Unexpected reaction

First a recap: when Crys and I first started talking about having kids, we asked our friend and housemate to be the father. We were working out the beginnings of a three parent situation when Crys decided it wasn't going to work for her. We weren't entirely sure why but it was clear we needed to back off the baby business for awhile. After a few weeks of talking, counseling and exploring all of our options, Crys and I decided we'd rather use an anonymous sperm donor. With Nick still living in our basement, we thought it would best to wait until he moved out in May to tell him and then start trying in June. But now he isn't moving until July or August. And everything came together early enough for us to start trying in May instead of June. So that's what we're going to do. But it meant we needed to tell Nick about our change in plans. So we did on Sunday.

Crys and I discussed several reactions, how we'd tell him and all the bases we wanted to cover with him. But we only got as far as "an anonymous donor will be the best for us". He told us it was completely understandable a couple of times and then went out for coffee. Now, he hadn't been home for very long but he had changed coats and does often just stop by after work to change and then go out again. So the fact that he left wasn't completely unexpected. But he never just leaves like that. He said bye and was out the door. Usually he tells us he's leaving and then chats for 20 minutes.

Last night when he came home around 10:15, he came in the side door that goes directly to the basement, which isn't unusual. But he went right downstairs, was there for a few minutes and then left again. He didn't even say hi, which is really unusual. So we're not sure what's going on. We just hope he comes around because if he doesn't, it's going to be a long four months for everybody.

The internet

In a few weeks I'll be ordering sperm on the internet. Does anyone else think that's funny? Mabye I just have an odd sense of humor.

And there it is

We went shopping for garden stuff this afternoon but ended up with a new baby gate (to keep the dogs out of the basement) instead. We also picked up more ovulation sticks since I recently started a new cycle. In addition to the cheap ones I'll be using every day we sprung for the Clear Blue Easy smiley face tests. This way I can see when the LH surge is going to happen with the cheap tests and confirm ovulation with the expensive ones. Crys laughed when I told her I wanted to try out the expensive ones as soon as we got home, even though I know I'm not ovulating yet. Every time I think about ovulation sticks I'm reminded of the Friends episode that involved Chandler using all of Monica's tests because he was bored.

One of the reasons for the new baby gate is everyone was getting tired of stepping over the old one. No to mention when I'm pregnant, I won't be able to. And there is it. When I'm pregnant. It's gone from a hypothetical "if I get pregnant" to "when". I think the transition officially happened when I was trying to project my next ovulation and thinking about the logistics of ordering sperm. Thinks like: it takes 2 days to ship, I'm fertile for approximately five days and we can keep the nitrogen tank for ten days. So if the train with the nitrogen tank o sperm leaves the station traveling 35 miles an hour and the egg drops from my ovary at 3 pm two days later, when should Mandy and Crys inseminate?

The count down to our first attempt is officially on. I'm afraid it won't work the first time. I'm terrified yet hoping it will. A month from now I could be growing a human being. Growing a human being. And there it is. I've gotten my hopes up so high, I'm a little afraid of what will happen, if a year from now, we're still trying. My paternal grandma had thirteen kids. I'm pretty sure 95% of my genes come from that side of the family and I'm hoping fertility falls in that 95%. I keep telling myself, women get pregnant every day. And so can I.

OCD dreams

I always joke about being a little OCD. There are some things that just have to be done my way or no way. Over the years, this little habit of mine has gotten better. I don't get upset when Crys doesn't fold my clothes the way I want her to. But then, we decided to save our relationship she would never do my laundry. Hmmm, that's a bad example of my improvement.

Anyway, last week a friend came over and put a ceiling fan in our living room. There was no light fixture in that room at all so the job required being in the tiny, hot, insulation filled attic for two hours drilling holes (for the wiring and the fixture). After he finished in the attic he told me, "you are so helping us peal wallpaper next weekend." He and his fiance closed on their first house yesterday and we showed up to help the long process of taking down the wallpaper in every single room in the house. There was even wallpaper on the pipe in the bathroom.

Pealing wallpaper can be like a dream for someone with OCD. Or at least for me. You make quick progress on a panel and have the little bits that just won't come off. And you just keep thinking, "one more spot, I just have to get one more spot." While I have decided that when we start looking for our second house, (this one will be two small for us in five years), if we see any wallpaper at all, we're walking out. I still don't mind helping a friend take the stuff down.

Time and temp

For about three weeks I was really good at getting up at six, taking my temperature, jotting it down and recording it later. But it was confusing because my temperatures were all over the place. Last week I finally realized why I was confused.

First, I grew up watching shows/movies about women trying to get pregnant showing the woman taking her temperature and saying, "I'm ovulating, let's make a baby" or something like that. But it doesn't work that way. I always knew it didn't work that way, but at the same time, part of me wanted charting by temperature to be that easy.

Second, I wake up at least once during the early morning hours. Sometimes two or three times throughout the night. It's always very brief, but I think it's throwing off my temperature enough that I won't be able to chart because this method works best after four continuous hours of sleep.

Regardless of which charting method works best, we should be trying in a few weeks!

Bad day

Yesterday needed a time out.

Now, I know I forgot my mom's birthday a few weeks ago. And you can't get much worse than that. It wouldn't have been so bad if I hadn't forgotten her birthday a few years ago too. I really need a calendar in the kitchen or something. But, I'd like to think that isn't the reason karma decided to kick my ass yesterday. In fact, I don't know anyone who had a good day yesterday.

It started with our old landlord. We took him to court in January because he failed to return our deposit and we knew he hadn't used it to correct the damages he listed in his letter to us. He didn't even bother going to court. We won, but he never paid up. So we decided to garnish his wages. And then found out he declared bankruptcy. We're working with a law student to see if there's anyway to get our money back, but yesterday after several phone calls from his bank and the law student, it looks like we'll be lucky to get 5% back. What bothers me is we're getting punished for his negligence as a landlord. He didn't rectify any damages. He should have given back our deposit. It's the law. But he's going to get away with it. Jackass.

The rest of the day was mostly general annoyances, but there were a lot of general annoyances and with the whole landlord situation, they just seemed much more annoying. I was almost hit by a car riding my bike home and then later when I was driving to a store. Bad day. If yesterday had been a good day to inseminate, I would have waited.

By the end of the day though, I was feeling better. A co-worker stayed home with his wife to clean up the massive amounts of mold growing under their basement carpet. (he totally won worst day, by the way) Looks like they'll still be at it today. I made them a lasagna and picked up some ice cream bars so they won't have to cook tomorrow. When we dropped it off, we talked for a few minutes and I guess there were turkey vultures circling the tallest buildings on campus that morning. We came up with two theories: 1. they were looking for weak freshman to pick off or 2. we all should have known it was a sign to just stay in bed.

Decisions

Ever since we started talking about having a baby, we've been faced with different decisions. Even though it feels like we've reached a waiting period, there were still a few more deicions to make.

1. The remaining four profiles I requested came in the mail on Saturday. We picked two more to round out our top four. It worked out really well. Of the eight we liked four and didn't like four. So we're set for sperm donors.
2. We NEED to tell Nick what's going on. His move out date has been pushed back to July (it's been January, March, May and June). I'm actually predicting an August move out date. But he could surprise me. At any rate, it looks like waiting until closer to when he moves out to tell him isn't an option any more.

Hunh, seems like we made more decisions than that. There are still a few things we're mulling over...

1. Should we tell our parents before or after we're pregnant?
2. Should we start trying in May or June? June gives me more time to chart my cycle, but if I know I'll be ovulating soon, should we just go ahead and try?
3. Should I make an appointment with the OBGYN now or wait we're pregnant?

I think most of those answers are just going to resolve themselves. We won't tell our parents until we're sure we want them to know. That might mean waiting until a pregnancy. We'll probably just play a May insemination by ear. The one thing I know for sure, is that I am officially ready for this but all we can do for the moment is wait. And thats a little frustrating, which sounds about right where we should be at the moment.

Cheese

I love cheese, quite possibly more than I love chocolate. But I suppose that depends on what day it is. Last night as I was sprinkling (drenching) my spaghetti sauce with cheese I was thinking, "I really need to stop doing this." Why? Because women who are trying to get pregnant shouldn't be too overweight or too underweight. I am in no danger of ever being underweight. But I could stand to lose a few pounds. I'm not a big fan of diets but I did make a few decisions.

1. No more eating after 9pm
2. I need to start riding my bike to and from work again
3. Fewer sweets
4. More fruits and vegetables
5. Less beer

Drinking less soda and more water is something I started doing three years ago. So that's not a problem. In fact, I rarely ever drink soda anymore. Its nice enough again, riding my bike will only be a problem on days it rains and less beer will just be better for me all around. I figure if I start doing these things and walking the dogs on a semi-regular basis I should be able to start some healthy habits that will need to carry over to the pregnancy anyway. Except #5, that will become 5. No beer.

You'll notice less cheese isn't on the list. I'm just not ready for that step yet.

Altruistic and gregarious

We requested 9 donor profiles yesterday. Midwest could send 4 by email and 4 by snail mail or fax and 1 of the donors won't be available until June so they won't release his profile until then. Since the only fax machine I have access to is at work and I really don't want a 22 page profile spitting out the fax machine where anybody walking by could see it, I opted for snail mail on the 4 that couldn't be sent by email. Our target start month of May will probably be delayed until June anyway so I'm not to worried about time right now.


Last night over nachos and beer (Crys's birthday meal of choice) we looked over the four profiles I managed to get through email. I'd actually skimmed some of them at work and found my first veto. Along with describing himself as "altruistic and gregarious" he has never had caffeine in tea, coffee or soda, never drank alcohol or fried food and started doing long division at age five. When asked what message he would pass on to the recipients of his sperm he said something like he was sure (I'm assuming based on his personal experience with himself) they would have an intelligent, good looking child. So veto on that one. He just thinks way too highly of himself and his profile just didn't sound real.


I actually sent that profile to a few people who know we're doing this just so they could get a good laugh. While Crys and I were discussing donors, we decided not to show anyone the profiles of the donors we pick. We'd just rather not have other people picking over the ones we like. And we did find two that we liked. One was honest about why he was donating. He threw out the whole "to help someone have a baby" reason and then said because he's saving money to start his own business. At least he's trying to be honest. He also likes working on cars and some art stuff, which is similar to Crys's interests. Since we have to narrow the field somehow, we're trying to find guys somewhat similar to Crys although that isn't the only determining factor. We also liked the lawyer that races cars on the side. Sounds interesting and we both had a pretty good feeling about him after reading his profile.

Two donors down, now we just have to find two more for round out our top four. I'd actually like to have five or six donors we like picked before we start. Just in case.

Tools

We were doing some home improvement things around the house and had to raid the tool drawer. It's actually more of a nuts and bolts drawer but that's much longer than just 'tool drawer'. Anyway, while I was rummaging, I found a kotex and cat nip. I'm not sure why, but it made me smile.

Charting

As I was plugging my daily information into the My Monthly Cycles Web site, it dawned on me that 1. I think I'm ovulating and 2. the program says this isn't supposed to happen until next week. Which made me wonder, what do I do to adjust the prediction to match my actual cycle? Nothing. I can't find anything. Maybe this Web site isn't as helpful as I thought it would be. Sure, it keeps track of all my information for me, but it's supposed to do the math too. And I'm really bad at math. Just ask the payroll person where I work. We had a too long discussion yesterday about what was wrong with my time sheet. Any time I don't work my normal 8-5 everyday of the pay period, we have this discussion, because I screw up the math on my time sheet. But I digress.

If you're trying to get pregnant and just starting out with this charting stuff, don't believe the Web sites when they say this is easy. Or at least, they make it sound really easy. The temperature thing is even more difficult than I though. Sure, I can make myself take my temperature but when I chart it, the numbers are all completely random. We were hoping to start insemination in May, but I think we're going to have to chart for a few more months and start later in the summer. Maybe not until July. Wonder if we'll be able to wait that long.

The doctor

Yesterday I left Crystal to deal with the plumber while I went off to the doctor for my annual physical. Actually, I was only going to get his signature on a form for the sperm bank so we can set up an account. But it's been two years since my last annual check up so I thought it was time for another one. When I made the appointment last week I mentioned that I'm planning on getting pregnant this summer and would like to talk to him about that. He was more excited than I was. It was kind of cute actually. He started asking me questions, like if I'd given any thought to delivery details and then tell me what he and his wife did. It's not unusual for us to spend my physicals just chatting. That's one of the reasons I like going to this guy. He also told me multiple times that from fertilization to birth, he can't do anything for the baby, but after that he'd love to be the baby's doctor.

So I left his office with a referral to an OBGYN he highly recommends and the sperm bank form with his signature on it. All the paperwork is now on it's way to Illinois. We're one step closer. Next up: looking at extended donor profiles.

By the way, our plumbing problems seem to be solved now. I didn't know how much I liked having a running toilet until my toilet couldn't be flushed for a day and a half.

Crap

Literally.

Our sewage line backed up into the basement Saturday night (it was discovered around eleven and we finally got the problem under control at midnight). We couldn't get a plumber until this morning...unless we wanted to pay overtime at $125 an hour. So we stayed with my parents Sunday night and will have to wait until later today for a plumber to come out and to snake the pipes. I'm still going to my appointment this morning though.

We woke up early Sunday morning in the hopes that a plumber would be available. One of the places we called was going to have someone call us back. So we decided to take our Sunday morning paper and go to the McDonalds down the street where we could at the very least use the toilet and wash our hands (and get breakfast). As I was sitting there drinking my coffee, reading the paper and listening to songs from the Rocky Horror Picture Show, I couldn't help but feel a little homeless. At least the Rocky Horror Picture Show music in the middle of McDonalds made the whole thing amusing.

Despite this little snafu I'd still rather be a homeowner than a renter.

Ovulation

Until I see the doctor next week, there won't really be anything pregnancy related going on around here. And even then, it'll just be setting up an account with Midwest Sperm Bank. Our planning has reached a bit of a plateau. Can't complain too much though, less of our lives are consumed by getting pregnant these days. We'd like to start trying no early than May, so that gives us some room to breath for a few weeks.

One thing I have been doing is charting my ovulation cycle. Silly me, I always thought women ovulated right after their periods. Or even during. I think that's the way they made it sound in health class. Apparently it isn't that simple. Fertility Facts is the Web site I used to learn about charting. It covered everything but charting by saliva and you need to buy a special kit to do that so I'll pass on that one.

What am I doing then? Taking my temperature at 6am (when I'm supposed to get up) every morning, checking my cervix (which is just strange) and peeing on ovulation sticks. Right now I'm using a cheap no name brand that as I understand is not very easy to read. But it'll at least give me an idea of when I might be ovulating and then I can use those expensive smiley face ones that will confirm it.

I also signed up with My Monthly Cycles. Can't say I'm blown away by the Web site and actually, I think the amount of spam I get increased a little after I signed up. But if you're like me- too lazy to actually calculate your when you ovulate, then it's a pretty good tool. There's a calender where I can record my periods, temperature, etc and it does all the math for me.

In other news, we're baby-sitting Brooke's son tomorrow night. He's three of four and we're both pretty excited to have him over. I feel a little like he's a science experiment, "how will he react to our care giving?" But I think once he's here, we'll have fun playing in the back yard and watching a video.