Sailing Wench, Fetch Me a Beer!

Oh my gods...

thirdbase — Tue, 22 Nov 2016 01:28:57 GMT

I'm back in. I don't know that I can be back yet... but at least I'm back in.

Home...

OMG, I'm in...

thirdbase — Mon, 24 Aug 2015 12:16:32 GMT

Oh good gods... LJ is open to me again. But only from this particular computer because I can't remember the password and you need to know the password to change the password and when I've requested an override from other computers, the emails never arrive...

I had a call from a friend this morning, just after 7am. It her kids' first day of school, the one who may still be recovering from surgery just threw up and she's a wreck. She just wanted them to have a good first day of (pre)school -- a normal day. Why can't she have a "normal" day?!

I kept my chin up and squared into sympathetic friend who finally moves from sympathy to "ok, M will go to school if you present the confidence that he can and should. And he'll have his won first day, and tomorrow, C will go to school (as long as it's still the virus the docs think it is and not anything more) and C will have his very own first day. And they'll get to be there for each other anyways, because M will pave the way and let C know what's going to happen. One step at a time."

A normal day? Normal? We all have our own normal. My day starts when I leave before my kids are anywhere near getting up and I get back to them at 5pm. This allows us to pay the mortgage and have health insurance. On weekends, the day starts with braced shoes coming off the one who won't have a second front tooth until after the surgery when she's 8 to move a bone chip from most likely her hip into her mouth to hold the adult tooth in place, and probably won't need surgery to correct how she stands and walks, but will likely drag her foot when she's tired for some if not all of her life. Who giggles madly when you pretend to eat her hands. And then we take the brace off the one who goes for her next appointment to see if her femur is actually calcifying properly in the hip socket a year from the 11-day stint in traction after we discovered at 8 months old that she had displaysia. After the diaper is changed, that brace goes back on, and she's stands, dances, cruises and moves around pushing a toy, a box, whatever, just like her sister.

No, my kids haven't had their first day of school. But I get monkey wrenches being thrown into plans. I remember the heart break in May when I found that the x-rays were not allowing the brace to come off completely. I dug out her old carseat, brought it with us to the doctor's like they tell you, and sat in the car afterwards and cried, my baby in the back in the carseat with no sides so that her brace would fit -- which was a blessing, considering the other option was to travel by ambulance everywhere, from Thanksgiving, on.

Gods. I am a wreck. I'm mostly ok, but calling the doc again today. I just... really needed this link to open to me today. And it did.
See? No rain, no rainbows.

Put me in, coach!

thirdbase — Thu, 13 Nov 2014 22:44:07 GMT

If you think Amelia's batting helmet looks a little like the container they serve cheese fries in at the AA Bowie Baysox stadium, you'd be right.

If you think perhaps Amelia's mom is getting a little punchy, you'd also be right.

She's smiling but a little low energy, and whining more than usual, but all things considered, she's taking everything very well. She's off OxyContin and on Motrim instead right now for the first time, so we'll see if she gets perkier or crankier. That will certainly tell us if it's working.

Recap, since I'm not sure I got a chance to tell anyone much of anything:
Just before Halloween, a NICU follow up clinic found Amelia had a dislocated hip, best guess was since in utero. She wasn't in any pain and was having a grand time practicing standing and had begun to soak her socks by sucking on them, and her toes.

We got in to see Hannah's orthopedist, the head pediatric guy at Hopkins, and then this past Tues (it was originally scheduled for tomorrow & things changed quickly), we brought her in for a procedure to pop her hip back into the socket (under anesthesia). Alas, her muscles were too tight for that to work so we are now on Plan B, which is the presidential suite at the Johns Hopkins Ritz Carlton (seriously: corner room, 11th floor, looking over the port and the entry to Baltimore Harbor) where she is in traction, getting her leg hopefully stretched so it can pop back in. We've been told that they will know within a week if this is working and if it is, we could be here for a couple weeks. If it's not working, then we go to Plan C which is surgery. We'd really like to stay with Plan B for Twin B, thankyouverymuch!

We're hanging in, Ben and Hannah are coming to visit tonight (woohoo!), everyone is saying nice things about Amelia and she's about the only non-cryer on the unit. I am managing to breastfeed as well which is about as comfortable as you'd imagine it would be to squish onto a bed and feed a baby lying on her back who is unable to roll sideways and has almost half her body weight constantly pulling on her legs. But no one is complaining.

She's in fact so good that one of the med students came by today and asked if he and some of his classmates could come in with their instructor and do a clinic on her, just getting practice, because she's so copacetic. Proud Mama. This med student stayed back the first day to ask about Captain Legoland's "Carleton Rugby" sweatshirt -- he did his undergrad there -- a. Little Minnesota liberal arts college also attended my Ben's brother, his mom, and a colleague of mine. And like people from small communities who find a connection to that place in the big city, he waves when they do rounds, smiles, and seems to find a kinship here. I've left the sweatshirt hanging up.

There's a white board in the room for use by whoever and I have co-opted it for quotes. Today:

Xposting this to their page....

We still have to communicate, no matter how hard it is

thirdbase — Tue, 22 Apr 2014 04:06:56 GMT

Oh goddamn, this is so hard sometimes. I can't imagine it's any easier being an introvert married to an extrovert, but the stress and lack of sleep may have officially gotten to us. I have zero idea of what we were just fighting about but when I'm done pumping, I'm going to give him a hug, even if he is still in the shower. We deserve hugs.

I don't want to go back, i just want to go forward

thirdbase — Thu, 10 Apr 2014 18:18:35 GMT

It seems I'm Lieutenant Commander Unrealistic Expectations. My clothes don't fit. Shouldn't they fit by now? Well, let's see, 3 weeks and 1 day ago, you were pregnant with twins. What do you think? Someday, I'll be promoted to Captain Obvious. Just keep my chin up and my nose clean. It's like being in the military -I only have 2 pair of pants that fit and those were hard enough to find. No way I'm going shopping again. I hate clothes shopping under weight loss conditions - you can imagine how it feels when my body explodes in the way women's bodies do and designers ignore it the way Creationists ignore evolution.

There's alot of positives out there today and I really can see every one of them and yet I'm crying. Hormones are awful. Recovery pains are awful. I don't want to go back to where i was because it's more fun to move forward, but as i told Ben the other night, boy, it's going to be great when i'm not in pain anymore.

I called a couple of friends today because I was very upset - not code red, but sort of yellow-orange. I texted them to ask for a call or visit before i got into the shower. It was tough to do. I can offer help, i can be asked for help, but doing the asking is a new thing. S called to check on me, and E just arrived to take me for a Dunkin Donuts iced coffee. All sorts of goodness. S says she's proud of me. I am too. It's a good thing.

CPOTD: What you win when you rearrange your face by carefully signaling a turn

thirdbase — Thu, 27 Feb 2014 12:30:12 GMT

For whimmydiddle, for whichever side of her face she can see out of when her new glasses arrive:

CPOTD: Today is a very good day for comics

thirdbase — Tue, 25 Feb 2014 13:19:43 GMT

Maybe because there's a growth spurt about to happen, but I am very tired, very weepy and very much needed a giggle today, but I did find these 4 gems. Vote for your favorite.

Wondermark:

Close to Home:

Pickles (aka My In-Laws aka My Life in 30 Years):

Dilbert (aka Another Office at Work):

I've been told by enough people that I absolutely positively need to see the Lego Movie. Now to figure out when we can go see it.

Also, baseball starts soon. I never thought I'd be one of those people who gets a second tv, but I think we are going to get a second tv so I can watch baseball from downstairs, in case I never make it upstairs this summer because I'm too busy with what's going on downstairs. Need to talk to Verizon about how that works, whether we need a second box -- whether that's already in the package and we're just not using it... I do seem to remember them being surprised when I said we only had 1 tv.

Passing on the angst, because that's what causes posts to get deleted mysteriously

thirdbase — Tue, 04 Feb 2014 01:04:41 GMT

So the long and short of it is that infertility drugs are extremely hard on me. And I thought the angst of a miscarriage was an emotional thing, and that because of how i had been approaching everything, that i wouldn't be affected, I'd just move on. Yep, it's pretty much emotional, no, your brain pretty much has no control over it. And just when you think you're good with it, you nearly drown yourself in tears you can't understand. And your spouse is doing things like telling you they love you, asking what they can do for you, offering to make you, buy you, serve you whatever you might fancy, explaining that it's all ok, it will all be ok, and generally hugging and holding you. And you tell every girlfriend you can that he just doesn't get it and he's not being supportive in the least. And you don't see the irony for months. Months.

And as far as I can tell, that's one experience, and it's a little different for everyone. But it should be something we should be able to talk about to each other. I found that every time I mentioned it to someone, everyone had a story. And was glad to talk or listen. Same with the IVF - I couldn't swing a dead cat without hitting someone going through it too. So either one, you know how to contact me. If you don't have my contact info, go find an old entry of mine, leave your email, and I'll ping you back and delete the email.

I finally got over the fear of starting the drugs again, and they were different drugs this time, so they did slightly different things to me, and luckily for a shorter amount of time. After the first time around, pretty much anything was going to be better. And i was so glad, because I spent 2 months crying to Captain Legoland "Don't make me do it again. I don't want to go on the drugs again!" And that was the hormones talking, because he'd hug me and say "We'll start again when and if you want to - we'll go at your pace, you tell me when you're ready." He wasn't "making" me do anything -- it was pressure I hadn't realized i had put on myself. This whole biological clock shit can be very dangerous to your health.

At the end of alot of crazy days where we really couldn't say anything to anyone about anything because we had so many unknowns, or at least several excellent doctors continually telling us reassuring things like "well, we can't quite tell yet" and "there's a good chance you might be looking at several months of hospital bedrest," we had information we could finally share, including that my risk had fallen to the point where I am probably not looking at several months of hospital bedrest.

Hopefully not til mid-May, Captain Legoland and I will welcome identical twin girls to our already pretty chaotic life, so if I didn't already feel like i was sailing the S.S. Minnow, now I will feel like I am racing the Minnow to Bermuda, the Long Way Round, and on 3 hours shifts with a captain who wants to tack every 45 minutes. So it's kinda exciting and terrifying at the same time. But I have a stalwart partner, who also isn't crazy about pink. It is good to be on the same page with your partner on the big stuff, when you'll be raising children together.

This isn't on facebook at the moment, and I'd appreciate it if it stayed that way for now, but email, here, smoke signals, homing pigeons (raptor-free), all good. Wondering why Cookie Season didn't happen? Ding ding! Why the Doldrums Party will get canceled? Ding ding! Why i haven't scheduled plans with anyone? Ding ding! My energy is generally low enough that i have to cancel anyways, so I've stopped trying. On the other hand, I have stopped canceling plans (since i haven't made any)! (leiacat, I'm still thinking tea on the 22nd). And when i disappear for even longer than I did last time, starting sometime late spring, i'm told I am going to have a very good excuse. Two of them, in fact.

Not the entry you were looking for

thirdbase — Fri, 17 Jan 2014 15:09:42 GMT

Sorry for the continual teaser, but I have to get this off my chest quickly.

My older brother is pretty much a jerk who managed to piss off and alienate my grandparents and mother years ago. He put my (well, mom's) truck up on blocks and took all 4 tires off and refused to put them back on because I returned $14 worth of soda/beer cans collecting in our basement and I wouldn't give him the money because those were his cans (mom bought the soda and the beer and the whole family drank the soda and mom & dad drank the beer) -- I had already put the money into gas for the truck. When my little brother was able to get away from work and college last minute and drove 4+hrs to attend older brother's daughters' christening, older brother wouldn't shake his hand and said "Haven't you ever heard of an RSVP?" Every conversation I have with him, I'm wrong. When I'm a fed and he's a contractor, I'm working for The Man and have no ambition. When he gets a job as a fed, suddenly I'm not actually doing things, I'm just a paper pusher and he's doing real work. I have a 40 year old beat up sailboat in my grandparents' yard that I use once a year but no, I should drop $3K on a new boat and get a trailer...to sail it once a year. I put a framed picture in my car, I'm doing it wrong and don't blame him when it breaks. And through all of that, I stayed civil, polite, wouldn't say bad things about him, agreed that he had hurt nearly everyone else in the family but I've always been the peacekeeper, I would always urge that maybe there was just a misunderstanding, and maybe talking things out would repair ties.

I called him after I got engaged to see if he wanted to be friendly at my wedding or if he was not in fact going to talk to anyone from the family. He thought I was calling to ask if his daughters (twins) wanted to be flower girls. Same page? We're not even in the same library. He and I talked for a bit, I explained that I wanted a friendly, good day, where people got to know each other, and I was a bit nervous about how he'd react/interact to 3 of my most important guests -- mom and grandparents. How would the girls interact with these people who raised their dad, but they hadn't seen since they were 2? He said not to worry, his girls didn't talk to strangers.

We were scheduled to talk the following night, he called me before I could call him. He said he had related out discussion to his wife who said they would not be attending my wedding so not to bother inviting them, and to please stay away from and do not communicate with their daughters (she had, maybe 2 weeks before, facebooked me to ask if the girls could write me letters and if I'd write back, as they were doing letter-writing in school. I said of course), because I was a bad influence.

I talked to him again within the next 2 weeks, because he called my dad to ask about a problem one of the girls was having that I had when I was a kid and since dad didn't remember how the problem was dealt with, would dad ask me? When dad called me back again with a followup question, I asked dad just to give me his number because it was stupid that he had questions for me but wouldn't ask me. We talked for a few minutes, I told him how it was dealt with, he informed me the solution was stupid and they weren't going to do that for their daughter.

I decided I was done with his shit. Done. Done. Done. I asked Captain Legoland what he thought. I have always tried to present older brother in an even light, acknowledging there are at least 2 sides to every story and I only know my own. Captain Legoland suggested that perhaps since I was the only one he hadn't completely pissed off, he had been deliberately pushing me to get there. (He's never had a problem with my dad, but my dad doesn't really stand up for himself or anyone else. Love him though)
----
I talked to my West Coast aunt last night. This is the aunt that lost her 24 year old daughter in a car accident in November. She lost her husband, my uncle, 25 years ago next month. He died rock climbing, 4 months before my cousin was born. She lost an employee to liver failure last week, the same day she got an email from her ex-husband (good terms)'s best friend saying he died suddenly. So she's very much in a "you never know what is going to happen so don't live with regrets" mindset. She hasn't ever been here to deal with the crap from my older brother and is a wonderful hippie who, like me, just thinks you should talk things out and let things go.

She brought up my older brother in the conversation and I said I hadn't really talked to him in a while. She reminded me that life is short and unexpected.

I've been thinking about that phrase alot since she said it. While the majority of my being feels that yes, I should not leave hard feelings anywhere if possible, I think I've found the exception. I got walked over, almost attacked, told I was wrong, watched people I love get really hurt by his behavior for 34 years while I was polite, nice, considerate, etc.

I think I've decided life is too short to get hurt and shit on. I wouldn't ever be mean -- I still believe there are sides of this story where he feels he's completely justified -- but I don't have to be near him or interact. I'm sitting on the cusp of where I really have the option to try and open a door and make a connection again, not just with him but his daughters (who are the innocent bystanders here -- I have no idea what their parents have/haven't said about me) and I have to decide whether to write a letter to him and his wife. It would explain why I was writing and say that I hoped they had decided I was no longer a bad influence and I would look forward to corresponding with their daughters.

I saw one of the girls at L'il Bro's wife's baby shower a little over a year ago, and wasn't sure which girl it was. It was much worse when that girl had walked into my mom's tackle shop 2 years before, a few minutes ahead of her mother, and my mom didn't realize who she was until her mother walked in.

There's just alot of hurt, and I get to pick whether I open the door and hope that hurt doesn't come through. History says it will, and in spades. I don't think I want to do this, but the optimist in me says I can. The strong person in me says I won't get hurt. At this point, I don't think I'll get hurt -- I'm past hurt and on to angry. I see more verbal abuse through that door, yet I want to open it. I don't want to be angry.

Life is too short to be angry, to get hurt. But still, I can't decide.

Fuckity fuck fuck fuck

thirdbase — Thu, 19 Dec 2013 02:04:47 GMT

I spent 2 hrs and was about 2/3 done with a really emotional post and i put my finger on the screen of the iPoodle somewhere and it's gone. Gone gone gone.
Fuck.

You'll get it eventually.

Comic Pick of the Day

thirdbase — Thu, 12 Dec 2013 12:14:54 GMT

Actual, content-oriented post coming this weekend. In the meantime, however, I really can't stop giggling at this:

Thankful for the ups and the downs

thirdbase — Wed, 27 Nov 2013 12:23:00 GMT

I am thankful my cousin's death in a car crash earlier this month led to lives being saved or extended through her organ donation. From a 6 month old girl to a 64 year old man, there are 8 families this season who are very sorry for our loss and so thankful for their gain. Wine glasses raised to Gina for many years to come. Hopefully, they were also able to use skin grafts for burn victims. As a former firefighter, that was important to me too. The skin is our biggest organ. I am sad and astounded we lost a vibrant 24 year old who brought alot of joy to everyone she met, but she's finally gotten to meet her dad, my mom's brother, who died in a rock climbing accident 3 months before she was born. I can't change the outcome, but I can take solace in other pieces. I set up an alter to burn candles the day she wound up actually going brain-dead, and one of the candles had just burned out when my mom called with the news. I set it up as usual, but instead of a ceremonial knife, we used one of Ben's two-handed broad swords, to help give her a fighting chance. I'm interested to see her actual, medical day of death, since they kept her on life support for a while to line up all the organ donors. Her remembrance ceremony is Saturday. I have to write the piece for my aunt to read and get that emailed out today.

I am thankful my dad's car crash last week didn't do more damage to him or his wife. He fainted over the steering wheel at a red light, she leaned over to shake him, worried that he was dead, his foot slid to the accelerator and they hit the building 80ft later. Her seatbelt was stretched too far to activate (full sized pickup truck) and the truck was pre-airbag, so she's got a new hip and some hardware in her arm and shoulder. Dad probably just had low blood sugar and what saved him from more damage was the cross between the seatbelt and being unconscious -- he's been released and now will stay nearby with my older brother while Fran's sisters finish packing up the house that they're selling in 10 days. Thankfully, Fran stays in the hospital for rehab while all this goes on, so she'll be frustrated she can't unpack into the new house (that they close on in 10 days) but she'll be getting better instead, so that's good. And I'm glad he's out of the hospital and she's in maintenance mode, because the nurses there go on a labor strike today. I hope they get what they need too.

There's another thing I'm thankful for, but I can't get into it now. It's one of those things that you have to be thankful for but at the same time you're sitting there thinking "what the fuck?!" I hope to be able to write about that soon. Keeping things in isn't good for me, but it's also not something that I can talk about yet. But I'm ok, and I will be ok. But boy, it's been a helluva month.

I'm thankful for friends. I haven't seen so many people in so long that I never thought I'd be thankful for something like LJ or FB but sadly I am. I need to stop getting my information t/here and getting it in human interaction instead, but at the moment, the only commitment I'm allowed to keep is the one that says I'm not allowed to make promises or commitments at the moment.

I read here everyday, I have enjoyed reading stories and have tried to combat the guilt of not contributing. I hope your pool and your mom's pool aren't all screwed up. I hope you got the job and I'm so sorry about your grandfather -- I'm going to be a mess when (if?) mine goes. I hope the car doesn't get stuck again and that recruiter calls you back. I hope biking has been as fun as it looks, and that silence on that front means your mom isn't actively driving you crazy. I'm glad you're making new friends. I'm glad you're visiting fun places.

I'm glad my mom and I are going to try a new lemon meringue pie recipe at Christmas.

Professionalism: And while I'm here, let me says something bad about your mother...

thirdbase — Tue, 29 Oct 2013 17:58:51 GMT

I mentioned my detail to this interagency groups is having its downs and downs. There aren't really ups at the moment. Today I got to hear the story of how we found out we were losing the office space.

At the last meeting, the nice man from (particular agency) who does seem to pick up on some strange details and takes the discussion off in different directions, was thinking to himself "Wait a minute, we give $120K/year in office space, but we're the only other agency besides the lead agency giving any money. Hey! I could cut that amount because no one else is giving them money either!"

We know this because he recounted this thought process to my detail boss. My boss asked if he was still planning to stay a member of the group, to which nice, weird man with no real understanding of political acumen replied "Absolutely! We'll be doing just as much as all the other agencies that don't give you money are doing!"

Rats, spiders and smart people, the life boats are now available for boarding on the port rail. Women and children next.

A good opportunity... to realize what a bad opportunity looks like?

thirdbase — Tue, 22 Oct 2013 15:15:41 GMT

Near the beginning (middle?) of summer, I started working very part time and 1 day a week in another office. This was intended as professional development, I keep reassessing my goals and keep coming up with staff work, chief of staff -- that kind of thing. Very much fits who I am, what I like to do, what fulfills me, etc. (See also: why I like to stage manage). My boss has been looking around for an opportunity like this for me for quite a while and was very pleased she could offer it to me. I'm helping out with an interagency group that does similar things to my home office, but on a broader scale. My home office pays for the director, the admin, we get office space from another agency, etc.

It's been a little slow, lo these several months. We're supposed to ramping back up after a previous director ran things into the ground and got booted out at the beginning of this year. From what I hear, slow progress is being made in the regions, but the national level (where I am) is still suffering. I feel like on one hand, we're not pushing some areas hard enough and in other areas, if we even ask a question, we're going to get a response that sounds like "Ack! Budget cuts! Sequester! Gave up my eldest child last time, must you bleed me more?!"

We ran out of money for the 2 part-time contractors at the end of September, leaving the director and the admin full time, me, and a communications person one day a week. I just changed my day to Tuesday, checked the calendar and found he's changed his day to Thursday. The communications, they floweth. Our October meeting got canceled in the shutdown. We got told that the agency providing office space is cutting their budget and realized no one else is giving us any resources, so we've got to be out of this space by the end of December. And I just got disinvited to the strategy meeting/where the hell are we going and we don't exactly mean geographically meeting with the director and our 3 home office leaders because one of the leaders is concerned that the other 2 are going to come to blows over the potential direction. I had an inkling I might be asked to leave the meeting. Good thing to know the spidey sense is still good.

I've been a little dubious for a while, now I'm just not sure what to make of it.

And the technology help guy just came by looking for the admin (wo is out sick today). Winds up she requested to have her voicemail PIN changed and he was here to check up on whether or not (and I am not kidding) she got his voicemail message on how to change it. I just looked at him and he said "Oh. She wouldn't have gotten it, huh?" I offered him paper and pen to leave a note on her desk, and he said he'd send an email.

My brains are leaking out my ears and I feel like it's not my fault.

From the Decks of Thirdbase

thirdbase — Mon, 17 Jun 2013 13:12:09 GMT

Dear Self,
They are not going to suddenly send you home early today for you to nap, plan irises and make jam. As much as you are really not liking today, you do have some responsibilities that come with being an adult, and while you did do a great job making your lunch this morning and leaving the house in time to gas up before making it to the carpool a few minutes early, you are not allowed to call it a day. You've got quite a bit on your plate right now, and I know you're feeling overwhelmed and crappy, but you really do need to cowboy up and get through.

Sometimes being an adult means you can have ice cream for dinner and you don't have to make your bed, but it also means you have to stop screwing around on the internet, buckle down and get through this part of your day so you can get to the next adult parts of your day where you fill out the papers to sell your townhouse and make a healthy dinner instead of bailing and getting takeout.

Yes, you have a long crappy Monday ahead of you. Yes, you had electronic problems, and almost locked yourself in the bathroom stall but these things happen and it's time to get to the rest of your day.
Best,
Me

p.s. remember to disable the comments, not because you are discouraging comments or people mocking you in ways you probably deserve right now, but you don't need to come back here every 20 minutes the rest of the day "just to see if someone commented." There are several ways in which that is not healthy.

If I had a million dollars....

thirdbase — Thu, 13 Jun 2013 14:50:09 GMT

I think if I had dramatic economic flexibility (i.e., won the lotto), I would work 5 or 6hr days, because I can't find time/balance to read the books I want to read, start writing again, cook more, weed the garden, walk/jog/get in & stay in a shape that is not as pear, volunteer, do my job (which I really love and wouldn't want to quit and does require at least 4 days/week because of what I love about it) and commute.

I may have just decided I don't want to move into management, at least not in the next 10 years.

Huh. Interesting. We'll see.

That's the nice part about being a woman (or just me?). I get to change my mind all the time and those of you who know me are never really surprised.

Kinda makes hitting a target hard, but I think I'm more about the journey. Getting the gun in a sailboat race is always nice, but I'd rather know that we sailed a clean race as a team.

Hang ten, dude

thirdbase — Fri, 24 May 2013 20:53:14 GMT

Pleased to report that after a week of physical, sometimes blinding pain, I am baking cookies and (carefully) dancing around my kitchen to Pandora's Irish Pub channel. It seems that taking it easy and ding alot of sitting was actually part of the problem, so instead of sitting and resting today, I'm moving around. That being said, I am doing things like baking and removing the toothpaste tube from the box, instead of mowing the lawn.

Tonight at tai chi, the kicks can go fuck themselves, but otherwise, I'm feeling much better than I I have in a while. I'll take it.

Off to mix molasses and eggs to the Pretenders. I would mix 500 smiles....

Mood Schwing!

thirdbase — Tue, 21 May 2013 19:34:16 GMT

Went to the doctor's today (twice, but that's another story) and I'm fine and everything is doing what it's supposed to be doing, except for the soreness, so I'm going to get back to life.

All of a sudden, while reviewing grant proposals, sitting here with the windows open, I decided to mow the lawn after my haircut appt tonight and suddenly I am really looking forward to this weekend. I feel like I am going to have fun, like there will be things to do, like I will make progress on things that need progressing.

Suddenly, hope.

And that's how fast the despair comes on too. I will ride the highs, since I have to drown in the lows. Haircut and a nice lawn! Maybe I'll even get the string wound onto the trimmer!

After much deliberation, I've settled on this icon. It captures this whole thing best.

thirdbase — Tue, 21 May 2013 05:09:45 GMT

After my brother-in-law's wedding last July, I realized that various ovulation prediction testing had only ever caught a single "go fuck yourselves" day, so we decided that since my 36th birthday (and it's negative pregnancy test, ensuing fabulous bottle of wine and a 45 day cycle in which I got PMS twice and wondered if I had in fact somehow screwed up the pregnancy test) was fading, we might as well get a medical opinion. Result: blocked fallopian tube, surgery, and a meeting with the infertility clinic about why I was a great candidate for IVF, and should not waste my time and money on other forms of infertility treatments that better benefit 28-35 year olds with 2 working ovaries and fallopian tubes. We had a fun January and February, and when nothing came of the fun except March, we started the process.

I was reminded: stay calm, get sleep, eat right, don't worry about things, Shady Grove (the infertility clinic) has assigned me a personal nurse (who is awesome) and a personal financial counselor (who has a several religious icons in her office, and lots of Biblical quotes posted there, where she meets with the patients. I have no idea if McKayla would be impressed. We weren't).

I'll tell you I'm not usually a worrier, Captain Legoland would probably choke on whatever he was drinking if he heard me say that. I just like to understand what I'm getting into so I don't have to worry about it.

Money: if you look up "cost of infertility treatments online" you find such reassuring statements as "It's really, really expensive" and "How to pay for your infertility treatments" and "Are your finances in order?" Ok, no problem. We have the worksheet from Shady Grove telling us how much the procedures are, though it take us 2 more weeks to figure it out because the financial counselor may be a whiz at talking to the insurance companies, but is really horrible about patient interaction. If someone says they don't understand, simply repeating the words more insistently doesn't actually engender understanding. And doing it a 3rd time, even slower, actually makes things worse. Nothing like feeling like a idiot before you even get through the first office visit. It took me almost a month before I walked out of the office not crying. The first day I was not crying, I had them re-take the picture for my file that they took on that first visit.

Drugs: The drugs cost more than the procedures. But it took We have a list of drugs from the nurse. The counselor tells us to call the insurance company and ask them for drug prices.

Aetna Specialty Hell: Actually, it's called Aetna Specialty Pharmacy, but I can't tell the difference. By the 5th phone call, I was no longer crying during the phone call. I had honestly given up. I would get told different things by different people and when I repeated what I had been told, I was told (yup, you guessed it) that I was wrong, I couldn't possibly have been told that. Long and short of it, I never found out what the medicines cost until the receipt and the medicines showed up on my doorstep. I hadn't even been told they were shipping that morning. They were supposed to confirm it Friday night, as I was supposed to start the medicines on Sunday morning (everything is timed based on what my blood levels and ovaries are doing at the time). I asked Ben to stay home while I went out Sat morning at 9:30 and when i got back at 11am, the medicines had arrived.

Important point: During the series of calls with the pharmacy, I had been put on birth control. They do this to even out the body's cycle, get everything reset, as it were. The first time I ever went on birth control, at 17 or 18 to control very very painful periods, I never made it to day 3 of the pill. On day 2, I sat on the edge of my bed for most of the day, peering over it, trying to decide if it was worth getting off the bed. Not worth it, since I wasn't having sex. I don't remember going on it again, but I've had to switch pills a couple times, each time to a lower dose because I'd go a little crazy/weepy when I'd start a new pill. Eventually I would even out. When I went off the pill March 2011, I was fine for the period week, fine through Wed, had a little crying episode on Wed and on Friday when I got home from work, I informed Captain Legoland that I was not looking forward to the next day. As we were planning to go camping, he hugged me and said "we'll have fun!" To which I responded "No, you don't understand. I'm not looking forward to the sun coming up tomorrow because there won't be anything good about it" and I burst out crying. I spent the whole weekend (camping and having fun) feeling very delicate indeed. Suffice it to say, hormones make me very emotional, very edgy, sad, etc. Can you even imagine me sad? Over the past 2+ months, I've had trouble remembering myself as happy.

I got through over a week of crying, moping, deep breathing followed by more crying, feeling like I was going crazy -- there's nothing quite like crying uncontrollably and when your husband hugs you and says "What's wrong?" you say "I don't know, everything is bad," and cry even harder. I was overwhelmed by everything. There were dishes in the dishwasher that needed to be put away! Couldn't he see this was horrible? I was an awful wife -- a good wife would put the dishes away! I would have made dinner and cleaned the house and gone grocery shopping and instead I was paralyzed by tears. And there were emails at work that I HADN'T ANSWERED. I was going to lose my (federal employee for 11 years and I do really good work) job and then we weren't going to be able to pay the mortgage! Couldn't he see what a bad person I was? Then I would cry and apologize for being such a horrible person. I honestly can't imagine being him in that situation. Talk about no-win.

I went in for a routine monitoring appointment (bloodwork, ultrasound) one day and they asked me (in the way that doctors will) "How are you today?" and I replied "Horrible. There's nothing good about today." They sat me down and quickly figured out that the pill was really screwing with me. I can't explain what a relief it was to realize that. Be told it was ok to feel what I was feeling, that it sucked, and no, I was not the only one this happened to. Perhaps mine was a little more drastic, but my nurse shared a funny story with me. When she first started working there, she felt that alot of her patients really didn't like her. Then it occurred to her that the patients were required to call on day 1 of their cycles (max PMS time) and otherwise called when their hormones were out of control to say everything was horrible.

I survived the few more days on the pill and they told me the new medicines would be different, so i wouldn't feel the same crazy, but I might be a different crazy. I wish I had kept a better log, but I think those 2 weeks were pretty ok. I was mostly focused on giving myself shots (squeamish? go straight to the next paragraph right now) twice a day in the stomach, which was more medically interesting to me than it was disturbing. Some friends, and my sister-in-law, had to have their husbands do it, they couldn't handle it. Luckily, I have enough belly fat that I didn't feel anything unless I nicked myself pulling the needle out. Ben would sit with me and a couple times, gave me the shots in my arms. Once I had to do it out an evening event and the couple people in the bathroom told me not to worry, their mothers were diabetics too. I just agreed.

The fun part - I promised there would be humor - is that I have a bunch of leftover clean needles that I can use to spike strawberries and such with rum or vodka. So there's that. That went on fairly well, do emotional issues I remember.

IVF is (as I explained to my grandmother) where they give me drugs to trick my body into thinking that it's a great idea to mature around a dozen eggs in my ovaries in one month, instead of just 1 or 2. Once the majority of the eggs (at that stage, still called "follicles") are mature, they give me a time to take a "trigger" medication, which will cause my boy to release the eggs 36hrs later. They book the OR time in the clinic in Rockville (just over an hour drive from home), count back 36hrs and I get the shot. We head to Rockville, I get put under anesthesia, they harvest the eggs, (and as I explained to my grandmother to make her laugh), Ben gives them sperm, they don't just take it from him like they do my eggs. I wake up, I eat saltines (yum yum), I go home, I sleep for 2 days. after 2 days, they call me and tell me whe I come back in -- I got Day 5, which is good, it gives the cells more time to split, and they get more time to figure out which horse is going to win the Thirdbase Derby.

Back to the emotional end of things:
Up to this point, I had never had any problems or emotional upset around kids, pregnant friends, discussion of such, etc. I have a colleague who was never so happy as to be away on detail while my boss was pregnant, because they were having a hard time of things. I had heard stories from friends who were ok around some things, but some subjects had set them off. But I had never felt anything but happiness for friends (who would caveat their own pregnancies by saying "I was waiting to tell you in hopes that you would be pregnant and I don't want you to feel bad"), family, etc. In fact, i got to the point where I wondered to Ben if maybe this meant I secretly didn't want kids? No, we decided, that wasn't it. I just didn't have the feelings that some people did. Didn't make me anything but me.

The Saturday between Retrieval and Transfer (when they give the fertilized egg back), Ben's brother called to say they were pregnant. I found out when I got home from tai chi. I immediately burst out crying. Then I felt bad -- they are such wonderful people, how I could I not be happy, even ecstatic for them? I cried harder. I said "I'm happy for them..." and then said "No I'm not" and cried harder because how could I be that cruel? The rest of that day, if I thought of them, I cried. If I didn't, I was fine. In the late afternoon, we were headed home from the hardware store and I was driving. I saw a large bird in a tree off the road and wondered what kind of a bird it was -- it was huge! Turkey vulture maybe? As we drove past it and our angle to the tree/bird changed, it appeared as if the bird, definitely a raptor now, was leaning forward to take flight. Holy crap, it was an eagle! And I thought to myself, in these exact words, "Well, I may be a complete failure as a woman because of my inability to conceive a child, but at least I'm not useless as a human because I do know my birds." And then I burst out crying (You have my full permission to re-read that whole bird part and giggle. Because this really is pretty funny. Sad-funny, but funny nonetheless). Ben had had his eyes closed in the passenger seat and I could just hear him think "oh god, what now?" That poor guy.

That evening, it was nice to think back on that and think that anyone who could have that kind of thought was clearly under the influence of things beyond her control, and that every other irrational thing that was happening was clearly irrational, and not me blowing things out of proportion for no reason. If that had occurred to me as rational thought, then it was ok, I should just take a nice deep breath, let it out, and repeat. And remind myself that it was ok.

Fast forward a bit. Transfer went fine. The waiting 2 weeks for the pregnancy blood test went fine. They offer pamphlets ad support groups for people waiting those 2 weeks. I had play rehearsal and 2 deadlines at work. I was vaguely aware that 2 weeks had passed. The first test was positive. I came back 2 days later and that blood test was positive and the hormone levels they look for were rising just like they should.

Next spoiler: this is not a post to tell you I'm pregnant. Gains and losses ahead. It's ok to stop reading at any point, though I agree this is a little bit like a train wreck.

I went back the next week? week after? for the first ultrasound. There it was, a dark circle with a light patch on the right and a round circle on the left. The circle was pulsating. At 103 beats per minute. Right on time. It was cool. They gave me a print out. And since I'm being completely honest, I'll add this: right now may be the first time I've been really excited by that little pulsating circle.

We went into this thinking of it as a science fair experiment. We were throwing alot of money (with embryo freezing, it cost more than our wedding) at this, with no guarantee that we'd even get anything to transfer, that we'd even get a positive blood test, that we'd even get a positive ultrasound. At that point, I was counted as being 5 weeks. If I were 5 weeks and we'd gotten pregnant naturally, I'd be staring at a calendar thinking "wait, do I get my period this week or next week? Or last week? I forget..." We were a loooong way from in the clear. I didn't want to get excited. People think about these things very differently and to us, it was not a baby at that stage. It wasn't even a going-to-be-a baby. It was a cool thing and when was my next appointment? I decided I'd write the weeks on the calendar after they had passed.

The medicine I was taking at this point, and had been since just before the retrieval was designed to make my body think it was pregnant. So I would get home from work, and sleep. My bio in the Twelfth Night program thanks Captain Legoland for waking me up for rehearsal. The reason I needed a co-stage manager was that I couldn't handle a normal rehearsal schedule and still stay relaxed, de-stressed, and get plenty of sleep. I don't recall any major emotional snafus with that one, but productivity goes down in all parts of life when you can't have sugar, caffeine, or chocolate, and you sleep all the time. Work emails backed up, laundry backed up, cooking didn't happen, baking didn't happen, etc. I got behind, and had to ignore it and not stress.

My next appointment was Monday of Tech Week. Monday of International Panel on Climate Change Review week. Tues, Wed and Thur, I was going to be in the office for an hour in the morning, in meetings til 1:30, in the office for another hour, and then off to Tech Week, where I'd nap in the car. I arranged not not go to rehearsal on Wed -- instead, I'd go sailing and get to bed early. That was the plan. Gotta have a plan.

It was immediately evident that the ultrasound nurse couldn't find what she was looking for. The doctor walked in just as I was about to say something calming and understanding to her, because she was starting to look a little nervous, knowing she couldn't locate anything. I like the doctor very much. I prefer straight shooting to anything else. Before I could say anything, he looked said said "I have to tell you, we're not finding anything good here. I'm very sorry."

I had a couple tears. He assured me that it was nothing I had done (I had gone easy sailing, everything had felt fine, they had told me as far as they were concerned it was ok), it wasn't the sailing, that something must not have been right, and my body had figured it out. We got straight when I would come back in, and I called Ben from the car and told him. Then I drove to Dunkin Donuts and got a coffee and a donut and drove to work. I got a big hug from him that night, told my skipper I had to be at the theatre on Wed because Thurs was invited dress, and I had my week. You don't have time to process when you don't have time.

Those that follow me on facebook will recall a recent Friday post that said "I can do this." It was the first day of quiet. I was the most senior person who showed up in the office that day, there were only 3 of us total. I had to get 2 letters written, and sort through email. I was sleep deprived. I hadn't actually miscarried yet and didn't know when I would. I had loads on my mind and plenty of time. But I couldn't break down, at the office, with no one there for support, knowing I had a full night of theatre that I had to get through -- a night full of friends, teammates and hilarity. I night where I could be "on" and have something to focus on.

I was ok. I was more ok than I thought I'd be. I wasn't weepy once, and shared the news quietly with people who needed to know, or who had been following part of the recent part of the journey. On Monday, I was back at the office and since my body hadn't chosen to miscarry yet, we scheduled a D&C (honestly, if you don't know what it is, I wouldn't google it. it's much scarier on-line than it actually was), where a minor procedure would help my body through this, before my body decided that the embryo was a scar that had to be healed over. So for a second week, I missed sailing, as the best time for them was Wednesday afternoon. I stayed home Thurs and Fri, teleworking most of both days. Unexpectedly, though explained to me later than night by a friend who has been through this, my hormones levels came crashing down at about 3pm on Friday. I was nervous, twitchy, delicate. I cried a little bit. As predicted, I got completely bloated, and nothing fit. I showed up for the play on Friday night wearing parachute pants folded down to my hips, and my 2XL crew tee shirt, inside out, so it was Stage Manager black. On Saturday, I hit two stores to try and find something I could wear, proving that the only thing worse than not fitting into your clothes is shopping and not fitting into theirs either. I cried myself to sleep for a nap, really really dragged myself out the door to get to closing night, and gave up completely on the wardrobe: yoga pants pulled down to my hips, black tank top and a black fleece that said "WILDFIRE" in orange from when I sailed with them. I had a great time at the theatre, I had a great time at the cast party. Being around people really perked me up but it was so so hard to pull the energy to get there. I had cried in tai chi that morning. I cried in the stores. On Sunday, I cried to Ben and then apologized in tears for crying.

This whole thing feels alot like hearing a friend of mine talk about how her depression used to affect her before she was able to get on the right kind of meds. I'm tired, unmotivated, lethargic, can't concentrate. My appetite is all over the place, sometimes I'm not hungry, sometimes I'll eat 2 full meals within 30 minutes. I can't decide what I want to eat, what I want to do, where I want to do it, or not do it.

I've been wanting to do this entry for a while, I wanted to keep track of how things were going, how I was feeling. I didn't. No energy. No drive. I don't feel for the loss of the blip on the screen, I feel a loss of myself. How am I supposed to be a coping adult if I can't control what is going on in and outside of my head? I know these are questions that are readily and rationally answered with a smile and the rather easy explanation of "because when you need to do it, it'll get done."

Except I'm not in a rational frame of mind these days. I can't come up with the energy to smile. Seriously, stop and think: when was the last time you saw me not smile? When did I not have a smile for you? I run on smiles. I could power the neighborhood with smiles. Most times. I can't even remember that there are things that are fun. I went grocery shopping with Ben on Sunday because while it would have made more sense for us to divide and conquer on the chores, this was really the first time I had spent with him since the negative test, since the D&C, because of our schedules. And I could not think of a single thing I would have done while he was out. There was a month's worth of laundry (all mine) to fold and put away. There were clean dishes to be put away. There were little tree helicopters that could be pulled out of the mulched garden and gutters. I could have pulled the weeds out of the raised beds so I could plant the vegetables I bought on Saturday. None sounded interesting or fun. I know I like gardening, but I can't remember what fun feels like. I know I enjoy baking, but I really can't be bothered to fish out a recipe. I know I'm not going to wash the cookie sheets or the the bowl for a week so why bother, right? I can't remember fun. I don't have time to find it at the moment. I don't want to take the time, because there are other things that ought to get done, and i wouldn't know where to look anyways. I did the retail therapy thing and got my favorite store (ever. in the whole world) shopped the Saturday of opening weekend. I don't need anything. I don't like clothes shopping when I do fit into clothes, I certainly don't like it when I'm 10-15lbs heavier than I was before I started the hormone shots.

There's just no energy.

I'm still in the throes of unknown. My soft practice kicks in tai chi on Saturday are still hurting the muscle area right where the procedure happened on Wed, so I'm back in the doctor's office tomorrow, because evidently there's another piece I haven't checked off their "Everything is good" list (but I did say no gory details). I am on continued rest, which means no sailing again on Wed (when I am stuck in an all day meeting anyways), so when I got on the boat Saturday, I'll be in coaching,/go-for-a-boat-ride mode, not trimming mode. Maybe I'll start teaching myself to call tactics.

The one really nice part of this is that when you tell someone you're doing infertility treatments, you can't swing a dead cat without hitting someone going through it. When you find out there's not a heartbeat anymore, there's no shortage of women who have been just where you are and offer to listen, to hug, and if you want it, to offer thoughts on how they got through. Even the D&C - no sooner did I mention it to a very very small group of friends, 4 of them came back and shared their experiences, told me what to expect and how to get through it. It's not a group you set out wanting to be a part of, but I'll tell you, it feels oddly good to be a part of it. And sometime, I 'll be able to give back.

I hurt alot physically right now, and my plan still seems to be to sleep-deprive the emotional part. My goal, after tonight, is early bedtimes the rest of the week. I've been typing this out for about 2 hours. Ben is now in bed, and I'll head off myself. I'll find the smiles and fun. They're somewhere. They're with friends, but I don't have the energy to call a gathering, or commit to something. I will. Eventually. "This too shall pass, said the rabbi," as my mother used to say.

The lesser of two weevils

thirdbase — Fri, 17 May 2013 19:35:54 GMT

I can't pick sleep over processing for much longer, but I'm going to take one more out. Expect an entry this weekend.

CPOTD: I can't explain why this is so funny to me

thirdbase — Thu, 25 Apr 2013 11:53:30 GMT

But it is.
Happy sunny Thursday.

Waiting Is

thirdbase — Fri, 12 Apr 2013 14:22:56 GMT

I can't tell if the biggest side affect of these medicines is complete exhaustion or lack of interest in life. Either way, it's getting a little old. I feel exactly like people who have suffered from depression explain how they were feeling when they were near or at rock-bottom.

I love my job and have a great project to work on right now: bored, can't gin up any interest in completing it.

I'm stage managing 12th Night with an awesome cast and crew: I enjoy rehearsals when I'm there, but haven't started any of the follow up work.

Discworld Convention: This is going to be an awesome experience for me and I can't come up with the energy to start recruiting people for onsite positions.

I get home from work and all I want to do is sleep. I'm not interested in cooking, or baking. I haven't gone grocery shopping in over a month except for milk and frozen meals for lunches. Oh, I guess I did buy some veggies on Sunday. Probably ought to cook those tonight or tomorrow.

I won't make plans with people because I wind up canceling because I don't have the energy. I had lunch with a friend on Sat and it felt like the biggest outing of my life.
Bonus: I have continued tai chi, which is good, and really helping. I've wound up taking the Fri night and Sat morning classes because I can't make it to Wed nights, but I'm even getting some practice in mid-week.

And I've been in one waiting phase or another since August, and I'm back in another one that is also doing a number on me. And one more round of waiting that has good & bad sides: I have to wait til my birthday to go sailing for the first time this season because I have concert tickets for next Wed. So boo/yea!

I know this will all pass, but argh! Sucks to be stuck into it. I want to write about happy things, but I keep getting stuck, so I write nothing. So today, I unbottle a little bit.

Keeping in mind the words and philosophy of Valentine Michael Smith, the Man from Mars: Waiting Is.

Sinfest makes me snarf my tea

thirdbase — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 11:18:30 GMT

I almost started choking. I don't know why this is so damn funny to me.

Where else will the sequester hit?

thirdbase — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 19:12:18 GMT

I had a discussion at work with a colleague where we looked at the impacts of the sequester on...
Area 51.

There will be 5% fewer flight tests on the UFOs.
There will be 5% less time spent poking the aliens.
There will be 5% fewer alientologists.
Area 51 will be renamed "Area 33 1/3."

Impacts:
There will be 5% fewer stories in World Weekly about Elvis being abducted.
There will be 5% fewer stories about Elvis being returned to earth.
There will be 5% fewer "anal probe" jokes on South Park. (we have to list both positive and negative impacts)
There will be a 5% drop in lab coat manufacturers.
There will be a 5% drop in used Winnebago sales.
There will be a 10% increase in sales of Barry Manilow LPs. (see note re: South Park)

Am I missing any?

Where Our Hero Changes the Course of Western Civilization or, The Pen Is Stronger Than the Sword

thirdbase — Wed, 27 Feb 2013 15:10:59 GMT

I was talking with my grandmother yesterday and she said that since I'm good at writing letters, I should write a letter to Congress or the newspaper and point out that the sequester would be bad and she went on to name a couple reasons why it's bad.

It's really awesome that my grandmother thinks so much of me that she feels a letter from me would go a long way towards solving the problem.