the (mis)adventures of jenna

a memoir in eleventy billion parts

Blankie November 7, 2009

Filed under: blog posts, infertility — jennawoestman @ 14:35
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I sleep with a blanket. Not just the kind of blanket that covers me up at night, but an actual, bona-fide security blanket. And I am comfortable enough with myself to admit it publicly. (Which maybe is a bad thing? Unsure. But I don’t care.)

Twenty-seven years ago, when the Grandparents Laird learned I freshly born and a girl, they dropped what they were doing and rushed to the baby store in Ankeny where Aunt Michele worked. They bought all the stuff (which, knowing Grandma, was probably a lot) they had picked out in the event of a firstborn girl and drove straight to Iowa City. Once there, they presented me with a bunch of stuff I don’t remember and, most importantly, Blankie.

As I grew up, I never slept without the Blankie. Not if I could help it, anyway. I caused my parents GREAT STRESS when I forgot it at the home of our Grandparents Laird after they moved to Indiana. It was seven hours away from me, and I think I cried for seven hours straight. Poor Mom went through all the towels in the house trying to find one that I was willing to accept as a substitute. (I recall it was pink, but had formerly been a shade of purple before it faded.)

I’m pretty sure I can re-create the frantic phone call that transpired between Pops and the Grandparents:

Pops: Jenna forgot her Blankie, we think it’s at your house.

Grandparents: OH NO.  (scurry scurry scurry)  Yes, we found it; she left it in the sheets that got taken to the laundry room.

Pops: Good, at least we know where it is.

Grandparents: What time is it?  7:30 p.m.?  Well, if we started driving now and went really fast, maybe we could make the 7 hour trip before she fell asleep.

Pops: It’s not likely.  And she’ll survive, she’s a big girl.  This is probably good for her anyway.

Grandparents: Well, we’ll send it Priority Mail first thing in the morning.  Tell her not to worry.

The mail was much slower back then, because I think it took about three months to get my Blankie back from Indiana. In reality it was probably about three days, but the pink towel was just not the same thing and each night was extra long since I obviously couldn’t sleep without my Blankie.

But I’ll have you know, I watched out the window every day until the mailman showed up with my Blankie in a box.

One summer when I was about eight, I spent a week with my Grandparents Richardson, and Grandma (who is a whiz with a needle) noted how awfully holey and shabby my Blankie was getting. I had literally loved the stuffing right out of it, so she offered to mend it for me. She took me to her material scraps drawer, and told me to pick my two favorites. So I felt each one of them for the Very Specific Attributes that were necessary in a Blankie, one of which was that it had to have a certain level of what I referred to as Fuzzy. I couldn’t explain it to you, though, but I knew it when I felt it.

Grandma very carefully matched the two materials I picked out, and I stood over her shoulder and watched her sew them carefully on to and around Blankie. I was kind of upset that Blankie would be different, but Grandma reminded me that Blankie was right underneath these new materials, and that Blankie was getting so fragile that he might fall apart in my hands if we didn’t fix him.

Then, after Blankie was nearly finished being re-covered, Grandma handed it to me so I could make sure I approved. I did. Then she let me pick the decorative stitch she’d use to tack the material down in Blankie’s midsection. I chose a rose.

After Blankie’s improvements, I always loved the fact that my favorite possession was now from both of my grandparents.

Way, way, way too many years went by. Every so often I’d try to quit sleeping with my Blankie and put him in my baby box, but about two to three days later I’d dig it out in the middle of the night.

I tried when I got into junior high – failed, but then I didn’t try that hard.

I tried when I hit high school – impossible, but I didn’t bring it on any basketball trips or overnighters.

I tried when I got to college – no dice, so brought it and announced it to my roommates first thing. They didn’t seem to judge me.

I tried when I was a counselor at East Iowa – couldn’t do it, brought Blankie along and hid it in my bed. No one ever found it that I am aware of.

And then, once I got engaged, I thought I really had to do something about this whole Blankie thing. I lived in Ankeny and Mom and Dad still lived in Robins, so I took him home with me and put him in my baby box again. As Joey and I drove back to Ankeny, I literally FREAKED OUT in the car. There was no going back for Blankie now.

For four years, Blankie had remained in the box in the blue room at Mom and Dad’s house.

Then in May, when we lost our baby, I was so upset that I would literally cry over and over that I wanted my Blankie, that my Blankie would help me feel better. I don’t think it was so much about wanting my Blankie as it was about wanting to feel some kind of security and normalcy. But Joey, who is and always will be amazing, told me there was no reason why I couldn’t get it next time we went back home.

So, in July when we went up for the weekend of the 4th, just about the first thing I did was march up to the blue room and excavate the closet until I found my baby box.

There was Blankie, right on top just waiting for me to come dig him out again, like always. (I don’t know why, but Blankie has always been a boy.)

I sat down on the floor and held my Blankie just like I used to when I was little. I felt through the re-covered layer to the original Blankie and just the simple act of finding my Blankie made me feel like, for a few seconds anyway, that everything was right in the world.

I brought Blankie back down to Texas with us. I decided it wasn’t worth it to leave the poor thing in a box in Iowa.  Blankie missed me too; I could sense it.

After a few months, I really did try to put it away again. It lasted for three weeks. Joey informed me that he really didn’t care so much if I slept with Blankie still, and I decided to quit trying not to.

I’d totally fail at Blankies Anonymous because I fall off the wagon all the time.

All this to say, it may seems ridiculous and weird to y’all, but it’s amazing how that piece of cloth makes me feel better when I feel like I CANNOT DO THIS INFERTILITY THING ANYMORE.

And, if we get pregnant, you can guarantee I will not be messing around when it comes to picking out blanket(s) for our kid(s). Security blankets are crazy important.

Even 27 years after the fact.

(I’d take a picture of Blankie and post it, but he’s not looking his best right now. He really needs a bath, but I hesitate to wash him since he’s so old. And…stop thinking that’s gross, it’s really not so bad.)

 

Hitler and Pepsi November 6, 2009

Filed under: blog posts, infertility — jennawoestman @ 09:38
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I think IVF stress is going to ruin my brain.  Either that or memory loss and idiocy is a side effect of my medicine: I’m forgetting absolutely everything lately, I’m bad at responding to emails, I can’t figure out my new cell phone.  AND SO ON.

 

Yesterday and the day before I felt pretty good.  Today I am absolutely dragging.

 

This could have more to do with the fact that I had a really weird and very long dream about being Hitler’s secretary.  Hitler was really mean in my dream, so I kept trying to find ways to blow him up but he kept foiling my plans by being screaming, “Jenna I need you to get over here right now!!” at me, and then I’d have to go stand by him. Which, of course, was always right where I had set my bomb to go off.  Obviously I was not going to blow myself up.

 

So after an entire night, pretty much, of trying to kill Hitler, let’s just say I did not feel refreshed when the alarm went off.

 

In fact I felt so un-refreshed that I got back in bed after drinking my coffee, and I fell asleep.  Which made us late.

 

That’s the secondary reason why I am having a Pepsi today.  The clock is ticking, y’all.  Once I start shooting myself up every day I can’t have caffeine anymore.  I guess caffeine and ovary simulation meds are not a good combination.  (I just really creeped myself out by thinking about that, so now I’m shaking my head really hard to jiggle the mental picture away.  Whew.  It’s gone, but now I have a headache.)

 

I have until November 21st to caffeinate myself.  I will totally rise to the challenge/occasion.

 

Cow November 5, 2009

Filed under: blog posts — jennawoestman @ 14:16
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Several years ago, I started calling Joey “cowboy”.  Just for fun.  Basically because I like cows, and Joey’s a boy.  Whatever.  A couple years ago, I started shortening “cowboy” to just straight up “cow”; it’s easier to say and since I really like cows, I thought it was a compliment.

Well.

At first, Joey was major annoyed.  He was all, why would you call me cow because those are large, fat, smelly animals that we eat.

And I was like, seriously?  Cows are amazing and you need to snap out of it.

I think poor Joey knew he was going to lose this one, too.  Because I continued to call him “cow”.  I couldn’t help it, I just forgot.

Fortunately for me, though, all these years later he doesn’t even notice anymore.  I could yell “COW!” across NorthPark on a busy Saturday, and he’d whip his head around to see where I am.  It’s amazing.

 

Arise And Be Comforted November 5, 2009

Filed under: blog posts, infertility — jennawoestman @ 08:13
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Psalm 86:15-17

But you, O Lord, are a compassionate and gracious God,

Slow to anger, abounding in love and faithfulness.

Turn to me and have mercy on me;

grant your strength to your servant

and save the son of your maidservant.

Give me a sign of your goodness,

that my enemies may see it and be put to shame,

for you, O Lord, have helped and comforted me.

It’s no secret that sometimes I get overwhelmed by it all.  That I can’t understand why, why, why this is happening to me.  That when I see irresponsible mothers with miserable-looking children I just want to scream HOW IS THIS FAIR?!  Why do they get to have all these children and screw them up when all I want is a baby to nurture?

And then there’s the paradox:

The same God who created me fearfully and wonderfully…gave me a reproductive system that cannot function properly.

The same God who miraculously allowed us to get pregnant naturally once…took our miracle baby away.

The same God who provided us the way to try IVF…may allow it to fail.

The Lord gives and the Lord takes away.  Somehow I have to figure out how to understand the “blessed be the name of the Lord” part of that verse, just in case he takes away again.  Sometimes I wonder what we’ll look like on the other side of all of this.  I feel like we’re too young and immature to be slugging through this stuff, ya know?

Maybe everyone in this valley feels that way, though.

That’s why I find comfort the Psalms.  And that’s why I love the song Arise And Be Comforted.   Neither one’s trying to tell me JENNA!  It’ll be GREAT!  Don’t WORRY!

They both face the fact that life gets hard. Seriously?  David (the Psalmist) did not have it easy when he wrote many of his Psalms.

Even the young at heart tire and fall…but He knows them all.

(Click the “play” button below to listen to the song.)

 

How In Vitro Will Work November 4, 2009

Filed under: blog posts, infertility — jennawoestman @ 19:19
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Disclaimer:  This post will contain the words “ovary”, “ovulate”, “egg”, “cycle”, and “uterus” in reference to myself.  If you think this is disgusting or creepy, you don’t have to read this.  I won’t be offended.

I’m feeling super good right now.  Like fresh, energized, and zippy.  I figure the next two weeks are going to be my best two weeks in the foreseeable future, so I plan to live them with gusto, y’all.  GUSTO.

Anyways, I told you I’d summarize how the whole process would work, and I’m here to make good on the promise.

So currently I’m taking birth control to regulate my cycle.  The reason they’re doing this is so that they can tweak it up just right because, on November 21st, I’ll start injecting Follistim into my stomach so Dr. Babyplease can make my ovaries go gangbusters.  I’ll shoot myself up every evening for 10 days, so if anyone plans to hang out with me in the evening from Nov 21 – Dec 1, just prepare yourself for me going off to the bathroom around 9:00 to give myself at least one injection but, depending on where we are in the cycle, up to three.

To start things off, Dr. Babyplease is hopping my poor little ovaries up on Follistim so that they produce more than one follicle.  I think, but am not certain, that that’s the same thing as an egg.  In any case, the whole point of the injections is that I’ll produce somewhere between 10-30 eggs in a cycle, instead of the measly one we women normally crank out.

My poor little ovaries, though.  They’re going to get all upset by the Follistim and, can I just say the side effects list for Follistim sounds pretty awful?  Things like severe and sharp pains, bursting follicles, and other grodies I will just not even mention because it won’t edify any of us.

So, after I get really, really good at injecting myself with Follistim every evening we’ll start going in about every other day for blood work and ultrasounds.  These will help Dr. Babyplease know if I need to be taking less or more of the medicine, and it’ll help her see if I’m going to have any really painful side effects.  If she can catch those early, she can make adjustments to the medicine regiment.

On Nov 26 (HAPPY THANKSGIVING TO JENNA) I will start another injectable medicine called Ganirelix.  Within a day or two, I’ll also add Centrotide, which is also an injectable. This bad boy costs over $1,000 per shot, friends.  Yes, you read that correctly.

Aside: When I spoke with the fertility pharmacy earlier today, I asked what the out of pocket costs for all these drugs were, just because I was curious.  It’s out of control expensive.  I’m so thankful that we have insurance.  So thankful.  Otherwise we wouldn’t even be able to think about this.

The weekend of Thanksgiving, we’ll be pretty much living at the fertility clinic for daily labs and ultrasounds.  Also, by this point, I will be feeling pretty much like death.  So…if I bite your head off, I apologize in advance.

All of these medicines are working together to cause me to not ovulate, but at the same time to make a crazy amount of eggs. Somewhere around December 2, we’ll be going in for the egg retreival procedure.  Thirty-six hours before that (and thirty-six hours exactly), I will give myself a HCG shot which will chemically force my body to begin the ovulation process.

However, the morning of Dec 2 or Dec 3, we’ll get up and get ready like normal.  Except this morning we will not put on any cologne, perfume or stop anywhere to get gas on the way.  Why?  Because those fumes are toxic to baby egglets.  Strong odors can actually kill them, so the ARTS Department and OR have tons of air filters everywhere to suck out all the smells.

CRAZY.

Once we arrive at the hospital, we’ll waltz into the operating room at Presby (second time this year, y’all!) and Dr. Babyplease will use what looks like an internal ultrasound wand with, here’s the kicker, an 18 inch needle on the end of it.

I KNOW.

I almost threw up when the nurse told me that.

But I’ll be asleep, so I won’t know it’s happening…probably.

Anyway, Dr. Babyplease will use the ultrasound wand to find where my ovaries are, then she will STAB ME THROUGH SEVERAL ORGANS in order to get to my ovaries, where she will do something involving the word “burst” (I stopped listening after that part) and use the needle to suction out all the eggs I have spent the last 10 days cranking out for her.

Within an hour, they have fertilized the eggs in a petri-dish where they will stay for either three or five days.

I will go home and lay down, because apparently I’ll feel kind of like death following the procedure.

Meh.  I should be totally used to it by then.

So, for either three or five days, the eggs will marinate.  The day they’re transferred back into me depends entirely on how they’re doing.  (The reason they can’t be transferred on day 4 is that they are turning into blastocysts on day 4 and the dish can’t be opened during that process.  Who knew!?)

On transfer day, they’ll just slide them right into my uterus using a tube.  A TUBE.  Joey could even watch….if he felt like it.  That sounds gross to me, though, and pretty creep-tastic.  After the float them into my uterus, they’ll close my cervix (SORRY, there is no other word for that) up tightly so the little babies can’t fall out.  That was actually a huge relief to me, I wondered if I was going to have to lay down for like 3 days, or what.  But no, they pretty much just cork me.

HOLY COW.  Now that I’ve typed all this I feel a little freaked out.  Maybe I need to bake some cupcakes.

This afternoon, as I was ruminating on my morning of information overload, I thought back to when I was in first grade and Mom read The Wonderful Way That Babies Are Made to me.  In that book there was nothing about a Petri dish, nothing about Follistim injections.  And I actually busted up laughing (probably looked like a crazy person) because if this works and someday our kids ask where babies come from?  We’ll tell them the doctor mixed them up in a Petri dish and floated them back inside Mommy using a plastic tube while Daddy held my hand, to make sure everything went OK.

That’s so much easier than explaining the other way.

 

The Big Pre-Start Appointment November 4, 2009

Filed under: blog posts, infertility — jennawoestman @ 11:24
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Today was The Big Day.  The day where we had our appointment at the fertility clinic to get a very thorough rundown of the IVF process, and to learn how to do, EEK!, shots.

I have to tell you, sitting in the waiting room at the fertility clinic is a weird, weird experience.  Half of the women look haunted, the other half look dazed.  I’m assuming the haunted ones are the people who are just starting out and who are feeling hopeless, and the dazed ones are halfway through the process and are feeling awful from all the drugs.  Either way, not a fun waiting room.  Just sitting in it makes me feel nervous.  It’s also strange to sit there and realize that we are not alone.  None of those women would be sitting there if they could get pregnant for free.  None.

When the nurse called us back, I was so nervous I thought I’d pass out.  Joey had coached me before we walked in, he told me to prepare myself; I’d probably have to practice an injection today.

I was like NO I WILL NOT, and he said that we could turn around right there, nobody was forcing us/me to do this.  But then I told him that was silly and why would we do something like that, because turning around was basically like sentencing ourselves to a lifetime of probably never having children.  Not a fun prospect.

I WILL stab myself.  And I will like it.

We waited in the room for what seemed like hours while the nurse did something.  I have no idea what.  All I know is that when I saw the large refrigerator in the corner, I started getting really worked up.

“Do you think there’s medicine in that?”  I whispered to Joey.

He opened the door and looked inside.  Then he shut it quickly.  “No, of course not,” he said.

I glared at him and looked in the fridge myself: it was full of medicine.  “You lied,” I said.

He didn’t appear to be too remorseful.

Then I noticed a large can of WD-40 on top of the refrigerator.  “WHY do they have WD-40 there?!” I squealed.  “Do you think they have to spray the needles down so they go in easier?!”

Joey looked at the WD-40 for a second, then said, “Of course not.  It’s probably for the refrigerator door.”

“I think you’re lying again,” I mumbled.

Then, fortunately, the nurse came in and for the next hour straight, she slammed us with calendar details, showed us the chart of meds we would be receiving in the mail, and explained the entire process to us.  She also said that I’m going to be feeling pretty much like…um, well, crap come about the first week in December.  All the medicine they’re giving me to stimulate my ovaries (sorry, boys, you don’t HAVE to read this) will make them get all fat and harden up.  This is going to be uncomfortable because I WILL BE ABLE TO ACTUALLY FEEL THEM.  Like with my hands, through my skin and fat and whatever else is supposed to keep me from feeling my ovaries.

That’ll be awesome.

Then the nurse whipped out an injection pen and showed me how the needle was really thin and bendy.  Joey reminded me how I used to do acupuncture all the time, and the nurse jumped all over that one and told us the needle was about the same gague as an acupuncture needle.  I beg to differ, it’s a little thicker, but it’s not by much.

After a few minutes of demonstration, the nurse put everything away and I never had to give myself a practice injection. Not one single time — take that Joey Woestman.

Then they whisked him away to get his blood type just to make sure we don’t have the warring blood types that cause miscarriage.  I was tested after surgery in May and they were able to tell that I didn’t have the antibodies or whatever, but at least now we’ll know for sure.

We talked insurance turkey for awhile with the business manager, and then off we went.

I just realized we forgot to pick up our huge packet of release forms down at the surgery center that we were supposed to get on our way out.  Dagnab.

And, speaking of turkey, we’ll likely be at the clinic on Thanksgiving Day, and the nurse told us they’d probably have food for us.  It really stinks to have to cancel our one Iowa trip this year (unless you count the whirlwind in July) in order to try to get pregnant.  We’re really bummed about it, actually, but if we didn’t do this now we’d have to wait until February.  And that’s just cutting a lot of things too close, and we didn’t think we should add this stress on top of Joey’s last semester, etc, etc, etc.

I just realized this is probably the most boring and poorly written blog post I have ever churned out.

Sorry.

I’m on information overload and suchlike.

Maybe tomorrow or tonight I’ll summon the brainpower to actually tell y’all about the craziness that will be forthcoming during the first week in December…when they float our prospective children through a tube into my uterus while Joey stands there and watches.

Because that?  Is crazy.

 

The Chocolate Frosting November 3, 2009

Filed under: blog posts — jennawoestman @ 08:26
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A couple weeks ago, when I was baking late into the evening, I dropped my cell phone into chocolate frosting.  Of course, it was the speaker part of the phone that got fully enveloped in chocolatey goodness, too.  I spent a fair amount of time trying to clean it out, too.  First I tried to use a washcloth, but that didn’t get down into the speaker part.  So then I glanced around to make sure no one was looking, and I licked it.  (Because for a fleeting second, I thought for some reason that might work better than a washcloth.  I can’t explain my rationale.)  Then I dug around in the speaker crevice with a toothpick.  Finally satisfied that I had done a good job, I got back to my baking.

The next day, I tried to use my phone.

The person I was calling sounded far away, yet also on speaker phone at the same time.  Kind of like he was really, really tiny and stuck in the bottom of a Campbell’s Soup can, trying to yell up to me to GET HIM OUT OF HERE PLEASE.

So I told Joey that I thought my phone was broken.  He told me maybe I should quit dropping it in chocolate frosting (he has a point there, unfortunately).

I tried using my weird phone for the next two days, but by Saturday it was driving me batty.  I went to the Verizon store on Lovers and Douglas, where I fully intended for them to be all um, lady, you dropped your phone in chocolate frosting.  We can’t help idiots like you.  So I took our backup phone, just in case.

We keep backup phones around due to the amount of awful things I have done to my cell phones.  To summarize: I set one on fire, I ran one through the washing machine, and I dropped one in a very deep puddle in the parking lot at NorthPark in a rainstorm; some lady from Plano found it several hours later, and one seems to have gotten thrown out with a chicken carcass.  Now I can add dropping it in chocolate frosting to that illustrious and extensive list.

There I stood, in line with my frosting phone and my backup phone.  The store manager took a look at my broken phone and said “Yep, your speaker is broken.”

I did not volunteer the frosting information.  I saw no point.

After a few minutes, he told me I could either upgrade and extend my contract, or purchase a new phone.  I whipped out the spare and asked him to activate it, which he did for free.  Maybe he could tell the speaker was full of frosting and he felt sorry for me.  Then again, maybe not.

Ten minutes later, I walked out of the Verizon store with a fresh, frosting-free phone.

All this to say: I haven’t gotten used to the new phone’s ringtones yet.  I keep missing calls and texts, and that’s why.  So if I haven’t gotten back to you I don’t hate you, it’s just that I can’t figure out my new phone. And the keypad is really weird for texting, which causes me great sadness.

I have a feeling I will never be entrusted with an iPhone.

 

Side Effects November 2, 2009

Filed under: blog posts, infertility — jennawoestman @ 08:24
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Maybe y’all remember how I was all please don’t make me take that birth control stuff because it will screw my entire body up and I will feel unwell and may even die, did you not read the stats on the back of the package?!

I was doing really good until about 4:00 yesterday.

Well, OK, I was doing pretty good.  I felt an overwhelming sense of malaise all day yesterday.  The kind where I was almost unable to get myself off the couch and get motivated to do my chores, so I begged Joey to force me to exercise.

We decided to walk to NorthPark to shop for the special shirt I am going to buy for the first day I have to give myself a shot.  We did not find said shirt, but we did walk about 3 miles.  And we forgot to bring water.  So by the time we returned home, I was really, really exhausted.  In fact, I told Joey I may even be dead.

He assured me that I was not.

Half an hour later, The Headache came upon me with full force.  I took two tylenol, being the good IVF patient that I am, and lay on the couch with my lappy to begin writing my novel for NaNoWriMo.  1,671 words later, the headache hadn’t even budged.

So we went to small group anyway, and I sat on the Paul and Kendall’s couch like a bump on a log and let everyone else participate.  Whenever I contributed something, it wound up being something that we had talked about like 2 minutes earlier in the conversation, and it made no sense.  I finally just shut up.

Once we got home, I challenged myself to finish all my chores in less than 45 minutes.  I was surprisingly successful and Joey rewarded me by trying to work some of the tension out of my shoulders while we watched an episode of HOGAN’S HEROES.  (Gosh I love that show.  Just go ahead and laugh at me.)

The headache did not lessen.

It got more worser.

So I went to bed immediately and fell asleep about 9:45.  At 10:15, I woke up abruptly, pretty darn sure that I may upchuck.

I hate that.  I hate it.  And I am bound and determined to not have any of that upchucking business until I am actually pregnant.  None of this bonus stuff.  NONE.

So I rustled around in the medicine drawer and got out the handy bottle of Gaviscon Pops bought for me like two years ago when he was down visiting and I had a stomach ache.  (Pops is always up on the newest and best stomach healers.)  I chewed my Gaviscon and lay very still, just like I had for the 6th – 12th years of my life when I was lactose intolerant but we didn’t know it. (I took 2 tablespoons of Maalox every night just to tame the stomach aches enough fall asleep.)

I fell asleep.

Then I woke up at 2:45.

It’s never a good sign when Jenna wakes up in the middle of the night.

My head was pounding, my stomach was yelling I HATE YOU VERY MUCH JENNA MARIE WOESTMAN. So I took my book and went to the bathroom, where I could read for awhile.  Just in case.

I had fleeting thoughts of do I really, really, really want children?  Is this going to be worth it? The answer is YES.  (Someone remind me that I am not allowed to ask that question at 3 a.m. while experiencing major side effect nausea.)

By 3:15, I forced myself to go back to bed, fairly sure I was going to lose the battle with my stomach.

I never did upchuck (I know, you’re all just loving this post; but get used to it…I have a feeling these next few weeks will be NO PICNIC) but when I woke up at 6:00, my head was still throbbing.

I told Joey I could not get up.  No way.

But then I realized that once I start shots and other meds, the side effects will only get worse and these will seem like a walk in the park.  So I forced myself to look out the window and notice what a beautiful morning it was, and that propelled me out of bed.

And, when I walked down the stairs this morning and took a deep breath of the fresh air, I felt like it was worth it to get up.  Worth it to keep going.  Even when I feel like this.

Ugggh, I feel like I’m going to need some serious reminders in about three weeks.

 

Suave, Jenna. Very suave. October 30, 2009

Filed under: blog posts — jennawoestman @ 12:29
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Maybe if Mom had let me be in ballet growing up.  Maybe if I was slightly more coordinated.  Maybe if I paid a little more attention.  Maybe if I didn’t wear wooden-soled 4-inch heels.

This morning’s been a little rainy.  Joey and I were running late because we slept in a bit; he’s been feeling sniffly and pathetic for two days.  (Me making him upchuck his vitamins did not help.)  Jeeves went off at 6:30 instead of 6:00, and I picked out a very fallish outfit, complete with brown stockings and my brown suede heels.

I hadn’t worn them in about a year.

I remembered why as we were walking down the steps, the brown suede heels are wooden-soled and make a ton of noise.  It’s embarrassing.

The rain was really coming down as we drove in, and Joey pulled me up right by the front door, a very sweet effort to preserve my hair which I appreciated quite a bit.  I gave him a butterfly kiss (Joey prefers to avoid lipstick shimmers, please and thank you) and darted inside.

The fact I should walk slowly because it was rainy and my wooden-soled shoes were wet on the highly polished marble floor did not cross my mind.

UNTIL.

UNTIL I began to slide, kind of comically like in a cartoon.  First my right leg went out from under me, but I quickly adjusted with my left.  But that adjustment caused my left leg to shoot out in front of me, and I felt like I was in cheerleading all over again.  I went down fast, kind of in an awkward splits motion, but somehow slamming my knees into that highly polished marble as I went.

And to ice the cake, my elbows buckled from under me and I face-planted, smearing lipstick shimmers into the already-shiny marble.

Oh, did I mention I’m wearing a skirt?  I AM.  We are not even going there, because you will all have to poke your eyes out if we do.

Quick as a wink, I darted up off the floor and noticed that yes, people had seen me do that.  People that I know. They were all ARE YOU OK?! and talked to me the entire way up the elevator, mostly because I could tell they felt sorry for me.

But nothing was hurt except my pride.  That was definitely bruised.

And thus I say to you: Happy Friday.  May you keep yourself upright today and behave with more decorum than I seem to be able to pull off.

 

The Pill October 30, 2009

Filed under: blog posts, infertility — jennawoestman @ 08:37
Tags: , , ,

So, I took it last night.  I didn’t hyperventilate, I didn’t cry, nor did I throw it against the mirror.  I just popped it out of the blister pack, stuck it in my mouth, took a deep breath and swallowed.

Then I waited for about five minutes.

Everything seemed normal, I hadn’t personally imploded or anything, so I found Joey and told him that I thought maybe I’d be OK.

He was asleep.

So I fell asleep and dreamed really weird dreams, which I blame on the medicine.  Unfortunately I can’t remember any of them any more.

But this morning, I feel pretty good.  I don’t think I’m prone to tear anyone’s head off, nor did I gain 25 lbs while I slept, and I haven’t had any fits of crying.  Maybe birth control won’t kill me after all.  (Although statistically, 7 women out of 100,000 perish from it every year.)

I did wake up with the song Arise and Be Comforted in my head, though.  I really like it right now; it somehow encourages me and reminds me that YES…Jesus loves me; even when I look at my Bible and can’t for the life of me remember where it tells me so.

I looked for it on YouTube and I could only find it being performed by some weirdos I’ve never heard of and who, frankly, aren’t any good. So the lyrics are all y’all are going to get.  Gosh, it’s just not the same without music, though.  (If I could sing like the Chrisy Nockels, I’d never even bother with talking.  I’d just sing everything instead.)

Arise & Be Comforted (by Watermark)

Arise and be comforted
For the Lord, He is good to the weary;
And even the young heart can tire and fall
But He knows them all.
For the Lord, He will renew their strength
And they will soar on wings as eagles,
And they will run and never grow weary
They will walk and not grow faint.
For the Lord, He is good,
Lift your eyes to the heavens
For the creator is living in you;
Come surrender as you are.

And know that you’ll never stray too far
Let His power within you heal your heart.
Lift your eyes to spacious skies
Let Him chart your way to flight
Spread your wings and fly…
For the Lord, He is good.