Drum Roll Please

Merry Christmas!!!

We all know Christmas is a time for friends and family and giving and caring and being thank full and Jesus is in there somewhere and yadda, yadda, yadda, yadda.  Insert sentiment here.  I do love the holidays.  And I do enjoy spending time surrounded by the people I love.  But lets be real here, the gifts are pretty cool too.  I love watching people open gifts.  Even when they aren't from me.  There is something about that initial reaction that is just so...honest.  I love that.  It is in that spirit that I give you, The Top Five Christmas Gifts of 2012.  Drum roll please.

Number Five:

The Redneck Wine Glass.  Every year the department I work for does a Secret Santa.  This year one of the gifts I received at the big reveal was what I have dubbed, The Redneck Wine Glass.  While I can't claim to be a true Redneck, I have some pretty strong tendencies.  That's probably why my Secret Santa knew this would be PERFECT for me!  Did I mention my Secret Santa was our department Vice President?...?..? I'm not sure if I should be embarrassed about the impression I must be leaving on my co-workers or excited because apparently she's cool with it...

Number Four:

A Cane Sword.  About a year ago, my Father In-law, Joe mentioned he would like to own a cane sword.  No he does not use a cane.  I tucked that little nugget away in the back of my brain and this year guess what Santa put under the tree?  A Cane Sword with his name on it.  He freaked.  It was awesome.  I am awesome.

Number Three:

Every year a group of our friends get together to celebrate the Holidays.  Part of our celebration is a white elephant gift exchange.  I'm telling you, every year these gifts get a little more awesome.  This year one of my favorite gifts was a set of Ninja Throwing Stars.  What, your friends don't bring weapons to gift exchanges...?...?  You should have seen the Samurai Sword.

Number Two:

"Cup of Joe" coffee mug.  This is a mug I got from my Sister In-law.  We'll call her Sunflower.  Who is that goofy dude, you ask?  That is my Father In-law.  Whose name, as I said before, is Joe.  I think the picture speaks for itself. 

       

Number One:

The lab results are in.  Captain says we have an egg!  Thank you Ovaries for your cooperation.  Best Christmas gift ever!  Now we have something to work with.



Day 3 - Holy crap!

This is the conversation I had with my husband while getting ready to head out the door to go to the doctor for my Day 3 blood work:

Him:  You sure you don’t want me to go?

Me:  It’s just a blood draw I’ve done about a million.  Don’t worry about it, I’ll be fine.

Him:  You sure?  You look nervous.

Me:  Because they HURT and I HATE them.  You’d think with as many as I’ve had lately they wouldn’t bother me anymore.

Him: Yeah.  You’d think. <<Heavy sarcasm>>

And that ladies and gentlemen is when I punched him in the face.  OK, I didn’t but I maintain that it would have been justified!!

Let’s back up a little.  Day 3 blood work is a blood panel that measures three different hormones and uses your levels to evaluate your fertility.  If you want to know more about it, google it.

So I get to the doctor, and what I thought was going to happen is that the cute little blood draw lady, we’ll call her Nancy, would stab me in the arm, take what she wanted, bandage me up, and send me on my way.  Then a nurse would tell me that once the doctor had reviewed the results she’d call me and tell me what to do next.  I assumed there would probably be some charting, maybe more blood work in a week or something no big deal.  This is after all, only the first month.  People, I was wrong.  W. R. O. N. G.  WRONG. 

Nancy did her thing and then Captain ordered me to have a ultra sound.  I have a wonderful doctor.  She is a tinny woman full of large contradictions.  She has the disposition of a drill sergeant but still manages to show she cares.  She's strait to the point, doesn't sugar coat anything, and quite frankly a bossy pants.  Somehow though, she's still has a warmth about her.  I call her Captain.

I asked her if everything looked good on my ultra sound and she laughed at me.  That's right, she LAUGHED at me! 

Then she says, "Oh, Honey.  Yours will never look GOOD."  I think she says things like this for my reaction.  It always works.  She assured me that everything looked as she expected and then asked if I was ready to start. 

To which I replied "What are we waiting for?  I aint getting any younger!" Stupid me.  All full of gusto, ready for her to tell me to pee on sicks or take my temperature.  Stupid naive me. 

"Great!" she replies, "We'll start you on one vial a day."

"WHOA, WHOA, WHOA!" I said.  "That does not sound like something I put in my mouth!"  Again, she laughed at me.  Out came the vials, needles, and instructional DVDs.  I tried not to shit my pants.  Long story short, I have to inject my self once a day with drugs to help develop my eggs.  I go back in a few days for more blood work and another ultra sound to see if they are "ready".

Speaking of blood work, I'm sure you are all dying to know my test results.  Everything came back normal.  YAY I'M NORMAL!!  FIRST TIME EVER!!  "Why all the needles then?" you ask.  I guess because Captain doesn't jack around.  I asked her for a baby and dammit she plans on giving me one ASAP.  I love her. 

So until my next appointment I'm going to try not to be a weenie while stabbing myself in the thigh on a daily basis.  Also, I'll try not to punch my husband in the face.

Let me tell you more about what this AINT!

I realized after I went back and read my first blog post that I might have left the wrong impression.  I have no intention of turning this tinny corner of the internets into a place where I go to whine.  Despite that first post I promise, I am very lucky.  I have a great life and I’m thankful every day for the blessings in it. 

So, let me tell you more about what this aint.  In bullet form.  Because I love bullets.

• This blog isn’t for the faint of heart.  Let’s face it people, life is graphic.  This blog is about my life and to be frank, for the last several months and for the next several months, my life has and will revolve largely around my lady bits.  Sorry.
• You will not be educated by reading my posts.  This is not a medical forum.  Notice my use of the term lady bits.
• This blog will not be monitored by the grammar or spelling police.  In fact sometimes I make up my own.  Grammar and Spelling.  I do my best to self-edit but I’m not great at it.  Hell, I sent out our Christmas cards this year with a spelling error on them and I didn’t even notice.  There were five words on the dam cards.  One of them was my name.  Still, I did not catch it.  Also, I’m told I have a touch of The Dyslexia.  So bear with me.  Also, I like commas.  A lot.
• It's not all about me!  There are some real characters in my life and they are hilarious.  I wouldn't want to deprive you of the comedic genius that comes from the people I love.  To protect the innocent they will all be given pseudonyms.  Chosen by me.  Because no one gets to choose their own nick names.  I certainly didn't pick Larri.
• There will be flashbacks.  OK, I lied in my first post.  This blog wont only be about looking forward.  Quite frankly my past is pretty dope.  I've done some cool shit.  I've thought about starting a blog at least a dozen times.  Mainly because I wanted a place to keep all my "stories".  Now that I've finally done it, there are a few things from my past that I think are worth a blog post or two.  Or forty.

Now that we've discussed what this mess wont be, lets see what it becomes!  Honestly, your guess is as good as mine!  Check back tomorrow for the results of my Day 3 blood work...

Day 1

I suppose any woman who’s ever tried to get pregnant is familiar with “Day 1”.  For those who have yet to begin this journey or for whose pregnancies were a surprise, Day 1 is the first day of your period.  Or as my Reproductive Endocrinologist puts it “your first day of bright red blood”.  SICK.  Today is my Day 1.  Sorta.

Day 1 for me was really May 11^th.  I found out I was pregnant for the first time when I peed on a stick the morning of May 11^th.  To say it was a surprise would be an understatement.  But maybe it shouldn’t have been.  It was only 6 days before my 30^th birthday and my husband and I were less than a month away from our 4^th wedding anniversary.  To say that prospective grandparents were getting antsy would be another understatement.  I guess god was getting antsy too because he decided it was time.

As I stood in our bathroom, pee stick in hand, screaming for my husband, I had no idea what a blessing god had given us.  And as he tried to contain his excitement while reminding me to breathe my husband could never have predicted what the next several months had in store.  If you got your calendar out or did some quick math you might have already figured out that my pregnancy didn’t end the way all pregnancies should.  I miscarried at ten weeks.

But that’s another story.  A story that was too private for me to share at the time.  I thought about it.  But I just couldn’t.  So this isn’t that story.  Bits of it will show up here, but for the most part this blog will focus on our journey forward.  So, here we go.

This is my Day 1.