The damn rabbit...

So today was day 14 and that meant pregnancy test date...we should either have a period or an embryo today. It's a big day!

Back up a day or two...so we pondered taking a test early to just "see" if we were pregnant. We did a little Internet research (sometimes the worse enemy is knowing too much, I might add) to see if the shots Heidi got, courtesy of my very skilled injection talents, would affect the test. Bad news there...the very thing we injected her with was the hormone the pregnancy test measures. So, theoretically, we could get a false positive if we tested too early because she may still have residual HCG in her system. So we pondered. And validated. And pondered. And wrestled. And...well, you get the point.

So, at approximately 4:07 a.m. on Saturday morning, Heidi had to pee. Since she wanted to test using her first morning urine, this was the time she chose to take the dead rabbit test.

What? Dead rabbit? What are you talking about, anyone under age thirty might be asking? Around 1927 it was discovered that if you injected the urine of a pregnant woman into a rabbit, there would be corpora hemorrhagica in the ovaries of the rabbit. These bulging masses on the ovaries could not be seen with out killing the rabbit to inspect the ovaries, so invariably, every rabbit died, even if the woman wasn't pregnant. The phrase, "The rabbit died," came to be a euphemism for a positive pregnancy test after the late 1920 and early 1930s. Yes, I actually had to look up this explanation to give to Heidi, hence, the "anyone under thirty" disclaimer. Anyway...

At approximately 4:10 a.m., at Heidi's urging, I got out of bed and found out that unfortunately, the rabbit had survived. Well, you say, you took it early...perhaps too early.

It was, to say the least, a very difficult weekend. It's amazing how one KNOWS that there is a small chance this will work on try #1. You are fully aware that statistically speaking, you only have a 10% to 20% chance of having this work the first time. Why should we expect that Heidi's uterus and several million strange sperm would play nice on their first encounter? (I imagine her body reacted with a stern "What the hell is that??? Hide the egg, it's going for the egg, HIDE THE EGG!!!) We knew that there was the issue with the infection in her stomach, or in her uterus, wherever it chose to infect. We knew all this, yet we still hoped. We hoped we would be the exception. We thought we would be in that 10% to 20%...I mean, those statistics have to be someone, why not us?!? Heidi learned first hand how hard it was to miss someone or something you had not yet created, but to miss the possibility of that someone. And it was hard for her. And when her heart hurts, mine hurts right along side.

So, we still had a shred of hope. Maybe we did test too early. Maybe the test on Monday would be different. It took all weekend, but Heidi had finally accepted the possibility and was ready for the result, no matter what it was. Either way, the hope was much more contained and not wholly optimistic.

This morning at approximately 6:30 a.m., the rabbit survived again. Damn rabbit.

"Like barbed wire being pulled through my stomach.."

Attention getting, isn't it? Now imagine dealing with it. That's what Heidi dealt with all last week. What started as a slight pain in her stomach last Tuesday afternoon ended up being quite excruciating for her through Thursday night. She missed two days of the Susan G. Komen 3-Day walk because of being sick.

When you are one day past day two of insemination, severe cramping in your stomach feels very ominous. Heidi could barely stand upright because of the pain. Even I am at a loss for humor when it comes to what Heidi went through. On Wednesday afternoon, we went to see Dr. Weldon to see if her pain had anything to do with the insemination.

Now, you should know that it was ridiculously difficult for me to go to work on Wednesday morning and leave her alone. Couple that with what felt like a million meetings and only short moments to call and check on her and I was feeling more than a little anxious. Thankfully, her mom offered to go and Heidi-sit until I could come home...big weight off my shoulders. At least knowing someone was there made me able to get through the rest of the day! (Not to mention, her mom also left herself logged onto Facebook on my laptop...well, let's just say all of those amazing things she had to say about me were, well, self-declared. LOL)

So, back to little Heidi and her tummy pain. We go into Dr. Welden's office, at his insistence, and the first thing he does is another ultrasound. Heidi is in a lot of pain during this process and every touch was painful for her. It takes a lot for Heidi to cry...I mean A LOT. But there she lay, on the examining table, crying. Yes, my heart was breaking for her and if I could have taken her place, every cell in my body would have jumped at the opportunity to take her out of that pain. The ultrasound showed that her ovaries were fine, her uterus appeared fine and there was only a moderate amount of extra fluid above her uterus where the follicles had recently collapsed (at least we knew she had ovulated...that was good news!).

Then blood tests. They took a lot of blood...seriously, I wonder if they know that she's only about 12 lbs., she doesn't have much of anything to spare! Blood tests to be back the next day and we'd figure out next steps. He gave her a prescription for an antibiotic just in case it was an infection; he wanted her to already begin the regimen. He advised it was safe for her even if she was pregnant. If you don't know Heidi, she's a little, well, what's the word? Stubborn. She is incredibly stubborn (you'd think she was the Leo, not me). She was very concerned about taking the antibiotic in case she was pregnant. It took a lot of convincing to get her to agree to take it but she finally relented. We also picked up some gas pills in case this whole thing just turned out being one big, painful, expensive...um, butt burp. She took the gas pills, the fast acting kind, and nothing. The pain was still there. She took the antibiotic too. The next day, Thursday, she was in the same amount of pain all day. When I came home, she was up and about; actually standing upright. That was progress! We were due to leave very early the next morning for the 3-day and we spent time discussing whether or not we would participate...I was NOT going to leave her alone for three days. Wasn't going to happen, no way, no day!

Long story, well, kind of long, she felt well enough to go to opening ceremonies on Friday and came to a cheering station with her mom. Saturday, she felt well enough to come to lunch and be a "walker stalker" for awhile. Sunday, she walked with us! She's still on her antibiotic, but feeling much better.

As an aside, the doctor gave her another antibiotic to take with her current one, but the first line in the instructions said not to take it if you are in your first three months of pregnancy. There was no convincing her on this one. I guess I just have to be happy she agreed to one regimen...I'm incredibly happy she's feeling better. Now, we just have a waiting game....

Monday is pregnancy test time. We have three tests to be sure. Cross your fingers! And your eyes, maybe even your toes...

Meeting our baby daddy...

This has been an exciting couple of days. First, we got the good news about our follicle count with our magic number. Then, we successfully shot Heidi up with human chorionic gonadotropin (very fancy words for HCG and yes, I do feel quite brilliant saying it). And now, we have officially gotten to the point in our journey where we will get to meet cowboy hat baby, in a round about way, via his sperm. Yes, my friends, this little vial, containing .7 ml of sperm, is the meeting we've been waiting for. Every day in this process has led up to this meeting, every doctor's appointment, every temperature charted, every ultrasound, every worry. Everything we've done up to this point was so we could transfer that sperm into little Heidi. And here we were...meeting our baby daddy for the first time. Hello, little cowboy hat baby, hello.

So Sunday morning was our first of two inseminations. We were very excited to be going to this appointment. When we arrived, there was cowboy hat baby, sitting frozen on the counter. Huh, frozen, a spermcicle if you will. Oddly enough, the sperm stays frozen until about twenty minutes prior to the insemination. We sat and chatted while our frozen sperm thawed. We were excited, nervous, amazed that something so small cost so much, and anticipating...

Dr. Welden came in to start the process...the first insemination. Whenever I think of these words, very dramatic music plays in my head. This is big! We're here! We're here! Time to knock my wife up!!!

Now, the process is relatively simple. A small catheter is used and placed into Heidi's uterus. Then, the sperm is slowly injected directly into her uterus. There is actually more sperm in each vial than needed so a smidge is placed on a slide for Dr. Welden to review under a microscope to make sure each of the spermies are active and swimming in the right direction. After the injection, Heidi lays on the table and marinates for about twenty minutes. Now, to respect my little Heidi's privacy, I'm not going into too much detail here except to say that Dr. Welden was awesome about letting me see what he was doing and explaining everything step by step. Interesting to say the least. Sadly, Heidi wouldn't let me take any pictures of this particular process to scrapbook later. I'm still a little sad about that. I mean, how many people can actually have a picture of their cervix!?!

While Heidi was marinating, Dr. Welden took me to check out our spermies under the microscope. I am proud to say that cowboy hat baby's sperm appeared to be the Michael Phelps of sperm; very strong, all swimming strongly and seemingly looking for an egg to crack. Go sperm! In one little tiny drop were thousands of sperm. That certainly gives me a huge boost of optimism when a lot more than a drop was put into the baby making chamber, I mean, millions of sperm are all working toward one goal...find an egg and breaking into it. And we probably have three eggs so how can we feel anything but extremely optimistic about this?

After the insemination, Heidi and I went home and took it easy for the day. While the doctor said nothing would happen, there's still that inate desire to feel like you have to lay down and make sure nothing leaves its intended receptacle. So, that's what we did...laid low. Heidi napped (it's exhausting making a baby, people!) and we made sure we were creating the ideal environment for fertilization.

Then today was the same process only a little longer. It took Dr. Welden just a little more time to get the catheter in because her glands were swollen from ovulation. Still, all of the spermies made their intended destination. Because she's ovulating today, she was a little more uncomfortable with back pain. We took it easy again today. She napped again and I worked...making sure I was here to take care of her if she needed anything.

So what's next? If Heidi doesn't get her period in twelve to fourteen days, we should consider ourselves pregnant. Then starts blood draws every three days to make sure. In between all of this, a sixty mile, three day walk. No...Heidi is not going to walk the whole thing! She's going to walk a little each day so she can participate but she is definitely going to take it easy. I mean, she has to...those are the days that the egg should be implanting into the uterus. We don't want to disturb that process!

So, fingers are crossed and we're starting to think of the future. What's next? Maybe baby names. Dr. Welden said if we didn't pick a name by six weeks, he got to pick the name and he's already used all of the good names for his kids so I guess we ought to get to it...concentrate...we would really, really like to use a boy name...concentrate...leave the stem on the apple, cowboy hat baby sperm!

The magic number!

So, yesterday was day 11 in Heidi's cycle and we were due for another ultra-sound to see how many follicles she made this month. She had been taking half the dose of Clomid this past cycle in hopes that her little follicle making machine would produce a more realistic number of follicles (not nine!). Before we left, I told a friend that the magic number was going to be three...I just felt it, it would be three. We wanted three to four and for whatever reason, I was convinced it would be three. I should warn you, I tend to always be right. I'm not bragging, I'm just saying, for the record. Despite Heidi's advice to the contrary, I tend to like to point out when I'm right. Which is always. I digress.

Back to our task at hand, at the doctor's office...Dr. Welden came in also hoping to see something a little less "over-achieving" than nine. He asks about any side affects, minimal this month. Good sign. Then the ultrasound process starts...uterine lining a little thin but still thickening. Check. Right side...two large follicles, measuring almost 20 mm each and a smaller follicle, only about 13 mm that wouldn't amount to much when ovulation actually happened. Check. Left side...one large follicle. Oh baby, check, check. Yes, my friends, two plus one equals what? Three! Sidebar here...Heidi had spent this week significantly more anxious than other weeks in anticipation of the ultrasound and her hope that this time we would be able to finally inseminate. On the way to the doctor, she was more nervous than usual. I wasn't. I knew there would be three follicles. Strange thing, sometimes, you can just tell something. I don't know why, but I was pretty sure about this. I wasn't even a little worried. I just knew we were ready. We had taken so long to get to this perfect point and we had done everything right that I knew the stars had to be aligned and the gods of follicle making were in our corner. I just knew it. Felt it. I was sure. Even when the doctor asked what we thought we'd see, I said three. I felt like I played the lottery and won.

We were finally able to hear the magic words...we'll be inseminating when you ovulate. I seriously almost cried...I'm almost crying now as I type this. We were finally at the next step. Then he began talking about HCG and how that will force the ovulation and then more HCG will induce the creation of progesterone and this is good because it will first make her ovulate and then help prepare the uterus for the egg to implant. He kept throwing that word around until we both asked, "well, how does she get the HCG? Pill? Shot from the nurse? What?" And here, my friends, is where the fantabulous, amazing great feeling of success got just a hair scary...shots. Clarification: shots that I had to give her. More clarification: three shots that I had to give her in her boom-boom pow (butt for the Lawanna lingo challenged). The look on both of our faces said about the same thing - I'm not qualified to shoot her up and she's not really interested in seeing how fast I can become qualified.

Well, the nurse, God love her, gave us some instructions and let me practice on Heidi's boom-boom pow without the cap off the needle for a few tries. Heidi's arse was the center of attention while both the nurse and I measured out where to give the shot, how to measure it, how to give it. If Heidi's butt was a crime scene, there would have been finger prints all over it. We have to do the first shot Saturday night at 10:45 p.m. sharp so that Heidi will ovulate in time for the Sunday 11:15 a.m. insemination. Uh, hold up...10:45 p.m.?!? We have tickets to see Chelsea Chelsea Bang Bang! Is my first experience shooting up my wife seriously going to take place in a stall in a public bathroom? I have to give her a shot in the boom-boom while watching bang-bang? Oh my...

So, there will be two inseminations, one at 11:15 a.m. on Sunday (after church for the doctor...hope he prays for us!) and the next at 10:45 a.m. on Monday. Then, another shot in the boom-boom pow on Tuesday and the last one on Friday. Whew. What an exciting, busy, scary, inseminating week we have to look forward to.

Oh and just so you know...since we were worried about the first shot and how we would explain ourselves if someone turned us in for shooting up in the bathroom, we've just decided to leave early and do it comfortably at home. Well, as comfortably as you can have a really long needle rapidly inserted into the muscle of your boom-boom pow by a completely shaky and unqualified shooter-upper. Don't worry baby, it will be fine...just close your eyes and hold your breath. We're one step closer to making a baby and yes, this might hurt a little.

And then, there were six...

We went back to the doctor yesterday for a follow-up ultrasound. It's a good thing too because Heidi is about on the verge of bursting. She's barely used to having one egg form and "burst", but having nine seems to be pushing the limits of her little tummy. She rode to the doctor's office with her pants undone to relieve some of the pressure created from growing excessive numbers of follicles.

When we get to the doctor, he explains that he is going to measure the follicles from Saturday to see if they have grown any. During the ultrasound, we learn that between Saturday and today, Heidi's follicle count went from nine to six. Three must have absorbed into her system but the remaining six are growing...large and in charge! One is over 27mm in length. I know that a millimeter may seem small, but we're getting used to getting really excited over really small measurements. And you multiply that times six and factor in the tiny circumference of her mini-abdomen and if you carry the one and divide it by PI, well, her tummy hurts. I digress...

So the doctor tells us to continue taking the ovulation tests and advises that based on her ultra-sound, she should be actually ovulating within the next forty-eight hours. A bittersweet pronouncement, since we won't be inseminating, but good news nonetheless. After she gets a positive result on her ovulation test, she needs to call him for next steps.

Guess what? Yea, she's ovulating. Her LH surge was so strong that the test indicated positive almost immediately. I tell you, even with six follicles, she's an egg-making machine! I'm so proud of my little ovulator! She took two tests this morning, just to make sure and then called the doctor. Next steps...she has a blood test on Friday to again test for progesterone and then she has to have another ultrasound when, um, well, how do I say this, um, on her, well, on the first day of her cycle. She's pretty icked out by this but the doctor wants it, so we're gonna do it. Kind of makes me happy I don't have his job. Ew. The nurse said it was a standard test so we're not concerned, just icked out. :)

After that, she'll hopefully start the next, reduced level dosage of Clomid. And if all goes well and she doesn't over-achieve on the egg making...insemination! Poor little cowboy hat baby is getting tired of hanging out in storage...he wants to be free to impregnate!

One little blip relating to something outside of our insemination. Unfortunately, Heidi has had to make the decision to forego walking in the Susan G. Komen 3-Day walk in October. She was ridiculously excited about participating but with the number of days we anticipate in her cycle, we'll be inseminating right at or near the day of the walk and the nurse said the heat may have an adverse affect on her eggs. So, bummer for Heidi, but if she gets preggars, not the worse trade-off in the world.

Back to waiting for her period again. There will probably be another two weeks before anything else happens. So, we'll miss you...see you in about fourteen days, crampy and ready for the next step!

Someone is an over-achiever...

On Saturday, we went back to the doctor so he could make sure Heidi is ovulating. This was her first cycle with Clomid and before we did an insemination, he wanted to make sure she had some follicles, or eggs to be, so to speak, that would make their happy little way down her fallopian tube for eventual fertilization (if cowboy hat baby's swimmers were up to the task). This ultrasound would hopefully tell us if the Clomid she took stimulated her little egg-producing factory. He told us that if it worked, we should expect to see two to three follicles. Our goal was to see some eggs and then hopefully inseminate when she ovulated, likely within the next few days. Whoo-hoo! We're so excited because all this talk of insemination and it might actually be happening soon. Time for the ultrasound.

Let me just add a side note here...our doctor is very good at telling us what is on the ultrasound screen. That's a good thing. Quite frankly, if it were left to Heidi and I, we wouldn't be able to tell one black spot from the next or one grainy spot from the next. It's all a mish-mosh on the monitor. Thank goodness Dr. Weldon is very descriptive as he moves his magic egg counter around. Otherwise, we'd have absolutely no idea what was going on in there.

Back to the point, so he puts the magic egg counter on the left side first. He's a little shocked as he begins to count the follicles...one, two, three, four, five. Five follicles on one side. He carefully measures each follicle and all of them appear to be maturing equally. Another aside for the fertilitiy lingo challenged...on average, two dominate follicles will mature and compete for the ride down the fallopian flume. So, five is, well, above average. Then he moves to the right side. Again, disbelief...one, two, three, four, again, all equally mature. That's nine (for those who are also mathematically challenged). Nine mature follicles. His quote "you have enough in there to populate a small village". Needless to say, the Clomid worked. It worked a little too well actually. If we were to inseminate right now, we'd likely be the stars of the next TLC series about multiples. The chances of having several little kiddies is very high. And while we want a baby, we don't really want nine. At least not all at the same time! (Let's be honest, I don't ever want nine kids. Ever.)

So what does that mean? It means that we'll be waiting another cycle. Why? See the last sentence of the last paragraph. And Heidi is all of 94 lbs. Where on earth would she store nine babies? So we are going to lower the dosage of Clomid, which for Heidi, means cutting her next pills in half. She was already on the lowest dosage and because her little baby making factory is a bit of an over-achiever, she created a future village.

The doctor was actually so taken aback he finished the ultrasound, put everything away, turned on the lights and then realized he wasn't done...he still needed to measure her uterine lining. So, he started over...long story short, her uterine lining is fabulous, as I knew it would be. One of the worries with Clomid include the potential thinning of her uterine lining. Not a worry here...little miss egg maker not only over-achieved on her egg making, she also kept a strong lining. I'm so proud. Who knew all of that could be happening in her tiny little body? I tell you, when she puts her mind, and her uterus, to something, there's no stopping her. LOL

The last patient of Dr. Weldon's that had this high of a follicle count on Clomid also waited until her next cycle to ovulate. She had three follicles at her next cycle and she inseminated. She's now mommy to twins. Again...there's no way on earth we'd want to inseminate with nine follicles. But the good news, his last patient got pregnant on her first insemination after waiting the cycle. Hopefully, we'll follow her lead. Of course, it would be nice if we only made one little Heidi, not two, but still, better than nine. LOL

We go back to the doctor on Monday just to make sure none of the follicle were actually ovarian cysts. The doctor was pretty confident they were all follicles, but he likes to be thorough. Good thing, I don't think we have nine baby names...

First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes sperm in a vial delivered via FedEx...

We have done it! We have made our first purchase of cowboy hat baby sperm...it's the first "delivery" date we are excited about in this process. Hopefully they send some good swimmers who can give us another delivery date to get ready for!

So, here's the plan: Heidi spoke with the doctor and got good news...she got the results of her blood test back and she ovulated last month! This is great news for Heidi since we aren't sure that she always ovulates. That means that when she gets her monthly visitor (due any day now!), we can start her prescription of Clomid. Then (fingers crossed!!!), in about two weeks, we begin taking the ovulation tests and when we get a hit...we inseminate!!!! Yes, I said it...we inseminate! We'll have two days of insemination and then, well, we hope the little miracle of pregnancy happens.

This is the first time, ever I think, that we have been counting down the minutes until Heidi's period started. She had cramps yesterday...it's a strange day when we're excited about that. Today, her breasties were tender...clue number 2! People, these things are important in our quest for insemination!

That's all for now...I hope that the next blog is about her insemination process and the successful use of two vials of cowboy hat baby. I think it would be unladylike if I posted about her period, so you'll just have to keep guessing. :)

Cross your fingers!!! We're on our way...on our unique path...

"Yes, can I get an order of sperm? I have a coupon."

You know, it amazes me how heavy the weight of worry can be. Nothing tangible, but heavy none-the-less.

Even more amazing is the feeling that happens when that weight has been lifted.

Today's visit with the doctor was a-fricking-mazing. We had another ultrasound done. The spot was smaller. A lot smaller. The doctor was actually amazed at how much smaller. We had the pre-ultra sound talk about how it may not be much smaller, that sometimes the difference wouldn't be easy to see this quickly, if it was just a cyst, that it could take up to six weeks to see a difference. But, no...Heidi's little uterus has been working double time at doing whatever it needed to do to crush that big black ball of worry. The doctor said it was likely an ovulatory cyst and it had collapsed. He was amazed at how much smaller it was and felt like it was nothing malignant or worrisome. The cancer blood tests came back negative and all is right with the world again.

And that alone would have made for a fabulous day, but wait...there was more! Not only did our little scare end up being all for naught, but if after a blood test to check Heidi's levels of progesterone (a little hormone that appears after ovulation), we may get to inseminate this month! "What?!?", you say. Yes! If her blood test shows the existence of progesterone, after her next period starts, we'll start our first round of Clomid...we already have the prescription! Because of the irregularity in Heidi's cycles, the doctor felt like it would prove more difficult to try to inseminate without using Clomid, likely making the process a little less successful. Uh, yea, need I remind you about the increased chance for twins? Well, it's still there but without it, we run the risk of taking a lot longer to get pregnant. So, what are our plans for the weekend? Well, you won't hear this everyday, but we are buying sperm. LOL The doctor said to go ahead and order it and have it delivered to his office for storage. And as if it couldn't get any better...there's a sale on sperm this month! LMAO Save $90! Whoo-hoo!

I know it will come as a surprise, but I damn near cried. Still get a little teary eyed every time I think about the stark contrast between the way we felt yesterday and the way we feel today. There is this crazy irony that all of the things I had hoped would happen on the last visit, happened on this visit. All of the things I had feared on this visit disappeared. Strange the way things turn out sometimes. God is good and he obviously heard the mountains of prayers I was throwing at him (Thanks G for listening and answering!).

OK then...I guess it's time to make a purchase. Hopefully cowboy hat baby is still in stock.

An unfortunate waiting game

I find that when I have good news to share, I can't wait to get on-line to blog about it. When I have less than ideal news to share, I marinate on it, procrastinate blogging and wait to post. And wait. And wait. As if waiting will change the content of the blog. So, I've waited long enough...here goes.

Almost two weeks ago, we went in for our ultrasound to see if Heidi was ovulating. We chatted on the way to the doctors about how cool it would be if she were ovulating right now and we could inseminate next month. I admit, it didn't seem far fetched to me and I was really excited that we were progressing so quickly in our little endeavor. We've already picked out our donor. We have the money in the bank...nothing left to wait for but Heidi's egg maker.

When we got to the ultrasound, the doctor was very good at showing us all of the important parts of her, well, her parts. We saw her little uterus (hehehe) and well, other stuff that I can't recall the exact name of (I am not medically inclined when it comes to remembering technical names). Then he got to fallopian tube #1. He showed us some small dark spots that could be either evidence of ovulation or something else. They were small, less than a centimeter each. There was an explanation of the end of the fallopian tube "exploding" or something to that effect when ovulation occurred. OK, well, I guess that's good. Then, he moved to fallopian tube #2. That brought us to a very large black spot, measuring over 3 centimeters. Let me just interject here...when your "parts" are on the monitor and enlarged for better visibility, they look much bigger than three centimeters. And when the size is magnified, and you find a large, dark cyst, it looks downright ominous. It was a weird moment. The sensation that something wasn't right but not really understanding what wasn't right. The doctor, again, went into a very technical spiel, big words, but definitely the words "further tests", "cancer", "issues with fertility". How is it, I wonder, that when a person is talking you can clearly hear certain words but not others? It boils down to him not knowing what it was. It could be signs of endometriosis, which doesn't make fertility impossible, but certainly more difficult. It could be something else...that word you don't want to think about, that word that even now brings the pang of tears behind my eyes.

The nurse took some blood for testing. There was that sad "I'm sorry" look in her eyes. That feeling that there was tiptoeing around you made the fear a little more pronounced.

And, we left. We'd wait for the blood test results to come back then schedule another ultrasound. With any luck, there would be a change in the size of the cyst, or mass, or whatever it is. If there's a change in size, that's good news. If not, well, not good news. I don't know what next steps would be...maybe surgery, maybe more testing. I don't know.

This blog is meant to track our progress on this journey. This was the first time in our progress that we said very little to each other on the way home. It was the first time that I was afraid to think about the future. It was the first time I didn't want to talk or think about this process. Even now, almost two weeks later, it makes my heart hurt to think that there is even the smallest chance that something could happen to Heidi. She is my world, my everything - she is the love of my life. I can't even find the words to describe how the thought of something being wrong with her makes me short of breath, makes my heart weigh twenty extra pounds and beat hard in my chest. Ugh!

On the up side, we did get the blood results back. The nurse said they were normal. Good news. I mean, normal is good, right? I don't know what it was normal for, but normal is good. Just a bump in the road...

So, in one and a half days, we go back to the doctor for another ultrasound. Fingers are crossed. Toes and eyes are also crossed for good measure. Friday at 1:00. Say a little prayer, send a little thought...think of, well, think of Heidi's uterus and send good vibes. Vibes...hahaha...even sad and scared, I still make myself laugh.

It's all good. It will all be good. I know it.

If you are what you eat, Heidi's a cupcake...

So, in our continued efforts to prepare Heidi's little body for incubation, we begin our journey into introducing Heidi into a more complete food pyramid; one not just supported by corn and cupcakes. Heidi has the world's best metabolism, however, it is not based on the highest level of actual nutrition. So, today we went to Borders and bought a book on pre-pregnancy nutrition. Now, this is likely to be one of my favorite parts of preparation. I obviously love food. I mean, I really love food. Heidi, eh, not so much. She eats to live, I live to eat. Now, we need to get to the same point where we both eat to live healthier. So we started a new journey today...healthy eating! Heidi took the initiative to learn all about her cervix and uterus (kudos to her!); I will own the responsibility of learning about her nutritional needs. Now, one must understand what an undertaking this is. Heidi is not exactly receptive to new foods. The ONLY vegetable she will eat is corn. Buttered corn. Correction: buttered, salted corn. I finally got her to eat asparagus, unfortunately, it has to be completely wrapped in bacon. Baby steps, but still a ways to go. I take on the role of "Dominating Donna" when it comes to getting her to try food, just taste it even. So I anticipate this will be a daunting task, to say the least. I mean, I don't know that I can actually force feed her, I mean, I can, but really? She's a wirey little thing. She can wriggle out of most grips and if I'm also trying to hold food, well, let's just say I don't know how successful I would be.

So, she's watching gymnastics today and I'm reading her book, learning about the importance of different vitamins, minerals, calories, wives tales, etc. I pick a couple of recipes to ease her way into healthy food. Again, baby steps. I read her the recipes. Eh...not an overzealous amount of excitement demonstrated by my beloved. LOL Tandoori chicken with a mango orange salad. And, yum, banana muffins for breakfast tomorrow. Off to the grocery store we go! I decide we are going to spend most of our time in the produce section...finding different fruits and vegetables to try. Again, received with less than stellar enthusiasm. We pick some fruits. Well, I pick several, she picks strawberries. Baby steps...

Oh, insert one more obstacle here: Heidi is, well, to say it kindly "thrifty". She'll pick up a bag of cherries and exclaim "$2.99 a lb.? This is like $7 worth!". Organic chicken is more expensive than regular chicken, don't think she didn't notice. And don't think I didn't see her little nose wrinkle up when I put flaxseed, and wheat flour into our cart. Those don't even SOUND good. We agreed on a wheat pasta enriched with calcium and vitamin A. She was looking less and less hungry the longer we shopped. This is going to be more difficult than I anticipated.

Well, much to my amazement, she sat in the kitchen with me while I marinated dinner and prepared her muffins for tomorrow. She saw me mix the flaxseed. She saw me add oats. She saw me mix in the wheat flour. And she still agreed to try the muffins for breakfast. She watched me make the mango orange salad. Not too bad looking...she even said the muffins smelled good when they were baking. Then dinner...she ate almost all of her chicken, all of her mango salad and of course, all of her corn. And even though she was full, she actually ate a muffin...and said it was good!!! Maybe there is hope! Maybe this will be a lot easier than I thought! Maybe she is so excited about the prospect of having a baby that she is willing to sacrifice her normal diet of cupcakes and corn to include actual nutrition! I'm on the verge of speechlessness!

And here she comes enjoying a desert. She is enjoying vanilla ice cream with hot fudge. Again, baby steps...she did, after all, try to add fresh strawberries. LOL

Baby Daddy

You know how when you got married (or not) and ended up preggars? Did you give much thought to all of the background details of your partner? Did you research his medical history before you procreated? How about his family's medical history? Did you think about how active he would be in your child's life? No, these were all things you would find out naturally and in the normal course of your relationship. Well, when you are trying to buy your baby's daddy, these are all questions that now become important. You don't get the opportunity to learn these things during the natural progression of your relationship. And most likely, you've actually met the person you made a baby with. Not us. It's like a weird one-night stand...only without the alcohol and sex.

When we started this process, we were pretty convinced we wanted an open donor. We wanted to give the option to our child to have the opportunity to know who their donor was. Oh, for all of you straights whose donor is a flesh and blood partner, when you are looking to have a sperm donor from a company, you get to do lots of fun stuff. You search through the profiles of donors, known only by their number. You read about their medical history. You get their ethnic background, their hair color, eye color, height and weight. You can get staff feedback on what they think of the donor. You get a short essay written by the donor. You get to find out what their favorite pet is. And you get a baby picture of the donor...all for free. The rest of it, if available, you have to pay for. For example, if you want to buy a silouetted picture of your donor as an adult, you can. Sometimes, you can buy a picture of your donor as an adult. And you get to choose between an anonymous donor and one who is theoretically willing to have your child make contact with him when he or she turns 18. It's almost like blind on-line dating only this person will never meet you, just donate sperm to help your cause. It's a little weird. And a lot expensive.

Back to picking a donor...so we are wrestling with whether or not we want an anonymous donor. There are so many pros and cons to either choice. We are braving new territory here, people. We don't have any friends who have had sperm donors with children who are old enough to verbalize how important it is or isn't to know their donor. At first, we were 99% sure we wanted a donor who would be willing to make contact. Then, we thought about it some more and started thinking about worse case scenarios of our child making contact with a stranger. What would that person be like? Would they be a criminal now? They aren't, in theory, when they donate, but we're talking about eighteen years here...lots of stuff can change! Maybe they are donating because they are trying to help a great cause, maybe they are donating because they are in college and it's a quick way to make a buck. What kind of person will they be in eighteen years? And do we want our child to bring that person into their life, if the donor is willing? The flip side of that is what if in eighteen years, the donor becomes "unlocateable" (I made that word up). The sperm bank makes every effort to keep track of where the donor is, but that's not 100%.

Then we went to see the movie "The Kids Are All Right". Yea, almost immediately, we decided we didn't want to know the donor. Go see the movie if you want to understand, but in short, the donor became a part of the kids lives and usurped all that the moms had tried to teach. Oh, and he slept with one of the lesbian moms. Way to make the movie mainstream. Erg...I digress.

We went to dinner after the movie and discussed our options some more. Yes, people, we spend a lot of time talking and thinking about sperm. More than any self-respecting lesbian should. LOL

We've talked to friends on their choices. We have a couple of sets of friends who have or are going through the process.

Then today, Heidi was surfing the world wide web looking for anything on known vs. unknown. She found a blog written by girl titled "My father was an anonymous sperm donor" and her perspective was what we feared our child might face if we didn't leave that option open. So, we are literally back at square one.

Not only are we trying to find a baby daddy, but we are also trying to make a decision based on how our child may or not may feel in eighteen years and hope that a donor will stick to his intention by meeting the expectation placed on him now. You should know that, as a couple, we have a hard enough time making a decision on what to have for dinner so this is certainly one heck of a quandry.

For now, enjoy some pictures of potential baby daddies in the form of their baby pictures. Yes, the ones you see here are willing to be known...at least for now. Tomorrow is another day to work this through and hopefully, our first parenting decision for a new baby will be the right one. (I'm partial to the cutie in the cowboy hat).

Sperm Learnin'

So yesterday, we took our first big step toward having a baby. No, it wasn't what you think...that won't work for us. It was our first visit to a fertility doctor. As we sat in the doctor's office, waiting for him to explain how the miracle of childbirth works without a boy, we noticed all of the picture frames decorating his office, some showing his certificates of education and qualification, but most noticeably the ones showing off the products of his work...pictures of babies, mostly twin pictures. Hhmmm, now there's something to think about.

Dr. Welden was the doctor used by lesbian friends of ours who now have two beautiful children so we knew he could help us get preggars. We sat down with Dr. Welden and did an in-depth recap of 6th grade health class with a few more details; we learned about the swimming lanes the little spermies swim in during a "traditional" insemination (you know, when a man is one of the players in this process). We learned about the menstruation cycle and how one little glitch in that cycle can throw off the whole impregnation thing. We learned how the pituitary gland can jack up a cycle. We learned all of the challenges associated with getting pregnant in a traditional situation (again, back to that boy and girl situation). We learned that it is in and of itself amazing that accidental pregnancies ever happen. Then we learned what OUR challenges would be (it goes without saying the number one challenge is that I was born without sperm).

We learned that Heidi's weight will NOT be a problem (whew!!!). Unfortunately, we also learned that her ovulatory cycle will be a bit of a problem; apparently, her pituitary gland isn't communicating with the other parts to get that whole ovulation thing going on a regular basis. But not to fear!! There are solutions to that! Rather simple solutions, even...it's called Clomid! Oh, and she has to be on birth control. Who knew that you'd need to use birth control to get pregnant? Totally contrary to all that I was ever taught about prevention of pregnancy. Maybe that's why I needed another health class recap.

So...here's the skinny on what it's going to take to knock Heidi up. First, she has to have some blood tests next week to see if she ovulated when she was supposed to. Then she starts birth control pills (still funny to me). She'll take those for about two weeks and then start peeing on ovulation sticks. When she gets a positive, we'll go into the doctor and he'll take a smidge of her uterine lining (ouch!) and test it to see exactly where she is in her ovulation cycle. Then she'll stop taking the pill and start taking Clomid.

I should state for the record here that the average woman has about a 1% chance of having multiples, i.e. twins, triplets, more... On Clomid, those percentages go up to anywhere between 7% and 10%. Seems like a lot but it's still a 90% chance that she won't have more than one little bundle of joy growing in there. But, for the record, it is a little concerning because Heidi is already super small...where the heck would she hold more than one baby?!?!

Back to the schedule...Clomid. She'll take that for two weeks. Oh, I should also note that one of the side affects to Clomid is that her PMS might be slightly worse. And by slightly, I mean, a lot. She may have to spend one week out of each month with family and friends so they can all share in this special time. :)

After the Clomid, they do some more testing and if all turns out right...we get to start that whole cycle over again, only this time, we get to inseminate when she ovulates! Dr. Welden inseminates TWICE during each ovulatory cycle so our chances of getting pregnant actually double. He guesstimates that it may take us three to four months to get pregnant.

I wonder what type of picture frame we will send to Dr. Welden as a thank you gift when this is all said and done? Will it have one baby or two? Three? Oh my!!!

Getting Ready...

So, when the traditional means of getting pregnant won't work, you have to look at alternatives. Wow. Who knew that would involve learning so much about making a baby. I guess that I am amazed at how easily traditional families can get pregnant, by accident even, when there is so much that goes into making a baby. We have so much to consider. Sperm (hahaha...funny to talk about sperm). Where do you get sperm outside the "normal" places? How about "charting your temperatures"? What?!? Heidi has read a fabulous book (Taking Charge of Your Fertility) and has enlightened me with new concepts, like the texture of your vaginal fluids and how a successful sperm swim requires a certain consistency in said fluids, more about your period than I ever wanted to know. Again, I say, what?!?

Then comes finding out the "hows" of two mommies-to-be becoming, well, mommies-to-be. We have to learn about insemination, sperm banks (reading anonymous profiles of mostly college students who splooge in a cup to make a few bucks), temperatures, talking to friends who have gone through the process and wondering how we are going to pay for all of this. Who knew that sperm, so freely exchanged by college students, could be so expensive to wash and buy.

And so we begin the next chapter of our lives. An exciting chapter, but a chapter filled with new challenges and hopefully the opportunity to be mommies together. Our first appointment with a fertility specialist is July 27th. ~ Taking a deep breath ~ Here we go...let's go make a baby.

Lawanna