Math

I had an epiphany last night, the format reminiscent of those dreaded story problems in school with the two trains going different speeds. Could you ever figure out when they would intersect? I never did.

But given that the flu is mercilessly taking down parents and children alike from the kiddo's school and we aren't sick yet...

I did the math and came up with 'flu over Christmas' as the answer.

Oh.

OH!

So I power wrapped all the Christmas presents last night and will buy the rest today along with more wrapping paper. I restocked the freezer with chicken soup last week, so that's all set. We have jello and will make a grocery run tonight.

I have some big cooperative marketing stuff going on with other authors...I always end up running the thing for some reason. People are intimidated by spreadsheets I think or maybe they believe it's too much of a time suck when it's not really bad. I need to get it all squared away so it's plug-and-play over the holiday and easy for someone else to step in and take over in the event I'm down for the count.

My husband thinks I'm nuts for being so attentive to this. He points out that we may not get sick and I know that's true. In fact, I hope that being the last family standing is a sign we're immune to this bug.

But working to get ahead of illness has always been a best practice for the asthma, although admittedly I wait until I'm actually sick to start over-functioning. This flu bug is pretty nasty and I don't think the flu shot covers it so...I'm trying to be smart and proactive as opposed to crazy germ nut. Time will tell whether I'm crazy or not.

The way I look at it, even if I'm nuts, all the presents will be wrapped, making for a very relaxing Christmas Eve.

Nothing Like Flashdance

It's been an interesting week.

First I was thrust into a rage of anxiety by my neighbor. I sent their child home as they said they were sick and didn't feel well. They didn't look well either. So I did what any mother would and felt their forehead, which seemed warm. Being a responsible adult, I sent them home.

And the parent in charge booted them right back to my house.

WTF?  Really? What part of that scenario screamed 'send them back'?  When your child is sent home it's not because we want to play boomerang.

As it turned out the parent in charge had the flu. The hug-the-toilet-like-it's-your-bff flu. So cearly, their child couldn't be sick.

For days, I ranted to the hubby about these dipshits. Both because I don't want to get sick and because they are not worthy of being parents half the time. They have beautiful children, but their parenting dims their future and there's nothing I can do to stop it. CPS is already involved and it's not getting any better.

At least I feed the one that comes over to play...they are a darling child. Too bad their parents are going to royally mess them up. I do what I can but the psychosocial paradigm that will doom them to poverty and a future as a dipshit parent themselves is already in place. The launch sequence has started, there's no stopping it now.

I was, however, able to stop being so mad about the complete lack of germ containment a few days later when it became clear the kiddo's entire school has the flu.

So I'm doomed either way. It's not all my neighbor's fault.

Then my body had an adrenal flashback. Dreams of lower back pain that woke me up because of the real back pain and left me exhausted by dawn. Stomach pain. Stomach flu type GI upset (although nothing ever really happened, I was just threatened with it for hours).

I couldn't figure out what the deal was but then I connected the dots...I'm probably fighting whatever bug is going around. Or  not. But many a time the adrenals flare before I'm objectively sick with a bug. I'm crossing everything this is the worst of it and I hope we don't linger for a month before we succumb like we did with that stomach flu a while back. If the puke is going to rain down, let's just get it over with.

Not the Only One Anymore

It's now PCOS plus one in my family. At least they aren't first and can, hopefully, benefit from my experience. The email I sent them today...

Are your LH and FSH ratios inverted? If anyone other than a reproductive endo looked at you and your labs..take it all with a grain of salt. Especially since you are not text book. The REs are the real experts on the hormone levels. There are all sorts of variations. As an example, my testosterone and androgen levels are fine but my LH/FSH are all messed up and I will have a good A1C but a high total insulin (of course the steroids don't help).

The shortcoming of the RE is that they don't care about your heart or diabetes risk, they just want to put a baby in your belly lol. So you might want to search the medical literature for patients like you and track down a nearby PCOS expert to gauge what, if anything, else you need to worry about.

I could not take Clomid...I reacted to it like a recreational drug, totally high with disruptions in vision which made it a no-no for me. So I moved on to injectables and then IVF.  If you do Clomid I would pester them to monitor via transvaginal ulstrasound so they know how many follicles are 'ripe' so you can decide if you want to risk multiples or not. This was/is not the standard of care but it's also how folks end up with too many babies. The best way to control for multiples is IVF two embryo transfer...but it will break your bank. Then again, twins or quads will mess you up financially too. So pick your poison.

I also would not get pregnant without knowing your progesterone levels. You will miscarry if they are low. Progesterone is usually administered via injection in the butt, but it is painful and can leave lumpy scars. I insisted on vaginal suppositories from a compounding pharmacy and the science supports this as being effective for maintaining pregnancy. Most REs know to check for this, if they don't I would be concerned about the clinic's quality of care.

Go to your local Resolve.org support groups...they know which doctors and clinics are good and are up on the latest research.

Let me know if I can help! Try not to stress about it...I've been there, I know it's not easy but don't let it eat you up. You are young and likely on the 'light' end of the PCOS spectrum...I would not imagine that you wouldn't get pregnant. I'm on the fubar'd might as well have Cushing's end (indeed some PCOSers actually have Cushing's).  I am very lucky to have my girl!

One more thing...The only big piece of wisdom I have to impart is time is more expensive than money when dealing with infertility. I spent four years trying to be cheap and now I am too old to pursue a second child in good conscience. My health is much worse now with the asthma and steroid side effects. On top of that, I'm almost 40. If I'd just sucked it up and done IVF that first year, I might've been able to have more kids.

So don't focus on the price tag, focus on efficacy and making sure you have time left to have more kids down the road, if you want them.

Loose End, Tied

That would be an emphatic yes on the tricked out glammed out rocket ship and space suit (although she might decide silver lame is fashion enough).

Total girlie girl. Who is also going to be a nerd.

For the record, she's the one saying she wants "more science stuff." However, I don't think she's thought through the implications on the pink and glitter front. Sadly, they are mutually exclusive. (Anyone else thinking how kick ass it would be to pair a lab coat Barbie with an awesome glam microscope and pre-made slides? No? Just me?)

I'm going slightly crazy this month for Christmas. We have money for once and I am decently healthy for once...it's hard not to overbuy as I have an abundance of the two rarest commodities in my life. Next year I will make more of an effort to restrain myself  (see also: the fiscal cliff will eat our disposable income and go after the money we need for groceries) but I'm not going to deny a Happy Christmas this year. Not after such a long period of suck.

Anyway, I just did a little mini workout and am cooling down by blogging with a side of steaming hot (low carb) chocolate. That's not how you end your workouts? You are missing out!

The kiddo is sick. Again. Good Lawd. She's coughing at night and has gunk in the lungs. I am mildly concerned.

There are only 7 kids in her pre-k class (yes, that is awesome) so I don't get how we're doing back-to-back sick. Hmmm. And I have no idea how I'm staying out of the fray (please don't let it ever end though).

I finally finished a project I was working on before my hospitalization in 2010...the kiddo's 2009 baby book. It just arrived in the mail today. It had lingered untouched in Shutterfly's system for so long I wasn't able to edit anything, so I had to order it with four blank pages in the back. Finished is more a euphemism for 'I opened my wallet and bought something.' If I could've edited I would've though. Does that count?

That last paragraph was really all I wanted to say. I do tend to go off in tangents, don't I?

Okay, gotta run. Time to kick this day's ass. Boo yah!

A Riff

I want to be five again. My daughter heals so fast that it makes me feel my advancing years and slow motion cellular response to injury. Her head bump was much better the next day. I checked on her all through the night and she woke up in full hyperactive puppy mode....running through the house and cutting paper like mad with the result that my house now looks like we hold regular ticker-tape parades.

Thank goodness.

The relief was immense.

We are almost ready for Christmas. I think I'm done shopping for my chickadee. There's some pressure as we're trying to avoid a repeat of last year where the educational presents were legion and she had no idea what anything was.

I will never forget how polite she was about it, opening each gift and staring it as she tried to puzzle out wtf it was. She said thank you very sweetly before chucking it over her shoulder and moving on to the next, her body language tight with hope that the next gift would make sense.

I felt so bad last year. Yes, she had gifts, lots of gifts, but they didn't impart joy or delight, just confusion.

This year, I've tried to remember she is all about the girl bling. The name of the game is balancing our need to shower her with microscopes and books with her raison d'etre, which appears to be pink glitter.

This may possibly involve my husband in the garage on Christmas Eve trying to glam up a microscope.

Okay, we probably won't do that, but let the record show we are fully capable of doing so. We have glitter and paint guns and an assortment of specialty paints. It wouldn't exactly be outside the realm of our weirdness.

So anyway, head injury crisis averted. I have no idea how my parent is doing, but assume we would've heard by now if the dogs had killed them off.

Infertility: The Gift that Keeps on Giving

I did not like my day today. Saw my parent who just had spine surgery and is recovering while navigating a gauntlet of love in the form of two rambunctious dogs.

Upon their arrival home from the hospital, one dog jumped and slammed into their groin, causing them to double over, a huge no-no post surgery. We thought they would have to go back to the hospital, it was so bad.

It would be funny if it wasn't so tragic.

Today's visit was better. Of course, the other dog jumped on my parent's stomach twice. It will be a miracle if their recovery continues uncomplicated.

Then the groin smasher pup nosed into my coat pocket like a thief and stole a sucker. Because these dogs have no training or boundaries, the dog was aggressive when I took the sucker back.

Yeah, well, my dog philosophy can be summed up thusly 'hello, bitch, I'm your alpha.' So you bet I got  that sucker back. Dog meets reality smack down.

By the way, we have the two sweetest, most well behaved labs you'll ever meet. Boundaries aren't just for kids. They work for dogs too! I wish my parents would try it sometime.

And yes, I offered to take the younger most hyperactive dog and also suggested they kennel both dogs for a while. What they do or don't do about it is out of my control.

This was not the low of my day. I wish. It just added to the tension.

Before we left to see my parent, the hubby rough housed with the kiddo and she ended up slamming her forehead into a wall. Hard. OMG. So hard.

Huge goose egg. Immediate bruising. Crying inconsolably.

I checked her pupils, administered ice and gave her some Motrin. She was a little confused about an hour later and still doesn't feel great, but otherwise seems okay. The goose egg is much smaller than it was. I am keeping a very close eye on her and confining her to quiet activity.

I spent the ride down to my parents' house crying in the front seat. I hate crying. Loathe it. But my daughter was hard won after a brutal fight with infertility. Seeing her with a potentially serious injury just gutted me. My stomach was a pit of fear for hours today and it sucked.

Five years after I 'won' my battle with infertility and nine years after I started trying to get pregnant, I am still not free of its grip.

Troll

You should see the spam I got on my last post....someone felt it was germane to share a link to a doctor profile featuring naked patients. I gather the guy is a plastic surgeon.

Why anyone thinks it helps their career to get a back link on my blog escapes me. The SEO of  plastic surgery? Not a concept I am familiar with.

For that reason, comments will continue to require moderation forever and ever, amen.

Also, trolls have been a problem. For a while, folks with IPs associated with various .edu or medical organizations felt the need to tell me I was depressed. At length.

Sigh.

I just...there really is no hope for patients like me. If you want to find a way out of bad health, you have to find it. Medicine's default setting is to throw anti-depressants at you while scornfully rolling their eyes at your temerity to have a different perspective.

Of course, I never had a real life physician tell me I needed anti-depressants, just the pretend ones on the internet. So I either got really lucky or the folks who troll patient blogs aren't such hot shots. I don't know. Probably both are true given that most patients with difficult-to-diagnose conditions usually do end up on anti-depressants at some point.

Then, recently, I stumbled across an online conversation of various medical blog personalities and they were colluding to troll patient blogs. That was scary to read. My stomach sank when I saw it.

So keep your comment moderation on and set fingers to delete. And if you're frustrated or angry...you're not necessarily depressed, you're just a patient at the mercy of merciless medicine. The trolls will make sure you don't forget it either.