Moving on...

When I started this blog, I hoped it would be a way for me to manage the tens of questions I was getting each week from readers of FertilityStories. I kind of got into the blogging, wrote about things that were on my mind, posted infertility news when it came up and wrote about infertility research I'd read. I met more infertility bloggers than I can count, some even in real life :-) and I plan to continue to keep up with all of your stories.

In terms of the questions, Yedda's helped me get them under control and many other people are able to answer them and give a much fuller picture than I ever could on my own.

I'll continue to post here, especially news and the results of my research (if I ever get the OK from the ethics committee), but I've opened a new blog that reflects where I am in my life now much more than this one does. I just don't live and breathe infertility anymore.

Thank you all so much for having been with me. I appreciate all of your comments, ideas and thoughts.

Yirmi & the paper towel roll

Yea, a strange name for a post, I know... but you'll soon see why.

Yirmi is soooo cute. Now that he's really close to 3 months, I'm happy to say that I got a baby without colic! I don't think any of the others were as easygoing as he's been so far.

He reaches for objects and laughs!

He loves playing on the mat and sometimes just wants me to put him down so he can play some more.

His outfit is from my ex-SIL who sent over a huge bag of things for him! I love the colors and I think she's pretty cool for being so sweet right after the divorce.

My sister gave me a CD, which I had sitting on the counter and I saw it reflecting the light onto the paper towel roll & got out my camera. (I'm weird, I know.)


OK, time for my weekly dose of Law & Order :-)

Happy 60!

Today's Israel's 60th Independence Day.

We just came back from watching the fireworks (I sat in the car holding Yirmi, but I think I had the absolute best view in the whole city). Wow. I love fireworks...

This afternoon, we got everyone together for some pictures, wearing our Israel 60 t-shirts - first just the kids... (yes, even Yirmi had a t-shirt):


and then everybody... This is our first family picture with Yirmi :-)

Happy Independence Day!

Moaning & groaning

I have the lovely pleasure of meeting with the court social worker & my ex once again today. A new report has been at the top of the news in Israel during the past few days - including the recommendation that mothers not be automatically awarded custody of children under 6 (which has been the standard so far). I am sure that in many cases, this is the right thing, but I can't imagine how much more I would have had to give up if my ex had tried to get custody of my kids and actually had a chance. As it was, I gave up a lot (financially) just to get out. I think that there needs to be some sort of labeling for abusive partners so that their ex-spouses don't have to continue to go through hell with them just because everyone naturally assumes they're decent human beings. I mean, the fact that the social worker thinks it's fine for me to have to have my ex agree to the kids going to the scouts - in writing - before he has to pay for it is insane. He doesn't want to pay for anything, therefore he just won't agree. How smart do you have to be to understand that???


It also made me really mad that my ex showed Lilach a piece of blank paper with the bank's logo on it as 'proof' that he has no money. I think it's really slimy to try to take advantage of the fact that he thinks she's not very smart. (She's much smarter than he thinks. She came home right away to ask me if that really means anything or not. I assured her that it does not.)

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Here are some pictures from yesterday:

Yirmi loves being on this blanket and he bats at things - not deliberately, but it's a start...

Nomi, holding the license plate Hadas found and plans to put in her new dorm. Check out her orange shoes...





Ohad and Yirmi in the garden. I love to see them together :-)

My oven's an imposter

My oven's temperature gauge is designed like a speedometer. You know how the speedometer goes up to say... 140mph and your car, even with the perfect tires, road & weather conditions could maybe get to 110? My oven claims to go up to 250 (celsius) but if you actually put it on that setting, it heats to a certain point and then blows a fuse (or whatever it is). Fortunately, it revives itself after a while. Anyway, this year I was clever enough not to repeat the mistake of previous years and the oven is behaving nicely. (I just hope it reads my blog and appreciates the fact that I'm writing about it.)

This Passover stuff is just way too stressful. I mean, when else would you bite off someone's head for putting something down on the table? (Maybe when you just ate sandwiches on the table and the 'thing' that someone was holding was a box of matza...) Fortunately, it's almost over. Unfortunately, being a vegetarian makes it a challenge for Ohad. In addition to not eating anything with flour but matza, we also don't eat anything with corn, beans, rice, green beans, peas, lentils, peanuts, etc... so it kind of limits his diet. Even worse is the fact that some people do consider these kosher for Passover, so they're sprinkled in everything. It makes shopping, even in Israel, in a kosher supermarket, a really annoying experience.

For a break (from the cleaning) I got up-to-date with as many blogs as I could... and I stole this from Rachel:


85 words

Speed test

My dad encouraged me to learn touch-typing during the summer between 9th and 10th grade. He was doing a post-doctoral program at Harvard (in ethics) and needed someone to type his papers. He not only paid for the course, he later paid me to type his papers... it was a good deal :-) I think his feeling was that no matter what I did in the future, knowing how to type would always give me something to fall back on. I enjoyed the course so much the first year that I went back and took another course the following summer.

Congrats to Ahuva Batya who just got a piece of GREAT news :-)

And happy Passover to all those who are celebrating!

Can you tell I'm in love?

He may not be the best person to take shopping, but he already likes to play... He seems to have gotten so big so fast - he's just over 5 weeks old(!)

I'm busy trying to prepare for Passover (which I think should be switched to every-other-year or maybe only leap years?) and am especially thankful that I was smart enough to buy an apartment within walking distance of my parents, allowing me to have all the comforts of home yet still celebrate the Seder with them.

Our boiler (is that what they call them in English?) is short-circuiting the house again. This is at least the 6th time since we moved in less than 3 years ago (probably more). At least we also have solar panels that heat the water - otherwise we'd be showering in cold water (yuck!). In Hebrew we call the boiler a "dood", so the dood dude is coming by tomorrow morning to hopefully fix it...

In other news, Hadas is finishing the last part of the process to be accepted to the high school she wants (wanted?) to go to in Jerusalem tomorrow. It meant spending 3 days and 2 nights in the dorms, taking classes and exams and having social activities. She said it's not at all what she expected and she needs to rethink whether she wants to go there or not. I'm cool with whatever she decides... (though I do think it would be an amazing opportunity for her if she did get in and chose to go there).

Tidbits

One of Ohad's papers was rejected and we still haven't gotten news about the second one... I actually wrote them to ask what is happening with the answer and they said it would take another few days (they were 2 different types of papers, so maybe that's why the answers are on different days). We have already been to Amsterdam together once (on our 'family honeymoon' in summer 2004) & I'm sure we'll go again someday, even if it isn't this year.


My MIL is upset that I told her it isn't convenient for her to come over in the middle of the day tomorrow when I'm alone with 6 kids, all of whom have a variety of things I need to do for them, including helping them prepare for a show they're appearing in in the evening. She may also have forgotten the fact that in addition to caring for my kids during the day, I'm not sleeping that much (combine night feedings with night sweats - not great). I felt it would just be too much chaos... She told me that I'm "keeping her from seeing her grandchildren..." I offered Friday (once Ohad comes back) but they only want to come here on the train (and not drive), so that wouldn't allow them to stay long enough. It's not like they didn't know I was pregnant when they booked their trip to China that left 10 days after Yirmi was born...

Yirmi is up 2lbs from his birthweight. He nurses so well that I haven't been worried at all.





Ohad is up in Giotto's bell tower now. I have to admit - I'm not even jealous, I'm just looking forward to seeing the pictures when he gets home.

Ten things you might not know about me

I sing. I even took voice lessons for a while. My teacher thought I should sing opera, which I was willing to try, but never did. I am too shy to sing in front of anyone but Ohad & the kids, so you'll probably never hear me unless you stand outside my window.

At the world premiere of the movie Genocide (1981 or 1982), I was responsible for being with former US President, Jimmy Carter, while we waited for everything to be ready. I spent 15 or 20 minutes with him during which I asked several questions including whether he got bored of attending events like that. He replied that he really didn't mind. I was also part of a choir who met Menachem Begin in Plains, Georgia , when he came to meet with former President Jimmy Carter. I think we sang mostly in Hebrew...

I love spoons. I don't have that many, but I buy any interesting one I can find. I like to use all different spoons to serve with. I also have some long spoons and espresso spoons (at least that's what I call them). The most expensive one cost about $7.50 and has a pewter handle.

I was fascinated by the whole pregnancy-baby thing even as a child. My mom taught Lamaze classes and I loved looking at her materials. During the summer when I was 12, I did over 100 hours of volunteer work in the newborn nursery at the Army hospital in Fort Benning, Georgia - including things like dressing babies for the first time, changing diapers, wheeling thembabies to their mommies and encouraging them to breastfeed.

I once wrote a book that was published. It was about graphics software on PCs and although it's terribly outdated, the distinction between vector and bitmaps (which was the main point of the book) is still relevant. I even happened to be at a book fair once and saw my book at one of the stands (I took a picture).

My best friend from my childhood got addicted to drugs while we were still in high school. I only found out a few years later, because I moved to Israel after graduating early and we lost touch. She went through lots of bad stuff, spent some time in jail and, the last time I saw her she didn't even remind me of who she had been. We were best friends from the time I was about 7 or 8 & it was really hard for me to realize I had lost her as a friend forever.

I used to be addicted to coca cola. I would often drink 2 liters a day. I have now replaced that addiction with one to soda water (no calories, no caffeine...)

I used to be able to eat anything without gaining weight. Until I was about 20, people used to think I was anorexic. I didn't even realize I was thin... When I got married in 1989, I weighed 95lbs. I think I never knew I was thin because I always had to buy large sizes because I'm wide-boned. Even at 95lbs I couldn't wear size 6.

I confuse my kids' names all the time. It's not that I don't remember who they are, it's just that when I call them, the wrong name always comes out. Sometimes several times. Sometimes I accidentally call Matan "Ohad" or "Akiva" (my youngest brother). In addition, I have a terrible memory for both names and faces. Unless I know someone well, I find it hard to recognize them. This is particularly embarrassing when people clearly remember me and I have no clue who they are... This happens often.

I hate planning meals. I would rather clean toilets than plan meals. Before Ohad left for Florence (which I keep wanting to call Venice - I can't even keep my cities straight), we made a list of a bunch of different meals that I can prepare while he's away. If we hadn't, I'm not sure he'd have gotten on the plane (evil grin).

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We should find out today if Ohad's paper was accepted for the conference in Amsterdam. If it is accepted, we're going to try to work it out so I can join him (with Yirmi, of course). The only problem is that it's right at the beginning of the school year... on the other hand, the older kids can just be with their father for a few days.

A bad combination

On Monday, I gave Nomi a little milk to drink and watched to see if she'd have a reaction (to date, her only reaction to milk was during the previous oral challenge, at the hospital. Then, after nearly 3 hours she started to sneeze & her eyes started watering. On Monday, she seemed to rub her eyes a bit after 3 hours, but it wasn't clear if it was because she was tired or because of the milk.

Yesterday, again I gave her some milk. She was fine for the first 2 hours and then she started screaming uncontrollably (this is unfortunately far from the first time she's had such a fit). Nothing we did would calm her down. I was worried that it might be an allergic reaction, so I gave her her antihistamine. It didn't help. Finally, after about an hour and a half, Ohad took her out & she was calm the whole time (over an hour), but soon after they got back she started screaming again. This time, Ohad was able to get her to answer when he asked if something hurt. She pointed to her left ear. We put in some drops & gave her paracetamol and she calmed down. This morning, when she woke up, her hair was glued to her ear. The doctor confirmed that she has a perforated eardrum... She said that usually it just heals itself & told us what to do in the meantime.

Hey, at least it wasn't the milk. Maybe she's really no longer allergic...

Lesson of the week: some things really are coincidences.

Pictures of our little Yirmi

Right after Yirmi was born, they placed him on me. In this picture, his umbilical cord was still attached. He gave a good, reassuring cry :-)

About 15 minutes after the birth - Ohad & I were pretty happy. It's unbelievable how quickly the pain subsides.

Ohad had plenty of time to snuggle with our little boy when we waited to get the OK to go home. We were terribly disappointed when they made us stay another day because his bilirubin was a little high.

Here's a close-up.




We played a special song for Yirmi before we started to get him dressed to go home. How many babies do you know who have an MP4 in their bassinet?

Getting ready to go home. I had bought a set of clothing when I was in the US (it was actually intended for someone else, but I ended up getting them something else because I couldn't part with it...) I love this outfit... (You can actually see the outfit in the next few pictures - the blanket came with it.)

We came into Abigail's nursery school with Yirmi to pick her up, on the way home from the hospital. She was pretty excited. When we got home, she got a chance to hold him.

Here he is in his playpen, looking fairly angelic, if you ask me...

When Nomi came home, she got to hold him too. Both Nomi and Abigail really enjoy holding him when they're lying on my bed, flat on their backs.

Today is our 4th anniversary. Who would have believed we could be so lucky?

We took Yirmi to be weighed today. He's up 4 ounces from his birthweight, so he now weighs 8lbs, 9oz.

Our baby has a name!

Today was the brit (circumcision)... we spent the entire week making preparations for the weekend, since we had to arrange meals for Shabbat. Tonight, we both feel totally wiped out...

Ah, the name. We had so many different criteria for the name that they just about eliminated all the names in the planet. Fortunately, kind of last-minute, we were able to find a name that seemed to fit our baby. We'll be calling him Yirmi and his full name is Yirmyahu Yaakov (I guess that would theoretically be Jeremiah Jacob in English :-)) Yaakov was Ohad's grandfather's name. The older girls (Hadas & Lilach) were kind of in shock at first - Lilach even came to me crying that she doesn't like the name... but it will grow on them, I'm sure. Ohad and I both like the idea of less-common names... (although I saw recently that Abigail is really popular in the US - here it's fairly rare).

Yirmi is sleeping really well, waking up just once at night & then going back to sleep for another few hours. He's also nursing very well - much better than either Abigail or Nomi did at the beginning. I saw Ohad's nephew today who isn't even 5 months old yet and he's HUGE. Yirmi's so perfect just the way he is. I can't believe he's going to change so much in such a short time...

In brief...

First, a quick correction - the previous post was supposed to read "surprisingly short", not "amazingly short", but Leah didn't have a chance to write what I said...

Some time around 4 or 4:30am I realized that I was having contractions, though I was kind of out of it, you know... sleeping & all... so I wasn't sure they were the labor type of contractions. I timed the next 2 and they were 13 minutes apart, so I flipped over onto my right side, fairly sure that they'd stop. The next one came 6 minutes later & they were pretty regular after that. Ohad couldn't fall asleep and by around 5:30 he said he was going to start getting ready to go. I wasn't at all sure that I was in labor, but it didn't sound totally unreasonable either... By the time he came out of the shower, the contractions were coming faster - about 3 minutes apart. Between them I still felt OK and was even still wondering whether I was really in labor. At 6 I knew that it was indeed labor. I came downstairs and told Ohad we'd wait until between contractions to head to the car, but the contractions were so close that it took a few before we actually were able to get out the door & then another 2 on the way to the car. I was still doing great the whole way to the hospital, although it was getting more painful & there was no time to rest between them. We asked the security guard to let us use an emergency elevator (it's a religious hospital, so the regular elevator stops on every floor, which was just not going to cut it for me since the delivery room is on the 9th floor) and got to the 9th floor at 6:40.

I went in, answered the questions, peed in a cup & was checked by a midwife who said I was at 5cm. She asked if I wanted an epidural. I said I did, but that I didn't believe they'd manage in time. Shortly thereafter I walked to the delivery room. They put in the IV & started getting the bed ready for the birth, introduced the midwife, got me some nitrous (laughing gas) and I was at 8cm. A few contractions later, I started feeling pressure & told the midwife that. She said I wasn't ready (without checking) and I told her that it's too bad, because in the next contraction or two I was GOING TO PUSH... The next contraction I did start pushing (she did give the OK) and it took quite a few pushes to get the head out (I was afraid it was going to take too long, so I just kept on pushing even when I wasn't having a contraction) - it was only about 2 minutes, but a whole lot of pushes. Meanwhile, the midwife was killing me, trying to prevent tearing because she thought the baby was much bigger than he was... I actually yelled to her that she was hurting me. After the head was out, they needed to suction the baby, since the amniotic fluid had meconium in it (which apparently is really common when you're as overdue as I was) & so I was told not to push for a while. Ohad and I both think that I didn't actually push the body out... The baby cried really quickly - I don't think any of my other babies cried so soon after they were born & it was amazing, because I knew right away that he was OK. I instantly felt much better, but since the midwife had been so aggressive, I was in a lot more pain than I had been in any of my previous births, so I hung on to the nitrous for a few more minutes. The midwife gave me the pitocin shot and waited a while to gently pull out the placenta. It was a cool sensation. I got to see the placenta & it was enormous...

In between, I was holding the baby, thinking how incredible it was to have the delivery behind us and to know that our baby was OK :-)

OK, Ohad is waiting upstairs with the baby who is nursing really well but ALL THE TIME, so I better go.

Thank you all for your wishes!!!

It's a Boy!

This is Rachel's sister Leah writing to tell you all that Rachel gave birth to a baby boy on Saturday morning around 7:30am.

She had an amazingly short (about 3.5 hours), but intense, labor.

Baby Boy Inbar weighed in at 3.77 kilograms. Mom and baby are doing great.

The Never Ending Pregnancy...

So, this morning we showed up at the hospital, just like the doctors told us to. Just one problem. I'm not 42 full weeks until tomorrow, so I'm low priority & since there were too many women ahead of me in line, they told me that they wouldn't be able to induce until after the Sabbath (at least). The doctor recommended I stay somewhere with better food and a more comfortable bed (i.e. go home) and come back again tomorrow night. She believes that they will induce within 2 days...

Fortunately, I hadn't gotten my hopes up and it really IS more pleasant to be home for Shabbat, so here I am.

I made it to 41w6d. I may yet get to my 43rd week...

Your eyes do not deceive you

I'm still here. The best they can 'promise' is that they will hospitalize me from tomorrow & fit me in as soon as there's a free room...

In less than 3 hours I will be at 41w6d. As Big Nutbrown Hare said (in Guess How Much I Love You by Sam McBratney), "Oh, that's far. That's very, very far."

Really bad news just in: because of a terrorist attack in Jerusalem, the hospital needs to use all its resources to take care of the victims. They had told us to call this evening to see if there was a chance they could take us & the midwife just told Ohad that now there's no way... (and don't misunderstand me - this is bad news in terms of the victims, their families & Israel. I'll be fine...)

Change in plans...

Here's one family that had a major change in plans. Imagine IVF triplets after transferring a single embryo(!)

We also have a change in plans. The induction is off for tomorrow. The hospital said it's too soon...

I think I missed the target...

I had said March 3rd, but I guess not... (cross out March 4th as well).

If UI is born on the 6th, that will be the day I was due with Abigail (who was born on the 14th).

Anyone want to revise their estimate?

We have a verdict!

Today, not only did Ohad come with me to my 'excursion' (post-date monitoring) but we had the nicest doctor, who actually sat with us for a long time and told us what wonderful prizes are hiding behind doors number 1 and 2.

Behind door number 1 is the option to go to the hospital now to be evaluated (i.e. repeat all the tests I did this morning). This would probably lead to being sent home with a big "NOT IN LABOR" stamp on my file, after wasting several hours driving back and forth and doing the testing.

Behind door number 2 is the option to continue being way-too-patient (don't know where I got that from) and see if anything happens by Thursday. If so, cool. If not, come in for tests again Thursday morning & then be sent to the hospital, where they will decide when they feel like inducing (but apparently they don't usually wait more than a few days). Waiting for induction last time wasn't the best thing, because it meant that at home things got out of control. Hopefully, since no sibling of mine is getting married within the next week (my sister got married 2 days after Nomi was born & so things were pretty crazy) my parents will be able to help us avoid that situation. I have plans about farming out my kids (but haven't talked to my siblings about it yet), so we'll have to see.

I think I'm choosing door 2. Ohad might have opted for 1, but I was kind of psyching myself up for having a few hours of labor at home so that I could get to the hospital with some sort of dilation...

So, Thursday's the day we head for the hospital. Ubar Inbar will hopefully join us by Sunday or Monday...

41 week pic

Hey, not everyone is willing to have their picture taken at this stage of pregnancy (and not everyone is lucky enough to be as overdue as me...) In the background are Nomi & Abigail (eating dinner) and Hadas, squinting...

Keeping busy

Well, it's not as if I could ever run out of things to do...

Hadas checked out a book for me from the library, but it turned out to be a historical romance. History & I don't get along too well, so she suggested that I actually go to the library myself and choose a book... How come I couldn't think of that? So, I went to the library & even chose 2 books that I hope are light enough reading for me when my brain is functioning a bit like a computer with too little RAM.

Before that, I went to the bank, to the supermarket & to the dollar store (which, since the dollar has fallen, has become more like $1.50). I got Abigail and Nomi a furry pink boa and clip-on earrings to play with (Purim, our dress-up holiday, is in 2-1/2 weeks) and a Finding Nemo tablecloth (since Abigail's birthday is next Friday) and notebook paper for the big kids (I'm sure they'll be thrilled). I keep reminding myself that I should enjoy this time when everything is so easy.

At the library, I sent Hadas an SMS telling her to call me before she got on the bus & then I drove to pick her up from school (saving her close to an hour, because the bus has the stupidest-route-ever). It's kind of weird, because she goes to school outside of the city, but it's only about an 8-minute-drive from our house. By bus it's over an hour, but the bus is so cheap (less than 50 cents) that it doesn't make any sense to drive out there.

Maybe tomorrow I will find out when they might actually send me to be induced, though it seems like they don't really like to share that information... I remember this from previous pregnancies in which I was overdue. Is that one of the things they learn in medical school? Keep the overdue woman in suspense???

Infertility at a time like this?

"Barren Karen" posted an interesting question that I've thought about myself numerous times. Although she didn't put it this way, this is what I see as the main issue: At what point do you stop being a member of the club, if ever?

Is it at all legitimate for a woman who's currently overdue with her 6th child to hang around infertility blogs as if she has something to contribute?

I spent years trying to get pregnant with Hadas. 8 months into my first marriage, 2 months before I turned 21, I went off the pill and hoped to become pregnant. My period was irregular, so the two-week-wait was often a 4-week-wait, ending always in the same disappointment. I was so convinced that everything was OK that it was only 14 months later that I made my first appointment. And then the tests began. And treatments. There was no internet, no support groups, and no one who really had any idea what I was going through. I went for IUI after IUI and then for IVF. And another IVF. On the 2nd IVF I got lucky. My beta was 2500 at 19dpt (that was the earliest they tested back then, because they gave hCG shots as late as day 8). One (much older) friend had told me that bleeding is common in IVF pregnancies. It didn't really help me not to freak out when I started gushing blood right around 6 weeks... but she was right, everything was OK & I carried Hadas to 42 weeks, when finally I was induced.

I was 24-1/2 when Hadas was born & my chances of getting pregnant hadn't changed. I didn't want her to be an only child and went through 2 more fresh & 1 frozen cycle (which took nearly 18 months) before I became pregnant again. Matan (b) and Lilach (g) were born just after my 27th birthday.

So, I was young and I had 2 healthy pregnancies and 3 healthy kids. How could infertility still possibly affect me?

Well, even with 3 kids in the house & even though their care fell almost entirely on me, from the time M&L were about 6 months old, I felt someone was still missing. The feeling was so strong that no matter what I did, I couldn't shake it. Some months I would fantasize that a miracle happened and that I'd be pregnant. I would try to calculate the odds again and again, but more than 60 cycles later, it still hadn't happened.

I did go back for another IVF cycle. I conceived on the first try, but had a really bad pregnancy that ended around 13 weeks. From the time I started TTC until that miscarriage, 12 years had passed. Twelve years of looking at other people and trying to convince myself that pregnancy-by-sex was not just a myth... years of knowing how fortunate I was to have had successes, but still feeling sad at the loss of a dream. At my inability to determine if/when I would have a child (or another child).

Does what happened after that erase the past? In some ways, it does. I look at pregnant women with a big smile on my face. Seeing mommies with little kids is the most natural thing in the world for me. Any jealousy that I had or difficulty going to birth parties (we don't have baby showers in Israel) is completely gone. I can even honestly say that after, with G-d's help, our baby is born healthy, my family will be complete, that I've 'done the pregnancy thing' and 'the breastfeeding thing' and the 'being a mommy to a baby' thing. I look at my kids and think how lucky they are to have each other and each one is an incredible blessing...

What will stay with me forever is the understanding of what it is like to go through infertility. The uncertainty, the fear of never succeeding, the frustration, the anger, the jealousy... I've also gained experience and knowledge during these years, so although my family may be almost* complete, I hope that I will be able to provide support and information for others who are still at the beginning, with the hopes that they will be writing a similar post someday. And, because I am free of any of the negative emotions that infertility carries with it, I have the luxury of always being purely happy to read other people's good news.

So, in answer to the question... you stay part of the club as long as you have something to contribute to the infertile community. I believe I still do.

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*BTW "any day now" is getting kind of old, since people have been telling me that since late January... Note that I'm actually getting FARTHER from my due date every day.

Week 2 out of 2?

I really don't want to break my own record, which was 2 full weeks past my due date.

I know I'm fortunate not to be scared of induction (hey, I've survived it twice... and with Nomi, it was my most relaxed labor ever), but the idea of having a chance to labor at home appeals to me (as long as the little girls aren't here/awake). With Abigail I was still sleeping between contractions until about 90 minutes before she was born...

Whatever... as long as the baby is healthy :-)

Got the cake...

Fortunately, there's not that much of it & I'm pretty good about sharing.

I already look like Humpty Dumpty, so what's a few hundred extra calories?

Have a nice weekend :-)

Peaceful weekend ahead?

It's getting a little old - the monitor > blood pressure > urine test > ultrasound > doctor thing... Obviously I appreciate the necessity, but it takes too long and there's not really any fun part (except perhaps for an excuse to leave the house?).

No news. No contractions. I know some women go into labor spontaneously, but I'm not counting on it. Instead, I'm wondering where the best place to buy the cake I'm craving is...

Ah, I did get some news from the doctor today. He said that they might send me for induction as early as next Thursday (i.e., a week) but that the hospital might choose not to induce for up to a week after that(!) Nah, they couldn't really do that to me, could they?

My last 2 week wait ever...

OK, so I realize that that's actually what this is - another 2ww. For some, it's equally stressful & full of anticipation... So far, I'm cool... I'm kind of happy that it could (theoretically) happen any time and equally freaked by the fact that it could (theoretically) happen any time... The next few days are inconvenient because the big kids are with their dad this Shabbat and the little girls would feel most comfortable with them... so, from Sunday is better (unless I could have a 'speedy delivery' & be out of the hospital by Friday afternoon - note that it's already Wednesday night here, so that's highly unlikely).

This morning I walked Abigail to her nursery school & then came home & made cream of wheat, worked for a while & then took a long nap. I only came downstairs after Ohad came home & then he took me to get a steak bagette (yum!). [Note: Napping in the middle of the day is a rare treat.]

Abigail drove us insane this evening, coming out of her bed an incredible number of times... I am so happy it is finally quiet.

A bit of nerve...

Got this in my inbox this morning (from one of the pregnancy update sites):

Congratulations, Mom! So how do you feel? I hope your labor and delivery were better than you had expected and you're recovering comfortably.

Of course it goes on and tells me all about my new baby... Well... Gee, thanks for making me feel like I'm the first woman in the world to ever go past my due date. And if the baby really were born by now, do you think I'd really have time to read your email???

Post #202

I got practically no work done yesterday, which wasn't great, because I still have quite a few things to do (which I plan to start as soon as I finish this post).

UI is squirming around, moving a ton. Last night it was about 90 minutes straight and I was beginning to feel seasick from all the kicks into my stomach...

I'm almost finished with Bridge to Terabithia, which is a children's book (making it something I might actually get through). Most of the book was similar to something I often imagine - about meeting Ohad when we were both children (we're 13 days apart) and sharing that innocent bond of friendship that develops into the purest form of love... It's so easy for me to picture us together as kids and to know that we would have been best friends, because we understand each other so well... I still haven't finished the book, but the ending is going to be very different from how I would have written it...

Last night I talked to Ohad about the ambivalent feelings I have (not about the baby, but about labor). I mean, now that it's fairly close (less than 2 weeks away) there are two sides to it - one is the totally unknown experience of labor - what it will be like, how it will begin, etc. & the other is the excitement of knowing that the baby is about to be born. Although I'm fairly hopeful that I'll get through the labor OK, I wonder what the rush is... Apparently, assuming all is well, there are no advantages to having the baby before 42 weeks, in terms of the baby's health. Maybe it's not too bad an idea to just wait it out.

Next appointment Thursday

OK, I knew that before I went today, but I don't really have a title for today's post.

I guess I was feeling fairly chatty today because I forced the nurse to listen to my entire life's history (OK, only the fact that I'd already done the overdue thing twice and that I don't really love the fetal monitor, but that I did appreciate the recliner & had even blogged about it)... I wonder if this had anything to do with her wishing me luck in NOT coming back on Thursday...

The ultrasound tech must have enjoyed doing the ultrasound, because she went over everything repeatedly (placenta, amniotic fluid, heart, baby moving, position of the head). I didn't really get it - did she think it was going to flip? I mean, it was weird when she told me that the head was down the second time, but the fifth time I was starting to wonder whether I was imagining it (I wasn't). Maybe she was just bored or something...

Since this post is deadly boring already, I'll add the fact that we found a way to keep the cat out of Abigail's bed. We took a thin mattress that's a little over a meter high & we blocked the doorway with it. It's perfect because it's easy to set up (takes about 10 seconds) and Abigail can still get out of her room on her own within a few seconds. (Nomi's in the crib, so she's stuck in any case.) Until we solved this, Abigail was waking us up sometimes 4 or 5 times a night because the cat was bothering her.

The kids are getting a bit antsy about the birth, especially Lilach and Abigail. At least they finally remember to take their cell phones with them...

Results are in...

OK, so perhaps not too many people are willing to risk this, but for the brave ones who did - thanks! Here are the results:

Note: I am still pregnant. This is just a preparatory drill, for when UI actually makes his/her appearance.

First, Anita - sorry, I couldn’t work your answers in, it was too complicated...

From Kirby at WhatToExpect:
We’re thankful to announce the birth of our new baby {Kirby's keeping it a secret, I guess} on March 3, 2008.

After 23 of hours in the hospital and a 72 hour labor, most of which was tolerable, Rachel decided an epidural was a passing fancy. Her most memorable comment was, “Wow, that was close!”
The baby weighed 8 lbs and 12 ounces and, as is the standard in Israel and Iran, was not measured.

From Rona (aka Eema or IcNIc) at DrSavta:
We’re thankful to announce the birth of our new baby boy on March 1, 2008.
After 5 of hours in the hospital and a 127 hour labor, most of which was tolerable, Rachel decided an epidural was important. Her most memorable comment was, “Oh my G-d!”

The baby weighed 6 lbs and 3 ounces and, as is the standard in Israel and Iraq, was not measured.

---
In other news, we were right - Nomi has a mild ear infection in one ear and can go back to her day care tomorrow. Ohad is kind of under the weather too :-(

Matan is going to Mount Hermon tomorrow to see some snow and go sledding. Lilach has a field trip and Hadas is going to school (for a change). Ohad is going to Be'er Sheva and I may actually get some work done (today was crazy, not a minute to do anything, even check my email).

4 that did, 4 that didn't

Four things that did happen since noon on Friday:
1) We discovered that Nomi had a fever. We think she has an ear infection (or two).
2) We saw Carmit (our turtle) in the garden several times (she's been hiding out for a few months, so it's considered a treat to see her again).
3) We picked about 20lbs of lemons off our tree (before Shabbat, of course).
4) I finished the book I was reading (The Brethren, OK, not great).

Four things that didn't happen:
1) I didn't leave any chopped liver as leftovers (we bought a really small amount & it's full of iron, right?)
2) I didn't leave the house (except to go into the garden and say hi to my parents, who walk by the back of our house on the way home from synagogue on Saturday mornings).
3) I didn't wash the floor (Ohad did & he did a great job!)
4) I didn't have even a single contraction...

Mad-lib

It's a do-it-yourself birth announcement... Here are the fields:

Month & date – any time Feb 23 to March 9
Level of necessity (e.g., critical)
What you say when you nearly get hit by a truck
A country you are unlikely to travel to
Expression of happiness or gratitude
Level of pain (e.g., not very)
Gender (boy or girl)
and 4 numbers:

• 1: from 1 to 16
• 2: from 1 to 24
• 3: from 6 to 8
• 4: any number

Please post your words in the comments. I will post the other part, complete with your answers, probably on Sunday...

---

In other news, today's monitor & u/s went well, with the baby being relatively small (just over 3.5kg) and a little bit too much amniotic fluid (though they don't suspect GD & last week there was a little too little fluid). The Women's Center got new nifty recliners, which made the monitor so much less unpleasant. I actually sat and read the entire time. (They also got a new electronic blood pressure machine, which I think gives far more objective readings - mine was 110/70.) The doc on call didn't say what I wanted to hear (i.e., it could happen...) but rather said something to the effect of, "your baby is probably happy to hang around for as long as possible. We might consider stripping your membranes sometime around March 6th...") I finished there, went shopping for some last-minute stuff (pita, cucumbers, milk, etc.) & was still able to pick Nomi up on time. I get to go back again on Monday...

Did I forget to blog?

In all the, ahem, excitement around here, I must have forgotten to blog today...

Well. The only news is that there's no news. Tomorrow I go in for my first 'post-date' checkup. It's a real drag, but the best way to make sure that everything continues to be OK. First it's half an hour on the monitor (have I mentioned how much I hate the fetal monitor?) and then an ultrasound (mostly to check the placenta, I believe). After that, I probably get to wait for whatever doctor happens to be around so that he can send me home and tell me to come back sometime next week. Sounds fun, huh?

I've got a great idea for tomorrow, I just need a little time to put it together :-)

---
BTW, anyone who makes fun of women who go past their due date should be warned: In your next life (or perhaps even several lives), you will be a female elephant.

Pretty neat kid!

Hadas got the letter telling her she passed the entrance exam to the high school she wants to go to. Next week is the interview and in April they have 3 or 4 days which all of the applicants who've passed the first two stages spend at the school. Ohad & I think that the real barrier was the test... well, that and psycho-ex who said, "I hope things will work out with your mother." (Meaning that he hopes I will succumb to the blackmail and let him out of the child support payments... My lawyer said that a court order can fix all of this. Let's hope he's right.)

Go Hadas!

15 reasons I have to be happy today

In no particular order:

Except for rolling over smoothly in bed & climbing on chairs, I can do pretty much anything I did before (despite being currently 39 weeks & 3 days pregnant). This includes caring for the little girls - giving them baths, getting them dressed, putting them in their beds at night, etc... (of course they do have to cooperate a bit, because running after them is not so fun). I am not even particularly tired most of the time, waking up at 7 & going to sleep at 11:30 or so.

UI is a cooperative little one who moves around often, even without me nudging or having to eat chocolate...

I have almost completely finished my project for work, but there's still one phase left that we haven't started. The work process has been fantastic, including lots of conference calls on Skype & really good communication with the client (who actually understands what I do, a rare treat).

My seminar paper was approved by the university and now I am ready to begin the research. It also turns out that I have 6 months from the time it was approved & not from the time I applied.

I am married to Ohad :-)

I am surviving the daily-double-dose of iron (with the help of a dried fruit pill), disproving my own theory that taking lots of iron is not compatible with human life.

I think I have a lunch date today. I let Hadas skip school (kind of) - the school she usually goes to on Tuesdays is closed because of the snow & she could have gone to her regular school, but she never goes there on Tuesday, so I didn't see the harm in letting her not go today either. (She's currently in the library, working on a paper for school, but I'll bug her on her cellphone soon.)

My oldest brother is starting something new today and I'm sure it will be a good change for him.

Today, I finally did something that I've been putting off for a long time. It is still a long way from being complete, but it's a step in the right direction. (Thank you to my little brother for pushing me to finish this by April 15th, after which it will be too late.)

Ohad made me delicious rice pudding with orange & lemon peels.

Nomi is talking more and more every day and is always surprising me with her vocabulary and her use of grammar.

Abigail didn't whine at all yesterday evening & totally surprised me by setting the table by herself, without my asking & knew to choose the right plates (we were eating meat)! [Abigail will be 3 on March 14th.] Last night, she also dragged a toy baby bed into my bedroom, set it up nicely with a sheet and blanket and told me that she made a bed for the baby... Later she told me that she is ready for me to go to the hospital. What a cutie :-)

Lilach is doing a great job at her 'work'. She goes to help at Nomi's day care place for an hour a day, 4 days a week. She helps get the kids changed & dressed right before they go home & then walks Nomi home, which is amazing (especially because it can often take me more than 1/2 an hour to get out of there). She is going to be one rich little kid.

Matan volunteered to help me pick the little girls up yesterday and actually let me sit in the car when he went to get them (they're in 2 different places). We also sat together to read a book (in English) for about 45 minutes.

Hadas is taking over all the work for the ovulation & pregnancy tests that I sell. She got the first few kits out yesterday and today & I spent some time teaching her how to prepare the receipts (all computerized, of course). I am paying her for the help and it's a great deal for both of us.

Um, the bag

Instead of continuing to pack it, some of the things that were in the bag (like my slippers) already found their way back out... (I guess that has to do with leaving it open and within Nomi's reach).

Here's my list:

Camera (we're charging the batteries more often, but use the camera on a semi-daily basis, so it's not in the bag)
Video camera & tapes (fully charged & in the bag)
Cell phone and charger (I'll probably forget the charger, but my phone usually lasts for a few days)
Music CDs (I prepared them before Abigail was born, but never used them - still on the shelf.)
Pillow (because usually you can only get one at the hospital and I like to sleep with at least 2)

Socks, underwear, nursing bra, slippers, flannel pants (I'm going to deliver in a hospital where I don't think they even offer pants, since most of the women don't wear pants ever).
Toothbrushes & toothpaste, shampoo, conditioner, liquid soap, hairbrush & hairbands (they may have some kind of soap at the hospital, but it's absolutely not the same as having my own).
A big towel (because the ones at the hospital are the size of my hand towels).
Pads (because I'm picky and I like the extra long ones with wings).

Snacks including sucking candy & gum. Snickers bars for Ohad :-)
Puzzles? A book? (No, I don't actually think I'll be doing puzzles during labor, but in the ward it might be nice to have them.)

Am I missing anything critical? I probably only have about 2 or 2-1/2 weeks left to finish this...

I wake up laughing...

Sometimes my dreams are really funny. I mean, so funny that I literally wake up laughing out loud. I don't use the computer on Shabbat, meaning no email, no blogs, no surfing... I must have been dreaming about reading blogs and for a second, the thought crossed my mind that I can't even check my blog to see if I had the baby...

No news. But, logically, each day does bring us one day closer to meeting UI, right?

Fired!

Here's what happened at my appointment that I didn't expect:

First, my doctor told me that eating parsley is good for edema...
Second, my doctor didn't faint when I told him I am taking the iron (though he did look a little pale)
Third, HE FIRED ME! He told me that in terms of visits I'm done & that from now on I go to the Women's Center for monitoring twice a week, starting next Friday.

Useful information for UI (Ubar Inbar)

Dear UI,

You know all the noise you hear now? Expect it to get worse… There are quite a few people who are looking forward to meeting you.

Abba (AKA Ohad) – He’s the guy who’s always busy: working, cooking, cleaning-up, giving baths & reading stories to your sisters, shuttling the big kids around, or being silly (yup, he does that too). He’s the one who will sing to you and hold you every chance he gets. He’ll take you for walks and show you things, he’ll notice every little detail about you…

Mommy (the one with the rumbling noises you keep hearing from inside) – I’m the one who will feed you, teach you the names of the birds and the flowers, make sure you’re always dressed nicely and not too warm or cold. I will also make sure to keep you safe from your sweet, but curious sisters. I will look at you remembering what it was like to feel you moving inside me and wonder how it’s possible that you are real… (I’ll also be the one panicking until we find you a name…)

Hadas – She’s the teenager with the glasses & braces who will sometimes be incredibly interested in you and sometimes completely ignore you. As you grow, she will be able to teach you so many things. You’ll also probably want to be really nice to her, since by the time you turn 3 she may already have a driver’s license… She may not live at home next year, so get to know her well during these coming months (I’ll try to peel her away from the computer so you’ll get to see her once in a while.)

Matan – He’s the one who will make silly faces at you and talk to you whenever you need company. He will love holding you and feeding you, but will suddenly have someplace else to go if you need a new diaper. Matan will talk to you in a silly voice not that different from Grover’s and when you smile your first smile; he will be the happiest kid on earth.

Lilach – She’s the medium-sized one who loves babies. She will do anything she can for you, even change your diaper. She’ll be the first to volunteer to feed you (should you actually agree to take a bottle) and she will be like a little mom to you. We may have to remind her sometimes to give you a little space, but she will do everything for you with lots of love and only the best intentions.

Abigail – She’s the one who you’ve been hearing whine for the past few months. She’s been kind of moody lately, maybe because she is curious as to what it will be like to have you around. She is going to be a great friend. She’ll push you in the stroller (even though she can’t see where she’s going), share her toys and crayons with you and sing songs to you so that you can fall asleep at night. She will also be able to answer just about any question you have, no matter what it's about.

Nomi – The smallest of the bunch and the only curly-haired one in our family. Nomi will be incredibly interested in you and, most of the time, she will remember to be very gentle. She will hand you your toys, bring me a diaper for you and try to make you laugh. She will point out what you’re doing at any given moment and will notice every time you’re not in the room, “where is the baby?”.

A lot to keep track of? These are just the people who live in our house… Many more people are waiting to meet you too.

In the meantime, I have a project to finish, so - no rush…

Love,
Mommy

I must be OK

At dinner, one of the kids asked what today's date was and I couldn't remember... I knew it was sometime around the 10th of February.

Last night my legs drove me bonkers. I think it is the fact that they are so swollen that causes them to be hypersensitive. I was finally able to fall asleep when I separated my feet with a pillow, but each time I got up it took time to fall asleep again. At 7, when Matan called from his father's house, I jumped out of my bed to get the phone & got a terrible cramp in my calf. I vaguely remember having cramps in both legs simultaneously at some point during the night. We are still sleeping with our window open (and the ceiling fan on) - so when I lay awake, at least I could hear that it was pouring outside.

Next on our list is a doctor's appointment on Thursday. It will go something like this:
Doc takes my blood pressure (so far still around 110/70)
Doc asks how I'm feeling. I say OK.
Doc asks if I'm taking my iron. I say yes.
Doc faints.
Doc makes a quick recovery and tells me to make an appointment for another week. (I guess it can't be much longer than that, because once I go past my due date he has to send me to be monitored twice or three times a week - really no fun.)
I try to make an appointment with the secretary who insists on telling me that there are no appointments until mid-March... (Actually, one of the secretaries is OK. The other is a wicked witch.)

Basically, nothing exciting is going to happen... Ah, yes. The doc may do a quick u/s, but his u/s is so quick that you barely get to see anything and he doesn't estimate the weight either (though when I asked him to estimate Nomi's weight w/o ultrasound last time, he was exactly right).

Since the doc's office is a 5-minute walk from our house, I estimate the whole thing will take about 15 minutes (including walking both ways). So why am I looking forward to the appointment?

Almost human

Today, Ohad decided to give me a rare treat... He picked up both Abigail and Nomi & took them to Tel Aviv, meaning that from 3:30 until now (almost 8:30) I could do whatever I wanted (some of that was working). At 5, Matan and Lilach went to be with their dad & Hadas and I went to see if we could hunt some clothes down for her (does one undershirt count?). It's been a while since we had time to just hang out and she's gotten pretty grown up - nearly 14-1/2 now... Today she participated in a bridge tournament and came in 3rd place for North-South, which she claims is harder than East-West (she has a 3rd place trophy for that from a previous tournament). It's pretty amazing that she could win anything, since she stopped taking bridge classes more than 2 years ago (yes, they actually had bridge classes at school - she goes to a school with special enrichment classes one day a week).

Hadas and I also went to a big discount supermarket and got macaroni & cheese (boxed) that the kids want to eat when I'm in the hospital. Anything they can make for themselves will make things easier on Ohad, so I didn't mind... (usually we don't let them eat that junk even though it actually tastes good...) The kids volunteered to do various things (set the table, clear the table, run the dishwasher, prepare dinner, etc.) and since it's all written down, some of it may actually happen.

On Friday, we put the infant seat in the trunk of Ohad's car (my sister had been using it for her baby, but they went out and bought a new car seat).

As you might guess, we have a lot of laundry. We (=Ohad) always end up doing a load or two in the middle of the week (I fold), but usually our goal is to have all the laundry baskets empty on Friday... Now we decided to shift to twice a week - Tuesday and Friday - so that there won't be huge piles of unfolded laundry & so that the little girl's outfits will be put away in their drawers & therefore easy to find. I still haven't gotten around to taking down things that UI might be able to wear...

Remember that small car accident I had last month? Strangely enough, they still haven't called & it's been 5 weeks. There wasn't a lot of damage, but there was some... Maybe it's because it was a company car & they didn't want the hassle of talking to my insurance company? It would be nice if they just decided to let it go...

Attack of the killer heartburn

I know that toward the end of pregnancy you're supposed to have less and not more heartburn, but apparently my body missed this little piece of information...

My project is moving along nicely. I guess it has to do with the fact that I am actually able to concentrate on work, which leads me to a question...

After an IUI, IVF or during pregnancy, did you feel a need to remember your embryo / fetus / baby all the time? As if, if you forgot about it even for a short time that it would suddenly disappear?

I may have to kill someone

But perhaps instead I'll just give a few simple rules...

1) If you know when I'm due, please don't ask me every time you see me / talk to me. My due date isn't going to change and if you don't remember what it is from the first 29 times you asked me, it might not actually be that important to you...

2) Don't ask me if I have symptoms of impending labor. If I wanted to say something I would. Also, please avoid the annoying 'checking-in' phone calls, unless you want to tempt me not to tell you when the baby actually is born. (I do allow people to call for that purpose after Shabbat, but they have to pretend that that's not why...)

3) I only want to talk about my weight with people who are totally uninterested. If you're really dying to know, don't ask me and I'll probably slip. If you ask me, I may ask you back and, believe me, you'll be more embarrassed than I will.

4) Drop the 'any day now' line. I know perfectly well how long it could be.

This post has been brought to you by the letter P and the number 39.

Someone else's salary

It was cool to open my bank statement today & discover that someone else's salary was deposited into my account. The difference between theirs and mine was almost the exact amount we paid for Ohad's car... Of course the first thing I did was made the call to clear it up. The (unnecessary) letter of apology I received read,

I really apologize for the inconvenience. And for the 5 star ski trip you planned as soon as you saw your good fortune.

But, alas, skiing is not safe in the ninth month.

Probably with that salary I'd have a better sense of humor too ;-)

Is Florence just the beginning?

Although at first some people thought it was ridiculous to even consider it, I thought that if Ohad wanted to get a doctorate then we'd have to do everything we could to make it possible. Even after I lost my job and found out I was pregnant (all within a month), I still thought it would be a huge mistake for him to give up his dream. So far, almost 2-1/2 years into his doctorate, things are OK, better than we expected.

Last year, Ohad submitted two papers to the same conference, in London. Both were accepted and he flew to London to present one of them (and stand by the poster for the other in a session weirdly named a "poster boaster"). This year, he's started submitting papers right and left and recently found out that his paper (co-authored by a whole slew of colleagues, but his name is first) was accepted and that he's going to Florence. For about a week, in April. I never realized these opportunities would come up & it's definitely a really nice bonus... I think by April he will be seriously needing a break. Too bad he'll be coming back just before the kids go on Passover vacation for two whole weeks.

In the meantime, he's submitted another paper for a conference in Vienna and he's working on one for a conference in Amsterdam (if it's accepted, hopefully I'll join him for that one). Pretty cool.

Abigail update: her eye looks better, close to being normal again. Putting in the medicine is not fun, but it's going OK. Bribery barely helps, if at all. (But I am enjoying the 'leftover' dark M&M's.)

Bag packing update: on Sunday, Ohad and I went to the Machane Yehuda market in Jerusalem. We stopped by a candy stand and picked up some mini chocolate bars, chewing gum and a package of sucking candy. Today I also took a hairbrush and some rubber bands upstairs. They haven't quite made it to the bag yet, but they might, maybe even this week.

Gift update: we got the two little girls stuffed animals that they can bring the baby as a gift. A while ago I got a small gift for them too (something cute that happened to be on sale).

Candy update: we got each of the older kids a 1kg bag of candy to hand out at school after the baby is born. They did this when the other two girls were born too (I think it makes them feel special.)

Birthday update: I picked up kaleidescopes to give out at Abigail's nursery school on her birthday. Her birthday is still over a month away, but who knows when I'll get a chance to find something - and these were 2 for $1... and something I wouldn't mind my kid getting. My other favorite gift is a beach ball. I can live without cheapy crayons, plasticine that gets all over the house and anything that has a gazillion tiny pieces.

Project update: actually, it looks like we're making progress. It's amazing how working with an intelligent team makes such a big difference.

Belly update: I walked into a mall today and a woman came up to me after about 10 seconds to ask if I wanted a chair. I said, "No, thank you. Do I look like I need one?" she kind of mumbled something and then my cellphone rang, so I didn't hear what it was, but I was wondering if I look that bad. Later I went into a store where the guy knows me and he said something to the effect of "good luck with the birth", but it was clear that what he was getting at was but not in my store... I guess I have made up for not showing until my 5th month.

Learning something new each day

Abigail has nodular episcleritis a severe version of episcleritis (a sudden patch of red blood vessels on the white part of the eye. The nodular version has something that kind of looks like a raised zit in the middle). On Tuesday, her eye looked a little red. By Wednesday I saw the nodule and immediately made a doctor's appointment. I could tell by the doctor's reaction that whatever it was was rare. She also called in the other doctor in the office to take a look (both of these doctors are great) and gave me a rush referral to the eye doctor who agreed to see her today. Even by Israeli standards (which I think are far better than those in the US) I found this to be very efficient.

Starting today, she'll be on steroids & strong antibiotics (all topical), with the hope that by this time next week it will be completely gone. Apparently it has a habit of recurring. And it's associated with a whole bunch of things I've been accused of having (like Lupus, which I honestly believe I don't have. I may have had symptoms, but they miraculously disappeared along with psycho-ex...)

I'll have to pick her up every day in the middle of the day to give her the second dose. This should be fun, because you have to actually put the ointment inside the eye, like rub it on the white part. I bet any almost-3-year-old would love that... Fortunately, other than that she's mostly a pleasure to have around. Maybe G-d has a plan for us to have pre-baby bonding time.

Final scan?

UI (ubar Inbar) was cooperative for today's scan. The estimated weight is around 2.9kg or 6lbs5oz.

In other news:
The bag situation is unchanged
I have survived 2 entire days of taking prenatal vitamins AND yesterday's visit
My parents are on their way from Cambodia to Thailand & are expected in Israel tomorrow morning :-)
It did snow in Jerusalem and it's really stormy here...

Good luck to Kirby from what to expect on today's scan!

Packing the bag

There's more to actually packing the bag than just doing it.

See, packing the bag means preparing to have the baby. In my case, it's practically the only preparation I have. Weird, I know, but I just don't have that much to do. So, packing the bag would mean that my last preparation is done and from then on, I just wait. OK, wait and work way too much, but it would mean that I'm done. Ready. And I'm not ready to be ready yet, so I'm putting it off.

I explained it to a few people as 'taking the cherry off the top of the ice cream and putting it on the side of my plate to save it for last'. I'm enjoying the thought of eating the cherry right now. Actually eating it would be less satisfying than just thinking about it.

On Friday I printed a list I found on the internet and on Saturday night, I took that list, along with another list and crossed out all the things I thought were irrelevant. On Sunday night, I took the bag upstairs and made a combined list on a piece of paper. At this rate, by the time the kid is walking, I'll have the whole thing ready...

When Abigail was born, we did something that I think was kind of special - Ohad chose what the first song our baby would hear would be & we took the CD & a CD player to the hospital. The first chance we had, we played the song to her... Nomi, on the other hand, was born on the Sabbath, so we didn't play anything for her. I was so relieved when she was born OK (after a GD / too high birthweight scare) that I started singing "Happy Birthday" to her (it was not planned and probably sounded kind of stupid, but that's what came out).

We're planning to go to Jerusalem to give birth, but I decided that we needed a plan in case Jerusalem is snowed in (a snowstorm is expected, starting tonight). So we decided where we'd go just in case...

In other news, my hemoglobin is now officially the lowest it has ever been in my entire life. I was not good about taking my prenatal vitamins or iron supplements, kind of due to circumstances that are beyond my control (i.e., I did not find them to be compatible with any form of normal life), but now I'm forcing myself to take them anyway. (See what a little fear can do?)

Oh goody, my in-laws just arrived...

2 hours in 2 minutes

Well, my floor is clean (or it was on Friday) but doing so made my uterus mad. I was waiting for it to calm down, which it kind of did late yesterday, but then this morning I decided to touch up the office floor and my uterus got mad again...

I called the women's clinic sure that they'd tell me that it's normal, but instead they said to come in and gave me the royal treatment. Fetal monitor, pee-stick (for protein & glucose. The pregnancy at this point is pretty obvious), ultrasound, and a lovely internal exam... All's fine. And the doctor gave me 3 sick days. Let me just point out that this doesn't really help people like me, since I work according to deadlines & clients (some of whom have no idea I'm even pregnant, much less due next month).

On Wednesday we have an ultrasound to check the weight.

Random things

1. I want to thank Serenity for appreciating my thoughts.

2. The Braxton-Hicks are becoming much stronger and much more frequent. In my case, it really doesn't mean anything, but it's very noticeable.

3. Baby is definitely head down. When my sister asked me last week (before the ultrasound) I told her I wasn't sure & she said that a c-section isn't the end of the world anyway. True, I said, but it's not part of my plan. It might wreck some of my favorite stretch marks.

4. I am less panicked about a name. Not because we have any, but simply because I realize that since there aren't any left, it's not going to help... (This is what happens when you have a big family - from my side alone I have 19 neices and nephews, in addition to 11 cousins that my older kids have from their father's side - and, of course, you don't want to re-use names...)

5. I am going back and forth about feeling stupid to pack a bag so early (next week, which will be week 37) and feeling like I might regret not doing it, just in case this baby decides to surprise us. Maybe I'll compromise by waiting another week?

6. I am currently fabulously, fantastically lucky because the only discomfort I have is minor muscular pains here and there. I was able to give Abigail & Nomi a shower tonight on my own without any trouble... I'm also sleeping fairly well (I noticed in the past that my 9th month tends to be much easier than the 7th & 8th. Of course I'm only starting the 9th month tomorrow, so basically I'm saying that I expect things to get better & not worse.)

7. My parents are still in Vietnam, heading to Cambodia pretty soon. They've been sending SMS's almost every day. It's incredible how different it is when you hear from someone on a daily basis. I even gave my mom (who reads at least as many blogs as I do, and probably many more) some updates...

8. Ohad and I are planning a pre-birth getaway, well... as getaway as you can get when you take an almost-3 and an almost-2-year-old along. Maybe the Dead Sea?

I forgot to work on my seminar paper today :-(

A ticker indeed

I did it, I put up a ticker. I didn't think I would, but this one is less annoying than most...

We've been considering interesting dates - in Israel, we write the dates European style (day / month / year) so...

February 18 = 18/2/8
February 22 = 22/2/8
February 28 = 28/2/8
February 29th (yup, it's a leap year)
March 3 = 11 days before Abigail's birthday, 22 days before Nomi's
March 8 = 8/3/8

Any guesses? (Hint: February 18th is probably too early)

Tossing & Turning

After CSI (which comes on here at 11, but airs commercial-free) I finally fell asleep at around quarter to one. I was trying to figure out how someone could be so cruel to his own daughter as to say that she can only take the entrance exam for the high school that she wants to go to if her mom (me) would say that he would no longer have to pay child support if she got in... This with it being a private school that costs more than 5x as much as her current semi-private school (for which he pays nothing). Hadas was literally in tears.

At 2:55* I woke up to find that our cat had hidden in our room. At least she didn't jump on the bed... I got up to let her out and, of course, went to pee.

At 4:18 something was tickling me. Usually it's my hair, but this time it was an ant walking on my face. Lovely. I got up again (to pee). After that I had trouble falling asleep because I was trying to figure out how I'm going to finish my seminar paper when everything's moving so slowly and I need a large sample to run my experiment on. I turned from side-to-side about 10 times, which means moving my pillow collection around with me. Finally, sometime around 5 I fell asleep.

At 6 I woke up all sweaty, went to go pee and then back to sleep. (I'm still sleeping in a t-shirt, with a summer blanket, I'm just really warm at night.) At around 7:30, we woke up...

During the time that I did sleep, I managed to dream that my doctor's secretary called to say they'd rescheduled my next appointment for May 10th (my birthday). Only once I got off the phone did I realize that the baby should be at least 2 months old by then...

I've got to admit that this is a typical night for me anytime (pregnant or not), usually with very vivid dreams, complete with color & sound - including background music sometimes. (On Friday night I woke up wondering what I should do when my dreams were so silly that they were like a show I wouldn't let my kids watch on TV for fear that their minds would turn to mush.)

This morning Ohad (who, as usual, slept through all the times I woke up) called the school that said that Hadas can be tested without her father's signature. My lawyer said we can get a court order that will allow her to study there if she gets in... so basically she's all set for now.

Maybe tonight I'll sleep a little better. What are your nights like?
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*We have a great projection alarm clock that projects the time onto the ceiling, so I always know exactly what time it is when I wake up in the middle of the night.

Those 4 weeks flew by

But I got a 2-week extension. I admitted that I'm not taking my iron or vitamins and my doctor didn't seem worried (I do manage to wake up at 7 & go to sleep at 12, without napping in the middle of the day & I can still do almost everything, including washing the floor).

The baby is head-down & weighs about 5 pounds (the doc estimates weight the old-fashioned way, but was very precise with Nomi, so I trust him). The best news is that there are no signs of gestational diabetes.

Pretty cool to be on the good side of the odds*

I'm getting pretty close to the 9th month...

Edit: Reading Serenity's post reminded me of something I figured out last night as I was shaving my legs. I had been wondering why, despite the fact that I hadn't shaved my legs in way-too-long they didn't look bad. Now I know. I have the same amount of hair, but twice as much skin. Yup, that's how huge my legs are...

*GD has a 60% chance of recurring in subsequent pregnancies and I have all the risk factors except for being overweight.

She got it...

After Abigail felt the baby moving a few minutes ago, I asked her if she knows how the baby will get out. She said someone would have to help it with its foot... I explained that usually the head comes out first and that it comes out of the vagina. She looked at me very seriously and said, "but the vagina is very, very small".

Survived the Safari

The safari is actually a nice place & looking at animals is fun. (My favorite was the baby gorilla.)

Our day started with certain people not considering the fact that Ohad & I and my BIL & SIL have small children - and therefore deciding to waste about 45 minutes before going into the safari by dragging us all out of the car to munch on sandwiches in the cold wind... This would have been annoying even had we not been on a tight schedule, but we were actually on a very tight schedule, which made it that much worse. Fortunately I wasn't the only one who was annoyed...

I would love to blab more about this, but it really isn't nice, so I will just quit there. Suffice it to say that I have a lot of trouble keeping my mouth shut, but I do try very hard (and there's plenty to say).

My parents are leaving for Vietnam & Cambodia tomorrow morning - they'll be away for just over 2 weeks. I'm looking forward to hearing about it. They've gone on such amazing adventures recently and I'm so glad that they have this opportunity.

My oldest brother ran a marathon last week, which is pretty cool. It's something I never even thought of doing, but I guess it was a dream of his.

In other news, UI (Ubar Inbar) must be getting bigger, because the kicks are getting pretty strong and difficult to ignore. I sometimes find myself feeling seasick. Unfortunately, it doesn't make me less hungry... Next OB appointment is on Thursday. Good thing he doesn't have a scale ;-)

Safari - Here we come

I love the safari, I really do. I think it's cool to see animals that can walk around freely and live a semi-natural life. What I don't like is the fact that we're going as part of a birthday celebration for my MIL. The only good thing about my previous marriage was that I didn't have any IL issues at all (MIL passed away about 10 years earlier & my ex was not in touch with his father). Ohad's parents like to make everything difficult and complicated, so today we got a list of things we need to bring with us... I'm fine with sandwiches. Why do we need to start cutting a salad and bringing tuna, pickles & olives for 12 people? Eating outside, when it's cold and smells of stinky animals is not my idea of fun. [BTW, since Nomi is allergic to eggs, any tuna we're bringing will be mayo-free & therefore not terribly appealing.]

After the drive through the safari there's a zoo. Now, since Abigail & Nomi will be with us that could be fun, but if you've ever gone anywhere with a slow-moving group, you know that you end up standing around waiting a lot. I can walk fine, but I can't stand around. My legs just can't do it right now. When I get 'stuck' on the stairs (because someone's taking them too slowly) my legs start to ache. When I'm waiting for Abigail to finish washing her hands, I often have to walk away and come back. When we went shopping for new car seats for Ohad's car the other day, I had to sit down in the store while the guy explained the differences... and with the edema that I have and the weight gain (yes, I finally passed the 70 mark) it's getting harder by the day. I guess the best I can do is hope there are a lot of benches there - well, that and that no one confuses me with one of the hippos. It might be somewhat embarrassing if a crowd started to form around me.

A mushroom in your glasses case?

There are some things that become trivial once you master a second language*, but then some things continue to sound weird even after many years have passed.

Recently a new immigrant told me that she doesn't know how to say she's pregnant, so she says she has a little child & points to her abdomen. Actually, in Hebrew, pregnancy is herayon and to be pregnant is b'herayon - literally in pregnancy.

I've been playing with ideas for a post about language for a while & the funniest example that comes to mind is the Hebrew word for vagina - pronounced narteek. Additional meanings of the word are holster or glasses case... The word for yeast infection is peetriya, which also means mushroom (like the kind you eat). So if you go to the doctor to tell him that you have a yeast infection you end up saying something that could just as well mean that you have a mushroom in your glasses case...

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*I lived in the US until age 16 & then came to Israel on my own. My parents wanted us to grow up knowing Hebrew, so they always spoke to us in Hebrew at home (despite being native English speakers). This led to many cases of hysterical laughter by people who heard me speak, like when I asked my advisor if she'd like me to 'chop some bread' for her or when I used the biblical (rather than the modern) word for shoulder to tell the doctor that my shoulder hurt. Very embarrassing at the time but, looking back, it is rather funny.

Really not ready for a countdown

But... today marks a maximum of 2 months before we get to meet UI. Although I usually say I have a history of being late, it's not exactly true...

• With Hadas I was induced (with pitocin & later having my water broken) at 41 weeks + 6 days and gave birth exactly 2 weeks after her due date.
• With Matan and Lilach, my doctor stripped my membranes at 38 weeks + 2 days and I gave birth 4 days later, 8 days before my due date.
• With Abigail, my doctor stripped my membranes more than once after 40 weeks and she was born at 41 weeks + 1 day.
• With Nomi, more than one doctor tried to see if you could actually kill someone by causing them intense pain, by trying (unsuccessfully) to bring on labor by stripping my membranes when my cervix was not ready at 38 weeks + 3 days (due to gestational diabetes and a high estimated weight). I later was induced using pitocin (which, I have to say, was not bad at all) and she was born at 38 weeks + 5 days (9 days early).

So actually, 2 births were late and 2 were early... But I never really had a birth start on its own, so I guess the safer bet is that it will be more similar to Abigail's birth (unless we suddenly discover gestational diabetes again).

Anyway, as well as this denial thing is going (not too well) I am still well aware of the fact that I'd better finish the project I'm working on in the next few weeks.

---

I was so thrilled to finally have a car & then yesterday, a bus driver got angry at me and decided to show me that his vehicle is bigger than mine (it was). Long-story-short, I backed into the car behind me to avoid being hit. This was probably a good choice in terms of keeping the front of my car intact. Unfortunately, the car behind me didn't enjoy it too much. I still haven't heard what the damage is, but I will probably pay it out of pocket and then try to sue the bus driver for causing the accident (at least I have 2 witnesses, including the driver of the car that I hit). The damage, of course, was minimal, but the frustration... and that feeling of vulnerability... ugh.

What I have to show for 2 years

This post has to be really quick because I have tons of work to do...

Two days ago was my 2-year-blogoversary. I actually started this blog because I thought it would work as a good content management system for all the questions I was getting & that it would save me having to answer the same questions over and over. I found that Blogger doesn't do it for me as a CMS and that Yedda has made my life easier (if you get a lot of questions on a certain topic, definitely try it out!)

Two years ago I was pregnant with Nomi. By now, she's talking in complete sentences, "I want to climb down alone, Mommy." (out of her carseat) and we've come to accept her allergies (milk, eggs, sesame seeds, nuts, bananas, kiwi) as part of our life. I've learned that 2 babies who are a year apart is actually much easier than twins and we have the almost-daily pleasure of seeing our two little girls interact with each other with love and kindness, usually including infectious laughter... We've also watched Abigail transform from a baby to a little, independent girl who always tucks her socks into her shoes when she takes them off & who knows that when the big kids are away for the weekend that they've gone to visit their dad... and she misses them.

In the blogosphere, I met a lot of terrific, hilarious people, gotten to read about plenty of women who became mommies (way too many to link to) and even got a new little sister (even my mom agrees)... Now, how common is that?

And just one last thing... yesterday, Ohad finally bought a car, meaning I get ours :-) That will be nice, after 2-1/2 carless years.

OK, back to work.

Fat is Relative

My brother-in-law came over on Saturday and was reading a very cute opposites book to Abigail. When they came to the word fat, he asked "Who is fat?" to which Abigail answered - "The hippopotamus, just like my mommy."

All I could do was laugh...

Have a happy new year & wishing all of those who are waiting to 'grow a bump' that 2008 is your year.

End of the Christmas Lull

I was beginning to feel lonely here in blogland...

Ohad & I have been busy working (him on his doctorate, me on trying to earn some money) and basically have no time to breathe. In the meantime, something weird was going on with Nomi's eyes. At first we thought it was an infection, but as time went on and there wasn't any pus and the antibiotic cream wasn't helping, I became more and more convinced that it was an allergy - which only left figuring out to what.

It wasn't too difficult, since she'd just recently started eating kiwi (which I seem to remember her eating last year with no problem). We cut the kiwi and her eyes went back to normal within 36 hours. Another thing we get to add to the list.

I did go back and check her RAST tests (blood tests for allergies) and they did show that she was allergic to kiwi, but since she hadn't had a reaction, we thought it was OK (this was our doctor's advice - anything she doesn't have a reaction to is OK).

It is amazing how many allergies one little girl can have.

4 More Weeks of Blissful Denial

I just got back from my 31-week appointment (I'm actually only 30w+5d). My obgyn (who has now moved to an office which is a 7-minute-walk from my house) looked over the u/s from Tuesday saying that breech at this point in time is meaningless & that everything looks good. He asked me again if I'm taking my iron pills. Um. Well. I do, but not on a daily basis. So, after about 3 minutes in the office, he told me to make an appointment for another 4 weeks.

One might wonder (as I do) why I'm in some form of denial. The baby was planned and is very much wanted. I'm really looking forward to the excitement around the birth, the birth itself and taking care of a new baby... and then the first year-and-a-half are pretty awesome in terms of what the baby learns how to do, with every day leaving me surprised and amazed... And, of course, there's the interaction with the other kids which is interesting, entertaining & probably one of the things that brings us the most happiness... (at around 18 months I find myself ready to turn my baby over to day care and return to some form of adult life).

What I'm not terribly excited about is the pregnancy itself. I feel like I concentrate poorly, can get fewer things done, am strangely shaped and heavy... I also know that once UI makes an appearance, my life will change - a lot of things will get more difficult - like picking the little girls up from their daycare (I have a mental image of holding Abigail's hand, Nomi in the stroller & UI in the Baby Bjorn) or just going to drop off a package at the post office - things that have become pretty simple since Nomi started daycare 3 months ago. I'm worried about having even less time for the older kids (& believe me, it's already really difficult to find time and have patience for a severely-learning-disabled child who is learning to read a second language when she is still several years behind on her first language or to spend time listening to a child who likes to go on and on about every interaction that went on during school that day).

So, although having another baby is what I really want, I'm enjoying the 'simple' time now and trying not to think too much about what will happen in another 2-2-1/2 months (we're due Feb 23) and trying to get as many things done now as I can (finishing the court case with my ex, moving forward with my seminar paper, getting Hadas through the testing for the school she wants to go to, touching up the paint in the house, etc.) - all this while trying to make enough money so I won't be pressured to work during the first few months after the baby is born...

Does the denial make more sense now?

8 Things Meme & Bonus

Thank you, trilcat for tagging me once again…

8 passions in my life:

1. Ohad
2. My kids
3. Music, especially singing to my kids
4. Writing
5. Thinking of new ideas (especially ways to surprise Ohad)
6. Rearranging furniture / organizing things
7. Reading research
8. Bargain hunting

8 things to do before I die:

1. Grow old with Ohad
2. Travel (with Ohad)
3. See my children appreciate each other
4. See my children become independent
5. Renovate, furnish & decorate a big house to be just what we want it to be
6. Write a novel (or two)
7. Finish my degree (hey, it’s only been 22 years since I started)
8. See all my RL & blogger friends have all the children they want
   

8 things I often say:

1. I’m so proud of you.
2. You’re such a good girl.
3. Can you please stop fighting?
4. I don’t know. Whatever. Ask Ohad.
5. Please pick up your shoes and take them to your room now.
6. Do you want me to count to three?
7. Oh no. (In response to the phone ringing when I’m busy or any time after 10pm.)
8. It’s your father. (That’s why we got caller ID.)
   

Eight Books I read recently (fortunately, trilcat claims that kid’s books count, otherwise I might have to go back quite a while…) You get my ratings too, on a scale of 1-5.

1. The Bretheren - John Grisham (still reading, it's only been about 2 months)
2. Fool Me Once - Fern Michaels (2)
3. Blink - Malcolm Gladwell (4)
4. Hop on Pop - Dr. Seuss (4)
5. Green Eggs & Ham – Dr. Seuss (5)
6. I Just Forgot – Mercer Mayer (4)
7. The Little Engine That Could – Watty Piper (4)
8. Guess How Much I Love You – Sam McBratney (5)

8 songs that mean something to me (with links to youtube):

1. I’ve Finally Found Someone – Barbra Streisand & Bryan Adams
2. Poems, Prayers & Promises – John Denver
3. Delilah Blue – Joshua Kadison (complicated)
4. Shanghai Breezes – John Denver (we hear a lot of John Denver at home)
5. The whole Yentl soundtrack
6. The whole Beaches soundtrack (if you like Bette Midler, you must watch this :-))
7. Modeh Ani – Meir Ariel (the first song we played for Abigail after she was born)
8. Somewhere Out There – Linda Rondstadt & James Ingram

8 Qualities I look for in a friend:
1. Clever
2. Has interests & ideas
3. A great sense of humor
4. Honesty
5. Has time to talk
6. Understanding
7. Doesn’t mind voicing (or hearing) an unpopular opinion
8. Speaks without too many grammatical errors

8 people I am tagging
I am not sure I know anyone who hasn’t been tagged and actually has the time for this… In case I’m wrong, consider yourself tagged.

And the bonus...

8 things my mother taught me about socks

1. Always wash socks together so both white socks can absorb the same amount of the bright red dye running off your sister's brand new t-shirt. (Unfortunately, usually one sock still ends up turning pink while the other remains a bleachy-clean white.)
2. If you put two socks into the laundry and only one came out: the washer ate it.
3. If you took two socks out of the washer and only one came out of the dryer: the dryer ate it. (Basically, both the washer and the dryer are bottomless pits, full of socks.)
4. If a sock needs to be darned, you either need a new pair or the dryer ate it.
5. Always buy more than one of the same pair of socks, that way, when the washer eats one from one pair and the dryer one from the other, you've still got a whole pair left.
6. A sock-sack is a place where pairless socks can wait until everyone has outgrown them anyway.
7. Socks can be made into hand-puppets, but never will be.
8. Would you mind just wearing sandals???

At least she's verbal...

Abigail & Nomi have both been sick on and off since Wednesday. Fever, coughing, runny noses and generally miserable - not to mention incredibly whiny. While I love being a mom, this is not the part I love the most...

Today Hadas (14) was sitting next to Abigail (2 & 8 months) and trying to talk to her when Abigail turned and said, "Hadas, I'm not in a good mood. Leave me alone."

She is too much...

Down the Sewer

I can't believe that when I was checking to make sure I had my house key with me, it slipped out of my pocketbook and into the tiniest sewer opening, never to be seen again... Fortunately, Ohad was with me & he had another key. I can't even begin to explain how unlikely this was to happen. Oh well.

The next exciting thing to happen was that I got to the post office to mail a few packages (of the famous OPKs I sell for peanuts) only to discover that I had forgotten to address one of the envelopes. Now, due to being a country that's known quite a few terror attacks, our mailbox openings are tiny. You can barely put a letter in them, much less a small package - so each time you want to mail a package, it means making your way to one of the 3 post offices that we have in the city (fortunately, one really isn't too far away, it's just down a one-way street, in the opposite direction, of course). A second "oh well".

This morning Einav Galili (who I like watching) wasn't on the morning show & her replacement showed a newspaper article about a 57-year-old woman who just had a baby. And she went on to say how happy that makes her. I really wonder how fair it is to a child to have a mom who's going to be in her 70's before s/he starts high school, especially a single mom. I can understand really, REALLY, REALLY wanting to be a mom, but it seems like there's got to be a point at which you give up. I'm feeling old to be a mom now. I look in the mirror and see my growing belly and think, "I am too old for this." and I am nearly 20 years away from 57...

What do you think? Is there a right age to stop at? Is there an age that's too old to become a mom?

This deserves an award

Yesterday I had my 2nd and final GTT (Glucose Torture Test) for this pregnancy. It's the one where they give you 100 grams of glucose diluted in warm water and sweetened with diet lemon drink syrup (no kidding). Well, actually, first you fast for at least 8 hours and then you have your blood taken and only then do you drink their weird concoction. I asked to have mine with as little water as possible. Sickly sweet, yes, but you've got to down the whole thing as fast as possible and having less of it makes it more likely for me to survive it without them having to mop the floor. I drank it very quickly. I may have even broken a world record, which would have been a very interesting claim to fame. It's a shame the Guiness guys weren't there to record the exciting event... Anyway, after that you get to have your blood taken every hour on the hour for the next 3 hours. All this to see whether sugar is harming you - it sounds kind of backwards to me...

Having had gestational diabetes with my last pregnancy (discovered in week 39) I had at least a 60% chance of having it recur. I also have most of the risk factors (family history, age, pregnancy #, etc.) but, surprisingly, all 4 of my numbers came back mid-range - definitely no diabetes. Cool... Now all I have to do is finish the 4th Snickers bar so that Ohad won't know I ate any... (since I bought another 4).

So - why do I think this deserves a medal? I had to do the 100g GTT in 2004 and 2005, the 75g one in 2006 & the 100g one twice more in 2007. That's in addition to all the fasting blood sugar tests that I've done, which I consider a piece of cake - with icing.

Yedda Does It - Congratulations!

Congratulations to my friends over at Yedda!

I woke up this morning to the news that they've been bought by AOL. I started using Yedda's Q&A widget in August 2006 (turns out I was their first partner!) and have answered hundreds of questions so far, almost all about infertility, many from my experience & others that I spent time reading journal articles or doing other types of research in order to answer. Some of the questions have given me inspiration for articles or blog posts I wrote. And, of course Yedda also sent me to BlogHer 2007, which was my first time in the US in 13 years... (OK, that may not be related, but it was one of the most exciting things that happened to me this past year.)

Now all I have to do is figure out how to get AOL to buy my website... ;-)

Up (in the night) dates

My yeast infection (if that's really what it was) seems to be long gone (yay!) I must really have caught it early because I didn't have any of the typical symptoms and it was gone after about a day (don't worry, I'm continuing the full course of treatment because I really don't want it to come back).

I wake up about 3 times during an average night. Either I'm connected to an IV without knowing about it or I drink much more than I think I do... I could say it has to do with pressure on the bladder or something, but the truth is that this has been happening to me ever since I moved out of the dorms (about 20 years ago), when I probably should have gotten up in the middle of the night, but was too lazy to.

One thing I'm thankful for is that in my pregnancies with both Abigail & Nomi, I was wearing a very sexy pregnancy belt by this point (no, that is NOT me in the picture though it is about the size of my belly). Fortunately, this time, I'm not suffering (so far) from symphysis pubis pain (I had it on the debilitating side & the belt really did make it possible for me to do things like walk.) What you can't see in the picture is that it has these two huge velcro straps that you have to undo anytime you need to use the ladies' room. I am enjoying every day that I don't need it...

On another note, I read Bea's cross-fertilization post (great, as all her posts are), which spoke about the idea of just letting her belly tell all and it reminded me of two things that happened to me last week - first, when I went to pick up the prescription, the pharmacist told me not to used the medicine during my period. I nearly cracked up in her face, but decided not to embarrass her, so I just smiled. Second, my neighbor (who I see almost every day) stopped by and suddenly, mid-sentence her jaw fell when she noticed...

In other news, I'm currently in the early stages of writing a seminar paper that has to do with IVF - the specifics aren't closed yet, but it has made me wonder about women's desire for twins...

Yowks! What is that?!?

My older kids asked me, "When did you get pregnant?" & not knowing exactly what they meant, I told them not to worry, that they weren't home at the time... (yeah, I know, who ever imagined I'd get pregnant at home?). "TOO MUCH INFORMATION!" Hadas and Matan yelled to me. Anyway, this post is definitely a TMI post, but also a request from people creating websites for women who are hysterical...

I have never had a yeast infection, so I don't know what it's like, what the symptoms are, how dangerous it is, etc. Well, yesterday, I started to feel a little itch and a quick look revealed that something was definitely wrong. I could have called my sister, who might have known more than me, but she has a baby who has decided that sleep is overrated (and my sister might say that sleep is underrated) and it was after 11, so I consulted with Dr. Google. This is what Dr. Google should have said:

• Stop freaking out!
• Whatever it is, it doesn't endanger the pregnancy.
• You can wait until the morning to see your doctor.
• Stop freaking out and don't call every pharmacy in the city to see if one of them is open.
• Don't self-diagnose.
• The fact that there is no discharge doesn't mean that it's gotta be MORE serious than a yeast infection. [BTW, none of the websites mentioned such a situation.]
• For goodness' sake, stop * freaking * out!
• It's really not going to hurt your baby and most importantly...
• Be nice to your husband who doesn't really get why you're freaking out.

I got most of that information (not the husband part) and was actually able to calm down until I got a totally miraculous doctor's appointment this morning (not with my obgyn, but with one I've seen before). He said I have a mild case, that it's really common in pregnancy & that I was just lucky to never have experienced it before. Mild. He also said that within a few days it will be completely gone, that the treatment is safe during pregnancy & that it does not harm the baby or endanger the pregnancy. Whew!

The only weird thing was running into my dad just as I got to the clinic... The good thing is that at my age it no longer embarrasses me.

The Weird Thing About Telling So Late

When I was going through IVF, I told people even before there was a chance I'd be pregnant. I didn't particularly enjoy my family & friends going through the 2ww with me, but the whole process was so intense that everyone ended up knowing. Clearly, as soon as the results were in, everyone knew that too...

This time, Ohad & I really enjoyed having a secret (we didn't even really feel any need to tell when we did)... we knew I was pregnant when Yedda offered to send me to BlogHer & we knew when I ordered the tickets to take Lilach to Croatia. I was careful when I tore through the airport in Atlanta trying to catch my flight (I did) and I avoided riding a gondola in Venice because I get seasick easily even when I'm not pregnant... I was also careful not to volunteer for anything at the school...

When we announced this pregnancy at the end of the 16th week, it was still not obvious. I could still wear my normal clothes for a few weeks, but now (it seems way too suddenly) I'm wearing maternity clothes and it's clear I'm pregnant.

I guess a pregnancy becomes 'real' for me at a many different points:

- a positive home pregnancy test

- a positive beta test (blood)

- the first ultrasound when I see a heartbeat

- the first ultrasound when the fetus begins to look like a baby

- when my ordinary clothes stop fitting

- the first time I *definitely* feel the baby kick

- when people can tell by looking at me and...

- when we tell people.

But maybe this one (telling people, especially family) has more weight, because when other people know, it's no longer just a fantasy (that for some odd reason the ultrasound machine seems to believe), it's not only part of my life, but part of theirs too...

In any case, it's fun that it's gone by so quickly, just strange.

On Saturday, we finish 24 weeks.

Postpartum Depression - MOTHERS Act

As my contribution to this day I decided to write a post that's hopefully somewhat enlightening & that might help lift the taboo from postpartum depression (also known as postnatal depression), particularly in women who suffered from infertility prior to the birth of their child/ren. (Interested in articles about PPD after Assisted Reproduction? See the bottom of this blog post.)

Infertility usually means at least a year of unsuccessful attemts to conceive before turning to a medical professional for help. After this, it's a process of many months or even years before a baby becomes a reality. During this time, having a baby often becomes a woman's goal in life (I'm deliberately leaving out the father here, because I want to refer to my thoughts on what might contribute to the incidence of PPD specifically in women), often taking a toll on her education, career, marriage, friendships, etc. Having a baby is the goal & the baby can become idealized, frequently as a warm, cuddly creature dressed in pastel colors, who coos on cue and smiles lovingly at her mommy...

I think it's rare for a woman to be prepared for the reality of motherhood (not exactly the description above, at least not all the time). Although I have a sister who is 9 years younger than I (and therefore I should have known something about having a baby), when I first brought Hadas home from the hospital, all I could think was, "OK, so what do I do with her now?" When she cried and I didn't know how to calm her, I was practically in tears. She was a fairly good sleeper - at night - but during the day, she demanded pretty much constant attention - 16 hours a day. She was alert, interested in everything, a good eater and mostly happy, but it was tiring - day after day, every day. I didn't have many people to interact with or places to take her, so aside from walks, we were mostly at home. My whole life changed when she was born but, of course, having her had been my choice, something I'd waited for for over 3 years (3 years of TTC + 9 months until she was born). How could I possibly complain about having a beautiful, healthy baby?

Fortunately, I have no personal experience with PPD, but I'm guessing that's how it is - there are the perfectly normal hardships and then the depression that sets in. On top of that, is the guilt for feeling the way you do - or for completely losing control of your emotions.

Having the "baby blues" is normal, but baby blues are very different from Postpartum Depression. Here are some brief descriptions adapted from emedicinehealth (in purple):

The "baby blues" are a passing state of heightened emotions that occurs in about half of women who have recently given birth. It peaks 3-5 days after delivery and lasts up to 2 weeks, during which time the woman may cry more easily than usual and may have trouble sleeping or feel irritable, sad, and "on edge" emotionally. Baby blues don't interfere with a woman's ability to care for her baby.

Postpartum depression is depression that occurs soon after having a baby. Some health professionals call it postpartum nonpsychotic depression. It occurs in about 10-20% of women, usually within a few months of delivery. Symptoms include depressed mood, tearfulness, inability to enjoy pleasurable activities, trouble sleeping, fatigue, appetite problems, suicidal thoughts, feelings of inadequacy as a parent, and impaired concentration.

A woman who experiences postpartum depression may worry about the baby's health and well-being. She may have negative thoughts about the baby and fears about harming the infant.
Postpartum depression interferes with a woman's ability to care for her baby. It can also lead to suicidal and homicidal thoughts.

Having PPD, from what I learned is a serious problem, but what is really important is to know that it's treatable. Treating PPD is the best thing a woman can do both for herself and for her baby. Women with PPD may have difficulty taking the first step, or even acknowledging that there is a problem. If you're a woman with PPD - tell someone. Let them help you get help. If you have a friend with PPD, find out more about getting help for your friend. If the first professional doesn't help, persist until you find someone who does.

Getting help means giving yourself an excellent chance of going on to having a healthy, rewarding experience as a mommy.

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Special thanks to Katherine Stone who took the time to speak to me at BlogHer 2007 and who, as a survivor, devotes incredible amounts of time and energy to increasing awareness about postpartum mood disorders.

Recent research performed by Karin Hammarberg (link to doctoral thesis), who also published an article entitled "Assisted conception is a risk factor for postnatal mood disturbance and early parenting difficulties" in Fertility & Sterility (link to abstract) has indeed shown a higher incidence of postpartum mood disorders among women who conceived with the help of ART.

An additional article I read, entitled "Impact of a multiple, IVF birth on post-partum mental health: a composite analysis", published in Human Reproduction (link to abstract, full pdf available from that page), suggests that the higher incidence of multiples in IVF births is a factor that raises the risk of PPD after ART.

Feel free to ask for explanations :-) This post is just getting too long...

Tap Glitch

I thought I heard the phone ring a little before 6:30. This is one of the mornings when my older kids are at their dad's house, so they sometimes call. Having just gotten a cable phone line (yesterday) and not having new phones to hook up to our old line, the only phone is downstairs... So I went downstairs to see if it really was our phone. What I saw was that our entire first floor was flooded...

I also immediately knew it was coming from the tap under the sink (where we have the dishwasher, the fridge and the water purifier connected, in addition to the sink).

Ohad was downstairs in about 1-1/2 seconds and he turned off the water as we both started to squeegee the water out of the house. The phone rang again & it turned out that the overflow of water somehow ran down into the parking lot, so now our neighbor (who speaks Russian very well, but absolutely no Hebrew or English) is trying to help us fix it (he actually came in with a briefcase that gave me the instant reference of "Dr. Sink").

In any case, no one can say my floor's not clean...

Special thanks to Abigail & Nomi who just woke up now (at 7) and let us get the whole floor clean by then and to the weather, for being so warm that we still haven't put the carpet back in the living room. Fortunately, we have no damage.

Uh Oh - The Opposite Direction

Today, as I was crossing the street with Abigail, I saw E. E has a daughter in the same grade as my twins & a son who's about 3 years younger. When I was pregnant with Nomi, we met at the bus stop & spoke (we first met about 7 years ago). She was in about the same week I was and she was really excited. My impression was that she'd been trying for a long time. She subsequently lost the pregnancy at around 20 weeks, I was never aware of the circumstances. Because she was already showing at the time, she had an email sent out to our community, explaining that she had miscarried. My heart fell when I heard. It seemed so unfair... I hoped that they would be successful again soon.

Today, when I crossed the street, I'm sure she couldn't miss the fact that I am expecting again. I thought about how looking at me with Abigail must remind her of the fact that we would have had children who were the same age (even though hers would have been Nomi's age). I thought about how hard it must be for her because I'm only one of the women she sees all the time who's gone on to have more children while she hasn't been successful (and when you have 2 kids in school, you run into these women often).

I also wonder if, after already having 2 children and then losing a long-awaited pregnancy so late, you wouldn't just give up at some point & think, "I can't do this to myself anymore."

Mostly, I felt guilty for how seeing me might have made her feel.

The Goofballs Strike Again...

Since I last posted about the partial results of my amnio, I hadn't checked if there were any new results - simply because I get an email notification when there are. Tonight, I decided to check anyway. Get this line:

Karyotype Preliminary AF - 0 (that's the digit 0) *see edit below

A quick search in Google revealed that this reporting system is used only by my health insurance company in Israel (2 results, both in Hebrew forums) & is completely meaningless to anyone but perhaps a gyn who's already encountered it in the past.

As soon as I finished my search (one answer from a doctor said it's fine, another doctor said he had no idea what the woman was talking about) I checked my email & there was the notification that the new result was in. What is the point of giving me these results directly, especially at 9:30pm? I don't even know who to complain to...

edit: my doctor said that the digit 0 actually has no meaning other than that they don't give the results over the internet. ARGGGHHHH!

and... in Hebrew, for my Israeli searchers - אין כל משמעות לספרה 0 - לא מפרסמים את התוצאה באינטרנט!

21 Week Scan

Today was our 21-week ultrasound (meaning we're currently in week 22). Normally, they kind of zip through it, saying, "this is the heart, here are the chambers, everything's normal..." but we got special treatment today - this was the first time the doctor did this particular scan for my insurance company (each company has different requirements for the scan - he wasn't sure of all the details). First, he went over everything twice, then he was busy showing the ultrasound technician and the secretary (who typed the data in during the scan) everything else that he knew how to do with the machinery (take a 3D pic of the face, measure the cerebellum, etc.) It was very amusing. The only thing we didn't get to do was count the toes, because of their position. I can't believe how much it already looks like a baby :-)

The doctor claimed that if anything were wrong with our amnio we would have been called within 2 weeks. I finally got through to the clinic today and it seemed as if the nurse had the results in front of her but wasn't yet allowed to tell me (she said something like, "I should be getting them any minute," which sounded strange). She said that we'd have the answer by Wednesday.

Since the last time I was weighed, just a few weeks ago, I gained 5 pounds(!). I don't even have much of an appetite (unlike Bea).

Congratulations to Karen on being able to bring her babies home!!! And thank you to Suz for sharing her terrible scare with Savannah. I hope everyone will take her advice and go for an infant CPR class. I did & I hope I never have to use what I learned...

Ugh

Warning... you may detect a bit of anger in this post...

Tomorrow I get to meet with a social worker (a new one, from another city) and my ex, to try to find a way to communicate. Now, in theory, that might be a nice plan. In practice, the #$(!@#* I was once married to (for 13-way-too-long-years) is an extremely irrational, terrifying creature who lacks self-control & doesn't hold himself accountable for things that he says or does. Most of our phone conversations end with me deciding I'm not going to listen to any more of his maniacal shouting and hanging up. The truth is, not communicating with him ever again about anything sounds pretty good to me.

Why is it automatically assumed that every divorced couple CAN achieve civil communication? I got divorced because I was way past the point of even trying to communicate with him... I mean, for the last 6 years of my marriage I wasn't allowed to ask questions like, "How was your day?" because it infuriated him. (Yes, I'm totally serious.)

The bottom line, though, is that I have to give it some sort of shot, because it will be completely obvious if I don't & that will knock points off my scorecard (the judge gets a report about these meetings).

At least the settings on my GPSare better than last time, so it should take me on faster roads. Hey, that's something to look forward to, right?

In other news, I posted a new page about early pregnancy. It still needs to be expanded (a lot), but I think it's a good direction, especially seeing that so many of the blogs I follow have gotten two pink lines in the past few months (and I hope many more will in the coming months!). Comments, as always, are welcome :-)

A week into the wait

Not that wait. The wait for the results of the amnio (expected to be 2-1/2 to 3 weeks). Since the amnio, I've been somewhat sluggish, suddenly feeling more tired than before. I can still wear most of my regular clothes, but they are beginning to get tight (total weight gain so far ~6lbs). I am feeling UI (ubar Inbar) move much more recently - many times a day.

Abigail (now 2-1/2) knows to say that the baby grows in the uterus. Today at dinner she told us that she has a little uterus and so when she has a little baby she will be able to put it there. I wanted to tell her that I hope she won't have to go through that :-)

I am pretty much back to doing everything I did before, though I've yet to wash the floor. You really don't want to see my floor when it hasn't been washed for 2 weeks. Maybe tomorrow. My doctor told me to keep things low key for a whole week.
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For anyone who's interested, I fixed up the download page for the free IVF guide. I think it actually makes it possible to understand where you're supposed to click.

Back from the amnio

I was still ready to turn around and go home, even 5 minutes before the test. It wasn't that I minded having it done, I just didn't mind not having it done either.

The doc was a bit of a joker, first telling Ohad it would take 30 minutes (yeah, right) and then telling me that they needed to use 2 needles - one to make sure they were in the right place and the other to extract the fluid. This might be helpful for someone who has never had amnio before, is stupid, or is so terrified that she'll believe anything. For me, it was somewhat annoying, because I wondered what other things he might find humorous... It was over in about 5 minutes and they took me to sit on a recliner for 20 minutes and fed me cookies. The doctor claimed that sugar helps prevent contractions. Sounded weird, but I took a cookie anyway... After about 1/2 an hour, we made sure to leave instructions to omit the gender from the report and then drove home, stopping on the way in Jaffa to get sandwiches (the test was in Tel Aviv). My parents surprised me by dropping by and bringing a chocolate mousse cake and flowers :-)

I spent most of the afternoon & evening on my back trying to be comfortable, but I'm used to laying on my side and my whole body started to ache, so I finally gave up and just lay on my side. It was much more comfortable.

This morning I feel fine. 3 weeks until we get the results.

Too much going on

So basically the court thing went well. My lawyer was happy. I'm a little annoyed by the fact that I have to go to 'communication lessons'. If 13 years of marriage, including about 3 years of therapy weren't able to teach him that communication isn't supposed to involve threats, swearing and going on and on unintelligibly (believe me, I'm NOT exaggerating), then I wonder what kind of magic they think they can work when I'm totally unmotivated...

A good mom should be motivated, right? But I guess there's a limit to the amount of abuse I want to subject myself to, even if (theoretically) it is 'for the good of the children'. I think registered letters, for example, is a much better form of communication. He really is one of the few people I find I just can't communicate with. Fortunately, his current mental state is so bad that he can't keep himself together for any period of time, so other people are able to see why. I hope this happens quickly - otherwise, it will mean a lot of driving and a lot of wasted days.

So, although no custody suit is looming over me anymore, I'm still really angry that the social worker chose to knowingly lie about things. Even the fact that the judge didn't buy it (she totally didn't) doesn't make me feel any better about it. And I have another question for the social worker: even if the fact that my kids were born through IVF is relevant (I don't know why it would be, but let's say it is), how did you, Ms. Social Worker, decide that the problem was with me and that my ex 'stood by me' (hence giving him bonus points for dedication)???

In other news, Ohad and I were never able to really reach a decision about the amnio. The default was that we have an appointment tomorrow morning at 10. Since we didn't cancel it, we're going. I can't say I'm looking forward to it, but I feel just as calm as I did last time, though this time I'm not really worried about the results either...

Ohad has promised to spoil me for 2 days (and when he says it, he means it). So it's not all bad :-)

Off to court

Should be a blast. I get to play with my new GPS on the way. I tried to test it once before, but it said, "prepare for arrival at your destination" (in Hebrew) about 5 seconds after I got in the car. I guess that's what happens when all your trips are that short...

I will update later, unless I faint there on the floor, hit my head & need to be hospitalized. In such case, I'll try to get someone else to update.

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Update: I survived. The social worker's report was good enough that the judge got the point that the kids are fine. Psycho-ex, despite his wishes, was convinced to change the suit from custody to visitation. He also went psycho in the court, screaming and crying. There weren't any emotional issues going on, so it was completely out of the blue and very out of place. He even yelled, very loudly, that the entire custody suit doesn't interest him and he doesn't even want custody. The judge made sure that got into the protocol.

It isn't over, but it's looking better. For now, I just forbade the kids to wear clothes that their father gives them to school (he has majorly bad taste, including sending them in things that are too small). I can't afford any more run-in's with the school.

Gotta run...

Tomorrow at 12

There really are worse things than having to go to court. I can think of many of them, but it still doesn't make that particular experience appeal to me. Actually, the court is troubling me less than seeing what our lovely social worker decided to write in the end.

On the phone, she said that, at most, she'd recommend that I be a bit more flexible about the visitation in the future. Considering the grouch (aka psycho-ex) rarely picks up the kids on time anyway, I didn't really get the point, but whatever. My lawyer will be there at 10 or so and he said he'd call to let me know how it (the social worker's report) is. I don't expect it to be honest or fair. She has always said that I just need to communicate better... I tried to explain that it's difficult to communicate with someone who was consistently abusive toward me throughout my 13-year marriage and can't get through more than 20 seconds on the phone without screaming at the top of his lungs, but she just doesn't get it.

My lawyer said that the case has a better than 50% chance of getting thrown out of court tomorrow (the grouch originally filed for divorce in the Rabbinic court and the divorce agreement clearly states that any disputes in the future must be resolved there - but when he filed the custody suit, he filed it in a Family court that doesn't have the jurisdiction).

Trying to ignore the fact that I have to be in court tomorrow, Ohad and I sat here for the past hour or so trying to decide whether we should go for amnio on Tuesday or not. The only good part of it that I can see is that I'd get to be spoiled for 2 days. Maybe we can just skip the amnio and I'll lie in bed as if I've done it... How about that?

Tonight, I asked the older kids to help arrange the poles of our Sukkah. After a little while, I heard hammering - turns out they put the entire Sukkah together on their own(!) Just as they were finishing, it started to rain - the first rain of the season :-)

And the winners are...

The top 5 ordered items were:

Helping the Stork: The Choices and Challenges of Donor Insemination

The Couple's Guide to In Vitro Fertilization: Everything You Need to Know to Maximize Your Chances of Success

FertilMARQ: A Male Fertility Sperm Test

Single Mothers by Choice

Mommies, Daddies, Donors, Surrogates: Answering Tough Questions and Building Strong Families

The only DVD ordered more than once was:

The Time Machine

Anything else you'd like to know?
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And of course, no IF blog would be complete without wishing Thalia a huge congratulations on the arrival of Pob!

Lastly, for all of those observing Yom Kippur, have an easy fast and a Gmar Chatima Tova!

Calming down?

Thank you all so much for your comments on my last few posts!!!

Things seem to be calming down around here. I hope. I got a good report from the social worker who was shocked to see real-live happy kids instead of Oliver Twist... She said that at most she would recommend greater flexibility with the visitation. I told her that I don't really mind, but that she should remember that he doesn't take advantage of the time he does have for visitation, so that giving him more seems a bit useless... At least this means there isn't going to be any sort of custody battle. I hope once we're able to tell the kids this whole thing is over (we will wait until after the judge's decision, hopefully next Monday) that they will feel much better.

Yesterday, when I was looking for good things to think about, I looked at my site stats and saw that in the past month FertilityStories.com has had over 21,500 unique visitors. Last year, in the same time period, there were 9300. Is there a doubling-time calculator for that ;-)?

I posted a message about the glucose challenge on a medical forum & the doctor there said he recommended repeating it at 28 weeks. I can live with that, although I admit that those last few sips really did make me want to vomit. I was lucky enough not to, because my guess is I would have had to start over. Mega-yuck!

We're still debating the amnio issue. My choice would probably be to skip it based on the three tests we did do - the NT which gave 1:975, the 16-week-scan that was normal, and the AFP which gave 1:1140. On the other hand, if it turns out that something is wrong, we have other children we need to care for. Basically, it seems that the risk of not doing the amnio is very small, but if we don't do amnio and there does turn out to be a very serious problem, it will have a significant impact on our entire family. It's confusing and it's time for us to make a decision. Our appointment is next Tuesday (the day after we go to court). I guess we can cancel it any time until Monday or so... Thoughts?

Oh and last, but probably most importantly GOOD LUCK to Karen whose c-section is scheduled for today!!!

Edit: I just wanted to mention that we did go for amnio with the last pregnancy (due to bad AFP results) and I documented the time in what I called my amnio blog - before I had a 'real' blog.

Gestational diabetes update

I got the results late last night. No diabetes! All of my values were well within normal range :-)

I'm only in week 18 now, so I am wondering whether I'll have to repeat the test, but for now that's good news - it means that I don't need to worry that too much sugar is getting to UI (short for Ubar Inbar - ubar in Hebrew means fetus). UI, by the way is what our (Ohad & my) field is often referred to - user interface...

The kids met with the social worker last night, but since they were at their dad's house both before & after (and while they're there, even when he's not home, their ability to talk on the phone intelligibly is severely limited) I don't know much about what went on there. (But I do know that I used 3 homonyms in the same sentence... Fortunately, I was always a good speller.)

I now understand that the social worker has serious problems expressing herself. What she meant to begin with was not that the children are neglected, but rather that we had neglected to seek professional help for them. It is hard to screw up this message in English, but even harder in Hebrew. I think she needs to see someone about this problem, especially if she's writing things for the court. If not, she's neglected. Ooops. I mean then she's neglected to get help for the problem she has. If I had been able to understand this last week, I would not have been nearly as stressed, especially considering the fact that even recently we took one of the kids to a professional (and told the social worker about it... I wonder if we should add amnesia to her list of problems).

BTW, I really did, as I told the social worker, lose 4 pounds over the long weekend that included 6 holiday meals. I started this pregnancy at 127. I now weigh 130 (I am, however, only 5'4").

In blogosphere news, I am keeping my fingers and toes crossed for Bea (AKA POF), who's having a less-than-optimal early pregnancy experience. I hope, pray and believe the next scan will bring a huge sigh of relief. Thalia is scheduled for a c-section on September 20th. I can't believe how excited I am for her! Karen (another woman with an unbelievably fabulous attitude) has made it to 32 weeks. She's in the hospital now, but everything's looking good. Even triplets has got to be easier than these past few months have been for her. Suz & Joe have now taken 3 of their quads home. Wow. And of course, good luck to Kirby who's having (what I consider to be) her first real appointment with an RE this week.

Now I really do feel better :-)

I stress

Some people can handle anything. I stress. Badly. It makes my stomach hurt, occupies my mind almost constantly and makes me unable to sleep.

It wasn't the fact that I got a notice on Wednesday afternoon that my AFP results were in and that I could "print them at the local clinic" (that was only going to be open on Sunday). It was actually the social worker who called me in on Monday to notify me that the school has reported that my children are 'neglected '(I won't elaborate, but some of the things were the exact complaints I'd reported to the social worker as issues I have with my ex, others were complete lies). She said the most recent report was in August (which I found strange, since vacation here is all of July & August). I came out of her office horrified. How on earth can I fight the school's lies? And if this is what the school thinks, why haven't I heard about it? The first thing I did (after I called my lawyer) was called the school counselor and made an appointment to meet with her. Of course the meeting was set for today (Sunday), which meant almost 6 days of intense stressing, including obsessive thoughts about how to try to explain to uncooperative people that some of the things they said are absolutely impossible... Every time I looked at the calendar (and it's on the front of the fridge) I felt sick to my stomach.

I don't easily decide that I like people, but I remembered that the last time I met the counselor I liked her, meaning she seemed like a reasonable person - making it even more difficult to understand how she would spread such lies. Ohad came with me to the meeting and there basically wasn't anything she said we didn't agree with. When we asked her about neglect issues and other specifics, she said she didn't recall any of them... Including the fact that there was no way she gave any report to social services in August because she was out of the country.

Back to the social worker. Oh. Oops. I read what your ex said and mistook it for information I got from the school... me (thinking): Oh. Oops, in the middle of a custody battle, it's not really that good to mix up an ex-husband's lies and reports from a school... Especially when you're the one reporting it to the mother and the court...

We may actually sleep tonight. Fortunately, I am so relieved that I don't even feel like killing her.

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AFP results - by age 1:153. Test 1:1140(!) I could not have hoped for better.

Tomorrow is the 100gr glucose challenge (the 3-hour-test). I had gestational diabetes with my last pregnancy & so I have a 60% chance of having it again this time. I'd trade the stress Ohad and I had over the holiday with 5 sugar-free months anytime.

Coming out of the closet...

Back in June I was already hoping that things would go well and the time would come when I'd be one of the ones with the news... and I tried to understand what the best way to say it was. I still came to the conclusion that there's no magic method, so here it is...

We're pregnant.

Having family members read my blog is an advantage, since that means at least 3 people read it. On the other hand, it meant that I had to be a little careful about what I wrote so that I could keep the surprise factor for them.

I started my 17th week and went for the AFP test today. Based on the results, we'll decide whether to keep the amnio appointment we have for Sept 25th. So far, the NT scan and the early scan were both good.

We still haven't found time to tell the kids...

Secondary Infertility - Random Thoughts

I've received a few stories about secondary infertility lately and those and blog posts I've read have caused me to think a lot about when you can really feel that infertility no longer effects you - when you can be truly happy at a pregnancy announcement or walk through a store full of baby clothes and just think, "Who could I buy this outfit for?"

At first, I thought that you can 'put infertility behind you' when you've had the magic number of children for you (and, obviously, for each couple this is a different number). After my twins were born (children 2 & 3) I was constantly "missing" #4. I couldn't get that 4th child out of my head no matter how hard I tried. I was truly longing for that baby, very nearly as much as I had longed for my first. True that I knew that my greatest fear of NEVER having a child was no longer relevant, but it didn't make it any easier to want that child so desperately and not be able to have it. So was 4 my magic number? Because of the changes I made in my life (divorce, remarriage) I will never know.

My current thought is that you can 'put infertility behind you' if you fulfil your 'fertility dreams'. Mine were particularly tricky 1)to just 'find out' I was pregnant (no two week wait) and 2) to wheel one baby in a stroller while being very pregnant with another. I am definitely one of the lucky ones, because I got both my wishes. And, of course, it worked, all the things that used to be hard for me aren't any more. I thank God for this often, very often.

What are your 'fertility dreams' and do you think fulfilling them will allow you to put infertility behind you?

Rijeka, Croatia here we come...

I've been catching up on the blogosphere and it seems lots of people have gotten good news. In fact, as I was clearing out my blogroll, I realized that many of the blogs have become pregnancy and even mommy blogs.

Now that my jetlag is almost over and I finished folding the laundry and washing the floor, I'm planning to wake up at 3:30 a.m. and head off with Lilach (one of my IVF-FET twins) to the airport, where we're taking a mommy-daughter trip to Croatia for a week. We plan to be in the Istrian peninsula, probably drive to Trieste (Italy), and then to Ljubljana (Slovenia) and to Bled (Slovenia). I also found out that you can take a day trip to Venice and, having never been there, it sounds really tempting. It's not even ridiculously expensive - for the two of us, it would be about 100 Euros. On another note - for some reason, I feel like camping. We're not taking any camping equipment with us or anything, but there are campgrounds where you can rent everything. I've never been one to enjoy camping, so I have no idea why I've suddenly got the camping bug. I hope we'll get a chance to camp at least one day... We didn't make any hotel reservations, so at worst, we'll sleep in the car (only kidding).

Anyway, before I go, I just wanted to wish Bea, my hero, a successful cycle with a fabulous beta. Bea - you've got the best attitude and you definitely deserve this!

Doing the jetlag thing

It's 5:37 in the morning and I wouldn't be up (probably) if it were not for the jetlag and for some weird nightmare a certain person I was sleeping next to had...

Yesterday I woke up bright and early and drove to the airport with my parents.

(boring flight story ahead)
I was lucky to have gotten back to Israel in time - all the flights out of Chicago Sunday night were delayed and the friendly people at the Delta check-in informed me that there was no way they could get me to Atlanta in time for my connection. At the last minute, I was able to switch flights to another flight that was running too late for me to get my connection... The stewardess actually asked all of the other passengers to remain seated so that the two other guys and I could zip off the plane as fast as possible. We RAN across the terminal, onto the train, off the train, down the halls & finally, really out of breath, reached the gate, where they greeted me with my name. I was literally in tears getting on the plane - knowing that if I missed this flight, it was a full 24 hours before I could get on the next one. It took me about half an hour to catch my breath, but I have never been happier to be on a plane before in my life (I have no fear of flying, I just hate it). Anyway, aside from the fact that there were a whole bunch of people waiting for me here, I knew that missing the flight would also mean missing the opportunity to greet Kirby & her husband.

Kirby's actually the first person I've met in person after reading her blog. I'm really looking forward to getting to know her.

I keep thinking about Thalia's comment about the BlogHer conference being all about "getting the brand out there" and it is so far from the reason that I or most other people were there. Some of the issues were technical (Did you know that you could use different rss feeds for different tags, for example? I didn't. Have you ever wondered how you could completely change the template without wrecking old posts or export your Blogger blog to WordPress?) Some had to do with handling comments (Do you delete negative comments? Do you turn off comments altogether?) Some had to do with handling multiple blogs on multiple topics (Do you have both a marketing blog and an infertility blog & how do you keep them separate and find time to update both? When is a blog considered dead & should you leave it up anyway?) And then there were others about monetizing your blog (How does it change what you write? Should you allow it to change what you write? In what ways are you obligated to your readers if you do product reviews?) and sessions about "From blog to book" - for women who want to get published - how to do it, what sells, etc. I went there to get ideas and hopefully, once the jetlag starts to wear off, I'll actually figure out if I did and what they are... In any case, I felt there was a lot to learn.
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Oh, weird. I just turned around and it's light out. And here I was thinking it was still night. I'd better go back and try to get some sleep. Today is going to be a long day...

Post #102

I can't believe I missed my own 100th post. Oh well...

Today is a fast day & the fast ends at 8:12 pm. My plane to Chicago (via Newark) takes off at 12:05 am & I'm supposed to be at the airport 3 hours before that... Between 8:12 and the time I leave the house I need to:

- eat
- cut Ohad's hair (no haircutting during the 3 weeks before Tisha B'Av)
- cut Matan's hair (same)
- take a shower (no showering on the day of Tisha B'av & no way I'm getting on a trans-atlantic flight without having showered in the past few hours.)

and probably a gazillion other things I've forgotten... Fortunately, we live a little less than 20 minutes from the airport. I hope I'll get there before 9:30...

My magnets, of course, didn't end up coming in on time. The guys at the printing place were trying to explain to me that it isn't such a big deal - they're only going to be a day late... Maybe someone else will be able to carry some of them for me and maybe not.

Let me just say thank you to my incredibly amazing and brave husband, Ohad (who never reads my blog) who is staying home with Abigail (2&4 months) and Nomi (1&4 months) just so that I can have a break...

I look forward to meeting some of you at BlogHer 2007!

Introducing me in 10 seconds...

The current task is to try to introduce myself in ten seconds or less... Here's my attempt:


I'm 38, married & a work-at-home mom. I've lived in Israel since I turned 16. I have more ideas than time & lots of dreams for the future.

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I started this blog as a platform to answer questions, discuss various infertility topics and present news and research. Sometimes (especially recently) I talk about my life. It's kind of tricky, because I write about infertility (of which I am a survivor) but I actually have a house full of kids (5, 3 conceived with the help of IVF).

I have really enjoyed becoming a part of the infertility blogosphere and as time goes by, more and more of the blogs I read have become mommy-blogs. I get teary-eyed just thinking about it.

Better late than never?

OK, so this was the week of the virtual world tour and it took me too long to get the pictures and then to transfer them to my computer. Here they are anyway...

On Tuesday, I drove to Hadassah Ein Kerem hospital in Jerusalem. This is where I had my first successful IVF.


We drove via Mevasseret, kind of the 'back roads' - closer & less traffic.

Here's Hadassah Ein Kerem (not to be confused with the other Hadassah hospital at Mount Scopus) up on the hill.

Getting closer...

The new Mother and Child Center. It's actually not that new anymore, but it wasn't around when I was doing IVF there.

The famous Chagall Synagogue (hiding behind the bus stop). We were kind of in a rush...

This is Hadas, my IVF baby that was 'made' and born at Hadassah Ein Kerem. (The similarity between her name & the name of the hospital is coincidental.)

Special thanks to Hadas who took all the pictures, except this last one :-)

Updates...

First of all, I promised more information - I'm going to be at BlogHer 2007 in Chicago next week. I'm hoping to start a discussion on the use of widgets to encourage reader participation in blogs, with the most successful of these that I've employed so far being the Yedda widget (you can see it on the right sidebar below). I haven't been in the US since April 1994, so it's been a while.

In order to be able to go, I needed to finalize Nomi's weaning. Nomi, as you may or may not remember, is almost 16-months-old and is allergic to just about everything (milk, eggs, sesame seeds, tree nuts, peanuts, and bananas), so nursing her was a safe solution. Except that some things really pass through the milk. For a few months I was completely off these things (great for weight loss), but as time went by, I ended up staying off eggs, nuts and peanuts and sesame seeds (which seem to give her the worst reaction). So since October, I've avoided them almost completely. Now that Nomi hasn't nursed for almost 4 days & there's no chance I'll put her back on, I can finally eat these again - so here's my question:



Back to infertility issues. I read all of Peggy Orenstein's article in Sunday's New York Times. I liked the article and thought it was written well. I recommend it to anyone who's considering using either sperm or egg donation.

Karen is now on bedrest after her cervix seems to have shortened. I hope her doctor will soon go back to talking about the planned c-section at 34 weeks.

Watson had a scare this week. Having been through the same (without the PGD), it makes me annoyed at the medical staff who passes on partial information without thinking of the implications. Fortunately, the doctor who did my scan gave me a lot more information before I went home.

Faith is also going through a scare. Weren't things easier before there were so many scans?

Sorry for only mentioning a few... I am just so swamped with work that needs to be done before the conference.

I must love order and chaos about the same...

For someone who claims to love order (me) I certainly live with a lot of chaos. I doubt this could be by chance... I have a tendency to leave things until the last minute (e.g., leave my house exactly 5 minutes before the doctor's appointment which is 4 minutes away), to count on miracles (fortunately, so far these miracles have been pretty cooperative), and to differentiate between what's important and what isn't in a way most people wouldn't approve of (e.g., leave the dishes in the sink until tomorrow morning, but put away the food five seconds after we finish eating, lest it instantaneously spoil.)

Today is a new record, even for me, I think... I have an exam in the university course I took this semester (Organizational Behavior) in an hour and 10 minutes and I didn't study for 1 second. It's a correspondence course from the Open University (the worst of about 20 courses I have taken, in terms of the staff responsible for the course) and I did enough of the assignments during the semester to be eligible to take the exam (3 out of 6). For some odd reason, I have way-too-much self confidence and a part of me actually believes I could pass this exam (um, yeah, right...) but the other (sane) part of me knows that if I fail, I have a few months to actually study the material and take a re-test. Since I'm not taking any summer courses (thank G-d) that might actually be possible. (I only once took a re-test and improved my grade by 28 points, so it does happen.)

Wish me luck. I *really* need it :-)

Edit: ** Surprisingly, the test was exactly what I expected. I am glad I didn't waste time studying. I even think I passed :-) **

Back on soy

Nomi can go back to eating soy products. This would theoretically be helpful... if 1) she didn't absolutely refuse to drink soy milk or eat any fake 'dairy' soy things, like pudding.... and 2) not all of the soy products contained egg (which is out).

In other, more exciting news, my sister named her baby yesterday. Her name is Kinneret Esther (they'll call her Kinneret). My sister & BIL had a tough job, because there are a lot of girls in the family and so far the cousins all have different names. I think even for someone who didn't have fertility issues, it must be hard to be having her first child when her siblings all have many...

OK. My house is officially too crazy for me to continue this post. Nomi must be traumatized by having been taken to the hospital again (just for an appointment, this time). She will not stop screaming.

Edit: A walk helped calm her down. Believe it or not, she's actually asleep now...

And a p.s. - this is what I actually do in true life... (or what I used to do, when I had a life ;-))

Haiku Meme

Kirby tagged me - here's the deal. You write a haiku to describe your IF/latest cycle/you name it. It can be deep and emotional, or snarky and bitchy, or just downright funny.

A haiku is a 17 syllable poem in three lines: the first and third lines have five syllables each, the second line has seven.

I chose to do my history...

Getting pregnant should
be easy at just 20
unless you're married

A year and longer
Counting down, late periods
Still no positive

I hate IUI
Catheter shoved deep inside
All my cycles failed

Gave up IUI
IVF sounds promising
Let's give it a go!

Cycle one torture
idiots sent for beta
a false positive

Cycle two one of
four embryos stuck around
now cute teenager

Cycles three and four
No plus beta for either
But some frosties left

Cycle five with four
frozen embryo transfer
I'm a mom of twins

Cycle six beta
29 is not so good
Blame hematoma

Not chemical but
13 long weeks 'til the end
Blame hematoma

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Kirby's are (mostly) hilarious, check them out!

Please leave a comment and consider yourself tagged :-)

Little sister in early labor - I hope

My sister started her 40th week today. Since the middle of the night she's been having contractions (it's about 1pm here now, so that's at least 9 hours). Her contractions are now 7 minutes apart and she's at my parent's house waiting to see what happens.

This is my only sister and this is her first :-)

I'll keep you posted...

***Edits***
5pm (local time): Contractions are getting longer and stronger - somewhere around 6 minutes apart. I am so excited that I periodically get all teary...

5:30pm: Contractions are 4 minutes apart and they're going to pick up Yaakov (the dad-to-be) and then to the hospital... I'm so excited I can't stop crying... I forgot to mention - they don't know if it's a boy or girl. I'm guessing girl...

8:55pm: At the hospital they said she was 2.5cm & 70% effaced. They kept her for a while and then sent her to take a walk for an hour. At 8, when she came back, she was at 4cm. Unfortunately, the hospital is swamped with women in labor, so they can't move her into a labor room until 2 more women give birth. She wants the epidural NOW!
Uh oh! 8:55... that means I have to go to a meeting (va'ad bayit - a meeting to do with the communal areas of our building)... yuck! At least I can take my cellphone & my mom can call to update in the middle.

11pm: About an hour ago she was at 5cm and in a lot of pain. She's still waiting for the epidural :-( Funny thing was I got to tell all my brothers that she's in labor...

at 11:55pm, Leah & Yaakov's princess was born :-)

If the baby fairy came...

And said you could have as many children as you want (all singletons...) how many would you choose to have?

On another note, I took Nomi to Jerusalem today to an allergy clinic. We knew she had tested positive for milk (split into 2 tests, both strong positives), egg (white & yolk), sesame seed (extremely allergic) and almond - but today she also tested positive for soy, banana, peanut and latex... She has been drinking soy milk for about a week, so it seems a bit strange that she's allergic. I hope the doctor will help explain this. Too bad I couldn't get another appointment until July 8th.

Edit: In answer to Sarah's question - the baby fairy would come with reasonable financial resources and disappear all TTC difficulties. It wouldn't eliminate normal pregnancy fears, but would eliminate chemical pregnancies and worrisome betas. Unfortunately, it couldn't bring back the lost time, but could ensure fertility until sometime in the early 40's. How's that?

I've been tagged!

Thank you to Projgen for tagging me...

Here are 8 arbitrary things about me:

1. I hate going to the hairdresser. I consider it to be about the same, torture-wise, as going to the dentist. It usually takes me a few years to recover after having my hair cut, which is why it is usually pretty long.

2. I went to 12 different schools in just 11 years because my father was in the US Army. The longest I spent at any school was 2 years (1st & 2nd grade and 8th & 9th grade). In 6th grade I went to 2 different schools, each for just half a school year.

3. I graduated from high school shortly after my 16th birthday, moved to Israel on my own and studied nursing at Hebrew University of Jerusalem (2 years into the degree, I dropped out because I realized that with the kind of nurse I wanted to be, it would be difficult to have a family. After that, I went to study graphic design and printing, which was much more fun).

4. I was frequently accused of being anorexic when I was a teenager. I was also told I looked like Brooke Shields many, many times. No one would say either of these things about me now (and no, I was never close to being anorexic and the feature I have in common with Brooke Shields is most likely my eyebrows...).

5. My childhood best friend got addicted to drugs, sat in jail and was unable to raise her son (he must be in his late teens by now). I still feel a loss at having lost her friendship and I always wonder if there is something that I could have done differently that would have prevented it from happening.

6. I have incredibly amazing stretch marks on my stomach. Most doctors gasp when they see them. It looks like my stomach was hit by a really violent earthquake. I am not sure any amount of airbrushing could fix it so that I could pose for Playboy…

7. I love logic problems and could spend hours doing them if I had the time. I also love organizing things, especially if I can find a place for everything. In theory, my house would be disgustingly neat. In practice, it isn't…

8. My husband and I worked in the same office for 4 years and did several projects together. We still consult with each other about almost every project either of us works on.

I tag:
Karen (who couldn't possibly have anything better to do with her time...)
Kirby
and anyone who's currently waiting for a test result of any kind.

22

A few 22's, just because I noticed...

22 - The number of years I've been in Israel, as of yesterday.

22 - The exact age I was when I discoved that what I was going through was really infertility (great birthday present, huh?)

22 - The combined age my (FET) twins will be tomorrow (happy birthday!)

22 - The number of children my 3 brothers and I have (my little sister started her 9th month today!)

22 - The number of school days left until vacation (I'm not sure whether this is a good or bad thing...)

Lastly, 22 - The number of minutes within which I will post a new blog entry to push this one down...

Shacking up & other news

I told my sister that I moved in with Ohad. She corrected me and said I'd 'shacked up' with him... She has the advantage of having lived in an English-speaking environment for far longer than I did. I, unfortunately, am stuck with the English of someone who left the US at 16 and decided to immerse herself in the new culture... language included. Anyway, back to the point... I finally decided that in order to get work done I needed to hire someone to care for Nomi some of the time. The allergist said it's too risky for her to be with other kids (she's allergic to milk, eggs, sesame seeds and almonds... so far), so it meant someone at home. My office, until yesterday, had been in the middle of the house - literally, a desk in between the kitchen and living room, with a view of most of the first floor of the house. Perfect for watching her crawl around while I check my spam email. I took over a corner of Ohad's (already scrunchy) office & now I can hide out here during those few hours a week when a babysitter comes to watch Nomi. Ohad and I have worked in the same office before & I'm actually finding it very nice. I would post a picture, but I don't think anyone would believe that my desk is the neat one (it is).

In other news, Mia sent in an update about her twins (born at 24 weeks) that will be posted later today (it's mostly good news, as she put it).

A good friend of mine who was misdiagnosed with PCOS and called me up one day to ask what a beta of 38 means (to which I answered - COME OVER & proceeded to give her peestick that showed a faint pink line) just started her 3rd trimester. In honor of that, I made her this shirt:

I'm going to have a designer draw a better version and put in on a t-shirt that people can buy (maybe at cafepress, if their site revives itself).

Congratulations to Adrienne Domasin, who is the first woman in the United States to have a baby born from IVF using both frozen egg and frozen sperm.

Last, but certainly not least, Bea has posted information about the next IIFF - International Infertility Film Festival.