Watch this space!

Wow it's amazing how a couple of days can change everything.  3 days after I posted last I took an internet cheapie pregnancy test.  It was super early, around 7DPO and totally silly... but I got a 2nd line.  Extremely faint but it was there.  Over the next 4 days I got extremely faint lines and then on Saturday at around 11DPO I got a clear 2nd line on an FRER, followed by a darker one on Sunday.  On Monday I took a digital - Pregnant 1-2 weeks.

I cannot believe it!  I AM PREGNANT.  Around 4 weeks or so.  I am so thrilled but also extremely nervous.  I want this so badly and am determined to enjoy every minute!

Moving on

It's amazing how someone else's happy news can completely throw you and haunt you for days.  The last couple of weeks have been really tough.  Pregnancy announcements from a close friend, my sister in law and the latest, another friend who literally 2 weeks ago was berating the fact that she can't afford a 2nd child.  I try not to let them get to me but I just can't seem to help it.  I feel like I have been moved to the back of the queue and that my turn will never come.  I have just about given up all hope and am trying to move on.  We even booked a holiday for next August, which means we will have to stop TTC for a couple of months to ensure that I am not due over the holiday date or heavily pregnant.  It feels like we are completely going against the grain by stopping but life must go on.  It will be OK whatever happens.

Tough Times

Another day, another pregnancy announcement.  This time my sister in law.  Worse still her due date is 8 days off what mine would have been if I hadn't lost the 2nd one.

I've been struggling today.  Tearful and low.  Not myself at all.  I just wanted to stay in bed and forget everything but I made myself get up and go out.  I did feel better for it but still not at all right.

I am spending most of tomorrow with pregnant friends.  Not what I want to do at all but I also can't hide away at home.

I know things will get easier.  I know I will look back and it won't hurt as much as it does now.  That my experiences will make me stronger and make me appreciate what I have now and anything I may have in future but right now it fucking sucks...

Odd one out

4.5 years ago, 6 weeks before Rosie arrived I took a series of ante natal classes.  I still maintain that it was the best decision I ever made as the ladies I met on that course are some of my closest friends.
Rosie was the first baby to arrive, followed by the other 7 over the following month.  One family drifted away but the rest of us have remained close.

15 months after the babies were born, the second babies started to arrive, until there was just me and one other lady R, who had one child each.  R always maintained that she only wanted one child.  The others grew closer over their second rounds of maternity leave whilst I and R had to continue working.

I found out this evening that R is pregnant.  Not only that but she has been TTC for 2.5 years and this baby has finally been conceived via IUI.

I feel awful, completely selfishly so.  Firstly, I am now completely the odd one out.  She was the last one of all my friends to also only have one child.  Secondly, I have to watch yet another close friend go through pregnancy when I am still not pregnant.  Lastly, I now feel that I cannot justifiedly be upset that my journey has been so long, when hers has been so much longer.

I am happy for her, how can I not be when she has gotten what she has wanted for such a long time.  I wish she had shared her struggles with me and I am sad that she didn't feel she could - even after I had shared some of mine.

I am so selfish...

Letter to Snowdrop

Dear Snowdrop

Today is the 25th August, our 6th wedding anniversary, the day we should be meeting you.  I wish more than anything that we were.  That I would soon be holding you in my arms, kissing your beautiful face and breathing in that new baby smell.  Instead I have empty arms and an empty spot in my heart that will never be filled.  You weren't with me long my precious little one, but you will never leave me.  I love you more that words could ever say.

Yours forever
Mummy xxx

Fate and Fault

My last hope of being pregnant before August 25th, Snowdrop's due date, is gone.  12DPO and I have had 2 consecutive drops of BBT signalling AF is on the way.  I expect she'll arrive tomorrow starting off Cycle 12/Month 13.  I'm not upset I just feel kind of numb.  I really thought that this cycle would be it.  For the past 5 days or so I've had backache, cramping, tender breasts,  fatigue and most weirdly a strange metallic taste in my mouth.  Also I had this kind of thought that maybe fate would play a hand as if I had fallen pregnant this cycle I would have had the exact same due date that I had with my daughter.  I guess fate doesn't really exist.

Since Rosie was born just over 4 years ago I have not used any hormonal contraceptives.  I had the copper coil for a year but it made AF worse for me so I had it removed.  For the 1.5 years prior to TTC we practiced withdrawal (though I can't say we were very strict about it at all - fertile times/non-fertile times, we didn't pay any attention).  During that time 2 of my closest friends fell pregnant whilst only using the withdrawal method.  Yet here I am after 2.5 years of no contraception, 12 months of actively trying - using OPK's, charting BBT, logging every symptom and change - and still no pregnancy.  I have lost almost 40 lbs and am between 7-10 lbs lighter then when I conceived Rosie and still nothing.  I can't help but feel like I am to blame, what have I done?  What is keeping me from getting pregnant when everyone around me has managed without problem?  Am I being punished for something?  I don't know where to go from here or what the next step is.  

Lonely...

One of the hardest things about this whole journey is how alone I feel.  The crushing sense of disappointment when my chart dips or when AF arrives.  No one understands.  All of my friends have their second child already, several of them were surprises.  None of them had to really 'try'.  I know in the scheme of things 1 year isn't a long time but my life is changing and moving on.  I'm not the same person that I was a year ago and my life is quite different.  Rosie is older, knows her own mind and takes longer to adjust to things.  I won't give up, we've come too far but I wonder how long I can keep on trying.  I also wish someone understood how I feel...