The Other Big Deal

In the midst of our journey through infertility, we've been struggling with another journey and that is our quest to get my husband Al a teaching job. When we moved here, he had been teaching in Australia at a private school with one of the best reputations in the state. In our naivety and ignorance, we assumed getting jobs here was going to be easy. We are great teachers with great experience after all!

Well, it turns out things are not so simple here. There were huge hurdles to jump over- like having certification in Texas for the right subject area. And that was a hurdle that just kept popping up. We finally got Al enrolled to take his correct certification tests and he passed all the relevant ones in late February/early March. He has one left to do but it won't influence what he teaches. We also had the hurdle of getting permanent residence for him since he came over on a 1 year work travel visa initially. Well, that came in the mail in early March. While doing all that, he's been subbing at schools throughout our school district. The pay is crap and the work is irregular at times but it is also flexible and has allowed him to be in schools.

So hooray- he's now certified and legally able to work- let's get a job! And that brings us to Saturday- the JOB FAIR! We went and visited nine schools and left with lots of smiles and we'll keep you in mind and even one mini interview. Al left overjoyed and I left optimistic. But today I'm getting scared. The principal at the mini interview school said let's get him in this week but the other teacher conducting the interview said we'll email you. Is that like a guy saying 'i'll call you' after a date when he has no intention of calling??? Here at my school they've scueduled 3 interviews already and he's heard nothing!

So, trying not to panic but it'd just be so awesome if he could go ahead and get a job lined up and I just don't know if we can handle another crushing disappointment right now. So I'm praying and trusting and trying not to worry...

Oh, while on this topic, the handful of people who know we're trying to concieve have sometimes expressed surprise we have been doing so 'before Al has a job'. Well, point one he is a substitute teacher and has worked almost every day I have so it's not really like he's unemployed and bringing in no money. And we also started before we knew he wouldn't have a job and were so dedicated to becomming parents by then. Plus, it's nine months after you get pregnant so we figured he'd have a job before the baby came and that was all that mattered. In the meantime, i have a job. I don't know- I just sometimes get this judgemental vibe from people like maybe I haven't gotten pregnant because God doesn't give babies to unemployed couples. Which is ridiculous on so many levels... and you probably think that's in my head but the number of times I've heard 'maybe God's just waiting for Al to get a job...' It kinda makes my blood boil...

Anyway, I would love for him to have a job secured for his happiness, my sanity and just a little bit to shut the cynical ones up. Oh, and also just in case God is waiting on Al to get a job... please hurry up and hire my husband!!!

How we met our RE...

So in my last story I think I sweepingly covered our close to a year of trying to conceive. Well, I went to the dr after about 6 months for a pap smear and just to get bloodwork done and rule out any physical problems. I hadn't had a check up in a long time so it seemed like a great idea. Well, God is just so awesome because he led me to the perfect GP very indirectly. I had an appointment planned with my parents dr but the day of the appointment, the clinic called and that dr was out sick so I said, fine I'll just take whoever is there. Well, I met Dr Perkinson who has the kindest man who- get this- had battled infertility himself. His wife got pregnant after 13 months of trying and he knew how I was feeling and how hard what I'm going through is. Well, he talked to me for a while and I found the whole thing very reassuring.

But I wasn't planning on doing any tests or anything until I got to 12 months and I figured then I'd go to an Ob/Gyn. Well, a couple of months later, I had to go back to my GP for an throat infection and he was so kind and asked all about how our 'ttc' efforts were going. We were at around 8 months by then and he suggested I go ahead and call an RE and get an appointment and start testing and so forth. He recommended Houston Fertility Institute and I left with a referral.

To my surprise but delight, my husband agreed with moving ahead and a month later, after 9 failed cycles, we met our RE. Of course, we were so nervous about this initial appointment even though in reality absolutely nothing really happened! But we did plan our upcoming tests and I was relieved to know that we'd have answers within a month or so.

Well, I will give the quick version now and maybe another time I can go back and describe the emotions and the humor of fertility testing. But, we discovered that I seemed to be ovulating normally (which was not a surprise since I had been using OPKs the past few months). Al's semen analysis came back very positive (and his self esteem has been soaring since discovering just how healthy his swimmers are!) and my HSG showed open tubes but a very tilted uturus.

On the day of the HSG, the RE threw out the idea that an IUI could help correct for the tilt of the uterus which may (but may not) be making conception difficult. From my research, a tilted uterus often has no effect but in absence of any other reasons, it seems like trying to 'fix' that hindrance is the best place to start...

So in the month almost since my HSG I've pretty much designed my own treatment course and tomorrow I go to the RE and hope that he agrees with me! I am hoping to start on Clomid this cycle and then do three rounds of IUI the next three months. Right now I just have to believe that it will work and I will get pregnant. I can't worry about that not working either and what all that would mean so I am choosing to embrace optimism and believe that within the next four months, I will have a beautiful baby in my belly!

OK, that's all for now- I'll update about tomorrow's appointment!

Another Period, Another Sad Day

Welcome to my blog! Since I am not ready to open up to all our friends and family about the details our of journey to become parents, I am not sure who will even be reading this blog right now. But I wanted a way to chronicle this next stage in our journey and I've loved reading other people's blogs and so I hope this will one day be the platform for sharing our joys and not just frustrations!

I guess a bit of background would be appropriate! When I was 16, I moved to Melbourne Australia from Houston Texas. Although anxious initially about leaving friends and starting at a new school in a totally different world, I did embrace the challenge and of course, know now that it was the best thing that could have happened to me! After being there about a year, I met a charming, wonderful, sweet boy who made me so happy. He was always doing the kindest things for me. My favorite story is that the first time we officially met was on Biology Camp (yep, we're total nerds!) and we had to do this activity that involved walking out into this mangrove mud (like a swamp). Being the ever graceful girl I am, I got stuck in the mud and couldn't free myself from my boots. So Alister came out into the swamp and lifted me out of my boots and carried my back to dry land and then went back for my boots. And he's been rescuing me from crises big and small ever since!

We dated for years because we weren't going to get married until we finished college. And this ended up being a LONG time because after completing a 5 year commerce and law degree and during his first year at an accounting firm, Al decided he wanted to join me as a teacher and ended up going back to school to become a teacher. During his first year of teaching and my 3rd year, he popped the question to my great delight.

Actually, to go back a few months. 2008 was Al's first year of teaching and we lived together in this amazing apartment on a very trendy road in Melbourne, Australia. I had changed schools and was loving my new job and Al was loving teaching. It was a really very happy stage. We were lying in bed reflecting on how content we were one day in May and we started our usual talk about having babies one day and both ended up saying we really felt like we were ready for a little one in our lives. We got so excited about it and even created this great plan that I'd go off the pill and we'd get engaged and have a quick engagement and go ahead and have a baby!

It was a thrilling couple of weeks of talking about it but of course, we both knew it wasn't how we wanted to do things. As much as we were ready for that step, we also wanted to get engaged and enjoy the lead up to a wedding. I wanted to have a long engagement and plan a big wedding and I wanted to not be pregnant at my wedding. Plus, we both knew my parents would NEVER recover if we did get pregnant before married and had a whirlwind engagement. My mom had been dreaming of my wedding longer than I had and I knew if was imporant to everyone- including us- that we take the time to savor getting married.

In the midst of all these talks about babies and the future, we made another huge decision. We started talking about raising our babies once we were married and had them and about owning a home and so forth. And Al suggested that maybe we ought to think about moving to America where we can afford to buy a house and where my parents are available to help us when we have little ones. Plus, that would enable us to have the big American wedding I'd always wanted and actually be there for the build up. It started as this kind of crazy plan but this one somehow stuck and we started to feel more and more confident that it would be the right move for our future and our precious family we were going to have.

So I a couple of months later, we had the big dramatic engagement with Al getting down on one knee in a restaurant. Soon after annoucing our engagement we announced our plan to move to America and in December 2008 we made the big move to The Woodlands, Texas!

2009 was a big year! The first 6 months were so exciting as our wedding approached. We also were substitute teaching and looking at jobs. In May, I got offered a full time teaching position at a high school. We went out to celebrate and decided that day that I'd stop taking the pill. We wouldn't try until we were married 2 months later but we'd heard it is better to have a couple of months without it in your system so I took my last pill in early May and started dreaming of my baby every night and daydreaming of Al and I being parents every day.

July 3 was the happiest and most wonderful day of my life as I married the love of my life. The week leading up to our big day was pure joy with all our family and friends out and the weeks after were blissful. We actually went to Vegas with Al's family for a week right after getting married (a slightly unorthodox 'honeymoon' experience but as they were only out from Australia for 2 weeks, we wanted to enjoy every minute with them!).

In August, we went on our 'real' honeymoon, a month after being married. We waited in hopes that Al would be able to secure a job during July. Unfortuntely this had not happened but we set off to Jamaica for a week at a Sandals resort. This was when we really started 'trying' to have a baby. We didn't actively prevent in July but because of when my health care was going to start up, we didn't try then either. It had taken my 8 weeks to even have a period after coming off the pill so I didn't expect it to happen in July anyway. But August came and by this point, I'd be insured by the time I could find out I was pregnant so we were good to go.

Of course hindsight in 20/20 but I do regret now that we spend our honeymoon consumed with 'we're making a baby' which was lots of fun but also meant I wouldn't drink any alcohol or caffeine or sit in a hot tub! I also wish that we had just taken that week to focus on us and the present but hey, it was a fantastic week so all is well that ends well.

I won't go through month by month the tears and disappointment but it has been a really hard 9 months. Because my periods are only 24 days, I have actually had 11 periods since trying and so 11 disappointments. The first few months were filled of course with analyzing every symptom and just being sure I was pregnant now! The few months after that were filled with sobbing episodes and enormous hearthache as what I thought would happen so quickly was not happening. The past few months have been consumed with testing and acceptance that we are going to have to get help which is also emotionally draining.

So I'll go for now and write more soon about what lies ahead for us. Being a mom has been my dream for as long as I can remember and it's been two years now since Al and I decided we desperately wanted to make a baby together. I know we'll get there eventually but in the meantime there are a lot of babytears while we wait on our miracle.