Fax Machine Patrol

As I mentioned a few posts ago, I'm seeing a fertility doctor this month.  This new guy is supposed to be the guru for helping to get people knocked up.  It's a decision that took me a while to come to, mostly because this "trying" stuff has been so hard.  Add this embarrassing gem to the mix.

You see, I had to call my OBGYN's office to have my records sent over to the new office.  No sense repeating a pap smear when I don't have to, right?

Then, I made one dumb ass decision that robbed me of my sanity for six hours.

When I called the office after school, the interchange with the receptionist went like this:

Receptionist:  "Most patients want a copy of their records as well, just in case you decide to see a third doctor. 

Me:  Oh, that seems smart.

Receptionist: Yes, and we charge you if we have to send the records out more than once, so it's just smart to have a copy. Do you want me to send them to you?"

Me (not thinking):  Sure! 

Then, I did something very dumb... I gave her my school's fax number.

I immediately ran downstairs and waited by the fax machine.  For twenty minutes.  No report.  Cell phone in pocket, I tried to call the office to see if she could send it now.  Straight to voicemail.

  It slowly dawned on me... She might send those records out at any time.  Meaning, if I somehow am not right by the fax machine to grab the reports, someone else might accidentally pick them up instead!  The gym teacher might come by and read my pap smear information!   The math teacher whose asked me several times about "when are you guys going to have kids?" could grab these and puzzle over when we started "trying"!! 

I think I started hyperventilating when I pictured my principal reading notes written by my OBGYN, like her recommendation to put my legs up.

  Holyhell&*$(#*#(@**can't believe I did that!

   So what did I do?  I stood by that fax machine for two hours.  People kept walking by, asking, "Waiting for something, Christen?" and commenting, "Don't stay here too late!" 

Uh huh, I'll try.

I constantly called the office to try desperately to get in touch with the receptionist. 

I left messages like, "Hi, this is Christen, patient of Dr. RushesMeOutOfHerOffice **not real name**, calling again.  Could you hold off on sending those results?"

and then...

"Hi, this is Christen again.  Could you please call me to let me know you received my other two voicemails??"

and then...

 "HI, THIS IS CHRISTEN CALLING AGAIN.  PLEASE DON'T SEND THOSE RESULTS!!  I'M KIND OF A PRIVATE PERSON AND I DON'T KNOW WHAT I WAS THINKING AND I'LL SEND A FRUIT BASKET... AND A BOTTLE OF WINE... AND GIVE YOUR KID FREE TUTORING SESSIONS IF YOU JUST DON'T SEND THEM TO MY PLACE OF WORK BECAUSE I REALLY DON'T WANT THE HOME EC TEACHER SEEING THAT I ASKED IF IT WAS BETTER TO HAVE SEX EVERY DAY OR TO SAVE UP DAN'S SWIMMERS!!"

I guess the receptionist is about attentive as my OBGYN because she must have left at 3:30 that day... or maybe just wanted to mind eff with me.  I never heard from her.  The fax machine just blinked at me for two hours.

The next morning, the school secretary chirped, "You're here early today, Christen!" when I arrived an hour and a half before the school day starts. 

"Just trying to get a jump start on my day," I smiled back, while thinking, Fax machine! fax machine!  I hope I'm first to the fax machine!  Maybe  she sent them last night??"

Blinking machine.  No report.

It wasn't until three hours later during my planning when I frantically called again that I was able to exhale.

Receptionist:  "Oh, hi!  I got your message yesterday.  I'll just send the results to the new doctor.  Sorry I never had a chance to call you back."

Bitch, you can forget about that fruit basket.

"A little bit pregnant"

    I was reading a friend's blog post the other day about comparisons, and it really resonated with me, especially this quote she included:

     The first thought that came to my mind: "True!"   The second thought:  "My blog is definitely my highlight reel."   From trips to recipes, inside jokes to fun projects, I keep this blog mainly as a cheesy scrapbook to things that make me happy.  I love scrolling back to look at, say, Dan's hysterical-to-himself posed pictures or re-read about our family's surprise Christmas.  That doesn't make my blog phony or embellished or untrue.   It simply focuses on my highlight reel.        

      I guess this post is about the more murky "behind the scenes".

     Lately, I've been thinking that there are few black and white things in life, but pregnancy is supposed to be one of them:  you either are, or you are not.   Like the saying goes, you can't be a little bit pregnant.

     I am not.  Just wanted to clarify that before going any further.

       Of course, you all are reasonable people who believe me the first time I say it, unlike a bold colleague the other day.  She came up to me during the ear-shattering pep rally, and I couldn't hear her question to me.  She smiled knowingly and crowed, "You're so out of it today!  I think you're pregnant!"
    
       She didn't know.   She didn't know about the boxes of ovulation tests we've blown through.  She didn't know about my feelings of wistfulness when I see other people's chubby newborns on Facebook.  She didn't know about Dan's hilariously uncomfortable visit to a certain doctor's office. She didn't know that I miscarried last year.  To be fair, she was just making a cheerily innocuous comment, hoping to be the first to discover some minor bit of gossip.

   I choked out something like, "Uh, no, not pregnant."  I thought that was the end of the interaction, but somehow it wasn't. She began to rationalize her sleuthing skills.  "You had that doctor's appointment on Monday, and you look exhausted!"  

** NOTE to self:  Re-stock concealer. **

       At this point in the conversation, I would not have been surprised if she had peeled up my shirt to poke my muffin top and squealed, "There's your baby bump!!"

        Getting pissed, I repeated again, "Seriously, NOT with child." 

      She just smirked, all Uh-huh, whatever preggers!  I'm on to you!  

      When I denied it a third time, she stopped smiling because I think she felt a bit embarrassed and chirped, "Well, it'll happen any day now!"  It was her way of being reassuring, after an exchange that felt like a punch to the (baby-less) gut.  It sucks to have to convince someone that you're not pregnant.

     Not even a little bit.

     The idea of being a little bit pregnant is, of course, false.  But it reminds me of another rather thoughtless comment made by a different teacher lately.  She had asked me about how the baby making was going, and I confessed that I was frustrated and also scared of miscarrying again, like I had the first time.  She commiserated with me about this fear, and then launched into a story about her sister losing her pregnancy at ten weeks, which was understandably devastating to her.  At the end, she said, "I mean, Christen, she was really far along, though.  It wasn't like yours where you were barely pregnant."

     Again, she just didn't know.  She didn't know what that night was like for us.  She didn't know how I couldn't stop crying, how I ransacked my house and threw the bib I bought to reveal the news to Dan, the pregnancy book, and my diary and slammed them away in a drawer that I haven't opened since.  She was trying to be reassuring that things could be worse.  I've thought a lot about this a lot and have decided that as well-intentioned as that comment was, she's just plain wrong.  There is no "barely pregnant".  I was. And even though it was over in seven weeks, it didn't make it easy to lose. I still think about it all the time.

    If it sounds like I'm throwing a pity party for myself, that's not my intention.  I know there are more extreme losses than mine, that people struggle for years with conceiving, that couples spend thousands in rounds of IVF.  There are so many things to treasure about having this time with just Dan: sleeping in, our winery visit the other day, date nights with no need for a sitter...  It's not lost on me!   If I need to be patient on waiting for a family, my best friend is a pretty damn good person to do it with.  No pun intended.  It's just lately other people's comments have mingled with my own frustration.  Anyone else been there? 

     Like I said before, there are very little things in life that are black or white.  This blog might usually show one side of my life, my highlight reel, but I thought it was worth giving some screen time to my frustrations and, yes, even sadness, too.

Hitting publish

Sometimes after writing, it's hard for me to actually hit "publish".

Let's call it what it is... my blog's identity crises. La Vida Lista has no problem with lists, to do's, and cutesy restaurant reviews. It likes to document happy times, like Dan wearing an apron with The David's junk on display from our Italy trip. It's even okay displaying snarky posts about life's hilarious hassles, like about our creepy neighbor telling us we have bats in our attic. But venting about work? People? A really shitty week? It isn't going there.

There's a half dozen posts that have never seen the light of the interweb. It makes perfect sense. I made a decision early on that I wouldn't vent about my job since people have been fired for a lot less, so you'll never see a rant about a student on here.

I knew that my blog wouldn't be a place where I would air my grievances Festivus-style about someone because I'm paranoid about causing hurt feelings. What if he or she just happened to be one of my seven readers??

And I didn't want to write about things that made me really sad because... well... I'm not sure. There's always someone who has it worse out there so it makes me kind of uncomfortable to whine. And I guess I don't really know most of you and you all don't know me. Maybe I was scared that people might make assumptions of me being sulky or a Debbie Downer or would (gasp) hit unsubscribe. Who wants to read about someone feeling blah? So instead of hitting submit, I wrote them for me, hit save, and moved on.

But I'm thinking now that this is my blog and that it's okay to write about the bad as well as the good. And you all seem so nice. So I've decided to be brave and real and write. No cutesy conclusion that ties everything together and no disclaimers. Okay, maybe one disclaimer: I'm feeling much better now, so no need to worry about me. There. Old habits die hard.

Here it goes. I've felt sad these past few weeks because:

I got pregnant in July. I wasn't by late August.

Of course, the real story is longer. How I peed on the test at 5:00 a.m. and then couldn't stop smiling after that and had to lie through my teeth to Dan to sneak out at 10:00 to go to the mall and buy a Redskins bib. How I gave him the bib and the test and his eyes bugged out because I think he'd been worried after more than a year and a half of trying and then he whooped and bear hugged me and kept repeating, "Oh, hon, I'm so happy!" How I bought two pregnancy books and felt uncharacteristically calm even when I read about side effects and labor. I can do this, I thought. Billions of women have! How I was so excited I even blurted the news to the lady at Jiffy Lube who changed my car's air filter since I figured it was safe she would not pass the story on to family or friends. (For the record, her response was so satisfying, whooping and saying something in regards to, "You go, girl!" Then, she gave me advice on how I shouldn't eat for two that people don't know that but if you eat for two you will look like a mutant of your former self so, girl, don't become a chowhound. Priceless advice from the Jiffy Lube lady.) How Dan and I Googled ways to reveal the news to our family and imagined surprising them Punked style.

It was barely seven weeks, but Dan and I already called that tiny cluster of cells our "Lovey".

Then, I started to miscarry and immediately called and sobbed to my mom, who hadn't even known I was pregnant yet. How I felt stupid for allowing myself to become so ecstatic, rather than my usual "cautiously optimistic". I'm a professional worrier with almost a superstitious tendency of looking out for Murphey's Law to take effect. How did I miss worrying about this? Later, I was shocked to go on the web and read about how absolutely common this very sad event is. Many of you reading have probably been there too, in perhaps even worse situations where you were pregnant for much longer. I'm sorry for anyone who has ever been in this club.

Afterwards, I realized three things. First, I have amazing people in my life, like a sister who will drop everything and drive two hours just to hug me, parents who really got how sad I felt, friends who will e-mail and commiserate over greasy Mexican and say the right things, and Dan who prayed, held, and was there for me every moment. Second, I realized later that I'm glad I let myself feel happy when I first found out. Joy is now, in the moment. It was wonderful giddily waking up each morning and feeling like it was a whole new world already. Even if I had crossed my fingers and "prepared" myself by reading miscarriage stories on the web and tempered my excitement, I still would have been crying to my mom that night. And I'm not sure lowing my expectations would have made it any less sad.

Oh, and third, that we're ready to be parents.

Since I'm being honest here, I'll admit that this isn't the only thing making me feel kind of low this September.

Beyong the usual chaos and stress of school, there have been other things that have been bringing me down. A family member is going through some shit that's been making her sad; it's her business so I won't go into it here, but I feel for her so much.

Like a bad country song, our family dog died last week.

And lastly, I haven't been able to stop thinking about a family who is suffering through the worst loss that anyone can go through. You know who I'm talking about if you happen to read this person's blog too. It's her story to tell, so I won't post anything about it here, but I will say that I can't stop reading her posts and feeling so helpless of what to write. Their loss is unimaginable. I can't help but to tear up when I read about all of the love in this heartbroken family. It certainly puts what's going on in my life in perspective.

As promised, no cutesy conclusion. Okay, hitting "publish" before I change my mind. Sorry for the heavy post. But I know you all will understand.