ramblings

I'm back. I wasn't far, just not in posting distance. Well, I did post some comments, but that's about all I could manage. I am still trying to catch up with comments. Please forgive your slow little owl. 

This new schedule is a bit grueling. The Monday morning drives have so far been 2 for 2 brutal ones, where the 90 minute drive gets stretched to 2-2.5 hours. I'm hoping for the best for tomorrow, but who knows. Snow squalls have been relentless. Here's my typical morning routine. 6:15: wake up, drink water, rub eyes. 6:17: think about morning yoga practice. 6:20, walk to the front window of the guest house where I'm staying and assess the situation. 6:21: Holy moly! There's a ton of snow in the driveway! Screw yoga, I have to shovel this snow. 7:35: Back inside the house, sweaty and with mildly achy back. Yoga would be nice now, but I have to get to work!

The new job is going well. I like the people I work with and the team-based approach is something I really enjoy. It must be said that I had moments of feeling completely overwhelmed this week. The responsibilities I have on our team are not slim and my self-doubts were reminding me far too often that I wouldn't measure up. But my self-doubts haven't cornered the market on truth, so they can voice their opinions, but I don't have to buy what they're selling.

And Christmas. What? Is that really happening this year? I've been dreading it and now it's upon us and I haven't done a thing about it. I don't even have a present for Mr. August.

We got "the package" from the fertility clinic this week, making the egg donation all the more imminent and real. The price tag was a bit hard to see, even if I know how much it is and even if I know that it is far less than treatment in the US. It's just that I haven't worked for money since June and my husband is an organic farmer. You do the math. We can access more money, but it will require asking parents. I was hoping to avoid that situation with my new job, but it looks like they want the ivf paid in full by Feb. 2, which may not give me enough time to amass the sum of money needed and pay for my (hopefully last effing) tuition in January, rent at two places, and manage my current debt. Like many people, money worries make me a bit coockoo, but I don't need to go on about it here. Many of you are in the same boat, I suspect, because no matter where you live, fertility treatments ain't cheap and life doesn't stop because you're infertile and need to pay for treatments.

My quest to welcome visions of a pregnancy (my pregnancy) continues. I went out for brunch with a friend this morning and when she was asking about next year at this time, I said "well, I could be on mat leave". It's not something I would say to someone who doesn't know about our journey, but it was safe with her. I think about December 2011 and allow that this may be the month when we welcome our baby. I'm not entirely comfortable with it, but I'm going with the 'if you can't make it, fake it' principle on this one.

I've decided to let myself hope. If the egg donation fails, it will hurt like hell. But no amount of holding off on hope right now can prevent that pain. It will hurt either way: whether I hope for it now or stop myself from hoping. Yet it's hard to imagine it working if I don't allow for it in my mind and in my body.

 Funny how hope for a pregnancy and baby through egg donation has not taken away the pain of infertility. Not really any of the pain at all. What part of me thought it would, I wonder. I've had two most beloved friends call in the last 2 weeks to announce their pregnancy. I wish it weren't so painful, but it is. They were both stellar, amazing, sensitive and immensely compassionate in how they conveyed the news. Both of them cried because it hurt their feelings to hurt mine. It also broke my heart that their great news couldn't be shared in a more ebullient way. IF gets in the way of so much, and I just resent it for interfering.

It feels hard to reconcile these different stances and the conflict inside feels hard to manage. Hope, pain, hope, pain. Sometimes, in kind of a superstitious way, I start to fear that letting the pain have some space could negate my investment in hope.

Enough ramblings. I hope you have a great week before Christmas.