You can tell I’m on my period when I talk about “the indicent.”

At July 21, 2008
By Lotus, aka Sarcastic Mom
In Depression, Mental/Emotional, Miscarriage, Parenting
72

Or when I tell you in detail about how I have PMS or, you know, just flat out announce that I’m on my period. That’s also a good way to tell.

But you can rely on me to talk about the miscarriage around this time of the month, too, I’ve come to realize. Because, really, it’s actually more painful to me than the date on which the miscarriage happened, this bleeding that says there is no life within these fleshy walls we call “my uterus.”

The bleeding that says, “AH-HAHAHA, YOU ARE ALONE IN THIS SHELL OF MEAT.”

I don’t think my depression about the matter is excessive. It’s not worse than it was in the beginning, but it’s not really getting better either. How about that, y’all? I guess it takes more time. Or magic dust. Or what-the-hell-ever.

Most “normal” days I am “fine.” Whatever that is. Sometimes stupid things make me cry. Sometimes un-stupid things make me cry. Sometimes people say asshole things, and that makes me cry. But mostly, on “normal” days, I am fine. And I think, “Oh, I am getting better, and next time I have my period, it will probably not bother me so much like last time.”

But I am wrong.

I have not gotten past the part where I want that very baby back. Somehow I feel like I should have been able to let that go by now and want a different one, but it’s just not happening for me. I have times when I can clearly acknowledge the fact that I still want to have another child someday and that I cannot have THAT child someday, and so I would have to have a DIFFERENT child someday.

But I don’t want to.

And then I think about it some more and I wonder if I really DO want to have another child someday. Maybe I just still think I kind of sorta like the idea of having another one someday, but that it’s not really true that I actually want to have one.

And I really don’t need to hear any more about how often it happens, or why it probably happened. I especially don’t want to hear about how it was probably ”for the best” because of why it probably happened. Thanks, but telling me that my “embryo” [my baby, asshole] was probably some kind of fackin’ chromosomally mutated freak isn’t going to make me want it back less. If Braden had some type of disease, I would also still want him, I’d just WANT HIM TO BE HEALTHY.

Also, Braden has been extra challenging for me lately. He is pretty much always up my ass so far I’m choking. Quite often, he is screaming/whining/throwing a tantrum/crying. I don’t quite know what to do when, for example, I’ve been playing with him all day and then I’m just trying to have a conversation on the phone with my husband who is NOT HERE and whom I MISS and Braden comes over and shoves a toy in my face. I tell him to wait, but then he cries, screams, or just gets another toy and hits me in the face with it instead. I get frustrated and raise my voice at him telling him to, “Just let me talk to Daddy for a few minutes!” but that just makes John mad at me.

It’s all just triggering a level of insanity in me that I am not mentally coping with very well. Icanhasdrugz? Maybe that’s what I need.

I’m reaching the end of my rope and finding it’s just a frayed knob and when I look down, there’s a pit of glass shards waiting below.

What with my inability to let go of the desire to have my dead baby back, and Braden having been really, extra difficult lately, I kind of really am starting to sort of think I maybe don’t want to have another one, not even someday, not even one day. Not ever.

And it’s making it really hard to make love to my husband. Because THAT’S HOW YOU MAKE A BABY AND I’M SCARED.

(Ooops, I just said that to The Internet, didn’t I? Oh well.)

That ends this installment of Pity Theatre. Also known as, “Oh, Poor Me!”

Not likely to be seen on Broadway anytime soon.

Where I go on and on about baby making and blahblahblah…

So, if you read yesterday’s post, you know that I am pregnant. *smirky face bursting with happiness*

Or, as John enjoys saying, “I banged you and got you knocked up!”

Either way.

A few of you have asked if we were trying. The answer to that is actually both yes and no.

See, when I got pregnant with Braden, we were REALLY trying. I was taking my basal body temperature every day at 6am before I started moving (thermometer and notepad on bedside table) and then charting it online to create ovulation prediction graphs. I was using ovulation predictor kits – Pee on a stick every day and it will say YES! or NO! so that you know if you should RUN HOME AND DO IT.

I was testing and charting my cervical position, openness, and mucous, for crying out loud! You haven’t lived until you’ve swished your finger around in there thinking, “is that high and medium or medium and open?” and “I think this is egg-white mucous, it’s pretty slimy….”

THAT’S trying.

This? Well, this was basically trying the relaxed way. As in, I stopped taking The Pill at the end of January to regain my libido and shrug off the worst of my depression. (And it worked! Hurrah!) But John and I discussed everything in detail, and decided that we wanted to get pregnant sometime this year, anyway… so we figured we would just forget about trying NOT to get pregnant.

So basically… we tried by not NOT trying. Hah! Looks like it worked for us. We feel incredibly blessed and are grateful beyond words.

The other question I’ve been getting is: when’s the due date/how far along are you?

I would love to tell you… but I cannot do so yet with certaintly. (And the control freak in me is positively FREAKING OUT ABOUT THIS, by the way. She’s just having seizures and melt-downs, pulling her hair out in clumps and FROTHING AT THE MOUTH.)

My last cycle was only 3 weeks long. Usually I’m a 4-weeker. Ovulation is generally during the second week, if nothing is fertilized, my period happens in week 4. Last month, “my period” happened in week 3. This both weirded me out and upset me. See… that tends to be a bad sign, because if your cycle is too short, you don’t even have the chance to become pregnant. Stick that together with what I learned from my Endocrinologist – women with Hashimoto’s (like me) often have trouble conceiving – and you had one worried Baby Momma. It was also right when we were moving out of Mold House… so I was already stressed. So, I just assumed my body was BLAH and I didn’t even take a test.

But upon reflection? That could have been implantation bleeding. Implantation, you see, occurs 6-13 days after ovulation (like, possibly in your third week, fyi). Well, that last “period” was also very light and very short.

The point of all of that drawn-out blahblahblah? It’s possible we conceived either Mid-March or Early April. And we’re not absolutely sure which!

Sooooo. The Carrolls are packin’ it up early Tuesday morning and heading to the lab at the OBGYN’s office. There, blood will be drawn and tested for pregnancy hormone or hCG. If the hormone levels are very, very low, the nurse says it is almost certain I conceived just recently. If they are above “10,000″ (direct quote from her) it indicates a pregnancy further along, and I can have an ultrasound for precise measurement. She says the labs should be back by Tuesday afternoon, so I’ll keep you all posted.

And before long, I may even be able to put up one of those cheesy sidebar widgets where you can watch my Floating Virtual Baby grow and imagine you’re seeing into my very own, real, wet and slimy uterus!

YAY!