Is There Anybody Out There?

 (One of my favorite Duran Duran songs, btw...)

Soooo....I was going through my bookmarks today and, lo and behold, this blog is still listed and out on Ye Old Interwebs.  Which is weird, considering the last post I had was apparently TEN YEARS AGO and it seems Blogger is like a dying T-Rex compared to what we use in terms of social media nowadays.  But, I did a deep dive/trip down memory lane and read through these old posts...wow, was I a whiny bitch!  I mean, not without cause, of course, but holy hell....it brought back a LOT.  The good,  the not so good (read:  fucking awful), and honestly some that are still fucking hilarious, even almost 15 years later.  Having a specially compounded progesterone suppository plop out of my whoo-ha and into the toilet when I stood up because I was stupid enough to insert it WHILE SITTING ON THE TOILET TO BEGIN WITH? Hilarious, I say! HILARIOUS! 

But, after reading all the shenanigans, I had to ask myself-what do I do with all this?  This started out as a diary for me-a way to preserve, for "posterity" the hard-fought journey to parenthood we had to take to create a human life that would hopefully be the best of the two of us.  It can't be discounted, or thrown away-it did happen.  Do I delete it all and forget?  Do I save it, maybe combine it into a site that documents what life has now morphed into?  Does anyone STILL read blogs at all, or even give a shit?

Since it's still obviously here, limping along, I figured, why not post something?  Maybe give the world a little update and test the waters to see who is still, in fact, reading or even checking this?  Who knows, perhaps some old dinosaur like me is actually looking for an update, unlike the most recent comments on my last post, which seems to be either spammers looking for me to CLICK THIS LINK, or are long comments in Russian, which could either be VERY indecent proposals or maybe spy encounters that could result in a visit from the local FBI office...but I digress.  Blame the perimenopause on that one.

If you're still on the playing field, here's what's been going on since I last was on here-I'll try to be brief, but well...if you're even slightly familiar with me that may be a 'lil hard to accomplish, but I'll try, to save your eyes from bleeding.  Can't make promises, though.

• We survived Hurricane Sandy (yeah, TOLD YOU it's been awhile).  The hubs lost his job not long afterwards (which royally sucked, but was a blessing in disguise because he was absolutely miserable), but they gave him a VERY generous severance package and also allowed him to file for unemployment, so financially it was status quo.  Except for the ACTUAL finding a job part, which wasn't working out so well.  He ended up applying in March of '13 for a great job in his field, and was offered the position but...it was in Florida, the Land of the Mouse.  1300 miles away.  We talked about it, and really, what was keeping us in NJ, besides our families?  And friends? And everything we knew and were comfortable with?  So we said fuck it, and threw caution to the wind, and moved to The Land of the Mouse.  Was it a good decision?  Ultimately, yes-it was a fresh start, one that looking back now was necessary.  Am I 100% happy here?  Not completely, but that's another post (if there is one, that is-jury is still out).  But, we ARE still together and and as happy as you can be when you've been married for almost 24 years (and together as a team for 29).  Is everything perfect?  HELLS NAH, SON.  But, he's my "person" and I wouldn't have it any other way-we've been through a lot together and made it through-a lot of people don't, so we're lucky.

• Due to the job change/relocation, we ended up living in the same city as my brother and his wife (who are now parents to three kids-MHN is going to HIGH SCHOOL next year, which is absolutely insane to me), and we live about 10 minutes away from each other, which is cool as hell because I get to see the kids all the time.  My parents followed us 18 months later with my grandmother-but grandma had to be put into assisted living because, frankly, it was too much for my dad to care for my mother AND his mother.  I got a teaching job in a charter school, HAAATED it (but met some awesome people who I'm still close with), got another job in ANOTHER charter school that made the first one look like Princeton, then moved to private, where I've been ever since. Yesterday was the end of my 23rd year in education, and, despite the ups and downs, I'm still hanging on.  Education has VASTLY changed, especially post-COVID (that's another whole conversation), and being in a state that doesn't really put education as a priority doesn't help, but at least in a private school I still have academic freedom.  And I met some kick-ass people, so that helps.

• We've had some kicks in the ass for a few consecutive years-my grandmother passed away in April 2016 (kidney failure), my father-in-law, unexpectedly, in June of the same year, which Sean took really hard (of course), and then my own mother in May of 2017, which is still something that I have a hard time discussing without wanting to break down into a hot mess.  Her cancer, which was never really curable, only treatable (as Ovarian cancer tends to do), and eventually, the treatments stop working.  She was admitted through the ER because she had fluid build up in her abdomen because of the metastasis of her disease, and was told by the oncologists that there was nothing more they could do, and she decided on hospice care-at that point, all she wanted was to go home.  We were able to do that for her, and she passed at 7:30 in the morning on May the 15th, the day after Mother's Day, with all of us there-we were able to thankfully have enough time to get her siblings here so they could say their goodbyes.  Dad was, understandably, devastated-they had just celebrated their 46th wedding anniversary the week before she died.  He lived in the house by himself until 2021, when we finally convinced him to sell the house and move in with us-he neglected his own health for years when taking care of my mother, and he wasn't really taking care of himself.  Dad was able to enjoy the last few years until he passed this past November (the 26th, the day after Thanksgiving), which started with a trip to the ER because he was having trouble catching his breath, and ended with him being diagnosed with late-stage emphysema, COPD and IPF (ideopathic pulmomary fibrosis), developing ARDS (if you're not sure what that is and want to look it up, trust me, dont-it sucks) after being transferred to the ICU and put on a ventilator, then being told that he wasn't going to survive off the vent.  Dad, being the person he was, asked for a pen and paper and wrote EVERYTHING down-where his will and the insurance policy paperwork was, and at the end wrote two words:  "pull plug".  He knew.  And he was tired. And missed my mother terribly-he was ready to be with her.  So, once we knew for sure, we honored his wishes.  I will say though...it was the hardest thing I've ever had to do-it makes all the years of fertility treatments look like a walk in the park. 

Tomorrow will be 6 months that he's been gone.  I still miss him every day.  It sucks that, as a grown-ass 50 something year old, I feel like an orphan, twisting in the wind, directionless.  I know, from my mother's passing, that grief will dull, eventually...but I'm definitely nowhere near there yet.  Maybe I never will, who knows.  But, I am grateful that I was able to take care of him, for a little bit.  He was happy, and didn't feel that crushing loneliness that I'm sure he did in the house where my mother died.  And, he quit smoking, finally-but too late to really help him at the end

So, now the update that I'M SURE YOU'RE SITTING ON THE EDGE OF YOUR SEAT FOR.  Was fertility treatment ultimately successful for us?  Did we say fuck it and adopt?  ARE THERE ANY CHILDREN OF OUR LOINS?

Well, no. No. Aaaand...no.  As of the last post, we were supposed to gear up for a shared donor cycle at BIC.  Then Sean lost his job and we moved, and well....it had to be put on the back burner.  And then we were living in an one-bedroom apartment for the first few years after we moved and didn't have space/time/money for self-pay donor IVF.  Then his dad passed and the estate had to be dealt with (PSA-PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU HAVE A WILL WHEN YOU DIE, for your family's sake. Thanks) Plus,  I'm at that point of my life where I need glasses to read and I'm eligible for a colonoscopy.  Even though I still have the sense of humor of a 13 year old boy (my average audience at work) who just heard an adult say the word "balls", in actuality I'm no young filly anymore.

In June of 2018, my reproductive system decided to do a big 'ol middle finger to me and I ended up with a burst tubo-ovarian abscess, and having emergency surgery to remove my left tube and ovary, as well as my appendix (hey, who needed them, anyway? GODDAMN SLACKERS.).  I had no pain, and no symptoms other than a fever for almost a week that I couldn't completely control with OTC pain meds.  I went to my PCP, and she did a blood draw and saw my white cell count was up to 30-a normal WBC is between 4.5-11. As soon as she got the results, she came in and informed me I was not going home and I was going to be admitted to the hospital, as something was very wrong-she managed to get me a bed that day and off I went for what ended up being a week.  It took them three days of tests, and every antibiotic thrown at me intravenously to figure out what was wrong (and to be honest, they STILL didn't know if I had an abscess or if it was a mass in my uterus-I had to sign paperwork that if it was malignant I'd be having an immediate total hysterectomy, so imagine the anxiety of all that as you're being put under)  Honestly, if it weren't for her, and the surgeon, I'd probably be dead-and I'm not being a drama queen-apparently I was septic by the time they got me into the OR.  The whole experience resulted in me getting BRCA testing due to family history (all negative, yay!) and a consult with an IVF clinic that is VERY well-known and reputable that have expanded to this area, just in case the test came up positive-that way we could do a DE cycle before getting rid of that old bitch of a uterus.  

The consult was....interesting.  It gave us a LOT to think about-especially that the doctor seemed to think that technology had advanced to the point that a cycle could actually work in our favor.  But, at that point I was 45-although there are people (some of them we know personally) who become parents at that age (and trust me, I'm NOT knocking them for it), I couldn't do it.  Partly, because I knew what it would take to get there, partly, because of the fear of another failure, but ultimately...I realized that I had made my peace with it. With being childfree.  Does it suck and do I wish it hadn't happened at all?  Sure.  But I can't change the past-I can only move forward.  My only regret is maybe that I didn't try so hard to use my own eggs , do Donor IVF sooner and then try to adopt, but that can't be changed at this point.

So, I'm sure you're wondering (if anyone is still here at this point...thanks if you are, because I'd have noped out about three paragraphs ago) why the hell am I posting today?  Why this follow-up?

About three years ago I was diagnosed with a pesky not-so-little condition called adenomyosis-it's sometimes called "endometriosis interna"-where the endometrial lining, instead of completely shedding, decides to burrow into the myometrium (the muscle wall of the uterus) and leave deposits of endometrial lining like a gopher on steroids, and grows and sheds monthly with everything else. It causes heavy bleeding (and I mean HEAVY), large clots (barf), awful pain that is pretty much all the damn time and, as it progresses, your uterus to thicken and enlarge.  It's as if endometriosis has a creepy emo teen sister that lives in the basement and only comes out every few weeks to put her dirty, crusty dishes that she's hoarded throughout the month under her bed, outside her door...and then shits on them before she goes back inside.  And, the perimenopausal train that's been happening since my first surgery in 2018, and the scar tissue that's accumulated, isn't helping with the pain OR the heavy bleeding.  It got to the point that the doctor prescribed something called tranexamic acid that actually gets my blood to clot so I'm not basically hemorrhaging every month.  The same thing that, interestingly enough, is used by military field medics (in powder form) to get battle wounds to clot so people don't bleed to death.  While I do feel a little like Andrew Garfield in Hacksaw Ridge when I pick it up at the local CVS, in reality, it's not a great medication to take long term due to the side effects, including making you more at risk for a blood clot in your lungs or legs; given that my mother had a stroke, that freaks me the hell out.  Also, did I mention that it eventually stops working as the disease progresses?  Yeah.  Found that out the hard way on Valentine's Day this year, when I basically had labor pains and "birthed" a clot about the size of my hand.  

My uterus is an asshole...I get THAT, instead of flowers or a card?  That rude bitch can go suck it.

At my GYN appointment in April (I'm a frequent flyer there at this point), I had an another ultrasound done that measured my uterus at about 13mm in size.  Which is about the size of a large orange/small grapefruit, I think.  She gave a few options (an ablation, which isn't ultimately effective; the Mirena IUD, but, given the size of my uterus, could end up being expelled...ouch), or hysterectomy.  Guess which one I chose?

I opted for the curative one-a total hysterectomy/right salpingo-oophorectomy.  Get rid of the whole damn thing. I mean, it's not like it's worked the way it's supposed to for all this time-why be miserable, especially when menopause may or may not relieve the symptoms?  Plus, the sense of relief of never having to worry that in a few short years I could develop the cancer that killed my mother, and my grandmother, overrode any fear or anxiety I might have over having the surgery to begin with. 

When in doubt, yeet it out.  Damn, I should make myself a t-shirt!

The surgery isn't going to be completely straightforward, considering the history-my poor GYN read out the operative notes during the appointment and looked horrified...shit, I WAS HORRIFIED when I realized how extensive the surgery was (by the way, you NEVER want to hear from your doctor that your insides looked "like somebody poured wet cement" into it...just sayin'.) and said that she didn't feel comfortable doing the surgery because of the risk (which I totally respect the hell out of her for saying).  She recommended that I consult with the GYN/Oncologist who did the emergency surgery in 2018 instead, who happened to share the office space with my doctor and is part of the same group (and also happened to be her Chief Resident in medical school, so she knows her personally and says she's the best).  I met with her two weeks later and we're scheduled for June 5th.  She's amazing and very thorough and I'm in good hands-when she walked in she said to me "you know, when I was prepping for our consult last night and looked at your name, it sounded familiar.  Then I read the report from the surgery andI remembered EXACTLY who you were!" Yay...I'm famous!  But, listen, if my surgery sticks out in her mind then she knows what she's gettting herself into, and she seems confident that we can get it out....through my, um, vagina apparently, which I was NOT expecting and was slightly grossed out about.  But, it's going to be a DaVinci (robotic) surgery, which was the way my first surgery happened, so I feel all Bionic Woman about it (and if you are STILL READING and don't know the reference, Google it. If you DO know, you're old enough for a colonoscopy).  And...it's considered an outpatient surgery, so I may be able to go home the same day, which I'm not sure I'm comfortable with, but even if I had to stay overnight it's still considered outpatient-I guess it depends on how long the actual procedure is and how long I'm in recovery.  It's up to me and my surgeon.  Oh, and I'm apparently getting a nerve block to my abdomen right before they close me up so I won't feel any pain for the first 24 hours after surgery, so that's cool.

Of course, there's always a chance that the adhesions are too extensive, which at point it would then be converted to an open incision (boo) and a 2-3 day inpatient stay, but she said that she's removed bigger uteruses (uteri?) and they've been able to come out through vaginally (cut into pieces that they then bag up and remove...again, slightly gross), so that's reassuring.  Either way, total recovery time is 6-8 weeks, so...happy summer to me?  As much as I don't want to recover from major surgery all summer, it's the only chunk of time I have where I don't need to go on disability and not have to worry about planning for a sub.  I'm looking forward to feeling SO much better once it's out-it's gotten to the point where I have "adeno belly" and I look pregnant-the irony is NOT lost on me with that one-and I can literally FEEL the heaviness of my uterus, like a bowling ball, inside my body.  Plus, once they add in HRT so I don't have the full "fun" of menopause symptoms, which I will officially be in once it's removed,  I'm going to have Hot Gurl Autumn once I get through Swole Gurl Summer-get ready, motherfuckers! 

T-minus 11 days until the uterus-aka The Great Yeeting of the Ute-is gone.  A fitting end to my reproductive years, don't you think?  Now, if that's not a dramatic ending, I don't know what is.  I'm already planning on giving it the double middle finger when they put me on the table, right before they push the happy juice.

So, the question remains-what to do with this diary of a large chunk of my life? And do I continue?  I don't have any answers as of yet, but something is brewing, so maybe I still need to so this.  I don't know.  Maybe it's irrelevant in modern times to "blog", when everyone is taking pictures of their food and posting them for the world to judge (or is that even too Millennial now?) or filtering every photo taken so they look like toddlers instead of being okay with what you actually look like?  Social media is so crafted now, and what you see online nowadays is definitely NOT reality.  So, does a blog like this have a place in that new world, or is it antiquated, like a landline?  Or, maybe something old can be something new again.  

It does need to be figured out, I suppose.  But, I guess if you ARE reading (and if you've read all this, you deserve a fucking gold medal at this point), thanks-you have no idea that the support I had on here (minus the trolls, but they're everywhere) meant so much to me when I wasn't in a great place...in so many ways that I can't really begin to articulate, even after all this time.  Hopefully, in a small way, this helped someone too-and they can pay it forward.