Are Those Happy Tears?

I feel like life has been really good for the past couple of months. I'm loving hair school. My husband is wonderful as usual. Things just feel really good right now. And yet, I'm very weepy. It may be a song, a comment, a feeling, anything these days can bring me to tears. Maybe it is the holidays. Maybe they're happy tears.

I know this is a little psychotic, but it is how my mind works, always analyzing everything. But I'm sitting here wondering if I'm trying to really focus on how happy things are so I won't think about the one thing I'm missing and that one thing is where the tears are coming from. Like I've decided to change my mindset and choose happiness, but those feelings of pain and hurt that I'm repressing just bubble up every once in a while.

I'm not sure what to do with this, because I don't know if it's a problem or not. It just seems like if you repress feelings they will eventually come to the surface, and I would rather not have a nervous breakdown! But how many times can you purge the same thoughts over and over? I'm just so old and practiced in punishment, that I'm simply not interested in it anymore. I guess I would rather focus on the happy and not let the one thing I don't have affect how I feel about all of the things that I do.

 So is it just me always waiting for the bottom to fall out of things and I'm freaking out because things are all really good and calm right now?? Geez I wish I wasn't such a freak!!!!

Christmas Cards

I have been getting the cutest Christmas cards in the mail this year. It is one of my favorite things at Christmas time to open up the mail and see all of the pictures and well wishes from friends and family. But at the same time, it makes me feel like a loser for not having sent any out this year...or last year. So I started thinking. Have I not sent out a Christmas card because I've been so busy? Yes. But now that I think about it, the first year that my husband and I were married, we sent out generic Christmas cards. The second year, we sent out an adorable Christmas card with photos of us and our puppies. The next year, we sent out a card with a cute picture of the two of us. And last year, I had dreams of sending out a maternity picture of us excited about expanding our family. That card never happened.

So my question is, is it pathetic at some point as a married couple to keep sending out Christmas cards with pictures of ourselves on them? All of our friends have sent us cards with pictures of their kids and a newly engaged couple sent us a card with a CD of holiday music.  I don't like generic cards, so I like the idea of a photo, but once you have been married for over 5 years, is it just arrogant/creepy to send out a picture of ourselves? I would just feel weird about it.

Clearly I need some new ideas for a creative Christmas card from the two of us. Or maybe I will just wait and hope that next year we will have a baby bump to take a picture of. Sigh.

Here's another option

Paying Old Medical Bills Is Fun

I got a bill in the mail from my IF clinic from July and decided to call the billing office to confirm that it was something I had to pay (we've had problems with their billing in the past). After about 30 minutes, they discovered that I have a $70 credit on my account (after sending me a bill for $28...glad I called). So the man told me that if I will be coming back in they can just leave that as a credit on my account for future visits. I said no, we won't be back anytime soon. 30 minutes later, we were about done with the call and the man said, "So did you end up getting pregnant?" Are you fing kidding me???? I almost lost it. It was just so sad to tell yet another complete stranger, "No, not yet, maybe someday, bla bla bla". His awkward reply was, "Well kids are such a blessing. Mine are all grown, so it's grandkids now". Seriously dude, F U!

P.S. AF came to town...

Do You Have Any Children?

I've been meeting lots of new people lately because I've changed jobs and I'm going to hair school. Getting to know new coworkers, employees, students, instructors, clients. When a new person finds out how long I've been married (five and a half years) the next obvious question is if we have or plan to have kids. I have made the conscious decision to be open about my infertility struggle (the basics and the facts that is, I keep this blog and most of my internal struggle private). So I let them know that we've tried for a while now and that it just hasn't happened for us yet. Then they usually want to know if we've pursued any treatments and I tell them we did for about a year and it didn't work. Finally they say "it will happen when the time is right" and diagnose that I just do too much and "stress really has a lot to do with these things". Then I have to say, "oh, I know! I'm sure we'll get pregnant when the time is right", because no one wants to be the depressing infertile girl.

I'm sure we've all been through this over and over. It just seems like I've been dealing with it a lot lately.

The reason I continue to participate in these conversations is that I feel it is important for me to be honest about our struggle (or as honest as I can be). But I'm not gonna lie to you, it freaking sucks to keep having the same conversation over and over again. It feels good to end the conversation with positivity, but as soon as I state so assuredly that I "know" we'll get pregnant when the time is right, I question it. I don't know that for sure. It is what my husband tells me all the time. It is what I tell others all the time. I just don't know that I believe. After three years, it just isn't that easy to believe.

Mark This Under: Things I Couldn't Do Pregnant

About a month ago I was asked to be a model in a hair/fashion show. This is something I would not have been asked if I was pregnant. God must have known that I needed the self esteem boost.

First, they hardly changed my cut or color because they thought it was perfect as it was. Then, when I went in for my fitting, the store didn't have pants small enough to fit me so I had to end up wearing my own jeans. Finally, the show was last night and I found out that because all the store had to fit me was a very underwhelming red dress, I would be dripping in diamonds (7 pieces to be exact) and wear a gigantic ruby and diamond ring. As the girl was covering me in jewels she told me, "Just so you know, you're the most beautiful girl here". I'm not gonna lie, as a 25 year old 5'7" infertile surrounded by 18-20 year old 6' tall girls, this made me feel pretty damn good.

In other venues this would sound like I'm bragging about how hot I am. But I know that you all know me well enough from my previous posts to know that this is just my way of looking at the glass half full. ie. if I was pregnant (or recently gave birth) lets face it, I'm not Giselle and no one would have asked me to do this.

So I'm going to just go ahead an mark this under: another experience I got to have because I'm childless.

Thanksgiving

I have been really emotional this week and I think it must be the holidays. The holidays always make me think about where I was on that day the previous year....and this past year has been a complete roller coaster ride.

Last November, we had our fourth round of Clomid and our first failed IUI. I was living in a hotel room last year for the holidays, working in a town two hours away from home. My husband and I spent Thanksgiving alone together because I was having a lot of trouble dealing. After three more rounds of Clomid, and one more failed IUI in March, I was pretty broken. In May, I graduated from college. In June, we sought help from a RE. And by August, I decided to go rogue and ditch our IF treatment plan all together. That decision put me onto a path that I can't fully explain. I started hair school and quit my job of five years. And although some days are still really tough, I have found a peace that I never knew existed.

I am so thankful this Thanksgiving.

I could be bitter that it has been another year and I'm still childless (and sometimes I am!!), but I find myself really, really thankful.

I look around me and see that I have been given the opportunity to get up every morning and do what I love! Most people don't get to do that! To you, maybe doing hair doesn't sound like that great of a job, but it is my dream job!!!! I have amazing people in my chair every day and I feel so much love from them. I get to talk to them and really learn from them and show them love back. Not only do I get to do what I love, but I get to wake up next to a man that I love. I would have told you a year ago that I couldn't imagine loving my husband more, but somehow I love him more now than ever. I'm working on my relationship with my SIL which feels really good. I'm seeing my siblings as they're becoming young adults and I'm really proud of the human beings that they're becoming. I feel so much love an support from my friends and parents. I just am feeling really good about myself.

If this is all making you want to puke, you can read past posts about how miserable I am here and here and many other places in my blog history, and you can be sure there will be more posts like that in the future.

However, today I have a different message, one of real hope. I hope that the next time I feel like I can't take it and I'm really hurting I will remember this feeling of thankfulness. I hope that I will remember all of the reasons that I'm so blessed. I hope I will remember that God has a plan for my life and that His grace can heal all wounds. I hope I will remember that tomorrow things may be completely different. I hope I will remember how strong I am and how much I've endured and accomplished.

This has been my mantra over the past year and I know that there is no way I've gotten through it without God's strength.

"Wait patiently for the Lord. Be brave and courageous. Yes, wait patiently for the Lord." Psalm 27:14

So I will make it through the holidays this year, because I made it through last year. I will be thankful for the blessings I do have instead of focusing on the one I do not. I will hold my friends and family close. I will eat lots and lots of food. I will really focus on peace. And I will be praying that those around me who are struggling like I have will find the same peace that I feel right now.

Five Days Late and One Pink Line Short

Well, that dirty biatch AF came yesterday. FIVE DAYS LATE! I was waiting until day 7 to take a hpt.

Here is my issue: I have reconciled the idea that right now is not the time and that I am trusting God with this. So WHY is it that my body is sabotaging me????? I feel betrayed. I have no idea how I was able get to the point that I was at two days ago. I was planning out how I would announce my pregnancy! WTF?!?!?! It is insane how no matter what state I'm in throughout this process, everything can change in a day.

CD2 and I'm okay. But I'm not going to lie, I'm a bit heartbroken. Despite my better judgment, I got my hopes up. I feel betrayed. By my own body.

So now, it's on to another month. It may sound completely crazy, but it has crossed my mind to actually try not to get pregnant just so that I have no reason to get my hopes up. I know, crazy. I just can't stand to get my hopes up. The day before AF came, I prayed that God would keep me from the pain. I can't stand the pain, and the fear of the pain to come. It is beyond frustrating to be on a path of peace and to pray and pray for peace and clarity and to feel that you're in such a good place and then be brought right back to that place of fear and pain and uncertainty.

I don't have anything particularly insightful to say right now, so I will quote Oswald Chambers:

"Faith is deliberate confidence in the character of God whose ways you may not understand at the time"