sittin’ around, nothin’ to do

this time last year, part 2

and then, a year ago today, i blogged this:

things we throw in the trash

mindfulness meditation only works when you remember to use it. to pause whenever you feel your body’s systems start to rev up and remember to really think about what’s going on, to breathe deeply, and to face what is happening with an open mind.

 i have been trying these last few days, i really have. i was disappointed at the negative test but relieved to start cramping. i was pleased at the idea of an endometrial lining that had never seen 2007. but underneath all that, i kept hoping, as many of us do despite ourselves, that the test was wrong. so i wasn’t really calm, or mindful. i had hopes. i had hopes that felt close to expectations. and we all know how bad that can be.

two days after stopping prometrium, when i still hadn’t started bleeding, i started doing a wee bit of research about progesterone withdrawal bleeds. my memory (never that great to start with) was that it took at least a day and maybe three, but not really any more that that. dr. google neither confirmed nor denied, but i read enough to know that i could be expected to wait 7-10 days before really worrying (whatever “really worrying” actually means). so i was ready to wait. and to calm the hell down revisit my mindfulness.

s asked about the cramps, which had stopped, and about any spotting, which i would have normally expected but which hadn’t started. he asked whether i should test again. i reminded him that dr h (the doc who brought us m) usually asked me to wait 5 days between tests. s thought maybe three days was a good window. i was happy to hear somebody besides me say that; i always feel such a fool when i keep testing and the results are the same.

i was prepared for it to be negative. so when, bleary-eyed and half-awake i peered at the stick and saw what i thought was a shadow of a first line, my heart leapt. and then the strong second line came. and then i couldn’t see the shadow of the first line. i turned the stick to catch different light and screwed my eyes up real tight but nope: no first line.

i tossed the stick in the trash and went back to bed.

a few hours later s asked whether i’d tested. yes, i told him. it was still negative. ok, he said. and he left to buy coffee.

i got up and grabbed m and the dogs to go for a walk. on my way downstairs i saw the pee stick, half-sticking out of the bathroom garbage. i always feel self-conscious about those damn things sitting around — what if my mil drops by?! – so i grabbed it, lifted the trash lid to re-deposit it, and gave it a closer look.

two lines.

it’s hard not to worry that the first line is too faint. that it appeared later than the 3-minute window (which i DEFINITELY did not wait for) as the result of some chemical reaction that has nothing to do with my body’s production of hgc. that i quit taking progesterone for three days and so have doomed the pregnancy. or that some piece of 2007 is still lurking in my body and is out to get to me.

but still: two lines.

happy day!

this time last year, part 1

late december 2007,  in another life, i blogged this:

male cuteness syndrome (māl kyoot’-nĕs sin’-drōm). noun. 1. collection of behaviors exhibited by the male species that are both unanticipated and endearing. 2. an apparently unavoidable display of eagerness and hopefulness shown by grieving and also possibly expectant fathers.

every morning s rolls over in bed and asks me if i can pee on a stick today. sure, i tell him. i can pee on a stick every day. but today (just like yesterday and just like tomorrow) that stick won’t tell me anything except that my pee is yellow.

now, he knows as well as i do when it will be reasonable for me to start peeing on sticks. he knows what day it is in my cycle and he knows the earliest that stick-peeing will actually maybe provide useful information. and he knows that it’s probably best for us to wait a few days beyond that as-soon-as-possible date, for sanity’s sake.

but he still has to ask.

he also knows as well as i do that it’s too early for me to have symptoms one way or the other. too early for sore breasts, too early for nausea, too early for bloating. too early to gag on my toothbrush, or to scream at him that the cumin he just threw into our dinner SMELLS LIKE B.O. and will he PLEASE GET IT OUT OF THE HOUSE NOW. and we both know that when that all starts we will both be MISERABLE and will be counting the months/weeks/days/hours/minutes until it STOPS. but he still has to ask.

it’s so adorable that it takes every last ounce of self-control for me not to squeeze the stuffin’ out of him.

and yet…it also makes me so sad, because when it is finally time to pee on a stick i may be the one who has to give him the bad news.

i finally told him this yesterday — that it’s getting hard for me to know his excitement is building and to have him ask me if i have a gut feeling about this cycle (i don’t) or if i feel pregnant (i don’t) or if i think “we have a little zygote swimming around in there” (i’m willing to believe that we could) — because when it turns out that i’m not pregnant i’ll have to burst his bubble.

i told him all this and he put his arms around me. “honey, that won’t be bad news. it just means that we get to have sex again next month.”

i’d forgotten that when i’m puking and yelling and crying while being bloated and constipated and really really sore that i don’t like to be touched. but apparently he didn’t forget all that, and even so, he’s hoping for it.

see? mcs.