The privilege February 9, 2010

It is cold (it is snowing!) and I have a cold and it has gone to my chest and I wheeze like an asthmatic accordion when I laugh. Like Muttley. I’m not sure H is up to being Dick Dastardly, but he is valiantly expressing his thoughts on his state of mind here, and own cold through the medium of Loud Sniffing.

(I always longed for them to catch Penelope Pitstop and batter her idiotic car to pink shrapnel and make her eat her own lipstick. I’m a bit weird about gender politics).

Work wasn’t too bad. I was dreading it, as I am coming to find Being Spoken To a trial of nerves not far short of waxing the backs of my ankles (I have fetlocks. Go PCOS!). Luckily, I was scheduled to spend my ‘counter hours’ in the basement, shifting stock around. It was very cold in the basement, which is unheated – and did I mention it’s been snowing? – which no doubt did my wheezy chest an almighty power of good, but the solitude was marvellous.

It’s very tiring, this grieving business. I have two particular issues with it.

Firstly, there’s too much of it to do. It took me bloody nearly a whole fucking year to feel more or less ‘over’ Pikaia. Note ‘over’, not over. You never go back to being the same person you were before. Not that every day of that year was a misery and a torment, not at all. But it was a year before I could think of Pikaia and say to myself ‘ah, well,’ rather than ’shitshitshitshitshit’.

I can’t claim the Halloween miscarriage was of the same heart-shattering calibre. We never had the chance to get emotionally invested. It was painful (ohhhh, Jesus, was it ever painful) and very bloody and actually really quite fucking scary, and then it was over, and I spent a couple of weeks getting my breath back, and then I went back to work and plunged head-first into family birthdays and visits and lookie here, I did have a meltdown about a month later because I Just. Couldn’t. Take. It. There was the visit to the Recurrent Miscarriage Clinic, which wound me up no end before and after. And then it was Christmas and so we had Christmas. And then I was pregnant again. Which went so very well.

Crucially, I hadn’t even remotely finished dealing with the Halloween Miscarriage when Zombryo came, and lingered, and went. I was commuting to work all of December with my teeth clenched, thinking ‘it’s not long until Christmas, and then I get ten days off work and a breather, and then it will be easier to cope with.’ Ah. Well. Like a clown getting laboriously to his feet after his colleague has just knocked him flat with the ladder he’s carrying over his shoulder. And there’s the other end of the ladder, swinging towards him as his pal turns to see what happened. Straight to the back of the head. Down he goes again. Just like that, only I wear sensible shoes. Face-down in the saw-dust, winded. Thinking ‘but I was hit in the face only a moment ago. What the hell? What the hell?’

Going back to work is important, because I want to keep my job and feel vaguely useful and not sit in the house brooding all day like a splenetic hen. Going back to work is shitty, because I am a splenetic hen. And I am a habitual aborter. And egg-bound. And probably moulting.

Secondly (did any of you remember there was a secondly? Well done) grieving is a big fat hairy issue for me because I still don’t really understand what happened.

Well, yes, obviously I got pregnant, repeatedly, in my own bed, because I humped my husband.

Zombryo, I conceived completely inadvertently while humping for fun, as I hadn’t a clue I was ovulating and thought we were nowhere near The Time Of The Dutiful Shagathon yet. For fun! I conceived a baby for fun! Like a normal human female! OK, so the ‘normal human female’ part promptly went to buggery. Honestly? That makes it all the more confusing.

I spent three years learning the painful, ugly lesson that my PCOS and mono-ovaried state between them had made ovulating and getting pregnant near-impossible without medical intervention. It’s a weird lesson to unlearn, and I can’t quite shake it. It makes these precious, longed for, completely ruined conceptions look all the more peculiar. They couldn’t really have happened to me. That isn’t how it works. That wasn’t what we were threatened with, it wasn’t on the cards.

When I was six, I longed with the ridiculous longing of a six-year-old for a piggy-bank. I have no idea why I wanted one so, but I did. And lo, I was given one for Christmas! A splendid one, patterned with flowers on its flanks and wearing a benevolent expression of good-cheer. I owned it for less than thirty minutes before I tripped and dropped it, irretrievably, on the tile floor. Oh, it was only a bloody piggy-bank, I was only six. But that feeling? Of guilt, horror, and bewildered astonishment at the catastrophic unfairness of it all? That I remember.

Later, years later, I discovered that most of my peers had the sort of parents who would have unquestioningly replaced the damn piggy-bank. I had no idea that that was an option. In the event, it wasn’t an option my parents could consider – we were dirt poor at the time – and I have no doubt my mother was nearly as distressed over the whole stupid incident as I was, especially as she got to spend my birthday tea tweezering china shards out of my knees and palms.

Pikaia, Flash-in-the-Pan, Zombryo, all irreplaceable. The mess and the pain of the clear-up, all unavoidable. And then there’s the senseless, pointless guilt, the rage, the longing for a do-over, the miserable bitter awareness that other people have no idea what you’re crying over, as it has never occurred to them that these things could be difficult, impossible, ruined, taken away, broken, irreplaceable, unreplaced.

To paraphrase Jane Austen, who was wise about hopeless longing, all the privilege I claim for my own kind (it is not a very enviable one; you need not covet it), is that of loving longest, when existence or when hope is gone.

How many items can you tick? February 6, 2010

Item – I am being very much bothered by insomnia, free-floating anxiety, irritability, inability to concentrate, strong desire to cry, finding myself unable to cry whenever I’m tucked up somewhere safe where a good cry would be appropriate, total feeling of meh even where cool things like going to concerts and finding out-of-print books by intriguing authors are concerned. It’s making work absolute hell, even though work is being no more than normally infuriating, and I get home in a state of nervous prostration and spend the evening catatonic in front of the telly. Which I’m not really watching. Can’t concentrate.

Item – According to both Beck’s and Goldberg’s Depression Inventories I am severely depressed. No shit, Sherlock.

Item – Actually, Christ, that’s depressing, being officially depressed.

Item – I’m not sure why I even bothered looking any of it up because seriously? How the hell else am I supposed to feel?

Item – We had family over to dinner on Thursday, and we went out to a concert after work on Friday, and ended up in the pub discussing French anti-romantic composers. No, really, we did. We’re that kind of crowd. So I have actually been behaving like a properly socialised human. I don’t think the family and friends would have said I was severely depressed. A little subdued, perhaps. Not quite as quick and funny as usual. Impressively navy under-eye Louis Vuittons. But, you know, depressed? Never. Tired, that’s the word. May was tired.

Item – May is tired. And yet she has done nothing more strenuous all day than wave a half-empty lager bottle at the rugby and complain that the Azzurri are a bunch of bunchy bunchers who wouldn’t understand forward momentum if it chewed the arse out of their shorts (which, alas, it was doing in fifteen green jerseys).

Item – H is going to try and lure me out of the house tomorrow with promises of brunch. If we survive the brunch, we are going to The Big Park in the hope that stomping about in the cold fresh air looking at trees for hours on end will do me some good. Wish him luck.

Item – I am hoping everything will look a little less dismal if when if WHEN we get some answers from Miss Consultant on Wednesday. It was a royal pain in the betonkas, arranging a vast great wedge of the day off work so I can spend it being sneezed on in a hospital waiting room. I arranged an even larger wedge than necessary so I could try and wangle a visit with Doc Tashless before-hand, so I could have some idea of what these bedamned blood tests say and what that means. I feel the only way to defeat Miss Consultant’s glassy imperturbability is to be twice as well-informed as that, even.

Item – If Miss Consultant brings up the subject of my weight, I will kill her. Or myself. Possibly both. Only, I shall reserve the Death By Chocolate for myself.

Item – When I was a depressed and anxious teenager, I was thin as a damn stick and ate next to nothing for days on end. How? How did I manage it, how? And while you’re working it out, pass me another chunk of stuffed buttered paratha.

Item – It’s nearly midnight and I should be in bed. I don’t want to go. Lying awake in the dark listening to my heart pounding is only very, very slightly preferable to going to sleep and dreaming of ditches full of rain and dead brambles. My imagination can be ever so Brontë when it tries.

Done February 3, 2010

I had taken the morning off work so I could peaceably trundle down to Mothership Hospital after the main onslaught of rush-hour, and had had no intention at all of leaping out of bed the minute the radio-alarm came on. For muddle-headed reasons neither of us can fathom, H nevertheless went straight into his ‘prising May out of bed’ routine*.

I therefore started the day somewhat lacking in gruntle. The lack of sleep, you see. Very disgruntling. Also, does something destructive to my powers of reason.

Anyway, answers! We need answers! So, as the EPU nurse was taking my blood, I quizzed her about the lack of proper bleeding. She pointed out on my notes that my always-pretty-low HCG had been going down very slowly, and under those circumstances it is not unusual to merely spot non-stop for over two weeks (like what I did). I mentioned that I hadn’t spotted for days now. That too is normal. Last time I had an ultrasound my lining looked thin, so I may even not bleed at all until ‘my cycle re-establishes itself’.

Not sure what I make of that.

I then tried to cajole my recurrent miscarriage blood tests out of her. Oh, please, I said, pleasepleaseplease I’m in limbo here please? Senior Doctor hasn’t got back to me and I don’t know what’s going on please?

She duly checked on the computer system and said, yes, my results were there, but she didn’t know what they meant and couldn’t interpret them for me. I asked for a print-out, at least, and she shook her head mournfully. She can’t interpret them for me. Oh, she could tell me my FSH. It was 3. But not the others.

I could see them on the screen, just slightly out of my focal length. Argh.

But wait! I can ask my GP for them, apparently! My GP can access the Mothership computer system and print them out for me and tell me all about them! That’s the best solution! Yes? Yes! OK? I mean, God forbid that anyone attempts to interpret their own blood test results. That way madness lies.

And as I opened my mouth to point out once again that I didn’t want her to interpret them, just GIVE THEM TO ME FOR CRIKEY’S SAKE, she added, very firmly, ‘you must not try to get pregnant until after you’ve been seen by the clinic.’

Now this was an excellent tactic for getting me to shut the fuck up, because I was stunned into total, meek, compliant silence for a good few minutes. And then I promised to go and talk to my GP. And then I left.

Work did not utterly suck, and I even did a (very) small amount of whateverthehell it is they pay me to do. Something to do with books? Possibly. I remember there were books. And… shelves?

The EPU did not call me back until I was on the train heading home again (oh, perfect timing).

My HCG has, now, finally gone down to ‘less than one’. Less than one! You couldn’t get less pregnant if you were monk. I felt relieved and pleased and miserable and weepy all at once, and have continued to do so all evening.

And when H got home, we Discussed Contraception (or, H looked wistful while I added ‘condoms’ to the shopping list). Because, while The Positive Thinking Fairy is quite sure the nurse was just being boiler-plate cautious, had no idea what the tests meant, yada yada, every other nerve in my body has joined Bitter McTwisted in the ’she wouldn’t tell you because she knows it’s baaaaaad‘ corner and tonight I shall not sleep and Lord alone knows if I shall ever sleep again.

PS – FSH of 3 during luteal phase (I was 6dpo when the test was taken). Any thoughts?

*(Nag. Make tea. Place tea out of May’s reach in next room. Tell May all about the lovely steaming tea. Nag some more. Gently remove duvet. Firmly re-remove duvet. Look reproachful when May, standing in the kitchen with one sock and no bra on, complains the tea is cold).

Je suis distrait February 2, 2010

Item – Many apologies for being such a lamentably poor commentator at the moment. Is bad. I knows. And now you’ll all be telling me I have every reason to be underinvolved in the social niceties at the moment and it’s no biggie, and I will feel relieved for approximately seventeen seconds before the bad recrudesces, because pointless self-flagellation is one of my favourite pastimes.

Item – I had to ask my boss for the morning off work tomorrow (for my Seventh Beta of Hell). She said yes on the instant. Not only that, but I was late today, and instead of skinning me alive with her laser glare of disapproval, she told me on no account to stay on after hours to make up the time, and to make sure I got a proper tea-break before lunch. Um. Who are you and what have you done with my boss?

Item – The fact that Madame Persnicketty the Perfectionist Boss (disclaimer: I actually like the woman. And I too am persnicketty. Just ask H about the washing-saucepan-handles saga) is being so gentle with me is being noticed. I came back into the office with the afore-mentioned cup of tea to catch the tail-end of a ‘well, what’s up with May?’ remark from That Colleague Who Always Knows Everyone’s Business. So, that was awkward. (I pretended to be deaf).

Item – The subject of Chinese New Year floated up. ‘It’ll be the Year of the Tiger!’ someone announced, ‘It’s lucky to be born in the Year of the Tiger, so I know lots of couples who are planning on having kids before next Christmas!’ and the rest of the room chorused ‘awwww, bless!’. This minutes before I had to go and Deal With the Public for a couple of hours, so I pretended to be profoundly deaf and clenched my teeth very hard I will not I will not think of my due dates I will not.

Item – My due dates would have been 3rd of July, 2010, and 14th of September, 2010.

Item – I don’t really want to have another blood test. Not that I mind the trekking about, or being stuck with needles (wait, OK, maybe I do mind that a teeny weeny bit. But only a teeny weeny bit). It’s the wait between leaving the clinic and someone getting around to phoning me back. I will be at work during that wait. I will be half-insane with anxiety. If on Thursday the newspapers are full of a story about a librarian who rammed a date-stamp down someone’s throat and validated their bottom, well, oops, you’ll all know my real name.

Item – Speaking of half-insane with anxiety, I am not sleeping at the moment.

Item – Speaking of not sleeping at the moment, I wish H would either snore, so I could banish him to the spare room, or not snore, so I wouldn’t have to. Making sudden, entirely random thunderous snorting noises every two hours or so is not playing fair in the least.

Item – H played more Chase-The-Consultant-By-Telephone today, and entirely failed to talk to any human beings at all. He couldn’t even leave a message, because certain secretarial persons were clearly sneaking away from their desks without switching the answer-phone on. The Power of the Testosterone Voice only works if someone gets to hear it. Grrrr.

Item – I don’t want to go to bed because lying awake in the dark waiting for H to go *SNNORRRK* is very boring and dreary.

You wouldn’t like me when I’m angry February 1, 2010

In the comments on my last post, HFF had a suggestion so very sensible I immediately yelped ‘why in buggeration didn’t I think of that?’

So I tackled H about it last night. I told him I was finding this all very hard indeed, and I asked him if he would take over at least some of the test-result-chasing and doctor-harrasslement for me.

Perhaps we had better not dwell at length on the subsequent screaming melt-down I had when he acted, shall we say, less than enthused? by the idea. In H’s defence, I must make it clear that he never at any point at all said he wouldn’t do it. All he did say was that he didn’t feel very confident about it and didn’t know where to start, and anyway, the clinics etc. might not release information to him as he was not me.

In my defence, seriously? And I am confident? I know where to start? I have had such amazing luck getting them to release my results to me and I am me? And then, naturally, there was a digression about who, exactly, was doing all the heavy lifting in terms of physical suffering and hormonal crash-and-burn, not to mention intense and instant emotional involvement because it’s my fucking insides our children are fucking refusing to live in.

*ahem*

When the green hue had faded from my skin, and I had brushed my teeth, I got my head around the idea that he wasn’t refusing, he was merely whining about it like a fourteen-year-old, and that this doesn’t actually mean no. And with any luck he got his head around the fact that it is very important to say ‘yes, of course I will!’ with puppyish enthusiasm before embarking on all the reasons why doing a grieving hormonal weeping anxst-ridden wife a favour is mildly inconvenient (and I may have mentioned (with ultra-sarcastic eye-rolls) the magic of Google for finding those tricky little things like contact details for World! Famous! Renowned! Clinics! I mean, the man is an internet professional. He gets paid for knowing about things like Google. Gah).

(H would no doubt like to counter here that I am an information professional, and get paid for knowing how to use things like Google).

Anyway.

It empurples me with rage to acknowledge it (what with me being one of they shouty feminist types) but, with the honourable exception of Doc Tashless, every clinic/doctor we’ve had dealings with has been noticeably more cooperative and forthcoming when H gets involved (I jest not. It’s 2010. This fucks me off but absolutely). It is, however, one good hard reason for wanting H to do the chasing despite the thick layer of tarnish now coating my ‘a woman needs a man like a fish needs a bicycle’ sash brooch.

To recap: May has fertility issues and recurrent miscarriages and tries to get answers, and she can just damn’ well wait for referrals and results until the assorted clinics damn well please (or, the end of May, in this case. Well beyond the end of May’s patience). H’s wife has fertility issues and recurrent miscarriages and he tries to get answers, and suddenly they’ve found us an appointment with the Assisted Conception Unit next week.

ARRRRRRRGH. Also, thank fuck for that.

H is going to call Miss Consultant’s secretary tomorrow to make sure Miss Consultant has the blood test results with her when we see her, so we don’t waste everyone’s time.

Senior Doctor’s secretary has gone on holiday, so H couldn’t tackle her directly about the blood-test results which totally have not turned up in the post, appeared in my in-tray, been relayed to me by any method whatsoever, since I spoke to her last Monday (And so we have no idea if Senior Doctor is now aware I have now gained the requisite number of Frequent Flyer Miles for him to take me seriously. And no idea if he’s ever going to get back to me so I can slap him dramatically across the face with an inch-thick print-out of pub-med articles about thyroid antibodies and miscarriage (you can read about my visit to Senior Doctor at the Recurrent Miscarriage Clinic here. See?)).

H is also making plans to call Professor Regan’s clinic and enquire about referral times and fees for going privately and such.

I think I scared H just a little last night.

Still here January 30, 2010

I went back to work, and work was merely being it’s normal dull, reassuring, mildly irritating, busy, finicking self. Nevertheless, by Friday I was weepy with tiredness. You’d've thought that The Powers That Be had made me rebuild all four storeys of book-stacks from scratch while fighting off a herd of wildebeest and negotiating Israeli-Palestinian peace. Actually, They made a valiant attempt to limit my hours on the front desk (thwarted by my colleagues falling ill in relays) and let me off anything involving heavy lifting.

And my colleagues were fine too. They divided neatly into those who came over to tell me they were glad I was back, and to hope I was better now, and then delicately nipped off again, and those who literally fled from the room when I came into it in their desperate desire not to be entangled in an awkward exchange (next time we met, we’d both pretend I’d never been away at all and talk earnestly about rotas and such until it all felt natural again).

Physically, the Cute Ute is lost in the Land of Meh. I have been spotting non-stop since, well, since the first day I mentioned I was spotting (when was that, by the way? Let me check – oh, right. Since the 14th. That’s more than two weeks ago now. ARGH). The cramps and back-ache are intermittent, and not so very bad. In fact, I don’t think I’ve had any all week. See? Meh.

I don’t know what the ‘meh’ means, though, in terms of whateverthefuck is going on inside. Have I completely miscarried and is this just my hormones settling? In which case, where the fucking fuck was all the blood? Is an apple-pip-sized Zombryo still clinging on with an HCG level of stupidly-just-above-totally-dead? (Probably). We shall find out on Wednesday, as I have taken the morning off work to haul ass down to Mothership Hospital for the Seventh Beta of Hell.

And I have to somehow, some-fucking-how, find the strength and with-it-ness to call the RMC about the blood-tests in December AGAIN, and call Doc Tashless to ask about referrals to Professor Regan and her Clinic Of Excellence In These Matters, and call the ACU and point out the end of May is a craptastic date for a referral, also, what the buggery hell do they want to see me for, given that they’ve sent me off to wait for IVF (ahahahahah)? Can they do anything about this situation?

I do not really have that strength right now. All the excitement and immediate fuss and bustle is over, and life is carrying right on with its usual spectacular tactlessness, and it’s now, now, that my sense of humour has completely deserted me and all I want to do is cry and possibly take narcotics.

I can’t bear the thought that I’ve lost at least three babies. I can’t bear it, I can’t bear it, I can’t bear it.

I have to bear it.

FAIL day January 26, 2010

I did not sleep Sunday night. At all. Not even in a dozing-between-glaring-at-the-alarm-clock-on-the-hour way. I lay under my duvet like a particularly rigid I-beam, and watched my thoughts hurl themselves endlessly against the bars. They’re not very bright at 3 am, my thoughts. And then, because I was not asleep, I kept needing to pee, so I kept waking H up. And H was being so very sweet about it. If I’d've been H I’d've beaten me senseless with the bed-side table on the third go-around. Perhaps he didn’t because I made a noble attempt to beat myself senseless on the bed-side table, by completely misjudging its position with relation to my ascending head as I forced a bend into my I-beam and levered myself off the mattress for the umteenth widdle.

Ow.

So Monday morning, I utterly failed to go to work. I was tired to the point of mental incapacity, my head hurt, and, you know, sod it. Sod it all. Sod it very hard indeed.

In an attempt to derail Bitter McTwisted from grinding on and on about my immense uselessness to the entire human race not least my own self, I spent the day playing phone-tag with the Recurrent Miscarriage Clinic instead. Oh, and laundry and dishes. I did them too.

I finally got hold of Senior Consultant’s Secretary mid-afternoon, and explained to her that I had seen Senior Consultant at the beginning of December, and he had sent me off to have eight vials of blood drawn, and then referred me back to the Assisted Conception Unit who would allegedly discuss these results with me, and lo, after setting my attack-GP on them I had received the referral letter at last, and excuse me? 26 of May appointment? I also pointed out I had had another miscarriage since I had seen Senior Consultant, bringing my Official Count to three. And that making me wait until the end of May to even begin to discuss the results, let alone do any follow-up or repeat testing, was Not On.

The secretary agreed, and told me what I really needed to do was get my GP to refer me to Professor Lesley Regan’s clinic at St. Mary’s Hospital, Paddington. She, you see, is Britain’s ultimate expert on recurrent miscarriage.

Oh.

Wait, what?

Is it normal for the secretary of a given clinic to tell people that actually, they want to dump this clinic and go to another clinic? Even in the NHS?

And then she delved into the depth of the Mothership computer system to find my blood-tests for me, and found that they’d all been creatively mis-filed under the pile of beta HCGs I’ve had this month and I had to explain again and again I’d had eight vials drawn. Eight. She could find four. Was she sure those weren’t the beta HCGs? She would check. Tap tap tap. Mutterings about people messing with the system in her absence. Eventually I heard the printer on her desk start up and she assured me she would take the whole lot to Senior Consultant and get his interpretation of them and have him get back to me.

And then told me I should really, really get myself referred to Lesley Regan.

I thanked her enthusiastically and hung up.

Naturally I googled the everlovin’ out of Professor Lesley Regan, and yes, she does head the biggest Infertility and Recurrent Miscarriage clinic in Britain, and has written a book, and did all sorts of pioneering work on Hughes Syndrome.

So. Um. I must admit it was a very clever way for the secretary to distract me from the royal half-assedness of my blood-test results/ACU referral.

And now I must put my Big Girl Panties on and really go to work.

The Positive Thinking Fairy and Bitter McTwisted go baking January 24, 2010

I mentioned, in my last post, that today I would be bigging up some more of my exceedingly cool friends. And so I shall. Because, seriously, the sheer overwhelming coolness of my friends makes me feel quite giddy.

I met Ben and her lovely husband back in the days when they were still Ben and her lovely ‘it’s complicated’. I met them on the internet. In, I think, 2004? Golly, you guys. Six years! I knew I owed you both dinner and a drink and stuff, but I think I also now owe you some kind of award for longevity. I met my Friend Who Knows Who She Is at about the same time, or, at any rate, on the same site, and she called me nearly every day while we were on exploding tube watch. And, as she is a funny, funny lady, cheered me up immensely whenever she did so. And I owe her and her family dinner as well (hey, Sol, tell B we now have a Wii Fit! He can practice ski-jumping this time!).

Therefore, as far as I am concerned, the internet is the best place to make friends. I was proved right yet again in May 2008. I was having my first miscarriage [pause while we all contemplate what a depressing phrase 'having my first miscarriage' is] when I first came across the astonishingly funny and adorable Hairy Farmer Family. It says a lot about just how funny HFF is that I promptly, despite own agony of mind, hurled myself into her (then, alas, all-too-short) back-log bellowing ‘nomnomnomMOAR FUNNIEZ’. But wait! HFF promptly commented back! And proved herself sweet and kindly as well as hilarious. Within weeks, I was all, ‘this is my long-lost twin sister and soul-mate and general all-around person I want to have a drink with’.

And then I contrived to invade her house and eat her cakes.

On Friday, proving that a year-and-three-quarters have taught her everything she ever needs to know about The Way To May’s Heart, she came all the way down to the Great Wen to have lunch with me.

And, because she is witty, and kind, and knows what The Bad Sad Place is like (and really, Universe? Someone as sweet and kind as the Hairy Farmer Wifey should know the Bad Sad Place? Universe, you suck), and because she is, as I mentioned, very much a girl after my own heart, she made me eat my own words:

(I did save some for H. I am so good to that man).

(Um, yes, I had already eaten one by the time H took the photo. I am human, you know).

And now, a pretty January 23, 2010

My lovely friend Ben and her equally lovely husband sent me these a few weeks ago, as a ‘damn, it’s a Zombie Embryo’ consolation gift.

Britain was still under inches and inches of shiny white fluff at the time, so H put on his photographer’s zen mellow and spent an afternoon in the yard with his second-best camera (while I lay in bed and stared irritably at the snow-reflections on the ceiling). And then the flowers came back into the warm and decorated the dining-table for over a week. And then, we got to keep the rather glamorous green glass vase. Yes! They came with a vase! Fabulous present, eh?

And THEN it took me this long to remember to ask H to email me a jpg of the flowers, so I could boast to the internets about just how amazing and wonderful my friends are.

I’m a bit… scatty… at the moment. Sorry about that.

More boasting about my exceedingly cool friends tomorrow. Stay tuned!

By the living hokey, ENOUGH January 20, 2010

I am very very sick of trekking down to Mothership Hospital for repeat beta HCG tests. I have now had six of them. SIX. Yes, six (6).

Admittedly this one was the epitome of How These Things Should Go. Arrive at the Early Pregnancy/Acute Gynaecology Unit. Tell the receptionist why I’m there. She sees I am not in the diary and looks back, ah, yes, I was here last week. She now knows where my file is, rescues it, and hands it to the Staff Nurse. Therefore, I’ve only just taken my coat off and sat down in the waiting room when the Staff Nurse calls me in to the exam room for the needling. (H declines to come and hold hands (oh, bless him. He is determined to be supportive, but would be more hand-held than hand-holding while the the steel was being sunk into my flesh)).

Staff Nurse is very kindly and friendly and extremely gentle with the needle, and goes over my history quickly with me while we wait for the computer to log her in so she can print out my test label. She is a little surprised that I have not started bleeding yet. She assures me that, oh, I will bleed. Hurrah. She tells me they will call me back late this evening – they are very busy – with the results.

I go home, and H goes on to work.

Staff Nurse then startles me by calling back mid-afternoon (what? Why?) with the results:

17.

(Zombryo, darling child, what on earth are you loitering about in this distressing and nerve-shredding manner for? Shoo, I say, shoo).

Staff Nurse also tells me that while the doctors at the EPU think things are going more or less in the ‘right’ direction (AUGH), they do not wish to discharge me yet. What with the weirdness of the dates (to recap, I got a positive pregnancy test on CD 15, while bleeding quite lavishly, leading to a ‘well, was that a period or wasn’t it? Is this the same miscarriage as I had in October? (Almost certainly not, as I’d been released then with a beta of <5). When the hell did I ovulate?‘ moment of medical disorientation), they want to be absolutely sure my HCG has gone back to Officially Totally UnPregnant before they tidy my file away. So I’m to go back in two weeks for a (please God) final stabbing.

OK, fine. Fine. No, really, fine.

I need to cry and eat ice-cream now.