Birthday

April 14th. It's my birthday! I'm 34 years old today, and life is great. We get possession of our new home in 2 weeks. We get to move from a place we despise to one we love. We get to save some money, cut off commute time, and call a place our own again. Bug will turn 4 soon, and she's growing up so fast. Goose amazes me every day as he proves he is so different from his sister. We've struggled financially recently but I see a light at the end of the tunnel. I'm going back to school in August. I've put off my masters for years, and now it's time. We will celebrate our 12th wedding anniversary this year. And I've been promised a night out at the melting pot for dinner for my birthday. It's all I want. Life is good.

Today

April 14.

This is an important day in my life.  For one, it’s the day I was born.  Today I turn 33 years old.  I cycle through another year of my life, and realize just how very very happy I am.  I have everything I have ever dreamed of having; a loving husband and two beautiful children.  We even have the dog J 

Last year, on my 32^nd birthday, we took a leap.  Last year on my birthday, sometime around 10:00 in the evening, our last fresh cycle of IVF became a reality as K gave me my trigger shot.  It was our last attempt at having a child that is biologically both of ours.  We were hopeful, scared, excited and nervous. Our prior attempts at IVF had gone over so poorly that neither one of us were really sure that it could work.  We wanted it to so bad, bad enough that we were willing to try one last time even though the hope we had was very cautious hope.   Up until the trigger shot it wasn’t as real, it could have been cancelled as so many times before, it could have been stopped and we could have moved on as if it never was.

But we didn’t.  We took a deep collective breath, and took the leap.

And on my 32^nd birthday, we became parents again. 

I know, nothing was fertilized yet, but it was the big leap in the process that gave us our precious little boy.  We were parents multiple times over at this point, but only to 1 living child.  This was the day that the wild crazy ride really really began of being parents to 2 living children.

K and I struggled with some relationship issues this past year.  They were very difficult, and potentially marriage ending.  But we got counseling and worked through it.  We both made the decision that we WANTED it to work.  That we needed each other, and that we wanted nothing to come to an end.  It was tough times, but we made it through to the other side. 

So I say Goodbye to 32 with happiness as well as sadness.  But I say Hello to 33 with love and excitement as I know that I have the family I have always wanted.  That while IF will always hold a part of my heart and soul in its nasty vice grip, that I will never have to confront it in the same way again; I will never have to fight to overcome it in order to expand my family.  Instead I can (attempt) to gracefully accept that it is and was, and look at the two beautiful children I gained out of it, and remember how much I love them, and how much more I appreciate them because I had to fight so hard to get them.  I had to put on my armor and fight infertility as well as the marriage separation and almost divorce that stemmed from infertility 4 years ago, but we are now long past that. We are renewed, in our hope, in our faith, in ourselves and each other.

I turn 33 where I thought I would be years ago, but that no longer matters.  Because as I turn 33, I am right where I want to be, with everything I could dream of having.

Welcome to the rest of our lives.

Terrible Two's?!

So, Bug's birthday is coming up in just under 3 weeks.  And boy, has she hit the terrible twos!!

I think part of the problem is that she still isn't really talking.  She says (in sign language) More, Eat, Please, Thank you, Milk, Water and Thirsty.  She speaks Mama and Dada (although not very often), This, That, yes, no and Ice.  That's about it.  So I think she's having a hard time communicating, on top of the whole learning to deal with the strong feelings.

Today was a good day.  We only had one mid level and three minor melt downs.  They involved crying and some kicking and hitting of the poor floor.  But there are worse.

Most days, in the time after I get home from work, we manage to have sometimes 3 or more melt downs.  Mind you, this is between about 5:45ish and 7:30ish when she goes to bed.  These melt downs range from minor (not lasting long, mainly just some sitting down and crying), to mid level (crying harder, throwing herself on the floor kicking and screaming) to major (all of the above plus hitting everything in sight including me, the dog, and herself), scratching herself to the point of drawing blood, pulling out her hair, crying so hard she almost pukes, and comes out sweaty and exhausted.

I've tried ignoring, holding through, talking to her softly, talking to her whiny.  I've tried joining her on the floor.  Nothing seems to work.

Is this all normal?  On the weekends it gets BAD.  I mean, sometimes 10, 15 tantrums.  I asked my mom one day if I was like that at her age (or my brother).  She said while we both threw tantrums, they were nothing like Bug's tantrums.

She's obviously a master tantrum thrower.

When K had her in to the dr for her 18 month check up, they gave him some phone numbers to talk to some people about her speech.  They also said we could try to wait it out to 2.  I wanted to call, he wasn't too worried so he misplaced the numbers.  The only new word we seem to have in spoken language since then is ice.  Sometimes I think I hear words (please, eat, more milk, hi, etc etc) but they never last.  I'm honestly getting worried.  And K is hardly ever home, so he doesn't see it as much.  This week was nice, he got almost all of Tuesday, and all day Thursday at home.  Plus, he's home now putting Bug to bed.  Which is so nice.

Speaking of putting bug to bed.  I was really starting to stress because she STILL wasn't going to sleep on her own.  I had no idea how I was going to manage it with her and an infant.  Then we went on vacation and my Mom sleep trained her.  Not in the way I would have chosen, but I was desperate, so it became OK.  She's doing pretty good with letting us put her down and then walk out.  She has cried the last 2 nights though.  I hope it keeps getting better, as I want to try to transition her to a new bed so the new baby can use the crib.  Plus, she won't nap in her crib any longer (she has napped on a cot at daycare for a year now).  So she's been napping on the couch.  I don't love this set up, but it's better than the alternative, which is no nap at all.  She's not ready for that yet.

For the good news, she's still very much a lover when she wants to be.  Nothing makes up for the tantrums more than some big old hugs and kisses from the sweetest little girl I know.

Trigger?!

So yesterday morning we went in for another ultrasound and bloodwork.  There were TONS and TONS of follies on both sides, and my estrogen was at 2969.  The RE I saw said that he felt there would be about 10 - 16 mature by Monday.

So....

I triggered last night at 10:00pm.  We have to be at the RE at 8:30am tomorrow morning for a 10:00 am retrieval.

I have to be honest, it almost doesn't seem real to me right now.  To us really.  After all we dealt with back in 2008 with IVF it's amazing that our first try at a cycle with a brand new RE is going so good.  It scares me a little that it'll all fall apart, but I'm keeping the hope that it won't.  I POAS this morning, and of course since you trigger with HCG it was positive.  I wanted to make sure it was.  I packed the second test away in hopes that I'll be using it in a couple of weeks for another, better positive.  I want this to work so bad, but every day I pray to God and let him know that I know his will will happen, and that there's nothing I can do about it, and that I accept that no matter how hard it is/will be.  I just hope hope hope it works out the way I want it to, the way I pray it will.

So yesterday, on top of the appointment and trigger, was my birthday.  I turned 32.  I've never really been a big birthday person, although since I was pregnant on my 30th they have been better.  Nana babysat and we went out to dinner, and then bought me a couple of new work shirts that I needed.  Nothing real exciting, but it was a TON of fun.  So nice to get out of the house.  Plus we needed to keep me up until 10 for the trigger, which I've been unsuccessful in doing lately (the hormones just wear me the heck out).

So I'm a bundle of nerves about everything, but at the same time strangely calm.  I don't know if that even makes sense, and I sure can't explain it.  I'm just hoping and praying for the best, and keeping my head held high.  The money is paid, we are now here.  This is it - our last shot at having a baby that looks like the both of us.  I'm at peace with that decision, and whatever decision we make if it doesn't work.  But that doesn't mean it's easy, because it's not.  I'm emotional over it.  But then I look at my bank account and know that financially and emotionally this being the last shot is the right thing.

Deep breathing.  Hopefully tomorrow goes smooth.