Sorry.
I just realised, in the same way that I’ve realised in real life, that up until this point I’ve been fine jabbering away about things, but now shit just got real. (I said that ironically, OK? In a pseudo-American accent. Don’t think I’m one of those people who say “shit just got real” in a deadpan way. I’m not.)
Anyway, what I mean by that is that this is all so timed, in that if you ovulate on this day, then your eggs and the sperm are defrosted Continue reading
When you think about, it would be a total miracle. I mean, I know science has done everything possible to optimise the chances – I’ve been given hormones to optimise the development of my eggs; my thyroid function has been checked and tweaked; the – one assumes – weakest eggs will have been weeded out by the freezing and defrosting process; I’ve not just got any old sperm but sperm that has been rigorously – I hope – health-checked; and nobody’s left it to chance that this sperm will fertilise the eggs, Continue reading
“When exactly ARE you going to tell Mum and Dad?” my sister asked me the other day when we were discussing my latest scan. “Dunno,” I replied, “I’ll worry about it at the time. I might get you to do it.” (I wasn’t entirely joking.) “You could just send them your blog,” she said. “I’m not sure THAT’s a good idea…”
It’s not that I’m cavalier about it, it’s just that it’s really not a significant concern of mine right now. Partly because I’m not really worried about what they’ll say, but also because it’s SOOOOOOOOOOO far away.
Before I get to the point where Continue reading
I just realised you probably thought that this post was a reference to the fact that, as I’ve mentioned a few times before, this whole trying-to-get-preg-on-my-own type thing wasn’t exactly Plan A. Or maybe to the fact that what I’m doing is, as I’ve mentioned before, not exactly the norm within my group of predominantly hetero, predominantly married-with-children friends. But it’s not (well, it kind of is, because everything I write on this blog is basically about the same thing.) No, this is something I wanted to write before I’m actually mired in the depths of the treatment. As a marker, maybe, as a reminder of why I’m doing this. So here goes… Continue reading
I promised you the headfuckery, the emotional fuckwittery, the messy lifeness, the mental rollercoaster. And what better day to write about all that than at the very end of the year? Here! Have it! My unburdening, so I can sally forth into 2017, lighter, happier, whatever, I don’t know.
In October I wrote that I had made a decision. I wrote that after
thinking, and dating, and sleeping with unsuitable people, and thinking that something might become A THING — and then realising that it wasn’t going to…
I had decided to try to get pregnant on my own. And making that decision was exciting, and terrifying, and empowering, and terrifying, and for a while it made me feel utterly invincible. Which sounds like a totally Continue reading
Ugh I just found this in my drafts – it’s from about a month ago, sorry about that, but you know, read it, then you’re pretty much up to date…
So, of course it wasn’t that straightforward, like I said, these things never are. Before I left the clinic my consultant sent me for a blood test to test my thyroid levels. Yet another of those things that you never even think about, but apparently your thyroid has to be operating at a certain level to create optimum conditions for pregnancy.
And whaddaya know, mine wasn’t. My blood test showed that my Thyroid Stimulating Hormone (TSH) levels were at around 5. The top end of normal in the regular population is 4.5 (although other people will say that normal can go up to 10) but crucially if you want to get pregnant with IVF, they want it closer to 2.5. The solution: daily pills of a drug called levothyroxine, which I have to take for three weeks or so and then get tested again to see if it’s doing what it needs to, or if I need a higher dose. Continue reading
Allow me a small diversion from the whole egg / baby thing — although it is kind of related…
I’ve spoken before about how I really resent arbitrary divisions being made between people — and particularly between women — defining individuals as single or part of a couple, pitting mothers against non-mothers and so on. And, with respect to the latter, one of the things I have real beef with is the idea that “until you’re a mum you have no idea what X means” where X is equal to “love”, “exhaustion”, “worry”, “fear” etc etc. Ultimately I think it’s hugely insulting to anyone to undermine their emotion by telling them that because they’re not a parent, there’s no value in what they feel.
So, I went to the clinic, and I talked to my consultant and I had a scan, and it mostly looked fine, and so we discussed a few things, like whether we’d try IUI (Intra Uterine Insemination – or what I like to think of as PTB — Posh Turkey Baster — where you get the sperm and stick it in and hope for the best…) or IVF (In Vitro Fertilisation — where the egg and sperm meet in a test tube (actually a dish rather than a tube I think) and mix there to make the embryo which is then put inside you. Continue reading
So, as you might have guessed from my previous post, it’s full steam ahead, all guns blazing, let’s try and get pregnant on my own. Project Faberge is GO. Well, sort of. I’ve booked the appointment to talk to my consultant about IUI, IVF, donors and all that, and I’ve joined the Donor Conception Network, and I’m all set to work out the protocol, pick my donor and all that. But I’m not planning on actually starting the process until after Christmas. Continue reading
So I’ve basically been thinking, and dating, and sleeping with unsuitable people, and thinking that something might become A THING — and then realising that it wasn’t going to. And I’ve been thinking some more about what life would be like if I had a child on my own, and thinking what life would be like if I never had children.
And I’ve been listening to friends with kids tell me I should “totally do it” and then listened to them, ten minutes later, blithely bitching about how shit it was when their bastard husbands worked late/were hungover/left them holding the baby, then seeming surprised when I gently pointed out that if I did “totally do it” I’d ALWAYS be left holding the baby. Continue reading
Egged On 