Friend's Loss - Needs Support

I'm just logging back on after having been away for a few days and read the most unimaginable post.

I've felt like I've grown close to Rebecca, enjoying her posts, finding her in my infancy of blogging and was compelled to want to continue with her on her journey after she had a successful IVF shortly after I met her online.

On Sunday, at 22 weeks, she prematurely went into labor and only had her daughter for a few minutes. I couldn't believe when I read her posting Unimaginable Loss. What the heck is this about? was my first reaction and then I got scared. I clicked on it and immediately said Nooooooo and started to cry and I kept reading.

My heart go out to her and her husband. So incredibly unfair!!!

Please, please give her your support. I know many of you follow her already and know you've visited with her. She could use many, many hugs right now.

My Brother's Comments on FB

I feel terrible that my brother's comments on face.book affect me the way they do. He probably doesn't even realize it (of course he doesn't!) and even if he did, it's my problem. They shouldn't  affect me like this...

My brother has a 2 1/2 year old son and a 6 year old step-son. We love them both dearly.

Recently, with his wife's brother and sister-in-law's anniversary, he posted "make my boys some cousins tonight."  It really affected me. I know, he has a weird sense of humor to begin with (not sure that I would've posted something like that...) but I couldn't help but think that we want to make his boys some cousins - and in fact, they would already likely have one by now if we weren't faced with infertility!!!

I did think it was slightly insensitive on his part, but then again, even though he knows of our struggles, he has no idea how an innocent thing like that can come across.

And on father's day, he posted, "he did it! it was, like, 11:30pm but [my son] slipped it in in the nick of time, giving me my 1st ever "happy father's day." i thought i was gonna have to wait til next year."

Sweet, right? Yeah, well, it should be, but bitter sad me can't help but read that with a pained heart. Where's our child who will say happy father's day to my husband???

As you can see, I'm having a particularly hard time handling these types of things right now.  How do you all handle comments like this? Any advice on how I can 'buck up' and not take it so personally??? :)

Welcome June ICLW!

How can it be this far into June already??? :) Welcome newcomers and thank you to my faithful readers who would stop by anyway! IComLeavWe is an exciting week as we discover new bloggers!

My short journey: Been married for 3 1/2 years, ttc for 2 1/2, 3 IUIs and 2 miscarriages both at 5 1/2 weeks, and recommended fibroid surgery this summer. All this leaves me in a state of flux, which is why this community has been so incredibly amazing to me! I love how we can relate to each other, sometimes much better than our real life friends. Check out my last posting if you're new called On Being a Good Friend because it's oh-so hard to be one & infertility can and does affect friendships. I think many of you could see yourselves in it.

Other happenings:

• NYC Next Up: a mini-vacation this coming weekend to NYC for a childhood friend's wedding. We both grew up in Montreal and found each other again about 8 years ago. She says I'll be her oldest friend at the wedding! We'll also be staying with my dear college friend and hopefully having a blast in one of my favorite cities!!
• India. I love my job in HR & we're opening an office in India, so am excited about going over there at some point TBD but likely very soon to help open it up officially, recruit & give the new team some TLC.
• Operation: Get My Body Back. I've been on a kick to lose the weight I put on during tcc. Like my good friend Hannah says - if I'm not pregnant, I'm going to be skinny! I just love that! She inspired me and many have joined me along this journey.
• This past week was great - I weighed in finally since the miscarriage and I think I've already lost since then! I did bik.ram yoga 4x and ran 1x. I made smart eating choices and stuck to my points (more or less) - went over only 5 total all week! How did you do?
• This week I commit to bik.ram yoga 4x again - maybe even 5x (once in NYC??)! Running 1-2x, writing everything down again, making smart choices (cantalope has been one of my favorites) and weighing in. What will you do?

So, thanks for stopping by - feel free to comment on your struggles, On Being a Good Friend, NYC, India, Operation: Get My Body Back or whatever else! I'm glad you're here! :)

On Being a Good Friend

I don't think I'm being a good friend righ now & I'm struggling with how to be one.

I usually am a good friend. I'm there, I listen, I empathize, I take interest in what my friends are doing, etc., etc.

But somehow with infertility, I can't fully do it. At least not now. And I feel like I'm being a crummy friend.

My best friend has the cutest kid. In fact, I'm his "god-aunt". Yet, it's painful for me to hear about the cute things he's doing. And she's pregnant again.

Her pregnancy actually prompted me to do our 3rd IUI. She, like many of us, is a planner, and she was going to wait to 'try' in March because she didn't want another December baby but her husband was going to be gone in April & May and she didn't want to wait that long (to which she also said that she could really feel for me... she couldn't wait 2 months to try, meanwhile I've had this struggle for 2+ years), so they went ahead and tried in March... and it worked.

That was the weekend I asked "so, what's going on with planning for #2?" to which she answered "I'm a week late". That's when I knew I had to do something about me & scheduled my Day 3 appt to get started on another IUI, which ended up not working.

She feels badly talking about her pregnancy with me. We were excited at the thought of going through pregnancy together and it pains her to see what I'm going through.

It's hard on me to not be able to be a true friend to her. She's been my best friend for over 15 years. We're supposed to be sharing these milestones together.

Infertility is affecting my friendships.

I finally told her that I just need time away with her. We used to go on vacations, just she & I. And I need that again. So, that's what we're doing. July 10th weekend.

I can't wait to have my best friend back again... and be her best friend in return. I hope that can happen, if only for a couple of days in vacation-land.

The Tears Finally Came

I was wondering where they were, yet I knew they were lurking. The tears hadn't come.

I was too busy. Too pre-occupied with work, with weekend travel and plans, with focusing on other things.

Last week, I started going back to bik.ram yoga. I noticed the sadness surfacing again. It's been only 3 weeks since my miscarriage and I hadn't allowed myself the space to really grieve.

I went to yoga again Monday night and noticed the sadness again, and then last night, it finally hit. We have a 2 min break or savasana in between the standing and floor series, and normally, the instructor talks. But we had a new person last night and they let it be silent. And that's when I almost broke down.

It didn't really happen until after I got home, showered and was sitting on the couch with my husband. I just broke down. The ugly cry.

It needed to happen. All the questions, frustrations, sadness... letting it all hang out there.

Why is this such a difficult and long road for us? How can I have had two miscarriages already... and after fertility treatments? Why am I not getting the support and empathy I need from friends and family? Why do I feel that others may be thinking that I miscarried (both times) at 'just' 5 1/2 weeks, so it doesn't 'really' count to be this sad...

Why did my mom have to turn things into a drama about her? Why have my friends not really said more to me? Why does it feel good to have my parents refrain from talking about my nephew so much and why does it hurt so much when my friends talk about their kids so much?

I'm just so sad. And I know I need to let myself be sad. It just hurts so much to be childless right now. And after so much effort. I know I need to continue to put forth the effort because it's what I really want. But it just hurts.

Operation: Get My Body Back - Week 3

I am loving this new initiative I created and love that so many of you have gotten behind it! It's inspiring to me to read about what you're doing!

Here's where I am:

• Writing down what I eat: I did a pretty good job this week, of course until we traveled and I was away on Sat & Sun and probably eating more poorly than I would have otherwise
• Weighing in: I still need to sign back up for WW (I let my monthly pass lapse when we did our last cycle)... I will do that this week AND weigh in. The Thursday leader is such a comedy show - I really enjoy going that day! My unofficial weigh in Friday night was decent but I need to make this official so I can actually track
• Exercise: I ran 1x this week, rode my bike everyday to work and to after work events and did bik.ram yoga 2x - I LOVE bik.ram yoga - it makes me so much more conscious of my body and what I'm putting in it. It's also what really brought my weight down earlier this year, after the last miscarriage.
• This Week: I commit to bik.ram yoga 3-4x, 1-2 runs, biking to work, writing down what I eat and keeping to my points allotment!!! and weighin in.

And in other news:

• Travel to NJ - We went to NJ this weekend for my cousin's baby's puja, which is an Indian version of a baptism. It was really nice to see them all again. And we took my parents too, so was nice to have some family time. BUT all that travel has got me exhausted!!
• India project - Work continues to be busy with our Indian office operations... we have some big meetings this week to decide our timelines for everything. I'd still like to know when I'm going!!

And on the IF front:

• I need to schedule an MRI and then get a consult w/a doc who will do a fibroid surgery on me. I'd like to try to get this done in July, probably travel to India in Aug, and then try for another cycle in Sept/Oct.
• I feel like I've been too busy to process the miscarriage, which is partially good. I also feel like many people's prayers must be working, which may be why I'm not feeling the impact of the pain as much
• I found myself, though, almost wanting to cry when I did bik.ram yoga this week. Something about that yoga brings out the emotions, so that's good that it surfaces, I guess...
• I've been a pretty bad commenter lately, but I am reading & trying to comment when I can. Once works returns to a bit more normalcy, I'll get back into it :)

Happy beginning of the week & for Operation: Get My Body Back, tell me how you did last week & what you are committing to for this week!

Operation: Get My Body Back - Week 2

What a week last week! I was so busy that it was nice to keep my mind off of IF and the recent miscarriage... in fact, I feel like there must be an influx of people praying for me because I've felt very shielded by my sadness.

Either that or I am just really busy and helps to have other things to focus on such as:

1. Our annual company event - it was so great! I worked so incredibly hard last week. We had about 75 employees come (about 1/2 from other locations/offices) for a day of team building activities in a hotel conference room & then about 40 people's significant others came for an evening bowling event. So, so fun. And so, so exhausting. But... I didn't have time to sleep this weekend because I was moving onto:

2. Furnishing a room for a room in a safe house for sex traf.ficking survivors. My church works with Courtney's House. The founder herself is a survivor of sex traf.ficking and is now giving her life back to helping others get off the streets. Did you know that the entry point into 'prostitution' is 12 years old? TWELVE years old! Unbelievable. Breaks my heart. But makes me so much more motivated to do something to help. We got some great furniture from craigs.list - and get this - after the person found out what we were doing with the furniture, they gave it to us for free!! And went to Target to really outfit this place right. I'll post pics once we're done with it in a couple more weeks. So exciting!

3. Operation: Get My Body Back - Week 1. Didn't do great with it last week. Tried to make good choices. I started off strong by trying to exercise, twice in one day even, but I actually kept bleeding all week still from the miscarriage, so decided to start off slower. And with the company event, I only wrote down what I ate until Wed...

4. Operation: Get My Body Back - Week 2. I'm going to try to do better this week though I'm still unsure of exercise. I'm still exhausted. I'll give it a couple of days. Still biking to work though! AND I will write down everything I eat this week. I stocked the fridge with strawberries, peaches, raspberries, cherries & apples along with lots of salad fixings and veggie burgers! I'm also going to go weigh in this week, which I haven't done in 6 weeks. I'm a bit scared but it's the right thing to do! :)


I've been very motivated & inspired by your comments on exercise & weight loss too, so keep 'em coming!!! How'd you do this past week and what are your intentions for this week?

Celebrity Musings, Exercise & Happenings

Goodness - have you all heard of Ce.line Di.on's news? Her 6th IVF was successful - with twins. Six. Six!

I can't even begin to imagine what six might feel like. Geez. So amazing for her. Makes me wonder if I should start doing acupuncture (she did). Congrats to her!

And what's this with Al and Tip.per??? I just don't get it. My pastor wrote a very thought provoking blogpost called Usefuleness if anyone is interested. It questions how & why we make relationships expendable... interesting spiritual food for thought.

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Operation: Get My Body Back started out strong... I went running yesterday morning - 3 miles. AND I went to bik.ram yo.ga last night but I started to not feel well. At all. In fact, 1/3 of the way in, I had to lay down on the mat, for the rest of the time. That's a long time. The class is 1 1/2 hours long. I felt miserable.

My stomach hurt when I got home. I thought maybe I was dehydrated. My dear husband made me some food. I felt better.

Then at 3am, I woke up with blood dripping down my leg and blood all over the sheets. I couldn't believe it. My period had ended 2 days ago. I just had pantyliner blood during the day yesterday. This, though, was an incredible amount.

Luckily B was sleeping in another room (forgot to get Clar.itin and he snores pretty loudly without it!), so cleaning up all that blood was not disruptive to him. But not fun at 3am either.

So... I decided to take the exercise easy for now. I may run or swim tomorrow but no yo.ga. That is intense and I have to ease back into this. My doc said that blood may be leftover disruption from the miscarriage.

I'm excited for those of you who were interested in Operation: Get My Body Back... so let's keep at it! What have you done so far this week?

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In other news, I'm excited for our annual Company Day on Friday. Being in HR, I'm essentially responsible for putting it altogether - presentations and team building activities. All 80 of our employees will be in town from other offices and signficant others are invited to a bowling event in the evening.

And then I'm excited for Saturday. Our church works really closely with this organization called Court.ney's Hou.se, which gets girls out of prostitution and into safe houses. It's remarkable work. This weekend, our church is putting together one of the rooms in this safe house. We painted last week and I'll be going over this weekend to get furniture we've gotten from craigs.list and get nice inspirational things for the walls, etc. So incredibly meaningful and had kept me going recently.