This morning I’ve been perusing the internets. I’ve been reading some articles on my favorite pregnancy site, Babble.com. I came across one that speaks so much to me and how I’ve been feeling for the last 2 months.

 

10 People You Hate When You’re Trying to Get Pregnant

1. Women With Four or More Kids 

A single child is understandable. Two makes sense. Three is actually quite nice. But four? Or more? Today? Are you just trying to show off your fertility?

2. Pregnant Complainers

Oh, you’re tired of hugging the toilet bowl for hours? I know, I know. Your feet are so swollen you can barely walk. And you’re not sleeping well — or at all. And your other kid(s) is so demanding right now. And you look like you’re carrying triplets. I’m sure it sucks. Wanna trade? Here. Here’s my infertility. I’ll take your pregnancy complaints.

3. Unplanned “Oops”

You didn’t even try! No fair.

4. The Pregnancy Expert

And I don’t mean doctors. I mean the women who have the exact right answer on how to get pregnant. Relax. Keep your legs up for an hour. Orgasm. Take your trigger shot a few hours before they tell you to. Don’t eat meat. Have sex on the full moon while praying to the fertility goddesses and signing an Om prayer. Sure, I appreciate the advice. And honestly, I’m willing to try just about anything, so keep the advice coming. Just know that sometimes — just sometimes — I want to punch you and your answers in the face.

5. The Woman Who Gets Pregnant Her First Try

B#tch.

6. Teenage Moms

I could so be a better mother than you ever could. OK, so maybe that’s not totally true. But it is.

7. Deadbeat Parents

I think pretty much everyone hates a deadbeat. But seriously, you don’t even deserve the title of parent. Do you have any idea how hard I’m working for this?

8. 20-somethings Who Say They Never Want Kids

Yeah, I didn’t either. And now my ovaries are like the Sahara Desert and my biological clock is a huge middle finger. If you’re young (and somehow reading anything but Perez), go have your eggs frozen. You can send me a thank-you card in another 10 years.

9. Baby Killers

Any news or story of some heinous human being dumping their newborn in the dumpster, or flushing them down a drain, or throwing them out of a high-rise, or whatever else these crazy f%*$% do to babies makes me so.effing.mad. Here’s an open note to all the world: If you have a baby that you don’t want, I WILL TAKE HIM/HER. No need for murder.

10. Yourself

You begin to think that maybe your body won’t ever work. Or that maybe you’re just not meant to be a mother. Or that you have some seriously terrible karma and you wonder what you did that was so bad for this to be your plight.

 

I know that realistically we haven’t been trying for that long but going through three full cycles with no ovulation is not feeling very promising.

 

I found an awesome product that can detect ovulation using saliva that will last for years and years. I’m seriously considering getting it instead of using the pee sticks (pain in the butt!). For some strange reason saliva gets extra salt in it during ovulation that you can see with a microscope, which is basically what the product is. The saliva goes from looking like little black dots to looking like ferns. Quite cool!

 

I’m also exploring my options as far as fertility testing, natural ovulation things and anything I can be doing to help get this party started. Its amazing how opening up about my journey has brought other peoples journeys to me. I’ve learned of several people who have also struggled, loved, lost and given up. I would love to hear from anyone who has struggled, what they did to help cope, if they overcame.

I’ve emailed my ob/gyn about getting fertility drugs. He’s responded that I need to see a specialist, so I’ve got a referral sent to a reproductive endocrinologist. Hopefully I’ll be hearing from them for an appointment in the next week!

 

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Just got an email about my referral. Kaiser can’t do anything for me as fertility stuff isn’t covered at all. This is really really crappy. My ob/gyn seems to think that ovulation can “spontaneously” happen 6-8 months after stopping birth control. Not so sure that is the case with me. I guess I’ll wait and see.

You know all those people who get pregnant when they aren’t even trying? Yeah, that’s not me.

 

Dealing with not being able to get pregnant without medical intervention is difficult.

 

The TMI section:

 

Before taking birth control I had always had wacky cycles. Sometimes I would go months without a period, and others it would be closer to 4 weeks. It has always varied like that and never concerned me. I assumed that since I was on the light side it cause me to have a weird cycle.

 

Now that we’re trying to have a baby that weird cycle sucks. All the advice out there is usually that if you’re under 35, wait a year before seeing your doctor. Most places don’t mention that if your cycle is over 35 days you should see your doctor right away. Even my doctor didn’t mention that to me. I learned that from an aunt.

 

So I’ve emailed my ob/gyn to see if I need to make an appointment with him to get fertility drugs or if I need to see a specialist. Once I hear back from him I plan to take whatever steps are necessary to move forward with expanding our family.

 

My hope is that I’ll be able to get in quickly and start taking fertility meds as soon as possible.

We went on a week and a half vacation with my parents a few weeks ago. While gone, my mom asked about our baby making plans so we decided to tell them that we’ve been trying since March. We facetimed with David’s parents a few days later to tell them the good news.

 

So now our parents, siblings and grandma Bea know that we’re trying to have a baby. I spoke with one of David’s aunts at a family party last weekend and that leads us to…

It has been just over two months since I left my job. I’ve mainly been using my time to eat better and exercise more. And reduce stress.

 

The bad news today: definitely no baby yet. And confirmation that I have a wacky cycle.

 

I’ve been trying to track my ovulation over the past 5 or 6 weeks and all the tests (two a day) have been negative. I’m getting a bad feeling about that, though I know I shouldn’t worry too much since I did just come off birth control. If I go through another cycle with no positives I’m going to see my OB/GYN about it. I know that when you’re under 35 you’re supposed to wait a year before thinking about infertility problems, but I’ve always had a wacked-out cycle and would prefer not to wait that long.

 

In just about 5 weeks we’re planning to tell our immediate family that either 1. we’re trying to have a baby or 2. we are having a baby.

 

In other news: I’ve looked at and picked out several types of cloth diapers to try out. I think I’ve selected about 30-ish from 6 or 7 different companies. I may look into others, but I think we’ll find some good ones from the ones I’ve picked. I’ve also come to the conclusion that when its time for a baby registry from Babies R Us that we’re going to have to drive to one that is just that (versus one that is half Toys R Us and half Babies R Us). We have a half and half near us and the selection at the BRU side is kinda sad.

 

Running: I’ve been excelling at running over the past few weeks and am enjoying that its becoming easier to achieve the times/distances that I want. I currently have a plan to run a leg of the Big Sur marathon next May, though that is seeming like less and less of a possibility. If I conceive during my next cycle we’re looking at a March birth. If it takes another 1-4 months to get pregnant I for sure will not be running, which is a bummer because it was going to be an adult “Matics and McGaugh” race.

 

Until next time… keeping my fingers crossed!

Friday March 28th marked my last “official” day at work. The plan was for May 2nd, but a replacement was found and trained well before then, so there was nothing left for me to do. I had work on Monday the 31st and again tomorrow the 7th just to help her out on Mondays when its most busy, but after tomorrow I will no longer be working a 9-5. Our plan was for me to stop at some point during pregnancy, but work had become too stressful and we have several things coming up this summer which would have been too much time to take off and I would have been laid off anyway, so I decided to leave on my terms.

 

Last week we decided that its time to make a baby.

 

As an aside, I’d like to say sorry to our parents and families for lying to you. Whenever we’re asked about when we’re going to have a baby, it’s tough to lie because we know that we’re trying now but we want it to be a surprise. We attended a family party yesterday and got asked more than three times about it. We’d like to say that we’re trying but also want to keep it to ourselves. So sorry. We’ll tell you about it beforehand next time.

 

I’ve been filling my time this past week with a whole lot of nothing. I’ve really just been trying to enjoy being home and seeing David more. I do plan to get into gear and get working on house stuff within the next few weeks and I’m thinking about looking into attending classes at the local community college during the fall semester. I also have a potential at-home work opportunity that I’m going to be getting more info about this coming week.

 

As far as running goes, I’m still trying to do my best at it. We had an obstacle course race yesterday that went quite well and another one coming up in three weeks. Then we have a break for the summer and don’t race again until the last weekend of August. I’m hoping that I will be able to continue running, even if I have to go slower or shorter or less miles. I think that pretty soon its going to get to the point where I can just enjoy it and don’t have to worry about going a certain speed for a certain amount of time and I can just go and do whatever. I think April is our last crazy training month then we just have a relatively easy summer of “base miles”, which means that I can pretty much do whatever training I want. Good thing because I’ve read and heard that the first trimester is going to be an exhausting one.

 

I don’t plan to test until after we do our Gumball Rally on May 3rd, but you can bet that I’ll be checking the morning of May 4th!

Yesterday, Tuesday March 18th was the Big City Moms Biggest Baby Shower. Naturally I bought tickets early and picked the mid-level ones (more about what that got us in a bit). The tickets were $132.87 and got both me and David in at 5:30, a half hour before the lower tier tickets got access. I picked the mid-level ones because they were $130-ish dollars and the gift you get with them is worth $149. Plus you get a huge gift bag of other goodies, and the chance to win prizes during the different seminars. Big duh that I’m going to purchase that one.

 

The basic premise of the event was a game of “bingo”. We got a “bingo” card at the beginning of the night to fill out. To get the gift bag, you had to visit 25 vendors and listen to 1 seminar. There were probably about 50 different vendor booths and a choice of 5 seminars. We went for the fitness and wellness during pregnancy and beyond seminar. Not nearly as much information about fitness or all that much about wellness as I thought there would be. We decided after the seminar that we were done and ready to leave.

 

We went to the exit to turn in our “bingo card” and were told to pick a number from a bag. The lady who was helping us went into the gift room and returned with our gift bag of goodies and…

 

Today I took everything out and put it on our dining room table.

 

Table before:

 

Table after:

 

I inventoried everything that was in our gift bag and that we received from the various booths that were giving out things. Holy cow it is so much stuff. Some of it we can’t use, like formula that expires this year or early next year that I plan to donate. Other things that we plan to use got put back in the reusable bags and will go into the upstairs room for safe keeping until next year. All of the older kid food, like the squeeze pouches, I fully intend to eat (I actually just ate the GoGo applesauce one, very tasty). Below is a list of everything that we got.

 

Bottles:

Dr. Browns Natural Flow, Reduces Colic

Evenflow Advanced+ Angled and Vented Bottle

Tommee Tippee Closer to Nature baby bottle

Avent Natural

Mam Anti Colic Bottle

 

Food:

Enfamil Newborn Nutrition Necessities in a Keepsake Box

Party-Tizers Veggie Dippin’ Chips – Kale, Carrot and Spinach

Earth’s Best Organic Super Pomegranate Cranberry Apple fruit puree

Ella’s Kitchen banana baby brekkie

Materne GoGo Squeez Appleapple

Nurturme Squash, Bananas, Green Kale nurturmeals 6+ mos

Nurturme crunchy carrots nurturmeals 4+ mos

 

Food Storage:

Yummi Pouch Reusable: 1 green, 1 orange

nurturme Eco-pouch

Sage Spoonfuls Plastic 4 oz bowl with lid

Inno Baby Packin Smart

 

Pacifiers and Accessories:

WubbaNub Infant Pacifier with attached dog

First Friends pacifier with lamb

Dr. Brown’s PreVent Orthodontic Pacifier – 18m+

Mam newborn pacifier x2

bobo buddy caterpillar

 

Toys:

The Original Boppy Gentle Forest Rattle Ring

 

Clothing:

Pediped 12-18 mo shoes

L’ovedbaby 3-6 mo pants

Born to Rock onesie 3-6 mo

 

Blankets:

Baby K’tan K’tan cloth

Rolling penguin blanket

Munchkin Swaddle Angel 2 pack

Summer SwaddleMe WrapSack Size small

PiyoPiyo Duck bath towel

 

Extras:

Car Shade

DLVR Graduated Compression Socks

JenniJune sleep eye mask

Jane reusable plastic water bottle

The Pump Station water

La Croix Lemon sparkling water

UPPAbaby luggage tag

MomAngels gift card

Daddy & Co $10 gift card

5 reusable bags, 1 backpack type bag

2 pens

Healthy Child Healthy World healthy parenting kit – babyganics 3.6 oz laundry detergent, Burt’s Bees Baby Bee Shampoo and Wash, Bona Hardwood Floor Cleaner 2 oz, Surf Sweets sour berry bears, Seventh Generation Natural Dish Liquid .4 oz, Seventh Generation Laundry Detergent 1 use, Burt’s Bees Baby Bee Nourishing Lotion, Baby Ecos Laundry Detergent 2 uses, Happytot green bean pear and pea squeeze pouch, coupons

 

Feeding:

BabyBjorn Soft Bib

OXO Tot on the go feeding spoon with travel case

Enfamil Cooler with Ice pack, flat plastic bottle for breast milk and can of Newborn Infant Formula

 

For Mom:

Project Nursery.com Measuring tape

Belly Bandit measuring tape

Bio-Oil

Rainbow Light Prenatal One Multivitamins, 30 day supply

Mama Mio The Tummy Rub Butter 1 oz plus .1 oz sample

Mama Mio Gorgeous Glow Balancing Facial Wash 1 fl oz

Babytime Skin to Skin Baby + Mom Massage Oil

Nordic Naturals Prenatal DHA, 2 softgels

Belli Elasticity Belly Oil .17 oz sample

Preggie Pop Drops, 1

Eat Sleep Poop by Scott W. Cohen

An amazing amount of brochures, pamphlets, handout and more!

 

For Baby:

Palmer’s Cocoa Butter Formula Bottom Butter, 4.4 oz

Babyganics Moisturizing Eczema Care, 3 oz

Nordic Naturals Children’s DHA

Earth’s Best Chlorine Free Diapers, size 1 44 count

 

Cleaning/Wipes:

Dapple Baby laundry detergent

Dapple Fragrance-Free Dish Liquid, travel size

Dapple Fragrance-Free Pacifier Wipes, 25 individually wrapped

Dr. Brown’s Naturally Cleaning Pacifier and Bottle Wipes, 30 count

Earth’s Best Chlorine Free Baby Wipes, 30 count

Honest Wipes, 10 count

Diono Travel wipes, 30 count

daddy’s disposable diaper changing pads, 10 count

The Pump Station soft bottom cloths, 20 count

 

Fitness:

knocked-up fitness Prenatal pilates-infused fitness DVD

Feb/March issue of fitpregnancy

 

 

So that lady who was helping us? She went into the gift room and returned pushing

a stroller. With a Lillebaby carrier in it. Yup, it was for us. Not only did we get a $149 carrier, we also got a Maxi-Cosi Kaia Stoller worth $199. Are you kidding me!?!?! Overall, it was a win-win for us.

 

Extra Gifts:

LilleBaby Organic Carrier – Came with the ticket level we purchased

Maxi-Cosi Kaia Stroller – We picked a number out of a bag to get an extra gift, and this came rolling out for us

 

 

It was a fun/awesome/amazing experience for me, and as far as I could tell not torture for David. There was an amazing amount of information and hands-on testing of many products. We saw some awesome strollers, car seats, high chairs, food makers, diapers, toys and much more.

Today is the three week mark. Just three more weeks of birth control. Then our lives change forever.

 

We have a 5K obstacle race planned for 2 weeks after we finish with it and another 5K planned for August. I feel more confident than before that I will have no problem running the August 5K and throughout most if not all of my pregnancy. It seems very doable, even if it means running at a slow pace in the later months.

 

For the last two or so weeks we’ve mostly been eating meals planned from The Runner’s World Cookbook. They are very heavily vegetable based and have a good mix of nutrients which are helping us to keep our diet in check. I have a feeling that the recipes will come in very handy as many are easy to prepare and make lots of leftovers.

 

There hasn’t been much baby research in the last month or two. I think I’ve got most everything I want figured out.

 

I gave my notice at work at the beginning of February and my last day should be May 2nd. I may have the option to stay on with an at-home position for a few extra months, but won’t know about that for sure until closer to May. I know its a bit early as I may not even be pregnant by then, but its way past time for me to leave that place, and lowering my stress level is very important to me. I’m so lucky to have a super supportive husband who let me know that I could leave my job whenever I felt it was best.

 

I can’t wait for it to finally be our turn to have a baby!

We have officially decided on March 22nd as the last day I take BC. I thought we should do something special to celebrate, so I’ve made reservations at the Blue Bayou in Disneyland for dinner that day.

 

David and I have discussed it thoroughly and decided that May 2nd is going to be my last day of work. Even though I’m down to 4 days a week, those 4 days I have to be there are very stressful. I think it would be best for baby prep to be home and focused on being the best, healthiest me possible. I know that women of all shapes and sizes can have healthy babies, but I want to create the best possible baby growing environment that I can.

 

I have been very focused on exercising in the past 2 weeks. I’ve made great progress and hope to continue working toward a sustainable workout schedule that I can modify if necessary during my pregnancy. I’ve also decided to run a 5K while potentially up to 3 months pregnant. I’ve read about it and as long as its something I’ve been doing, I can continue doing it during pregnancy.

 

I ordered another baby book last week called Raising Baby Green: The Earth-Friendly Guide to Pregnancy, Childbirth, and Baby Care. I found it to be extremely fascinating. It really put into perspective just how many better choices David and I can make for our children. I know, kids have been raised with chemicals and pesticides and all that stuff for decades with no problems. Doesn’t mean we have to do it that way. We’ve decided to take and eco approach to all this baby stuff. I’m going to be preparing much more of our food from scratch and more whole foods.

 

Its all starting to become more real and I am growing very excited. I will continue to take the best care of my body that I can in preparation for creating a human being.

Today should be marking one week until no more bc. But it isn’t.

 

Micechat does a competition every year to see how many points you can get by riding as many rides at Disneyland as possible. David has been talking about this for most of the past year. The competition is, of course, on May 3rd, and I can’t be pregnant so I can go on all the rides. This presented a problem as I was hoping to be pregnant by then. I know how much doing this means to David so have decided to continue taking bc until the middle of April.

 

I find it to be a good and a sad thing. Good because it will guarantee birth in 2015, sad because there was a possibility of getting pregnant right away and having a baby in September/October/November, thereby starting the next phase of our lives sooner.