Good News, Bad News

I have needed some dental work done for a while, but I was in the process of switching dentists, and after finally getting my initial appointment a while back, I learned it was actually only a consultation. They told me over the phone that it would be a few more weeks after the initial consult before they could actually see me. I thought this meant I was many weeks if not months from being able to get the dental work done. But when I went in today for the initial consult, the dentist did the necessary work right then and there! Good news! I need to go back in a few weeks, but it looks like I'm fixed up for now. As long as everything is good in a few weeks, I'll be all set.

And more good news. . .my doctor ran bloodwork last week, and it came back fine. She also thought I might have a kidney infection, but the urinalysis came back fine, too.

But it can't be all good news. . .my doctor also thinks the digestive issues are no longer due to a bacterial infection, but because the bacterial infection has caused a long-dormant chronic problem to flare up. I have to go see a GI specialist, which is probably going to mean a boatload of icky tests. And I'm still on another two weeks of "just in case" antibiotics. I refuse to make any final decisions until I see the specialist, but it looks like TTC is going to be back on hold indefinitely.

Moving On

The pity party is over. My doctor was right. I AM lucky. And if I needed any proof of that, I need only look around a little. Today's minor setbacks for me are just that. . .little bumps in the road. And I will eventually move right past them and forget they ever existed. I am thankful for that.

Yet Another Doctor

I went back to my GP yesterday about the GI issues. She took blood, did a urine screen (I might also have a UTI--isn't it FUN to try something new and different!), gave me a stool card, put me on antibiotics for TWO MORE WEEKS, AND referred me to a GI specialist. As a prize, I got a bandaid advertising Gardisil. It seems like I should've at least qualified for the plastic model of genital warts, after all of that, but all I got was the crummy advertisement. The nurse didn't even have the decency to laugh when I joked about getting a piece of the action for wearing HPV vaccine advertising on my body. Later on, the doctor also told me I should feel lucky that my condition isn't worse. Yes, it was just another fine day in the medical neighborhood.

I don't think I have high standards when it comes to my medical professionals. I want them to a) correctly diagnose my problem, and b) treat me in a way that improves my health. I don't expect my doctor to give me her home phone number, hug me, or taking me shopping when I'm feeling down. I know there are children starving in Africa and people with health plights much worse than mine. So you can call me selfish and needy if you want, but I just don't find it helpful to have a doctor tell me I should feel lucky that I'm not worse when I feel like crap. When I rhetorically ask why the universe hates me, as I am wont to do when I haven't been allowed to drink for weeks, work is overflowing on my desk, and I'm feeling lousy, please don't take this as an actual question that needs answering, and please don't do so in the tone my father reserved for lectures about my curfew. Please just smile understandingly--indulgently, even--and pull out the prescription pad or tequila bottle, as the situation may warrant.

Enough whining. In other news, we have been scrutinizing The Map every night in bed. We have come up with a list of countries that we either a) really would like to visit, or b) are simply intrigued by, and we want to know more about. Here's the list so far:

1. The US by RV
2. Central America
3. Brazil
4. Hawaii
5. The Galapagos Islands
6. Tanzania
7. Madagascar
8. Greece/Turkey/Croatia
9. Sweden/Finland/Norway/Denmark
10. India
11. Vietnam
12. Bali
13. Australia
14. Fiji
15. Japan
16. Egypt

We will be limited by cost, and also by the fact that I refuse to go anywhere cold. Given that the trip will fall somewhere between November and February, this immediately shortens the list. I haven't yet told Terrific T that I refuse to go anywhere cold. He likes the cold, but I'm sure I can win him over with my enormous charm and constant whining.

Fear

Every once in a while, I become absolutely terrified at the idea of becoming a parent. Last night was one of those nights when I awoke in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, only to then be inexplicably seized by the fear that perhaps I am a fool to want to do this. Perhaps I would be messing up a perfectly good life by having a child. Perhaps I will be a terrible mother. Perhaps it won't at all be what I thought. Perhaps I would be happier without children. Perhaps, perhaps, perhaps. . .

Admittedly, I have a log of baggage about this topic. I grew up believing that my mother was tied to a marriage that didn't suit her because of a lack of education and thus career options, and because she believed her children were better off growing up in a two parent home, no matter how dysfunctional the primary relationship within it. It is therefore not surprising that I've spent the last 15 years voraciously pursuing my career, and married a man who everyone believed was so utterly different from me that it could never possibly work. . .and yet it does, because we are wildly in love with one another even a decade later. It has taken me the better part of a decade and a half to realize that I am NOT my mother, and that my assumptions about why she stayed in her marriage are also probably not true.

But, even as I've come to recognize that my life, my career and my marriage can be whatever I want them to be, even as I've realized that I am really not my mother, I am still afraid sometimes. I grew up believing that she was trapped by us. It seems unlikely this was true. . .it is far more likely that she was trapped by her own inability to make her own needs known to all of us who loved her. (And I definitely don't have THAT problem!)

Yet the fear persists sometimes that I will feel trapped by my choices, and that I will be a poor parent because of it. Does everyone have secret fears that they will be inadequate as parents, that they might have regrets, that having a family won't be everything they hope, or am I just hopelessly scarred by my own journey into this?

Waiting sucks even more. . .

I've been assuming that we will be back TTC in May. But you all know what happens when we ASSume!

I've been back on antibiotics for this stupid digestive thing for almost two weeks. The universe clearly hates me, because I am still not better. I talked to my regular doctor today, and she wants to see me again. She is talking two MORE weeks of antibiotics, and maybe a specialist appointment. Can I not catch a break??? While I would like to have a normally functioning digestive tract again, I would also like to make a baby, please. Is that too much to ask???

I likely won't ovulate for three more weeks, anyway, so if I respond to the antibiotics over the next two weeks, I suppose it's theoretically possible that I won't be out this next cycle. Yeah, right.

Waiting sucks

I called my doctor's office yesterday morning (thanks to the people who posted--you prompted me into it!). When I told the nurse how short my LP was and how late I've been O-ing, she agreed that something seems off and scheduled me for an appointment. Unfortunately, my doctor is "beyond popular" as she put it, and didn't have a single appointment until May 14.

This isn't the kind of appointment I want to have with another doctor in the practice. I love my doctor. She's the only reason I'm still with that practice. It pains me to think that I might have to deliver with one of her colleagues (there are many of them, but the two I've met are DOUR). But, I'll cross that bridge when I manage to actually get knocked up again. Anyway, that left me with May 14 as my only option. Suckage--I started a new cycle today. I wish I'd made the appointment weeks ago. I am an idiot.

Luteal Phase Problem?

I have weird issues about doctors. I was raised to believe that you only go to the doctor when you're in dire straits. So, unless I have an actual, real, tangible problem (ie, I've got a broken bone that's protruding through the skin), I'm reluctant to go. Unfortunately, I will admit that I'm neurotic on the best of days, and sometimes I can't decide whether something is worthy of going to the doctor about. I waffle about whether I have an actual problem, or I am making a mole hill into a mountain because I am crazy. . .I mean, neurotic.

My most recent issue is whether I have a luteal phase problem. I have been both temping and using the CBEFM, so I am quite certain of the ovulation days. Here are my stat's:

1st cycle off BCP: 33 day cycle; O'd on day 21; 11 day LP
2nd cycle: O'd on day 22; Pregnant; miscarriage at 8 weeks; D&C 8/07

I didn't get my period for three months after the D&C, until 11/13/07.

3rd cycle: 29 day cycle; O'd on day 21, 8 day LP
4th cycle: 41 day cycle; O'd on day 28; 13 day LP
5th cycle: 27 day cycle; O'd on day 16; 11 day LP
6th cycle: 31 day cycle: O'd on day 21; 10 day LP
7th cycle: 33 day cycle; O'd on day 23; 10 day LP

I guess if I'm thinking this much about it, I should talk to my doctor about it. If anyone out there has any thoughts in the meantime, I'd love to hear them.