Longtime, Lovely, Live-in, Lady Lovers take it to the Doc.

My partner argues that it didn't start with the L Word, but where the hell else did it come from? The L Word always had that title bit that put big 'L' words up on the screen for the viewer to ponder. Maybe it came from the house-cleaning hilarity of the phrase 'domestic partner.' As in 'What is your marital state? Oh, we're domestic partners' (substitute sarcastic 'long-time, lovely, live-in, lady lovers'. Sounds better, no? But in our case, I'm determined that where ever it came from, it's inspired an on-going quest for us to create more 'L' words that we can pile into one phrase, accompanied with high kicks (the high kicks didn't come from the L Word. The persona is totally based after SNL and Mary Katherine Gallagher.)

Most of the time, it's just the five L's in the title of this post, but occasionally we throw in 'lustful' or 'luxorous' or whatever seems to fit at the moment. Today, I add 'list-making' to the lot. I think it sounds good after 'live-in', don't you think?

We have composed a short list really (as if that's possible) of questions to ask our doctor today at our 'long-awaited' appointment. Well, it's as short as we crazy lesbians could make it:

1). Why was the home pregnancy test positive? Does this mean that I was actually pregnant at one point?

2). Clomid:
a. Should I take the same dose again next time?
b. I had some weird symptoms like dizziness, tiredness, headaches and dehydration. Is this normal?
c. Letrozole vs. Clomid: should we switch it up?

3). For the last frickin time people, how the fuck much will any additional testing cost us? Can anyone tell us this?

4). Is there any significance in the fact that we are two women living together? Is my cycle being affected by the hormones during my partners cycle and potentially preventing my pregnancy/causing miscarriage? (Yes, this is a bit far-fetched, but we're going to ask it anyway. It does make sense. FYI our cycles are not synced. I did a little research on this and it is not unusual for cohabiting females cycle's to sync. However, specifically dealing with lesbian couples, once you've lived together for an extended period of time, your lives and stresses tend to grow more individual and your cycles return to normal).

5). How is progesterone affecting my cycle/ability to get pregnant?

6). Are you tired of us yet? We'll take your honest opinion here doc. All you have to do is get us pregnant and we'll leave you alone. :-)

A perfect day for sarcastic, lesbian humor

Another Monday morning of Internet surfing and GMA viewing. Now that Ellen is on at 4pm, my day-off TV mornings sort of suck. But today, I discovered a website that I've been on now for at least an hour. Please for the love of God, check out Autostraddle.

Apparently, I have been living under a giant lesbian rock since March of 2009 when this site was initiated (under 'About Us' it states that they have about 1.75 million hits each month...) Quirky, sarcastic, lesbian blogging has never been so funny. Topics include pop culture, politics, parenting and everything in between. A little bit of L Word meets Glee meets Nancy Pelosi. Best part: you just might pee in your pants a little.

In order to relate this site to my own purposes here on this blog, here are two posts on parenting:

How to live with Kids: Toys and Entertainment

How to live with Kids: Food and Cooking

And because I am a Gleek who is obsessed with the fantasy of an almost-entirely gay (or at the very least bi-curious) high school glee club, here is their recap on the season premiere:

The Purple Piano Project

I have no interest in summarizing these posts as I won't do the humor justice. You'll just need to read them for yourself.

And now that I've done my part to advertise for another blog, I should include a bit about my current hopefully preggo state. All day yesterday I had cramps. You know, those cramps that come around when you're mid-cycle and ovulating. A friendly reminder of the break we're taking from IUI's. Next Monday is our big meeting with the doctor. I can't wait. We are literally going to have 'lesbian pregnancy question diarrhea of the mouth.' Fun!

Have a great week everyone!

Marc Anthony Syndrome: it's more serious than you think

I've never met a lesbian who wasn't a little neurotic. Just even a little. Some more than others. We're so defiant as a whole, strong-headed, and we tend to take after the honey badger and just not give a shit. In our case, we also crave knowledge like the plague. We just need to know; my partner refers to this as 'Marc Anthony Syndrome', and then I typically get a little tidbit of the song sung to me in perfect pitch....he he. After my weekend of miscommunication, I've decided that I should give our Dartmouth contact a little break; after all, if she is the ring leader for a couple dozen lesbians, then she has her hands full and could potentially be completely consumed with hopefully preggo lesbos who need to know everything right now.

It is a small break, however. We sent her an email right away after our negative blood test with a whole new list of questions. As of today, we've come up with even more questions and situations to discuss. I had a long chat with her yesterday afternoon, and our conclusion is that we should come in and have a face-to-face with our doctor and get everything out at once. I love this idea. 

Both our contact and our doctor are baffled by the fact that we had a positive at-home test and then a negative blood test. Typically, she said, it happens the other way around where people have a negative home test but are in fact pregnant. That being said, they are very curious to do some further testing. They suggested that we take the current cycle to meet with the doctor and do some testing and not do an IUI. At first I thought that was a bad idea, but the more we both thought about it, we decided it is best. Why should we throw away more money if in fact something is not jiving down there? 

This break will give us a much-needed chance to catch our breath, calm down, save money, formulate a master list of questions for the doctor and chillax on the Marc Anthony Syndrome. *Sigh*, much better.

not pregnant, pregnant, not pregnant

This is going to be a long post; my apologies now for being long-winded. I have a pumpkin beer helping me write, so I'm good. Go on, get yourself a cocktail.

Friday morning: Tinkle day. Both of us got up at 5am so that I could use my first tinkle of the day for the test. As I walked into the bathroom, I was thinking that something was up down there....period; a familiar spoogy sensation. I am literally half asleep, so I get the tinkle stick out anyway and pee on it. Less than a minute later, it says 'pregnant'. We are both a little dazed and confused (simply because it's 5am). My partner wears contacts and hasn't put them in yet. She has to put her face way up to the display screen to read the single word. It really says 'pregant,' not ' not pregnant.' We don't know what to think. I rationalize that maybe I'm just having a little light spotting. So we start our day as cautiously excited.

We go downstairs, make some coffee and write an email to our contact at Dartmouth. I go off to work.

By the time I get to the north country, I've got an email back from our contact. She wants us to tell her about the color of the blood and says that we should go in for a blood test. I write back.

It's Friday, and for those of you who get it, it's not the greatest day for me to have to leave work early. Or at all. But it never fails that we're going to have our IUI's and whatever else we need to do on Fridays. My body is playing sick games with me I think. It's not just ironic.

So I leave our contact a voicemail. Finally around noon she gets back to me. She asks me where I'd like to go to get my blood drawn and I say back somewhere near my house. We talk about the hospital which is minutes from my house. Fine, she'll set it up. 'Oh wait,' she says. 'Let's check your blood type. Oh, you're a negative blood type which means you'll need Rhogam.'

'What is Rhogam? Why do I need it?'

'Rhogam is a shot that women with negative blood types need when they first get pregnant, again at 28 weeks, and then again after birth only if the child has (a certain blood type that I can't recall).'

What I want to say is 'why the hell are you just now figuring this out when you've known my blood type since day one?' But, I digress. Same lack of communication, different day.

'Okay, so where can I get the shot?' We decide that she'll set it up for me to get my blood drawn at the local hospital and then if I'm in fact pregnant, go to my PCP for the shot. I am to wait until she gets back to me with more info.

She calls me back in a few minutes. Apparently my PCP takes an hour and a half for lunch, so she can't talk to them until 1:30pm. Are you serious? Who has that much time for lunch? Finally again, our contact calls back at 2pm. Still waiting to hear back from someone else regarding the blood work. We're in a holding pattern.

Finally, I just can't think clearly anymore at work. Must be around 3:00pm. I've got to get out of the north country or I'll never get back home before the end of business hours. I call our contact and tell her I'm headed down south. 'Any additional word?'

'No', she says. 'Still waiting'.

So I go home. Then I get a phone call at 4:45 from my PCP. They are wondering where I am. I am now just confused. I was waiting for more information, and never got it. My PCP asked if I'd had the blood work done yet. When I said no, she said I should get my butt to the hospital since their lab closes at 5pm. WHAT THE FUCK. No information. Huge communication breakdown on all parties.

I get to the lab at literally 4:55. They are trying to explain to me that I won't be able to get my lab results back today, which means that I'll have to wait until tomorrow to know if I need the Rhogam or not. But Saturday is not an option for a potential doctor's appointment that's 2 freakin hours from my job. Silly brides and their weddings.

The lab people have a private huddle and decide that they can stay late to do my test. Amazing, and so nice of them considering how long my day has been at this point. They said we should go home and they'll call me in an hour or two.

We go home. At this point, I'm fairly convinced that I'm not pregnant. My period is raging and the cramps are unbearable. When the phone rings, we put it on speaker and happily say 'hi'. The woman says 'Well, don't sound so excited. You're not pregnant.' It was a gentle let down, really. Not.

Shock. Tears. Confusion. Advil. In that order. Why was the at home test positive in the first place? Another email sent to our contact with a fresh list of questions.

I don't think Mother Nature likes me on Fridays. She is always screwing with them.

Dizzy oddly still....

And still optimistic :-) Last night, another screwed up dizzy-fest. I have drank so much water today, you might think I'd float away, but I still feel dehydrated. Oh, and I am headed to bed shortly, so tired (it's 8:04pm now.....I think I'll go to bed as soon as I finish here...)

I can't help but compare how I feel to a few months ago with the concussion. It is so similar. It is exactly the same. Am I just having a weird relapse of symptoms? This pregnancy stuff is a total mind fuck. How many symptoms can I come up with to analyze, truly. And my poor partner has to listen to it...heehee. That is love. 

I called my bestest bud tonight on my drive home (live free and/or die people). His kids are really little and it's fun to hear his tales of crazy, exausting parenthood. They're shopping for a mini-van....barf me sideways. With two kids and one on the way I suppose that is a necessity. Hopefully I can rock my Jetta/Cheap German Sportscar for a bit longer. 

Friday can't come soon enough. I gotta know. 

Dizzy......Seriously, again?

Needless to say we can't wait until this Friday to take a pregnancy test (and yes, we both agree that we will test on Friday morning). The past several days of our unknown pregnancy state have been exciting. I feel as though I may have had some noticeable symptoms for the first time since IUI #1. They come and go, but I can't help but be a bit more optimistic than usual.

'Usual' is defined as follows:

Day of IUI: Smiles and happiness. Cup overflowing.
Day 3 or 4 after IUI: Optimism. This might be the one!
Day 8 or 9 after IUI: Neutral. No emotion one way or another. If it's meant to happen it will.
Day 12 or 13 after IUI: Pessimism. Cramps. PMS. Bloating. Mentally preparing an awesome martini.

As you can see, I am in day 8 to 9 post-IUI, but am still in the optimistic stage. Truly a rarity. Potentially a devastating one.

Dizziness. As I laid on our couch the other night trying to shake the spins, the first thought that came into my head was, 'what the hell did I hit my head on this time?' After I was able to negate that option, pregnancy was my second thought. Achy boobs, weird dizziness, nausea, ridiculous thirstiness, oh and strangest of all, a lack of interest in my favorite morning/afternoon/border-line all day food, coffee. Sort of tastes nasty these days.....but who's keeping track of these silly things anyway, right? Maybe I'm just dehydrated. Same symptoms..... !!!!!! Coo-coo crazy.

Regardless, we're thinking proactively about the potential of a sixth IUI. We're trying to decide if we would initiate intertility tests a little early (our provider has stated several times that they typically wait six full, unsuccesful cycles before any testing, but ever since we've decided to take charge of my health care, it seems as though they are willing to test early). We're also trying to decide if we would switch sperm banks. We literally are paying a premium for sperm with California Cryobank. And since I now know that all sperm is governed by the same entity and processed under the same guidelines, ALL SPERM IS actually EQUAL. Half the cost elsewhere, and apparantly high price hasn't produced high results as of yet.

IUI #5 is hopefully the one. This will be the first time that I am emotionally crushed if it isn't. Bracing for impact (with fingers and toes crossed)!!!!

Taking Charge of your Fertility

I have no idea what to think this morning. It is the third day after our IUI and I am just simply enjoying a very normal, average Sunday morning of CBS news programs with no sense of anything funny happening down there. We've decided that this fifth IUI is a very pivotal point in our quest as hopefully preggo lesbos. This is a mildly expensive process, and we're wondering how much more we can truly afford.

It has been recommended to me that we check out a book that specializes in fertility for both trying to get pregnant and trying to avoid pregnancy. Taking Charge of your Fertility, by Toni Weschler, MPH, is a guide to charting your cycle and understanding the individual points in each person's cycle that pregnancy can be both achieved and avoided. I've also discovered that the author has a website with forums and blogs and online charting options at www.tcoyf.com. The website seems to be basic, but has information about the book and a downloadable pdf chart that you can use if you'd like to manually chart. I had trouble getting to the part of the site where I can chart online and share my results with the world; wouldn't let me create an account. I may check back later since charting manually sounds horrid to me.

I'm not sure I want to buy the book because it seems as though I already have a stack of books about a man and a woman creating life and none have been inspirational. The sample charts on the website show a space to make note of the days in your cycle that you have sex with your partner. Some of the samples showed 5 or 6 days in a row of sex. THAT hasn't happened in my life in years!!! HA!!! I'll have to get on my partner about this. My challenge with charting is that we only have one chance each cycle, not 5 or 6, so it really is imperative that we get our timing right every month. After looking at the sample charts, I am wondering if we could really narrow our chances down further by charting. I do think that it is worth a shot. Instead of us being able to narrow it down to two days of ovulation with our digital tinkle test, we might be able to narrow it down to 12 or 24 hours of peak-ovulation. Definitely worth a try.

We decided to go on our second day of ovulation this cycle for the first time. Perhaps the second-day method will work! I plan on charting if we need to try again.