A Womb Without A View

It appears now that the womb with a view is no longer available. Yep. Signed a 9 month lease with a bean sprout that has so far fulfilled almost 4 months of said contract, and I have the boobs to show for it. Maybe this is rent? Bean sprout is now bigger than a chick and smaller than a puppy, and loves ice cream.

Pregnancy came , obviously, unexpectedly, and with none of the usual symptoms. This, I should have expected, but as you may have guessed from the long absence I was simply fed up with obsessing, and decided to give myself a break. Yes, I am now one of those women. I know. I used to hate those women. Used to want to stick my tongue out at people who told me I just needed to relax. I would fantasize about spilling ketchup when someone told me I needed to stop worrying. That’s not true, actually. In fact I wanted to kick their shins and scream obscenities about their righteous ovaries and careless use of birth control.

Instead of food aversions, everything is dangerously delicious. Large, copious servings of everything. A friend told me to be careful of salad greens, and I said, “Are you trying to kill me? Do you have any idea how much cheese I am capable of consuming in a day? I am eating all the salad I can stand.”

She said, “You know about cheese, right?”

It so happens that fresh cheeses are the only ones without 20 grams of fat per serving, but whatever. Yes, I know about cheese… Nachos it is then.

The little plus sign came so unexpectedly that I showed it to my husband for a second opinion as much as to share the news. After staring at it together for 10 minutes he said, “Let’s take another one.” Little plus sign again. Suddenly I understand the reason for the tests that say “yes” or “no.” Somehow  ”+”  versus “-” didn’t seem to capture what we were looking at here.

Little plus sign had us a flummoxed.  ”What do we do now? Should we see a doctor? We are out of network. What’s a doctor going to tell us for $500 that the pee stick can’t?”

Negative sign – easy. A massage, a manicure, emergency lunch date with girl friends, bottle of wine, sappy music – very straight forward.

Plus sign – very complicated. Listeria lurking around every corner. A crash course on new vocabulary words like bubby, onsie, blinkie, moby wrap and binkie. Unsolicited advice about everything from exercise to eye brow waxing. Learning the technology behind optimal burpies. A heightened awareness of household spiders, and a sense of smell that makes my husband wonder if he could lease me to the local CSI unit for some extra income.

Don’t even get me started about strollers and car seats. I don’t understand them enough yet to say anything, but when I do…

What Else Would They Say?

I used to think it was so consoling. It used to give me a much needed shot in the arm. It meant so much; the words of encouragement; the people who love me, even those who only know me – cheering me on:

“Don’t worry. It will happen for you.”

“Just be patient – it’s meant to be!”

“It will happen when the time is right”

“it’s totally going to happen”

Today it suddenly occurred to me – HA!!!

What else would they say?

“It will never happen to you. Don’t spend another f-ing dollar on ovulation tests”

“Don’t bother with taking clomid ever again – it’s a waste of time!”

“Start saving for adoption fees…It WILL NEVER HAPPEN FOR YOU”

What else would they say?

Art History for Children

This past weekend I went to the LACMA (Los Angeles County Museum of Art). An incredibly unassuming name for such a fabulous collection. In any case, I was impressed by the volume families there, and children of all ages were receiving impromptu crash courses in everything from German Impressionism to Fauvism. This is good stuff, I was thinking. I’ll have to pay attention and take mental notes on how parents properly inspire and expose their kids to art appreciation. I find a good study at a piece by Ludwig Meidner, a German Expressionist from the early 20th Century period.

Father and son are discussing the painting. The boy looks about 9, and the father is casual but polished, with a flair of contemporary, if you know what I mean. Think, LL Bean meets American Apparel – at the office.

“So son, what do you think of this piece?”

“There is a lot happening.”

Good, good, ask open ended questions…I could learn a lot here about how to introduce my future kids to art. I’ll have to stay and eavesdrop.

“How does this piece make you feel, anything?”

Brilliant! Encourage children to explore their own reaction to art! This is what art is meant to do – elicit an emotional response – let him formulate his own thoughts about it.

“Yes. Not happy. Kind of uneasy. It seems sort of dark.”

Yes child! The painting is from 1913 Germany – why do you think that is! Oh I love it! Art and world history on a Saturday afternoon with quality family time to boot! What upstanding parenting!

“What seems dark about it? What do you see happening?”

“Well, the railroad tracks are broken. People are running. People look scared. There is a fire…”

“Why do you think the people are scared?”

“Go on, go on, yes! Because we are on the brink of the war to end all…”

“You see, son, the title of the painting is Apocalyptic Landscape. This is what is going to happen to us right before Jesus comes to save us.”

Aaaaaaaawwwwwwwwww. Shit.

The Surprise

“We really weren’t expecting it to happen so soon!”

“It was totally unplanned, but we are thrilled.”

“It’s a little earlier than we expected, but we always knew we wanted them – so it’s super.”

“We never knew we’d be so happy about it at this time in our lives! It’s like a gift!”

My, my girlfriends. Things sure have changed since we were 20. In any case, I suppose when I am finally preggers it will go more like this:

“It’s about freaking time!”

“There is not a single thing that was remotely unplanned.”

“We were really, really trying.”

“We’re doing a home birth because we spent all of our money trying to get knocked up in the first place.”

Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell

We have been married long enough now that people who know us seem to have a sense that it’s inappropriate to ask. Oh sure, there was the extended family memeber that got her head bit off last summer. There are occassional references to, “if you guys decide to have kids…” But for the most part, it’s only people we are newly introduced to who ask us if we have kids or if we want them. I chalk it up to “desperately trying to make small talk with strangers,” and I cut them a break.

Recently though I was at an event where I sat next to a woman I’ve never met. I wear a wedding ring, and my attendance at this fund raiser implied a certain level of civic responsibility and socio-economic status. So it’s not a far off guess that I might be a desperate housewife. “Do you have children?” She asked innocently.

“No,” I replied. Insert awkward silence… It wasn’t intentional. I just didn’t know what to say. Do I tell her I have 2 dogs and a husband so sometimes it feels like I have children?

“Oh,” she smiled, “You must be too young.” 

Since then I have imagined incredibly entertaining scenarios where I give people an honest answer to this question. It would go something like this:
“Do you have children?”
“No” 
“Oh, you must be too young.” 
“No. I’m infertile.” 

How awkward would that be! 

But mostly, it’s a very silent piece of my life, and I can’t say I mind. You see, I never know how I’m going to handle it when someone brings “it” up. Especially if it’s someone I’ve never talked to about “it”. It hasn’t happened often, but it usually ends badly.  So maybe a better way to say it is that I am ambivalent about how I feel about my silence. Maybe that’s why I am writing about it here.

In any case, I always thought this was incredibly intuitive and sensitive of our friends and family to not ask. But then I remembered the last time someone did. What I suspect now is that word got around, and not that everyone we know is necessarily an empath.

We were on a sunset hike with them when they told us A. just confirmed she was pregnant. We were so excited for them! It was all joy and hugs and congratulations. But then they asked us if we were planning on having kids some day, and to my horror I burst into tears. What was supposed to be all about them turned into our story. A. spent the rest of our hike consoling me, while cute husband and K. exchange war stories of getting their swimmers checked. That part actually was really funny. It’s not every day two grown, respectable men compare experiences about whacking off in public places with Nurse Ratchet right around the corner.

The “I” Word

It changes you, the day they diagnose you. The day they label you. The day you become a piranah to the health care system. It’s bewildering and strange. With any other condition it’s a good thing when all of your medical tests come out normal. With any other condition it indicates you are healthy, and you go home relieved.  

You do everything they tell you to do. You take every test they ask for. You give so much blood for so many tests sometimes the phlebotomist has to call her supervisor to decode the request. You know they are bursting to ask why you need so many things tested. Cancer is easier to detect. “There must be something seriously wrong with you…” you feel them thinking. 

You are cooperative and accommodating. You make up convoluted excuses to your boss about why you suddenly have to drop everything and rush to the doctor. “I, ah, he’s booked the rest of the week and is squeezing me in. Oh, yes, I’m fine. Um, just getting something checked out, it’s nothing.” 

“I am on day 3 and if I don’t get an ultrasound done today I will not get my clomid this month so get out of my way!!!!” Is what you really want to scream. 

But after more than a year the protocol is completed, the battery of tests are checked off, and all of the usual causes are ruled out the receptionist hands you a piece of paper and a sudden request for payment in full with the words: 

“INFERTILE – UNEXPLAINED”  

“How can that be?” you think. “Me?” You’re kind of stunned. The doctor didn’t prepare you for that. But then again, what could have possibly prepared you for this.  

“What do you mean?” you ask. “Dr. said the tests came back normal.   That doesn’t mean I’m infertile. And why can’t you take my insurance for today’s appointment?” 

“And do you have any idea what you just said to me? You have just told me that I will never have children and no one can tell me why, and I actually have to argue about my health insurance while I absorb this ‘tidbit’?” I only have the 10 minute drive back to my office to process a complete meltdown, and when I get home tonight I have to tell my husband that he may never father a child, and you think I care about the friggin’ PPO exclusions?”

 But you don’t say any of this. You say nothing. You just hand her your bank card and get out as fast as you can.

Tell Her

I have had the amazing opportunity over the past year to start working with my local Girl’s Inc.organization. For anyone who doesn’t know about them – see if you have a chapter in your home town and check it out. They have dozens of ways to get involved, and they throw fabulous fund-raising events. The logo for Girls Inc. is “Strong, Smart, and Bold;” words to live by! They are currently running a national campaign titled “Tell Me…”

It includes thoughts like:

“Tell me I can do anything…”

“Tell me my confidence is my greatest feature…”

“Tell me that math is cool…”

“Tell me that the glass ceiling is a fairly tale…”

Bold words and big work during a time when 73% of 18 year old girls don’t like their bodies. An era in which girls age 12-17  have the poorest nutritional diet. A society in which suicide is the 3rd leading cause of death among 15 to 24 year-olds, and girls are twice as likely as boys to contemplate suicide.

Yes, please tell her… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0hbtN6eppM 

Clara Clomid

When embarking on the journey of fertility, especially when hormone therapy becomes a part of the picture, invariably there is a trail of casualties left behind a woman each day. Among them is probably her partner, but they include the pharmacy assistant that has never heard of clomid and its effects on cervical fluid, the check-out clerk that closes her check-out lane at the wrong time, the bus-boy that moves your jacket from the chair you reserve… None of these people have any idea what monsters lie behind our initially smiling greeting.  We are friendly, reasonable, even likable people until we are crossed – intentionally or otherwise. 

What innocent bystanders have no way of knowing is that the fertility challenged have dual personalities. We still know ourselves by name, but there is someone else within our newly stimulated ovaries and the hyper-activated hormone producing portions of our pituitary glands.

I call my someone else “Clara Clomid.”

She is both foreign and intoxicating to me. She is the one who will not go to the back of the line. She is the one who demands a refund. God help you if the mocha is too milky. She is the one that will walk out when service is poor – and that’s on a good day. She has been known to demand audience with managers and even call city hall and senators. Clara’s sarcasm can make a man cry, and her glare puts a pause on global warming.  

Cute husband calls hormone stimulation medications divorce pills. 

Let’s just say that I do not plan on treating menopause with soy. When my estrogen goes down I will be behind the pharmacy counter in a minute.  

I Love My Day Job

Love is really too strong of a word, but I will never, ever complain about my day job again.

This is an article about people who work in a pig slaughter house for a living. It is specifically about the people who work at the “head table.” Um, that would be where the brains are scraped out and then sold as food. Apparently there is a delicacy known in the south as pig brains and scrambled eggs.

Ew.

This article is why I only eat meat from my local farmers. The story realizes every single thing about the mass production of food and how simply wrong, wrong, wrong it is. It’s inhumane to the animals, and now it’s making the meat-packers sick as well.   

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/05/health/05pork.html?pagewanted=1&ref=health

Bon Appetit

Baby Talk

I was IM-ing with a friend who has a kid today. (Actually, they all do, so this is the one and only time I will clarify that). She was describing the time when she lost her mucus plug.

Her what?

Shortly thereafter was the bloody show.

The huh?

Then the midwife stuck her entire arm inside of K’s body to turn the baby.

And she lived to tell about it?

But the best is yet to come – Crowning. This is not the party hat you get with your happy meal. 

When it comes time for delivering they make it sound like you’re trying to get up for work on a Monday. It’s not that you are being torn apart from the inside out. You’re simply ‘Transitioning.” You know, like changing lanes on the freeway in plenty of time to make your exit.

As you can imagine, while sympathetic, K was not impressed with my cervical scraping. And then it occured to me, the whole language of womanhood is ALL WRONG.  

Vagina? And the slang words we come up with are no better. I used one myself just a few posts ago. What does hoo-ha mean? Clitoris sounds like a power tool. Labia - porn site or a book binding agent? Os? Who the hell came up with that one? You can’t even Google it! All you get are links to hard drives and Operating Systems. Though maybe there is something to that. Hymen. This one I kind of get. As in, “Hi-Men.”

And my all time favorite: Artificial Insemination. This one is particulary hard on my self-esteem. Are we likening me to a prize horse? A designer dog breed? Blue ribbon bovine? Can we not come up with something better? And why aren’t gynaecologists required by law to have art work on their ceilings?