Sucky Sucky Blah Blah

I'm on day 11 of stimming (day 12 of my cycle).  Things are going pretty typically.  My E2 levels are very similar to those of Baby Girl and Mackenzie's cycle.  I have about 8 follicles that they are tracking, which is pretty on par for how these things go with me.  If I trigger tomorrow (likely), then I will be triggering on the same day that I did with Baby Girl and Mackenzie's cycle.  The two cysts that I started the cycle with do not seem to be impacting my E2 levels that much.  I'm trying so so hard not to let my hopes get up because my E2 and trigger days are similar to my two previous successful cycles.  I mean, heck, last cycle I transferred two beautiful Day 3 8-cells and no dice.  Previously, as long as I transferred a pretty 8-cell on Day 3, I wound up pregnant.  There is no rhyme or reason to this IVF stuff.  And, by my tenth cycle, you think I would know that.

Life has been pretty sucky, lately.  My husband (only my husband could do this) got a corneal abrasion and potentially long term eye damage by stabbing himself in the eye last week. My husband is also potentially going to lose his license because he got a reckless speeding ticket on Father's Day (that's a WHOLE other story).  We are in battle with some contractors about getting our porch remodeled.  They were trying to gouge us financially and we are trying to get out of the contract.  Lawyers, lawyers everywhere.  It all just feels so overwhelming, when I know this is just typical life stuff.  I just wish I could shout to the universe "hey!  can you just give us a break?  our baby died!"

Retrieval on Friday or Saturday.  Wish us luck.

Double Digits

I can't believe that this in my tenth IVF cycle.  Ninth fresh cycle.  I can't believe this is my life.  I can't believe my baby is dead. I can't believe that I was pregnant.  I can't believe that I started this process for a third child a year ago.  I find that I have little energy to do anything.  Completing one to two tasks a day, such as unloading the dishwasher or running an errand, is all I can seem to muster most days.  I am deeply unmotivated, which is completely unlike me.  I hate it.

In other news, I went to my first support group this week.  At the time, it was reassuring to see other actual human beings that had suffered the same loss, not just people I read about on the internet (no offense).  But, the day after, I had this horrible feeling of shame and embarrassment about talking about myself and our horrible journey with other people. I feel I shared too much, telling them about our IVF journey and losing Mackenzie's twin.  I'm not sure if I did actually share too much or whether I'm just sensitive.  Others in the group told about their child's death, using donor eggs, etc.  But, I just felt raw and open and embarrassed.  I'm not sure I'll go again in the upcoming months as I might have classes with my potential career change.

SO, angry girl, what good news do you have to report?

Baby Girl and Nugget seem to have such a close, happy relationship.  Baby Girl is definitely an extrovert and has to be touching, laying upon, or in very very very close proximity to her big brother at all times.  Nugget is more introverted, but he puts up with her generally.  The poor kid just wants to watch a movie or eat or lay in Mommy's lap and Baby Girl is always wanting to join in the fun.  My favorite moments are watching them in the bath together.  Baby Girl is obsessed with washing Nugget's hair and she will dump water on his head again and again and again and he just lets her.  They play this game in the tub where she tries to hide behind the shower curtain and he pretends he can't see her.  The sound of their laughter echoes through the upstairs, reaching me in my bed where I often lay exhausted.  I don't seem to have the energy to do anything.  But, their tinkling laughter can make me feel that all is well in the world.

Fireflies in a Mason Jar

I've been walking around in a daze the past few weeks since the negative, trudging through Mackenzie's due date and the birth of my friend's son that was due the same time.  My husband insists that I have pulled out of my darkest days because I am more interactive and making plans.  But, what he doesn't seem to consider is that I still sometimes wish that I was dead and I didn't have to live this life.  I know some may think that is melodramatic, but the pain of Mackenzie's birth....feeling his cold dead body fall out of my body, wet against my legs...and the pain of having to live in this world where people get to live normal lives where babies don't die and they don't have to do multiple digit numbers of IVF cycles to try and build their families.  Where people are constantly exuberant and expectant walking around with their big, pregnant bellies or complaining about how hard life is with so many young children under the age of XYZ. 

Every week I take Baby Girl to a music class.  I hate it.  I hate all the other mothers.  Particularly the one that had a baby on Mackenzie's due date.  I hate how sometimes they try and make small talk with me and I shut them down because really what am I going to have in common with you?  I know this is cynical and not particularly healthy and I will say that I don't feel this way all the time, but lately I feel this way the majority of the time. I continue to go to this stupid class, though, because I know Baby Girl enjoys it and I really need to have activities to do other than work through my massive to-do lists.  I wrote down today all the projects I want to get done around the house and it literally took two whole handwritten notebook pages.  I can do household updates and renovating and laundry and dishes until I'm 90.

But, this isn't what I wanted to post about.  I wanted to post about the fireflies.  Nugget finally grasped the enormity of the concept of fireflies.  They are amazing.  I've been trying to tempt him to catch them for the past few summers but he previously showed little to no interest. 

Not this year.

This year every night we tempt the mosquitos as we catch dozens of fireflies, dutifully stored in mason jars with holes poked in the top.  We've learned all their secret hiding spots.  My husband complains that I let him stay up too late and that our predation of fireflies will result in a decrease of the firefly population if we don't let the males out to mate.  I don't really care.  I love catching them and the parallel nostalgic memories of doing so in my youth in hopes that I could catch enough fireflies to read past my bedtime using their light.

After a four-day visit with friends down in North Carolina, we returned home just in time for our evening ritual.  After nearly fifteen minutes of searching, Nugget started sobbing that the fireflies were all gone.  I cried a little myself, heartbroken to lose one more summer of catching fireflies with my not-so-small little boy anymore. 

My husband and I spend 30 minutes yesterday looking at videos of my Nugget when he was Baby Girl's age.  That beautiful stage of life before they're really communicative in words and just emerging with little personalities of their own.  I was struck at how distant those videos seem and that the cobwebs of time and experience had made the memories more remote.  Why can't our brains hold more memories?  How could I have lost that moment when Nugget was obsessed with cleaning the sofa with windex?  How many more moments would I lose?  I should start living my whole life on camera so as to not let the beauty of these small moments fade into grey.

Testing again

I find it highly depressing that I have to do my mock transfer and infectious disease testing again.  It seems unreal to me that this time last year I was gearing up for my first IVF post Baby Girl and now...I'm still freaking doing IVF.  I swore that I would only do two cycles and then move on.  What's my threshold now?  How far am I willing to go?  Some days, I petulantly just want to throw in the towel.  Others...I accept that this is a freaking long process.

Can I just say that I hate the Royal Baby?  But, not as much as I hated getting my friend's announcement that her baby boy (due the same time as Mackenzie) was born and is healthy.  I don't really mean that...but it has been really hard to face Mackenzie's due date and realize how far my life is from where I thought it would be a few months ago.

Off I go to read books to my little boy and snuggle in bed.  Hopefully with just enough time for a glass of wine and a little T.V. tonight.

Failure

I couldn't believe it.  Two perfectly beautiful 8-cells.  Neither took.  Two different negative pregnancy tests.  Tons of what are typically uniquely pregnant symptoms for me.  Still no period.  I am devastated.  It is like losing Mackenzie all over again.  I can't help but feel that I am a failure.  That we will never get pregnant again.  That something is messed up in my uterus now and I'll never get to hold another baby of my own in my arms.  That my premonition that Josie would be my last child, the last time I would have a full pregnant belly again, was indeed true.  That my heart will never heal from losing Mackenzie and I will always walk around feeling a little more broken, a little bit different from the rest of humanity because my child is dead. 

My arms ache for my baby.  I am so angry to be doing IVF fucking again.  I am so angry to end on such failure.  I am so angry to have to cancel holidays and vacations and suck our financial resources into this.  I am so tired of being in pain and sad and crying and wanting so much to just be like a normal person that can make plans and implement them for my life.

Be gentle with me, dear readers.  Know that I am in a dark, sad place and the perspective that one gets when not depressed and utterly devastated is not here.

Please, tell me.  How will I survive losing my baby?  How will I ever get over losing him if I cannot have another baby? 

Oh, Mackenzie.  I am so sorry I failed you.  I am so sorry I didn't take the doctors more seriously and listen to them when they told me about a support group.  I wish someone had taken me by the shoulders and gently said this is not good, this is very very bad.  No one did that.  I didn't know.  I would have laid in bed and treasured every little moment with you if I truly thought you were going to die.  I would have never freaked out about being pregnant with twins.  I would have been more scared of losing you.  I would have loved you better.  I would have done so many things differently, my dear sweet boy.  I miss you forever.  I wish that Baby Girl and Nugget had gotten to be your big sister and big brother.  They love each other so much.  They would have adored you, too.  Come back, baby, come back and be in my belly.  Come back and be with me.  I love you, little one.  I love you so much. 

Not Strong Enough

I could test today.  But, I'm not feeling strong enough.  I don't think I can handle a negative.  I stay up at night until 2 or 3 am, watching random movies.  I did this when we didn't know what was going on with Mackenzie.  I would stay up all hours watching Shameless on Demand.  I couldn't sleep.  Waiting.  Anxious.  Unable to sleep, but exhausted.

I have mixed symptoms.  My boobs are a little more tender.  My appetite is ravenous, especially in the early morning.  But, I am not constipated.  I don't know if I should test tomorrow, two weeks from retrieval, and get it over with.  Or, if I should wait until Friday and test on the day of my blood test.

For now, living in limbo seems easier than living with the cold, hard failure.

What to do?  What would you do?  How did you handle testing after a cycle?

Morbid Book Club

Since Mackenzie died, I have been looking to learn from others who have survived tragedy.  I have found several books to be essential to my healing process and highly recommend them to those seeking to find examples of people that have chosen to continue living.  The first few weeks after Mackenzie died were excruciating.  I couldn't stand walking around in the world.  I felt too fragile, too broken to walk among "the happy people."  At the time, I couldn't imagine that this pain would ever end or be less raw.  I holed up in my house, refusing to leave.  Even a trip to the grocery store or a workout at the gym would reduce me to a mess of tears.  Upon reading novels of woman that had lost children, lost husbands, lost their lives and more, I began to see that I was going to have to chose to keep living and to not let this experience make me bitter and removed forever.  I am not sure if I am a resilient person, but I know that I have learned through all this that the only way I can control my life is to control the framework through which I view it.

The End of Your Life Book Club: A book club between a mother and her son during the last days of her life.

They Were Still Born: Personal essays about stillbirth and infant loss

I'll See You Again: A mother loses all three of her precious daughters in the horrific New York State’s Taconic Parkway car accident in 2009.

Wave: A woman loses her parents, her husband, and her two boys in the 2004 tsunami in Sri Lanka.

Stumbling on Happiness: Understanding human behavior and perspectives on happiness.

A few phrases that people said to me or stories that they told also were very healing.

I spoke with a woman that had lost her first and, so far, only child to stillbirth and I asked her how long would I be in so much pain and agony.  She shared with me what a friend once told her: "You won't feel this way forever, but you do have to feel this way right now."  Whenever my grief was overwhelming, I would calm myself with this saying.

I also talked with a friend who struggled to get over her father's death.  She visited with a shaman who performed and energy ritual repeating: "hold on to the love, let go of the pain."  Whenever the grief or guilt of losing Mackenzie sends me reeling, I concentrate on the love that I had for him and his twin and try to let go of my pain in losing them. 

This isn't the most poetic entry, but I wanted to write these nuggets down before I got lost in the minutia of every day living.

In other news, I am one week past transfer.  I am trying not to obsess about everything little thing, but as you all well know, it is hard.  I concentrate on the two beautiful 8-cells that we transferred and hope that they are burrowing away in me, so that I can carry them with me for the next 9 months.