Grow Cyst, Grow!

So that cyst I previously told you about is still around. Meaning I haven't ovulated yet. But that's ok, because I didn't think I did anyway. Well, after looking at it yesterday and seeing it was smaller, I was a little upset, thinking it was just re-absorbing into my body, and I wasn't going to ovulate this cycle :::my paranoid self:::. So today, I took another peek at my ovary, and now it's bigger - about 2.2cm in its greatest dimension. Yay - it's getting bigger! Which probably means I should be ovulating soon. Here is my lovely little cyst, which will hopefully release a tiny little egg, which will hopefully produce a beautiful little baby :::fingers crossed:::

So now I have a confession to make. I really had to pee today at work before I left to go home. Like, really had to pee. But I didn't want to waste the pee, given I didn't have an ovulation prediction test with me, and I have an hour and 15 minute drive home, and probably would have pissed myself if I hit a little bump in the road. SO, I "borrowed" a specimen cup from work, and peed in it so I could bring my pee home to dip an OPK in and test with that urine. I figured if I peed, and then went home and peed again, that second pee would have less LH in it. However, the best part of this story is as follows: So we already established that I really had to pee. Well, apparently I had to pee so bad, that I ended up overshooting the cup, and peed all over my hand and cup! Ugh! I guess I couldn't control how fast I peed. Needless to say, when

I finally got home and dipped the OPK, it was negative. BUT, the test line was darker than it had been in previous days although the test line was just slightly lighter than the control line. This means my LH is starting to go up, so I will test again in the morning to hopefully catch this surge. I don't want to wait another 24 hours to test again for fear of missing my surge. Granted, my last surge lasted 3 days; But I still don't know what my cycles are like, so I'd rather be safe than sorry. What a lovely less-than-positive OPK. Hopefully it will be positive tomorrow!

113 pounds of B!TCH

Ugh. Today was such a crappy day. I am in the worst mood every. And I guess I really don't know why. I am about 6 days past ovulation, so it's not O moodiness...And I shouldn't be getting AF (aunt flow) for another week and a half...That is unless we're pregnant this cycle. Which, by the way, I have some guilt about (I'll discuss later). I think my crankiness started this morning when I couldn't find a shirt I wanted to wear to work. Then the day was long, and heat was broken at work and it was like a sauna, and work was a little frustrating today. Some of the day, I just wanted to punch a wall; the rest of the day I wanted to cry. And when I got home, I wanted to punch Matt. Maybe because I'm cranky. Maybe because he wasn't home when I got home from work for me to vent to. Or maybe because he got nasty and yelled at me when I called him because the dogs were making noise coming out of their crate while he was trying to ask me a question. I yelled back by the way. Oh yea - the question he wanted to ask me? "Can you start my work clothes in the washer for me?" Yes, sure honey. Ugh. To top it off, I had to scan a patient today (boobie related - not OB related) who was 20 or so weeks pregnant. Great. Usually it doesn't bother me. But today it did for some reason. I miss being pregnant. I should have the start of a belly by now. I would be 14 weeks and 5 days right now. I know I shouldn't dwell on it, but I've been good lately. I just want to be pregnant again, and have our baby. I kind of want to cry now thinking about it.

So about feeling guilty. My mid-wife said for Matt and I to wait 2-3 cycles before we started trying again. Honestly, I don't know why so long. I know every doctor is different and every situation is different. But I was so early, and there was no sign of even a baby. My levels went to 0 in one week after my miscarriage because they weren't high to begin with. Maybe it was because we got pregnant right away the cycle following me coming off birth control? I don't know. Maybe it was for my emotional well-being; I was really devastated, and couldn't stop crying during that visit.

So I'm in the middle of my second cycle right now - O'd 6 days ago - so that means if I went by my MW, then Matt and I could start trying again after I get this cycles' AF. Right? Well, I think we went against that advice. Honestly, we ran out of condoms. Or at least we thought we did. It was an honest "mistake". I found 2 under the bed while collecting laundry. So we had sex without a condom. This was last week. Two days before ovulation. Oops. Thing is, my temps were so screwy in the beginning of the cycle, I figured to hell with it, I'm not O'ing this cycle. I guess I was wrong, because I started peeing on OPK's (ovulation prediction kits), and I got 3 positives in a row starting the day after we had sex. And then I had a 3cm cyst on my right ovary that ruptured sometime Wednesday night (day I O'd). So I'm pretty sure I O'd on that day. Although, FF (fertility friend) still hasn't given me CH's (cross hairs) yet for an O day, so I overrode it, and set my O date the CD26. So now, we have to wait for next week to pee on a stick to see if I am pregnant. Maybe that's why the moodiness? But it would be too early for moodiness, as I am only 6 days after ovulation. The little speck would just be nestling into my uterus.

The reason I feel guilty is that my MW said to wait 2-3 cycles (meaning 2-3 periods), and I've only had 1 period so far. Maybe I can make myself feel better by thinking, maybe she meant 2-3 months? In that case, I'd be golden. But in reality, I know she meant periods. But whatever makes me sleep at night, right? I would feel so bad and guilty if I did get pregnant, and I miscarried again because we didn't wait like we should have. But then again, plenty of people have had doctors tell them it's OK to try again after 1 period. Some doctors even say couples can try right after a miscarriage (assuming they will ovulate immediately following a miscarriage). I would also be so frustrated with myself, Matt and in general if we did have a miscarriage because we didn't wait long enough, and we had to wait even longer to try. I wonder if it was even worth it to not use a condom. I do hope I'm pregnant, but at the same time, I hope if I am that it's not being jeopardized because we were being selfish. I don't know. All I know is that things happen, and you can't change the past. You can only prepare for the future. Hopefully it's a future (very near future) with a healthy pregnancy, and not a future with another miscarriage caused by our lack of responsibility. :::fingers crossed:::

Getting There

So to continue the story about my mom, and the stress she gives me :) So I told my brother to call an ambulance because something was obviously wrong with mom. So he called one, and off to the hospital they took her. They ran a bunch of tests on her from a chest X-Ray (what's a hospital visit without one of those!), to testing several vials of blood, to a head CT. Now, they called a Code Orange on my mom (which I'm assuming is a neuro/stroke code), and actually removed a patient mid-scan from the CT to scan my mom. When my step-dad told me that, I knew it probably wasn't good. My first impression from talking to my mom prior was either a stroke or mini-stroke. Based on the hospitals actions, I was assuming they were thinking the same thing.

So it also took 3 techs and 7 pokes to my moms arms to get any blood for testing. They were checking everything from liver/kidney function to drug testing. Fortunately (or unfortunately, depending how you look at it) everything in the blood work was negative. And her head CT was also negative. WHAT?! Um, then why is mom like this?? So because they still didn't know what was going on, and even though she was starting to come to with NO memory of that entire afternoon what-so-ever, they admitted her. It was Sunday night around 11:30pm by the time they put her in a room. Oh yea, and she was on the Stroke Unit. Great.

So the next morning, I get up and do my usual thing - take my temperature, eat a little something, go to the gym, shower, and then head to work. I called a good friend/co-worker while I was on my way to work, to give her a heads up about the happenings of the night before, so she could forewarn our other co-worker/supervisor. So I show up at work, and my other co-worker looks at me, and says, "Why are you here?" I told her because my step-dad and Matt said to not go down, because they still don't know what's going on with mom, and I had just got back from Long Island "hours" before. She then asked me if I wanted to go back, and to that I started crying, saying that I'm scared, and yes I do want to be with my mom. With that, she then told me to "get out of here", and not to worry, the building will still be around when I get back. She told me to take off as much as I needed, and if it was the whole week (I was going BACK to LI on Thursday for my BF's wedding) that would be fine - it wouldn't be worth it to drive back on, say Wednesday, work a day, and then drive all the way back. So I did an about-face, punched out, and headed home (an hour and 15 minutes away) to pack for a week.

Ok, so longer story short, I drove to Long Island, and got there by around 4ish pm. I stayed with mom until about 8:30pm that night. She looked good, and was surprised to see me. Of course, she asked me "who told you I was here?", and I looked at her, a little nervous, and said, "Mom, when I talked to you at 7:00 this morning, I told you that I was the one who told Rob to call an ambulance." To that she said, "Oh yea, that's right. I remember now." :/ I then went on to jokingly ask her what her birthday was (Which I think is going to be a long-standing inside joke now). That day, they did an MRA, MRI, and echocardiogram. All of which were NEGATIVE. Huh?? What??? Negative? Well, then mom, you're not going anywhere until they find out what happened, and why you still can't remember anything from Sunday.

Lo and behold, they did have a reason. They called it Prednisone Psychosis. And after looking it up (I thought the doctor was pulling this out of her ass), it made sense - she had all the symptoms, which oddly enough, mimic a stroke. Mom has been on and off Prednisone for years for bad lungs and chronic pneumonia. She was just finishing up a tapered dose for pneumonia when this happened.

So, she didn't have a stroke or mini-stroke, and all of this was caused by a drug. One drug. Amazing. I'm just happy that mom is ok, and there was nothing seriously wrong with her. She was discharged on Tuesday with no restrictions, except to stay away from Prednisone. Thank God. So I stayed down for the rest of the week to help out with the kids, and when mom was feeling better and I knew she was ok, I transitioned over to wedding stuff. Which, by the way, the wedding was so beautiful, and so much fun. And I have a new favorite picture of Matt and I (above).

In other news, October is over - YAY!

And I started using OPK's (Ovulation Prediction Kits - pretty much a stick you pee on that tells you when you're about to ovulate), and got my first + OPK on CD 19, October 27. I also got a positive last night, and this morning right after I temped. Initially, after the first +OPK, I thought I wasn't going to ovulate this cycle because my temps were so weird, and didn't show any temp spike to go along with ovulation. But now, I have a temp spike, and 2 +OPK's. So I guess I'm going to O; just a little later than expected.