If you're visiting from ICLW...

hi. Thanks for stopping by. I didn't do this last month, which was my first time participating, so I thought I'd fill you in on some of our journey.

We first got pregnant in December 2005. We didn't exactly plan it, but we weren't using birth control either, so we were pretty excited. Then the nightmare began. I spotted almost the entire time, and my doctor (the quack) assumed it had to be an ectopic, and gave me methotrexate to end the pregnancy. I didn't question her at the time, but now that I know a little more I would have waited before treatment.

We got preggo pretty quickly after that for the second and third times, even though I had such bad bleeding/cramping with each that I had no idea that I was pregnant. We were trying, though, and I was waiting to ovulate so I knew something was up. With each, the betas were rising, but a bit more slowly than they should have, before they stopped. Empty uterus on the ultrasounds. Empty heart as well.

Number 4 was kind of a blur, but similar to 2 and 3. After this loss, I was finally diagnosed with anticardiolipin antibodies, and prescribed a daily mega dose of folic acid, baby aspirin, and progesterone and lovenox upon confirmation of the next pregnancy. All other fertility tests came back fine.

Number 5, 15 months after number 4, sucked ass. The scenario was similar to the previous pregnancies (bleeding/cramping and negative hpts, which made me think I had gotten AF, before finally getting a positive). After much bloodwork, and pleading with the RE, I got an early appointment for an ultrasound. I just KNEW something wasn't right, and sure enough, little cletus the fetus had parked his ass in my fallopian tube. Surgery and massive doses of painkillers ensued. I became pretty depressed after this loss, and considered giving up trying.

And now, six months later, here we go again. This seems different, though, so maybe we'll actually end up with a kid in 36 weeks or so. Or maybe we'll discover another new and horrifying way to experience pregnancy loss.

Only time will tell.

the holidays

Christmas is ruined.

Two years ago, on Christmas day, I had my 3rd miscarriage. The year before that, I was pregnant, but soon to have my 1st miscarriage. This year, I am recovering from surgery to deal with an ectopic pregnancy.

I was never a real nut for the holidays, probably because of one particular Christmas when I was a little girl (maybe 3 or 4 years old). My dad, as per usual, overindulged in the, ahem, spirits, of the season, and sustained a black eye from a street fight with the wall in our apartment hallway on Christmas Eve. My brother and I were asleep after a fun filled party (and an even more jovial Christmas Eve Mass) with stuffed tummies and visions of loot in our heads. We woke up the next morning to find Dad with a shiner (and probably a wicked hangover). He told us Santa had beat him up. This was the beginning of my disillusionment with the fat guy, but my brother's had begun years before.

Until I came along, he was the youngest of the cousins. The next-youngest cousin was a girl, and so, predictably enough, my brother developed a fascination with Barbies. They played with the Barbies a lot, and even though he was pretty young at the time (maybe 2 or 3, but really, I have no idea. I wasn't born yet), he surely dealt with some teasing from the older male cousins and their dad. I think this was probably harmless enough, until Christmas that year. Our uncle dressed up as Santa and passed out gifts to all the kids. My brother got a dress. To this day, he still remembers an almost uncontrollable desire to punch Santa right in the nose.

The year after the whole Santa-breaking-into-our-place-and-beating-up-Dad incident, I put two and two together and realized that the fat man is a myth developed by adults to keep kids in line: I found the Sears price sticker on one of my presents. I certainly had never seen an elf standing in line in a Sears, with a cart full of goodies for the nice little boys and girls of the world. I did know that my mom liked Sears. A lot. The whole thing was a sham.




I've tried, as an adult, to find some magic in the day, but never really with any enthusiasm. Hubby seems to have caught my malaise. We always wait till the last minute to buy gifts (this year we were traipsing through Target one and a half hours before our family Christmas Eve shindig). We've tried putting up a tree, though it seems to function as more of a cat magnet and endless supply of new doggy chew toys than anything else, so it hasn't been de-basemented in several years. After the turn of recent events, it seems even more depressing - after all, the whole holiday is about the birth of an infant (for the religious) and the spoiling of children (for the secular), and I am confronted yet again with my body's inability to function as it should.

When I found out about this pregnancy, before we knew that it was the right zygote, wrong place, I had visions of a joyous Christmas spent exchanging meaningful looks with Hubby, drunk on our secret bean and visions of next Christmas, our baby's first. I should have known better than to indulge.

Next year, we're boycotting the whole thing. I'd like to take the money we would have spent on gifts (okay, plus a whole lot more) and escape to someplace warm and wasteful, with a beach and lots and lots of alcohol.


Anyone want to tag along?