#Microblog Mondays: Body image

It's been blazing hot here and so this morning we decided to take Girl Wonder off for her first taste of the local outdoor swimming pool.

Sitting on the lawn surrounded by women of all ages, many with kids and grandkids, lots on their own or in groups, it struck me how at ease the women here are with their bodies. They look comfortable in their own skins. I think it has a lot to do with generally more relaxed attitudes towards nudity and sexuality in this culture, (all family-friendly pools here, including the one we frequent, have nude bathing sections), and it's wonderful and liberating to be around.

The women (and men) here seem unencumbered by the tiresome body image issues that characterize women's attitudes to their appearance where I come from; the perception of body parts as too fat, too thin, too round, too pointy, too fair, too dark, too freckly, too hairy, too wrinkly. It's something I admire, and it's a good environment in which to raise a daughter.

Speaking of said daughter, here are some gratuitous Girl Wonder shots from today, just because.

#Microblog Mondays: risk versus possibility

1) Prenatal screening can detect the risk of delivering a baby with Down syndrome.

2) Prenatal screening can detect the possibility of delivering a baby with Down syndrome.

They mean basically the same thing, but not. We welcome possibility, while we shy away from risk.

As an agnostic feminist, I have been a lifelong supporter of women's right to choose. I have also been a lifelong advocate for - celebrator of! - the plurality of human experience. We like to think of ourselves as moving into a world of ever more respect for rights (of women, of minorities, of various 'others') and respect for diversity.

And so, like others before me, I struggle with the contradiction inherent in the fact that as our societies become more embracing of diversity, we are also, thanks in part to more accurate prenatal screening (which is not accompanied by accurate education), adopting ever more normative standards of what that diversity should look like.

By some estimates, upwards of 90% of pregnancies where a risk/possibility of Down syndrome is detected are terminated. There is a real chance that for people like my daughter, a day will come - and soon- when they will wake up to find themselves the last of their kind.

While I suspect that most people will find it hard to understand how I can say I have come to love that extra chromosome in all its unique, confounding, divisive glory, it seems a little sad to me that we're denying ourselves opportunities to live with this diversity: diversity of experience, genetic diversity, human diversity.

I can't help but think it's a shame that in our avoidance of risk (what life worth living doesn't involve some level of risk?) we are closing ourselves off from all kinds of possibilities.

Written as part of Mel's Microblog Mondays. Check it out here to participate.

A spotting update and attitude reboot

Since I posted my frantic report of spotting on Friday, I've become a lot calmer and regained much of my zen about this pregnancy. The spotting has stopped and I'm inclined to believe that it might just have been one of those little blips that are not uncommon to perfectly normal healthy pregnancies...a topic on which I have too little practice.

When I could get away from work on Friday afternoon, I called our clinic, fighting back tears as I talked with the doctor on call. She reiterated what all of you wise women, with your reassuring comments, already knew: that spotting at this stage of pregnancy is not only very normal, but could even be a good sign. That based on what I'd told her it could very well be the little one making itself comfy for a long stay. That as long as the spotting didn't increase in flow or become red blood, I should try not to worry. That the cervix is very 'vascularized' in early pregnancy, and given the fact that my progesterone levels have always been through the roof naturally even before pregnancy (thus precluding any need for supplements), this increases the chances of even mild irritation leading to some bleeding. That my biggest job right now was staying optimistic and looking after myself. She prescribed bed rest for the weekend and said that if things remained the same there was no need to advance the u/s which will happen tomorrow (tomorrow!) anyway. 

Since then, I've had two more episodes of spotting on Saturday morning, slightly heavier at first, but brown in colour, making me think (hopehopehope) she may just have been right that this was leftover implantation bleeding. It dwindled by yesterday afternoon and today there's been nothing.

I'm so relieved and a strange sense of calm has even fallen over me. I still think that those of us who have struggled hard to get and stay pregnant deserve a free pass when it comes to anything hinting at pregnancy complications, but so be it. It's absurd and difficult, but I'm trying as I might to place some distance from my past experience and just exist here and now.

Of all the insights culled from the not-actually-reassuring because I'm deeply neurotic phone consult with Dr. B last week, there was one I've clung to in the last few days. He said that as hard as he can imagine it to be (and I like about this doctor the fact that he doesn't assume he knows, can only imagine), that we have to try and look forward and see this as a new experience, a new pregnancy entirely separate from all our past experiences. Although my history reveals a lot of really crap luck, it may be nothing more than just that: shitty luck. And the one silver lining of having spun our wheels for months on end this year has been the copious amounts of monitoring that have taken place: we now know that there are no identifiable barriers to healthy conception or pregnancy, we're both in great health, and indeed, there is no reason why this shouldn't work. In fact, as we prepared for IVf over the summer, we were both hyper-conscious of being in the best possible shape we've been in ages, so the timing is right.

This is it's own pregnancy, and history doesn't always repeat itself.

At the moments when those scary events are happening, and when I let my mind wander to the worst case scenarios that have been, (as well as the ones I dream up) it can indeed feel as though H and I are somehow marked for bad luck. That it is always and inevitably attracted to us. But really, where we now find ourselves, that attitude won't do. Firstly because it's not a very appealing quality to possess and not one I'd like to be associated with, but also, secondly, because it won't do us any good to think like that and may even steal precious moments of joy from what is becoming. As much bad luck as there might have been, right this very minute, we are lucky indeed for what is.

H has been amazing through all this. This time around, he is both more connected to this pregnancy than I am able to be (which made this spotting episode all the more scary for him), and also more able to tap into his optimism. He continues to dream quite vivid dreams of us with our child (including, amusingly, one last night of teaching the fundamentals of potty training...who dreams of that? All I can say is, if the realist leanings of his paternal yearnings are anything to go by, he's a natural, and I'm going to have it relatively easy). He has been nuzzling my belly and whispering coaxing words of all the delights that await, to tempt this little life to stay put and grace us with its presence in eight odd months. Last night, as we watched old episodes of Parks and Recreation on the computer, in bed, snuggled close together and with the speakers near my belly as the opening credits rolled, he said: How could it not want to stay with us when it can hear fun music like this? We promise we'll have lots of fun baby! We always have lots of fun. (The kid better share our taste in entertainment, I guess...) [He has, despite his own terror, managed to make me laugh in these moments of uncertainty. Having asked for immediate spotting-status-updates after each of my visits to the toilet, he then announced, on his own departure to the bathroom: I have to go to the loo. I wonder what my own pee will reveal? Maybe that we've won the lottery! Yeah, you had to be there... As schmaltzy as it gets, but this is why I love the man.]

Are we getting way ahead of ourselves? Yes. Is it way too early to count our embryos before they've hatched never mind need potty training? For sure. Will any of this have even the slightest impact, for ill or good, on how tomorrow turns out, or all the tomorrows after that? Not a jot. So we might as well enjoy, because we sure as hell deserve it.

Now....Breath held. Fingers crossed. On to tomorrow. 

Same road, different bend

It's been one heck of a week; I've been a crappy blogger and a crappier commenter throughout my participation in September's ICLW. I tried to keep up and I did often read, in the flash of an eye; but, one month into my new job as things really heat up with the workload and several new high-needs clients, as well as prepping for and attending what was intended to be our final pre-IVF consult, commenting got the better of me.

Yes, I did say was intended. We walked into that room yesterday with our carefully cultivated, fragile hope, ready to be told the date for our mandatory information evening, sometime in mid-October, and be given instructions on who to call with what in order to announce the start of my cycle (in late October) - the one that would finally be a realistic shot at a baby. Our IVF cycle.

Turns out, there's yet another twist in this long and winding road. In fact, it seems to wind ever onward.

It's not that any of our test results were anything other than stellar; we're still very much 'unexplained' in terms of our inability to conceive a healthy pregnancy. Our test results look great. No, it's my medical history, ancient at that, that's the snag this time.

If you've been reading this blog for a while, you might know that I'm a cancer survivor. Throughout my adolescence I was treated for a rare form of bone cancer, which recurred several times in my lungs until I was given a terminal prognosis, after which I...sort of just kept on living, really. I'm a freak of nature. A medical miracle. It's not something I dwell on a lot these days, simply because it never defined me and doesn't much effect me now. Or so I assumed.

What it does apparently mean is that my adult eggs, even all these years later, may be at a higher-than-normal risk of susceptibility the the tiniest viruses that might be present in normal laboratory conditions. There are likely only two IVF labs in the country, so we were told, that will deal with them. We're going to be referred again. Which may mean another, yet longer wait, but will certainly mean all the pre-IVF tests we've already completed will have to be redone at the new laboratory, since according to our current doctor each likes to have its own baseline. And because the labs are so specialised, there's a good chance that the wait for the procedure will be that much longer.

They've done one last slew of bloodwork yesterday, the results of which should be available in a few weeks. If these prove that my system has in fact recovered from its years of chemotherapy and invasive surgeries, there might still be a chance that we can stay at our current clinic.

Of course this begs the question (the first on our lips, leaving the office), WHY DIDN'T THEY THINK OF THIS BEFORE? Have they not actually read my charts? My cancer history is not a secret, and should be common knowledge among my care providers.

But what's done is done, the time for those questions to have any relevance is past. Yes, the road winds ever on. And so we wait. And wonder.  

Will we ever reach the end? When will it be our turn?

No, thanks, I think I'll wait for mine

From the lab tech taking my blood this morning at the clinic --

Her: Do you have any children?

Me: Nope. That's kinda why we're here.

Her (very brightly): It'll happen for you eventually! Or if not, I've always got a good-for-nothing eight year old at home you can take off my hands!

Me (disbelievingly, weakly): Ha...ha?

I mean...Who thinks this is a remotely ok thing to say to someone undergoing fertility treatments?

(In fairness to my clinic, we are normally very impressed with their high level of sensitivity and training when it comes to the medical realities we are dealing with, so I can only assume this woman was a temp or something; I've never seen her before today).

Here's my rule of thumb: Anyone who finds themselves in this shitty Club of IF has the right to make light of their (our) situation with as much irreverence, shock value and cursing as they see fit. Anyone who has no clue what this is like, kindly keep your humour -- and your children -- to yourselves.

Too harsh?

Take foot. Insert in mouth. Source

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In other bloodwork news, they have re-tested me for a clotting disorder. When my OB/GYN first tested for this in March the results came back borderline, and he said that he was satisfied this was not likely an issue for us beyond the possible need for baby aspirin should we manage a pregnancy in future. But in all the data collection run-up to our IVF, when they tested again recently in the fertility clinic, they said the results were 'inconclusive'. We'll be able to discuss these latest results (from today's test) at our appointment on the 25th. Is it wrong of me to say I almost wish they'd find something? At least that way we'd have some answers, and a fairly straightforward means of managing any pregnancy so that it doesn't end in such a dire/devastating/baby-less way in future.

We should be so lucky.

Keepin' it real?

Here we sit, in the waning days of summer, (and perhaps for the first time in the history of ever, this country has produced a season worthy of that moniker, though not without some considerable and pretty laughable fanfare, I can tell you. Listen people of the British Isles: 33˚C is kind of, uh...normal where I come from.) And here I sit, trying to just be in the moment, and soak up every last ray of sun and enjoyment and not think ahead to the scary, uncertain cooler days to come. I really am trying. We're sitting on the terrace every night until well after the sun sets and we need extra layers, taking languid walks along the coast, and - this being that self-indulgent five days at the beginning of my cycle when nothing feels off limits and my self-imposed alcohol sanctions don't resemble Sharia law - enjoying plenty of these and these.

 Last weekend was the final long weekend of the season, and so we took ourselves off to Notting Hill Carnival along with one million other Londoners. We soaked up all the pleasures the event has to offer: a colourful kaleidoscope of sequins and feathers, the best jerk chicken this side of the Caribbean, ginger beer and steel drums and salsa and that distinctive brand of listless/audacious gyrating amid millions of sweaty bodies that can only be described as 'pleasurable' in the context of carnival.

 And it was a sublime, childless couple-y thing to do. We even managed genuine smiles at all the adorable families out with their adorable offspring.  So there are definite moments.

But then, well...there are other moments.

We're in the process of undergoing numerous humiliating and/or invasive procedures gathering all the necessary body data in anticipation of our upcoming IVF. H has undergone yet another sperm analysis, this time (for the first time) in the confines of the clinic itself, so as to insure 'optimal freshness'. (My dear, slightly OCD husband returned insisting he'd developed a rash as a result of sitting 'on that couch'. I saw nothing.) Bright and early next Monday I'll be in for my first ever antral follicle count. Our appointment to review all this stuff is not until the end of Sept; the clinic offered us the 4th, but that was impossible since it's also the day I start my new job, and anyway it seemed scarily close when we booked. I naively thought a few extra weeks might help us process all this. After that, there is a mandatory information session that we're expected to attend, and by the time we get through all the hoops, realistically we're looking at an IVF cycle by late October/early November. A long way off still, but nonetheless, very real and getting moreso all the time. (Suddenly, I feel like we're hurtling, headlong without helmets, along that long and winding road.)

The other day, as the impending signs of my period's arrival were hitting me particularly hard, I told H: 'I don't want to do this anymore. I just want it to be finished'. And it's true.

I don't feel particularly optimistic about IVF. And I know it's already a bad sign that we're both so exhausted before we even hop on that crazy train, where the best of the invasive, mind-bending, hormone-altering procedures and processes are yet to come. This is not how I would have chosen to approach all this you guys. It's not even that I'm afraid of all that stuff, though I know I have reason to be. But the fact is, even if this were to work, there's nothing to say it wouldn't just end in yet another loss. IVF provides absolutely no assurance, (particularly given my dismal track record), of a healthy, viable pregnancy. And I don't know if I have the reserves to face that right now.

I just want it to be finished.

Confession: I really wanted to be one of those people who, on the eve of getting all down and dirty with an RE's office, syringes and catheters, was just all of a sudden like, 'We conceived spontaneously! No need for IVF after all!' I wanted that to be our narrative arc. 

Those people exist, right? It's not just an urban legend.

I don't think this is a case of denial though. On the contrary, I feel like lately, when I can't help but let my mind wander from the here and now to the what's-to-come, I'm all realist. And sometimes I wonder if we shouldn't just conserve our energy, stop fighting, and accept a life made up of sublime, childless couple-y things. Would that be so bad? Would it be enough?

When you look at it like that

First off, you guys. You guys. I mean seriously, it's these little nuggets of kindness and encouragement that lift me in such times and all your comments and emails were so appreciated. Thank you. 

I'm not going to lie; the last few days have been exhausting. Between tying up all kinds of loose ends as my job winds down, and my grief hangover, I don't have much physical or emotional energy these days. (This is not helped by another round of will-she-won't-she erratic menstruation antics on the part of my disobedient body). Right now, my Spring ain't looking so Invincible people.

Still, I'm putting one foot in front of the other. I'm slowly trying to catch up on all your blog news, and on my commenting. My brain has been intermittently weighing pros and cons, cons and pros in all of this, trying to figure out where I am for the moment...I'm trying to focus on pretty, shiny objects little things that bring me happiness, and just stay with that. Because that's the thing I know how to do, and what else is there, really?

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It's not just my metaphorical spring which seems to have been deferred. We had snow flurries again last night. No kidding. I'm missing the sun and the close-by beaches of Portugal now more than ever. On the other hand, if H's weather divination has any basis, we're still in for some good things in the remaining three seasons of this year. I'm going to go with that.

*******************************

 Yesterday was my last real day of work at my current job. I had to accompany a student to an offsite visit where most of the clients are mental health patients recovering from substance misuse. Within 20 minutes of arriving, I'd had encounters with two men in their 70s. One wanted to know if I'd accepted, really accepted, the Gospels into my life. He followed me around the facility until I explained my confused Catholic/Jewish parentage and my personal views (Holy atheist, Batman!) and that finally stumped him. The other guy  - in his 70s, remember - kept eyeing me and my student with a creepy leer, and tried to ahem...shall we say 'win me' without apparently realizing the coffee he was drinking was ending up in a fine spray on our faces. Yeah, he was hot stuff alright. Fun times. Will I miss this part of the job? For the most part, not so much.

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I'm down and out for another cycle. I was neither hopeful nor despairing this time around (in fact I pretty solidly found other things to think about), and so ends another two week wait, less eventful than many that have come before, and for that I am thankful. Still, after two + years of staking my existential status on where I sit in a monthly, merry-go-round cycle, all this uncertainty that my body is dishing out makes it hard for me to relax into the early part of my cycle. I'm Cycle Day...? 2? 3? -1? I have no clue. It's on and off and this is definitely signalling a less-than-reassuring new chapter. Luckily, the lovely Dr. B was entirely true to his word, and we have an appointment to meet with his colleagues in the sub-fertility clinic in just over two weeks. I'm hoping they'll be able to get to the bottom of all this faffing about that my body is doing. By then all my RPL panel results should be back so we can review those as well. I feel like I'm getting good care at last, and people who listen and follow up.

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Crucially, H and I are making big progress on working through our own ideas on the 'what next'. I hinted previously that we'd approached some more concrete plans in this department. Another long, tear-filled, looking-forward (and ultimately very cathartic) heart-to-heart took place over the weekend, and we finally have some sense of where we're ready to go. At our appointment on the 24th we'll ask about possibilities for IVF. We finally fulfil the criteria for 24 months of active ttc without any positive results (technically the year after S died was spent much more actively on grieving than on making a new baby). We still don't know the wheres or hows or whens, exactly (and there's still all the other uncertainty to deal with). But until quite recently, H had trouble with the idea of any kind of major intervention. He admitted himself that it was a kind of protective denial of the reality of our situation. So this is big. Huge.

And just like that, it looks like we might be boarding the IVF train. Holy shit. Honestly though, I'm hoping it'll give us the feeling of moving in a solid direction. Any direction is better, surely, than spinning our wheels as we have been for so many months now.

So good/bad/good/bad/good/bad. All in all, I think I can work with this. I just need to catch my breath first.

A real mixed bag, sweet and sour. Source.

On Second Thought

Remember how I counted this cycle as done and dusted earlier this week? Well now I'm not even sure if it's ended, and I have to say I am totally confused. I posted that update on Thursday because I had all the usual PMS-ish symptoms - bloatiness and cramping and general blech feelings, sore boobs, fatigue, 30 second emotional meltdowns of the I-will-never-parent-a-living-child variety - that always indicate Day One is on its merry way. By Wednesday evening I had already begun the mild spotting that has become pretty typical since my third loss.

And so I sat, wallowing under the duvet, and I waited. And waited. And nothing really happened.

And before we get unreasonably enthusiastic about the possibilities herein, let me rule out the prospects for anything approximating a pregnancy in the works. Zero. A gazillion negative pregnancy tests concur on that. Well, ok, it was five; but all different brands and all at different times of day - for the sake of triangulation - with the last this morning, just to rule out the possibility (and potential new source of worry) of a late implanter.

I actually had a very faint line on the first test I did on Monday afternoon, but it didn't appear until a good thirty minutes after use*, so in light of that and the subsequent mounting evidence, I'm guessing it was an evil evaporation line. 

At first I worried that the late arrival of my period would clash with the long awaited and finally nearly here procedure to remove my cervical polyp. But, then.

By Friday evening all those predictable symptoms seemed to have dissipated, and now I'm just....sitting here, confused. Not bleeding.

Now I'm sure for many of you who have experienced irregular or anovulatory cycles this might all sound like nothing. (Obviously, it's nothing. Literally). And maybe you can add your two cents and provide some insight as I await the call to my doctor tomorrow morning. However I have always been a pretty standard and predictable 28 day kind of girl.

Fourteen hours of spotting, bloating and sore boobs. I probably even thought that coming here and recording all this on the interweb would help me get things in order and find some clarification. But no, I'm still confused. Was that a period?

Aaaahhhgg! How does all this work if I can't count a Cycle Day? Does not compute!

Source.

* I always think this gives a special insight into the insanity that is my hoping-to-be-pregnant brain. Is there any other item on which you have recently urinated that you would want to save for future reference?

Totally Not Prophetic: my body didn't want to play ball

Well, in the end, the dream I had proved to be just that: a dream and nothing more. As suspected really.

Meh. I called in sick this morning, which will instead be spent wallowing on the couch, curled up into a ball in my duvet.

Right now, I don't have the energy for witticisms or the wherewith all to run through my silver linings (although I know they are there). Maybe tomorrow.

Onwards and upwards. Over and out.

Edited to add: What can I say? You ladies are the greatest and I'm really feeling the love. Waking up this morning to all your thoughts and support has helped me make the best of a crappy situation, and I promise to be back soon with updates of the Onwards and Upwards variety.

Well, I'm glad I asked then!

In all the recent excitement about presents and awards and wondrous surprises, both random and rather more expected, I have completely overlooked the report on my last doctor's appointment. (Because the internet provides me nothing if not the folly that other peoples' thoughts besides my own spin around the state of my cervix). But well, really, that's also because there's not much to tell. Nonetheless, read and rage with me a moment, won't you?

So I made it to my GP's office (because in this land of NHS referrals you don't get the opportunity to speak directly to a specialist and just ask the straightforward question pertaining to the procedure you're due to have in a mere five - ok, three now - weeks) to discuss the relationship of the surprise discovery during my recent cervical exam to this current cycle.

We're at a new(ish) practice, and you get seen by whoever's on that day, and our conversation with that day's whoever (because honestly, I had trouble believing that her medical qualifications were earned anyplace but the DeVry Institute of Technology*) can be summarized as follows:

Any number of questions I had...

Could this polyp, and not, as I had been told, my miscarriage last August, account for my wonky cycles the last several months?

Do they often materialize that quickly? (Remembering my HSG and uncountable pelvic exams in the last six months)

Will this jeapordize our ttc attempts for the coming cycle?

If we were to become pregnant, could it put the pregnancy at risk?

...were met with a stock answer:

'Again, I really don't know. That's something you'll have to ask the specialist'. In a mere five three weeks. After this cycle has come and gone. Seriously, I've never heard such a continous string of 'I don't knows'.

So yeah, that happened. Thanks for comin' out folks.

The good news is that the results from the original smear test came back normal, meaning there is almost certainly nothing of concern with regards the polyp itself. That was really scary, so...Phew. I'm still hoping ('cause hope springs eternal) to get some insight into how this may be implicated in (and potentially even resolve) our struggles to conceive over the last months. But - as I've been reminded again and again by my caregivers (let's use the term loosely) - that will have to wait.

So I'm hoping, in the coming days and weeks** for more little surprises, or at least shiny things, to keep me busy.

Feel like I'm hitting one. Source.

* If you actually earned any of your degrees there, and are reading this...Well, sorry.


**Because there's also that other, more familiar kind of waiting just around the corner.

And yet again

Yesterday's stark single line, at thirteen days past ovulation, was enough to seal the deal for another month. I poked and prodded around my abdomen, to instigate the cramps I wasn't feeling yet, to dissuade my recklessly and stupidly hopeful heart that no, it wasn't a false negative. She hadn't got the memo at all, and it seems my physiology was late to the monthly meeting that my rational brain had called.

Sometimes it seems like my heart and my head and my body are not working in concert, aren't even speaking to one another. (Maybe there's as much tension in there as there is out here?) Sometimes that makes me more angry than anything.

I shed quiet tears as H was extra nice all afternoon, making me teas and propping pillows oh-so-delicately.

I have a big day of work lined up today, to keep me running. It's a small mercy.

I just want to start bleeding already.

Tonight it'll be a large glass of red wine, detox be damned. I fear that soon it'll call for something stronger, monthly method and post-waiting come-down both.

Even my heart isn't that naive anymore. Source.

Oh f%#k

Right about now, I could be writing a witty post about surviving the travails from deep within the two week wait (I'm halfway through). But this is not that post.

This morning I went for a routine smear test, and while down there, the nurse found a polyp on my cervix. She said it was 'probably nothing to worry about', but I could tell by her reaction on finding it that she was a bit freaked out; she admitted never having seen one before. (Perhaps I shouldn't have asked?) I'm being referred for a colposcopy so a specialist can have a better look, and won't know anything more until then, I guess*. I'm resisting the urge to goo.gle the hell outta this thing, I know it'll only make me feel more anxious.

Come on universe, can you not just cut me some slack here? Once upon a time, I used to love and worship my body like it were a goddess temple, but nowadays I'm not so sure it deserves quasi-divine status.

It's probably nothing, they said.

But seriously, what if it's not nothing? All of a sudden, this has turned into an altogether different kind of waiting.


*Thanks to the wonders of the National Health Service here in the UK, according to my GP practice, any colposcopy referral will be treated as an 'emergency' case. Which means I have to wait only...oh, just a maximum of six weeks.



I'd totally do it, if I thought it'd work

 



How is it possible...

...that during the holidays, when we took an official ttc break so I could relax and enjoy and not worry about all the indulgences (and let's face it, downright unhealthy levels of excess) or how they would effect my possible future babies-to-be, when I continued my conception prenatals but ditched all my other supplements...that then, I had a perfect, healthy cycle and plenty of 'the coveted clear and stretchy' cervical mucus? All dressed up and no place to go.

And now, when I'm back to diligently observing every morsel that passes my lips, and downing my evening primrose oil, my raspberry leaf tea and vitamins with the discipline of an Olympic athlete (to say nothing of post-coital, legs in the air acrobatics*)...no egg whites to be seen.

WTF??

I'm sure there's some kind of lesson in here about the perils of hyper-vigilance and just relaxing already, which I guess I'm just too darn busy being hyper-vigilant to appreciate.

Edited to add: I may have over-reacted on this. All the stuff that was supposed to happen eventually did, and all the stuff we were supposed to do, we did. So, the wait begins...

* Just kidding, I don't really do that and haven't for ages. Is there anyone for whom this has actually worked?