this in the 14 months we were trying before we got pregnant.  But we still have the MFI to deal with. 

I know we will probably have to do treatments.  I'm not ready for that yet.  But with the way I'm starting to feel, I'm not sure how much longer I'll be able to put it off.  I don't want to try naturally month after month and experience the heartbreak month after month.  That's too hard on me, emotionally.  Especially since we know what our issues are.

I didn't think I would be dealing with this when Noah was 15 months old!

Cycle Info

It's Wednesday.  I wanted to go into town to run errands today.  Instead I am stuck in my house.  On Monday I got my period, and its so heavy I can't be away from a bathroom for longer than an hour.  So instead I am baking a chocolate cake (I've been craving chocolate like nobody's business), listening to music, and hanging with my little man.

While I'm feeling annoyed at being house-bound, I thought I would write out my last cycle information (since this blog is my catch-all space).

-It was a 42 day cycle.

-CD 1 was Monday, March 7.

-I had EWCM from CD 27 to CD 32 (April 2 - April 7).

-I had moderately sore nipples from CD27 to CD 31 (April 2 - April 6).

-I had really sore nipples from CD 32 - CD 35 (April 7 - April 10).

-My period came on Monday, April 18.


I'm really not sure when (IF??) I ovulated.  I'm guessing maybe on April 7th, give or take.  That was my last day of EWCM, and also the first day of really, really (I mean really) sore nipples.  That would make my luteal phase about 10 days long.  When I was doing treatments and was actually successfully ovulating, my LP was 12 days.  This was only my second cycle after giving birth, and I'm still BFing 10+ times a day, so it's normal that my LP be short for awhile.  Just like it's normal to have such a long cycle at the beginning.

I do know that I never noticed so much and such pronounced EWCM in the whole time I was TTC.  So I do wonder if I actually am ovulating.  I wish I didn't have such a bad track record with OPKs.  I just can't trust them because of my high LH.

I'm glad I decided to keep track of all this.  I'd like to see a pattern emerging.  I had EWCM for 6 days, which is kind of a long time, and sore nipples for 9 days, which is quite a long time.  And I got my period a mere 7 days after all the symptoms were gone.  I was expecting it before Sunday, but really didn't think I was going to get it on Monday. 

So I will continue to track my cycles and symptoms.  And we will continue to sprinkle a few 'marital relations' in amongst the EWCM, just in case. 

It's the Infertility in me.  I just can't let a cycle go by without giving it a try.  Even though I don't have the burning desire to get pregnant again right now, and I like things how they are, I do want a couple more children.  And a natural-miracle-pregnancy would still be welcome.

I wonder if this is what normal people feel like when they decide to have a baby.  Not all high strung and "LET'S GET PREGNANT RIGHT THIS SECOND!!!!!!" but just casually seeing what will happen.  I wouldn't know, because it was never casual for me.  From the second I was able to try to get pregnant, I wanted it to have happened 3 months earlier and was very bothered when it didn't.

And even now, we most likely will not be getting pregnant without ART.  So why is there this little tickle in my brain telling me that just maybe we will???  My logical side tells me otherwise, but that teeny voice is still there.

Back on the Fertility Train??

I think it might be time for me to jump back on the fertility train.  Or rather, the infertility train. 

As I mentioned in my angry post about getting my period back, approximately two weeks (a little less, actually) before I got my period, I was showing fertility signs.  Really sore nipples when Noah was nursing, egg-white CM, maybe a few twinges in the ovarian area.

Well, my first day of this cycle was March 7 (I only know that because I blogged about it), and now, April 4, I am having those fertility signs again.  Starting on April 2 I was having lots of EWCM, and my nipples are starting to get sore again.  Not as terrible as they were last time, but that might still be to come.

I'm not wanting to start actively trying to get pregnant, although we're not preventing it.  Still, I think it might make sense for me to start paying a little more attention to my body.  Who knows when I'll want to get pregnant again (I could say 'we,' but really, my husband will just follow my lead).  When I do want to, it's quite possible I'll want it to have happened YESTERDAY (since that's how it goes with me and my "ideas").  It'll probably be good to have just a basic amount of cycle information.  Just cycle start dates and maybe the EWCM and sore nipple thing.  I think its probably a good thing for me to track. 

I've also been thinking about asking my doctor to give me a requisition for Day 3 bloodwork.  He knows nothing, but I know a lot.  So I can interpret my own results and decide what to do.  If my FSH has gone even higher, I'll probably want to start trying to get pregnant earlier.  Earlier than what?  I don't know, because I seriously have no plans in that area.

I'm feeling kind of blaaah about this.  I have liked not paying attention to these things.  But Noah's 12.5 months old, and we're infertile, and I don't want to have my children 5 years apart, so I feel like I should at least be slowly shifting my focus in that direction.

Plus, every once in awhile I get an "Awwww" nostalgic feeling about being pregnant or having a newborn.  It's really such a magical time.

Then I remember 24/7 morning sickness, being on crutches for the last 2 months of my pregnancy, and how I was only getting 2 hours of sleep in every 24 hour period leading up to and after Noah's birth.  For months.  And I realize that I already HAVE a baby, who will make having another baby more complicated than it was the first time around.

And the nostalgic feeling starts to fade... ha.

Elijah's 2nd Birthday

On Saturday, March 5, 2011, my nephew Elijah turned 2!  His parents, my brother Nick and his wife Hilary, had a birthday party for him at their house, which is 2 hours from our house.

Our day was super busy, but fun!  We left when Noah was ready for his nap at 11am.  Noah slept in the car from 11:08 until like 11:50 when Justin yelled (it was a windshield wiper fiasco).

We had planned to stop as quickly as possible in L-town, the halfway point between our houses, because I desperately need new nursing gear.  That is a whole other story, which I'm going to tell separately, but we ended up spending an hour and a half there.  I was hoping for 30 minutes.

We didn't get to Nick and Hil's until 2:30. Noah had a great day (so did we), but he never had another nap.  This is about the 3rd or 4th day that he's gone with only one nap. I didn't even bother trying for a second one because he was having so much fun playing, never fussed once, and the house was so noisy it would have been hard to get him to sleep.  Then I would have had to sit there holding him the whole time since he refuses to nap anywhere but in his own crib. 
 
Desite the lack of sleep, he did wonderfully.  He wasn't even that attached to me.  He was going all over the house, playing with everything.  He would come back to me for some cuddles or nursing, but he often left my sight, on his own, and never freaked out.  It was good. 
 
We left at 6:40pm with Noah in his jammies, and he fell asleep within 45 seconds of driving. He stayed asleep the whole way home. I just had to reach my hand back to touch his head once when we were almost home because he gave a little cry. He immediately fell back asleep, though.
 

Oh my gosh, the drive home was SCARY!  It was so weird. It was totally fine until about 35 minutes from home.  Then suddenly there were tons of ambulances and cars were in the ditch everywhere. There were at least 15 cars in the ditch in the span of about 3km.  Some of them were flipped onto their hoods! The roads were so weird. They would be completely bare and dry and then suddenly black ice. We never actually felt any slipperyness except when we drove on a bit of snow, but it was terrifying to see so many cars going in the ditches around us. My stomach was in knots.  Especially when a stupid transport truck swerved into the lane right in front of us and then completely stopped.  Smart thinking, buddy.

 

We got home at 8:50pm. I took Noah out of his carseat and laid him on his sleepsack on our bed, and he stayed asleep the entire time.  At least, his eyes were closed and he was barely moving.  That is NOT like him.  Normally if I even put my hand near his head while he's sleeping he will stir and almost wake up.  It's not like he was limp, he was moving, but he wasn't waking up. I could have just put him straight into his crib from his carseat (which I normally could never do), but he needed to be in his sleepsack, because our house goes down to 64 degrees at night. When I started putting his arms in the holes he must have woke up just a little more because he kept his eyes closed but he lifted one hand to sign "nurse". I was planning on nursing him anyway, so I nursed him for about 8 minutes and put him in the crib, and he stayed totally asleep.  He slept until 7:15am, just getting up to nurse once at 4:30am.

 

It was a fun day.  I really like this age that Noah is at.  He's a lot easier to do things and go places with, because he takes fewer naps.  And he is sooo much fun.  And so much more independent.  I can actually visit with people now, instead of 75% of my time being spent caring for Noah.  I feel like I just got used to that, and now we're past it.

 

Elijah's little brother, Josiah, is 5 months old.  I was holding him and saying "You're so little!" (which he's not, if you compare him to most 5 month olds, but compared to my 11.5 month old he is!).  My mom said, "Doesn't holding a little one like that make you want to have another one?" 

 

It doesn't really.  I mean, yes, I want to have another one.  Hopefully two - but not at the same time.  But not right now.  Noah is still a baby.  And a 5 month old is so useless.  Maybe if he was a newborn my uterus would be tugging a bit.  But a 1 year old is a lot more fun than a 5 month old, especially when he's my 1 year old, and it's someone else's 5 month old.  I love this stage in Noah's life, and I am in ZERO hurry to disrupt our lives and start into the fertility treatment madness again. 

 

I think it's weird that I don't have that burning desire to have another baby right now.  I love that I don't have that feeling.  I do want to have more children, but I am not in a hurry for it to happen.  It's such a nice change from the feeling I had trying to get pregnant with Noah.