Goodbye old friend.....I will miss you

A year ago Sunday I found out for the very first time in my life that I was pregnant.  It was the happiest I've been outside of adopting my son and marrying my husband.  Now I'm so grateful for the few precious weeks I have with my baby.  I can honestly say I don't regret that transfer for a second.  God blessed me with 2 babies even though they had to go to Heaven.

This year on Sunday was a sad day.  Not because I mourned the loss of my babies, but be cause I mourn the loss of a very dear friend.  Gary was a great friend, co-worker, and Father figure.   We had alot of great times together over the last 13 years.  Today I was reading a poem written about him by another co-worker and I was remembering all the stories he told and funny things he said.  He was such a character and someone who really taught me to lighten up and not take things so seriously.

We were so close that outside of my immediate family, the person I called first when I found out I was pregnant was Gary.  He was SO happy for me.  He saw me go through the struggles of infertility and adoption.  He retired a few years ago, but we always kept in touch and got together with my other co-workers as often as we could.

Gary had a massive heart attack that took his life Sunday afternoon.  I am having a hard time realizing that he's really gone.  It all feels like a bad dream.  I want to wake up and call my friend Gary.  Gary chose to be cremated.  He wasn't a religious man for the most part and so he didn't want a funeral or a service or anything.  His wife decided to have a memorial service anyway.  That won't be for another couple weeks though.  HOW am I supposed to go?  HOW am I to face the reality that he's gone?  I don't know, but I have to do it.  Even though Gary would be cursing us for attending a service for him, I have to go.

I just wish he would have stayed with us longer.  He was only 65.  Work parties just won't be the same without him.  Who am I going to call when I need someone to listen to me and not judge me?  Who's going to call me late in the afternoon to tell me some crazy movie that's on that I could care less about.  While annoying sometimes, I'll miss that.  I'll miss all his stories about the places he had worked and things he had seen.  Gary was more than a co-worker, more than a friend.  He was family.

I'll miss you old friend......

Just an update

Wow!  It's hard to believe it's been a month since I last posted to this blog.  Alot has been going on in our personal lives and I've just not taken the time to sit down and type.

Zach's party went well.  He got lots of cool things.  He and his friends went swimming and had cupcakes and ice cream.  All was well.  My mother in law did come (I invited her.  I either have a big heart or I'm just crazy).  For the most part she acted nice.  As nice as she could be at least.  That is until she was leaving.  Then she decided to start stuff with Greg.  Much to my surprise Greg put her in her place and sent her on her way.  So all in all a great party.  I still can't believe my baby is 9.

The same weekend AF started and didn't leave for a whole week.  She was NOT nice to me either.  Full flow and very painful the whole time.  I'm just glad she finally came (and finally left) and hopefully now I can get back on schedule.  Also that weekend I got the bill for the storage of our embryos.  UGH!  What a weekend that was.

I'm still not sure I want to do another transfer.  I've been trying my best to find another route, but none seem to work for us.  I know at some point I'm going to have to just give in to God's will.  I normally don't have alot of trouble with that, but this time, the fear of my heart getting broken again is keeping me from moving forward with another transfer.  The money is not there for us to go yet so I've been able to use that excuse for a little while, but in another couple of months we WILL have the money and then I'm going to have to face my fear I guess.  Knowing this is God's will for my family and knowing it's what I'm supposed to do, but having this horrible fear of another miscarriage is NOT good.  I know I'll go back to CA one last time, fear or no fear, but how do I focus on staying positive when I REALLY don't want to do this.  All I know to do is just pray, pray, pray that these next embryos will be very strong and able to make it no matter how much their Mommy worries that they won't.

It bothers me that I see almost all the original bloggers I followed last year have either had their babies or are about to have them.  Makes me SO sad.  We dealt with infertility years ago and then ended up adopting our precious son.  Now to be dealing with it yet again feels like we just started all over.  I hate the feeling of being a failure.  I know that it's not my fault, but when you have not one, but two miscarriages, it's hard to question what you did wrong.

On a happy note, my boss offered me a new position Friday.  He asked me to be the SUPERVISOR over my department!!!!!  I said yes!!!!  I am thrilled and nervous all at the same time.  I've worked with these guys for a long time.  Some for as much as 10 years.  Still I'm nervous about how they will feel having me as their boss instead of co-worker and how I'll handle being their boss when we have to deal with the tough issues that come up sometimes.  On the other hand I think it's a great opportunity for me and I never dreamed that at 33 years old that I'd be a supervisor at my company.  I was a supervisor at Kro.ger when I was a teenager, but that's nothing like this.

Now that my professional life is moving up I pray that my personal life (or more my personal feelings) will get better too.

Just rambling and my baby boy turning 9

It's been MONTHS since my last transfer (March to be exact) and I have yet to see a full flow period.  Until I put my body through hormone hell I was as regular as clock work.  Now I have a little here and a little there.  I found a couple of weeks of birth control I had left from my first transfer so I decided to take it and see if after I stopped if it would force my body into a regular period.  I have two more days of active pills so we will see soon I hope.

My weight is staying within the same few pounds.  No matter what I do I can't seem to lose weight.  I was doing low carb for a while and although my clothes didn't feel as tight, I didn't lose a single pound.  :~(  I've fought my weight my whole life, but usually I could lose weight if I changed this or that.  Now....not happening.

As for transfer plans I'm still struggling to get excited about going again.  I just really don't want to go anymore.  I keep saying that over and over in my posts, but it's honestly the truth.  My desire to get pregnant is gone.  As for more children, I still would give anything to have just one more child, but I can finally say I'd also be ok if we were just a family of three.  Zach wouldn't like that so much though.  He wants a sibling SO bad.  It makes me sad for him.

We are still working to pay off the money that was spent on our A/C unit.  I can't complain because I'm so blessed to even have A/C, but it is taking us a while to pay it off.  Until it's paid all mention of transfers is on hold.  Greg asked the other day when we would be going back to CA.  I told him it's not even something I want to talk about until we have the A/C unit paid off, but my goal is to be able to go back end of September or October.  We will see how that works out.....

My baby boy will be celebrating his 9th birthday next week.  While I love watching him grow up, I'm also sad to see him grow up.  I so vividly remember the first time I got to hold this little tiny 9 month old baby.  He could barely sit up and didn't crawl much.  Just the tiniest little thing.  I NEVER thought he'd grow.  LOL  Now he's about 4' 4" and probably 55-60lbs and almost NINE YEARS OLD.

Some time away....now back to reality

We took a spur of the moment trip to St. Louis this weekend. We had enough points (from all my nights in CA) that we were able to stay at the Hampton Inn for free. Other than getting lost MANY times, we had a great time on our mini-vacation. We went to the City Museum. I have to say it was one of the neatest places I've been in a long time. Just all sorts of things to explore there. We then went to the Wax Museum. It was pretty neat. Not the best I've seen, but not bad either. Today we went to the Magic House. That was ok. A few neat things there. We also stopped to see the Big.foot monster truck. Zach was really impressed with how big it was. On the way home we had dinner at Lambert's. It's the home of the thrown rolls. It was Zach's first time and he loved it. He said "This place is CRAZY!"


We had a scary moment during our trip and it made me realize how precious life is. We were about 30 miles outside of St. Louis, headed home. Greg was driving and I was looking at pictures on the camera and thinking about all the fun we'd just had. Next thing I know I feel this hard bump and when I look up we are headed across the median and just a few feet from going into oncoming traffic. All I remember is screaming at the top of my lungs. Greg steered us back into the middle of the median and came to a stop. We were going about 70 miles an hour and Greg had all of a sudden fallen asleep. He wasn't complaining of being sleepy or I'd have taken over. It was probably the most scared I have EVER been. I still can't talk about it without crying. We came SO close to either losing our lives or being horribly injured. Thank GOD we are ok.

Greg got back on the interstate and took the next exit. Once I stopped shaking we traded places and I took over driving the rest of the way. Poor Greg was SO upset with himself. He just kept shaking his head and looking out the window. He was REAL shook up too. Zach handled it well. He didn't get upset. All he wanted to know is if we could have died.

It really made us all hug each other a little tighter tonight. How we avoided hitting someone or something OR rolling over our truck I will NEVER know. Only thing I DO know is that God was protecting us today.

So anyway, it was nice to get away and have some time as a family of 3. Now it's back to reality and back to saving our money.

Preparing My Body

We are pretty sure we will be going back to CA in September (October that the latest).  So in the meantime I've been getting my body back in shape.  I gained probably 30lbs in the last year and a half since we started doing all the shots and stuff for our very first transfer.  If I'm not really careful with what I eat I gain weight very easy.  (Thank you SO very much PCOS.  NOT!)  Since I'm on hold for another transfer I figured it was high time I got this weight back off and get the scale moving in the right direction again.

This week I started a low carb/ high protein diet.  I'm following my own plan.  It's not like Atkins or anything like that.  I'm eating little to no bread, pasta, etc.  Instead I'm eating lots of lean meats, fish, and chicken along with having a protein shake every afternoon.  I've done a low carb diet before and after about 3 days my body is SO tired.  I know it's all due to the carb withdrawals.  I'm going through that today, but I also know that after a couple days like that then I'll have tons of energy and feel so much better.  I already feel less bloated.

So for the next 3-4 months I'm going to focus on eating better and getting at least some form of exercise 3-4 days a week so I can get these extra pounds off and be healthier for when we get ready to transfer my babies.  =) 

A few less things to worry about

It looks like somethings around my house are looking up finally.  =)  As I type the A/C guy is on his way to install me a brand new unit.  YAY!!!  Praise the Lord!!!  Thanks to the help of my wonderful parents who loaned me half the money, we are able to have the new unit put in.  Now of course I'll need to pay my parents back, but with my bonus check I get in July I should be able to pay them back next month.

I also contacted Dr. K's office about the letter I got from my insurance that stated that they needed some sort of codes to process my request for reimbursment.  The lady at Dr. K's office said she would refile it for me and when they got the money they would send me a check!!!!  Woohoo!!!  That should be about $1500-$1800 we get back.  =)

We finally got our pool water cleared up.  It's been cloudy looking since we filled it up and I hadn't been able to figure out what was wrong.  I was getting really frustrated.  Well come to find out my sweet hubby had switched the filter to circulate instead of filter.  LMBO  So once I figured that out we now have crystal clear pool water!!!  =)

We are also planning a BIG vacation.  Greg and I talked last night and we want to take a big vacation for our 15th anniversary.  That gives us two years to save.  Even though it's for our anniversary it will also be a family trip.  So we will be taking Zach (and any other children we may have) too.....HAWAII!!!!!  I can't wait!!!  We are going to start saving January 2012.  We plan to invite some good friends of ours and their kids to go with us.  That is if they want to go.  We had a blast with them at Disneyland a few years ago so we hope they might like to join us on our 2014 trip.

So anyway I'm feeling so much better these days than I have in a very long time.  CA is still on the horizon, but for now I want to just live life and focus on the son I have already with me instead of the 12 that are still frozen in CA.  As soon as we pay off this A/C unit though, I'll be back to saving for the CA trip so I can go get 3 or 4 more of our precious babies out of the freezer.  =)

My crazy life

Wow it's been a while since I posted last and so much has been going on.  I fully expected to be into my next cycle by now.  Unfortunately we have had to spend all of our FET money and are back to square one.  First of all AF has not ever fully come since before my last transfer in March.  My doctor says it will come and just give my body time, but I'm getting concerned honestly.  I've had spotting on and off the whole time, but none of what they call "full flow" which is what I need to start my next transfer.

So it's looking like we might be able to go in September for our last transfer (IF AF every shows up).  Everyone is so sure the devil is just causing all these problems to distract us and keep us down and so they have been praying that God won't allow that to happen.  Me on the other hand, I'm SO ready to give up.  Greg, Mom, Dad, and a couple friends keep telling me to keep going because this is the one, but I'm not so sure.  I just want to move on with my life and my family.  Miscarriage is SO hard both mentally and physically.  All the hormones are SO hard on my body too.  I'm just now starting to feel half way normal again.  Those telling me to keep going have NO clue what I've been through.  None of them have ever had a miscarriage.  None of them have ever had to take hormone shots.  Who are they to tell me to keep going?!?!?!  Then on the other hand maybe they are the voice of reason.  Maybe they are the ones that God is poking at because he knows poking at me doesn't work anymore.  I want to follow his will, but I'm tired.  Tired of fighting, tired of shots, tired of flying to CA, tired dealing with miscarriage.  I'm just T-I-R-E-D.

Anyway it's been so crazy these days.  First our A/C went out last Friday.  We were told about a year ago that if it went out again we'd need a whole new A/C unit.  Well it lasted all of one more year.  :(  We had Sears come out for an estimate.  What a rip off!!!  They wanted to charge us $7800!!!!  I then called a friend of mine's A/C guy and he said he would do it for $3000.  Much less money, but still money we don't have because we've been spending all our money going back and forth to CA.  Here we are a week later and we are using window A/C units in our living room and bedroom while Zach sleeps on a matteress in our bedroom floor.  UGH!  THIS is what trying to have another child has done to my family!!!!  THIS is why I want to quit!!!!

Then there are my inlaws.  They are the inlaws from Hell to put it lightly.  They want to see Zach and we have refused to let them.  Greg won't even answer their calls anymore.  They have verbally abused Greg and me for years and had started doing the same to Zach and that's when we cut all ties.  Last week we got a certified letter.  It was a handwritten letter from them stating that they had tried to contact us and we wouldn't talk to them and if we didn't want to be a part of their family that was fine, but that they want to see Zach.  Then stated we should contact them with good or bad news.  Ok, well......sorry but you won't be seeing MY son.  You have treated him like dirt.  You call him a snake, threaten to give him more of his ADHD medication because he's being "bad", tell him if his parents die you will raise him, tell him she is a better Mother than me, whip him almost daily (when he stayed every other week over the summer) because he was being "too loud", don't allow him to play with his toys, make him do yard and house work for you, and the list goes on and on.  That's just what you've done to MY son.  Not including what you've done to me and YOUR son.  Now why in the world would we want to let you see him.  REALLY?!?!?!?

Oh and they are threatening to file for grandparents rights.  First of all that law doesn't apply to this situation.  Second, go right ahead!!!  I'll fight you til my dying day to protect MY son from you!!!!  You won't hurt my son like you hurt YOUR son.  Let me bring out the pictures of you with your 14 year old when ya'll were enjoying a beer together.  Let me tell a judge how you drink and drive to this day even though your youngest son was killed in a drinking and driving accident.  Let me tell a judge about how you argued with me when my son was just 2 years old about giving him "a little sip" of your margarita.  Take us to court (IF you can get anyone to listen to you)!  Let me call all the witnesses to how you've treated your OWN son over the years.  BRING IT ON!!!!

Then in with all this mess there is a girl who I was best friends with in junior high and then we lost touch and found each other recently on Face.book.  She's down on her luck so I've helped her a few times.  Well now I've caught her in three lies in the last couple of weeks.  I HATE to be lied to.  You can do a lot of things, but don't lie to me.  I feel so betrayed!!!  I call very few people my friends.  I "know" alot of people, but you got to be really close to me to be called a friend.  I thought she was a friend, but boy was I wrong!  This is NOT what I need right now.

My life is all over the board right now and all I want is some peace.  I certainly don't need to be trying to have a baby right now with all this stress in my life.  Especially when Dr K says you need to do your best to be stress free.  Stress free right now is a word I don't understand.  My life is too crazy right now.  Hopefully by September it will be better and I can go back to CA one last time and then be done with this.