maybe not this one, paul, dad, et all...

"you're still in town? i thought you left four years ago!"

this was the friendly greeting from a former colleague. i saw her as i was rushing jasper into the doctor's office on monday afternoon. she was going to afternoon tea at a nearby hotel. ironically, i had been invited to an afternoon tea as well, but jasper needing more drugs took precedence.

i last saw this colleague after i resigned from the hong kong standard. after over one year of concerted temperature and mucous charting (sorry paul), timed sexual relations, carefully selected positions, and several thousand dollars invested in useless ovulation kits and useless and frustrating and tear inducing home pregnancy tests, charles and i knew we were going to have to get aggressive with our fertility, or lack thereof. i was on clomid, a drug to help me ovulate.

i quit my job. less stress, i should have gotten pregnant the next month.

i didn't.

the marks on my wall left from my feet as i raised them carefully and rested them against the wall in order to coax any direction impaired (male?) sperm towards hopefully beautiful waiting follicles got darker and darker. i am not a particularly filthy person, but over a year, feet on one place on a white wall do make a difference.

after i saw the marks, i realised it was really time to get tough. the fertility doctor we had been referred to was making us go through that chart time. red badge of courage girls, you know what i mean. i had just had a test, my tubes were clear. wait a few more months. at least one year.

the book i was reading, optimistically titled take charge of your fertility or something ridiculous like that, said to get fit. i did. cut out lots of fertility inhibiting habits, magnificent charles was sworn to wearing boxers

"even when i jog?"

"yes! no more nasty tight terrible biking shorts!"

months passed and more negative home pregnancy tests passed from my hand to the garbage (and out of the garbage again, just in case, and then back into the bin). magnificent charles was finishing his kellogg EMBA and was spending weekends away from me. i spent a lot of weekends with him, or more specifically, any time i was ovulating. the other weekends, i was hiking and most certainly away from the cigarette filled pubs we might have frequented otherwise, and did before we started on le journee du babe.

we took a holiday and did not get pregnant. we were not staying out late, not eating japanese food, drinking mineral water and the rest of the drill.

i went to the dr and demanded action. he suggested that since i am polycystic, an iui ought to solve our problems.

it didn't.

we weren't planning ANYTHING, because we never knew but always hoped our lives and luck would change and i would fall pregnant.

we didn't.

the dr thought that we should do a few more before heading to an IVF. by this time, i had been away from my job for six months. i said no thank you, and called a clinic.

we went for a consult.

we saw the cost and cancelled a holiday. hoped i would get pg naturally the cycle before. remember when you still had those thoughts?

we went back for the IVF.

it worked.

sebastian was born, and he was so great decided we wanted another baby soon.

failed FET.

failed FET.

failed FET.

three trips to canada, one month each time, and three failures.

in a way, my friend was right, i did leave hong kong, almost. my heart was certainly in canada during that year of failures.

and then, a fresh cycle and a positive test. hospitalisation, spotting, home rest for 10 weeks, only out mornings for another two months, then weekly drs visits and spending what little energy i had on my little sebastian and my sweet magnificent charles. then the premature birth and three months devoted to the hospital and then semi reclusive living after they came home.

i can see why she thought i was no longer in hong kong.

but i was.

but i never see you!

as the night life action was no longer a regular, more an irregular, it's true, she didn't.

my gynaecologist did though.

Comments

[Boulder]

I'm going to call them my "Howard Hughes Years" - the years I have lost out on real life while trying to reach a live birth - because I became such a recluse. I'm certain that is what my friends thought of my absence, that I was simply a recluse, but I put 6000 miles on my car taking myself back & forth to RE appointments just the first 1/2 of this year. That's quite some sex drive, eh? I have a more intimate relationship with my steering wheel than I do with my husband - but don't tell him that, k?

[AyEnDeeAreEeAyAitch]

LOL@ Boulders "Sex Drive"

wow tess you have been through a lot. And look where you are now... Curious...are you one of those people who think that you are a better person for what you have gone through and endured? I sometimes wonder. I sometimes think I would be a better person if I had just been one of those lucky fertiles. I wouldn't be so jaded and sometimes bitter (although having my Littles has helped)

What say you?

[Tertia]

Wow my friend, what a journey!