Progress!

I've been so busy catching up with my life that I haven't had a chance to learn Photoshop and post a longer review (with more photos!) of my trip to Yellowstone. I promise I'll get to that soon! In my defense, I don't generally function well on weeknights after work, then I had a really busy weekend: Mike and I had orchestra tickets on Friday, we had Carleton trivia on Saturday afternoon, we went snowshoeing on Saturday morning, my friend Dotty and I had dinner and a ballet (Giselle - my favorite!) on Saturday night, Mike and I cleaned the house on Sunday, my friends and I had mahjong on Sunday afternoon, then Mike and I watched the Oscars on Sunday night. Whew! Yes, I know those weren't all "necessities," but they certainly were fun enough to keep me away from blogging (and laundry, and returning emails, and paying bills, and the million other things on my post-vacation to-do list). Anyway, I just wanted to start off with an apology and let you, my loyal blog readers, know that I will post more Yellowstone stuff soon!

But the big news for today is that I finally got in to see my doctor! Not only did I manage to get there without getting into a car accident (yay!), I also got all of my questions answered - or at least got the process started toward answers!

First of all, she reassured me that I probably don't have Luteal Phase Defect (LPD) or Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS), which is good. She also thinks that I'm still ovulating, and she was really impressed with all the charts and data that I brought to my appointment. :) But she is concerned that I might have endometriosis (which was the primary problem I was suspecting). To figure this out, (1) I had a ton of blood drawn and (2) I'm scheduled for a hysterosalpingogram (HSG) in April. (Unfortunately we couldn't get it scheduled before then, since it involves coordinating the schedules of my Ob/gyn, the radiologist, the rad tech and my own menstrual cycle.) Basically, the HSG involves injecting some dye to make sure my fallopian tubes are open and not blocked/scarred/etc by any wandering endometrium (aka endometriosis).

I am very excited about these developments! I trust my doctor and feel really good about the steps we're taking, and I'm also feeling more at peace with the entire process. With that said, I still do have flashes of "Oh-my-gosh-what-if-this-works-and-I-do-get-pregnant-again-and-we-do-have-a-kid-and-it-turns-out-I'm-a-horrible-mom-and-I-end-up-regretting-that-we-ever-did-this" but luckily those moments tend to be pretty few and far between. I think my daily* mantra ("I am fertile. I am pregnant. I am happy and health. I am a mother.") has been helping.

*okay, maybe it's not daily, but I do repeat that mantra whenever I meditate (using the guided imagery from that Making Babies book), which I've been doing at least every couple days. And it does really seem to be helping to calm my mind!

I also want to mention that Mike is very much involved with this whole process. A couple of you have pointed out that I posted MY action plan, but never mentioned what he's up to. Mike is certainly taking steps to improve his health and we are definitely on the same page regarding our ultimate goal. But at the same time he's a bit more private than I am, and he asked me not to blurt out too much about his experiences with this process. But, rest assured, we are definitely a team in this effort.

So that's the exciting news for today! Probably no updates on this front for at least a couple months, but at least we're making some real progress now!