Under the wire

So one of my "mid-year's resolutions" that I posted a couple posts back (after my 6 month hiatus) was to post every 2 weeks.  Well, I think it's exactly two weeks today. :) And how am I doing with the going to sleep early thing? Not so well.  There's just too much to do! I'm really ready for those extra hours in the day anytime now. Maybe a 28-hour day would be good.

But anyway, what I really want to talk about is the upcoming ABC show Pan Am.  Why? Well, my mom was a Pan Am stewardess in the late '60s, '70's and early '80's (until my brother was born).  I grew up hearing my mom's stories about flying and her run-ins with the law in countries like Libya (for smuggling in alcohol to trade for ... something ... probably a Hermes scarf, knowing my mom ;) ) and visits to countries all over the world.

1968

This article from the Advocate (GLBT news magazine, in case you didn't know) talks about the top 10 reasons you should watch the show and some of the points are exactly why I'm looking forward to it.  Like the feminism. I mean, sure, my mom had frequent weigh-ins but she was travelling all over the world and spoke 3 languages fluently and boy does she have some crazy stories.  I have heard her stories but it will be fun to see how the show does stuff and how many things my mom can say didn't happen that way or were exactly that way.

We had a bunch of art and stuff from foreign countries in our house growing up that I just took for granted.  You mean not everyone's family has Persian rugs that they actually bought in Iran for probably $5?  It's not normal to have coasters made from Zebra hide? (Yes, before you tell me how the Zebra was probably poached, let me remind you it was purchased in the '60s or '70s, not today).

And not to mention random things in our house that had somehow made it from the airplane into our house.  Like my favorite tongs that my mom used. When I asked her where they came from so that I could buy some when I was moving into my own apartment she said, "oh those? Those were used in first class for food service." Or all the blue throw blankets with Pan Am logos on them.  And she still has all her uniforms.  I wore the original one (similar to the one they wear on the show) for Halloween when I was in high school (and the skirt actually fit me) and then 4 years ago (when I had to wear a skirt I already owned, but the shirt and jacket fit)!

Being a flight attendant is different now and when I was trying to figure out what to do after I graduated, being a flight attendant was on my list but didn't seem quite as glamorous anymore.  Sure I would have gotten to fly the international legs earlier because I spoke a bunch of languages, but I don't think I would have worn my uniform sight-seeing.

1970s

Okay, I'll do it, too.

I have already seen a number of people posting the "where I was 10 years ago on 9/11" thing so I thought I'd add my voice in since mine may be different from the majority of Americans.

I was in South Korea on my 2nd month of a 13 month stay teaching English in a girl's high school.  I had just moved in with a Korean host family and was sitting in the family room while they watched a Korean prime time television show (it was 10pm-ish on 9/11) and I was on their computer checking email and probably scanning photos to post online.

A crawl showed up on the bottom of the TV screen and my host mother said that it sounded like a plane had hit one of the buildings in New York.  So I tried to get on a news website but none of them were loading.  I couldn't get on to any new sites.  Finally my dad came online (he and I chatted multiple times a day via AIM) and told me that a commuter plane or something had hit one of the towers.  Then he essentially narrated the second tower being hit.  Nothing was really known but my dad said they thought maybe it was a terrorist attack. Finally I had to go to sleep.

In the morning, there was nothing about the attack on the English-language paper I got every morning (I guess they went to press earlier in the night).  However, I was able to finally get onto news sites and was shocked to find out that not only had the towers collapsed, but the pentagon had been hit and a fourth plane had gone down and they were calling it a terrorist attack by Al Qaeda.

It was pretty strange.  Here was I was halfway across the world while all kinds of crazy stuff was happening.  My friends and family in NYC were all fine. My brother in Ithaca, NY was fine.  My mom in Chicago was convinced the Sears Tower was next and the 30-something of us on Fulbright Teaching Assistantship grants in South Korea were not quite sure what to do.  We were told that we were safe where we were (spread out across the country all in different cities) and to let them know if we couldn't get in touch with any family.  I was able to communicate via phone or email or IM and spoke with my mom to assure her I was fine.

I think I had a much more detached experience than anyone in the US. I still had to teach 5 classes of 40 students each that day. I'm sure I could have gotten out of it if I wanted to but I didn't feel as overwhelmed or worried as somebody in the US may have.  So we just kind of continued on.  I paid a lot more attention to the news than I may have otherwise and certainly spoke with my family a lot.

So that's my "where were you on September 11th" story

Ouch

Well that's silly. The entry I posted last week sometime has a June date on it, which is when I started a draft. I'm not sure how to change the date, but no big deal. :) 

Jen has gone up to bed after a fun (day-before) Labor Day cookout today with her family. Nate and his cousins had a blast playing together. It's nice that Nate's now getting to the point where he and his 10-month older cousin are interacting and speaking with each other instead of crying anytime the other takes a toy away.

So Jen's up in bed and I'm laying in a strange sideways position on the couch since sitting still causes my sciatica pain to act up. What an odd thing chronic pain is. It's never something I really thought about. Occasionally I'd get a pain in my back or sleep funny and wake up with a stiff neck, but then it would go away and usually Advil helped it. When you have a pain that radiates from your lower back down to your ankle anytime you sit and no painkillers really help it, you'll do a lot and change a lot of habits to get it to stop. Like standing all day. I started to have pain in late April or May and once I realized how impossible it was to concentrate on work sitting at my desk, I requested a standing-height desk. That has definitely helped (and though I was more tired the first month, I'm now totally used to standing all day).  Jen and I used to sit together on the couch all the time at night to relax and watch a little TV but now sometimes I have to stretch out on the other couch in the living room or lay on the floor. It has definitely gotten better but it's not totally gone.  I also no longer sit on the T. Those seats are not friendly. I'm one of the annoying people standing with an available seat in front of me.  SORRY!

Thankfully it is better or the 2 1/2-hour each way that I drove yesterday to go to a great friend from college's wedding would have been excruciating. There were times in July/August when I dreaded driving the 10 minutes to the chiropractor because not only was sitting in the car hideously painful, getting out of the car was almost worse. That part has definitely gotten better. I'm confident it'll be gone eventually. Thanks to stretching and yoga, massage and the chiropractor.

So Nate and I went to his first wedding yesterday. :) I have proof that he wore a tie (for about 5 minutes) and looked very handsome while he did. Even while making a silly monkey face.

The wedding was at 3 and we enjoyed the reception until about 7:30, which was after the cake. Nate wanted to stay for the cake. :) After the cake we packed up and put Nate's PJs on for the ride home.  He told me he had a fun time.  Then this morning when I asked him the best part of the wedding, he said it was the orange juice.  For some reason the orange juice was really memorable.  Possibly because he got to have it in an adult glass and not a brightly-colored plastic cup.

We have no plans tomorrow, which is one of the best things.  Maybe Nate and I will bake something for Momma, or maybe we'll all go for a walk at Wompatuck and bring a picnic. Maybe we'll just lounge around and do nothing. Maybe we'll sort through some of Nate's toys to put away the ones he has outgrown and get rid of any broken ones.  I like days with no plans!

I know you're sick of my constant blogging

So it's been more than 6 months since I updated my blog. I've been busy?

Stuck inside because of hurricane, I mean tropical storm Irene is a good reason to finally post a new blog.

I've written about 15 great blogs in my head as I have been getting ready to go to sleep or standing in front of the sink while doing dishes or on the train heading to or from work. However, by the time I'm in front of my computer, I either have to do work work or stuff for church or want to get off the computer as quickly as possible to spend time with my family.

And what a wonderful family it is! Nate's language development cracks us up. Language growth certainly results in some funny conversations. As you may have seen on facebook, Jen had this recent conversations with Nate:
Nate: "The socks are warm mumma."
Jen: "Are they too warm?"
Nate: "No they are one warm mumma."

And the other day when I was driving, Nate said I was going fast and when I asked if he was going too fast he said "No, Mommy's going nice fast."

I've been working on losing some of that weight I gained while we were trying to get pregnant and also have been dealing with sciatica pain that I've had since May. In the process of researching yoga classes (hoping the stretching would help with the pain) I found a place that has classes for 2 and 3-year olds not yet in preschool one day a week for 3 hours. So I signed up for a fitness membership and Nate is now going to a class from 9:15-12:15 on Mondays. The pain has gotten better with the chiropractor, massage and stretching. And I'm down about 5 pounds by restricting calories.

So I have a couple mid-year resolutions. One is to blog once every 2 weeks (or more frequently). And the other is to start getting ready for bed at 10pm every night. I'm going to keep you updated through my blog posts. :)

Door number 4, please.

So after having a few days to digest things and to see how the options settle with us, I find myself looking forward to all the things I haven't been doing for the past 8 months because for half the month I might be pregnant. Like drinking 2 cups of coffee in the morning instead of tea or a cup of decaf. Or drinking a glass of wine with dinner and not feeling guilty because I might be pregnant (even though it's likely fine anyway). Or getting a 15-minute chair massage at work because they're not supposed to do massages for pregnant women in their first trimester.

I think we've decided that option #4 (enjoy our one son and get on with our lives) is probably the right one for us right now. We're not even going to bother with the testing. In 6 months or a year, if we want, maybe we'll reevaluate and if we feel like we're missing something, there's nothing stopping us from trying some more.

I'm really happy with the thought of our family the way it is. Sure, it would be nice maybe to have a girl, but girls are problems. They can get pregnant! ;) And I don't really feel this burning need for another child. It would be nice, sure, and certainly it's something we wanted because we tried but I'm feeling perfectly satisfied with the one.

I think the only thing bumming me out a little is not getting to be pregnant again. I really liked being pregnant! :) Even gaining 55 pounds and morning sickness and being swollen and getting kicked in the ribs. It was so much fun!

Jen wasn't feeling well today (a virus of some sort with chills, fever, aches, etc) and Nate was so sweet. At one point we called him doctor Nate and then he said he wanted to be a doctor. What a sweet child we have. If he sucked, we'd definitely have another, but I think we'll keep him. :D

Now what?

I know, it's been nearly 2 months since I last blogged.

Jen and I decided to take off the month of December from trying to get pregnant and things were busy. And we were busy with Christmas so although I wrote 3 or 4 blog posts in my head while falling asleep, I never quite got anything down on paper/pixels. ;) Then we decided to give the January cycle a try. I've written about the superstitions that you start to develop when you're trying to get pregnant and I decided that maybe it was time to give a try without baring everything for the Internet to see.

But I guess, ultimately, it didn't matter what I do or don't do. We did a two-insemination cycle and that didn't even make a difference. Got my period this morning.

So now what?

We've done six cycles over 8 months without getting pregnant. It doesn't mean anything is wrong. It could just mean that the timing hasn't worked out yet. Plus, as ridiculous as it may be, I am over thirty so it can take a little longer to get pregnant then and we don't have the luxury of being able to just have sex every day to try to get pregnant.

We have a few options:
1. keep trying the way we have been
2. switch donors and keep trying the way we have been
3. get a referral to a reproductive specialist and make sure everything is hunky-dory
4. enjoy our one son and get on with our lives

We are considering options 3 and 4.

If it didn't cost us anything, I'd probably do 1 or 2 for a little while longer. But every time we try, we have to pay for the vial of sperm (if you're really interested, go ahead and check out the prices for IUI specimens at a few different sperm banks) and if we do double insemination cycles, that's twice the price. Plus shipping (which runs from $110 to $225 per delivery). Thankfully my company's insurance considers same sex couples to be "infertile" and so the doctor fees are covered (donor sperm is rarely covered by any insurance) otherwise that would be an additional $250 per appointment (as it is we just pay the $10 copay).

We'll probably get the referral from my doc and go get everything checked out to make sure there's nothing funky going on. But seeing as my cycles are super regular (every 27-28 days) and that my pee turns an OPK positive (showing that I am, in fact, ovulating), it's probably just that the timing hasn't worked out yet. Since the testing will be covered by my insurance, we might as well go for it, but then regardless of those results, we may decide to just stick with our awesome only child.

The pros for that are numerous. We can save that money for other things that we'd like to do. Kids cost money (even if you don't have to pay to get pregnant). We can spend more time and money on Nate. When Jen gets a new job, we'll only have to pay for one child in daycare/preschool; only one kid to send to college down the line; Nate will be out of diapers soon so we won't have to pay for any more of those; we can keep our guest room; won't have to get up 3 or 4 times a night with a newborn ... you can go on and on with big and little pros. Cons ... well ... we won't get to go through the cute infant phase again; I won't get 4 1/2 months paid 100% off of work again; Nate would be an only child (also a pro?) ... it's tough.

My mom was pretty noncommittal, she pointed out all the same pros and cons we have already recognized. Uncle Doug thinks Nate needs a sibling. Jen and I see both sides. Nate says he wants another dog not a baby. (Today when we went for our weekly Sunday tea at Great Nana's his 9-month old cousin was pushing him -- she was really just trying to get his attention -- and he made me pick her up.) So, who knows. We're figuring things out. We'll do the doc's appointment and then we'll really need to make the decision. Right now I think I'm leaning towards enjoying a single child. :)

edited to add: Adoption is much more expensive that donor sperm. So a large part of our hesitation is cost, adoption is not a better option. We have, however, discussed being foster parents. We have talked about his even before considering not continuing to get pregnant with another biological child, so that's always going to be a possibility.

You all are bad finger-crossers.

Next time I'm not having you all cross your fingers for us. Obviously you didn't cross them hard enough or long enough. ;)

Another cycle gone. We're taking a month off. I don't want to have to think about this over the holidays. We'll try again in January. That will be cycle 6 and we're thinking about doing a two insemination cycle (so instead of going in the day after the OPK turns positive, which is what we've always done, we'll go in the day the OPK turns positive and the day after). Hopefully that'll do the trick.

If that one doesn't stick, then we'll see.

Nate's being even more of a monkey lately. His pronunciation of things sometimes cracks us up. And sometimes it's so cute. His "yessssh" is adorable and I don't know where he got "uh-uh" from but a two-year old saying "uh-uh" is pretty funny. He also likes to blame Ella for things. And the other night we went to see Christmas lights and kept saying "Oooooo, lights." Two-year olds are fun.