The Old Guard

Arthur and I went to see the RE today to talk about the two remaining embryos we have frozen.  The embryos are a discussion for another post, but as we stepped into the clinic, I had this odd sense that I no longer belonged there the way I once had.  It reminded me of going back to my alma mater, walking around the campus, seeing the current students going to classes, realizing I was an alumnus now and that era of my life was over.

We sat in the waiting room.  A couple came in.  They seemed happy, and I watched as they were ushered back in the direction of the ultrasound room and suspected they were here for a pregnancy check.  Unless the routine had vastly changed, I knew ultrasounds for follicle counts were done much earlier in the morning.  I hope that they got good news.

Eventually, we were ushered back to talk with Dr. E.  As we discussed the remaining embryos, it was clear that we were no longer there with that mixture of fear, anticipation, and hope that we had originally come into the clinic carrying four years ago.  Instead of trying to begin, we were bringing the journey to an end, working to figure out the last steps.

I’m not nostalgic about IVF or treatment.  A few days ago when I went write about a particular experience during my first IVF, I was surprised at how p*ssed I still felt when reliving that memory.  I don’t miss the uncertainty, the worry, and the torturous waits for everything from follicle checks to the infamous two-week wait.

I am slightly nostalgic for that nervous but hopeful person I was when I first walked into the clinic.

Many of the times I’ve gone to the clinic, there’s been the sense of doors opening.  Of possibilities and plans and fresh starts.

Today, we walked out with all but the last two doors closed behind us.

Want more Microblog Mondays posts?  Head over to Stirrup Queens and check them out!  Thanks to Mel for originating and hosting.

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Odds and Ends

A couple of weeks ago, E knocked my laptop off the coffee table accidentally.  In a freak sort of moment, it hit the corner of a heavy basket I keep next to the table and cracked the screen.  Since the crack didn’t affect the LCD part of the screen (it was a very surface crack), I groaned and figured I’d keep using the laptop for a bit while researching potential replacements and saving.

A few days later, M spit up directly into the keypad.  I turned it off immediately, wiped up what I could, and waited.  The laptop is mostly working now, but has some sticky keys and is clearly running even more obviously on borrowed time than before.  Arthur is researching alternatives and hopefully we’ll get one ordered in the next week or so before this laptop dies entirely.  I’m backing up all my files to the external hard-drive and getting ready to move my bookmarks and such before that happens.

It is telling that upon seeing the screen crack, my first thought was: well, this will most likely be less expensive to replace than two vials of foll.istim and definitely less expensive than a single IUI.

Infertility has clearly skewed my view of the term “expensive”.

~*~

Life is in that busy but largely pleasant mode for the most part these days.  I’ve been back to work since mid-June, which is going well.  I enjoy what I do, so while I’m tired (trying to readjust to working nights is taking some time), it’s great to have a chance to interact with my coworkers and take on some projects.

Arthur and I got to go to a fundraiser for the local zoo on Friday with his parents and a couple of his siblings.  It’s a sort of local “taste and drink” deal, where many of the restaurants and catering companies in town set up booths with small portions and typically a signature drink or two.  Because I have a terrible sweet tooth, my favorite is the artisan chocolate company.  It was a lot of fun, made more so because the animals were far more active at night than they typically are during the day.

~*~

E is almost finished with speech therapy.  We have one last session in September just to make sure she hasn’t regressed.  I’m not too worried at this point.  The other day, she walked up to me and started talking about the “botanical garden”.  Yep, with the word ‘botanical’ clearly pronounced.  We’ve come a long way from the 18 month who had what the speech therapist termed a “moderate to severe” speech delay.

She’s doing extremely well overall.  Still doing some physical therapy for a few motor issues, but we see improvement and hope that soon enough the gymnastics class I’ve got her enrolled in at our local YMCA will be enough.  We’re gearing up for a minor procedure for E in September due to congenital partially blocked tear ducts, but hopefully that will be her final surgery for the foreseeable future.

M is growing so fast!  Having a term baby after a very premature one is a totally different game.  She’s a happy, giggly baby who smiles and babbles a lot.  It’s strange not to be in a doctor’s office on a regular basis and to watch her outgrow clothes at an absolutely (to me) extraordinary rate.

~*~

Arthur and I scheduled a consult with Dr. E to discuss our two remaining embryos.  We aren’t anywhere near ready to make a final decision, but we need information to make some of those decisions, time to potentially save up financially, and a discussion of what’s even possible or advisable at this point.

~*~

We’re starting to make appointments to prepare for a house purchase.  We’ve been looking at various neighborhoods, narrowed what we are looking for, and decided on a couple of financial institutions to talk to for the mortgage.  It’s both daunting and exciting to get to this point.

A Long Time Coming

In the weeks and then months after E was born, we spent a lot of time at the hospital, first in NICU, then going back and forth to doctor’s appointments and tests.  Every time I made the trip to the hospital, the route took me through a nature preserve marsh area.  I’d often spot hawks, great blue herons, or swans.

One day, I saw a flock of white birds perched in the trees and logs.  At first, I wondered if they were seagulls or more swans.  They were quite a long way from the road, so hard to make out, but as I got a better look, I realized that a couple of them were wading in the water.  They were storks.  A whole friggin’ cloud of storks.  This realization elicited a rather dark-humored chuckle from me, given the association of storks with babies.

“Really?!”  I muttered incredulously to myself.  “This is where y’all have been hanging out all these years, huh?”

I continued to see the storks all summer, and the next spring, I kept an eye out for them.  Sure enough, the cloud of storks again descended on the marsh.  I would watch for them as I went back and forth to my OB appointments in those early, tenuous days of my pregnancy with M.  I saw them as I headed in with bleeding.  I saw them after good ultrasounds.  I got to the point where I was almost superstitious about it – if I saw the storks, everything was probably okay.

This summer, I waited to see the storks.  While I’ve seen a few of them on and off, it’s nothing like the last two years.  At most, I’ve seen three or four at a time, whereas in previous years, I’d see ten or fifteen easily.  I’m completely aware that this has something to do with changes in the migratory pattern of the birds, but it’s a sort of strange coincidence how it has almost perfectly dovetailed with the volume of my anxieties and feelings about infertility.

When I was first diagnosed with infertility, the one thing I wanted to know was whether or not the acute distress of not knowing and the horrible limbo of waiting would ever end.  I figured intellectually it would – and multiple bloggers/authors in this community with every manner of outcome testified to that – but there were days it felt emotionally like we might remain in the undecided, unresolved ether forever.  In some ways, that was one of the hardest parts of fertility treatment for me.  I could deal with the physical side effects, but the waits – waiting to start cycles, waiting for lab results, waiting for paychecks to pay for cycles, waiting for embryo reports, waiting for pregnancy tests, waiting for ultrasounds, waiting on those long weeks of hospital bedrest to see if E would survive – stressed me enormously.

For a long time, infertility has been a wound that has stubbornly refused to heal or even really scab over.  We still have two frozen embryos, and with my history of subchorionic hematomas and the concerns with whether or not something in the IVF process possibly exacerbated the first one with E, there are some loose ends yet.  Lately, though, I’ve noticed that while I’m not quite resolved, I’m starting to see that eventuality on the horizon.

Things that go Bump in the Night

A few months ago, Arthur and I started talking about buying a house.  After we spent our original down payment on IVF, it’s taken us awhile and a few breaks that went our way, but we’re starting to look a bit with the hope of finding something in the fall or early next spring.  As we were brainstorming questions to ask a potential seller, I looked at Arthur somewhat sheepishly.

“Do you think it would be completely weird if I asked if they had ever seen or heard…anything strange over the years they lived there?”

Arthur gave me a quizzical look.  “Like ghosts,” I clarified, slightly embarrassed.

Arthur considered for a moment.  “No…” he finally said.

“Well,” I hedged, “I don’t like being startled.  And I do think there are phenomena we don’t understand or can’t explain sometimes.  I don’t know that it’s anything that won’t eventually be explained, but I just want to cover all my bases.”

I have a sort of love/hate relationship with scary.  As a tween, one of my favorite books was Horror at the Haunted House by Peg Kehret (spoiler/content note: it has an infant loss plot point).  I also had – and still have – a highly overactive imagination and frequent nightmares.  I read several books by Betty Ren Wright that scared the heck out of me, read a couple of “real life” ghost books that did the same, reached Steven King in high school and after reading one or two of those, promptly quit dabbling at all in horror.  Eighteen years after reading the King books, I still have nightmares specific to those novels.  That being said, I’m a total sucker for a good creepy story.  Even when I know it’s bad for me, I can’t help reading them occasionally.

I don’t really believe in ghosts, or at least, I don’t believe in ghosts during the day when the sun is shining.  However, if we are purchasing a house to live in for a long time, I have zero desire to discover any sort of…quirkiness once the purchase is final.

So, even though I suspect I’m going to get a few odd looks, I think I’m going to ask.

If you want to read more Microblog Monday entries, head over to Stirrup Queens to check them out.  Thanks to Mel for originating and hosting.

One Project Finished

May and June comprised one of the busiest periods I’ve had in a long while.  As my BSN program drew to close and deadlines ticked down, I found myself running around completing a sixty-five hour practicum class that involved setting up and then interviewing community leaders on my chosen topic as well as doing the research for my classes to prepare for papers.  June finished out with an absolute orgy of writing as I wrote three major capstone projects totaling over seventy pages.  It was, to say the least, completely exhausting.

However, it was also rewarding as I got the notice on Monday that my final paper passed and my advisor recommended me to receive my diploma!

When I decided to go for the BSN, I initially rolled my eyes a little.  I already have a BA (in English) and I figured this degree would be more of the same.  However, with more and more push for RNs working in hospital settings to have BSNs, I knew I needed to go ahead and get the degree.  Otherwise, I risked a situation where, if I ever found a position I wanted to pursue in another hospital system or my system changed rules or ownership, I might find myself either unable to apply for a different position or told that I needed to complete the BSN within a certain number of years.

I was surprised at how much I learned.  While I definitely had a head start since my degree in English had taught me a good bit about research and writing, in my new coursework, I learned how to really evaluate scientific research.  I also learned about statistics and worked through the steps of problem-solving in a nursing setting.

In short, I know I’m better at what I do thanks to earning this degree.  Eventually, when I’m ready, it will also set me up much better to complete masters’ level coursework.

At this point, I’m looking forward to catching up with reading blogs, commenting, and writing here a bit more often.  I’m hoping to watch the documentary “Vegas Baby” about the Sh.er Inst.itutes IVF contest when it comes to Net.flix and read Belle Boggs’ The Art of Waiting.  I recently finished Kate Hopper’s memoir Ready for Air about the premature birth of her daughter and D. Knight Smith’s Letters to Ellie.  I’ve been thinking about infertility and NICU quite a bit.  It’s as though suddenly I’m really starting to process some parts of the experience that perhaps I couldn’t when I was going through them.

A Great Aunt Indeed

One mid-February evening as I was getting ready for work, my phone rang.  Arthur answered it and I could tell immediately by the tone of his voice that it was not good news.  My mind jumped immediately to my grandfathers, both elderly and not in the best health.  However, my mother told me that the news came from an unexpected place: my great-aunt J had died that afternoon.

While Aunt J had experienced several serious bouts of illness in the past year, she had recovered and was doing reasonably well at that point.  She had even gone out with my aunt for a drive earlier in the week and my cousin had visited with her the day before.  Apparently, Aunt J had been resting in her room, pushed her call light, and by the time the staff responded a minute or two later, she was gone.  It was quick and by all accounts, peaceful.

~*~

Aunt J was my maternal grandfather’s older sister.  I remember very clearly going to Columbus most years for the Fourth of July holiday to see my grandparents and her.  Since Aunt J’s birthday was on July 2, she always hosted a party for the assembled family and friends.  As the oldest cousin, I was the first to get to accompany her on trips to Star Beacon, a treasure trove for a child.  I got to help her select items such as small Styrofoam gliders that looked like airplanes and went much further than homemade paper airplanes, jelly bracelets, poppers (little plastic pieces that could be turned inside out, set down, and then jumped into the air with a “pop”), and other similar bits for the goody bags.  Aunt J always asked me to consider the smaller cousins or items that might amuse the adult guests as well as the children.  It was my first lesson in hospitality and thinking about others.

Aunt J was always ready with fun surprises, including everything from climbing walls to a simple trip to the local park.  She was the first in a long day to suggest a break for rest or food when one of us cousins got cranky, making sure she cared for our physical needs.  We always knew Aunt J took a nap herself in the afternoon, letting us know by example that it was okay to slow down a bit and recover.  She also helped support me during nursing school in many different ways.  It’s thanks to her that I stuck with school on the really awful days, and I am so grateful for that.

In so many ways, more than I can possibly list here, she taught me how to “adult”.

Beyond the ways in which I knew her as an aunt, Aunt J had a very full life.  With a degree in Biological Sciences, she worked in the labs at Ohio State for the College of Medicine, Department of Surgery, and clinical chemistry.   She traveled behind the Iron Curtain in the 1960s.  Aunt J also made many, many friends over the years and was active at church, writing down the names of newcomers so she would remember them if and when they returned.  Aunt J also did a great deal of volunteering with the library and other organizations.

In 2007, after having lived in Columbus most of her adult life, Aunt J picked up and moved to Pennsylvania, near one of my mother’s sisters.  When I asked her why she’d move so far away, Aunt J said she was ready for another adventure.  She was always up for a challenge and excited to meet new people.

~*~

It’s also worth noting here that Aunt J never married and did not have children.  This was the other way she taught me by her example: that a life without having children could be immensely well-lived.  As much as the infertility was horrible, I also had a role model for a life outside of the nuclear family structure.

~*~

My mother told me about Aunt J’s memorial service, held in mid-March.  All of her five nieces attended.  Several friends from Columbus made the trip out to Pennsylvania.  I wanted to go very much, but it was simply impossible given the timing.  A friend Aunt J had made after she moved delivered one of the eulogies.  There is no doubt that this extraordinary woman had made an enormous impact and touched many lives.

It was my great privilege to know and love Aunt J.

Everyday Miracles

Despite the many shortcomings of modern medicine (and there are obviously plenty, alas), I still find myself drawn in by so many things that are routine in many healthcare facilities.  I can’t help but be slightly awed every time I see antibiotics work in clearing up an infection.  I’m struck by the fact that brain surgery and cardiac valve replacements are everyday procedures in plenty of hospitals.  Even something as run-of-the mill as x-rays or ultrasounds where the bones or organs can be visualized to direct treatment is amazing in its own way.

My Facebook feed this weekend was full of nursing memes and videos that ranged from the somber to the humorous.  National Nurses’ Day (in the United States) was on May 6, and as many friends and colleagues celebrated, I thought about an article I had come across last month on NPR.  The article features another sort of everyday miracle: waking up after a general anesthetic.

I was totally fascinated by Dr. Shafer’s perspective on the profound moment as a person wakes up after a procedure and her awareness of the awe-inspiring trust the patients place in her and other health care professionals to help them get safely through surgery – or, by extension, any health care experience.  Having worked as a nurse in both recovery (post anesthesia care) and neuro/trauma ICU over the last several years, I couldn’t help but think that Dr. Shafer has captured the essence of the humanity and beauty of the “ordinary” events in modern nursing and medicine.

Want to read more Microblog Monday posts?  Please check out Stirrup Queens’ blog.  Thanks to Mel for originating and hosting.