Have I come this far already??

It's hard to believe but I am nearly at the end of the second trimester!! :O How did that happen?? Where did the time go?? Crazy. I'm now 25 weeks pregnant and going strong. :)

I've had a pretty uneventful journey so far which is obviously a good thing. No one wants complications during pregnancy. When I say uneventful, I just mean in the "things going wrong" sense of course. Of course there is a very good reason things have been cruisy and uneventful.... I haven't invited any negativity and crap into my pregnancy/birthing space. I haven't done lots of tests which could potentially stress me out for no reason (ie genetic testing that wouldnt impact on my decision to keep a pregnancy so why bother having the test). I haven't had to listen to a dr tell me my pelvis isnt big enough or my baby is too small or my baby is breech and it will die if I try to birth it that why or I will kill my baby if I go "overdue" or my blood pressure is too high or too low or Im too fat to birth a baby naturally or my hair is too brown or or or....I could go on but I'm sure you get the gist. You really can't underestimate the benefits of not having that stressful shit thrown at you at every turn during pregnancy. We pregnant women have enough to think about without all that useless crap being dished out as well. Every appointment I've had has been stress free, relaxing, fun and supportive. I couldn't ask for more :) It really is a stark contrast to the appointments we had when my partner S was pregnant with our little munchie J. Whilst those appointments weren't filled with as much crap as many others have experienced they still weren't even remotely as nurturing and supportive as the ones we have had this time. There really is no comparison. Oh and our appointments are on average about an hour and a half as opposed to the 10-15 minutes we were "lucky" to get with the obstetrician when S was pregnant. Homebirth rocks :P


Oh speaking of appointments, my last one was a hoot. I got felt up by a few people which was new and umm different lol When I say "felt up" what I really mean is that a couple of "ring ins" (read: midwives in training lol) got to palp my pregnant belly. I was a test dummy. A real life test dummy. lol It was actually pretty fun and trippy to be used as a teaching tool. :P I did get a bit of performance anxiety when it came time to have my blood pressure taken though lol Even though I had taken my blood pressure the day before (and took it the day after) and it was fine, it went up slightly when I had it taken in front of about 6 or 7 people. Aaah well, the joys of being a performing pregnant monkey eh lol


So even though my pregnancy has been uneventful in terms of negative stuff it really is a truly amazing experience. Really truly mindblowing. For so many years I have dreamt about what it actually feels like to have your baby kick you from the inside. I have always wanted to know what that was like. Right now I get to experience it on a daily, no hourly, basis! It still all seems a little surreal at times. It's so hard to describe exactly how amazing it is to feel your belly babe kick you. I'm not sure I would do it justice if I tried to explain it. Suffice to say I am loving every second of it. I'm cherishing every moment (at least until the end of pregnancy when everyone keeps telling me I will get sick of it lol). But right now I love it. I love having that knowledge that my bub is growing, getting stronger, stretching his/her little limbs. It is such a comforting feeling. I love it I love it I love it.

I'm sure there was more I was going to blog about but I cant remember anything else at the moment. Doh. If I think of anything more I will be back :)

Just a quickie....

I just had to write this down before I forget coz I thought it was so funny.


I had my second midwife appointment today and we decided to have it in a local playground. Our first appointment was at our house and J was a little, how shall I say this, pain in the arsey lol She covered the dog in milk, put milk and peanuts in her trolley thing which was already filled with water, yelled, threw grapes everywhere, yelled some more, tried to hit the dog etc etc you get the picture. This time it was great! She got to play for an hour in the playground and we got to chat without interruption lol


So anyway after we chatted away for nearly an hour Lisa went to take my blood pressure. There was another man there with a young child who had been playing with J for a while. When Lisa pulled out her bits and started to take my blood pressure the look on this guys face was just priceless LOL You could just about hear his brain ticking over - "what they fuck are they doing over there???" "who has their blood pressure taken in a playground??" It gave me a jolly good laugh anyway. Aah the joys of homebirth and not having to go to a yukky hospital for antenatal appointments!! Edumacating, one playground dad at a time lol


Oh another even quicker funny story....my mum suggested we call our baby Ned if its a boy *snort* Sooooo not going to happen lol Sorry mum :P





See I told you I would post again soon! :P

Slacker Slacker Slacker

I have no excuses this time. Just pure slackness. *blush* I really need to get better at this blogging gig. Sigh. So much for trying really hard to make it less than two months between blog posts. Oops.


Where to begin...When I last posted I had just completed insprogulation again. So for all those who dont know (which is probably not many) I am pregnant again. Woot! I'm 18 weeks pregnant at the moment. That just seems crazy to put down in words. I cant believe how quickly time has flown. Im nearly half way to having a baby for goodness sakes! Eeeeek!


Things have been pretty cruisy so I dont have heaps to report. Im sure I can waffle for a while though. LOL I never really had any major morning sickness. I did have what I termed "afternoon queeziness" though. Basically by the afternoon I would start to feel a little icky and I was really fussy about what I could and couldn't eat. I never actually vomited or really came close. Yay!! Im so damn happy about that. I sooo wasn't looking forward to being sick. Thank goodness I never got there. The only other slightly uncomfortable pregnancy "thing" I have had to deal with is that the left side of my lower back has become a bit "dicky". It clicks out and then back in fairly regularly and causes me a little bit of pain. Thankfully it doesnt seem to last too long, its usually gone by the next morning after a good sleep. For now anyway ;) Apart from those two things I have had what could only be described as a really cruisy pregnancy so far. :)


One of the things that I find so trippy is how hard my tummy feels. I really had no idea it would feel this hard this early. Not that its really that early I guess. Its just such an amazing thing to experience. I cant stop feeling myself up all the time LOL I lay there every night running my hands over my increasing tummy and talking to the little one inside me. I have dreamt about this moment since I was a little girl and it seems so surreal sometimes to finally be experiencing the amazingness that is pregnancy. I swear if I was heterosexual I would have been up the duff by the time I was 20 LOL There would have been no stopping me. :P Having said that I am actually really glad that I have waited this long. I have done a lot of growing and learning between year 20 and year 31. I often joke that I can see what would have happened if I had had a child at 18 instead of getting my pussy cat. My first fur baby is a pain in the arse. I love him to death but he's a pain in the arse. Im sure I caused at least some of that because of my immaturity so thank god I practiced on a cat first LOL Sorry Kobie. I feel like I'm in a really good place emotionally to have a baby now and Im so thankful I waited. Or should I say I was forced to wait. ;)


In between my last post and this one I had my first midwife appointment. I was looking forward to it so much I could barely contain myself. Of course I acted very cool, calm and collected so I'm sure she never guessed hahaha. It wasnt like like there was really that much to do on our first appointment. For some silly reason it just made things seem even more real in my head. I knew the midwife I chose before I became pregnant. In fact I had her pencil me in as a client before I really officially knew I was pregnant lol. I could write a whole blog post on what a wonderful midwife I think Lisa is but if you dont already know her you can read about her yourself here. So our first appointment was just to take a very basic history and a chance for S to meet Lisa for the first time. Thankfully she really liked Lisa which was helpful because there is no way I would have ditched Lisa as a midwife if she didnt lol. I had that first appointment when I was 14 weeks pregnant and apparently I measured 16 weeks which really means nothing so woohoo lol. I will be having my next appointment in two days time and I'm really looking forward to that too. :) Even though there probably wont be anything that exciting happening at that one either lol. The whole journey is just so freakin exciting!


I did have a bit of a "moment" in that last week. I went to the dr two weeks ago (which I just hate doing) because I wanted a referral to get some blood taken so I could find out what my blood group was (coz Im curious), whether I was immune to Rubella (nosey) and what my iron levels were like (again just coz Im nosey). So the dr I saw was this doddery 60 odd year old guy (funnily enough he is my Nanna's favourite dr) who is apparently known for going a little overboard. So instead of the three things I wanted to know I walked out of that room with a referral to have about 20 bloody tests done :O Including a wee test because "how would I know if I have bladder cancer if I dont have this test" ummm okaaay. I skipped that one by the way lol. So anyway I had my blood sucked and went back just over a week later to get the results. Everything was absolutely perfect apart from one thing. Apparently my thyroid levels are slightly high. Of course the first thing the dr I saw to get the results said was "drugs". WhatEver. He also gave me a referral to an endocrinologist. The first thing I did when I got home from getting those test results was to make an appointment with my homeopath. She was great. We had a jolly good chat about how fucked and dumb dr's can be. She gave me a remedy after we chatted for a while. It was just how appointments should be :P I did decide to go ahead and make the appointment with the endocrinologist so I could quiz him about what this result really meant. I was pleasantly surprised to hear him say that he didnt think my thyroid level and lack of symptoms warranted drug management. I have a referral to go back in a months time and re-test to see that it hasnt gone up anymore. Im sure it will all be fine though. :)


Our 4 yr old DD (J) has been very cute lately. She has become the newest homebirth advocate on the block. She is always making comments about how its sooo much better to have your baby at home in a baby pool. She has even been doing some birth role plays lately. She gave birth to twins in the bath the other day. LOL It was very very cute hehe. She kisses my tummy a lot and talks to her new little brother or sister. I really cant wait to see the look on her face when she finally sees her new baby brother or sister for the first time. It makes my heart melt when I hear her talking about or to her new sibling.


Well I think that's all my important goss for the moment. I really really mean it when I say I will try to get back here and blog a bit more regularly than I have so far. No really, I mean it!!



ETA - oh the only other thing that happened in the last few months that I didnt mention was that we got a puppy. Am I crazy I hear you ask. The answer is YES!!!

Slack. Slack. Slack.

Oops, it's been nearly 2 months since my last post :O How did that happen?? I wonder if I was holding back from posting on here because it was a bit of a painful reminder of my experience. I don't really know. No matter....Im back and I will try really really hard to not make it another two months before I post again!


So what has happened in the last two months? Not much really....I've been processing, grieving, living life... I have had some moments of sadness since I miscarried in August but thankfully I haven't been a snivelling wreck or anything. It is still sad to think about baby Baz leaving us. I really didn't want him/her to go. Obviously. It sucks that it happened. But it did. All I can do is honour those feelings of sadness and grief and look to the future when the reincarnation of baby Baz will hopefully join us again. I have also felt a few pangs of fear when I think about the possibility of miscarrying again. I think they are pretty normal fears though so Im doing my best to acknowledge them and move through the fear so that I can embrace any future pregnancy like I did my first.


Oh oh oh! I have a story. It goes under the heading "Reason number 59836252834653 to stay away from doctors during pregnancy". I had a dr's appointment booked so that I could get a piece of paper to "allow" me to get some blood tests done (I don't know my blood group and thought that might be useful and wanted to get tested for hep B so the midwife I have chosen doesnt need to worry about catching that particular disease from me - which she said wasn't necessary but hey they were going to suck my blood anyway). So I rock up to the dr's appointment ( I dont have a GP so I just see whoever is on) and this gum chewing, arrogant looking fucker invites me into his office. He asks why I'm there. I tell him I want to know my blood group and hep B status. He asks me why. I tell him that I am pregnant although almost 100% sure I am in the middle of a miscarriage. He tells me I have to have an ultrasound to confirm it. I tell him no I absolutely do not have to have an ultrasound. He asks me how else am I going to find out what's happening. I tell him that the large clots, cramping and the general feeling I have are some pretty fucking good indicators (actually I didnt say fucking but I wish I had!). He then asks me what's wrong with ultrasounds. I tell him I think they are invasive, potentially dangerous and at this point it would be completely unnecessary. He rudely tells me they are not invasive at all. (I'm 6.5 weeks pregnant which means at that point I would have been having a transvaginal ultrasound. That's right, a fucking probe shoved up my vagina. Noooo that's not invasive at all. Fucker. I would sooo love to shove a probe up his arse, or perhaps his penis, and see how invasive he thinks that is). So I tell him again, I think an ultrasound at this point would be very invasive and I wont do it. He berates me a little more, saying that women have ultrasounds all the time. I tell him I could bring in the research I have done regarding ultrasounds, how useless and uneccesary they often are etc etc but dont think there would be much point because he didn't sound like he was going to change his mind. He said "damn right" or something along those lines. I tell him I dont care what he thinks, Im not having one....full stop. So he tries a different angle. "Who do you think is going to see you during pregnancy if you haven't had an ultrasound??" he asks. I told him I already have a midwife booked, I will be having a homebirth and she doesnt require an ultrasound thank you very much. He grunts. Then says "that's how babies die". Tact anyone? Anyone? By that stage I was fucking ANGRY. Really fucking angry. I was in the middle of a miscarriage for fucks sake and he's telling me I'm going to kill my dead baby. Fucking wanker. I was that close to getting up and saying fuck you arsehole but for some reason I didn't. Bloody Inner Good Girl. I told him again I just wanted the piece of paper for the blood tests. He chews him gum loudly and finally gives up his abusive rant and prints it off. I just about run out of that room as fast as I possibly can. I rang up my partner and then a friend so that I can rant and rant and rant some more about how much of a fucker he was. Fuck me he was a fucker.


A week later I had finished my 2 page letter of complaint and handed it to the office manager of the doctors surgery. I waited 2 weeks and hadn't heard anything back so I rang the office manager. She informed me that she had given the letter to (you know what Im going to name the fucker - adelaide women, avoid this man like the plague!) Dr Martin Waters and had heard nothing back. She informed me that doctors in that surgery are employed in a similar manner to subcontractors and as such the practice has no power over them whatsoever. I slipped in my conversation to her that if I hadn't heard back from him in 2 weeks I would contact the AMA and make a complaint. Guess what buddy, your 2 weeks are up. I'm sure it wont change a thing but Im going to look into making an official complaint against him. He should absolutely NOT be around women, especially pregnant women, most especially women experiencing a miscarriage. He is truly an arrogant pig.


Buuuut anyway.....on to much happier matters! After my miscarriage I had a pretty normal menstrual cycle so I have chosen to get back on the horsie (so to speak ;)) and insprogulate again this month! Woot! That insprogulation was yesterday. So I could well be rapidly moving towards up the duffness as we speak! Or not...but I really hope so ;) I learnt a valuable lesson from my first insprogulation that proved to be very helpful this time round. I actually got into position, with my legs in the air, BEFORE the insprogulation commenced. This meant they didn't all ooze out as I wiggled and slithered into position. Genius, I know! Too Much Information? Perhaps....lol Rather than reading gay mags while I waited with my legs in the air I went with something a little more appropriate this time....birth notices from the local paper lol People call their kids some reeeeally weird names. Have a look sometime, it's quite funny....



About 14 odd hours after insprogulation I experienced the same strong cramps on my right side that I experienced the first time. Fingers crossed that's a positive thing! Other than that I just have to wait....and wait...and wait some more... I have decided this time that I probably wont be peeing on a stick to confirm pregnancy. I did it last time even though I knew full well I was pregnant. So this time Im just going to sit back and enjoy the ride. Trust my instincts. If my period is late there is a pretty good chance Im pregnant lol We shall see....All fingers, toes and pubic hair is crossed in anticipation. In fact some people have even gone so far as to plait their pubic hair in a show of support for my cause lol I shall keep youse all updated....


Oh and to the luffly people who offered their condolences and well wishes - I thank you all very much *kiss*. I have been a bit slack in responding to them and I feel a little guilty about that but please know they were very much appreciated. Oh and Kate, where the crap are ya!? lol I sooo keep meaning to get back to you and I haven't *blush* I am so slaaaaack!!!

Aaaaaah Fuck

It seems success can be fleeting. Im nearly 100% sure that baby Baz (as s/he had lovingly been named) is no longer with us. :-( I started spotting and cramping 4 nights ago....spotting turned into light bleeding and cramping....light bleeding turned into moderate bleeding and cramping....it all went to shit from there....


I had a big shift in my emotions late yesterday afternoon. For the previous three days I felt like I had been clinging, physically and emotionally, to the hope that baby Baz would be ok. I dont think i was breathing properly, I was tense, I was feeling every little thing that happened in my body. Late yesterday afternoon I just let go. I stopped fighting what my body was doing. I just let it do its thing. It is perhaps no coincidence (or maybe it is?? who knows) that not long after I did that the bleeding stepped up a notch.


Im sad, upset but ok. The whole thing has been shitty but I dont feel like I want to bury myself in a black hole or anything. I feel like there were some lessons for me to learn surrounding letting go and just going with what my body needs to do. I also feel like there were some lessons to learn about being patient. Im feeling optimistic and hopeful that I will get pregnant pretty easily next time as well. Dammit I hope so! I just want baby Baz to come back to us as soon as possible. Come back baby Baz, we love you....

Oh. My. Goodness.

It's official. I'm a one hit wonder! :-O One time, first month = success!!


I'm pregnant! My period was due 5 days ago. My boobs are sore. I've been having mild, niggly cramps on and off since a few days after insemination. Oh and I pissed on a stick and it was positive lol I actually "knew" I was pregnant before I pissed on a stick. I really didn't need the stick to tell me what I already knew. Maybe next time I will have the strength to not piss on a stick. ;-)


I'm still in a little bit of shock. I had a niggly feeling it would happen the first month but I had largely dismissed that thought as wishful thinking. I mean seriously who gets pregnant on their first try? When they dont even have sperm on hand in their house? ME :-O


Obviously its still very early days. I'm about 4.5 weeks going by the silly EDD pregnancy charting thingies. So all going well I will be expecting a bub sometime around late April to early May. :-O :-O :-O Still in shock. Lotsa shock.


J has been asking all kinds of questions: "Where will the baby sleep?"..."It wont take my spot in the middle of the bed will it?"..."Will you have to have an operation to get the baby out like Mummy did with me?" :-( "Will you scream when the baby comes out? I dont want you to scream" lol


She has also named the baby(s) lol. Apparently it has to be a girl called Angelina Ballerina and she has to come out with a pink tutu on, a bow on her head and a magic wand. Sigh. I only felt like a bit of a feminist failure over that one. Oh and she thinks it might be twins too. If it is twins they are to be called Angelina Ballerina (surprise surprise) and Rocky. Mmmmkay.


Oh what a fun journey this will be.....

Patience is a virtue....so "they" say....

I cant believe nearly a week has gone by since my last blog! It doesnt seem that long ago. Aaaah well.


So at around 3am (approximately 9hrs after insprogulation) I started cramping. It wasnt bad but it kept me awake for a while. Or maybe what kept me awake was my crazy googling, trying to discover if that was normal. Not having much to do with sperm I wasnt sure but I had a feeling the little swimmers might have been the cause. I was right. Prostaglandins can do that apparently. I was however seriously disturbed to find that the first few google pages relating to "cramping after sex/insemination" related solely to IUI. Bloody medicalisation of pregnancy and birth grrrrr. Anyway the next day I went to a Joyous Birth gathering (I just love living in the birth, babies and boobs bubble) where I continued cramping on my right side for the majority of the morning/early afternoon. My cervical mucus had also exploded that day. All signs (and some strong intuition) led me to believe that I was indeed ovulating (from my right side). Yay *bounce bounce*! I was rapt with the timing of it all. It really couldnt have been better (unless our donor hadnt gone interstate that day and we could've done a second insprogulation, just to make sure). But anyway it all felt right. I spent my time at the JB gathering surrounded by children and earthy birthy folks. I even got two lots of baby vomit on me (thanks baby M) which I considered to be a sign of good luck lol. Rubbing and sniffing her gorgeous little head probably helped too lol.


Since that day I seem to have been aware of every little thing going on in my body. I have had little cramps on some days, not others, and funny little pains that I find hard to explain. I woke up so freaking exhausted today after 11hrs sleep (I was dreaming that I was so tired I was opening my mouth but no words were coming out!). I could put all of this down to the fact that I probably haven't paid this much attention to my bodily movements in the past. Or to the fact that I might have gone into some kind of shock given that sperm would be completely foreign to my body after many, many years of no contact. But I dont want to think its either of those options! I want to think I'm pregnant!! I really really want to think Im pregnant. Did I mention I want to think Im pregnant?? Sigh. Hence the title of this post. I am soooo freakin impatient. I really want....no need to get over this. I want to relax and enjoy this journey. I dont want to be obsessive and crazy about it. I want to trust my body and trust that the universe knows what its doing. All those birth mantras I love so much and read time and time again fit well in this part of the journey too....trust...surrender...relax....Aaah its soothing just reading that back a few times. So this post is largely about reminding myself that I just need to go with the flow....yes be aware of what's happening in my body (which, at the moment, is little weird crampy things on the right side of my uterus) but dont obsess. Trust that what happens is meant to be. That everything is happening just as it should. Whether I am pregnant right now or not. Crap I still hope I am though lol.


I also need to let go of some of the negative shit running through my head. I have occasionally been having pangs of guilt when I think I might actually have been super lucky and managed to get pregnant first try. Guilt over the fact that I know people who have tried for years with no success. Or people who have had success in achieving a pregnancy but they had to go to hell and back to get there. Or people who would dearly love to even be attempting to TTC but have no resources (read: sperm). I have no reason to feel guilty. I know that logically. But still, I sometimes do. Guilt seems to be a feature in my life (thanks mum and dad for all your efforts). I want it to stop though. I want it to stop now. If I want to live a healthy and happy life I need it to stop. So I am working really hard at believing that I do deserve to get pregnant after 1 attempt (even if it doesnt actually happen that way). I want this attitude to flow throughout pregnancy, birth and into parenthood. I want to trust that my body knows exactly what it is doing, like millions of women's bodies before me. I want to trust that I deserve to be pregnant. Trust that I am worthy of carrying, birthing and nurturing a child.


I just need to stop my brain from working overtime, relax, trust my body and enjoy the ride. I will know soon enough if I am actually pregnant....





Hilarious side note (to me anyway) - I just googled "insprogulation" and my blog is the only hit that comes up! Morph your word is rapidly becoming famous! roflmao