Is It Really ICLW Again?

My months are really starting to run together these days. I can hardly believe it's already time for the May ICLW! This is such an annoying cliche, but I seriously feel like April's just ended.


If you're stopping by my blog for the first time, welcome. This is the third time I've participated in ICLW, and I've loved it every time--and have always been happy at how it seems to garner me a few new followers (hint, hint).


Probably what you're most interested is my infertility history, so I won't keep you in suspense any longer. My handsome husband and I only started trying to conceive last July--on our third anniversary, to be specific. Which was a highly unfortunate choice, as it's going to make our fourth anniversary be the day that we officially get labeled "infertile."


At the time, I actually had an inkling I would have a little trouble because of my past history of absent periods (which you can read about here). So I ushered myself--perhaps too quickly but still appropriately--into the world of infertility craziness within a couple of months of going off the (so-ubiquitous-but-now-exceedingly-hated-by-me) Pill.


I quickly learned that I had something called Hypothalamic Amenorrhea. My body stopped cycling because it wanted me to have a little more padding before getting pregnant. I'm very, very fortunate in that this is a condition which seems to be fully reversible in most women, though it takes some time and determination--and weight gain. I quickly gained 10 pounds and, last fall, I was thrilled to be rewarded with my first natural period in over six years! I thought, at the time, that a pregnancy would be just around the corner. But I guess ovulation does not equal pregnancy. Who knew?


Since then, I had two 50-ish-day-long natural cycles and one 40-day-long clomid cycle.  I'm currently on day 59 of my third natural cycle. The One Where Absolutely Nothing Happens.


Because I work for a church, I'm on a cheap-o insurance policy that doesn't even cover an appointment with an infertility specialist. So no REs for me at this point. Instead, I'm faithfully going to an acupuncturist, Katy the Needle Lady, and drinking herbal teas she prescribes. And hoping her promise to get my body back in balance isn't empty.


Oh, and I also just gave up on the One Where Absolutely Nothing Happens. I started a 7-day regimen of Provera on Wednesday night to induce a bleed and then go back to clomid. I'm happy to have an acupuncturist who's willing to work with Western drugs, as much as I hate them.


So that's the True History of My Attempts to Conceive until this point. It's a journey I have dreaded for many years, to be honest. But now that I'm on it, I firmly, wholeheartedly believe that it's happening for a reason--a good reason. One that I will, in fact, look back on thankfully, as unattainable as that gratitude sometimes seems to me now, sitting here stuck in the miry heartache. And I also firmly believe that the best is yet to come. [Cue corny Frank Sinatra song here.]

The Scaredy-Cat's Meow

What if my biggest infertility fear is not that I will never be a mother but that I will never be seen as a mother? By others?

What if the fears that keep me up at night in this gut-wrenching process are ultimately fears of what others will think in the coming months and years as we still haven't had children? Fears that as all our friends become parents, they will think themselves superior to us? In the same way that those who are...well, less innocent look upon the virgins in the world. As those without the privilege of a certain special knowledge. To be pitied.

I am afraid that I will always be a pregnancy virgin. Unwillingly excluded from that special knowledge.

Ever since I can remember, one of my biggest fears in life has been that I will be excluded. Excluded from the athletes because I am not athletic. Excluded from the popular crowd because I am not outgoing or witty enough. Excluded from the married group because I am still single. And now excluded from parenthood because my eggs don't know how to come out of their follicles in less than a month.

And so I've always been good at fitting in. At observing enough details of the group around me to seem like I belong. I honed my skills at fitting in when I was eleven years old and my family moved from a small town in the Philippines, where I was homeschooled and belonged to a safe, inclusive community of homeschooled expat kids, to a suburb of Philadelphia, where I began attending a large public school. I didn't know how to dress. I hadn't seen any of the movies that my fellow sixth-grade classmates had seen. I had no clue what music and bands were popular. I feared I was the ultimate girl-who-should-be-excluded.

But because I wanted to make friends and fit in so badly, I learned how to pretend. It's a survival skill for kids who live cross-culturally. I would nod my head and say, "Yeah, I've heard of that movie." Laugh along with the jokes that involved quoting a line from last night's episode of Friends. I was always aware, always attuned to the details of conversations around me, always putting puzzle pieces together to try to figure out the culture of American preteens. I learned to pretend I had the insider knowledge. And never, ever, to be the clueless one to whom other kids would pose the incredulous question, "How could you possibly never have seen an episode of ER?"

I nearly had a panic attack in seventh grade when my English teacher asked us to write down our favorite band. Was I supposed to have a favorite band? I wrote down the name of the only band I could think of at the time. Smashing Pumpkins or something like that. I had no clue what songs they sang, but I knew they were on the radio sometimes. And at least semi-cool. And I knew I did not want to be that girl who admitted that really, her favorite musician was Rachmaninoff.

Without realizing it, I had begun to live to be liked and included. I thought everyone lived that way. It was an anxiety-ridden way of living, but really, what else mattered if no one liked you? If the only kids who let you hang out with them were the kids who had been snubbed from every other coterie? If you were always labeled as the cluelessly nerdy, formerly homeschooled missionary kid?

Around my sophomore year of high school, I distinctly remember having a conversation with my mother that left my little fear-based world shaking on its foundations. She told me in no uncertain terms that it actually was not okay to live to please other people. That the approval of others was too small and restrictive of a purpose, and that it would leave me empty, even if I became the most popular person on earth. At some point, I needed to be willing to live the way God wanted me to live without worrying about what others would think, or whether they would include me in their groups. Exclusion--or perceived exclusion--was not the worst tragedy that could befall me.

I cried when she explained all this to me. I couldn't conceive of a world in which acceptance and inclusion weren't the end goal. I couldn't conceive of myself as someone who didn't live for others' approval.

I like to think I have grown since then. I like to think that I am more secure in who God made me to be. That I am better at loving and including people without caring as much if they really love or include me back.

But I find myself here, struggling with one of the biggest IFs of my life. Infertility. Feeling like the twelve-year-old girl who wasn't cool enough to sit in the back of the school bus. Excluded against my will. Clueless about what it would feel like to be pregnant, give birth, be a mother. These are not things I can simply pretend to understand, the way I pretended to know that JTT was Jonathan Taylor Thomas.

I'm unable to turn off the constant question in my head: what if I never get pregnant? The pain of living childlessly sounds unbearable to me right now. I long for a baby, a child, to be a mother. But as I delve more deeply into what I really fear, I realize that beneath the fear of childlessness is a deeper, darker fear that I will be forever excluded from the pregnant club.

And what if that's really my greatest infertility fear? Exclusion? Does that mean I long to belong to the pregnant club more than I long for children? That I long for others to admire and respect me more than I long to be a parent?

I believe that fear is a choice. That even though I can't turn off the scaredy-cat voice in my head, I can choose whether to dwell in the fear or to move forward in courage. I believe this in my head. I really do.

But so far, I have felt powerless to tell that voice to shut up. I vacillate between fear and courage not based on my decisions but based on the latest bloodwork, cycle, news, pregnancy announcement, physical symptom. What if I could believe in my heart that fear is a choice?

And what if I could really live for something greater than my fear of exclusion?

For more information on infertility, please visit Resolve. If you're curious about National Infertility Awareness Week, travel here. And, finally, to learn more about my inspiration for this post, visit Stirrup Queens.

The Most Misused Verse in the Bible

I realize I haven't been offering many personal updates on this blog recently. The reason for that is simply that not much is going on in hoo-ha-ville--at least not much that is manifesting itself tangibly. I'm around cycle day 20 today, but my cerv-myu (as Pete calls it) has been pretty boring, so I'm not expecting the big O anytime in the next few days. I will consider it a major victory (and evidence of chinese medicine's efficacy) if Little Miss Eggy decides to free herself before CD 30. My last natural ovulation took place on CD 35 or 36, and the one before was on CD 33.

But I do have some perhaps more interesting news to report from Subculture-ville. You may or may not have picked up that I do, in fact, belong to this strange breed of people we call evangelical Christians. To be honest, I'm hesitant to admit that because of all the connotations those two words put together may have in your mind and your experience. But as much as I would prefer to focus on how my beliefs are "not a religion, but a relationship," and tell you that I'm a "follower of Jesus" instead of a Christian (these are well-loved phrases among those of us who wish to separate ourselves from the negative stereotypes surrounding evangelical Christianity), the fact is that I have grown up in the evangelical Christian subculture and remain firmly planted there to this day. I just like to think I'm not as arrogantly judgmental as the Christian church is characterized as being. Though, I think if the truth were told about all of us as a human race, we're all pretty judgmental. Some of us just choose more socially acceptable criteria for judging--and are better at keeping our mouths closed--than others.

Anyway. That's not at all where I intended to go with this post. I just felt the need to preface what I'm going to say with an admission of where it comes from.

In this evangelical Christian subculture, one of our favorite things to do is quote Bible verses to people. Are you battling fear? Memorize and hang onto to Joshua 1:9: "Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be terrified; do not be discouraged, for the Lord your God will be with you wherever you go." Are you having trouble loving that person who sits next to you in church? Cling to 1 Peter 1:22: "Now that you have purified yourselves by obeying the truth so that you have sincere love for your brothers, love one another deeply, from the heart." We have an obsession with the Bible (and rightly so, seeing as we believe it's the word of God), and that obsession often turns into us picking and choosing verses here and there that we think might help or comfort someone. With mixed results, of course.

This is a particularly popular thing to do for people who are hurting. We don't really know what to say when someone shares their latest sorrows or struggles with us, and we often end up turning to the Bible. Again, with mixed results. I've had a few times when I've come crying to a friend or family member, and, in the context of a meaningful conversation, they've quoted a verse to me that came from a place of authentic pain in their lives, and the verse has become a lifeline for me. I've experienced others who respond to me with a quick verse that feels like a punch in the gut. Like what they're really saying is "If you really trusted God, you wouldn't be so upset about this."

One of our favorite verses to quote, in times of pain or otherwise, is Jeremiah 29:11: "'For I know the plans I have for you,' says the Lord, 'plans for welfare and not for evil, to give you a future and a hope.'" It's a great verse, really. God is speaking to the Israelites, who are in captivity and going through a lot of tough stuff, and telling them essentially that he hasn't forgotten about them.

But, like good Christians, we like to take that verse and quote it to anyone and everyone. High school graduates heading off to college. College graduates looking for a job. Single people looking for love. Families struggling to make ends meet.

Infertiles hoping for babies.

We like to think that the "you" in that verse is a universal you, and that "welfare" means what we want it to mean: good grades, jobs, marriages, babies, prosperity of all kinds.

We forget that this verse comes in the middle of lots of horrible suffering that the Israelites are going through and will continue to go through for quite a while before it ends. That God's perspective on welfare is a little different than ours. That "future" and "hope" both have to do with...well, the future. As in, what comes after the present.

Chris Blumhofer over at Relevant has written a great article about what this verse is really saying, which is what got me thinking along these lines in the first place.

Ironically, in certain subcultures among the evangelical subculture, this verse has almost become an inside joke because of how often it is misused. I guess we have found another criterion for judging other Christians--their Biblical interpretation skills (or lack thereof).

I am very fortunate that I haven't had anyone quote Jeremiah 29:11--or any other of the plethora of similar verses in the Bible--to me with regards to my fertility issues. I guess this would be the spiritual equivalent of those who tell the infertile woman, "Just relax and it will happen." Not so helpful.

Fly, Arrow, Fly

Back when I was first learning about hypothalamic amenorrhea, I came across several places that described the typical HA sufferer as white, female (well, duh), intelligent, well-educated, and controlling. Well, I don't exactly remember if they used the word "controlling," but it was something to that effect. In any case, I was implicated completely. I'm as white as they come, have a graduate degree, and always did well in school (as in, straight A's all the way through until one class in grad school, which still kills me. But I'm over it, I promise). And, yes, I'm naturally someone who wants to be in control. Of almost everything. In fact, when P and I did our premarital counselling, our counselor (a professional) gave me a little booklet about OCD. Hint, hint.

I'm willing to admit that I like to be in control. This is, after all, why I was so good at controlling my diet and exercising regularly, thus getting myself into this HA mess. As with most personality traits, it's both a strength and a weakness. I'm awesome and being discipline, organized, efficient. I get things done way faster than expected. I never (repeat, never) had to pull an all-nighter to finish an assignment or study for a test--because I had always planned ahead enough to get it done in advance. I plan all the meals we're going to eat each week ahead of time so I can use our money wisely and save time by only making one grocery trip a week.

But I have dreams (nightmares, really) about being late, being unable to get something done, about chaos. These are the things that literally keep me up at night, as pathetic as that sounds. And I dread planning meals each week because of my perfectionist tendencies. I have a strongly held belief that there is a perfect plan out there for our meals--one that would be perfectly efficient, healthy, varied, balanced. Etc. So I labor trying to find that perfect plan. Just in case you're wondering, it doesn't exist. Perfection doesn't exist in our broken world. That sounds hopeless, but it's really quite freeing when I can believe it.

God gave me the perfect (okay, I just said perfection doesn't exist, so I guess I'm using it figuratively here) husband to help me learn to let go a bit. Thankfully, he's almost as much of a planner as I am. I believe I would actually go out of my mind if I were married to someone who liked to fly by the seat of his pants (someone like my little brother, for example). P gets anxious if we don't have the next five years planned out; I get anxious if we don't have the next week planned out. So I help to let go of the next five years and he helps me to let go of next Tuesday. It works quite beautifully, actually. Thanks for orchestrating that, God.

This infertility thing is, needless to say, a huge, painful, stretching experience for both of us. I can't sleep at night worrying about my temperature the next morning. P gets frustrated that we are losing the possibility of having a baby in 2010. And we both just have to let it go, and help each other let it go.

That doesn't negate the fact that I still feel better now that we have put a bit of a plan in place. I was feeling really lost for a while because I didn't know what came next. Or how soon it could come. Without being able to see an RE, it seemed like we would just be floundering on our own for months and years on end. But we have a plan. And it was actually P's idea, so I don't have feel guilty about being too impatient and pushing things forward too fast. He wants a kid just as much as I do.

The plan? Assuming AF shows when she's due early next week, P will go in for his SA on Tuesday. I guess the results of that could change things entirely, but it's likely that he will be at least borderline normal. Then I will start acupuncture next Friday. I already booked my appointment. I'll go ahead and pay for the six-month plan and start going weekly, taking the herbs, eating warm foods, whatever. If P does have sperm issues, I might even be able to convince him to go in a few times.

After (and maybe even during) that six months, we'll start researching the process of adoption. We've always wanted to adopt, so this is not totally out of the blue. The idea of providing a home for parentless children, of creating a diverse family, is beautiful to us. We just always thought we'd adopt after having a couple biological kids. But why not now? It's expensive, it seems insurmountably complicated, but I guess we feel more at peace with the idea of dropping a lot of money and time into adopting rather than infertility treatments. We would probably look into international adoption first, since we plan to live overseas in the future anyway, but we'd really be open to anything.

That's our plan. It's faulty. It may be selfishly motivated at some points. It's unlikely that things will proceed as expected. But it's relieving to have a direction to move towards--a target to shoot for, I guess. If some wind comes along and blows our arrow in another direction...well, okay. We're learning that things work better when we release the arrow rather than trying to hold on to it as it flies.

The Obligatory Update

I've been super busy these past couple of days, which is the reason for the lack of blog communication. But, I promised myself I would at very least keep a basic record of my progress here, so I'm popping on for that update.

I'm on CD 17 today after my first crack at 50mg of clomid (to correct the lpd). I'm hoping, hoping, hoping for an earlier ovulation than the past two cycles. I have been warned that it could actually take longer, which seems weird. But I'll try not to freak out if it does. As long as it's a good ovulation this time and I have higher progesterone at 7dpo. We shall see. Starting to see a few signs of ewcm, but little else in the way of O yet. Really, my body just has no clue that most people get things going by CD 14.

I did convince DH that we should get him a semen analysis if this cycle doesn't work. He realized how important it was for my peace of mind and, like the dear he his, agreed he could go in to a clinic and wack off. Although he would like it if I came along to help ;). Something to look forward to if this cycle fails.

Oh Familiar Jealous Anger

I think every infertility blogger has a post on this topic. That awful jealousy. That inability to really rejoice with our friends who get pregnant. That ugly sense of injustice.

This is where I think infertility has a lot in common with unwanted singleness. I have friends who are still single and desperately long to be married. I have always been so grateful that I met my now-husband in college and really didn't have to spend any time wading through the uncertain loneliness some of my friends have to deal with. And hearing news of engagements without being able to be really happy. I had enough trouble with friends of mine who started dating long after us, got engaged the week after us, and decided to get married the month before us. Of course, these friends are also due with their first baby in April. And, though they haven't said it, they probably believe that our infertility is due to the fact that we (gasp!) eat beef that isn't grass-fed and chicken that isn't free-range organic. Yes, they are those kind of friends. You can see why I'm keeping this blog anonymous.

Back to the jealousy. I just found out (on facebook, of course) that good friends of ours are due with their second. Already on their second. And she's younger than me. Of course. And they got pregnant "sooner than expected." Of course.

I'm a committed follower of Jesus. Does this simplify or complicate the feelings of jealousy and sense of injustice? I can't decide. On the one hand, Jesus affirms me that it is unjust. This world is broken, and so our bodies are broken and don't work the way they're supposed to. If the world were as it should be, we would all be fertile. And he hurts for me because he loves me and doesn't want to see me in so much pain. Cries for the barren woman are all over the Bible. Moreover, he promises that one day, all the brokenness will be gone and the emptiness filled.

On the other hand, I know that the jealousy isn't entirely okay. It's selfish and ugly. God has the right to give other people babies within their first month of trying, and he has the right to make me wait. I can't free myself of the ugly feelings. I'm stuck. But he can. In fact, though he doesn't promise me a baby, he promises me freedom. So I pray and wait for the freedom while I pray and wait for the baby.

The Infertility Social Networking Pet Peeve

I can't be the only one who is starting to dread checking my facebook because of the many pregnancy and baby-related updates I will see. Seriously. Every time I check my home page, there is bound to be at least two. My least favorite? Ultrasound pictures that become people's profile pictures. Really? Do you really want a picture that was taken from your wife's vagina as your profile picture? I have news for you. No one wants to see that except your mother. Other annoying habits: women whose every status update has something to do with the discomforts of pregnancy. Or moms who change their email addresses to something like "jimmy.mom@gmail" or "busymommy@yahoo." Jimmy's future little siblings are out of luck, I guess.

The latest, and this is not really a social networking thing but is nonetheless annoying, is the professional maternity photo shoot. I just popped on my fb account and saw that a friend of a friend had uploaded an album of professional maternity pictures. That's a tradition that ranks up there with the Texas tradition of pre-wedding bridal portraits in strangeness.

Would any of this bother me if I had gotten pregnant within the first month of trying? I can't really say. I'd like to think it would, because I've always felt sympathetic to the plight of the infertile woman--but that's probably because I've always suspected I would be an infertile. So I have always vowed that if I ever do get pregnant and have a child, I will not be one of those people. My children will not exist on facebook. Just to retaliate at all the child-obsessed social networkers out there. I'm sure they'll learn their lesson for good from that.

Ups and Downs

It continually amazes me how filled with ups and downs this whole infertility journey is. And not just little hills, we're talking the Andes. Of course, that's partially the nature of who I am--I am not one of those emotionally steady people, like my mom or my husband. No sir. No steadiness here. Fortunately, I have lived long enough to know this about myself and realize, whether I'm on the peak or in the valley, that, for better or worse, my current emotional state will not last long. This self-knowledge helps. A little bit.

After feeling pretty great all week, I suddenly crashed yesterday. Admittedly, only a small part of my crash had to do with IF. More of it was related to how frustrated I was about my seemingly chronic sneezy/stuffiness, the boredom I'm feeling with my current job, and the fact that my husband is leaving tomorrow for 12 days, leaving me alone with my emotional instability.

My sudden high temperature this morning did not help at all. Here's the latest irony of infertility for me: during the follicular phase, my moods are the inverse of my temperatures. During the luteal phase (especially at the end), my moods echo my temperatures. I was feeling pretty good about my 96.9 yesterday morning. But 97.8 this morning? What the heck? If I had had a positive OPK yesterday, all would be well. But no positive. And I think it's highly unlikely that I totally missed my surge. So I'm starting to think the big O may still be a ways a way, and probably too late for DH's swimmers to make it.

To top that off, there have now been two girls who joined our hypothalamic amenorrhea forum after me who have now gotten their BFPs. I'm so, so elated for both of them. But now I'm officially one of the more veteran members on the board. It's kind of a weird transition, and it makes me even more ready to make the transition to the vets board with them. I just have to keep reminding myself that I joined the board and made the necessary changes much earlier than most of them, so all of them have still been TTC longer than I have. I am in no race!

Yet again, I am losing all my earthly sources of stability--promising signs of O, health, busyness, my husband. All I've got left to make it through the next few weeks is God. Thank you, God, for being far bigger than all these.

The Part I Hate

If nothing else, I have learned through my experience so far that infertility basically revolves around waiting. You get short bursts of activity and news--a positive OPK, temperature rise, AF--interspersed in the midst. But mostly, you wait. You wait for AF to finish. You wait for any sign of ovulation. You wait for your temperature to go below 97 degrees--and then above 98 degrees. You wait for your cervix to rise. After BMSing, you lie on your back, waiting for the spermies to find their home. Of course, it all culminates in the dreaded two-week wait, as you agonize over every twinge and temperature rise or dip, frantically googling "first signs of pregnancy."

I think some fertile women get a small taste of what this is like in the last couple of weeks of pregnancy, when their huge belly is getting intolerable and they feel like they're going to burst if the baby doesn't come soon. A few of my friends who have gone through this have been very anxious about how long their babies would take to decide to come. When they've complained to me about it, though, all I can think is, at least you know you're baby IS going to come, and very soon. Not that I'm not sympathetic. I'm sure I will feel exactly the same way when I get there. But waiting is one thing when you're certain that a good outcome is on its way. It's a different thing entirely when coupled with uncertainty.

Right now, I'm waiting for O. My temperature was a little lower this morning, but still not below 97. No sore boobs, no ewcm. The waiting is worse this time around than last time, though, because I have the pressure of DH's upcoming trip looming ahead on 9 days away. 9 days! I keep telling myself that things could start happening any day and very likely within the next 9 days. But if they don't... I'm really not sure how I'm going to make it for 11 days without DH to put me back together.

I have still been trying to focus on the sense of peace I glimpsed yesterday. Really, there is nothing I can do to change what's going to happen, as fatalistic as that sounds. From a scientific perspective, there are things I can do to increase my odds. But in reality, God's going to make it happen when he knows is best, and all the supplements in the world can't change that. I've been having a lot of trouble trying to keep these two competing concepts in my head with respect to TTC. So I've taken the tack of focusing on God's control and his love for me. I think that's a better place to be than the frantic attempt to optimize everything.

Accepting the Miraculous

Yesterday, having succumbed to my addiction to googling infertility-related questions, I came across someone else's blog that hinted that having a long follicular phase (in other words, delayed ovulation) can compromise egg quality and thus reduce your chances of achieving a BFP (pregnancy). I was dismayed, and suddenly had something new to worry about. By having the long cycle that I do, I already have way fewer chances than most people to get pregnant. Am I now supposed to believe that even when I do ovulate, my chances of pregnancy are worse than most?

Along with that came the growing realization that I will probably never have a normal reproductive system. I think I have still been operating under some illusion that suddenly, my body will just snap out of it and I will be normal, with normal (ie really good) chances of getting pregnant. I had at least hoped that after struggling for a first pregnancy, I could conceive easily for the second. But I'm coming to realize that my hypothalamic amenorrhea is likely here to stay. I'm definitely recovering, but getting pregnant will probably never be easy for me. One would think I would have accepted this by now, but it's still been hard.

And on top of that, my body's signs of ovulation have been backing off the past couple of days--back to creamy CM and high-ish temperature. And completely un-sore boobs. DH leaves in 10 days. For most people, 10 days would be plenty of time for ovulation, but for me, I'm cutting it really close. So now I'm imagining how devastated I will be if I ovulate several days after DH leaves--and no one will be around to pick up the pieces. Enduring the two-week wait would be hard enough with him gone, but at least I would have hope in that situation.

Lots of suck. But, at some point this morning, I came to a realization. Getting pregnant will in fact be a miracle, no matter when or under what circumstances it happens for me. It will be a miracle that I don't actually deserve and over which I had very little or no control. I have been trying to figure out my odds and preparing myself for every possibility. But God is the only one who will determine when I get pregnant--not my weight, not my OPK's, not our furious love-making. This seems a pretty simple revelation and is a truth that I have known all along. Somehow, though, it sunk in more this morning. I don't know what happened. But I feel just a little less stressed about it. I can't actually do anything to determine when I get pregnant.

To return to the question that got me started on this whole thing--whether a long follicular phase compromises my odds or not--I don't think it actually does. One of the wise women on our HA forum assured me that we HAers simply take a long time to grow our little eggs. The quality would be compromised if they grew and were ready to go but then took a long time to pop out. Ours pop out when they're ready, it just takes a while for them to get there. Or something like that.

I'm definitely still hoping for more egg-whites and lower temps tomorrow.

Why Does This Bother Me?

The question I have been dealing with a lot in the past few weeks is why all this is bothering me so much. When Pete and I first began the TTC journey, I thought I would be fine with waiting if things took a while. After all, there are distinct benefits to being child-free--and not pregnant. That was only seven months ago. Seven months is hardly anything to be concerned about. And we have even less to be concerned about than most because we've only had one honest go at the baby-making thing, since my body has been so sluggish.

So why all the angst? Yes, part of it is because I project things into the future and fear the worst--that we will keep trying and trying and never actually achieve a pregnancy. But I realized this weekend that this kind of irrational fear is only a part of my emotional turmoil. I'm actually pretty good at putting that out of my mind and talking some sense to myself.

When I get the most upset is simply when we hear news of another couple that's pregnant. There is something deeply ingrained in me that sees everyone else only in comparison to me. Whenever another couple gets pregnant, I feel like an 8-year-old whose friends have decided to start a secret club and leave her out. I feel like my friends who have gotten pregnant and have had babies have some secret knowledge from which I am excluded. I also feel like there's some race going on to have kids, and I've missed the starting line.

All this leads to me being unable to really rejoice with my friends when they get pregnant. And I hate that about myself. I have struggled and prayed and wrestled so many times over the past few years, longing to be free to really be happy for the announcements. Instead, my heart sinks every time I hear another one, and my initial reaction is that I don't want to talk to them. Or if I do talk, I want to tell them about what I'm going through.

So there it is. The ugly truth about my self-centered heart. Usually the struggles of infertility are portrayed as being mostly about the longing for a child. For me, the longing for a child is coupled with--and often dwarfed by--the envy and anger at all the fertiles out there.

On a practical side, I'm on CD 22 of what will be my third natural cycle. I got really excited a few days ago because I was having lots of signs of ovulation, but they seem to have subsided a bit now. DH leaves on a 12-day trip on January 29, which will be CD 33 for me. CD 33 is when I ovulated last time, so I'm really, really hoping and praying that my cycle is at least the same length and ideally shorter this time. As usually, nothing I can do but wait and see.

Introduction: My History with Hypothalamic Amenorrhea

I've decided to start blogging my way through my journey towards motherhood. Partially so that I can reference this in the future, and partially for others out there who might stumble across my blog and find it a comfort. Or those who might know nothing of infertility but would benefit from a glimpse into its twisted depths (which would be most people).

I'm currently 26 and have been very happily married for three and a half years. My husband is a graduate student, working on his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering. I have spent the past few years working full-time, getting my MA in English Lit, and then working full-time again. Ironically enough, I work with kids. I just turned in my thesis last December, and my husband and I had decided that our ideal timeline was for me to be pregnant and due sometime this spring, which we figured would put us in a semi-decent financial position and give me a secure job to potentially return to after maternity leave, should I choose to do so. So, I officially went off the pill last June, and we started TTC on July 8, our third anniversary.

Let me back up a bit. Back in high school, I used to weigh around 130 pounds at a height of 5'4". Not really overweight, but I have a small frame so it was actually a bit overweight for me. I got up to 140 the year after high school and decided things needed to change. So, starting that April, I embarked on an all-out weight-loss campaign. This was back during the low-fat craze (pre-low-carb craze), and so my method was to cut out almost all fat from my diet and exercise every single day. Looking back now, I can say I was bordering on a sub-clinical eating disorder--I was so restrictive and obsessive about it. Over about 4 months, I lost about 35 pounds, getting down to 106. And though I gradually loosened up on the eating and exercised over the next 5 years, I stayed around the same weight.

But. My period stopped coming. The last one I had was in April of that year, before starting the weight-loss crusade. After 6 months, my mother convinced me that I should see my OB about it, and I did. She basically said I had nothing to worry about, really, and just put me on the pill. I was 19. I tried going off the next summer because I didn't think I really needed to be on it, but still no period. At that point I started to get anxious about potential fertility problems, even though I had no idea why. My OB assured me there was nothing to be concerned about and just told me to get back on the pill.

Fine. By then, I was seriously dating the man who would become my husband. So I just stayed on the pill through the first 3 years of marriage. Always in the back of my mind was a fear about whether we would be able to have kids, but I kind of pushed it off and just hoped that since I was more moderate with my eating (or so I thought), I wouldn't have any problems. I include this because it gives a little more background on the anxiety of my fertility journey. Basically, ever since I was 19, I haven't been able to see friends get pregnant and have babies without an impinging feeling of fear. About a year and a half ago, we found out that my younger sister-in-law, who had been married less than a year, had gotten pregnant accidentally. I admit with great shame that my initial reaction was extreme anger. Why couldn't she figure out the birth control thing? Why did she have to upstage us? We should have had the first grandkids, if she and her husband could only figure out the planning-ahead thing (which, pregnancy aside, they really do suck at). I couldn't believe that was my reaction and I worked through it with God and my husband, but there it was.

So, back to last year. Took my last pill June 23. Lived in ignorant bliss for exactly one month, hoping good ol' Aunt Flo would show up right on time and I would have nothing to worry about (or else be pregnant). On July 23, nothing. Tried to hold back the anxiety, but didn't make it very long. I eventually started emailing my OB, and she ordered a bunch of bloodwork. Everything was actually fairly normal, so we tried progesterone for a week, which she guaranteed me would cause a period. Nothing. Well, lots of cramps. But no blood. More bloodwork and an appointment which included an ultrasound. She finally diagnosed me with hypothalamic amenorrhea, which means my brain wasn't sending the signals to my body to ovulate. She referred me to an infertility specialist. I found out the appointment with the specialist would cost $516 out of pocket and went right back to my OB. No way could we afford that much just for an appointment, and clearly any treatments would cost much more.

Meanwhile, lots of freaking out and crying.

Also meanwhile, I stumbled across the Hypothalamic Amenorrhea discussion board at FertileThoughts. Finally, some answers. There are actually a lot of other girls out there with HA! And most of them have been able to get pregnant! Their answer? Gain weight.

Ouch. At that point, I could hardly stand the idea of gaining weight. I was quite attached to my size 0 body. But, slowly but surely, I began to accept that I just needed to do it. So, I started gorging myself and gained 7 pounds in one weekend! I made it up to 115 and kind of camped out there for a while, hoping I wouldn't need to gain more. My OB had taken pity on me and done some of her own research on HA, even contacting  her RE (reproductive endocrinologist) friend to ask for advice. She suggested that we start with clomid. So DH (dear hubby) and I talked it over and decided to start a cycle of clomid right around the beginning of November. I picked up the prescription at the pharmacist and waited--and prayed that something would happen naturally.

Though I had been pretty religious about checking my CM, CP, and temping every day (these are infertility code words for cervical mucus, cervical position, and taking basal body temperature), I had basically given up that anything would happen and stopped reading into them. Then, about a week before I was planning to start the clomid, I noticed that my boobs were really sore for a couple of days. Then, all of a sudden, my BBT shot up from the upper 96's to the lower 98's. I had ovulated! I couldn't believe it! I got my progesterone tested just to be sure, and the ovulation was confirmed. My period showed up 10 days later. I was ecstatic! I couldn't believe my body had done its thing on its own after six years!

DH and I were more prepared with the BMSing (baby-making sex) the next cycle. I ovulated on day 33 and endured a gut-wrenching 2-week-wait, reading into every symptom and doing everything I could to think about other things. I had gotten progesterone suppositories from my OB to lengthen my LP (luteal phase--time between ovulation and period, which should be around 14 days but had only been 9 for me the first time). I had just about the worst pms I've ever had, but I was holding out hope that the awful cramps were a sign of a little fertilized embryo getting cozy. In the meantime, we spent Christmas break with my in-laws, hearing about little else than my adorable niece. Okay, maybe that's an exaggeration. But that's how it felt. I guess I expected a little more sensitivity on their part since they knew what was going on. But really, I don't think anyone who hasn't gone through infertility has much of a clue how it feels, so I can't expect them to simply not mention their cute granddaughter ever around me. That would be even weirder, I suppose.

After 18 excruciating days (and three or four negative pregnancy tests), my period finally showed. Even though I knew we only had a 25% chance, I think I had been so worried about ovulating for so long that I felt like once I finally ovulated, the problem would be solved. So many of our friends seem to be able to get pregnant on the first try, so when we didn't, I was crushed yet again. Yet again, intense negative emotions for no rational reason.

And here we are now. I'm on day 18 of my third natural cycle. The emotions of all this are just killer, and there's no way around them. I trust that God is sovereign and that he loves me, but I fear how much suffering he's going to take me through. DH had been reminding me to take this one day at a time, and to focus on all the many things I have to be thankful for--that I was diagnosed so early, that I found the HA message board, that I only had to gain 10 pounds, that I'm cycling. But it's hard not to focus on the fact that with a cycle as slow as mine has been, I only get half as many chances as anyone else. So this could be a long journey, folks.