More on becoming a Mother

I read one time someone describe going through fertility treatments being similar to being on crack and in a very real way, it is. It's that "one more time, just one more time and then I'll quit" syndrome. You start out saying, "Ok, I'm just taking a few pills to help nature along" and in the end you are shooting yourself up with hormones twice a day. You draw lines in the sand and then erase them or jump over them, all in a quest for a baby.

One regret I have....you see the media talking all the time about celebrities having children in their 40's...this one was 42, that one was 44 and you think it's normal and easy to have a baby well into your 40's. The truth is, that your fertility declines at 30 and that at 35, it has sharply declined and by the time you are 40, the chances of giving birth to a healthy baby has declined to 5%. Not great odds. I really wish I had known those odds when I was 34 and we were working on the house....but whatever.

So, we knew that Ralph had an issue . What I didn't know was that I was the one who would "pay" for that. See, if you increase the number of eggs each cycle, you increase your odds of getting pregnant. And that means that the woman has to take fertility drugs. So we started with clomid aka "the devils drug" because of the side effects. It makes you cry at the drop of a hat over nothing, gives you wicked hot flashes and basically turned me into a witch. Then it becomes all about timing. Time the ovulation, try to get pregnant. We went through 12 cycles of clomid, because I didn't want to move onto the "big guns", the injectables. Each cycle is a little death. You take drugs, you have ultrasounds to monitor your progress in your ovaries, you inseminate and you wait. And when you find out that it didn't work, you cry, you are heartbroken. Each cycle is not cheap, either, because insurance doesn't cover fertility treatments, so we were spending about a thousand dollars a cycle.

Finally we had to make a decision, give up or move on. I always said I wasn't going to do the injectables but when push came to shove, I shoved and we moved on to the big guns.

Now, the cycles cost more, too. The meds themselves cost a couple thousand dollars a cycle and you have more blood tests and ultrasounds monitoring your progress. Emotionally, it's very trying, too. I remember the first time, sitting in the kitchen, trying to inject myself. I would get very close and then I just couldn't do it. I think the first shot, it took about half an hour for me to build up my courage. Of course, in the end, I was a pro. After you give yourself an injection twice a day for however many days time and time again, well, it becomes easy, second nature.

I had to change my work schedule, so that I could go in, in the early morning for blood tests and ultrasounds. I started looking like a junkie, too. I have hard veins to draw from and sometimes it would take 3 pokes for the phlebotomist to get the vein. Three pokes and I'm getting blood drawn every day as we get close to ovulation and you can imagine what my arms looked like.

I was emotional as hell. Your emotions take a pounding....hope, wishes, dreams, dreams shattered, hope squashed, fear, failure, all wrapped up in a month and then, you have to do it again.

I was ready to stop, I'd had enough. Let's adopt. No, Ralph didn't want to adopt. God, so now I faced a decision....go on childless or go back to treatment. I hated treatment. I hated what it did to me physically and mentally. It was draining our bank account. It was harrowing emotionally. But, I couldn't imagine not being a mom. I wanted to be a mom so badly.

So, after a few months, we started the treatment up again. I did 2 more cycles, both a bust. I had all the meds for the 3rd cycle, it was the day that I should start the shots and I sat in the kitchen with the syringe and the medication and I couldn't, I just couldn't. I broke down, I sobbed, I was defeated. I just couldn't do it one more time. I just couldn't. And so ended our fertility treatments....me on the kitchen floor sobbing.

How I came to be a mother...the long version

So thinking back yesterday about Mother's Day and Marielle's birthday, which is fast approaching, I thought I'd just write a bit about how I came to be a mother...

I didn't get married until I was 33. I had a fine time being single and saw no need to "settle down". But then I met Ralph and we were friends for quite a while and eventually it turned into romance and we got married.

We wanted to buy a house (no easy feat in California) before we even thought about having a child. We did buy a house.... a total piece of crap (known as a "fixer upper). To give you an idea of just how crappy it was, the day we took over the property, the granddaughter, who handed over the keys said to me, "I meant to have the carpets cleaned but didn't get around to it. I know it smells in here. Grandpa's ostomy bag often leaked and it was just too much trouble sometimes to clean it up". I took one look at Ralph and later said, "I don't care if we live off of concrete, those rugs are coming up before we move in".

As it was, we planned to renovate the bathroom, which was full of dry rot, before we moved in, so we had a dumpster coming the next day. Well, we wound up filling that dumpster with the rugs in the house and the crap they left behind and not even touching the bathroom. Everything you could imagine was left behind in the house....from old rusty BBQ's filled with coals and ash, to rotted outdoor furniture, with all kinds of bugs living in the cushions, old furniture, tons of old wine bottles, saved for God knows what....just tons o' crap.

We had 30 days rental remaining on the house we were living in and in those 30 days we got the bathroom remodeled (barely) and the hardwood floor down in the bedroom and part of the living room. The rest of the flooring was bare concrete the day we moved in. We both worked full time in those 30 days and I spent my evenings patching, sanding and painting every wall in the house. Ralph ripped out the bathroom, down to the studs and took out a linen closet and enlarged the bathroom.

The day of the move, we still didn't have the toilet installed and Ralph's answer to that was to go 2 blocks down and use the gas station, which didn't fly with me at all, so I got up at 6 am and painted the bathroom (first primed the new drywall, then painted) so he would install the toilet, which he wouldn't install until the paint was dry.

And so we moved into our new home....and for the next 2 years we worked on getting it into a decent shape. It took all my salary and much of our free time to do it. We remodeled the kitchen, got the hardwood into the rest of the house, got the front and back yard in decent shape, all while we both worked full time and Ralph drilled in the reserves.

Then Ralph left his job because of stress and the new job he got ended 3 months later in a lay off. It took a while but he wound up going back on active duty in the Coast Guard, on a one year contract. At least he had a job, even if it was for only 1 year. That one year contract, by the way, turned into an 8 year job, one year at a time.

As time went by, we decided to add onto the house, pushing the front forward and adding a dining room and enlarging the living room. The house was 900 sq. feet when we bought it and 1200 sq. feet after the addition. That took our time, energy and money as well, since we did the entire addition by ourselves. It was a fun time, though, because we played "how can we make our house look custom on the least amount of money". We found killer cabinets on sale for $5000, they had been a display set and Ralph came running in one day while I was visiting with my mom and said, "Hop in the car, now, we have to go" and so off we went with my mom. Ralph thought they were "the ones" but didn't want to lay out the money until I had seen them.

Anyway, time was marching on and the next thing you know, I was almost 40. Not impossibly old, but it was time to get serious. We knew that we would need ART (assisted reproductive technology) to get me pregnant, but let's face it...when it's not just a romp in the hay that gets you pregnant, when you have to sit down and plan and have money and go to the doctor's, well, it's a whole different story. I mean, how many people have to actually sit down and plan, sock money away, etc. to have a family? I think it's very different than "the norm"

Ok, stopping here...more to come....

One more thing....

There was a time in life when I thought that the definition of a good mother was one who raised their children to be productive, decent adults.

But, I've since learned that some of the best mothers never get to see their children become adults. They sit by their children's side, they hold them in their arms and they watch them suffer the horrible side effects of chemo. They spend days and nights at the hospital, they give medicines, clean up barf and still shine through with love for their child. And then, they have to say goodbye, all the while wishing they could have one more day, one more hour, one more minute with their beloved child.

My heart is with all the mothers today who ache for the loss of their child. I cannot fathom your extremely huge loss, but I can ache for you. How bittersweet Mother's Day must be for you.

Happy Mother's Day!

There was a time, not that long ago,when Mother's Day meant tears of sadness running down my face. There is nothing harder than longing to be a mom, working so very hard to become a mom and yet not being a mom on Mother's Day.

I wanted to crawl into a cave and not crawl out until the holiday had passed. Because once you are a certain age, people just assume you must be a mom, people like checkers at the grocery store or cashiers at the bank or waitresses at restaurants. And in the week or so leading up to Mother's Day, I'd often have people wishing me "Happy Mother's Day". I would smile and thank them and cry inside.

I distinctly remember the last Mother's Day I wasn't a mom. We had gone through a couple of years of fertility treatments that didn't work, had waited over a year to try and be matched for a domestic adoption, then changed gears and switched to international adoption. Our paperwork dually filed, all the i's dotted and the t's crossed. And we were waiting.....

Waiting to be matched with a baby who would become ours eventually. I was waiting, again, that year, to become a mom, instead of being a mom. And it cut like a knife.

I remember well the tears, the hurt, the pain. I remember wondering if it was ever going to happen, if I would ever become a mom.

Then, it happened....not even 2 weeks later, we got the call....we'd been matched with a little girl, there were pictures already emailed...go sign on to your computer...where have you been, we've been trying to reach you....

And that was the day I first saw my daughter....a picture of her, she was 1 day old and the most gorgeous baby I'd ever seen in my life, because she was my baby.

And so today is Mother's Day, but it really is Marielle's day, too. As I often say to her, "Thank you, sweetheart, for making me a mom and making my dreams come true".

Pictures, yeah, we have pictures.

It's nice to have friends.....who like to dabble in photography....who will come over and take pictures of your kids....


And capture just a bit of their personality....


And capture a moment in time with your family....


Including your boy when he says, "I'm not listening" in actions, not words (which happens often, by the way)



Oh, the sweetest smile....

Siblings and he even caught Rico and a bit of his impishness in this shot:


Yes, it's good to have friends who are willing to come over and take pictures of you and your family.

Thanks, Brian!!!!!!!!!!!!!

There's something that's freakin' me out....

So I asked Marielle this morning to bring the dogs in from the backyard and she comes in and says, "Mom, there's something that's freakin' me out in the backyard. I think it's a nose". I asked her, as I'm standing at the sink, "Oh, like a little critter peeking out from under the deck?" and she said, "No, like a nose all by itself on the ground".

What was it?

A dead bird. Even though we have collars with bells on our cats, sometimes they still manage to get a bird here or there. I don't really feel guilty because we do have a bird feeder and do keep it stocked with sunflower seeds and I figure it evens out....we keep some birds fed and alive through the winter and now and then the cats win one.

Anyway, Dad came to the rescue, with 2 kids peering out the window, he grabbed a plastic bag, snared the dead bird and put it in the garbage can. Oh, it's so easy to be a hero!

Love after 18 years...

So Ralph and I are sitting on the couch watching American Idol and chatting about the contestants and he sets his coke down between us and then unknowingly knocks it over. I grab for it, miss, and then try to grab it again, as it's dribbling coke all over my sofa. Ralph grabs my hand, thinking I'm reaching for him to hold hands....how sweet..... and I pull my hand back and he grabs even harder. I finally say, "Let go of me" and he looks quizzically at me and asks why.

No, I'm not getting coy after 18 years, the coke is spilling all over the couch! He finally lets go and I grab the darn can and set it up on the couch and he knocks it over again! By now I'm freaking out. I can't get up quickly and he's not moving. Is it fair to ban coke from the living room? He finally gets the can back in the kitchen and cleans the couch. Sheesh, I love you but let's face it, I'm not grabbing for you because I love you, it's the coke!

P.S. I couldn't get up quickly because my hip has had severe pain for almost a week. I got xrays yesterday and saw the orthopedist today. I have arthritis in my left hip (to go with the right knee that also has arthritis). So, I'm on a cane, NSAIDS, steroids to fight inflammation and pain meds and movin' nice and slow right now.