reflections on the simple arithmetic that crushed our holiday dreams: cycle 2, days 3-7

Exactly five days, an out of town vacation,

Calendared and planned with hopeful expectation,

That we’d have the green light, to try to conceive.

Instead? Exactly five concurrent days of Clomid. We. Were. So. Naïve. 

At least someone is happy to hear that I got my period: cycle 2, day 1

But seriously. Who do you call when you get your period[1]? Who is genuinely excited to hear that you are shedding your uterine lining? Absolutely no one because that would be weird. The fertility clinic nurse, that’s who. For the unwanded uninitiated, here’s the deal: as soon as I get my period, no matter where I am, I am instructed to call the nurse, immediately (cut to me in an office stairwell at 9 am, hand over muffled mouth and phone). And there’s no other way to describe it – when she calls me back, she is legit cheerful. Her emotion is so unmoored from reality – hello I am still so not pregnant – that I can’t help but audibly giggle on the other end of the phone.

It’s not that she’s thrilled to hear that I’m still barren[2], it’s that she knows that I now get to embark on another glorious round of Clomid. That, undeterred, I get to try again. That I now have another chance at that FX for a BFP on your HPT! baby. That once more, my hopes can be raised unreasonably high for approximately two weeks only to hit a crippling low shortly thereafter. It’s a rollercoaster, people.

Even my own mother was not this excited when, at the ripe old age of 14, I joined the lady club. You’ve reached a real milestone! is what she could have said, before taking me out for a martini and buying me condoms treating me to a PG rated movie. Instead? We spent 90 minutes  - I, in a fit of excruciating teen angst, her, probably wondering how much therapy would set us back financially - on a family vacation in Peru, screaming at one another through a hotel bathroom door as I cried my eyes out over having to (wait for it) put in a tampon. Oh dear. If only I had known then the transvaginal ultrasounds of my future...

But I digress. At least there's this. Thanks for the irrational cheerleading, fertility-clinic-nurse-lady!

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[1] The transition from an entry exclusively showcasing decadent baked goods to my pelvis is SEAMLESS. Just seamless. I try my best to please you, anonymous interweb people.

[2] At least that’s what my rational brain tells me. My rational brain also tells me that she doesn’t work on commission. Wait, does she? She doesn't, right?

food > fertility

Because food is funner than fertility and because the net result of hormones coursing through your body on the regular is, essentially: I must eat all the foods RIGHT NOW, and, because I promised, here are a few hits (oh boy were there some misses) that I made this month:

 Dark chocolate, sour cherry, no-knead bread

 Chocolate pumpkin pie with toffee crumble

Apple mosaic tart with salted caramel

You may notice a theme that goes something like this: the addition of melted chocolate makes all things better.

(Also, I swear that all of my other meals consist exclusively of steamed kale to offset this obscene consumption of sugar.)

Recipes after the jump.

missed connections

I, was wearing purple polka-dotted crotchless panties, yellow fuzzy tap dancing shoes and rainbow knee-high socks with swirly peace signs. On my tits, I had disco pasties. I have sicc multi-colored dreads.

You, had a green goatee, and no pants. A cow patterned blazer, No shirt. Sicc tatts.

I saw you hula'n on the multi-colored flying dragon art-car as I was riding my TIGHT cruzer thru da sicc playa dust.

We made eye-contact and never saw each again! Hope the universe brings us together. Namaste.

P.s. my name is Raven.

p.p.s we saw each other at burning man. 

[You guys: I could not make this up. Also, I just lost a little bit of respect for the Atlantic. I mean, really?] 

The truth is my crotchless panties are striped OMG JUST KIDDING MOM I had a little missed connection of my own last week. The above writer’s schizophrenic commitment to commas notwithstanding, it turns out that I, egg had a missed connection with You, sperm. Namaste. Also: ofcourseyournameisraven.

I went to the doctor this week for a follow up appointment in case I needed additional confirmation that I am BARREN not pregnant. In addition to not being with child, I am also apparently on the accelerated ovulation track (note to my first grade gifted and talented program: you failed to account for this particular predilection). Basically, I ovulate(d) too early. Although my follicles “looked great” and the nurse provided all kinds of false hope, my progesterone levels were already elevated by the time of my day 12 wanding. By the time of my post-coital headstands, it was probably too late.

not for the faint of heart

There’s something I haven’t told you. There’s something I’ve kept from you. Something that shames me more than my uncooperative ovaries and over sharing, combined. But because we’re all recklessly divulging our most vulnerable thoughts to strangers friends here in anonymous-blog-land, I am going to be nothing if not candid.

You guys – I faint when I get my blood taken. Not every time, but kind of a lot. Enough so that there was[1] a special note in my file that two nurses should be present whenever I have the privilege of giving blood, in case I, you know, go down. I cannot lie: the nurses were INCREDIBLY UNAMUSED by this requirement. Because on top of the 30 other hormonal pincushions they have to deal with in a very short period of time, very early in the morning, there’s this super high maintenance chick. *takes bow*.

Plus, I also have to contend with this incredibly demoralizing fact: C is basically a phlebotomist’s wet dream. Because he is a self-righteous saint has a rare blood type and is a glutton for punishment, C gives blood at every opportunity. Doesn’t flinch, keeps his eyes open, chats away – the color never even leaves his face. But I, well, I am a freak. On bad days, sweat starts pouring off me with brazen abandon and my until-now-quiet-stomach lurches into a volcanic frenzy. Within seconds, I’m down for the count. The nauseous, sweaty, count.

rest stop surprise: cycle day 19

At a rest stop on my way back from jail (yes, I heard that as soon as I wrote it and no, I’m not a transient grifter[1]) and lookee here. Surprise! That’s right, Aunt Flo’s in town. The crimson wave. Red tide. On the rag. (Yes, that last one is pretty heinous and yes, the six, four, two men who read this blog have now fled in abject terror).

I’m on Day 19 and I realized, that until this very moment, in a ramshackle Burger King bathroom – where I may or may not have audibly exclaimed “FUCK!”, much to the alarm of the mother of two in the stall next to me – I really hadn’t considered the prospect that I might find out I’m not pregnant by like, getting my period. Why? Well, because I assumed I would, like always, take 37 pregnancy tests and count my negatives before they hatch cry my eyes out on my own (much cleaner) bathroom floor. But my period? No ma’am. That never occurred to me (I am aware of my poor intuitive reasoning skills, thank you).

Also, math. Math plays an important role here. And while math isn’t exactly my strong suit (duh, that’s why I’m a lawyer), I feel like “counting” is a skill I should have mastered. Because, umm, wasn’t it way-too-effing-early for this? (more on that later).

EVEN KATE MIDDLETON IS MORE FERTILE THAN ME: cycle day 16

Okay, fine. This comes as no surprise. I mean just look at her. She is more fertile just as she is more thin, more pretty, and way more married-to-a-royal-prince. But whatever.

So, when I got home from work the other night (I swear there’s a sensible transition happening here), my dear, sweet husband said to me – in the calm, nurturing, reassuring tone he probably only uses when speaking to elderly Russian grandmothers who are one breath away from their last (you know, in his job as a hit man doctor) – so [putting his hand on my shoulder now like he’s prepared to break the news that they’re cancelling the Bachelor our dog died] you heard? And that was all he had to say.

Now, I should clarify something (because if one thing’s for sure, THIS needs to be said). We don’t actually know, Kate Middleton. Like, know, know. Or Prince William for that matter. In fact, we have no relationship whatsoever to the British royal family. It turns out, we often say things like Ohhh you want some mohrrrrr? in affected, obnoxious British accents  are just two, sloppy, unrefined Americans. We didn’t even watch the royal wedding (audible gasps from the interwebs).

Anyway, I swear I was making a point. Basically, C was afraid that I would royally (see what I did there?) FLIP when I found out that yet another basically-my-age-but-actually-older (the horror!) brunette was pregnant (did I mention we look nothing alike almost exactly alike?).