Of cups of tea, and cabbages, and kings

I haven't been around much over here recently because I haven't felt like I've had anything much to say.

As I predicted, we decided we'd put the IVF stuff on hold for a few months at least - I think we're going to reconsider our decision around the time we get back from Japan, around mid-November.

We should have a better idea of when our land will title, and when the building of our house will start - we've signed all the contracts and we're just waiting on final mortgage approval from the bank. We'll be building in Williams Landing, and we've picked a nice two storey house - well, I say that now. We'll see what I think when it comes time to move in.

So that's where all my emotional energy has been going lately. I even stopped focusing on the weight loss thing and the exercise thing, with, of course, the expected result - I've gained back four kilos from my all time lowest weight.

Over the past few weeks I've been really focusing on getting back to the gym and eating properly, and I've lost about 2.5 of that... so a little more focus and attention to go and hopefully I will be back in the habit.

I am playing a weekly game of netball, and trying to keep myself occupied with other thoughts while it feels like everyone around me is getting pregnant - sometimes it's more than I can take, especially when I've got my period and I feel like a failure for another month.

But, you know, I have these little guys, and One, and so I do my best to stay positive.

Arming myself

This morning I got up late. I didn't have to be up early; I didn't have to go to work. 


I put on my wedding ring and my engagement ring (I don't usually wear them; they're a lot looser since I've lost 20 kg and I'm afraid that one day, while I'm changing my gloves in the lab, they'll flick off and I'll lose them and that will be that). I put on my calf length black boots under my jeans (I usually run around in sneakers, forget heels!). I added a smart stripy jumper and my thick black Gap coat (no t-shirts and hoodies today!). Then I pinned on my favourite red wooden bird brooch and added a pair of small silver earrings, made by a jewellery student who is friends with my sister-in-law.


I took a deep breath and ran for the tram to meet One at his work by 9:30.


Compared to what I'd been dreading in the lead-up to the appointments today ("YOU ARE NOT SUITABLE PARENTS," in the counselling appointment, "THIS WILL COST ELEVENTY-BILLION DOLLARS" in the accounts appointment, and "YOU MUST HAVE FIVE PAINFUL INJECTIONS PER DAY AND LOSE ANOTHER 20 KILOS BEFORE WE WILL EVEN MAYBE CONSIDER YOU," in the nursing appointment), it was actually a breeze.


It will be a little more expensive than One was expecting (me? Well, it was an awful lot less than eleventy billion dollars, so I'm good!), I gave myself a practice needlestick in the belly in the nursing appointment (and you know what? It didn't hurt at all - says hypocrite me, with five tattoos and seven piercings), and the counsellor was a little amazed that we had done so much research and were so prepared - especially that we were so prepared for the actual, real statistics. Huh.


Then One and I went out into the sunshine and birds sang and there was a rainbow and all was right with the - okay, okay. We went out into the grey, cold Melbourne morning, and caught a tram back to the city. He bought me lunch - a baguette with roast beef and mustard - and we sat in the watery winter sunshine on the steps in Fed Square.


He went back to work; I had a coffee and a slice of ricotta and sultana cheesecake at Brunetti's. 


Now I'm at home, feeling more at peace and relaxed than I have in a long while.


PS. I told my boss that One and I were trying IUI (so that I could have today off), and he laughed. He is ridiculously excited for me - he kept telling me how wonderful he thinks it is and how happy he is, and what good parents we will make. It was honestly a little surreal, as I was imagining that he was not actually going to be all that pleased and possibly have a little emergency buzzer labeled with "MATERNITY LEAVE" that he might hit...

The prodigal returns

Blogging has been the last thing on my mind in the past few weeks, but I think I need to spill all the crazy in my head out so that at least  I might be able to get some sleep tonight. (I worry. That's my problem. The things I am worrying about now are things that I have been worrying about for the last five years, because not only do I worry about the problems I face right. now., I also worry about the problems that I might face five years in the future. Because why worry about one or two things when you can worry about everything, right?).

So.

One and I are looking for a house to buy. Awesome, right? Well, yes, except for a few things. We'd like to stay in the western/northern suburbs of Melbourne. I don't want to move to Taylor's Lakes. One does. His argument has merit, I admit - we can get the space we're looking for out there, if not the lifestyle.

I want to stay in the line of suburbs we're living in at the moment - kind of a line from Airport West down to Newport-ish. Except our budget in this area will stretch to an unrenovated 3 x 1, or a renovated 2 x1. One is not interested in renovating (majorly), and while I would be keen, I have to grudgingly admit that I have absolutely no talents in that area at all. Except maybe in the knocking down before rebuilding step. 

After a frustrating day last Saturday of frantically driving between home opens in Taylor's Lakes, Footscray, Coburg North and Airport West, which topped off a ridiculous six months of pre-buying internet searching, I reluctantly came to the conclusion that One was right, we are not going to be able to afford the space to raise out family the way we'd like to (that is, if we manage to ever have a family - more later) with our current budget in the area we'd like to live in.

I thought I was defeated and I was going to have to move to Taylor's Lakes or - shudder - Doreen - when One came home and said one of the guys he worked with had recently built a home in Point Cook, but has wished he could afford to build in Williams Landing as there was a train station going in there at the moment to be completed by the end of the year.

Huh. One  of our (major, deal-breaking) requirements is that our house be close to reliable (well, as reliable as it gets in Melbourne anyway) public transport. 

We started investigating, and trying to work out if the loan we have pre-approval for will cover building... apparently yes, yes it will.

Without having seen the estate and having been quoted the price of one block over the phone, and doing some hasty internet research, we are pretty sure that building a place will fall into our budget (just). And it's the just that's the sticking point.

We're just not sure that we'll be able to afford IVF, an interest-only loan on our block, and gradually, our house, and rent until we can move into our house - which could be longer than a year.

Oh, and our trip to Japan. Er. I might have forgotten to mention that. Long story short, amazing Jetstar sale, cheap flights, we've both always wanted to go and never been, figured that before kids+house it might be nice, and before we knew it, holiday was booked. One still has to organise his passport. I should remember to nag gently remind him about that later. We're leaving towards the end  of October, and spending just over three weeks in Japan (I am super excited. I have a special Japan song I sing to One sometimes when I remember we're actually going).

I think we've come to a bit of a decision, though.

We have our initial IVF appointments on Friday, and then on Saturday we're going to drive to Williams Landing and see if we can get some hard and fast numbers to do some calculations with.

But. At the moment, it's looking like we might buy a block in the next release (around November-ish), which should mean our block is available to build on by January, the house is done by June and we can move in. Theoretically. We could buy a block now and start building in a month, but then they'd be building while we're on holiday, and because both One and I are control freaks want our first house to be perfect, we're not entirely comfortable with that.

Having said that, to make it easier for us (and because that means we're probably stuck with housemates for another year), we're more than likely going to postpone IVF until the end of the year or the start of the new year. We'll make a final decision after Friday, but this is (unfortunately) probably the most sensible decision.

I have a little time to lose some more weight, we can (hopefully) get a house sorted out, and - don't get me wrong, we're not going to stop trying naturally, we're just not going to help things along with IVF either. 

I hate this decision and myself with my heart, but my head is resigned. This is why I can't have nice things; I am way too logical. And also panicky.

Run run, as fast as you can

Today One and I had an appointment with the gyno. She told us that there was no point in continuing to try to conceive naturally; we have a 3 - 5% chance every cycle  of getting pregnant naturally. 


Onward to IUI it is then. IUI, for those of you playing along at home, stands for Intra-Uterine Insemination. They will take some of One's sperm (which he will prepare earlier), spin it down, wash it and extract the "normal" (as far as anything of his is normal) percentage, and insert it into my uterus, through my cervix, at the appropriate time of month.


I thought that we'd be able to try an unstimulated IUI cycle (that is, one without the use of drugs to ensure I ovulate), given that I was told last time that I was ovulating and everything was A-OK with me, but apparently not - the referral to the IVF clinic that the gyno gave us indicated that I was to be put on drugs - not Clomid, I didn't recognise the name - to make sure I"m ovulating. 


She didn't say why.


I also got in trouble because I hadn't lost any weight since the last time I saw her. I saw her a month ago - not even, it was the last week of March, so three and a bit weeks ish. I've been stuck at my current weight since a little before then, but in total, since May 4th last year, I have lost 18 kilograms. I think that's a pretty fair effort - and I've managed to keep it off. It made me a little grumpy, as he implication was that I was just going to give up and sit around and put all the weight back on deliberately. Excuse me? I haven't gone to all this effort for nothing, you know! 


So we headed down to the IVF clinic and made the initial three appointments we need - the clinical appointment, the accounts appointment and the counselling appointment. We have to pay a $265 administration fee up front, of which we will get nothing back, and also get both police and Department of Family and Children's Services checks to make sure neither of us have ever done anything bad to kids. 


Then we can venture onto the rollercoaster.


(IUI will boost our chances from 3-5% to 18-20% per cycle. The gyno said if I'm not pregnant after 2 to 3 IUI attempts, we will probably need to move on to IVF. This is not something I am thrilled about).

Sure, I swear

One and I threw a surprise party for a friend last night. It was amazing - he suspected nothing. He didn't realise we'd manage to wrangle his family there, and the look on his face when he realised we'd gone to all of this effort for him was the best thing ever.

I baked him a rainbow cake as his birthday cake, and took the remnants to work today, to make sure that One and I didn't eat all the leftovers ourselves. Of course my workmates fell on it like a flock of starving gannets - although we have the annual Anzac Day Anzac biscuit bakeoff next Thursday, so I may not be the undisputed queen of baking for very long after that competition (Is it strange that I'm a bit scared of competing, given how competitive I am? I guess it comes back to my old fear of failing...).

--

I've started playing netball again, one night a week in a mixed social competition. I'm playing on a team with the same friend we had the surprise party for. There's no pretty way t o say it - our team is abysmal. We lost our latest game with a score of 45 to 2. Yes. 2. I fluked one  of our 2 goals - there was a reason that I was always stuck in defence in high school and it wasn't just because I was one of the taller girls on the team.

But. I am having fun, and definitely, definitely working out, and that's what it's all about, right?

I'm just not looking forward to the 9:40pm games, because usually I'm thinking about toddling off to bed right around then. 

--

I had a phone call yesterday from the gyno's office. One's tests came back with exactly the same results as last time. 

We have an appointment on Monday to discuss our options and what we actually want to do now. We have to check exactly what our health insurance covers and doesn't - I don't really want any nasty surprises in relation to costs, especially when we're saving for a house as well. 

I just - I'm finding it hard today. One of my workmates told me that she needed to leave early because she had to go for her 12 week scan - "oh yes, I forgot to tell you, I'm pregnant" - oh, she didn't want to tell me earlier (when she told my boss and the other girl who works in our section) because she was worried about how I'd react.

I'm a pretty open person, I think, and so I've been honest at work about what One and I are going through (partly, I admit, for selfish reasons, because I get sick of the "oh, why haven't you had kids yet? You'd both make such great parents!" and telling people the truth is a great way to get them to stop and think about what they're saying), but I was, I suppose, disappointed that I'd made her think that she couldn't tell me such beautiful news. 

Yes, I'm upset, because I can't help but wonder what if would feel like, I can't help trying to put myself in that position, but I am able to put that aside and be present for her, share in her excitement - but it was killed a little for me today when I realised she'd made the decision of how I was supposed to feel for me. 

Baking funtimes

I love to bake. If you know nothing else about me (I bite my nails, I have a degree in botany, I listen to ridiculous music), please know that I love to bake. I like cooking too, but my true love is baking.


The problem is, now that I'm trying not to eat all the things ever and actually, you know, not eat so many carbs and possibly drop some weight, I cannot bake all the time.


(Exhibit A: There is nothing I would love more this Easter weekend than to spend the whole four days baking. Oh my goodness. I bought a new piping nozzle set and some gel food colours off www.bakingpleasures.com.au last week, and I secretly want nothing more than to spend the entire weekend trying them out. But I cannot, because there is no one who will take the baked goods off my hands afterwards).


So here is a recipe. A recipe, that every time I make it when we have One's mates over,  there is never any left.


Jam Roly-poly


Preheat the oven to 180C.


Then, make a scone dough. You will need:


500g plain flour
4 teaspoons cream of tartar
2 teaspoons bicarbonate of soda
pinch of salt


Sift into a mixing bowl.


75g cold butter, cubed.


Rub butter into flour mixture with your fingertips until it resembles wet sand.


300ml milk.


Pour in, mix together with wooden spoon until a dough begins to form. Tip out of bowl onto a lightly floured surface, knead.


Roll out to ~1cm thickness in an approximate rectangle. Spread liberally with whatever type of jam takes your fancy (I have used cherry, with canned cherries and slivered almonds sprinkled generously on top, or peach, with walnuts and choc chips - but feel free to try out whatever combinations you like!), and add nuts or sultanas or fruit - I think grated apple and sultanas and a marmalade might be a really nice combination?


Roll up, just like a swiss roll, place in a baking pan, and pour over a quick caramel sauce - oops, sorry, forgot that bit. Melt a knob of butter in a saucepan, add a couple of tablespoons of brown sugar and let simmer until butter and sugar dissolve. Dilute by about half with warm water, stir in until you get a sauce, then pour over the roly-poly in the baking dish. (No exact quantities for that bit, sorry, I usually do it by eye).


Bake for 35-40 minutes at 180C, serve warm with custard or ice cream or on it's own.

Muffled voices

I have been procrastinating a while on posting. I'm not sure why, it's not like things go away if you just ignore them. 


I did that a lot growing up as a kid, pretended the uncomfortable things, the lying in bed with hot wet eyes, wishing I was dead, the lack of any friends and the bruises on my legs from the boys in my class just didn't exist. I don't tend to be real good at dealing with confrontation, you see.


So. The gyno told me that I was perfectly normal, I was ovulating as expected and she was really impressed by my weight loss (18 kilos to date, wooo - aiming for a total of 20 in the year since I started this diet-and-exercise thing). Just as I was getting ready to be told that we should go forth and procreate, she mentioned that there had been some irregularities in One's semen analysis and she'd like to repeat the test.


Apparently he has good total sperm numbers, but not very many normal sperm. Where a "normal" (for a given definition of normal, a couple with no fertility problems) have a 20% chance per cycle to conceive, with One's current "normal" sperm numbers being what they are, we have a 3 - 5% chance.


He's repeating the test in the next few weeks.


 I did have to stifle a few giggles over the list she ran through - "Does he smoke?"


"No."


"Drink?"


"Not frequently. Maybe - a beer or two a week and an occasional glass of wine?" (You would think for someone who loves to homebrew as much as he does, he'd drink more beer, but anyway).


"Uh - you should make him start wearing boxers."


"He already does. Plus, he's lost about ten kilos recently too."


"Well, that's definitely good. Does he take hot showers or baths?"


"Actually, no. He hates the heat - that was part of the reason we moved here from Perth."


We didn't end up reaching any successful conclusions. We'll see what the results indicate from the next tests, and then I guess we'll decide what to do from there. She did say we could leave it to chance, but as a scientist, I am not so fond of that idea. I know that 95% is generally considered a pretty statistically significant number, and, well, that's the chance of NOT getting pregnant every month that we have...


That means that the first thing we get to try is IUI. I - am not actually sure about this. I was all ready to deal with using ART if it was because I was infertile somehow. I was expecting a little more time to get used to it, I guess - kind of a "okay, well, we'll put you on Clomid and see if that helps and then we can start looking at other options," kind of thing. Instead,  it feels a little like we're leaping into this, and because I am a planner and a worrier (and am already worrying about ridiculous things, like what if our baby is bullied at primary school? Will I know? Will I handle it better for them than my parents did?), I can't help but fret about it. 


I suppose I also feel a little resentful. It was supposed to be my fault that we couldn't have children, and now apparently it's not. Mentally, I'm not prepared to cope with this. I was all ready for it to be my fault, and I'd researched the most likely pathways we'd take to try and fix it, and I was all prepared for that journey - and now we're embarking on something that is superficially the same journey but is in reality completely different. If that makes any sense at all. Sometimes I feel like I'm just babbling on randomly.


--


In other news. To change the subject. One and I realised on Monday that we have exactly the same amount of weight - 23 kilos -  to lose to reach our goal weights, so we decided to challenge each other. The person who reaches their goal weight first (we're not setting a time limit on this, we'd rather be  healthy about losing the weight; all bets are off if I get pregnant before either one of us reaches our goal weight) will take the other person away on an all-expenses paid, surprise long weekend! 


It seemed like a great idea and then I realised that we have joint finances anyway... Regardless, I am determined to win - given, I have a slight advantage for the next four weeks or so as One has stuffed his knee and has been advised not to do any cardio or weight bearing exercise, so he can swim and do some upper body weight work, but that's it.


I may or may not be slightly competitive.


And then my sister moved out last weekend. I've lived with her for most of my life - I think in total, we've lived together for 23 years? It was time, although I was hoping we could put it off for another six months or so, but I think she's made the right decision (but I am still horribly jealous of the friend she's moved in with and I miss her like crazy).