If only it were that easy. Right now this time in the middle of the night, when I should be sleeping, is the only time I have “to myself”.

I guess I kinda left you guys hanging, didn’t I? There are reasons I haven’t been writing. Not good ones, but reasons just the same. I will be filling in the blanks of the last 7 months. There is much to say.

I did spend the rest of my high risk pregnancy on bedrest, getting weekly hormone shots. But it worked! I went into labor on my due date (March 30) and our daughter Olivia Rose was born early the next morning.

We had a bit of a rough start – she had a “poor transition”, which basically means she didn’t start breathing the way she should have – and spent the first few hours of her life in the NICU. Then she came to our hospital room where we were all bathed in the light of the bilirubin glow for the next two days.

Then we went home. And life hasn’t been the same since.

I tried to get a better picture, but that’s the best I can do.  I’ve already decided to start using pregnancy brain as an excuse for everything.

That’s one of three positive tests I’ve taken over the last two days, from different brands.

My chart had very clear patterns this month, and I’m pretty confident July 8 or 9 was the date of conception.  Making my due date April 1st or 2nd.

Something tells me it’s likely to be April Fool’s Day.

PS. Yes, I know it’s really, really early to share such news, but now seems a silly time to stop sharing every step of the journey with all of you.  And there is absolutely no way I could keep my mouth shut until my 6 week appointment on August 3.

It won’t be today.

I don’t know whose bright idea it was to make the symptoms of PMS the exact same as early pregnancy, but I would like to kick them in the nuts.

I say nuts because I can only assume it was a man.

Every month I try to reason with Puppy.  (That’s the part of myself that gets overly exuberant about everything.)

Puppy: Look! Our temperature is way low today! Today’s 7-10 days after ovulation.  I think we’re pregnant!!!

Cathy: Or it means that we slept with the window open and we’re freezing.  See the goosebumps?

Puppy: Was that a twinge? It was! That was totally an implantation cramp!

Cathy: No, I think that’s from the wine and ramen noodles we had for “dinner” last night.

Puppy: You should stop drinking wine.  We’re totally pregnant.

Repeat above scene with each common early pregnancy PMS symptom:  fatigue to the point of stupidity, food cravings, bitchiness, crying at the drop of a hat, nausea, and sore boobies.

That’s what I found this morning when I logged onto Fertility Friend* to enter my temp and the first day of my period (click to enlarge it).  A “free VIP upgrade” that I didn’t want, for this very reason.  Because it gangs up with Puppy to convince me I’m pregnant, and then I’m outnumbered.   And really start to believe it.

It’s all Look at your good sex timing!** and Look – an implantation dip! and Holy crap you can take a test today!!!”

Except? Aunt Flo had already arrived bright and early this morning to piss in my Cheerios.

When I do enter my period into my chart, FF just starts the cycle over, like nothing happened.  The least it could do after getting my hopes up for weeks is give me some pasta, chocolate, and wine.  And some salt & vinegar potato chips.

See the thing is, I do get my hopes up.  Every month.  Even though common sense tells me not to.

And then I get disappointed and have a difficult day or two.  Days where I try to remember that this is happening to my husband, too.  I don’t know if I always do a very good job of that.

But even though it’s hard, I think I’d rather deal with the disappointment than stop getting my hopes up.  That feels too much like giving up.

* For the record, I have no beef with Fertility Friend and I’m going to continue to use the free, non-VIP service as soon as they’ll let me.  The fancy stuff just feeds my neuroses.  Of which I clearly have several.

** Also for the record, we did it more often than that. Way more often. I’m just lazy about things that are less fun than sex. Like data entry.

If you look at my about page or my various social media bios it sure looks like we’ve been actively trying for a long time with no baby, or even a fetus or embryo to show for it.  But we haven’t really been trying.

Confused yet?

We got married in November 2007 and spent at least the first year actively trying to not get me pregnant.  Which, incidentally is how I’ve conducted my entire sexual life.  I’ve never been in a situation with a previous partner where we thought it would be good for me to get knocked up, so we made sure it didn’t happen.  Which is why I’m always astounded that when I proudly respond “No” to the “Have you ever had an accidental pregnancy?” question I get a frown and a note in my chart instead of a high-five.  Pardon me for using birth control consistently and effectively.

When Jerrad and I decided we were ready to start a family, I scheduled an ob/gyn appointment that I had been putting off for years after being surgically treated for cervical cancer.

Because after being treated for cancer, putting off yearly check-ups is a really intelligent choice.  I got lucky in that I had the aggressive fast strain that almost always goes away entirely after one surgery, and every pap smear since has been normal.  I repeat… I got lucky.  Not following up with a doctor was so irresponsible of me.  I can’t say it enough.

Anyway.  At that appointment in the fall of 2008 my ob/gyn found lots of gunk in my uterus that started off a thoroughly blogged year of tests, D&C’s, and waiting to get into see a surgeon who could remove the fibroid garden in my uterus.  Throughout this time we were having plenty of unprotected sex, including several months of me taking my bbt, charting, peeing on ovulation predictor kits, and seducing my husband with announcements of my impending ovulation.

It was all for naught, because when we finally got to surgery time and could see the inside of my uterus (well, not me, I was asleep), it was obvious a pregnancy would never have happened.  The fibroids were taking up more than the available space in my uterus.  Seriously, once I figure out the scanner, I’m totally going to show you guys.

Since I do happen to be slightly over the age of 35, at my initial surgery consult, Dr. Specialist talked with us about the subject of fertility in general and where we would stood with treatment.  While I’m certainly not grateful to have had the fibroids, I am extremely grateful that it has given us a sort-of back door access to the knowledge and services of a specialist without the “trying for a year” most couples have to go through to even get a referral.

Like I said earlier, no one has said “infertile” to me, but I do know I have some challenges.  Almost a quarter of my cervix was removed during my previous surgery.  My mom and both of her sisters have lost pregnancies.  More than one.  Fibroids and polyps almost always grow back, so now the clock is ticking too.

But even so… another reason I think we’re luckier than some couples?  Infertility is never going to just come up out of the blue and bite us in the ass.  We’re prepared for it.  We’ve been talking about the possibility that I can’t produce an heir to the throne since before we got married.  He still chose to marry me knowing that my parts might not work.  That has to give us some sort of coping advantage.

During these discussions we talked about what we would do if I wasn’t getting pregnant.   I know some couples are fine with never having children or actively choose not to.  But, that’s not us.  We can’t think of anything more important than being parents.

We also talked about how we each felt about fertility treatment and adoption.  Fortunately, as in most things, we found we were much closer to agreement then disagreement on where our “lines” were.

This is where I hesitate to be specific, because I would never want anyone to feel like I was passing judgment on their choices.  I’m not… by any means.  I can only talk about what feels like the right thing for us, and what doesn’t feel like the right thing for us.

None of this has anything to do with the rules or dogma of my religion, but it does have to do with my spiritual beliefs about family and love and the birth of the soul and all this other deep shit I haven’t decided if I want to talk about here.

So, where we stand is this: if I can’t get pregnant from making love with my husband, we’re going to adopt.  We’re willing to do lots of things to help that along – surgeries, tests, maybe even some drugs to encourage ovulation.

That’s one reason why we’re going to go ahead and do a sperm analysis.  If there’s a problem, then we’ll know and it will help us make decisions about adoption more quickly.

It’s not just for the blog material.

Well, I suppose again isn’t exactly the right word, since all of our previous trying efforts were destined from the start to be futile on account of how there were a bunch of fibroids already taking up all of the room in there.

And no doubt confusing any sperm that dared enter. What the hell is this? The directions said to go straight up and to the left or right. Are we in a forest? A hedge maze?

On account of my advanced age, if I haven’t conceived within six months, we’ll look at some next steps, like checking my tubes for blockages.

So… remember when I said I was going to do this detailed post about my appointments with Dr. Specialist and the hysteroscopic myomectomy, and scan the surgery pictures and make it all fancy like?

Yeah, I’m not.  Knowing me, if I haven’t it written it by now, chances are I’ll never get around to it.  I’ll give you the short version so we can all move on.

The short version is that he’s a fantastic doctor who obviously knows his stuff and is good at what he does.  I also happen to really like him and think he’s funny.  If you’re going to talk about your sex life and your husband’s sperm count with someone who has an ultrasound thingie up your hooha, it’s a real bonus if you happen to get along with them, too.

Oh yeah,  the other thing we’re just going to go ahead and take care of soon is Jerrad’s sperm analysis.  And yes, I have obtained permission to write about certain aspects of it.

What I learned at yesterday’s appointment was that the surgery was successful, and the wall of my uterus looks good.  A slight bit of bad news is that I still have two somewhat sizable fibroids in there, but they aren’t in a position likely to interfere with conception or pregnancy.

He was also able to tell that I had successfully ovulated from my right ovary recently (yesterday was day 20 of my cycle).  It looked all cute and kidney bean shaped and there was a super pretty corpus luteum.

Then we looked at my left ovary.  It looked like a kidney bean being eaten by a tiny football.  As he looked more closely at the cyst, he pointed out some layers and swirly things that led him to believe it was a dermoid cyst.

Yes, that’s a cyst made up of hair, teeth, eyes, bone, cartilage, etc.  Attached to my left ovary.  Awesome.

At this point he’s recommending we leave it alone.  My ovary could still be working, and there’s a risk of causing damage if we remove the cyst now.  These types of cysts are almost always benign, and the chance of it bursting is fairly small.

Although I was initially pretty irritated that my follow-up appointment got pushed back so far, the timing turned out to be perfect.  Now we know for sure I’ve got a good working ovary, and we know which month the good one is up to bat.  We’ll still try just as hard on the “off” months, but my expectations will be adjusted a bit.

I think it’s safe to assume we missed the boat this month, but next month, it’s ON.

Who knew constipation and iron liked each other so much?

For the record, I’ve been taking the iron for almost two weeks now and things are moving along quite nicely.

When my surgery was scheduled I had all these plans of getting my posts about the doctor’s visits and my surgery up quickly and in chronological order.

I even have some super gross totally awesome before, during and after pictures of the inside of my uterus for your enjoyment.

But then, I actually had the surgery, and getting well thought out posts up quickly wasn’t so high on the agenda anymore.  While I was recovering, the anemia won the battle for my attention.

My initial consultation with the surgeon was on February 1, and I told him about some of my symptoms – night sweats, nausea, extreme fatigue – because I figured they might be hormonal or at the very least related to the fibroids.

He pointed out that I was really pale, and that my skin seemed sort of… yellow.  Awesome.

All signs of anemia, he said, which made sense seeing as how I was bleeding like a stuck pig every month, and had been for quite some time. He ordered some bloodwork to check my iron levels and some other thyroid-y thing.

At my next appointment, a few days before the surgery, he told me I was definitely anemic, and that my iron stores were 3 (or maybe it was 4?).  I didn’t give it much thought then, seeing as how the other part of our discussion was about how he would be cutting fibroids out of my uterus with some sort of lightening rod and then burning the skin that was left with a hot poker.  Or something like that.  I was a little nervous, so I might have gotten some of the particulars wrong.

Anyway, Jerrad had been googling things about my various conditions, and he was the one that found that symptom list I included in the last post. That is when everything clicked. Realizing that some of the symptoms I was the most worried about (mental confusion, nausea and vomiting, listlessness) were on that, or other, list(s) made me feel so much better. An answer! With a solution!

It doesn’t mean anemia is my only problem now.  I still have IBS, my uterus still lacks a significant amount of awesomeness,  and I’m still a neurotic nut job.

But. I learned that one of the things anemia does is take the problems, issues, and tendencies your body already has and make them worse.  Add to that the fact that no part of your body is ever functioning with the appropriate amount of oxygen, and it’s easy to see how you can start feeling like shit.  Quickly.

I can’t even describe the exhaustion.  It feels like you haven’t slept for days.  Like there are weights on your arms and legs.  Like you’re moving through water instead of air.

Four years ago, I woke up every day at 4:45 am to exercise for an hour and a half, then I went to work for 8-10 hours as an intake worker for child welfare.  A job that uses quite a bit of emotional and mental energy, not to mention requires multitasking skills.  I had hobbies, I read at least a book a week, I maintained friendships, and started a relationship with my husband.

Now? I don’t even know that bitch anymore.

I fall apart if I have more than two or three things I have to do in a day.

I’m like a toddler – you can’t give me a task to do that has more than two parts or I see something shiny and forget what I was doing.

Despite having all the time in the world, I can’t seem to accomplish anything of significance in a day.

I have bouts of nausea that last two or three days at a time.  Where I throw up literally every single thing I eat and drink.  Then it just… goes away.  As randomly as it showed up.  I’ve been calling these IBS flare-ups because I don’t know what else to call them.  Even though they’re nothing like flare-ups I’ve had in the past.

Although I make jokes about being lazy, the feelings of listlessness I’ve been having were pretty scary, too.  I didn’t understand where they were coming from.  I didn’t understand where my personality went.  I knew that I felt content and happy and not depressed, but at the same time things were just… blah.   It’s hard to find the right words to explain it.

But when you think about it, I got a pretty good anemia deal compared to some.  Others have more dangerous symptoms, or have consequences and reactions to things because they don’t even know they have anemia.

Others get more disturbing interesting pica symptoms like craving dirt or paint chips.

I haven’t gotten any of that, but I do notice that I crave foods with iron, like beef and spinach.

And? This one time I was cooking a burger and when the blood started oozing up through the patty I had the strangest urge to lick it.  Then I started literally drooling.  Like one of Pavlov’s dogs.

And no, I didn’t actually lick the burger. Gross! Although it did make me think about how it was a good thing I wasn’t a vampire.

Which is a shame because vampires are sort of awesome and they probably hardly ever get anemia.  Not pale, scrawny, sparkly virgin vampires that need to take a shower and wash their hair, but sexy vampires.   Like Mitchell from Being Human.

Yummy.

Do you watch Being Human? You should start now, because SyFy is going to do some crappy American remake.  That I’ll piss and moan about like a snobby purist and end up watching anyway.

I tend to do this when Aunt Flo is in town.  I curl up on the couch with my heating pad, abuse ibuprofen, pass clots the size of nickels, and wish I was dead.  Jerrad only gets close enough to hand me food, chocolate and booze.  Really, it’s just safer for all involved.

This month it was a little bit easier.  Long story short – only because I will blog in detail after my surgery -things did eventually start happening after my last post, and I’m scheduled for surgery in the morning.  Knowing that this was likely my last extra-shitty period made it easier to bear.

Well that and the morphine.  I have to say, I’m a big fan.  I’m not taking a very big dose, so it’s not like I’m sleeping all the time or drooling on myself.  It’s just enough that I’m relaxed and that being in pain just doesn’t seem like that big of a deal.

Ok, so I might be hallucinating and seeing pretty colors, but I’m pretty sure that’s because I’m still not sleeping.  I’m just going to hope that works itself out as some of these other things work themselves out.

I’m assuming surgery, even something relatively minor like this, will put me out of commission for a bit, so don’t be surprised if I crawl back under my rock for another week or so.  I plan to lay on the couch, make out with my morphine, and continue marathon-watching my latest sci-fi obsession, Farscape.

Once again, the answer should be no surprise.  I’ve been unpacking and organizing, all while dealing with a moderate IBS flare-up. Which is kind of why I haven’t written – I’ve had things to say but not the time or energy or good humor to organize my thoughts properly.

I’m not saying I have time, energy or good humor right now, but I do have a great desire to procrastinate on doing something I don’t want to do.

So, what I don’t feel like doing is filling out the 80 billion page questionnaire that I need to mail back to the doctor so I can have my fibroid/polyp removal surgery consult scheduled.  I think I’m just having one of those moments where I’m simply SO tired of not feeling well.  I don’t want to think about this stuff, let alone answer detailed questions about it.

No.  You know what? It’s much more than that.  And I think I started to realize it yesterday when I started working on the form.

The first few pages were easy – name, address, insurance info.  Then it gets into reason for referral, current symptoms, and medical history.  Besides the fact that emotionally I didn’t want to think about it, logistically it was kind of tricky, because I’ve had lots of tests and procedures and minor surgeries over the last few years and my files are umm, around here somewhere.

It’s important that this form is accurate because the doctor reviews it before we meet so we can make the best use of our time at the appointment, so I was trying to at least get some sort of  timeline on another piece of paper so I didn’t leave out anything.  (OCD, much?)

Since I was going mostly from memory, I was kind of marking time in my head based on what job I was doing at the time.  I started the timeline back at my first abnormal pap in early 2000 when I was still living in Arizona and working for child welfare, through those first years when they were just doing a pap every six months, through when it decided it wanted to be cervical cancer after all and I had my first real get-put-to-sleep surgery in 2004, through when I was finally diagnosed with IBS in 2005, up to where we are today.

Seeing it all down on paper was insightful to say the least.

So, have I built it up enough? Are you ready to hear the exciting emotional breakthrough that I’ve had?

I have chronic medical conditions that affect my functioning and my ability to work.

Anticlimactic, no? Are you all sitting there saying, umm, how are you just now figuring this out, dumbass?  Especially since I wrote that fairly detailed post right after I quit about how hard it was to accept that I couldn’t do the detention job anymore because of my symptoms being so bad?

But see, that was just one example.  As I compared my work timeline to my medical history timeline, I realized that every job I ever quit was directly related to my medical problems.   Every one.

In 2000 was the first time my stomach problems got bad enough for me to seek treatment.  I was introduced by a mutual friend to a wonderful, wonderful woman who was a homeopath and a spiritual healer.   One of the many things she was amazing at was getting me to realize that it was ok to take care of myself first instead of last or not at all, so that I’m even capable of being there for other people. A lesson I periodically forget.

It didn’t take much to get me to realize that what I needed to do to not only manage my symptoms but maybe even heal a little was to not work a job that took so much time (50 hour work weeks anyone?) and emotional energy.  I quit child welfare and actually started working with her and studying homeopathy.

Also? She’s the first person who told me I was a writer.  Very matter of factly, like I would just realize it some day.

I haven’t yet, but it would be swell if she was right.  Or is it “were right”? See? No idea what I’m doing here.

I moved here and we eventually lost touch.  All my fault, by the way.

Anyway, despite having told myself I was done with social work I ended up getting a job as a mental health specialist in 2001.  I frakking loved that job.  Loved it. It had the perfect balance of being able to help and make a difference and do what I was good at and all that other good stuff, without being too emotionally draining.

Sure, I still had symptoms but I was managing them.  Then my paps got all scary and I had to have surgery.

The bad thing, it was the only bad thing, but it was a very big bad thing for me was that we were contracted through the state.  How to say this nicely? States have budget issues, and when they do guess what’s the first to go? Mental health services.

So I had a big expensive surgery after my hours had been cut and changes had been made to my insurance.  When all was said and done I had a $2000 medical bill and less money coming in to pay it.  It became impossible for me to live on what I was making, and although I didn’t want to, I had to find something else.

I applied and was hired with child welfare here.  Not only had I not learned my lesson, I decided to take the stress up several notches by doing intake instead of ongoing.  I’ve written about my emotional reasons for quitting this job before, but it was during this time that I was finally, after lots of testing, diagnosed with IBS.  One suggestion made by my PCP was finding a less stressful, time-consuming, and emotionally draining job.

Did I listen to him right away? Or course not! That’s how I roll.  I waited until I was basically completing falling apart physically and emotionally, then I quit.

By this time Jerrad and I had been dating about 6 months or so and let’s just say he was more than happy that I was no longer going to be doing a stressful, time-consuming, and let’s not sugarcoat it, sometimes dangerous job.

I went to work as secretary at my parish, completely convinced I was done with social work. Done!

My readers that have been around since the myspace days might remember the Parish Place blogs.  I won’t repost them here (yet) because I don’t have the privacy controls I had with myspace, but suffice it to say that shit was way more stressful than it needed to be.

While I was dealing with all that craziness, I was also trying to do all the things I needed to do to manage my IBS symptoms, on top of wondering why my periods were so heavy and I was in so much pain.

By this time, Jerrad and I were married.  We knew we preferred for me to be a stay at home mom, so at that point I was just trying to just suck it up and handle that job until I got knocked up.  Sadly, those stupid fibroids and polyps were already taking up all the available space in my uterus, unbeknownst to me.

Then the most awesome thing ever happened.  That mental health specialist job I loved so much? Was open again.  And it was still part-time.  And it was at my old branch with all my old peeps.  And the insurance didn’t matter anymore because I had an employed husband.

This was perfect, this was right, and I’d never been more sure that I was absolutely doing the right thing by going back to that job.

I settled into my old cubicle, renewed friendships, started new ones and was flooded with emotional support when I was diagnosed with the polyps and fibroids and had my first hysterosonogram and D & C.

Remember what I said about the state and budget cuts and mental health? Umm, yeah, I got laid off less than 6 weeks after I started.

By the way, God? I do not appreciate your sense of humor.

Then what followed was 7 months of looking for work while not-so-secretly hoping I would conceive before I found something.  Which didn’t happen because, again, those damn polyps just grew back, and oh by the way I have a bunch of new fibroids too.  I think the nice lady who sticks the giant camera in my hooha counted 7 or 8 at my last hysterosonogram.

I know I wrote a post when I got hired at detention about my reservations about accepting the job, but I’m too lazy to go look for the link.

I knew going into that job that it would be a struggle doing shift work given that I need to do certain things to manage my IBS symptoms, not the least of which is to be allowed to at least drink water during my shift, eat foods that I don’t have an intolerance for, and go to the bathroom when I please, not just during my 15 minute break.

There were also lots of scheduling issues with this job that I won’t even get into because it doesn’t matter anymore.  But it just seemed like whenever I could manage to get more than one shift in a row, it was always during my period.  I only worked there 3 months! What are the odds of that?

My periods are intensely painful.  And by painful, I mean cramps, excessive bleeding, and just.. pain.  I can’t explain it well, but everything hurts when I have my period.  Every single inch of all my ladyparts hurts, my cervix throbs because all that garbage is flowing over scar tissue and has less of an opening to get through.  Did I mention I lost about 1/5 to 1/4 of my cervix to the cervical cancer surgery?

Since I apparently can’t learn things without being slapped in the face with something obvious like a medical crisis, I got one of those.  And it was so bad and so painful that I had to quit that same day.  Fortunately it was a training day, but still.  It’s not the way I wanted to go out.

And like I mentioned before, my departure clearly wasn’t taken well – or possibly some didn’t believe my reasons, but I need to let go of that – since no one that I worked with (or for) responded in any way to my leaving.

It’s this last job quit that’s been the hardest.  It’s the incident that has, in fact, after all these years, gotten me to realize that I’m sick.

I’m sick.

I’m sick in such a way that sometimes, even when I eat everything right, and work out and manage my stress, I’m going to be knocked completely on my ass with a painful IBS flare-up.  For no particular reason at all.  Because that’s how IBS rolls.

And after my surgery? The fibroids and polyps are going to grow back.  That’s already been established.  Twice.

The acceptance part is tricky.  Very tricky.

I don’t like feeling weak.

I don’t like that most of this is out of my control.

I don’t like that most people don’t get how bad I really feel most of the time because I look healthy.

And I’m very, very good at pretending things are ok when they’re not.

When last we spoke, Jerrad and I were trying to sort out where we wanted to move.  We’re still trying to sort that out, but some recent events have made some of the answers much clearer.  Although not exactly in the way that I would have liked.

I quit my job last Friday.  It was a very abrupt, but necessary decision.  I decided to just sum it up for you guys like I summed it up in an email to one of my friends:

It’s mostly more of the same – IBS, chronic fatigue, and all the shit growing in my uterus. I was in so much pain when I woke up on Friday that I knew not only could I not go in, I can’t do that kind of shift work at all anymore.

And my girly parts problems are just getting worse and more painful, and I know I’m going to need two different kinds of surgeries. And in October is when we’ve been trying for a year, so then I’ll be infertile, all official-like. Which obviously sucks.

I think I’m overall just really fucking pissed and sad that I have health problems that affect my functioning this much. I just want to be able to do what I used to do. Plus all this crap means I can never, ever let my health insurance lapse.

Which brings me to the next point, which is that now we can’t just pick up and move. We *have* to do it so that he has a job – with benefits – before we can even think about moving.

So, is everybody all caught up now? Basically, I’m “officially” infertile,  my intestines are trying to kill me from the inside out and trolls are now executing their well-planned hostile takeover of my uterus.  Apparently the only treatment for these sorts of trolls is to have yet more sharp pokey metal objects inserted into my girly-parts.  And this troll execution service is insanely expensive and requires me to keep this thing called health insurance.

Do you know what has become my new least favorite phrase?  “pre-existing conditions”  This little phrase means that I can’t be without health insurance ever again in my life.

I’ve spent the last almost week feeling sad, mad, frustrated and helpless.  As has my husband I’m sure.  It can’t be easy to watch your wife be sick and know you can’t make it go away.

I’m really sad about quitting the job, too.  Stop laughing!  I’m totally serious.  Some of you might remember that I had a few concerns about taking the job in the first place because I was worried the shift work wouldn’t fit so well with my health problems, and sure enough I was right.

But aside from that, I really liked the work.  I liked the facility, the kids, my coworkers, the way they ran the program, and being just an on-call helped me detach enough to do (what I hoped was) a good job and then be able to go home and not stress.  In many ways, it was a perfect job.

I’ll stop with that topic for now, because I suspect my feelings about my work future could take up an entire post on their own.  I will say one more slightly emo thing, then I’ll move on.  I realize that quitting the way I did caused an inconvenience, and if there was any way to avoid that, I would have.  But in the numerous messages I left and in the resignation I sent in writing, I made it clear that I was quitting due to a medical crisis and how I wish circumstances had been different because I enjoyed the job so much.

Not one person from there has called or responded to see if I’m alright.  Not one.  (Except for one coworker who’s a facebook friend).  Even though in my messages I could barely be professional because I was in so much pain and so upset.  I suppose I should take that as a good sign, right? My loss wasn’t even noticed, so they must be managing the schedule just fine with one less on-call.  And I should take it as a sign that moving on was the right thing.

Speaking of signs.  Lots of people are reminding me to pray, which I appreciate, but trust me, I have been.  I’m Catholic, so we got that shit down pretty good.  I’m saying rosaries and everything.  AND I’m even doing it all “right”.  Like instead of begging God to just get me the fuck up out of here please before I kill someone, I’m praying for guidance.

What I would prefer to have happen is like to maybe have a nice dream about Jesus where we’re like walking in a field or something and he’s all, “so, this is what’s up” and he tells me exactly what we’re supposed to do.  Also, if he wanted to heal me, I would be totally cool with that.

In all seriousness, we did get the answers we need to figure out the first part of the plan.  The fact that I can’t be without health insurance, and we aren’t about to drain our savings on COBRA payments, means he finds a job, then we move wherever it is that he finds that  job.  As he’s been looking at what’s out there, it’s confirmed a suspicion he already had that if he takes a few months to earn some certifications and try to take on new projects at work, not only will he be more employable, but likely to land a better job with a bigger salary in our new city.

Also, I kind of like the troll execution service I already have, and I wouldn’t mind letting them finish the job.  It could take anywhere from 3-4 months.  Incidentally, that’s about the amount of time it will likely take Jerrad to get his certifications.

And.  Since I can’t work right now, it seems to be as good a time as any to start practicing being  a one-income family.  A spreadsheet fueled budget discussion has determined we can do this as renters in this area. Homeowners, no way.  Renters, yes.

One last point.  Have I mentioned enough in past blogs how much I hate and despise the house we live in? Besides being impossibly tiny and not having a dishwasher, it has so many other issues that if I list them all I’ll start twitching.  Did I mention they recently raised our rent?

A quick internet search has revealed that we can find a bigger, nicer place in this area for the same or less than we are paying now.  The money we’ll pay in deposits will be evened out by the fact that we won’t pay $300 a month in electric bills to freeze our asses off this winter because the insulation in this house is so bad. And there are plenty of month-to-month and 6 month leases available.  I refuse to sign a one year lease.  Like, stomped my foot refused.  Not that he seriously suggested that.

So, to sum up the revised plan.  We are moving into a new place here before October 1.  While here we will have trolls removed and he’ll study for his test thingies.  We can start the first culling of our many belongings so we have less to move to our new city.  And I plan on spending at least the first week making out with the dishwasher.

This health crisis forced us to look at things in a new way, and that’s good.  Although the revised plan isn’t ideally what I wanted, I know it’s the right thing because I feel at peace and happy with the decision.

After a 6 month “vacation” I’ve returned to the world of the gainfully employed, and let me tell you, the adjustment has been painful. Painful.

I mean, it’s not like I’ve never done this before. I’ve always worked – I got my first job when I was 14 – except for a few weeks here and there when I was between jobs. But these past 6 months have given me a taste of what it’s like to be a stay at home wife, and I have to say, I really liked it.

And not just because having all that free time is totally sweet. Believe me, it is.

But also because I had so much time to spend with my family. Maybe I’m some sort of 50s housewife deep down, but I loved being home to make my husband lunch, cook a fabulous dinner, keep the house clean, the laundry done, and the fridge stocked. I mean, seriously, the only thing missing was me meeting him at the door with a martini and his slippers.

Not only that, I had plenty of time to work out, read blogs and magazines and smutty fanfic, and stay on top of all the details involved in running a household.

If I got insomnia, it didn’t really matter because I didn’t have anywhere to be anyway.

I had the freedom to pee on my ovulation sticks in the privacy of my own bathroom instead of trying to do it on a break.

I was home and available for nooners should said ovulation test be positive, in which case it’s important to have sex like rightnow. Because when you’ve been trying to conceive for 7 months, and even though you’ve already had sex like 5 times in the last 3 days, missing that one potential opportunity to make a baby feels like the end of the world.

If I felt an IBS flare-up coming on, I had the ability to adjust my diet, exercise schedule, and meal routine any way I needed to manage my symptoms.

Unfortunately, I don’t have that ability right now, which resulted in me being sick as a dog last week, and missing two shifts on my brand new job. Awesome.

Anyway. I realize things just feel crappy now because it’s an adjustment, and also because training actually requires more out of me than when I actually go on the schedule for reals. I just need to get through the next week and a half or so, and figure out a way to keep as much of my symptom management routine going as possible.

But, I’m on the mend and not at all totally prepared to work 6 am – 2 pm the next 4 days. Yes, that said 6 am. As in starting my shift at 6 am. As in leaving my house at 5:30 am.

Sweet Jesus.