Horse Saga

Anyone in the market for a horse?
My step daughter Rose has been horse-mad since she was 8 or 9, we started sending her to riding school when she was 10. DH had horses when he was a kid and has always wanted to buy her a horse, but I thought she would grow out of it, so I said suggested we wait until she was 13. So the week after the fire [July this year] he went out and bought a 15.3h ex-racehorse! Related to Octagonal no less!

We have learnt several things from this exercise:
1. People trying to sell a horse will blatantly lie about its training
2. Thousands of dollars spent on riding lessons do not an experienced rider make
3. A 50kg teenager is no match for a 15.3h ex-racehorse who thinks that said teenager wants him to run
4. Riding Schools use 20 year old half-lame ponies for a reason
5. No-one wants to buy a horse in the midst of an equine flu epidemic

Poor little Rosie, she thought she knew everything about horses, and specifically asked for a challenging young horse who could jump. Unfortunately Daddy took his little princess at her word and forgot she is just 13 years old and only comes here every 2nd weekend. We took him to the riding school for a couple of lessons, the instructors loved him and under their guidance he was awesome. But Rose has lost all confidence in him and won't even brush him. She says he tries to bite and kick her, but I have never seen this and she is rarely with him alone. So I think she is just making sure we do sell him.

I have had nothing to do with horses before, but I have fallen in love with this gorgeous creature. He has such a sweet nature, he whinnies and bolts across the paddock when he sees me coming, follows me around and rubs his head against me. He loves our 2 goats and if they are lying down in the grass in their paddock, he will lie down too as close to the fence as he can get. I have thought about keeping him and learning to ride myself but I don't think horse-riding and trying to get pregnant go together very well?! I will miss him when he goes....

Mutterings of a mad woman

The Debutante Ball was worse than expected [amazing but true!]. DH and I were put on a table away from the kids, but that may have been a good thing considering the Screaming Banshee's loser boyfriend-from-hell was plying 14 year old Tiger with Bourbon! DH was fuming but handled himself well. It really bothers me that we have such little say in their lives, and I worry so much about what they are exposed to in that house.

Feeling a little unhinged lately. I worry about everything and feel life is out of my control. I cry at the drop of a hat and haven't been in to the office for weeks [DH just brings it all home for me] which is really bad as he is so busy. I just can't handle any stress at the moment. We are still virtually camping in our house and the insurance company appointed builder says he can't start until after the new year. Couldn't they at least demolish the burnt parts of the house so we don't have to keep looking at it and smelling it? All I want to do is bury myself in bed all day and read, read, read. I reckon I could do it too, if only I could train my cats to bring me pots of tea.... Maybe its finally time for some happy pills?

Anyway, on a cheerier note, we had a great meeting with the Doctor this week. He discussed possibilities of why our last cycle was such a disaster - probably the drug cocktail - and went through all our previous cycles. We ran into him at the conference so maybe now he thinks we are serious and deserving of his attention. He is keen for us to try again but wants to do karotype [chromosomal] testing first. DH has been put on my Ele.vit multi-vitamins with a view to starting another cycle November or December, depending on the test results. We will do ICSI next time and add HCG injections to try and improve egg quality. In the mean time I guess I should pull myself together. I'll let you know how I go.

Life goes on

I have just attended a Fertility Society of Australia conference in Hobart this past week wearing my user group hat. Unfortunately I feel slightly jaded for the experience, confused and a bit despondent. Confused because the conference content was so scientific I rarely knew what the f*#k they were talking about, and despondent because when I did it wasn't what I wanted to hear. When you hold a conference for IVF specialist doctors, scientists, embryologists, counsellors etc you don't expect patients to turn up, and when they talk openly about women with my diagnosis and my age they don't talk as positively as they do when you're standing in front of them with hope in your eyes and a big fat cheque in your hand.

I guess one good thing to come out of it is that it's started a conversation between DH and I about what lengths we will go to to have a baby and how much longer we will continue with IVF. DH came to Hobart with me, the gorgeous supportive fella he is, but did not attend the seminars. I must admit that his presence back in the room was distracting when some science nerd was droning on about the results of some study involving monkey sperm or mouse oocytes. There was a bit of wagging and much missed afternoon sex-just-for-the-fun-of-it going on - felt like Uni days again! Not really a holiday for us but a nice break all the same.

Tonight is Batman's (oldest SS) Debutante Ball! Bound to be a blast! Naturally the Evil Stepmother has been relegated to a table in the corner with people she has never met, and will be totally ignored by all three kids lest their mother see them. Not to be outdone - she will be wearing a bright red dress with a plunging neckline and will laugh and smile like she is having a fabulous time, even though she would rather be having a wisdom tooth extraction....

My body hates me...