a period of waiting; pause, interval, or delay.

I'm not trying to conceive anymore.
I've decided to just wait, not quit, just wait.

Wait until we can say that we've celebrated our 5 year wedding anniversary.
Wait until my body works itself out
Wait until I've lost more weight (I'm down 17 lbs so far)
Wait until I have a stamp in my passport that says: Germany
Wait until my bank account is pregnant
Wait until my sister moves back to the states
Wait until all the babies that I know are all grown up
Wait until I'm so tired of waiting that I grow old and am unable to have any babies at all

I feel like I'm standing in a very long line waiting for my number to be called, but I'm in the wrong line, with the wrong ticket, in the wrong building, at the wrong time...

so, for now, we will wait. I will not take medications. So, this is where I am. I'm going to finish out 2010 with out urinating on anymore EPTs. I'm just going to enjoy my 4th year of marriage to a man who shows up at my work in the middle of a summer storm, in a white button down shirt and khaki pants, soaking wet, holding an umbrella so that I won't have to get soaked when I walk to my car. The man who surprises me with white and red roses, just because. The man who took me to see Eclipse TWICE and didn't mind that I drooled over Edward. The man who lets me cry in the crook of his arm because I miss my sister. The man who swears that every single meal I cook is "the best" he's ever had.
I don't think that a baby is "missing" from my life... a baby is just waiting.

questioning the ultimate question.

I'm sad to say, I feel that I've lost my way. I use to be so certain about faith, God, my spirituality. Unfortunately, somewhere along the line, I feel that it got too foggy. I am not so sure of faith, of life, of anything really. There are things that I feel sure about, like love. but, faith? Hope? I find it so much easier to have hope and faith for others. But not myself.
here was my "message from God" on Facebook today:

On this day God wants you to know...

... that when the night feels very long, remember that a new day is just around the bend. With each new day we are given new hope, new possibilities, new opportunities. Each new day is a miracle.

hmmm....

food for thought, no?

Don't read this if you don't want to read a woman rant and be bitter.

I had my appointment with the Endo yesterday. It had been over six months since I'd seen him last. I had left his off that day (in November) SO optimistic. He had felt so strongly, and had made me feel so certain, that I could get pregnant on my own (with out medication), and BY my next appointment. I was on cloud 9 when I left his office that day. Smiley. Friendly. Excited. He said I could cancel my follow up with him if I was pregnant. And I really felt like I would cancel that appointment. As the date approached and as I sat in the lab to have my blood drawn, I knew, I'm not going to be able to cancel this appointment. I already knew what the blood work would show, elevated testosterone, etc... I knew, and yet that little tiny part of me held on to the shred of hope that I was wrong. Maybe I really had tricked my body taking the birth control for so long. Maybe, JUST MAYBE, the time on the pill had made my body decide that it wanted to have more estrogen and less testosterone. Maybe I was CURED!

Nope.

Not even close. My testosterone level was not only elevated, it was DOUBLED; higher than it was pre-Yasmin. He said that I needed to think about seeing someone at a fertility clinic (as he does not prescribe the medication I will need). He said he would like to start me on a medication for insulin resistance (or whatever it is exactly), though not a medication that will aid ovulation (again, since he does not prescribe that).

So, this is where I am in my baby race. Apparently I'm not even in the race. Apparently, I'm sitting back, with my feet kicked up, watching everybody else race.

Apparently my ovaries belong in special Ed. They're too busy not doing anything to be bothered by making a family.

I'm sure my cousin who just gave birth will get knocked up again before me, hell, I'm sure her daughter will get knocked up before I do.

I don't remember that from sex ed class!

I just watched the documentary The Business of Being Born.

I was sobbing at the end, from the beauty of it, from the amazing blessing given to those women, and from my own indescribable ache.

My longing is suffocating. My desire is monumental. My ache is deep and vicious.

I recommend seeing the movie, even if you are dead set against home births, it's still a VERY interesting movie. With a lot of valuable information.

Not that I am any where close to delivering a baby (considering that first one must actually be able to get pregnant), but I've been thinking that I like the idea of midwifery. I don't want to be given pitocin or an epidrual. I don't want to be attached to an IV and unable to move. I don't know if I want to give birth laying down with my legs in stirrups. Of course I'm also not saying that I want to deliver a baby in my sleep number bed, either.
I need to get pregnant first, before I start coming up with a birth plan, I suppose.

proceed with caution...

I've always thought that there is a child out there who needs a loving home. A place to go to. A tree to sit under at Christmas. A man to walk them down the aisle one day, and a woman to sit in the front pew, teary, while she watches that child move forward in life. I've always considered adoption. Not because I NEED a child, but because a child may need me. I've always thought of myself as someone who could open my heart, my home, my life to anyone...
It's never been an "if we can't have a baby naturally" kind of concept. Having a baby naturally, or not, I've always thought that adoption IS an option.
My husband has 2 adopted sisters and an adopted brother. Except, you would never know (or care) that they were adopted. They are family, siblings--regardless of how they were "born" into the family. So, for my husband, adoption is a huge option too...

that is, until Saturday night, when I stumbled on a blog that completely and utterly changed my perspective, and not for the better. I found this blog, and began to DEVOUR it. Not because it was comforting to me and not because it was interesting, but because it upset me so much that I could not stop reading it. Like a car accident on the hwy, I slowed down to look. and the jury is still out on whether that was a good idea or not. Suffice it to say, I spent the mass majority of my Sunday crying to the hubs and then to my mother-in-law (who I swear has ALL of the answers to every question I throw at her. I'm lucky to have her).

I know blogs are just one person's opinion, but even so... what if every child feels the way that woman does? What if every child really "does not want to be adopted" like I've read in some of these blogs? What if I open my heart up to a child, only to have them decided later that I've just been a "substitute" a "babysitter"?

One of the parts that I keep reading over and over, and repeating in my head, is something I read in a comment that someone had posted on one of her blogs:

"I can not beleive the rage and immaturity that comes from women who can't get pregnant. God! GET OVER IT!! Get a puupy! Being infertile makes all of you mentally ill you know that. You also act like a bunch of brats, DEMANDING a baby when you want one, especially christians who can't have their own kids. Who are any of you to NOT wait even 20 years if that is god's will and plan for you to have your own child? None of you do. You'd rather have some vulnerable young mother talked into giving HER baby to you and say it's god's will."

Ouch! That stings.

I don't pretend to know what it feels like to be adopted, or what it feels like to have given a child up for adoption, but I do know what it feels like to be a "mentally ill, demanding, infertile". I don't want to sit a adoptee down and tell them how they feel/how they should feel. I'm not going to call them brats for not being happy/grateful to have a loving family. So, why do they feel that they can call Infertiles "brats", "demanding", "mentally ill"?? And GET A PUPPY?? really?? I love my dog. She makes me laugh. She is possibly the best snuggler in the house.... she is not a baby. She does not fill that void in my heart/soul for a child. That's like telling someone with a severed artery to put a Hello Kitty band aid on it. That's not exactly going to fix the situation.

I know that we all have hurts in our lives. Some have huge hurts (domestic violence victims; returning soldiers suffering from PTSD, people who have witness death of a loved one, miscarriages, endless negative pregnancy tests, feeling of abandonment from your parents putting you up for adoption, fires, floods, Mother Nature's rage, breakups, divorces, overdrawn bank accounts, failed tests, etc). I would never sit down with that returning solider and tell him that he is being a brat for not being able to "get over it". Or telling a victim from 9-11 to "get over it", or a woman who just miscarried after her year long struggle with infertility to "get over it".

Are we all so self righteous that we have to feel that our hurt is THE WORST. That nobody else can hurt as much as we can because we have A, B, C, and D wrong with us?

Maybe the reason I can't shake this woman's blog, the reason it has affected me so much is because I (as a DEMANDING infertile) feel personally attacked. And may I ask, what exactly is so wrong with demanding what you want?

I don't like the idea of anyone hurting, for whatever their reasons may be. I don't take joy in others pain. I do not wish ill will on anyone. I think we all have crosses to bear.

And you know what? If you really think about, an infertile and a hurt adoptee are pretty much the same. We are both longing for someone that we do not know, and may never know.

I would like to say that writing this blog will get my mind off of this topic. That after I click the "publish post" button, all will go back to my previous state of mind. But, unfortunately, my perspective has been changed. And I'm afraid that I will dwell on this longer than I should.

every stranger's face I see, reminds me that I long to be....

My nephew graduated high school this past weekend. So, the hubs and I packed up the Rover and navigated our way to Georgia; home of peaches, pecans, the Zac Brown band, Third Day, the coco-cola company, Gone With the Wind, the Big Chicken, Paula Dean, River Street, the world's largest aquarium, Stone Mountain, the Varsity, the Falcons, MLK, Delta, the AJC, and all of my loved ones.

the hardest part of going back home, is feeling like a stranger on the streets where you grew up. It's funny how everything looks different, but feels like your favorite old sweater, that still fits you perfectly despite the 15 lbs you've added on since you saw it last. ahhhh.... home.

I never feel like I have enough time. Like it's slipping through my fingers, quicker than sand, and with less impact. I can't stop time and cling tight to my loved ones, and it worries me. My dad looked ages older, and it scared me. In the back of my mind, is that voice, saying what I don't want to type, what I don't want to think about, but what I know to be true. We are fragile. We are a wave in the ocean. I'm reminded that I live too far away.

I couldn't soak up enough southern accent, southern hospitality, southern charm, and dear lord the southern cookin'. I miss the south. I adore my blue ridge mountains. I miss the comfort of seeing an old friend in the grocery store, grabbing lunch with my girlies, snuggling next to my momma, real sweet tea, hearing "y'all" and "lordy"...

I tried not to cry as we drove down my parents driveway on Sunday morning. I kept my arm out the window, waving long past the point where they couldn't see me anymore. I promised myself I would be a "big girl" and not sob like I normally do. The hubs knows (after four years) not to say anything right away, he just reaches for my hand and drives. I hate the drive back. It's too long and depressing; and every time I say "next time we're going to fly". But I couldn't bare to put my Chloe in cargo (she is, after all, the only baby I have).

Today, I was driving to work feeling rushed because I showered longer than I should have, and my hair was still damp and starting to get wavy from the quick blow dry I gave it. I was, to be honest, exceeding the limit pretty significantly and listening to the new Sex in the City soundtrack, when I came up on a long line of traffic in the right lane. The left lane was moving pretty steady, so I got over. It wasn't until I made it to the end of the line of traffic to my right, that I noticed a hearse. The long line of traffic was a funeral procession. And here I was, blaring I Am Woman (sung by the fab girls of SATC), crusin' past a funeral. I wanted to cry.

In the south, everybody pulls over for a funeral. I've seen colossal sized bikers get off of their motorcycles and remove their helmets to show respect for the deceased and I've seen police officers salute the hearse (at my own Poppi's funeral). I've seen people pull to the side of the road my entire life... and then I moved here. People here keep going on about their business, like they can't be bothered to show a little respect...Because they don't have time, because it does not fit into their schedule, or because it does not revolve around them enough. And I was keeping right up with them. I was driving right past with out so much as a tap on the break; singing I am Woman hear me roar.

I am ashamed.

Oh lord, please don't let me lose my roots. Please, please keep me a southern girl, who has manners, shows respect, and sips sweet tea.

am I losing me?

it's okay.

I'm not going to be sad that tomorrow is Mother's Day and I'm babyless. Instead, I'm gong to celebrate that I have:
a husband that makes me feel full and complete; a pup that loves to snuggle and lets me hold her like a newborn baby; a house that is truly home; a car with a full tank of gas; and Breyers Triple Chocolate ice cream in my freezer.

I've still been blessed.

Our Snuggly Family
May 7, 2010