It's been awhile

At doctor's orders I was taking estrogen to be followed on the last 10 days of the script by progesterone to induce my period. What followed was a two week period. Oh joy. I think today is cycle day 40 or 41. I'm not pregnant according to the test I took yesterday but who knows if I even ovulated last month. I wasn't diligent with the fertility monitor. Actually I ran out of test sticks and did not want to shell out the $50 for another box.

Based on the above it looks like we'll get to do the IUI for this upcoming cycle. I have a script of Clomid waiting and I have to call my doctor on day one to schedule the bloodwork and ultrasounds. If all goes well I guess we'll have a December baby.

So wish us luck that we get lucky with the IUI the first time around. From what I've been told I should not get my hopes up that it will work the first time.

It's hard to believe we've been trying to conceive for almost 2 years. We are two months shy of that anniversary.

Surgery

Wednesday I underwent a hysterscopy to remove a polyp. The surgery went well and the polyp was removed. It was large enough to require the RE to cut it in half to get rid of the polyp and I now have a balloon catheter in my uterus until Monday. The RE spoke to J after the surgery while I was sleeping off the anesthesia in recovery. He told him he definitely felt like this polyp was having an adverse affect on conceiving. Basically the polyp was pushing/hanging down from the top of my uterus and essentially blocking my tubes. Now the HSG or dye test did not show a typical blockage in my tubes and the dye spilled over as it should. However, the polyp was preventing the egg from leaving the tube and adhering to the wall of my uterus. So we pray this is our last obstacle but who knows. I will find out more information on Monday.

The pain was more unbearable than the D&C of June and I ended up taking the additional 2 days of rest as recommended by the doctor. My stubborn ass went to work on Thursday but left after a couple of hours. The pain meds really helped this time.

One year anniversary

Monday the 27th is the one year anniversary of when we started our kitchen demolition/renovation project. We lived without a kitchen for 4 months! It was a PITA but I'm so happy with the end result.

We have been living with the exposed sub-floor since then because Jason and I were unable to decide on flooring. We both wanted tile but were unable to find anything either of us really liked. Next I wanted hardwood, then I wanted cork but Jason did not like the samples we found, then I went back to hardwood to match the rest of the house, and then finally we moved back to tile.

Last Friday on my way home I heard an ad for a flooring warehouse. It was not the first time I heard the ad but for whatever reason it stuck in my brain this time. Saturday morning I was telling Jason about it and I looked up the website. We read the directions and drove out to have a look-see. Well lo and behold we found a tile option. We purchased a 12x12 and a 20x20 sample. We brought them home, laid the two tiles on various sections of the kitchen floor, walked around, played with the lighting and it's now snowing in Hell because we both agreed we loved the tile! We hightailed it back to the warehouse before they closed and purchased 6 boxes of our new flooring tile.

So this weekend we will be installing our new floor! Our kitchen renovation is nearing completion! The only items left are deciding on(HA!) door/drawer pulls, over & under cabinet lighting, a backsplash, purchasing an over the range microwave, and finally a new window. The microwave is not a necessity as our old counter model works fine. The backsplash we like is pricey and not a necessity at this time. The window is a long way off as we need new windows in every room except our bedroom and bathrooms. 50+ year old windows = drafty.

Stay tuned for photos.

Dave Ramsey

J and I are enrolled in Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University at the beginning of September. In May I bought his book, Total Money Makeover and we implemented the first two baby steps. We are currently in the middle of working Baby Step 2, the debt snowball. As he said we finally got sick and tired of being sick and tired. I know a lot of people pooh-pooh his ideas but he makes sense to J and I and we are already making huge strides towards a debt free life. In fact we no longer have any credit card debt or credit cards. It's a wonderful feeling.

Dave posted his Common Sense Fix for our economy on his website and it makes sense to me. I'm not a financial guru, however, so there may be flaws. Given the current panic in the financial sector maybe a little common sense will go a long way towards our economic recovery.

http://www.daveramsey.com/media/pdf/the_common_sense_fix.pdf

A funny thing happened at the gas station

Last night I HAD to stop at Tar-J to buy the Sex and The City movie. I also picked up some more pregnancy tests to have on hand for next cycle. Anyway, as I was cruising around I noticed the Mapco had gas....regular unleaded....AND there was no line! So I whipped into the station and filled my tank. As I'm standing at the pump I hear a faint, "Excuse me."

Me: "Yes?"
Him: "Hi, gay man here. I love your top. Where did you get it? How much was it?"
Me: "Thank you. I bought it at Target...oh months ago. I think I paid $15 or $16."
Him: Oh. Well it looks great on you, shows off all of your curves in all the right places and the color is fantastic!"
Me: Well thank you very much.

And off he goes. I had to smile to myself and it definitely gave me an ego boost. Compliments from gay men are awesome. It's been awhile since I've had one. I'm still smilling about it today. So thank you unknown gay guy for brightening my evening and now my morning too.

And yes I did watch the movie last night and yes I started crying at the opening credits. J had a friend over so I had to keep my sobbing to an approriate level. J watched the first 15 minutes or so and the last 15 minutes or so. I told him he missed all the good stuff so we'll have to watch it again...soon.

Beautiful floors

I mentioned last month that we decided at the spur of the moment to have our hardwood floors refinished. Our contractor did an amazing job! I love my floors. Our animals do as well. A few photos to give you an idea of the really bad state of our floors prior to refinishing. After much debating on a stain we decided to just clear coat the floors and bring out their natural beauty and color.

Infertility Update

Our appointment with Dr. Hill at Nashville Fertility Center was this past Tuesday. It went well. He's very nice, soft-spoken and he seems very determined. We went through our history and he discussed everything with both J and I. I had another vaginal ultrasound. I have a cyst...most likely from the Clomid and of course that polyp is still there. Dr. Hill examined me. Poor J-I think he was traumatized. He sat in the examination room with me the whole time so he saw my uterus and ovaries on TV.

We sat back down with Dr. Hill after my exam to discuss what the tech found on the u/s. I have either a uterine septum(I think this is the proper terminology) or something else which I have completely forgot the term but it is a deformity of my uterus or a uterine anomaly. That may pose a problem. Dr. Hill confirmed the cyst and the polyp. On CD1 I have to call to schedule another HSG. Dr. Hill mentioned doing a hysteroscopy and laproscopy. He wants to move quickly on these procedures so we can move forward and he can see what we are dealing with, especially in regards to my uterus. I spoke to him about Clomid and he wants to try a Clomid challenge which will involve a lot more monitoring than I just had or had in the past. It will also involve an HCG trigger and an IUI. Unfortunately, Sally did not send my records over in time so things may change a bit once he sees those results.

J and I went ahead and had the blood test to determine if we are CF(cystic fibrosis) carriers. J kind of balked at this but I pushed him to say yes. The man hates needles with a passion. I just reminded him that one little prick is nothing compared to how many times I've been poked and prodded thus far and what is still to come.

I told Dr. Hill about not being told I was not a good candidate for IVF and he said he doesn't think that is the case but he needs to review my records from Sally first. However he did say we may be closer to IVF due to my age. He doesn't want to wait and he said he will do everything in his power to help us and that he does not give up easily.It was a pretty good visit so I'm happy. I think J is scared of all of this. We didn't really have a chance to talk about it afterwards as he had to get back to the office.