Friday, May 25, 2007

Leak Week

Cycle day 1 is here again,
The uterine highway is clear again,
So come sing along, we'll try again,
Cycle Day 1 is here again!

So, in honor of that annual tradition here in the Tri-State area called Fleet Week (where hundreds of hottie sailors roam the streets of NYC looking for a good time), I had my own dishonorable discharge, but from the Uterine Navy.

Yes folks, we've got bleeding! It started this morning, after the usual spotting/killer "progesterone is falling" headache last night. Oddly though, there isn't a lot of cramping or bloating, but that's a good thing.

How do I feel about this? I mean, since we actually made a go of having "baby making sex" this month? Surprisingly, I'm not really upset that my period is here. Really. Now, pick yourselves up off of the floor and check your panties for skids, because I'm not kidding. SERIOUSLY.

I really didn't expect it to work this month-not because I'm being all Miss Negativity and Doom and Gloom (which I'm good at, I know). But, I usually have ovulation pain, and I had it on my left side this month (the blocked side), and, since there's only a slight chance (around 5%) that an egg will migrate and be swept up into a good tube, I kinda had a feeling that the odds wouldn't be in my favor this month. So, we'll give it the good 'ol college try again this cycle, with the added bonus of using that handy-dandy digital fertility monitor that I have (once I can dig it out of wherever the hell it's cowering in fear)-I've forgotten how much I hate OPK's and the "is-it-or-is-it-not-a-surge" game. C'mon, you KNOW what I'm talking about-that little ritual where you hold the OPK up to the light source of your choice, squint at the stick and use quantum physics to determine whether or not the line is AS DARK OR DARKER than the control line. You end up looking like one of those Central Park painters who hold out their paintbrushes to "find the right angle" in their subject. You get the mental image, right?

I'm not devastated that it didn't work this month. I was contemplating doing another cycle this month (the last day to start stims at my clinic before they close is June 11th) and bypassing this TTC shit, but something is telling me to hold off one more month, to wait until they reopen in July. And, I'm okay with that-I need more time to relax, maybe lose a few more pounds, center myself a bit more, enjoy part of the summer IVF-free. And, I have to listen to that little voice more than I do, because it's most often right (which was another thing that the Tarot reader told me). I'm still feeling the good Va-jay-jay juju and all that. I just need to enjoy the good mojo feeling a little more, so I can figure out how to channel that into an IVF cycle. If it gets to another cycle, I mean.

And so, here I am-sitting on my parent's couch at the Jersey Shore watching bad daytime TV, with the dog sleeping next to me and waiting for my mother to come home from work to do a little retail therapy. Since we only used two of the allotted five snow days built into our schedule this year, our district gave us a little Memorial Day Break, with today and Tuesday off. So, I decided to drive down here after work on Thursday and go home tomorrow night, in time for church on Sunday. Then Monday at G&A's, and Tuesday to hang out at home. Then, we're in the home stretch with 17 days left of school (actually, only 10 full days of school and 7 half day sessions), and I'm officially on break, with my (hopefully not-so) fat ass in a bathing suit on the beach with a trashy novel.

Oh, yeah, and sex. LOTS of sex. Because life is for living, right?

Monday, May 21, 2007

A-Buh-Bye, Evil Eye!

I am, apparently, just about cured of the Xema. Today's findings in the water glass showed two drops of oil, along with a few smaller droplets floating on the surface of the water. I need to go one more time, then I should be evil-eye free!

Thank fucking GOD. I was beginning to think that I was seriously screwed there.

So.......wanna hear about my Tarot card reading? Huh? Do ya?

I left off in my tale with me hauling ass to the New Age shop for another bracelet (which is now FIRMLY lodged on my left wrist). While I was there I bought another one titled "miracles", because........well......I figured that it was good to hedge my bets, ya know? Plus, it was green and purple and SO cute....

Anyway, the store still looked open, and the sign was still up, so I opened the door, only to find out that they were, in fact, closed. I offered to come back the next day, but the owner said not to worry about it, since the register wasn't closed out yet. As I was buying the bracelet, she pointed out a new bracelet they got in, which was an "evil eye" bracelet (it kinda looks like this). I get a few emails from the store too, so I inquired about a reader that they were having the next day, and the owner told me that she JUST HAPPENED to have one appointment left in her schedule, so I snapped it up.

I showed up on Sunday and met the woman for the reading. Now, I'm not a Tarot-a-holic, so I'm not up on the specifics on how to read each and every card, but every card that she put out pointed toward a new opportunity for me, creatively, and that right now, whatever I want is within my grasp-all I have to do is focus my energy into it, and it's all mine. I did ask about the baby thing, and, after pulling more cards, she told me that I did have a good doctor and I was in the right place for things to happen. The cards did show me to be successful, but that I had to be patient. She also said that I needed to be more open spiritually and not let other people's negativity drag me down, especially at work. She felt that these negative thoughts might potentially affect my health in one way or another. She suggested sending petitions and anointing a candle and lighting it to the Archangel Raphael in regards to my infertility, so of course I left the store with those things firmly in my shopping bag (candle and oil, I mean).

Oh, yeah, and I need to take pleasure in more things in a creative way. And that my husband rocks. Can't get much better than that, right?



Now, here's some freaky shit that's just up Watson's alley. This happened about a week and a half ago, but I didn't have time to post it:

'Lil' Man (my BIL) called one night to talk to Sean, and, while they were bullshitting, he asked how/where we are in the babymaking process. Sean just said that we were gearing up for another cycle (not that we had the HSG or the results of that). 'Lil' Man then said that he had a very vivid dream the night before that I was pregnant and that we waited to tell people (he said because we were afraid to) until it was so obvious that we couldn't hide it anymore. He said that we knew the gender, but weren't telling anyone, and that it was so realistic it woke him up out of a sound sleep, and, for a moment, he wasn't sure if he had just dreamed it or if it really happened.

Freaky, huh? Can these signs all be pointing toward something?

Maybe. It's not to say that it will happen immediately, because I'm certainly not expecting it to. It's hard to explain, but lately I feel "lighter", less stressed out. Perhaps my mental state is attributing to it, who knows. But I really feel that all these things aren't coincidences, and that there is a light at the end of the tunnel for me, and that we will soon know the ending of this chapter.

Or else I'm a SERIOUS sort of crazy. Take your pick.

Sunday, May 20, 2007

Shit Storm

About a month or so ago, during Spring Break, I went to lunch with a friend, and afterwards we wandered up the street to find this little New-Age type store. We went in, and I ended up buying a Karma Bracelet, which was made of hematite. The woman behind the counter said that it would absorb negative energy from me and those around me, and, when it was "finished" absorbing that negativity, it would break.

Curiously, from the moment I put it on, I wasn't having such shitty days at work. The problem kids were actually pleasant to me. I got the good HSG results, we did the sexing numerous times and numerous ways.

No problems, right?

Until the bracelet broke on Monday night. I was taking it off when it got caught on my watchband and snapped-hematite beads rolling all over the hardwood floor.

On Tuesday, I had an issue with a student. Later that morning, he ran into me while going with his class into the cafeteria, promptly starting screaming that I "hit him", then threatened to slap me. All this, from a ten-year old. So, I had to deal with the aftermath of that, which meant dealing with the principal, the parent, suspension, did I want to PRESS CHARGES..........ergh.

Last night, the neighbors had a birthday party for their teenage daughter/step-daughter and all of her friends, and JUST HAD to blast House music and scream for about two hours. In surburbia, this is a definite no-no, so Sean had to get up and go next door and tell them to cut the shit out. So, let's just say that neighbor relations are not going well around here.

Now, the main sewer line in our basement has decided to back up onto the basement floor. It does drain, albeit slowly. Needless to say, we're currently waiting for a call from a 24-hour plumber, who will surely financially try to rape us for what I'm sure will end up being a simple15 minute job unclogging the drain to allow the yummy "soup" to go through the pipes and out to the street.

Oh, yeah......did I also mention that I'm in the 2WW, and I've been spotting/staining (not majorly, just on the toilet paper, or a slight stain on the panties) since Friday afternoon? Cramping, too. And, I'm not due for my period until Thursday at the earliest, so WHAT THE FUCK!?!?!?

Coincidence? Maybe. But I quickly hauled ass back to the store last night for a new bracelet, and other goodies. Better safe than sorry.

Stay tuned tomorrow for the next installment of "My Foray into New Age Mysticism-The Evil Eye Update, Guardian Angel candles and Tarot Readings Galore"-whee!


*Watson-I know that you totally live for this shit, so if you can drag your ass out of that first-trimester coma, have fun reading!

Thursday, May 03, 2007

PoonannyPalooza 2007

I've learned three important things during yesterday's coochie-fest:

1. Valium is the awesomist drug ever fabricated by mankind.
2. Do NOT take your mother to your exam and dildocam wanding and act as your official drive home person. Especially my mother-BAD idea. I'd rather eat lint out of my belly button.
3. Hydrogen peroxide is GREAT for removing blood from your white sports socks.


My mother (also known as the "designated driver") showed up at my house after 11 am due to nasty traffic on the Garden State Parkway, which put us running late. Since I know that she is the slowest person in the history of the state of New Jersey when driving, I offered to drive to Dr. Pipsqueak's office. Plus, I must confess, I wanted the opportunity to drive her bitchin' BMW X3. So, I spent the next twenty-five minutes or so with her nagging me that I was driving "too fast" and that she gets nervous when in the passenger seat. Short of pulling over on the highway and stuffing her ass in the trunk, we made it to the hospital in time, with me relishing the thought of taking that one Valium stashed in my purse.

Once I get there, Dr. Pipsqueak informed me that we weren't doing the saline sono, only an exam and a date with the dildocam, then the HSG. She leads me (and mom) into the room, where I strip down to my goodies and put on that oh-so stylin' robe they have. Nursey then comes in to take the vitals-height, and weight. I hem and haw, since I am seriously allergic to scales, so the nurse tells me to give a ballpark figure............so I blurt out: 140 lbs.

Only to hear my mother pipe up: "Wow, that's a LOT".

Then the conversation ensues:

"Well, didn't you USED to weigh like 110 lbs?"
"Yeah mom, in college, when I smoked and didn't eat. It's mostly boob weight, I guess"
"More like from the waist down. Your legs got big."
"Yeah, well mom, you shoot up fertility drugs and tell me if you don't gain any weight".
"Well, when you started teaching you DID gain a bit"
"Uh.....I'm on my feet all day, how would that happen?"
"Oh..........well, maybe it's muscle weight then......."

Now, mind you, this is going on while the nurse is trying to take my blood pressure. I still don't understand how it stayed low-I was sure that my head was about to explode.

Anyway, that part (with the exception of my mother's diarreha of the mouth) went well. I've got a couple of follicles happily buzzing away in the ovaries, the cyst on the left ovary is still there, but no larger, the usual. Then it was off to admitting in the main hospital for the HSG. I check in, get my pass, down the Anaprox and Valium and trundle down to radiology to start my trip to Shiny Happy Land. And, trust me, I didn't have to wait long for that.

The next thing I know my mother is calling my name to tell me that it's time to go-apparently, I fell asleep for about 10 minutes. Nice radiology nurse has to lead me down the hall, since I almost ran into the wall (whoops!). She hands me a gown, shows me to the bathroom and tells me to remove everything from the waist down, but I can leave my socks on. As I leave the bathroom, Dr. C shows up and asks how I am, at which point I tell her that I'm in my happy place (which got a laugh).

I get settled up onto the table (NO stirrups, just some towels to prop up my butt, and my legs in the "frog position"), they put in the speculum and explain the whole procedure. Then, Dr. C warns me that the injection of Lidocaine is about to be administered.

Holy motherfucking OUCH! That shit sobered me up, let me tell you. But, then the catheter was inserted and I thankfully felt nada. And then, the dye was injected, which was bearable but not entirely comfortable. Turned to the left, turned to the right. It was done in less than 10 minutes. Everything was pulled out, and Dr. C warned me that perhaps I might need to change my socks when I got home, since when they pulled everything out they got splattered---great. Then she told me that she would go over the results with the radiologist and Dr. Pipsqueak, but also reviewed the films with me right then and there on the screen.

My left tube is blocked. It looked like a sausage at the bottom where the dye collected. I was told that normally they would remove the tube to prevent the fluid from washing back into the uterus, but since they've never seen the hydro during the stim cycle that perhaps they'd leave it alone, but couldn't give me a definite answer either way. Honestly, if it's crap, take it out, and the ovarian cyst on that side right along with it. Hmmm.....perhaps that "cyst" is part of the hydro?

And the right one, which wasn't visualized on the first HSG and was assumed to be a proximal blockage?

Open. Completely and utterly open. The dye passed easily through and into the abdominal cavity. She even suggested that we try on our own, since an HSG tends to slightly increase pregancy rates.

I was in shock. I started to cry right then and there. I tried to apologize, but I told her that we basically stopped trying on our own, since we were told many times that there was no reason to. She pointed to the screen, then took my hand and said to me, "Well, you do definitely have a shot on your own-you only need one good tube, so why not try?"

Why not? Perhaps the xematiasma is working and the curse is slowly being lifted.

It gave me hope that perhaps this will work out for me, after all.

Wednesday, May 02, 2007

Xematiasma

It seems, people, that there is a reason for my troubles. And it's fucking weird as hell, so strap yourselves in for this one.....

Friday afternoon I got a phone call from a friend I teach with (she teaches art in my school). (Just a little background-she's been out on child rearing leave since she had her son back in September, and started working again yesterday). She told me that she had to take her son to the doctor that morning, and her mother tagged along, and that my name came up in conversation. Her mother asked how long we were trying to get pregnant, blah blah blah...........and then she told her daughter that she thought that perhaps I had "the mati" and she wanted to see me to find out by doing something called the "
xematiasma".

Now, for anyone out there who has no idea what I'm talking about, it's the Greek version of the "evil eye". We Italians call it "malocchio", and it's a common belief in Meditteranean and Middle Eastern cultures. When I was a kid it was a common thing in my mother's family-it was said that if someone "overlooked you" (ie. coveted you or something of yours) they could give you the evil eye. Many times, when I had a horrible headache or didn't feel well, my grandparents would say that I had "the eyes", then they would take a possession of mine, and say prayers over it to get rid of it. I distinctly remember watching them do if for people (the affected person doesn't have to be in the room, by the way), and as they silently said the prayers, their eyes would start to stream with tears, they would yawn incessantly, and do that dry spitting thing that Nia Vardalos made famous in her movie. So, the point is, once my friend explained what the mati was I knew exactly what she was talking about, and I didn't think she was nuts..

So, what did I do, you're wondering. Well, I booked my ass over there with her yesterday afternoon after school to see her mother. And it was the freakiest thing EVER.

She came out into the living room with a glass of water and some olive oil on a spoon. Then, she made the sign of the cross (Orthodox version, of course) three times, said a silent prayer, made the sign of the cross again three times. She then dipped her pinky finger into the oil, and dropped the oil into the water. Then she repeated it three times.

Now, all you science people out there-what happens when you place a drop of oil into a glass of water? It floats on the surface, right? Well, each time she did that , the oil dropped into the bottom of the glass, and stayed there. STAYED THERE. Weird, right? The last time, just to show me, she did it to herself, and the drop of the oil floated on the surface of the water. As she went through the ritual, she kept saying "Oh, my God", then said something to my friend in Greek.

Apparently, I have the evil eye. Bad. I have to go back two more times for her to do it again.

Now, realistically I know that it can't be possible, but you know what weirder shit has happened. And, it's not altogether implausible that someone's bad thoughts or malicious intentions can affect another person. But make them infertile? Huh?

So, after this weirdness I called my mother to tell her about this, and she ACTUALLY AGREED. My mother then tells me that she's convinced that someone put a fattura on me (it means "spell" in Italian) and she's almost positive she knows who it is.

Here's where the story get's weirder, like sicko weird-so bear with me.

My mother is convinced that my father's grandmother put the fattura on me as a child. When I was really small (from birth to about 6 years old) we lived with my father's grandmother's house (she lived downstairs, we lived upstairs). She wasn't a nice woman (she was a midwife), really-the little I remember of her she was constantly yelling and screaming at us, and telling our parents that we were horrible children. Anyways.........when I was six or so we moved out of that house to another town to live in my mother's grandmother's house, in Orange, NJ. My father's grandmother apparently told her daughter-in-law (my dad's mother) "Go ahead, let them move there.........and I hope S gets raped when they're there, too!" Nice, huh? My mother said that, ever since that day, our family has had bad luck.

I called my friend last night to talk to her about it, and relayed what my mother said about my great-grandmother and the fattura. She then got freaked out and said, "well, didn't you hear what my mother said?". I told her that they were talking in Greek (which she didn't realize). She then said that her mother told her, "She's got it bad. It's really old, and been there for LONG time". She said that her mother is CONVINCED that this is the reason I can't get pregnant.

Even Sean, who said that he "neither believes or disbelieves" this, said that it's entirely possible.

So, the upshot is that I've been cursed, probably by my evil great-grandmother, and I'm going this week to my friends Greek mother to get it removed.

Yeah.

I'll let you know how it plays out. So, if anyone out there knows how to remove a curse, please let me know-I'd like to hedge my bets, if you know what I mean.

Now, I'm off to PoonannyPalooza 2007 (saline sono and HSG day-hooray!). If I'm not too fucked up from Captain Valium and the Anaprox, I'll be back later to update you on that hot steaming pile of mess.

Hell, who am I kidding-I'll post later..........just for the sheer entertainment value of blogging on meds. I'm sure you all will be amused, anyway.