Growth

Do we ever stop growing? You think you have kids, your married, your in your career....everything just kind of goes on auto pilot. But we can't live in auto pilot mode. Most of us need more. Self discovery at 30 years old. Waking up, working through the things you try to put away and ignore. It feels good and bad all at the same time. Thank God for my soulmate and beautiful children. Thank God that Mere wants to take this journey with me. Thank God for time and space and quite and unconditional love. Guess what? I don't have to be perfect or please everyone all the time. It is a lot easier said than done!

Happy Birthday

Happy Birthday to my niece and nephew, Maddie and Colin are 10 years old today!!!!  Time flies is the understatement of the year.   We had a great time spending their special day with them.  I love you guys!!!

I can cook a turkey!

Ok, so Bob (my FIL) had to help from afar, but I (I mean, we...Mere, SIL, and me) did it.  There was some great Christmas day drama that resulted in my mom and sister leaving our house soon after opening gifts.  This left me to cook the turkey.  I love to cook, I cook all the time, but I'm not into big Thanksgiving/Christmas cooking.  And, I have never done a turkey because someone has always been there to do it for me.  But, now I've done it and it was easy and it was good....YEAH!  We did it.  Oh yeah, and thanks Bob.

The rest of Christmas went off without a hitch.  My mom and sister came back in time to eat (yipeee) and we had a blast with the twins.  In other news, cookies have taken over our house.  I mean....dozens and dozens and dozens of cookies.  I'm going to need to be put in a room with celery, water, and a treadmill for a month to get rid of all these cookie calories.  But I keep eating them.

The girls are happy with their Christmas gifts and the twins are over the moon with their Wii.  Syd has not put down her pixos since yesterday and Layne loves to put her baby to bed in her new crib.

Last night we went to the Big Green House and exchanged gifts.  They gave us the AWESOME plaque that is going to be perfect in our entry way.  In turn, we destroyed their house, drank their rum, and ate all their cheetos.  Oh, I might have had some Nutella and peanut butter in spoon (but I cleaned the spoon in between dips).  See the plaque below:

I can't get the whole thing to upload on blogger the right way, but you get the picture!

One LONG post

My wife has turned into a world class blogger. She is ALWAYS blogging. On the other hand, I have been so bad about it lately. I have little blogs in my head but never seem to have the time to sit down and put it together.

I am finishing up a VERY long weekend in Newport. The ER has been trying this weekend. 2 people dead on arrival, one young man in a car accident that will likely leave him paralyzed, and a child in respiratory distress (just to name a few). Everyone always talks about how hard they think Oncology would be, but the truth is people die in all fields of medicine. Man, I need a break. Thank God after tonight, I have 2 weeks of NO MOONLIGHTING!!! I am so excited. I'm also off the 23rd-28th....I mean, OFF, OFF....no fellowship, no ER, no hospitalist. Just me and the family. Oh...heaven.

This week was a tough one. Monday started with our appointment with the RE. We spent about a hour in his office. We had a plan, we were set. He went to talk to the legal department to get the forms we would need for Mere to donate her eggs to me. He comes back into the room and says, "our legal dept says we can't do it." What????? Long story short, the "legal" dept said not to get involved. Some bullshit about us being married in Vermont and that we could move to Vermont and there could be battles over embryo custody. What???? After arguing with our doctor for awhile I asked, "could my sister or a friend donate?" He said, "yes." Ok, so what is the difference here? He had that deer caught in the headlights look about him. He essentially had no idea what he was talking about and he knew it. He kept saying, "I don't care, I don't have any problem with it." Obviously, his "legal dept" does not actually have an attorney because the argument that he was making made no sense at all. He said we could do in vitro w/ Mere or she could donate to me and we could go out of state and they would do the monitoring here. The actual retrieval and transfer would have to be done at another facility. We were both so shocked we just didn't know what to say. He finally said, "I will talk to my partners and see what they say." I haven't heard from him since. And since he is the only partner in his group that will even see same sex couples, I am guessing that the answer will be no. I have called Memphis and Dallas fertility clinics and none will see same sex couples. I have cried, been depressed, and been mad. Mere has been SO supportive. She keeps saying, "we will do anything and everything if you want this." And I do. But, now is just not the time. It was going to be enough to do this locally. I was still nervous about the drugs, nervous about how depressed they make me, nervous about us both being pregnant. But now there is this HUGE roadblock and I'm thinking someone is trying to tell me something. Now is not the time for me. Maybe later, but not now. I am ok with this. Not perfect, not happy, no pretending that it is all peachy. Just ok. Our decision now is to do IVF w/ Mere and if there are extra embryos we will save them and maybe we can transfer to me later. Yes, there are a lot of ifs, I know. This is all that we can do RIGHT NOW. Who knows what the future holds?

One thing this has done....make me wonder what in the hell we are doing living in Arkansas!! We do love it here, this is where our life is, but can we do this forever? Live somewhere where it is ok for us to be discriminated against? I really don't know if I can do it forever. I don't know if I want my kids to do it.

On a happier note, Megan and the twins are here!!!! YEAH!!! I haven't seen them yet (because I at work) but I am so excited. When I talked to Mere earlier I could hear them all in the background and it made me smile. I love a house full of family and kids. I can't wait to get home to them all. Warm fires, cookies, and lots of people for me to cook for. Ahhh....it doesn't get any better.

What are your Christmas plans??

Plan B or C or D......

If you have read Mere's blog then you know, we got another BFN! This is truly starting to suck. We spent the morning on the phone (I'm in Newport for the weekend) discussing our options. As luck would have it, our RE sometimes covers for the OB docs in Newport and he was here this weekend. After Mere called with the negative test I walked over to OB and we talked for awhile. Talked about our options. Then Mere and I talked some more.

Finally, we have a plan. For the 1st time in a long time I am hopeful and happy about the path we are choosing. So, here it is (BTW, thanks to all the great comments on my last post).....

We have an appointment on Monday where I start a "mock cycle." If everything goes well, then we get on the same cycle and then EGG RETRIEVAL!!! This time, Mere's embryos will go into both of us. Yes, I might get to carry a baby...OMG!!!

The only downside is that we will have to wait about 3 months to do a retrieval because it will take that long for us to prep. But, that is ok. We have a plan. A plan that MUST end in at least one baby, or two, or three. I'm excited and hopeful and happy.

The morning started out terrible but the day is ending on a high note :)

Membership DENIED

Female? Yes

Years of painful periods, acne, and PMS? Yes

Uterus? Yes

Ovaries? Yes

Fallopian tubes? Yes

Younger than 35? Yes

Membership of the pregnancy club? DENIED

As you all know, we have become very close to the members of the BIG GREEN house.  This is the first couple that we have been friends with where both partners have carried a baby.  This is the first time that I find myself in a group of people swapping pregnancy stories and I am the only one who cannot participate.  I don't have stretch marks, I can jump on a trampoline without peeing, and I have never had cankles.   BUT,  I have never felt a baby move inside me or known true power of my body.  

I have been a part of the mommy club for 6 years and it is the best 6 years of my life.  I wouldn't trade my membership for ANYTHING.  I am so lucky to be in this club with such amazing, perfect, beautiful girlies.  I am their mom and NOTHING will ever change that and I didn't have to get stretch marks or cankles to get them.  It is hard to complain about that.

I guess I still really struggle with how I feel about this whole infertility shit.  There are days I want to carry a baby so bad I can taste it.  But then there are days when I think....oh crap....if I got pregnant and had to go on bedrest we would be in trouble.  I am the breadwinner which makes it seem so irresponsible for me to go down a road where I could potentially get pregnant with more than one baby (i.e. IVF with donor eggs).  For what? An experience?  I am usually a means justifies the end kind of person.  It doesn't matter how you get there.....getting there is the important part.  I already have 2 kids and a fertile wife so I know that we will likely reach our dream of 4 children.  So if I have kids then why does the journey matter?  Does it matter? And, why can't I figure this out?  I am not the sort of person who has a hard time deciding what I want in life.  So, WHY IS THIS SO HARD?

I think being back in the RE's office, injecting Mere with drugs, and discussing things like follicle counts, transvaginal ultrasounds, and trigger injections has brought my infertility struggle back to the surface.   Having to deal with all this stuff I thought I had put to bed.  Aghhhhhh!!!  The good news? Mere has 2 great follicles ready for release so keep your fingers crossed.

Motivation?

I don't know what is wrong with me lately but I just can't get into my fellowship. Don't get me wrong, I love working with cancer patients and I love reading and learning about cancer but all the stuff in between is already wearing thin. In our program, we have to give presentations ALL THE TIME. At least once a month. And these aren't just any presentations....they are long, dense, and esoteric. Yes, I actually had an attending tell me that my talk needed to be more esoteric. Seriously?? Less than 6 months into it and I already hate these damn talks. It seems like once I get through with one another comes along.

And the conferences.....DAMN, there are so many!! When are we supposed to actually learn? I guess I'm just not digging this program. I know there is nothing I can do about it. I want to be an oncologist and we aren't moving (says my wife) so here I am. But, that doesn't mean I can't complain about it? Here I am again, digging my heels in for another 3 years of misery. Dear God, please help me see the light (not that light, the one at the end of the tunnel).

Right now I'm in the, "I should have been a (insert another specialty)" mode. I'm doing my Heme/Path month which is SUPER laid back and fun. I spend about 2 hrs a day looking at slides and discussing the pathology. Ok...reading that last sentence does not make it sound like fun, but it is! I'm really enjoying it and thinking....why didn't I do pathology? Oh yeah, no patients. I know that the grass is always greener and I KNOW in my heart of hearts that I am where I am meant to be but the motivation has been less than stellar lately.

And then I think, what am I complaining about? I don't have cancer. I'm healthy. I have a great family. So get over it, right?