Weight: 160.0 lbs.

Well, it looks like we are in search of a new egg donor. When I say "we" I really just mean the guys because that's not something I get any say on. (Although, guys, if you want my advice, look for the ones with SMALL head circumferences!!) Oh, and preferably one that has eggs. We have now rounded 70 days with no period for the previous donor and rather than wait it out and wonder what this might mean for a successful harvest quantity/quality, we are looking for a new one. Don't ever let it be said that for two gay guys "all" they have to do for a family is surrogacy, that's for sure! They've had one disappointment/loss after another through this whole thing. I can't wait for them to have a family and to finally be parents after all of this.

With that news coming in last night, AND a production down issue on the floor around 9PM, it turned into a kinda late night. When I say "late" I mean, I went to sleep after the sun went down so it wasn't really that bad. I just was hoping to get to sleep by 9 because I've been so tired with the 10-5 routine lately. Then, this morning I wake up at 4 to hear a child calling me. I figure out it is Jessie because she's had a bad dream. I get her (and change her sheets and pjs because I'm blessed with a houseful of nighttime bladder control rebels) and bring her up to my bed in the hopes of getting about 30 minutes of sleep before the alarm goes off. Jessie keeps m-o-v-i-n-g in the bed and I keep saying "Jessica, for the love of Captain Feather Sword PUH-LEASE just go to sleep." Finally it is about 5 minutes before my alarm will go off and I'm dropping into sleep and my cell phone rings. I run to answer it before it sets off the other child in the crib and it is work again saying that they are still down. (Last night it had turned out that the server people were doing scheduled maintenance only they had neglected to tell our site that it was scheduled.) I'm pissy and tired and up for the day so I jump to with a HUGE case of "What in the hell are you trying to do to my production site" on my shoulder and call the support person in Arizona. Yes, it is 2 hours BEFORE 5AM there. Now, it might be good to point out that what I SHOULD have done was log into my work computer first and VERIFY that the production people were not just making things up. They do that, you know. They come to me and say "We can't work" and when I walk over there and WATCH them do what they say they can't do, they do it just fine. "Well, it didn't work before." riiiiight. But I was pissy and tired and evidently feeling vindictive so I called and woke up the very nice Arizona support person to pass along the news that they were down. She said that she would check on things and while she was doing that, I was logging in to verify that they were, in fact, as down as they said. Low and behold, the app came right up and was working just fine. Hehe, hehe, heh, um, oops. I called the production people and asked them to try it again and "Hey, it's working now, what did you do?!" Um, nothing. The Arizona support person calls me to inform me that everything on her end looks just fine and it all should've been up and running since about sometime last night. Yes, thank you very much everything seems fine sorry to have woken you up. Ah, today is gonna be AWESOME!

Jessie is, of course, totally awake after all of this and I get ready while she says she doesn't want me to go to work. I finally convince her to settle down when I offer to turn on Caillou or Peep for her so I can get, by now LATE, out the door to the gym. I have 5 miles to run this morning before work. At the gym, I try to get my stretching in while sitting on the bench in the locker room before the run. Someone has got her gym bag the size of Texas sitting on the bench. PEOPLE - your BAG can sit on the FLOOR. Please remember this. Your bag LIKES the floor. So after I deliver a precise and powerful ninja kick to send the bag flying over the lockers and land wedged ever so gracefully atop the bathroom stall door, I use the tiny unoccupied corner of the bench to get some stretches in. My run actually goes rather well. Slower than the other times at 51 minutes for the 5 miles but I also didn't feel all drained from it. Then I do an abbreviated stretching routine while walking back to the locker room. Where I weigh in at 160 again. But hey, look, the sun is up and it is a beautiful day for me to drive into work now.

Ah-choo! Oh, sorry, I don't think the fancy drug samples I got from the allergist are working. I'll give them a little while - maybe they need to build up in your system. You know... like nicotine or crack. I've got a giant bag full of little packets with one pill in each packet. You are supposed to take one each night just before going to sleep and they last all day. I woke up this morning sneezy and itchy and yuck. Before I get too far into this, I'd like to point out that I was actually kinda impressed with my visit. It didn't help me much, but it told me what I wanted to know and the allergist seemed very eager to help me out. A little too eager, actually. Have you ever noticed that often, your doctor has a different goal out of your appointment than you do? I have three examples to share.

1) I went to a dermatologist to find out if there was anything I could do (ie laser skin treatments covered by my insurance) to get rid of the red rosacea on my face. It isn't bad but it can be if I get warm or, ya know, drunk. There is nothing better than having a 'This one is sloshed' signal right there on my face. He answered my question right away about the laser treatments - not gonna happen under insurance. He also told me it was probably not going to get a whole lot worse which was my other question. At that point, I was done. Ready to go home and get drunk and read about interesting new ways to serve kid-friendly tofu. My doctor, however, was just getting started. He was handing out sample skin creams and talking about ways to reduce the chances of my face getting redder (something about not drinking) and making a regular set of appointments for me to come in and chat about how well the lotions were working. He was ready to find ways to fix the problem while I was just interested in more information - I was managing to deal with the issue on my own otherwise, thank you very much.

2) I saw a sports medicine doc about my knees hurting from running. I wanted to know if I was permanently damaging them or not. Would they get better if I kept training or would they get worse? He answered that right away. From the X-rays, he could tell me I was not permanently damaging them and that I just needed to build up the muscles around there. Ok, awesome. Thanks doc! But alas, he was just getting started. Braces, taping, lining up therapy sessions... everything. I have to admit, some of it did help. Ultimately though, he was interested in FIXING the problem while I just wanted to know more about it. I could deal with the pain as long as I knew it would get better and not worse.

3) These allergies. I've been living with them for 20 years. Since I was born Since I was in high school. (Fine, I'm not 20.) I was interested in finding out if there was a simple thing that I could do that did not involve taking pills all day long or eye drops. Maybe in those 20 years medical science has found a miracle allergy shot that you take once and are done with allergies for the season. Granted, some quality time with Google would've told me that, but I was going to go through the old fashioned way of talking to the allergist. Turns out, there is no such thing as a one-time shot for the season. Instead, people that are not in the process of becoming surrogates or going through IVF can sign up for a series of weekly, then monthly, then.. I don't know I stopped listening.. shots. I asked if I could give myself the shots because, ya know, I'm now qualified to shoot up with the best of them. She said no because of the risk of anaphylaxis shock. She also said that if you get pregnant, they stop the treatments and the weekly ones have to go for about 6-8 weeks so I'm pretty much SOL for starting that now anyway. That was pretty much it. I was ready to go home. She was ready to have me lay on the exam table and put all sorts of questionable solutions on my back and make little pin pricks to let it seep into my skin. SHE wanted to FIX it. Find the right drug, keep trying different ones, etc. From my perspective, she has done what I went there for. From her perspective, I'm an ongoing client that she will see back some day. Unfortunately, I'm shockingly meek when it comes to making a stand at the spur of the moment so when they had me lay on the bed thing for the allergy tests, I did it. (Also, just so you know, I did NOT hide my very attractive periwinkle blue bra under my shirt on the chair. I hung it on the lamp.)

After the test, I got the sheet of all the things they tested me for. Turns out, I'm allergic to willow, oak, birch, all kinds of grass, ragweed, and all dust of any variety. This is fine - but the things I'm NOT allergic to were quite alarming. Not because I'm not allergic to them, but because WHAT, exactly, did they just expose me to to find out that I'm not allergic to them??? The list of molds included cockroach. Cockroach mold. Let's imagine, for a moment, what one might do to get a solution that you could put on someone's skin and scratch the skin to find out if they are allergic to cockroaches. Hmm. I just have to say, I didn't sign any waivers for this test and I seriously think I should've been asked before they did this. I mean, gross. Oh, and after the test on my back didn't produce any results for a certain small list of things they figured I was actually allergic to, they took a more concentrated solution of that and used very small needles to actually inject it under the skin on my arm. Three of those are now basically very small bug bites and the other 4 did nothing other than make little blood blisters from the needle. They evidently thought my little bug bite ones were nothing and crossed off those items from my allergy list. It was cute when the girl asked me if needles bothered me. I looked at the little things she was using and laughed. Those are needles? LOL!

As of this morning, I am 6 miles into my 15 mile week for running. Not much more to say about it - pretty boring, typical workout. I'm a little irked that I'm still at 160 after a decent day yesterday but oh well.

I found out today finally some more surrogacy information. Since the egg donor is still not cycling, we have at least 7 weeks out before any transfer. That 7 weeks moves out for each day she doesn't get her period. We're now looking at June 24th at the earliest. I have a lot of feelings about how long this has been taking but since I don't believe MY frustrations and irritations can compare to Paul and James's - I'm not going to blog in length about them. It is what it is and I will just keep waiting. This news does mean that I can finally plan the end of May and the birthdays for Asher and Jessie. It also means Gavin won't be in school anymore when I go for the transfer so that might make childcare easier. Oh, one more thing... when I asked the allergist about the shots and doing IVF, well, in the course of the conversation she said a number of stupid things to me. Well, probably stupid is the wrong word. I just didn't appreciate them although I know she was just trying to be nice. Because I knew that, I just smiled politely. She commented on how darn many kids I have and that always makes me want to say that I REALLY have 4 kids. She said something about how I have 3 kids so I must just be such a star at pregnancy and never had a problem to go and do it for someone else. Um, where do I start? She also asked if I knew the people I was being a surrogate for or if it was a 'womb for rent' (yes, she ACTUALLY said that.) Being more offended than I've been in a long time I just said I knew the people. She said 'Oh, that's good.' Ha, small talk... isn't it fun? Had I been feeling snarkier I'd have said "No, I don't know them but I've always had a fantasy of getting knocked up by two gay guys." Alas, I was too busy trying to unhook my bra off the drop ceiling frame where I had tossed it after the allergy test.

5 miles down, 10 miles to go this week for my goal. I was thinking as I was running, 3 miles a day every day this week would get me 15 miles. So for every mile over 3 that I go in a day, that is a mile UNDER 3 that I can go another day. I know it is silly since I'm pretty much planning to go 5 miles on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and 1 mile on Tuesday and Thursday (thus BEATING my goal) but for some reason it always appeals to my mind to think that I'm getting ahead and doing my work early. I was feeling quite proud of myself during my run today because while I was running I was watching people come up to the machines, start their workouts, finish their workouts and leave and I was still there. Yes folks, I'm that amazing. I know! This morning was 'interval' training kinda like Sara had mentioned. I would run a little at 5.5 MPH and then sprint sections at 7.0 MPH. At least, I did that until it got hard and I wussed out and stopped going up to 7.0. I think that was somewhere between the first quarter of a mile and about 2 miles in. I've decided, Sara, that the difference here being that you could've probably outrun me while you were 9 months pregnant. Plus, I highly suspect that you enjoy running while I just enjoy being able to say that I ran. I still finished the 5 miles somewhere in the 50:20 range still.

This weekend was every bit as exciting as I had hoped. I almost forgot the carnival on Friday but thankfully I remembered while driving home from picking the kids up at daycare. It was a madhouse and while I know Gavin is glad that we went, I'd be hard pressed to say that the effort was worth it. The one highlight was that Jessie and Asher and Gavin all got to go in the jumping castle there and you should've SEEN the little one's faces!! Gavin also enjoyed the giant blow up obstacle course. The lowlight was walking blocks because there is never enough parking for all the parents on nights like this and it was raining and windy and freezing and I had Ash in a stroller and was trying to hurry Jessie along. Yuck.

Sat we all went out during the day to get the kid's hair cut. Yes, I cut Ash's mullet off. I've been resisting because he hasn't had that first haircut and those little curls in the back just made him seem like such a baby to me. I don't know why his hair refuses to grow in the front but either way, we did give him a typical little boy cut. He looks so totally different now. Jessie was very into going to get her hair cut but then when we got there she did the shy thing. I just needed her bangs trimmed anyway so it wasn't a big deal. She finally has normal hair now that doesn't look like she cut half of it off herself. (Because, ya know, she DID.)

After dinner when Kris was home I left to do my upgrade at work. Have you seen that horror movie where the woman is working all alone in a dark medical building and people start attacking her with the surgical scissors? No? Well, apparently it is terrifying because I nearly died while working in the dark cleanroom all by myself. This is the place where we put the sewing rings onto the heart valves and it is a sterile room. You have to gown up and put these booties on your feet and everything. Each station has all sorts of sharp objects for sewing purposes along with the computers that I had to upgrade. It was dark, quiet, and totally creepy as hell. I finally finished everything around 2AM. *Shiver* I think I'm scarred for life really. Thankfully though, there never actually was a large figure dressed all in darkness - or - at least - he never attacked if he was there.

Sunday went well with very few problems reported from work. Gavin has finally gotten to the age where he has neighborhood friends that are in and out of the house all day long. This is great in that I've really wanted him to have more friends and all that. It is annoying because the house is full of ~8 year old boys and, naps get difficult. I ended up kicking them all (Gavin included) out of the house for Ash's nap. Now, here's the other issue - Jessie. My 3 year old is infatuated with her big brother's friends. She follows them everywhere and participates in everything they play. On one hand, my heart melts watching these older boys and Gavin not only including Jessie in their play but encouraging it. They were dressing up in costumes and they were helping Jessie put on her snow princess costume (which along with all the fighter boys made me think very much of star wars) and giving her a very large nerf dart shooter. (We lost the darts precisely .054 seconds after we got the guns and always do. They were just for imagination, not actually shooting.) Yes, it is sweet that they include her. Um - but - I foresee trouble in the future. A 5 year age gap - plenty of boys 5 years older than her in and out of the house all day.... and OH MY do the boys seem drawn to her even now. Hopefully Gavin and Jessie don't have issues with all that as she gets older.

You may have noticed I'm back at 160. I think my body seems to just settle there. This weekend I know I was too busy to really eat the way I should've. I tried a little bit but mostly I just ate whatever was easy. Turns out, ice cream is REALLY easy. It is even easier if you put chocolate syrup over it. Hopefully my 15 miles this week will put a dent in that but even if it does, how long before I'm back to 160? If I'm here forever though, I'm happy enough with that. We'll see how it goes.

One last thing.  Please feel free to leave a comment!  Even if I don't know you and you just happened to find this blog mildly amusing... I'd LOVE to read a comment from you! 

May 1, 2008 9:21 A.M. Weight: 159.0 lbs.

I missed my 1 year anniversary for starting all of this. I'd have to look back but it was about last Friday. I've had 70 pounds off since then - about 60 of those pounds I've had off and kept off for 5 months now. (Yes, I've only lost 10 pounds in the last 5 months - BUT - I've maintained under my goal weight for 5 months.) See, it's all in how you look at it. I've also gone since that date with exercising very nearly a minimum of 20 minutes 5 days every week. (I've missed that a week or two, I believe.) I'm trying to find some way to infuse some humor to this, however I'm just too dang busy being honest and happy about myself to do so.

A couple days ago I got an e-mail from our surrogacy agency asking me if I had gotten BCPs and started them. Yes, thank you ever so much for giving me your credit card number to use without your knowledge as I have not only purchased and received a month supply of BCPs, but I've been distributing Lupron and PIO and several other fun street drugs out of my home for the past week. Don't worry, I've kept receipts for everything. Or, um, no - I have not spontaneously found and started taking any BCPs. They made the choice that since I'm pretty regular anyway (at least I was before they shot up my system with all sorts of drugs - hopefully that is still the case) they will just forgo the BCPs for me and trust that my system will behave as needed once the egg donor gets on track. I believe that the egg donor was supposed to get her period about the same time that I did with last cycle, so around the end of March. We were baffled at the beginning of April as to what was happening. At this point, now May, one does start to wonder what is going on. We were hoping before the holidays for a Feb transfer. Then all the legal stuff took so long that we were hoping to capture the March/April timeframe. Now I'm basically thinking we're at least into June. The delay is frustrating, to say the least. At least now we're getting to a spring birthday so Paul should be happy about a lower RSV risk for the early days.

Well, I'm happy to announce that there will be no porn spam mail for me!! I DID get in my 5 miles today! The machine even told me I averaged 6 MPH for those 5 miles, however the time was 50 minutes 20 seconds so I know I didn't average 6 MPH. That's OK though because I was aiming for a nice long 5 mile run, not a kill-yourself pushed fast as possible 5 mile run. Now I get to keep running the 5 miles instead of continuing to add .25 miles on each time. I will not lie to you - I do not TOTALLY hate running. There are some moments while I'm going that I feel like I'm flying. Like I'm totally free and grooving to my own montage. (I'm such a dork that it was a Billy Joel song that came on today that had me really moving!) At those times, I feel like I could go forever. The trouble is that as soon as I think "Oh WOW I've hit runvanna." it ends and I'm pushing and struggling to keep going again. I wish that I could spend more time in that state. I wonder - for you runners out there - as you train and get better at it, does that state get easier to attain?

I biked yesterday - real biking - not at the gym. I went from my house, down past where my kids go for daycare, and up around the business area by my house. I was out for about an hour. It is so frustrating to bike around my home because there is nothing for bikes. There isn't even a shoulder on a lot of the places. I even rode past the high school and there was no bike path, shoulder, sidewalk, ANYTHING. That is such a sad statement. It makes me want to go to arms and start a campaign to get more bike friendly streets. I would if I ever had spare time in my life, which I don't. Thus, I'll spend my time whining about it and hope it has the same effect.

April 29, 2008 11:02 A.M.   Weight: 160.0 lbs. 

Two gay guys and a Wiccan walk into a theatre together... OK, I'm not actually Wiccan. Sorry Gerrald Gardner. I think the term 'witch' still applies to us plain old ordinary pagans though. While that line sounds like the start of a joke, it was based on real life events as Paul, James, and I went to see Baby Mama. I have to say, it was actually a really cute movie. Not so much a surrogate movie, as it turns out, but cute none-the-less. The one thing that really irritated me was the points of error or factual impossibility. Paul shocked me by insisting that film incongruities deserve artistic leeway because, dang Paul, YOU saying THAT? I won't ruin the movie for anyone that hasn't seen it by pointing out the things that were wrong. It was interesting that they totally glossed over ALL the humor potential in all the work that is involved in actually getting a gestational carrier pregnant. They did have one scene where the intended parents and the carriers were all in this group therapy thing together. They had one couple that was two gay guys and they had another group where the intended parents were a man and a woman, but the carrier was this goth-looking Wiccan. The guy in that group said that at first he was not so sure about a witch carrying his child, but then he was totally OK with it... unless she cast a spell on him. We had a good old laugh at that one. Haha! Heh..heh... um... moving on.

Speaking of gestational carrier stuff - there's not much news to report. I'm still waiting to know what the heck they want me to do. They had said on CD1 they wanted me to start birth control pills again. They neglected to get me those pills, however, so I'm taking my imaginary ones each morning quite dutifully. I don't know if imaginary ones work the same or not, but I'm totally blaming my weight on them anyway. I can only conclude that our egg donor is still waiting for her period at this point which makes me think that instead of halving her dose of Lupron next time they should, um, not get the Lupron anywhere near her. I'm thinking they should invent a code word for Lupron so she doesn't even hear the word should they happen to bring it up around her. I'm partial to "Holy Monkey Balls This Shit Will Knock Out Your Ovaries" or perhaps "Do You Smell What The Pron Is Cooking?" I asked how long they'd wait before getting a different donor and the agency told me it was up to the clinic and one donor went 4 months without getting a period. Originally when I said "they" I had meant the guys - the dads to be. Wouldn't you'd think it was up to THEM if they didn't want to wait it out with this donor? I'm not sure I'd want too much control sitting in the hands of this particular medical group if it was my family on the line. For that matter, I'm still totally in the dark as to why we are dealing with a fertility clinic in Toronto in the first place. In reading fertility blogs, it appears that some people actually travel HERE, as in, from OTHER places in the world to get TO Minnesota, for our high quality fertility specialists. Cost had been mentioned... but with all the costs of travel, especially with a canceled cycle under our belts, I really don't buy that. I guess anything is possible though. I don't care much because I am excited about the trip, even if it is proving out to be a pain in the ass to have to deal with all the timing things. I'm having a hard time believing that they are going to pull an actual cycle and transfer out of the current state of things by the end of May.

I have to report that while my weight is doing OK - my youngest son has become the baby that ate NY. He is 26 pounds, 10 ounces. That is almost at the 50% mark for his age! He is growing more this year than he did his first year, it seems. While most parents would be celebrating this spurt of biggerness in their almost 2 year old, it is messing with my head. I'll tell you, no matter how many kids you have and how much you think you have it figured out, it really is true, they are all different. Asher and Jessie are probably less than 5 pounds apart at this time. Jessie had a melt down at the table because I didn't sit next to her last night. I finally convinced her that if we sat across from each other we could make faces at each other. This worked out OK but now I'm going to have to convince her that sticking your tongue out at the person across the table from you is not good manners if the queen ever comes to tea. For that matter, neither is all forms of bodily gas noises nor picking your nose.

After two days of utter laziness and down right no good lounging, I finally put in a run today. Stopping just shy of a full 8K, I ran 4.75 miles. According to the display after I walked for probably another minute or so to cool down, my average time was 5.9 MPH. Tomorrow will be a 1 mile day and then Thursday I will (or you will have my permission to send my e-mail address to three(3) known porn sites) run the full 5 miles. If that declaration is not enough to make me do it, I don't know what will. It is funny, while I'm running I alternate between thinking "This isn't so bad, I can make 7 miles." to "OMG I've only just gone 0.03 of a mile, this sucks, my legs are going to buckle under me, I'm dying, is that my right or left arm that shouldn't be hurting like that...?" I do little celebrations at the 1.5, 1.75, 2, 2.25, and 2.5 mile marks ALL saying "Now I'm halfway done!" Hey, if you can't play mind games with yourself, how will you practice? The 160 today was OK. It isn't in the 150s like the week before, but it is also not over what I had on Friday and after this weekend, well, I'll take it and be happy. Besides, those imaginary BCPs are really screwing with my system!

April 25, 2008 9:20 A.M. Weight: 160.0 lbs.

My youngest son is obsessed with cars. It is the first thing he will say in the morning and the last thing at night. He spends the entire drive home from daycare saying "Mommy's car!" "Daddy's car!" over and over. He walks around the house with handfuls of little toy cars. Yes, the boy loves cars. I made the mistake of letting him take a car into the crib with him at night and paid for it by listening to "Vvvvrroomm" and "Mommy's car! Daddy's car!" for the next 2-3 hours before he actually went to sleep. He has a little shirt and overalls outfit that has cars on it and he could hardly contain himself when he wore it. He likes to point out which ones look like Mommy's car and which looks like Daddy's car. Apparently my minivan looks more like a little red convertible than Daddy's truck. That's OK. He has a placemat at the table that has Superman on it and he points to it and says "Daddy!" a lot so we all know his ability to match things up isn't so hot. :) Jessie, on the other hand, points to the monkey 'Boots' that is on Dora's shoulder on her placemat and says "Daddy!" after Asher does his so I'm expecting all AP courses for Jelly Bean once she's in school.

So far this week I've run 13.25 miles! Vvvvrrooooom indeed! That's more than I've ever done in a week, I think. I did 4.5 miles today and 4 on Monday and technically I only ran 3.75 on Wednesday. Then on Thursday I put in 1 mile. I'm not in any pain so that is great. You'd think with all this success, I'd have learned how important stretching is. Sadly, I'm clearly pretty dense as I skipped my stretching this morning in exchange for getting to work at least closer to "on time". You would also think that all that work would mean that I'd be at a new low weight wise. This is also not the case. After my uber 4.5 miles today I was rewarded with another day at 160. Bugger. I am fully using the fact that it is 'cycle day 1' today (YES!) as an excuse. I did not eat anything yesterday that I should not have and frankly, that involved a lot of will power last night. SO - piss off 1-6-0. You're not gonna mess up my day.

My allergies seem to be calming down a little bit due to the colder weather. I'm fully in favor of this, however I know that the colder weather just means it is delaying the inevitable and I really would like to just get it over with. I've made an appointment with an allergist for May 5th. They told me as I scheduled it to not take ANY allergy meds for 5 whole days before going in! HAHAHAHAHAHA! Oh how we all did laugh! Upon recovery, I said... no way. Could I live through it is I were pregnant? Yes. Am I going to just for this appointment? No. They just want to test me for what I'm allergic to and they want to accurately measure the reactions I have. If I have an armada of antihistamines coursing through my veins they won't get the natural reactions. I don't really care. Obviously it is all the seasonal allergy stuff from spring. There is no reason to make me miserable when we can use OTHER clues to finding out what I'm allergic to. Plus, there's the test I had back in high school. Trees, grass, flowers, fur, did I leave anything out? That's what I'm allergic to. Oh, and dust and mold, just to round things out. And Penicillin, as it turns out, but I only know that because of the strep throat I had while I was suffering from the chicken pox in Jr High and they gave me penicillin and I broke out in massive hives. Ya. It was a blast. My immune system and I are TIGHT friends. I don't know what I expect to come from this appointment. I've had appointments with allergists before and nothing has come from it. They told me to take Claritin, which does NOTHING for me. They also told me they couldn't do allergy shots as they wouldn't help. I've never understood this. Who then, exactly, are allergy shots FOR? I'll go though, and I'll whine about my dumb allergies and they'll tell me to buy the newest, latest and greatest allergy drug that costs more than fricking gasoline and then they will glare at me for not listening to the instructions to not take anything for 5 days before coming in. It will all be fun. I'll take pictures.

Weight: 160.0 lbs.

Yesterday I was up (weight-wise) due to eating these veggi-chips while I was working at my computer the day before. ya, they were healthier than normal chips. No, I should not have eaten 3 servings. No, I didn't help things last night. I found this snack called 'veggie bootie'. It is like fake popcorn with spinach and kale or something like that. Ya, also healthier than regular junk food. No, I should not have eaten the 4 serving bag with ~120 calories per serving. I've known for awhile that it is safer for me to put a serving in a bowl and bring that with me. Bringing the bag has brought temptation so I tend to not do it. I guess I wasn't thinking last night. Anyway, I didn't actually eat all that many calories so I know there's plenty of water sitting around so I don't feel quite so pathetic. I also know I'm just waiting on good old "cycle day 1" so I'll use that as my excuse too.

Speaking of that... come ON cycle day 1!! I've had no progesterone shots for a good 24 hours plus at this point. I wonder how long it takes. The agency is talking about putting me back on BCPs again so who knows how long we've got at this point. That is one thing I remember about trying to conceive in the past. The enormity of how long it can take is breathtaking, and that's when it is just the 'natural' way. For me this time around it is a little surreal because the details, the timing, it has very little effect on my life. I mean, I'm not thinking about birthday spacing or age gaps with my kids. I'm not thinking about how long it will be for a major life change to take place. For me, the only real effect is the specific here and now stuff like appointments conflicting with plans in my life. Those are little things. On the other hand, I know very well how the loss of a cycle feels to a family that IS waiting for that major life change. I can feel empathy for the dads that are living this waiting game and while I'm here trying to help, there is nothing I can do to make this go faster.

For my workout this morning, I ran 1 mile and then did the rowing machine for 20 minutes. No one was on the machine today! YAY! I've been noticing that one of Gavin's friend's mom works out at the gym at the same time as me. I don't know if she's seen me but I'd have to think she has. We haven't said hi or anything yet. Why is the social life of adults so weird? Why can't I, an extrovert in the extreme, just go out of my way to go say hi to someone? Why do I get so nervous and self conscious? I think it is weird.

April 23, 2008 9:09 A.M. Weight: 159.0 lbs.

Nature sucks. I know I know, I'm supposed to be a good little pagan and all that but these allergies are horrid. I've always found it ironic that on Earth Day when we should be rejoicing in the wonder that is Mother Earth, I have an overwhelming urge to go on a tree cutting warpath with a chainsaw and a bumper sticker that says "Screw Global Warming" stuck to my ass. My little Benedryls are totally overwhelmed. That's like taking Tylenol for the pain associated with cutting off a limb. I was working from home yesterday due to a case of "ugly eyes" from the swelling and redness and watering weepiness that turns to crusty goo. Gross. Anyway, my desk at home faces this picture window in our bedroom and right outside is a tree. A very lovely tree that I very much enjoy except all day yesterday I would look out and see masses and masses of pollen horking buds. Be afraid, be very afraid. I refused to step even a toe outside. When I let the cat out I hid behind the curtains. Gah! Please let this end soon! Grow you damn leaves, GROW already.

Yesterday marked the first day that I did not take a drug or shot or anything surrogacy related. Now I'm just waiting for my period to show up and then.... well... we don't really know. The egg donor has not yet had her period, from, ya know, ages ago, so we're all just waiting on that. I feel a bit sorry for her with all the pressure. I'm also a tad nervous that I'll catch whatever voodoo she's got going and not get MINE in a few days here. I mean, because, it works that way right? Contagious voodoo?

For the record, I was actually down in weight yesterday. Since I never made it to the gym (ugly eyes don't go to the gym either - especially since that would've meant going... OUTSIDE) I never weighed in on the official scale so I didn't get to record it. Today's weight is due to sodium, I know that. It is harder to eat healthy when you're in the same house as, well, your food, all day. Why is it so hard to just eat a carrot or an apple when you're at home and you KNOW there are crackers and cheese sticks available?

Well, after some time of really pathetic energy levels, I was hoping today would be different. I had a real, live, full on 'rest' day yesterday when I did not work out at all. I got to bed before 10 and set my alarm for 5:15. My plans were slightly foiled when Asher woke up at about 2 yelling for juice. Now, this was annoying but, it was also really cool. He was yelling FOR something with WORDS. He wasn't just crying in his crib. He was saying quite rationally, albeit loud so I could hear, "Mommy, juice!, more juice Mommy!" I love words way better than crying. When I went in there he got all excited and I picked him up and told him I'd sit him in the rocking chair until I came back with the juice. He was fine with that but he wanted his TWO blankets and his moon book in the chair with him. We call the little boy in the moon book "Asher" and it is SOO adorable because Ash will kiss the little boy and say "Goodnight Asher." Anyway, I came up with his cup, we snuggled for a bit while he drank, and then it was back to bed. THEN my alarm got me up at 5:15.

I hate getting up in the morning when I JUST DON'T WANT TO. Anyway, I got up and got ready and I even had my glass of soy milk and I headed out. I gotta admit, I'm still dragging. It could be the allergy pills I'm popping every 3-4 hours. (4-6 hours my ass, I need to find the 'other' allergy pills that I can overlap like I do the Tylenol and the Advil with my babies when they are sick. You never have to deal with one wearing off then.) It could just be the allergies. From what I understand, having your immune system think it is fighting off mutant virulus enemies from hell (AKA pretty little flower pollen) 24 hours a day might just wear you down. At any rate, me and my mutant fighting immune system ran 3.5 miles at 6MPH and then I had to take the speed down a bit. After just a few seconds running at 5.5 MPH I wasn't feeling just right so I walked for a bit. I did bring it back up to 5.5 and finished off that last mile for 4 miles total. It is possible that just the concept of running 7 miles with my friends on the 17th is really freaking me out. I can tell though that I actually enjoy running a LOT more at 5.5 MPH than I do at 6.

I'm having to restrain myself a great deal in the locker room. You see, there are a lot of pregnant women in there. A lot. Now I've gone through a lot of different phases in my life where seeing other pregnant women has invoked a wide variety of feelings in me. Right now, it makes me anxious. I am torn between blurting out to them that they should find out if their medical care does cord insertion checks as a standard practice or not and if not, they should ask for it - or just not saying anything. Pros to not saying anything? I don't have to be "that" woman. You know, the one that tells pregnant women scary things and should really just mind her own business. Cons? What if. Just what IF that baby needed me to speak up for it and not doing so allowed that baby to die just like Anily? I don't WANT to scare pregnant women. I don't want to be that person. I know though, that if you don't ask for a cord insertion check you are just playing a game of roulette with your baby's life hanging in the balance. The really sad part is that most pregnant women don't KNOW this. They TRUST the medical professionals to be doing everything they need to for this baby. They would never in a million years think that there was a deadly, known pregnancy complication that is easily diagnosed and dealt with, that many medical establishments do NOT check for as a standard of care. It is cheaper, you see, for insurance companies, to play the odds and let a few rare babies die than to have EVERY pregnant woman get checked. How much cheaper? I don't know - but that is the dollar amount on Anily's head. So if I say it, that woman will think I'm a nut at best or a very evil, sad little person that needs to not let pregnant people just be happy in letting their body do what comes naturally at worst. She may or (more likely) may NOT actually ask about the check. If she does, and nothing is found, she'll have confirmed that I'm a nut. If something IS found though - and that baby is born alive - It would all be worth it. Conversely, if I don't say anything, sure I get away without anyone planning to coat my bra in itching powder then I'm not looking. But that same WHAT IF is there. Would I even know? Would she come into the gym crying? Probably not. We'd just stop seeing her. Still though - a baby could die and I could've stopped it but I didn't because I didn't want to be rude. Seems a little pathetic. When it was closer to Anily's death, the telling won over. I spoke up each time. Now though, I don't. I just stay quiet. Is that right? I don't know. My guilt says it is not. Would YOU speak up?