Month: June 2020

Posted in Trying to Become Parents Journey

Trying to Become Parents, Part 1

Posted on by babbles&brains

I’m a teacher in an alternative education school, going to school for my masters and administrative credential, my husband and I just bought a house and moved in, and from the depths of my heart and soul I want to be a mom. So much.

I got married at 23, and my husband and I wanted to wait and live children-free before we started family planning. So we waited five years. Rather, I waited impatiently, and my husband had a set date before we would start trying: January 2020. Got to be honest, I was not happy with waiting for so long, and I wanted to start trying as soon as I turned 27. However, it was my husband who needed time to feel a little more “ready,” and I know he will be an even better dad for his patience.

I don’t have a detailed knowledge of my paternal health history, so I made sure that in 2019 to get a genetic screening to see if I was a carrier for anything that would impact the health of our future child. Thankfully, I am not a carrier.

I know that for many women, they wait at least one year of trying before seeking help from their OBGYN. However, in January I made sure to seek help because I’m really impatient, AND I have irregular cycles. I didn’t have a regular period for 8 months in 2019, which means I likely wasn’t ovulating at all. In January, I had a hemorrhagic cyst (my doctor said it was tiny) and ended up in the emergency room because of the pain and all the bleeding. After checking in with my OB after the emergency room visit, we decided to work on getting my body to ovulate with Clomid (also known as Clomiphene).

I was so hopeful. I worked so hard: peeing into little cups, taking my temperature in the middle of the night, checking cervical mucus, doing the horizontal-no-pants-dance at the optimal times, losing weight so that it will be easier to conceive, the whole enchilada. I took Clomid for four cycles, and the last two I took Clomid at double original dose per my doctor’s instructions. All of the testing I was doing at home said I had ovulated every time.

All pregnancy results were negative, and since I took over three rounds of Clomid with no success, there was nothing else my OBGYN could do to help me get pregnant. Every single time I got a negative result, I was devastated. The last round and negative result caused me to be stuck in bed crying and hating my body for at minimum a week.

It’s okay to mourn for something that didn’t ever happen, especially if you very much wanted it to.

So I took a break from stressing myself out at the end of May through June. I mean, we had to move into our new home anyway and that was stressful enough.

Our journey to becoming parents isn’t over. We were referred to a fertility clinic and are going to get a whole gambit of testing done. Unfortunately, with the COVID-19 outbreak, I couldn’t schedule anything in June really and radiology is only doing one of the procedures I need to schedule and it’s time-sensitive. So now I have to wait for another cycle and MAYBE I’ll be able to do all the tests required. I just want to know what’s going on with my body. Do I have Poly-cystic Ovarian Syndrome? Do I have endometriosis? Is there something else that’s keeping me from ovulating? I need to know what’s going on to eradicate my irrational fear of never getting to be a parent.

I’ve always had the irrational fear that I might never be able to have a baby, because of how I came to be. Currently, I’m trying to get rid of that fear, but it’s been six months with no success even with assistance, it’s starting to feel more rational. So I’m not going to keep up all the testing and tracking right now. I just can’t do that for my sanity.

I’m not going to stop trying. I’m just going to keep working on limiting stress and keeping my body as healthy as possible, and make attempts at being patient.

Don’t wish me baby dust or send baby dust my way, that sounds way too creepy. Also, please don’t give me advice right now, it makes me feel inadequate. I mean, I have doctors who are doing their best to figure things out, and a lot of independent researching of my own. If you want to give support, the best ways for me are: prayer, good vibes, peace and calm, well wishes, eating cookies and ice cream on my behalf, and keep reading whenever I post.

I will keep you in the loop on the next update.

Posted in Miscellaneous Shenanigans

House Update! June 2020

Posted on by babbles&brains

Note: Some of the links in this post are affiliate links. You definitely do not have to use them, and I will only provide links to things I personally have used and liked, but it would totally help out a little teacher blogger!

We’ve been spending a lot of time getting the house in order in the last few weeks. Here’s an update on what we have done so far.

Step 1: Removing the wallpaper. Luckily for us and this wallpaper remover, we got all the wallpaper off in ONE DAY. ALL of it. Three rooms of wallpaper GONE. And the glue residue is really easy to remove also: just a dense sponge and hot water gets it right off. The fuzzy plaid wallpapered room needs the sponge and hot water one more time before we paint, but I am extremely happy that we were able to remove all the wallpaper.

The FUZZY plaid wallpaper is now gone, but here is the middle of the process!

Step 2: Primer and Painting. This is something we are still doing, but we finished painting the living room walls, the kitchen, the hallways, and our master bedroom. We used mold/mildew killing primer in the kitchen and will do the same in the bathrooms. I am so excited that I now have a gorgeous dark teal accent wall in our master bedroom, and it’s going to look so nice when it all comes together.

I LOVE my accent wall! The master used to be a grey-brown, and now it’s tranquil and so pretty!

Step 3: HVAC repair. Ugh this was a journey. Working with our city’s utility services has been a nightmare, and they shut off the power to our house while their offices were closed (fearing riots) with no clear information on who to contact and what to do the day we were supposed to get our HVAC repaired. Thankfully, we got it all sorted out finally, and a week later, our HVAC is running properly, filters have been replaced, and it cost double what we thought it would. Of course. Such is the life of home owning.

Step 4: All the little things and also moving and the big things. The second bathroom toilet flapper broke so we had to replace that. We moved out of our apartment and cleaned it thoroughly so we could turn in the keys, and brought everything to our new home. My niece came for a few days to help me unpack the kitchen and clean the old apartment, and that was such a great help. Our three cats were terrified of the new place for a few days, but are now adventuring everywhere and they absolutely LOVE all the windows.

There is a lot we want to accomplish with our new home, but we did move in a week ago and I’ve got the unpacking to deal with for now. More pictures will come once we get settled. Thank goodness it’s the summer so I have a little more time to unpack and organize!

We definitely purchased a project home, and have a lot of things in store, but I am so happy to make this place my own with my husband. I am SO HAPPY. Only a week living in our new home and it has been the BEST.

Sincerely, Babbles&brains