What is helpful? What is not helpful?

The following is a list of typical scenarios that one might encounter within the inner sanctum of the IVP.  I am curious about what you guys find helpful (or not helpful) for any of these situations.

What do you want to hear when:

1. You get your period at the end of a trying cycle
2. You are going in for an IUI, IVF, ART
3. You get crap blood work
4. You get crap follicle reports
5. You announce that you are ovulating
6. You announce that you are feeling symptoms
7. You announce that your sister, cousin, neighbor, co-worker, nemesis is knocked up
8. You realize you can’t afford another cycle for a while
9. You realize that you might have some super serious IF issues
10. You are having a tough pregnancy
11. You are freaking out over pregnancy exams, US, blood-work
12.  You miscarry, have a dead baby, chemical pregnancy
13. Your kids are driving you nuts
14. Your kids are sick

If you have been through any of the above what did you want to hear?  What was helpful, what was shitty? Obviously “sorry” would cover a lot of bases, but sometimes I know a lot of us want to say MORE.

For example, the recent inclusion of “it sucks donkey balls” within the IVP vernacular has been especially helpful for me to hear.  It conveys a good level of suckitude acknowledgement and it also manages to lighten the mood a little.

Sometimes, when we are in the thick of shit, we need more.  So I want to know, when you were in the trenches, did someone say something that was especially wonderful that helped you through.

Please share.

Finish this thought:

A good friend calls you up and says that she wants to have a baby. She knows that you have been through hell and back working towards the same goal. She asks you for advice, words of wisdom, pearls of brilliance.

You take a breath. You push away the part of you that knows you will hate this woman if she dares get knocked up before you. And you say: _____________________.

Then you get off the phone as quickly as you can.

An hour passes. Your head is filled with things that you wish you had said.

Please share those thoughts with the class.

Sometimes we all get a little crazy.

In cleaning up for an out of town guest this weekend I did some light dusting of my bookshelves. As I ran my white-gloved (heh) finger over the books I noticed that most of my non-fiction selection is comprised of books telling me the secrets to getting knocked up. I have at least a dozen books. Through the aid and endorsement of these books I have done some crazy things.

I have given up coffee, gone back on coffee, given up meat, given up dairy, taken up eating ice cream, given up orgasms, gone back to orgasms, given up exercise, taken up power walking, consumed 345 raw pineapples, sipped 450 thousand cups of green tea, prayed to God, cursed at God, considered that there may not be a God, went to church, stopped going to church, read books, wanted to burn books, took my temperature, tossed my thermometer, gazed at my female bits, shared my female bits with 620 thousand RE’s and RE’s in training, gained weight, gained follicles, lost follicles, politicized my ovaries, hated my ovaries, lit candles, built a shrine, tried to call forth spirits, dreamed about babies, dreamed about dead relatives, and I have developed a freakish attachment to on-line astrology sites.

Trying to get knocked up can make you crazy.

What crazy things have you done in the name of procreation?

Stupid things should be left unsaid.

Relax!

Go on a vacation!

Adopt!

We’ve all heard them, those stupid as fuck, lame ass things that people outside of the IVP say to us to “help” us along. Usually these things are said without a prompt…just your basic unconditional love thrust.

So let’s hear ‘em. What are all of the stupid things people have said to you on your ttc journey. And what do you wish you had said in reply?

Here is an old post of some of the things I have gotten.

Popping the insem cherry.

My very first insem…seems like it was two hundred years ago. It was, however, two long years ago. I recently pulled out the journal that I had started at the very beginning of this process to become a Mother. I was all moon-eyed and hopeful back then. I wrote most of the entries as if they would be gifted to my future offspring. Once I reached my 7th IUI the rose colored glasses came off and I stopped writing in the journal and unleashed all of my “creative energy” into my writing in my blog.

But I kind of miss that hopeful gal: the woman that planned what she would wear the night before her insems and found meaning in every single song that played on the radio on the way to the clinic.

In the comments section please share your own 1st insem story. Or, if you have a blog, feel free to post a link to where you write about it. Other topics such as picking a donor, cycles on clomid, the 1st failed cycle, having an HSG exam will be discussed soon.

_____________________________________________

April 30, 2005

I’m in the lobby of the clinic. Any moment now I will get called back. I am trying to be calm & positive. I just can’t articulate how excited I am that today could be the very beginning of you!

It’s a Saturday and the clinic is quiet and empty. It feels like I am going to school on a weekend: familiar, but weird. There were two other women in the lobby when I first got here. My turn should be next. Your Grandmother is with me and she keeps rubbing and scratching my back. I am SO nervous.

IT’S DONE!

The procedure (it sounds so clinical to call it that, we will have to come up with another name) was just like having a medical exam. I rested on crisp, white paper on an exam table. A pink, cotton sheet covered my legs and Dr. D____ shined a light so she could see what she was doing. Before she began she showed me a tube of sperm. I had to sign my name to verify that it was the one I picked for you. Dr. D____ let me hold the tube in my hands to warm it. I wanted to speak to the little sperm inside the tube,wish them a safe and successful journey.

Dr. D_____ collected the tube back from me and drew up the contents into a syringe. She connected the syringe to a thin, long straw. She then threaded the straw inside of me and when she reached the right spot she pushed the syringe plunger and released the sperm inside of me.

I could feel my cheeks flush with excitement. How marvelous that you are being made right now!

______________________________________

So how about you. What was your first insem like?