8 things you don't know about me...

Oh no I have been tagged.... Topcat wants me to tell you 8 random things about myself, so lets just dive right in shall we.

8. I am going to an Elton John concert in December. There, I said it out loud [kind of..]

7. I used to work in Child Protection, amazing really since I absolutely hate confrontations. Not so amazing that I burnt out within 5 years.

6. I am a huge wimp - I am scared of spiders, heights, swimming where I can't see the bottom, and sometimes I am even scared of the dark!

5. I was sexually assaulted when I was [very] young. This has obviously affected many aspects of my life, one of which is my strong belief in karma - because the mofo died of testicular cancer ;-P.

4. On my wedding day, DH's aunt told me I looked like Kim from Kath&Kim. Hmmm. Noice. Diffrent. Unusual.

3. I am a sucker for a sad movie [Babel is my latest sobber] but I also love British comedy [Black Adder, AbFab, Little Britain].

2. I knew that my DH was my soulmate almost as soon as we met, despite the unfortunate problem of us both being married to other people at the time.

1. I come from a long line of spinster/childless women and am secretly terrified of what the results of my chromosomal testing will show in 2 weeks.

Wow, I wasn't expecting to go so deep, sorry about that! There are so many women on this ride that I would like to know more about, so I am tagging two of them: LL and Bean from BayBeasts.

PS: HUGE Congratulations to Leni who has finally got herself a positive that looks like it will stick. Go Leni!

To Do List

It is a beautiful spring day here. A few Simpsons clouds in an otherwise faultless blue sky with a light, fresh breeze. My two cats, Scaredy Cat and Super Cat are stretched out on the paving in the courtyard. The most gorgeous little birds flitting cheekily around them. There are just a few blossoms left on the fruit trees and the weeping cherry [above photo taken a few weeks ago], all of the tulips have flowered this year and look just stunning. We have had quite a bit of rain lately so the grass is freshly mowed and green. The crepe myrtle I thought was dead has leaf buds everywhere and the azaleas below it are flowering. Days like this remind me why I love living in the country and having land around me.

However, beautiful days like this also show the areas of the garden I have neglected lately. We are not doing any IVF this month so I really must make time to get out there. When we are doing an IVF cycle there are so many things I can't do - some of them are like 'rules' but others I think are just my superstitions, like not handling cat poo [which can be dangerous for pregnant women] or horse poo [which probably doesn't matter], but it tends to keep me out of the garden a bit anyway.

There are loads of other things I plan to do this month while we are not cycling, such as:
Indulge in a feast of sushi and sashimi and a bottle of wine
Have lots of baths [had one last night - mmmm so relaxing]
Go to the local swimming pool at least once
Fertilise the fruit trees
Clean out the horse's paddock
Set up a compost heap
Have a day at a Spa with the girls [no kids allowed]
Get an exterminator in to kill the flying ants that are attempting to colonise our lounge room
Plant poppy seeds for summer
Walk every day

I will let you know far through the list I get....

The Drama Queen Awards...

And the Drama Queen of the Year Award goes to... *drumroll*.... Evil Stepmonster! *slight smattering of applause*...

Oh my god, I am so overwhelmed. I don't know what to say! I never win anything! Oh there are so many people to thank! First of all I must thank my ovaries for all their polycystic-infertile fun this year, and my uterus for that lovely miscarriage adventure. Thanks also to the electrical fault that almost burnt down our entire house and everyone in it. Oh, and the Screaming Banshee and Loser Boyfriend deserve a huge mention for the total lack of common-sense and responsibility they've demonstrated this year. And last, but not least, my stepson Batman for getting mindlessly drunk on the weekend, borrowing Loser's car and crashing it into a house! Thank you all so much for helping me to win this fabulous award!

My life used to be so quiet. Seriously. Before I met DH I lived on my own in a tiny wee house in a dodgy area of inner-Melbourne. Not so much as a whiff of danger or fear or drama for the whole 3 years I lived there.

Now look at me. All I did was marry a man with 3 kids and a psycho ex-wife, and try to have a baby. My life has turned into a bloody soap opera from hell! I am so sorry you have to read all this crap, but if it wasn't written down I wouldn't believe it...

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...