Things I’m happy about and things I want to remember

I’ve been thinking about all of the random, weird, unrelated things that happened in the past couple of months that, all together, combined to make this month the lucky one. At the time, some of these things were completely not awesome and made me upset. Without them, however, things might not have turned out as they did. Without further ado:

• I had an HSG on September 10. It sucked and I hated it. Who knows, maybe I didn’t need ink pushed through my nether regions to clear out my tubes for try #4 to work. But maybe I did.
• My period refused to show her face for 33 days the month we took off from inseminating. Massively irritating at the time, but it led to two more good things:
• 1: The decision to continue with medicated cycles, because my body was clearly wonky and unable to regulate itself. Who knows; maybe I would have grown follicles without Femara. But maybe I wouldn’t have.
• 2: The timing made it so that the theoretically “ideal” time for insemination would be on a Sunday, the day that the fertility center is closed, meaning that we had to inseminate a day earlier than “ideal”. This one I know: SUNDAY WOULD HAVE BEEN TOO LATE. Which brings me to state the obvious:
• Thank god that our fertility center is closed Sundays. If we lived in a different sort of place (rather than the “you’re supposed to be at church on Sunday, so everything’s closed” sort of place), this might not be so. Again: seemingly obnoxious, but in actuality completely awesome.

All of these weird-ass things, individually, are ho-hum, and most of them are annoying, if not painful. However, when added up and taken together, they made the stars align. Knowing that so many bizarre things lined up at the same time makes me realize and appreciate how incredibly lucky I am to be pregnant right now. It’s all chance, it seems to me, and it’s only looking at them in retrospect that makes these things good.

Other things I’m happy about:

• We went with the 90/10 insurance option. Again, pure luck: we don’t have to worry about whether or not or how much the new insurance covers inseminating, and more of the birth-related costs will be covered.
• I got the H1N1 vaccine yesterday. CHECK.
• I have the wonderful advice of my medically aware family to rely on: my Dr. Dad told me NOT to go with University hospital, which he is familiar with, because it’s where a lot of people with major diseases and traumas go, so it’s more likely that bad bugs will be floating around the halls there. Also, new residents come in to University hospital in July. And when would I be delivering? That’s right–July. He said that even if the doctor in your practice is in the room, he or she might let a resident do the actual work of delivery. Oh HAYL no! He suggested going with a small, private hospital where a lot of babies are delivered, and to find a small ob-gyn practice within that hospital. That certainly narrows things down!

Things I want to remember:

• Walking the dog after work the Wednesday before I tested and talking to my sister on the phone about how upset I was that this try hadn’t worked. I had cramps and was weepy and frustrated and angry and mopey. Later that evening, I learned that she was coming down in mid November to celebrate her birthday. Now, I know she is excited to come here and we have plans to do a ton of fun stuff while she’s here, but I think she partially based her decision on a desire to cheer me up. Now, instead, we have two things to celebrate this weekend!
• What my chart looked like the one cycle I charted:

crazy-ass chart

(I took my temperature the day after the last one charted here. It was like 96.5. I ignored this, washed my thermometer and put it away, and that was the end of THAT.)

• Picking up some books for The Other at the library that she had on hold, and realizing that most of them were “mocktail” recipe books she’d requested so she could make me nice things to drink. Awww.
• My mom going on a business trip to Israel the day after we found out, and telling me when she got back that she put a prayer in the Western Wall for a happy, healthy baby. (tear)
• The dozen-plus years I spent post-PCOS diagnosis intermittently worrying that my body probably couldn’t allow me to get pregnant.
• How tiny my waist was. I should have taken more pictures.