A Cinderella IF

Do you remember that part in Cinderella when the heroine of the story wants to go to the ball?  The evil stepmother says of course she can go to the ball, IF she gets all of her work done.

In other words, keep on wishing Cinderella ‘cause life has to get a whole lot more difficult before it is going to get any better.

I feel like I was given a Cinderella IF this weekend. We had an ultrasound on Friday afternoon that showed images that shocked even my expert doctors. Apparently the medication worked too well and, while I don’t really want to get into all of the personal details, they are changing their course of action so that I don’t end up with a dozen children and my own reality TV show.

That leaves us with two options.

• Option 1: We go on birth control and not try to get pregnant this month. All of the medication, money, and self-injections considered a failure.
• Option 2: We make an abrupt detour in another direction and begin in-vitro fertilization (IVF) treatments.

We decided to try the IVF. If it didn’t work than we were in the same place we would be at the end of option 1 and at least we could say we had tried everything. Right?

Well, tonight I am wondering if I am crazy. Today I heard the word “if” at least a million times. And it turns out that IF all of those ifs pan out then maybe we will end up with a baby. If my hormone levels are at the right place tomorrow, and if they can find the medication that they need (which they don’t have), and if I can get the days off from work, and if all the sciencey stuff works…. if, if, if, if, if.  Who knew such a small word would make such a big impact on my day?

This is my first round of IVF. I have heard of women who go through this for months and months.  I wanted to give up after 24 hours.  How do they handle the stress? My hat is off to you ladies. If this doesn’t work this month, I may start filling out adoption papers.

A Big Sigh of Relief

Phew!!!

Everything is going to be fine. It always is, really. I work myself up into a tizzy worrying about things that are completely out of my control. I need to learn to sit back, take a deep breathe and a long sip on a Coca-Cola and say, "What can I do to make this situation better?" If the answer is nothing, then so be it.

I have been able to schedule in all of the appointments that I needed and the pharmacy came through as promised. The medications may or may not work, but again, that is out of my control. I am going to sit back, relax, and enjoy my Halloween evening.

As a side note, if you or someone that you know is looking for some inspirational reading about infertility I recommend this blog: http://blog.freedomfertility.com

Have a wonderful day!

The Stresses of Infertility

First off, I kind of want to apologize for my last post on infertility. Obviously I was a little emotional when I wrote it – otherwise I would have never accused people of “not understanding”. Lots of people have expressed sympathy and kindness. Thank you.

Also, I can’t believe how many people have contacted me about their infertility issues or the infertility of family members since I last posted about infertility. And, really, if you have a sister or a cousin or a close friend with infertility, you really are almost as heart broken as they are. And it is much, much more common than one might realize.

Anyway, today I’m going to talk about how stressful infertility can be. This weekend was one of the most stressful EVER!

Why can’t life just be easy?  Why must there always be another challenge?  It doesn’t seem fair. I mean, I get past one problem just to run into another one. Why?!?!

Can you tell that I am frustrated? But I should probably start with some back ground information.  I am seeing the doctors at the Idaho Center for Reproductive Medicine in Boise, but because of the distance and time involved in getting to Boise I have my appointments here in Twin Falls. The technicians here e-mail the test results etc. to Boise and then we consult over the phone. Supposedly it is “easier”. Also, the very, very expensive medication that I have been taking is “time-sensitive”. I’ll explain as I go along.

On Friday I had an appointment in Twin Falls at 12:30.  When I called Boise at 3:30 to consult with them I ended up in a several hour game of phone tag full of miscommunications and anxiety.

• I called the Boise clinic and they prescribed more medicine,
• then I had to call a pharmacy on the east coast to ask them to overnight it and they said that they would once the doctor sent in the prescription,
• then the clinic in Boise called me to confirm that they had sent in my prescription and to remind me to double-check with the pharmacy,
• and then I had to call the pharmacy back to make sure they received it but then they told me that it was too late to be overnighted and I wouldn’t get it until at least Monday (even though it had only been about 20 minutes between conversations the e-mail from my doctor had arrived just after the deadline for overnight shipping – I was sooo mad!),
• and then I had to call my nurse in Boise back and she was super annoyed at the pharmacy. I was out of luck and out of medications which basically meant that the last few weeks of pills, self-injections, and hundreds of dollars were wasted because I can’t go three days without medications.  It just won’t work and we would have to try again next month. (This is where I became really emotional).

Luckily the nurse in Boise found an emergency supply of medication, but the catch was that I had to drive up and get it.  Their office is only open from 8:00 a.m to 10:00 a.m. on Saturdays. So instead of sleeping in Saturday morning (I know, I’m such a whiner) I got up at six-thirty, met my wonderful mom at a gas station in Twin Falls, and we made the two hour drive together. 

Once we got there everything was fine. I picked up the prescription, we went and did some shopping at Tai Pan Trading, went to the Olive Garden for lunch, had a fun drive home  and we were home by 5:00.  The day wasn’t bad, it just wasn’t what I wanted to spend my weekend doing.  All of my other plans went out the window because I had to have that medication and I had to have it immediately.

The stressing isn’t over.  I am supposed to have another appointment in Twin Falls on Monday, but the Boise clinic didn’t tell me that until the Twin Falls office was already closed.  I am hoping that I can call in early tomorrow morning and squeeze in somewhere. If I can’t, well, then it is possible that all of the stress, money, and emergency drive were still all a waste of time. If I do manage to somehow get pregnant this month it will be a complete miracle because as far as I can tell the universe is conspiring against me. 

But writing out my frustrations makes me feel better.  It makes me step out of my problems and look at them more objectively. I am feeling a little bit better already.

Halloween-ey!

Halloween is only a fun holiday if one really gets into it.  This year I am trying harder to catch that spooky Halloween-ey vibe.  We put out the Halloween decorations, including cute witches and huge scary spiders!

Tonight I decided we should carve some pumpkins. 

Jake got into it more than I thought he would.

I had a lot of fun too.

Sara joined us from Albuquerque to give us advice and encouragement.

They turned out nicely.  Don’t you think so? 

A Little Thank You–A Big Difference

Why do people become teachers?  Particularly teachers of middle school? Ask a middle school teacher you know and get back to me on that.  I bet that there are as many reasons as there are teachers.  For example:

• They like working with children.
• They like having  their summers free.
• They’re gluttons for punishment.
• They do it for the money.

Some days I wonder why I became a teacher.  There are some days when the lesson planning, and the unhappy parents, and the multiple meetings, and the discipline issues, and the middle school-er b.o. all join forces into one deadly combination that make me want to turn in my resignation and walk away.

Today was one of those days.

My lessons for the day weren’t ready- I needed to make 170 copies, type up a presentation, grade assignments that are piling up on my desk, and be at a committee meeting this morning by 7:30 a.m.  Unfortunately I slept in (I didn’t get up until 6:10 this morning!! Eep!!) and I didn’t get to school until 7:10! (I also had to swing by the ATM and get cash to give to a student doing a fundraiser. I don’t remember what it was for but I’ll be getting a Christmas scented candle out of the deal).  Long story short: I skipped the committee meeting, made the copies right before the bell rang, finished typing the presentation while I was giving it, and brought the papers home to grade tonight.

Anyway  what is the point of this, you ask?

Well, during 2nd period today a wonderful thing happened.  A former student, now a senior at TFHS, stopped by my classroom.  He came by to thank me for being his teacher 5 years ago.  He said that I have been his most inspirational teacher.

Did I tear up? Yes. Did I grin like an idiot? Probably. Was I floating on air when he left? Absolutely.  He didn’t have to do that. But of all the days to do it, I am glad that he picked today. Because it made all of my problems disappear.  Those few moments in my room made the rest of the day seem bright and cheery. Somehow I didn’t have a single discipline problem the entire rest of the day. 

I think maybe my favorite part of that moment was seeing the changes in him.  He is still the shy, quiet, boy that I remember. But now he is at least three times his previous size (serious growth spurt) and he has so much self confidence.  He looked grown up, mature, and ready to take on the world.

I don’t know exactly what motivated me to become a teacher back in college, but now my favorite part of being a teacher is running into former students. I like to see what they’re doing with their lives. I like to see what they look like when they’ve outgrown the braces, the acne, and the silly haircuts.  I like to see if they still remember all 23 helping verbs. Ha ha. (They never do.)

Okay, so I didn’t write this post so that I could brag about myself.  I don’t really know why I wrote it. Other than maybe to encourage you, my readers, to find someone who has meant something to you or one of your children and say thank you. That one moment from your day will do untold amounts of good.  I’ve had approximately 700 students pass through my classroom doorway in the last 6 years and I still remember almost every one of them (their names, if not their faces.) Hearing from the . . . um . . . 20 or so that keep in touch makes me get out of bed every morning and get back to work.

That’s why I teach middle school.

Opposites Attract

It’s true what they say- opposites really do attract.  Jacob and I are a good example of this principle.  Having him home the last few weeks has made me wonder how I ever survived without him for an entire year!   Jacob is a do-er. I’m a procrastinator. While I’m busy thinking of several different ways to fix a problem or, more likely, thinking of ways to avoid fixing a problem, Jacob already has it fixed. Done. Finished. What problem? 

I don’t consider myself a messy person. Creative maybe. Scatterbrained, definitely. But I sure love having Jacob around to keep me organized.

I began thinking about this as I folded laundry last night.  I had been thinking about doing laundry all weekend. Tonight I came upstairs and found a clean basket of laundry sitting on my bed. This surprised me for two reasons. One was because I never manage to wash and dry one load of laundry let alone complete the entire process in only one day, and two was because I was surprised that they hadn’t already been folded. I wondered what had stopped Jake from finishing the load? (Clearly I’m becoming lazy). However, I was so excited to finally be able to help with something that I jumped in and folded them immediately.  That’s actually beside the point.  Here is what I found when I tried to put away our socks.

My sock drawer:

Jake’s sock drawer:

Looking around the room I discovered other things that follow this same pattern.

Can you guess which bedside table belongs to me and which to him?  (Yes, the clocks tell different times. That’s my fault. As a procrastinator I have failed to change the batteries in my clock for. . . about a year and a half now.)

I also need to show off the linen closet (just to brag a little).

I have no idea where anything goes anymore because it didn’t look like this last time I opened these closet doors, but it sure looks nice. 

As does the man himself in his new Sunday suit!

I’m such a lucky girl!

Infertility: My Thoughts and Feelings

Infertility is a delicate and often touchy subject. Which is why I am going to face it head on and be as blunt as possible.  Why not?

It has been my experience that people with infertility often feel a sense of shame or embarrassment that prevents open and frank discussions.  People who do not have infertility are either curious but afraid to ask, or they feel guilty about their multitudes of adorable children and so they want to avoid the subject.  Either way they are often full of platitudes like, “If it’s meant to be, it will be” or “Everything happens on the Lord’s time.”

Well here is my story.  If you have questions feel free to leave them in the comments and I will answer them as honestly as I can and to the best of my limited medical knowledge.

I have a condition commonly called PCOS or PolyCystic Ovarian Syndrome.  I have linked the acronym to a website if you are interested in reading more. According to womenshealth.gov between 1 in 10 and 1 in 20 women have PCOS which makes it fairly common. I am glad that it is so common because the more common something is the more likely that there is a treatment.  In my case, the treatment is a series of different medications. More on that in a minute.

Jacob and I began trying to have children several years ago. However, in order to even be diagnosed with infertility a woman must try to get pregnant for at least 12 months before doctors will consider looking for infertility issues.  The doctors in Twin Falls were finally able to diagnose me and started me on medications which I tried for several months.  When the medications didn’t work, we were referred to the Idaho Center for Reproductive Medicine in Boise.  We met with the doctors there and after an extensive dose of medications, self-injections, and multiple trips to Boise we were able to conceive Julia. The whole process took over two years.

Today we went back to the ICRM and met with Dr. Cristin Slater.  She was wonderful.  After our consultation and an examination we left feeling buoyed up and happy. She seems confident that we will be able to conceive and her confidence is contagious. So much so that we jokingly discussed baby names at dinner tonight.

Infertility is a very depressing condition.  I have several friends with infertility problems too and have been able to talk to them at length.  I know that, like me, they feel anger and disappointment. However I won’t speak for them, just for myself. My situation and coping techniques will be different than theirs and I have no right to speak for them.

Nothing seems more unfair in life than being denied something that many people have and don’t seem to deserve.  Nothing is worse than seeing people taking their children for granted.  Walking past the baby department in any store is painful.  All those cute little outfits and baby toys that we may never be able to buy. Facebook updates about babies are depressing. Baby showers are depressing.  The only thing as bad as that is when well meaning people ask about the children you don’t have.  They say things like, “when are you going to start having children?” or “why don’t you have any children yet?”.  It makes me feel like a failure.  Especially in a church where the commandment to “multiply and replenish the earth” is still going strong.  I find myself doubting my own self worth.  After all, if God can’t trust me to be a mother of His children, what is my purpose, or what have I done to deserve this?  These thoughts mostly occur on a monthly basis and go away after, say, 3-5 days.  I understand that they are fueled by hormones that I can’t control, but that does not make them any less real at the time.

If you know someone with infertility I’d like to offer you some advice.  First of all, don’t pretend that you understand. If you have healthy, chubby babies you don’t understand. That motherly urge is so ingrained into our bodies from generation to generation that to be denied its fulfillment is almost painful in and of itself.  Second, its okay to offer to let them hold or play with your children, but don’t force them to ooh and aah if they just don’t have it in them. Sometimes just being around other parents is emotionally exhausting. Finally, please remember that infertility does not just affect women.  The fact that I can not have children easily is as painful to my husband as it is to me.  Be aware that men also love children and may be sensitive to issues about babies.  He loves me unconditionally and for that I am grateful, but I know that he is looking forward to the day that we finally have a bigger family.

I know that I will have children eventually. Modern technology and faith in miracles are two powerful tools, especially when combined. I hope that it is sooner rather than later but in the meantime I am going to just keep blogging, hoping, and praying.

Student Writing Examples

I’ve written a couple of blogs about the humorous mistakes that my students make.  Now I want to take a few minutes to show some of the writing on the other side of the spectrum. 

My students recently wrote poems called “Come With Me” poems.  The poems were based on poetry by Barry Lane.  This is the video that the students watched to kick off the descriptive writing unit.

Hey, don’t judge free educational resources.

Anyway, they had to improve on the poem by including two examples of figurative language- similes, metaphors, hyperboles, or personification. These poems are cheesy and silly but they are meant to be descriptive and beautiful.  Here are some of the poems written by students in the Honors Language Arts class.

________________________

“Come With Me” by C.G.

Come with me to the shooting range.

See the brown, rough, tumble weed rolling past you as if it were alive.

Hear the loud bang of the rifles spitting out lead and hot brass. Boom! Bang! Crack!

Feel the aching soreness in your fingers as if you’ve been pulling the trigger 100 times.

Smell the gray gun smoke seeping out of the hot chambers like ghosts.

Taste the sweet, cool Gatorade that you brought with you.

__________________________

“Come With Me” by M.J.

Come with me to the zoo.

See  the white tiger as it smiles fiercely at the people watching

Hear the hyena’s laughter as they laugh at the sky.

Feel the cold exhibits glass as you press your face against the window.

Smell the wild exotic animal smells as you walk through the zoo.

Taste the cool, crisp air as you enjoy your day at the zoo.

_____________________________

“Come With Me” by R.A.

Come with me to the Oregon Coast.

See the ocean water twinkle and glisten as if the suns gleem is dancing on the ocean’s waves.

Hear the sound of seagulls tweeting loudly but calmly.

Feel the hot sand beneath your feet riding up in between your toes.

Smell the salt of the ocean on a cool, crisp day.

Taste the crisp, gooshy marshmallow in the night by the world brightening fire. Watch the waves crash on the soft sand of the Oregon Coast.

Say What–Take 3

The “Exit Ticket” or “Question of the Day” is posted in the same place in my classroom every day.  It is called an Exit Ticket because it is a ticket out the door and into the hallway. The students can’t leave until they answer the question.  It is usually a review of the day’s lesson.  This allows me to look back and see if there are any gaps or misunderstandings to clear up the next day.  The downside is that the students have already left the room before I get a chance to read the answers.  On really busy days I don’t get a chance to check them until after the last bell has rung and the students are gone for the entire day.  Today was one of those days.

The Exit Ticket is posted in the bottom corner of one of my whiteboards. Because it is in the corner it does not read straight across.  Today’s question looked like this:

Write down one

thing that you

would like to have

explained better.

Okay, I’ll admit that it could have been worded a little bit clearer (my first mistake).  My intention was to have students name one thing they would like me to reteach next week.  Because they were taking a quiz today, I assumed (my second mistake) that they would pick something on the quiz that was difficult to answer. I wasn’t expecting the answers that I received.

Here are three of about 20 answers:

• superpowers
• a cell phone to call my dad after school
• my parents to stop fighting all the time

Have you figured out where the misunderstanding lies?  These kids didn’t read all the way to the end of the question.  To them it read: Write down one thing that you would like to have. Period. So they did. 

Now, I can assure you that the entire sentence was written in the same clear handwriting and that there was no confusing punctuation.  It is also the same question that I asked last Friday when we were in class. This just goes to show that learning proper communication skills is a life long process.  Clearly I need to reteach how to read the question on the board, and they need to relearn how to read until the sentence is finished, not just until they feel like stopping.  They probably thought that was an unusual review question, but nobody said anything about it. 

Exercise

The Twin Falls School District has teamed up with the College of Southern Idaho to offer free fitness classes for employees and their spouses.  What a great deal!

L.O.L.

My friends and I decided to go to spinning tonight. It’s offered every Tuesday and Thursday. There were about fifteen of us in the class altogether and Jake came with me too which was nice.

About um… seven minutes into the program the lights were down and the music was loud and I remembered something really important that I had forgotten. 

I hate exercise. A lot.

I have no endurance, no stamina, no tolerance for pain, nothing. To my friends out there who enjoy running marathons and going to the gym I want you to know that you’re nuts. Absolutely.

I survived the class. I never quit. I also didn’t follow all the directions. When the instructor said go faster I just kept going nice and steady. But I also think my resistance was higher than hers because she was pedaling so much faster than I was. Like, really, really fast. By the end of the class I was sweating like a Coke can in July. It was disgusting! My hair was running with rivulets of water and my make-up was smeared on my face. Nasty.  

I am feeling much better now.  One nice, hot, long shower, a handful of chicken nuggets with Winger’s sauce, and FOUR no bake chocolate chip cookies later I think I may recover. And I kind of like the wiggly feeling in my knees as I walk down the stairs.  I won’t be going back this next Thursday because of a previous commitment, but I think I’ll go back again next week. Supposedly it gets easier and I’m all about easy.