Trying to De-Stress Myself

In my last post I mentioned just how stressed I am about not TTC, and it was definitely true. I'm envious of those people that get PG so easily because I've never been one of them.

I really think my thyroid meds have my hormones so out of whack that I don't really know what to think half the time. I'm taking time out to evaluate what it is that DH and I need now, and I think I really need to just let this go until my thyroid gets regulated.

I'm not giving up, but I'm not making it easy to stress myself out about it. I'm hiding my BBT thermometer, OPKs, and PG tests so I won't be tempted to temp or pee on anything. I think I need to totally put it out of my head at this time.

I am hoping my thyroid will regulate within the next 6 months, still and will proceed to the RE if it's not. I am also hoping to find a full time job, either at home or outside of the home, so DH and I can relieve one more stressful burden, living with my parents.

We both are hoping that finding good ways to combat the stress of our situation will make this forced break easier.

So Frustrating

It has been so stressful not TTC this cycle, and I know this stress is going to continue as long as we are on this forced break.

I figured it would be easy because I stopped temping, using OPKs, and checking CM & CP but it hasn't been easy to just relax and stop trying all together. Of course, part of me wants to keep trying and the other part of me is saying that I know this break is for the best.

I guess I just kinda feel like this break is taking even more time away that we can't get back. I mean, when we started TTC almost 7 years ago, we thought at this point we'd have a couple of healthy, living children. Now, every time I babysit my nephews or my best friends kids, I can't help but think, "If we have kids, these kids are going to be old enough to babysit for us by the time our kids are this age." Then part of me wonders if it's ever going to happen.

It's really frustrating to know that I have no control over what is going on, though I am thankful that we finally have everything diagnosed so I'm not fighting an impossible battle. I just feel so discouraged right now, but I do know there's hope and I'm planning for a future with kids. I've decided that I'm going to give my GP until March 15 next year (6 months from diagnosis) to try to get my hypothyroid regulated and if it's not by then, I'm remaking the appointment with the RE that I canceled this month and am going to let her take it from there.

I also realize that even if my levels are within the normal range by that time, I will still have to go to the RE because they won't be optimal for pregnancy. Most GPs only care about getting the levels in a normal lab range, not getting them to an optimum level. I did find some of my lab results from 2 years ago and according to standards set in 2008, the levels were high but it wasn't treated because the lab that ran the test had a higher range they considered normal. This is such crap because I could have been diagnosed then and been regulated by now.

There are a lot of things that I would go back a few years to change and that would be one of them. I'm going to try to relax over the next couple of months and try to forget about TTC. The problem is that I'm just hitting the 6 week mark on my thyroid meds and I want to track my BBTs to see if it's having any effect on my cycles. I don't necessarily want to use it to TTC but I know that if I do track them, it's going to make the TTA (trying to abstain) harder to stick to, especially if I start Oing on my own thanks to the meds.

Getting it Right

In order to try to boost my chances at getting my thyroid levels as well as my A1C optimized (and below diabetic levels), I'm trying something new. I've been unsuccessful at changing my eating habits in the past because in part that I'm lazy and don't want to have to keep track of every little thing but also because it's hard to keep yourself on track. I also freely admit, I don't like to exercise. I'm a couch potato.

I've tried several different things this year including doing Weight Watchers on my own and doing the Eat to Live program. I believe both of these programs can work wonderfully for people and before I had thyroid issues Weight Watchers worked great for me.  What it comes down to, really, is that when you have hypothyroid your metabolism is working at a fraction of the speed it should be at optimally.

Because the thyroid isn't working optimally, it's harder to keep the motivation to continue plugging away at eating on these plans. At first, of course, I lose weight but that doesn't last past the first week. Then it's up and down like a yoyo. It gets frustrating and makes me want to give up. The only problem is, now I have a goal that I want to reach. It may not happen by December 19th when I get the results of the bloodwork for the first 3 months on thyroid meds, and I realize that's okay.

The important thing is that it happens at all. As long as I give it my best effort, it will work eventually. My goal is to get that IVF scholarship from INCIID and be healthy enough to be accepted by a fertility specialist to do it. I'll focus on having the money to pay for the PGD and doing the fundraising after that. It doesn't matter if it takes a year or more to get my levels right, though I pray that it doesn't take that long, what matters is that I get them optimized and get healthy.

I was very upset after researching what the side effects of hypothyroidism are on a fetus because every side effect was something that our baby, Nora, had. Granted, I don't know how much of her condition was caused by hypothyroidism and how much was caused by DH's chromosome defect, but the fact remains that if I had been diagnosed then, she might be alive today.

I realize that my condition did start in pregnancy. I started having a racing heart beat early in pregnancy, I was always tired (the kind of tired where I'd take a nap at work then go home and take a nap plus sleep eight hours or more a night), and I put on weight fast despite eating well the first few months.

This makes me realize just how important getting it right is because if I don't, we might never have children of our own. We have always said we'd like to adopt children as well as having our own, but when that's the only possibility a little part of your heart dies. I'm not saying we wouldn't love that child any less because that would still be our baby, but not getting to be there at birth and not getting to carry it, that would be heartbreaking.

Finally A Diagnosis

I went to the doc today to get my well woman exam and results from bloodwork I had done last week. I was diagnosed as being diabetic, hypothyroidic, and Vitamin D deficient. They think the diabetes may be related to my thyroid issues, so they aren't going to put me on any medication for it or have me track my blood sugars yet. They want me to go back in 3 months and have my fasting blood sugar/A1C, tsh levels, and Vitamin D levels checked again. Then if my A1C drops that means the diabetes is related to the thyroid issues and I won't be put on medication, but if not then I go on Metformin.
I know it's not right to be relieved to have these problems, but a big part of me is relieved because I've been telling doctors for years that something is wrong and I literally could not lose weight no matter what I did. They, of course, started me on the smallest dosage of synthroid they possibly could, but I'm hopeful that there will be a turn around in my symptoms. I, honestly, feel like the people on Mystery Diagnosis who after so many years and doctors find out what's wrong with them and that they aren't imagining symptoms.
The sad thing is that we have to wait until we get my thyroid levels normalized to continue TTC. I really don't want to put it on hold, but I will if there's going to be developmental problems caused by it if I get pg. I'm hoping that with diet and exercise I can really start boosting my weight loss and help out my thyroid. I'm also still going to the chiropractor and getting treatments for insulin resistance and thyroid issues. I hope between the synthroid and the treatments at the chiro that I can get this regulated very quickly.

Still Trying

I'm still plugging away at my lunaception, and have come to the conclusion that it might take longer than the estimated 3 months of sleeping in complete darkness before my body resets itself. I haven't been doing the grounding as much because, let's face it, it's not very fun to put your bare feet on the ground in a bed of dead grass. We have gotten some rain lately, though, so I'm hoping the grass will start perking up and I can get back to my barefooted ways.

I have started going to a chiropractor but not initially for the infertility/hormone balance acupuncture. Every year around this time, I get spasms in my neck and shoulder, well, this year it's been worse than most. I finally broke down and went to the chiropractor and dissected every little issue I have, including infertility. I showed her my BBT chart for this cycle and she took one glance at it and said, "You definitely have thyroid issues. Your temps are way below what they should be." I told her a few times I've taken my temp before bed and they were in the low 98's.

Then, she told me something amazing that I didn't know. She told me before all of these synthetic thyroid medications came out doctors prescribed glandulars to correct thyroid problems. Basically, it's thyroid tissues from animals. They stopped prescribing them when pharmaceutical companies came out with thyroid medications. She told me that I should look online for organic thyroid glandulars and start taking one capsule per day. Before you ask, they aren't the actual raw tissue, it's pulverized and freeze dried into capsules and you take one capsule per day if needed.

But before anyone considers doing this, they need to make sure they need it because the hormones the glandulars emit in the body can damage a healthy thyroid. The thyroid is in control of our metabolism and body temperature, so messing with that, no matter how badly you want a baby, is best under a doctor's care.

Lunaception & Earthing Updates

Okay, this is my assessment of my Lunaception and Earthing experiments. My April cycle started mostly on its own because I hadn't finished a full 2 weeks on the progesterone cream before AF was trying to start and I started spotting on CD39 of that cycle with AF starting 3 days later. My May cycle (the last one) I didn't even start the progesterone cream yet because I was waiting but with AF starting today that cycle was 39 days. Maybe I'm beginning to regulate to a possible 39 day cycle.


I do believe the Lunaception is helping a lot even though my cycles are not quite matching the moon phases yet. My husband and I have both started sleeping in a pitch black room as well as wearing sleep masks to block out any missed light sources. I am going to stop using the nightlight at the full moon until my cycle regulates its self for at least 2 cycles. I do, however, need to get a new BBT thermometer because I think mine is highly inaccurate. If I went by my most recent BBTs, I would think that I had possibly O'd about 2-3 days ago because I had a week of low temps then the last 2 days I had temp rises, but AF ruined that theory by showing her ugly head.


On to the Earthing. I do really enjoy Earthing but find I often do not have enough time to devote at least a half hour a day to do it. Most days I'm lucky if I get 10 minutes in. I can say that the days I do it, I experience less pain in my feet and ankles (I have always had foot and ankle issues) as well as less pain in my back the days that it bothers me.


Earthing makes me feel peaceful, and honestly, it helps me relax before bedtime if it's not too hot outside. I think I would do it just for the stress relieving benefits alone, but I do feel more, excuse the pun, grounded and even-tempered the days I practice it. I would love nothing more than to be able to walk around barefoot outside all the time, but it's not always that easy.


To sum it all up, if you have irregular cycles, for any reason, try Lunaception. It's actually very easy to do and once you get used to sleeping in a pitch black room, it's hard to adjust to sleeping in even a dimly lit room. As for the Earthing, if you need a stress reliever and can't find anything, then try it. It's not dangerous unless you aren't careful where you walk.

Another Few Things to Try

On the days that I go to work at 1pm, I usually watch Dr. Oz while doing my work. Well, last week he had a show called The Dr. Oz Approved 7 Day Crash Diet, or something like that. It's based on Dr. Joel Furhman's nutrient dense diet that has resulted in some of his clients losing 125 pounds in a year. And, most people lose around 10 pounds the first week.

At first, I was skeptical because I don't like crash diets, and it's not really a crash diet if you stay on it but as I watched the show, I realized that it's not really a crash diet, it is a nutrient-dense diet plan. In reality, it's the way we should be eating instead of the way people eat modernly. Basically, you gorge yourself on fruits, vegetables, healthy oils, beans, and nuts. And by "gorge" I mean you can eat as much of these things as you want. You can have healthy cuts of meat and full fat dairy but you only need about 6oz of meat-based protein per day and only 1 serving of dairy products per day. You will get all of the calcium, vitamins, and minerals you need from the nutrient-dense foods you are eating. There are very few nutrients in dairy, meats, and poultry, you are better off getting your protein from beans and nuts.

There is a little bit more to it than what I've said but if you click on the link, you can read up on it and the basics of the plan are there too.

The  second thing that I read recently on one of my favorite sites, Naturally Knocked Up, is about Vitamin A and Fertility. I never really thought about other sources of getting vitamin A other than through orange and red colored fruits and veggies, but this article has really opened my mind to another natural source of vitamin A, whole milk. For many, many years I have drank solely skim milk because it doesn't have the fat in it that regular milks do. Vitamin A helps the reproductive organs function properly and whole milk is a natural source of healthy fats and vitamin A.

The final thing I just discovered today is called earthing. It's based on the principal that all humans create energy and require physical contact with the earth to transfer that energy back to the earth. In this article, Can Walking Barefoot Lower Cortisol and Balance Hormones, this concept is discussed and it is very intriguing. In fact, I spent a half hour outside this morning walking around barefoot and getting my daily dose of vitamin D in, and I could tell in the first 5 minutes that my feet that I normally ache all day had stopped hurting and I felt more energy than I usually do in the mornings. Walking around outside barefoot may not be for everyone, so if that's the case, you can buy earthing sheets and computer mats to help ground your energy. This is also supposed to help with insomnia.

If you try any of these, let me know the results. I'll be posting about my results with hopefully all of these but if not all, at least the earthing.

Lunaception and Sugar Detox Update

It has been a frustrating second cycle with lunaception and a dismal failure on phase 5 of the sugar detox. First, I believed that the lunaception had actually begun working for me the first month because I had high daily temperatures (I didn't track my basal temps because we weren't actively trying that cycle) for a few days then it dipped back down to normal and despite the fact that I was still using the progesterone cream to start my cycles, the next cycle began on its own without me stopping the progesterone cream beforehand.

This cycle, I'm on CD26 and my temps have begun to seesaw drastically, which means an anovulatory cycle. Each day that I have a temp drop we do the baby dance, but I'm disappointed because I may have a significant rise the next day but two days after it'll drop drastically again. I have decided to follow the original author, Louise Lacey's suggestion that until my cycles begin following the moon we sleep in complete darkness. I don't think this will hurt us any to do this for awhile.

As for the sugar detox, I've had a major backslide on it. It's been a difficult month for us financially and when you depend on others for your food supply, it's hard to eat what you need instead of what's available. Phase 5 is when you are supposed to eliminate all refined sources of sugar. I haven't been able to do that and for the first couple of weeks, I managed to keep my intake under 15g of refined sugars per day but we also had some pretty steady money coming in but the last few weeks we have been broke and depending on the food my parents buy to eat. My parents are not healthy eaters and they definitely do not care if foods comply with the sugar detox. My dad tries, he asks me if things are okay but that's only if I'm with him when he goes to the store.

I also haven't lost any weight. Originally when I'd started phase 5 I dropped about 5 pounds but that hasn't stayed off since I've been eating what's available which more often than not contains more than my desired daily intake of refined sugars. I'm hoping to get back on track once we get some money to go grocery shopping.

Acupuncture & Lunaception

At a certain point when TTC for a long time, a woman gets to a breaking point. We are willing to try anything in order to get pregnant. I've done tons of research into natural fertility assistance and it seems to be something that is constantly evolving.

I began working as a housekeeper and nanny three months ago and the couple I work for also have a girl. Jessica, come in that does deep cleaning once a month. So, the first time I met her we got to talking and we both had very similar tales of infertility. The only glaring difference in our stories is that she's slightly overweight because of being very active and eating a strictly healthy, organic diet while because of insulin resistance/estrogen dominance I am 105 pounds over my maximum ideal weight and I've gotten pregnant twice(though the pregnancies themselves weren't successful).

Jessica and her husband had been trying to get pregnant for two years and they'd done everything they could medically to achieve pregnancy, and she'd been on the pill before they started TTC. Jessica hadn't had a cycle in that two years that hadn't been started by provera. So, as a last resort she told me they'd decided she was going to try acupuncture to get her hormones balanced. The chiropractor that does the acupuncture told her that she has had success in helping previously infertile women achieve pregnancy usually within two cycles (or eight acupuncture sessions). Jessica didn't believe her even when she had her first natural cycle start on its own a month later.

I didn't see her until last week and she told me that she successfully conceived after that cycle. Now, I find this amazing because Jessica had high testosterone and estrogen levels and very low progesterone. So, within 4 weeks of doing the acupuncture weekly, her hormones regulated and she got pregnant. She's still in shock and not quite ready to believe she's pregnant despite 2 ultrasounds. I think this is evidence enough to make women consider this a valid therapy to assist them when TTC. My husband and I talked about it and decided that we will try it if I'm not pregnant by this time next year with clomid though I was really pushing for the acupuncture instead.

Now, onto Lunaception. This is something that I've heard about occasionally but never put much credence into. I know I've mentioned the site Naturally Knocked Up before, and about a week ago I found a link on her site to an article she'd written on natural aids to PCOS. As I read the article I noticed, yet again, mention of Lunaception and moon cycling. The purpose of Lunaception is that before electricity and modern society, women's cycles followed the moon phases. They would menstruate at the new moon and ovulate at the full moon. Now that sounds rather simple, doesn't it?

The problem is with modern society that we don't sleep outdoors in perfect darkness with only the moon or firelight as the only sources of light. There are a few things you can do to practice Lunaception.

1. Sleep in a completely dark bedroom. If you can see your hand in front of your face, it's not dark enough, so do what is necessary to make the room so dark you can't see your hand in front of your face. Eliminate any and all sources of light, even electric alarm clocks, so if you have to have one find some fabric dark enough to cover the face of it.
2. If you get up during the night to use the bathroom or for any other reason, install red or orange low wattage light bulbs in the rooms that you go into. This mimics natural sources of light and won't cause early ovulation.
3. On cycle days 14 to 16 you get a dim white (and I mean WHITE) nightlight and turn it on only for those 3 days. This mimics the full moon and stimulates the body to produce the hormones necessary for ovulation.
4. Within 3 months, your cycle should regulate to match the moon phases you are creating and if pregnancy is achieved, you should continue to sleep in a completely dark room throughout your pregnancy.
5. This is more of a tip than a step to Lunaception, but you should go to bed by 10pm each night so you can reset the natural biorhythms of your body. If you go to bed at the same time each night, it will help regulate your cycles faster.

I just started practicing this last night, but this is what I did to start trying to get my cycle to match the moon phases, though if you follow the steps I just listed, you don't absolutely have to match your cycle to the moon phases because you are actually matching your cycles to a night light. First, I downloaded an app on my Palm Pixi that tells me the moon phases and when they occur. The next full moon is May 5th (and in my opinion a great night for it with all the Cinco de Mayo celebrations). Second, I have to eliminate any and all sources of light in our bedroom at night. We already had room darkening curtains, but to guarantee no light coming in, I duct taped them to the metal frame around my window then duct taped a couple of black trash bags on top of them, and put up a pair of thick curtains on the curtain rod.

So, my husband and I go to bed at 10pm every night, but he was shocked by how dark it was. We have our computer in our bedroom so I shut it down because it creates extra light in there. We turned off our light and it's completely dark for a couple of minutes until we both notice that the tower to our computer still has a light on it, so rather than unplug it, I just put a sleep mask on because I'd spent hours trying to get the room completely dark and I was frustrated that I'd missed something. We both slept better than we probably ever have. Now, I'm not hoping it will work this cycle, but I'm not sure what to hope for. I'm not going to match up to the moon phase exactly because I'm already 16 days into my cycle, with no hope for ovulation.

I am seriously considering just postponing ending this cycle until the next new moon so that I can be on track with the moon phases. That's easier for me than most women because I do not have regular cycles and I control mine with progesterone cream, so all I have to do is postpone when I start the cream and stop it the day before the New Moon. Until then, I'll sleep in complete darkness and hope that I am doing the right thing. I haven't done much research into Lunaception but most of the results show even women with PCOS regulating their cycles within 3 months. I'm not going to hold my breath but anything can help.

And, maybe if I do both the acupuncture and Lunaception, I'll get some results.

Waiting Again

It seems like every cycle I'm always waiting for good news. I have been getting frustrated with this cycle because I had a week of fertile cervical mucus and low temps. Well, this morning I had a very nice temp rise, so I'm just praying that my temps stay up.

Frustrating New Cycle

So, against my better judgement, I started temping again and it still frustrates me beyond belief. I had a nice temp drop 5 days ago but instead of getting a rise my temps stayed down and aren't in any hurry to go back up. This is so frustrating when TTC.

On a better note, I started an 8 month sugar detox and am on Phase 2 of it. The first phase was relatively easy for me, but this one is much harder because it requires only eating 100% whole grains and so many things have refined white flour in them, it's unbelievable. I'm hoping that by doing this I can reverse my insulin resistance/estrogen dominance.

BFP Maybe

A few different things have happened in our rainbow baby quest. First, AF this cycle was very short for me (4 days when it's usually a minimum of 7). A few days after this cycle started I was praying before bed. I started a new part time job as a nanny/housekeeper and am really enjoying it, and I was thanking God for my job. I began to say, "I'm really happy with it," but what came out was "I'm pregnant." Now I wasn't thinking along those lines at all and though it's something I do pray about it wasn't on my mind that night because I was beyond tired. So, I thought maybe God is telling me that it'll happen this cycle because I was a few days in.

My mom bought a new blood pressure cuff 4 days ago that also reads the pulse and she kept bugging me to check mine because hers was reading high and my BP usually stays around 114/76. I began to notice that every time my pulse was higher than is usual for me. My pulse is usually about 68 and every time I take my resting BP with her cuff (and when I've measured it on my own) it's between 78 and 89. None of the times I took it was I doing anything to make my pulse accelerate, so it made me start wondering if something was up. I did a little research because this combined with the other things I mentioned made me wonder if maybe my increased pulse could mean I'm preggo. I know pregnant women have a higher pulse rate than they would normally because they are pumping extra blood throughout the body and it makes the heart work harder.

So, last night I took a test because I really began thinking that if I was pregnant then it couldn't be from this cycle and maybe the AF I had wasn't really an AF but ovulation bleeding. We'd BD'd 3 days before AF started so it was totally possible. As soon as I did the test I could see a faint line appear but I couldn't tell if it was a true BFP or an evap line. My hubby saw it too, and we decided we'd do one this morning with FMU. So, I took the one this morning with FMU and didn't see anything, and neither did my hubby but when I got home tonight I saw a very faint line on it that almost looked like a shadow.

I know you aren't supposed to read tests that are hours old but I did anyways just to see and compare it to the previous test. I think the line might have been there before because the test strip was still wet when we read it (we used $ store cheapies) and the wetness could have been hiding the line. So, if it is a BFP, then I must not have conceived when I first thought because the line would have been much darker. With my previous 2 pregnancies I never got a BFP before CD35, and this is only CD28. I really don't want to wait another week to take another test, so Mike and I agreed I'd take another test on Friday but I'm going to buy a 2 pack so that if it comes up questionable, I'll have one to take on CD35.

Interesting Info on Cervical Mucus

I don't remember where I was reading this, I think it was on a blog called Naturally Knocked Up, but I found some very interesting information about cervical mucus (CM).

What's really sad is that it's more common sense than anything else, but hindsight is 20/20. The article basically says that women who are trying to conceive with regular cycles should look for two days in a row with egg-white-CM (EWCM) instead of monitoring BBT, cervical position, and cervical mucus for the majority (if not the whole) of their cycle. If EWCM is noted 2 days in a row the likelihood of conception at that point is greater.

So, I do find this interesting and while reading it was asking myself why I didn't just do that instead of checking all of those things each day. Then, I realized the reason I track my BBT, CP, and CM is because it makes me feel like I'm in control of this one thing that I want more than anything. Just that routine makes me feel like I have an edge over just having sex every other day and hoping that we'll catch that egg.

Just writing this post makes me realize just how stressful all of those measurements can make TTC. I never considered those things stressful, but all of the sudden I realize that they are. Making sure I take my temp as soon as I wake up, and not after an hour of tossing and turning hoping I'll go back to sleep, is stressful and annoying. In fact, I find temping to be the bane of my existence because I always want to argue with my charts especially when I think they should detect ovulation on a certain day or if my temp is unusually high one day.

If I followed this method, I wouldn't have to constantly be searching for my cervix hoping that it might be at just the right stage. I wouldn't have to be checking CM when there's not a chance I'm fertile. I wouldn't have to immediately search out my thermometer, that seems to always be moving, and temping for just long enough to wake me up. If I followed this method, I wouldn't be as anxious about each cycle.

The more I think about this method, the more I realize when we conceived our daughter, this was actually the method we used. I would just monitor my CM and we would have sex accordingly. It wasn't stressful because there weren't so many things for me to scrutinize and stress over.

I guess what I learned most from this article is that educating yourself about these methods can cause more issues than resolving them. I didn't even know about BBT and such until after we'd lost our daughter and had started trying again. When I started having all of the cycle issues was when I started looking to educate myself on TTC methods. I did conceive the first cycle we tried again, and with temping, but we lost that one also.

This cycle is already well under way, but my next cycle I am definitely going to try to revert to this method. It's much simpler and less stressful. And let's face it, we all need less stress.

This is Unusual

I know I haven't updated for quite awhile but Mike and I had a lot to discuss. Plus, I needed to get the opinions of a group of women that I trust to be completely honest with me. We are officially trying again as of January 20th.

On to the unusual. My cycle previous to this one I began experiencing symptoms of menometrorrahgia again and it really scared me because I didn't want to experience those symptoms again. I was honestly expecting the same thing again this current cycle but it's been the exact opposite.

AF (my period) has actually been very manageable this cycle and even on the point of almost unnoticeable. I did have 2 heavier days in there but not as heavy as the cycle before this one. Now on cycle day (CD) 5, AF has almost disappeared completely. I have a little spotting and that's it.

This is unusual for me because even when my cycles were, for a brief time, normal they usually lasted 7 days. They would lighten up by CD5 but not practically disappear. I have been thinking about it, and I really think this could be because of the Vitamin D.

I have been taking Vitamin D3 for about a month now and have noticed dramatic differences. Within about 4 to 5 days of starting the Vitamin D3, my previous cycle ended (it had lasted 21 days). I started feeling more energetic, and less stressed about things. I feel like it's really doing what I'd hoped it would do.

Right now, I'm taking a combo of prenatal vitamins, calcium with magnesium/potassium/zinc, Vitamin D3, folic acid, and iron. I take the iron separate from the rest because iron and calcium can counteract each other and the pills will be wasted. I have also lost about 4 pounds this month. I know it's not as much as I'd hoped to lose but I'm just glad to be losing.

Decisions

For a long time I've wondered if we are ever going to have kids. Considering our history, it's not an illogical place to be. I'm not giving up but I often wonder: what if we don't have kids in five or ten years? Neither of us are against adoption, but we've never been able to afford it either.

Mike got laid off today, probably indefinitely, and it really has me thinking about our rainbow quest. Should we continue to put it off until he has a stable job and benefits or should we start trying again because the window we have to have kids is diminishing?

We don't want to seem irresponsible by having a baby when we can't afford it, and I know people that will look down on us for it, but part of me feels like if we don't start trying again before we said that we'll be wasting a good part of this year waiting until Mike has a job and benefits. We both feel like we pay into these state aid programs and everything with our tax dollars, so why shouldn't we be able to use them temporarily, and without guilt?

This is something I'm really struggling with personally. I know Mike doesn't really care if we have to use those programs if necessary as long as we have a place to live and food to eat, which we do but those programs will help a lot more. I also feel like we aren't abusing the programs because we are both responsible adults who have fallen on hard times thanks to the economy. But like I said, I know people who will look down on us for using those programs as a crutch. We know we aren't irresponsible people but knowing that some of my family members, including a few who have used those programs themselves, will look at us like we are abusing the privilege is enough to have me wondering if the scrutiny is worth it.

We have decisions to make, and if we are going to start trying again next cycle, then I am in need of a new BBT thermometer because the one I have is the worst one on the market.

Can't Forget

I realized the other night after talking with Mike that we like a lot of couples who take a break are still hoping for that "accident" baby. What I mean is even though we aren't trying, both of us can't help but hope that every time we make love that we catch that egg.

It's not easy to get past those hopes after so many years, and though we both feel so much less stress now that we have officially decided we are on a break, it's a thought that still haunts both of us.

Mike's family especially make it difficult to forget because it seemed like all they could talk about when we skyped with them on Christmas and New Year's Eve was us having a baby. I don't think people realize when they get married how all of the sudden the results of the sex they have are very much a public matter within families.

I think tact dictates that you leave it up to the couple and don't discuss it unless they bring it up. I'm sorry but it offends me a bit that my sister-in-law has our 3 year old niece asking us when she's going to get a cousin. If the family wants another baby so badly why doesn't she go get pregnant again?

It is very annoying to me and Mike that everyone assumes we haven't been trying for years and that it's a choice we can make as easy as changing a shirt. We have fertility issues and a chromosome issue to deal with, so it's not as easy for us as it is for women who can look at a man and get pregnant.

I am seriously tired of being asked why we aren't trying to have a baby. I am about ready to remove everyone from my facebook list who asks about it again. It's hard enough to see my younger cousins having babies and my former yearbook advisor from high school, who is almost 50, has just given birth to twin boys. These are reminders that make me especially feel like a failure. I don't mean that these babies aren't welcome and cared for in our lives, but it just drives home the unfulfilled want even more.

So, just remember to have some tact around couples who aren't having babies on someone else's schedule because it may not be by choice.