Month 4, Day 28 - 5 DPO

I've had a very nice ending (so far) to a very LONG week. To start out, Friday was a pretty good day. I called the bank to find out how much Eric's check was and found out that our tax refunds had been deposited. Yeah! Then my boss called me into his office to let me know about my raise and bonus for this year. I'd like to preface by saying I had my review about 2 weeks ago and things went pretty well, plus I switched departments in July and am in a MUCH better situation. (That's another conversation in itself). Anyway, my raise is 8%! The average for the office was 3% and I've been between 2-4% the other two years I've gotten raises. Someone must think I'm doing a good job! Then he told me my bonus amount which I think is awesome! Probably shouldn't provide $ amounts online, but it will certainly help gets some bills paid off. Oh yeah, my temp made it up to 98.0 too!

Today is Saturday and I woke up to a beautiful day. I had an appointment to get my hair cut and highlighted at 12:15 p.m. so I did that. Then I came home and took Zeus for a walk. He appreciated it and now needs to rest a bit...


Still to do this weekend...tonight we're going to The Melting Pot (fondue place) with W & S for my birthday dinner. (Monday, I'll be 25). Then tomorrow, we'll probably go to church in the morning and then we have tickets to the Arena Football game at 3:00.

I'm in a really good mood. Well, I should probably get off the computer and do something productive like study for my CPCU exam, but... we'll see.

I just hope the rest of the weekend goes as well.

Month 4, Day 26 - 3 DPO

My temps are still headed upwards, so I think all is good. Fertility Friend moved my O-day to Monday (day 23) so I am going to go with that one. Now just 13 days to wait and we'll see how we did.

Month 4, Day 25 - 1, 2 or 3DPO?

Well, I think I ovulated. My temp was up to 97.5 today which is .2 over the previous 6 days, but is still really low for me. Fertility Friend gave me an O-date of Sunday (day22). I'm not so sure that's right. If I had to put money on it, I'd say late Monday night or Tuesday morning. I had some breast tenderness creep in Tuesday, so that makes me think I already had some progesterone flowing in there. If I mess around in fertility friend and add 2 more days of temps at 97.5, it moves my O-date to Monday, so we'll see what happens for the next couple of days. Regardless, I think we're in the wait for this stage. I'll probably wait to test until the March 10th or 11th.

FINALLY!

Month 4, Day 24

No spike. Did you really expect different? Took another OPK this afternoon. Negative. I'm taking that as a good sign that maybe I've already ovulated? If I spike tomorrow I'll expect this to be a 36 day cycle. That's long even for me. But the longer this cycle goes the more it makes me think the cycle I got pregnant was like this, just I didn't know. I put this in an e-mail to my girls a couple of days ago, but want to post here for me to look back on when I actually am pregnant and laugh about what I didn't know.

The logic.
June Cycle
We know AF arrived 35 days after stopping birth control pill. We can assume with a 12 day LP, I ovulated on day 23.

July Cycle
We know AF arrived 7/12 and positive HPT on 8/23 CD42.
We also know there was a negative HPT on CD35 and BD occured on CD20 and CD24 among others.
Theory - if I ovulated on CD24 or CD25, I would have only been 10 or 11 DPO when I got the negative HPT on CD35 (too early). That means that the breast changes I noticed on CD40 would have been 15 or 16 DPO and the positive HPT would have been on 17 or 18 DPO. That timeline makes a lot of sense to me.

The moral of this story. I've probably had cycles this long before and possibly got pregnant during one of them. I'd like to see that happen again. Ok, there's only so much I can talk about without annoying even myself.

Month 4, Day 23

My temp was still down today. 97.1 at 7:00 a.m. I didn't wake up when the alarm went off at 6:00 to temp, but it was still low, so I don't think my waking up late affected it. I may take another OPK today, but am REALLY hoping my temp goes up finally tomorrow. I feel like then I'll be able to relax a little and just wait. Yeah right, when have I ever been able to relax while waiting? I did a little browsing through the chart gallery on Fertility Friend, and it seems like a lot of people ovulate the day after the positive OPK, so I'm not really concerned yet. I sure hope I get pregnant this cycle. This has seemed like a lot of work!

Month 4, Day 22

Finally some good news today, no my temperature didn't spike. I just took the second OPK and this time it was positive, meaning that I should ovulate in the next 24-36 hours. All I have to say is it's about time! I'm not sure if that means I'll spike tomorrow or the next day. Either way, soon, I should be in my 2 week wait. I'm hoping a long cycle is a good sign for me, I think my last PG cycle was long too!

Land of Crazy

I officially have crossed into the land of crazy. I usually don't get this anxious/anxiety stricken until the 2ww. This month I'm really concerned that I may not ovulate. I'm still holding out hope that it's just going to happen later. I don't really have any reasons not ovulate. I haven't been under any particular stress, except this last week waiting every day to see if I actually ovulated. Can be anxious about ovulating, actually keep you from ovulating?

Here are some signs of my obsession:
1. I have been taking my temperature several times a day, just on the off chance I ovulated sometime during the day and it's on it's way up.
- Why that's bad...The only time your temp means something is first thing in the morning before any outside factors like moving, eating, drinking, showering, etc. can affect it, yet I still have the urge every couple of hours to do it anyway. At least I can reuse my thermometer, it isn't like taking HPT's twice a day.
2. I can't go through an evening with Eric without mentioning, my temperatures, how late my O-day is, or what we need to do to get pregnant.
- Why that's bad...My DH is of the belief that worry about getting pregnant is a sure fire way to not get pregnant. Once it becomes my only topic of conversation, he gets annoyed.
3. I bought my first pack of OPK's tonight. I was hoping they would help me find my missing O.
- Why that's bad...You probably shouldn't start using them on Day 21, but it was negative, so I think I can expect no spike tomorrow. They were also only $12 for a 5 day supply and came with a bonus HPT, so that's not so bad. It also gives me some practice at POAS (just added that one to the glossary).

Anyway, this cycle is not that fun anymore. Read Erica's blog and she's thinking it's not so fun either. Message to Erica, stick it out and see what happens this month. Your timing couldn't have been better. It does take a while for some people, but places like FF I think exagerate that. I mean people who get PG on the first shot, don't usually make it to the charting and waiting around in TTC chatroom stage. If you're concerned, I would call the doctor after this cycle. It's been over 6 months of trying and you have a couple of great charts, so you have something to start with. I have faith that it will happen eventually. Don't worry about feeling a little meloncoly about your cycle this month. I felt the same way last month and also had perfect timing, it really did help take that sting away when AF did show.

On another note. According to my OPK, I probably won't have a spike tomorrow. Which means I didn't ovulate today. If I ovulate tomorrow, and spike on Monday, I will be due to test on 3/9/04. I think that could be a sign. If Erica is due to test on my birthday, and I'm due to test on hers, I think we should both get positives, for working it out that way. I think that would be a great birthday present.

Month 4, Day 21

I've got good news and bad news.

The bad news...still no spike.
The good news...still no spike. That means missing 2 days in a row were not the 2 most important days not to miss.

I had a dream last night. Eric and I were leaving for a trip to Hawaii. Our plane was leaving in 1 1/2 hours, but we weren't ready yet. I was rushing around trying to get all of our stuff together, at first Eric helped me out, but then he got distracted and just sat in the car while I was trying to finish getting ready. At one point I thought we're never going to make it in time, I should just stop trying, but then thought of how great Hawaii was. Then I got mad because Eric wasn't helping me. Dream interpretation... Hawaii = pregnancy (something really good that I want to do), Trying to get everything ready for the trip = Us doing our part to acheive pregnancy (BD), The fact that there wasn't very much time to get everything done = My anxiety about my O-day being MIA, Eric's originally being helpful and then lack of helpfulness = My hidden anger that last night he fell asleep again instead of trying to help me "get ready". Being ready to give up = frustration at the missing O and being ready to give up.

It's weird how dreams can do that. I tend to occasionally have dreams where I get really angy at Eric and just let him have it. I wonder if that's because I don't tend to get angry that easily when I'm awake? I understand about last night. I was really frustrated because I'm afraid we'll miss the window. Now I'm a little concerned that there may not be a window this month. I guess we'll see what happens. I'm a little afraid that this has now crossed the line into being obsessive this month. Eric's cool about the whole thing until he thinks it's consumed my every waking thought. Probably not a good sign that the first thing I said to him this morning was, "You're lucky my temperature didn't spike, we still have another chance." Maybe I should have started with "Goodmorning?"

Still Month 4, Day 20

Highlight of today...Lunch at Tammy's. Jonathan is so BIG. He's almost 4 months old. It feels so good to hold a baby. Just gotta be patient. My day will come.

It's been a pretty relaxing evening. I was exhausted after work, so I came home and took about an hour nap. I figure it's ok if I can't sleep, because tomorrow is Saturday and I don't have to get up early, so I can stay up as late as I want.

Eric was in a bit of a mood when he came home. It's been a rough week and he had to stay an extra hour and a half at work tonight to find an accounting error his new employee made before he could make the nightly deposit and come home. He also said he had a headache, so I sort of steered clear of him and played on the computer. I'm looking for more cool things for my site.

I had a good chat with Mom tonight too. I think I'm going to plan a trip to see them in the next couple of months. It'll be interesting to see how the house is coming.

I just went down to see how Eric was doing and he was asleep on the couch. I kind of tried to wake him up, but he's not interested in waking up. That combined with the fact he wasn't in a great mood when he was awake, leads me to believe there may be a disruption to our (strike that - my) BD plans. I know we've had a busy week, but I'm sure that I'll be o'ing any day now and I think missing 2 days in a row is not the best course of action. It's a delicate line, I don't want him to feel "used," but timing is kind of important. I guess I'll try to wake him up one more time, and if not... If it's meant to be, it will be.

I feel like reading some good blogs. I may do a search and start linking to people. For some reason I have the desire to be read by a lot of people. Maybe I better get a more interesting life. I read someone's blog that had a Friday 5, where every Friday a group of people answered 5 questions about themselves. Maybe I'll do that.

Month 4, Day 20

Ok, so I'm getting a little tired of waiting on the big O. I'm a little concerned, but keep thinking of those long cycles the first time I got pregnant. It was 35 days after stopping the pill and I did get a negative HPT on CD35 last time I was pregnant, so maybe a long cycle is a good sign!

Another cool thing. As many of you know, Erica and I were born only 8 days apart. 3/1 and 3/9. Erica is due to take a test on my birthday 3/1. If today is my O-day, I will test on 3/7. So if the O hides out for 2 more days, I would test on Erica's birthday! I'm hoping it comes sooner than that, but it's still cool.

On another note, I'm so glad it's Friday. It's been a long week and we have NO plans this weekend. I just want to veg.

New Features

I learned how to do some new things! Check out the coolness on my sidebar! Also, as requested I added the link to the doll maker site, so I didn't "steal" anything. The other "blinkies" were on free sharing sites although I did upload them to my own server. I found a free place to store images, so we don't have to take up Chadd's space! I could stay up all night, but I have to work tomorrow.

Month 4, Day 19

Just thought I should put another entry in. I'm stilll in the pre-o stage, but am really hoping that today is the day and tomorrow I spike (actually that's been the hope for the last several days). The first month I charted I o'd on day 19, so I'm still in my "historical" window. That's not to say it couldn't happen later than that, but so far it's not abnormal. Not much else to say except still waiting.

Oh yeah, my CM issue has cleared up a little I had EWCM both CD17 & 18 (not sure about today yet), I guess the fact that I haven't o'd yet, explains why I hadn't had any back on day 16, it was just too early. I'm tired of trying to guess when O will happen, I just hope it happens soon (so I can wait for another 2 weeks, 16 days to be exact, to see if I can take an HPT.)

Gotta get ready for work. Hopefully, there will be a good update tomorrow.

Month 4, Day 17

Still no spike. The look of pain on Eric's face this morning, when I told him. He just doesn't think he's cut out to be a rabbit.

Month 4, Day 16

I'm looking for my spike soon. I'm hoping maybe tomorrow. I have o'd on day 16 for the last 2 months, so I'm hoping it's the same this time. My temp was down at 97.0 this morning, and it probably doesn't mean anything, but I took my temp this afternoon (around 5:30 p.m.) and it was 98.5, now that was right after I got back from the gym and took a hot shower, but still.... If I do spike tomorrow, I'll feel pretty good about the timing, we'll have gotten 3 days in a row in. Last month was perfect too, so who knows. This cycle is weird though, my temps have been all over the place, I think I'm looking for a 97.9 for a spike. Technically, the highest temp over the past 6 days is 97.4, so 97.6 would be a spike, but I've had 3 temps that high this cycle, so I'd rather see something a little closer to 98.0. My CM pattern is really weird too, I've only had 1 true day of EWCM (Friday, which we didn't take advantage of). I'm not sure what that means, if I am going to ovulate later this month or if I just don't have much. Kind of hard to analyze now. I guess I'll just see what happens.

By the way, Erica has a beautiful chart this month. Her temps are so stable. She ovulated a little later than expected, but it looks like a definate ovulation pattern. Her BD timing was also great, so I'm hoping that something come of it. It's been 7 months, that seems like a long enough wait. Interesting thought, Erica is 2CD ahead of me, with her not Oing until day 16 and her LP is 14 days, if I O on day 16 with a 12 day LP, we technically will be due for AF at the same time. We'll have to see if we end up testing together.

Bizarre

Ok, I had to add this link.

I was surfing the web looking for some other trying to concieve journals and someone had a link to this guy's website for a Valentine's day "perfect man." In case you don't want to visit the site, here are a few of my favorite quotes. This guy is a freak.

He wants, "2 - 6 women to have 2 - 15 children by me."

Here's his timeframe:
February through April - Promote web-site. Receive responses. Begin initial selection.
Mid-May - Complete initial selection. Complete respectful notification of those not selected. Request further information from those initially selected.
May through July - Receive additional information. Correspond to become better acquainted. Possible personal meetings.
Mid-August - Final selection

Here's one of his preferences, "If your vision uncorrected - either by lens or by surgery - were normal or you were farsighted up to perhaps +5 or +6 diopters, this would be a definite plus.

"I would like to have 17 children. Why 17? I don't know. It just seems like a good number to have. I didn't say this earlier in the web-site because I didn't want to scare you away right off the bat."

"Our tractor would have an enclosed cab. "

"Harvesting our wheat, beans, and potatoes in the fall would require a lot of work, but I think we could do it. "

" I would prefer, when we were working outside, that you use such items of clothing, etc. that would prevent you from becoming roughed up and weather-beaten. "

"Shoes would be left in the entranceway."

"Everyone in the household would keep a baseball bat under their bed to deal with possible burglars, intruders, and trespassers. "

He sounds like a real winner. I think I'm lucky I got my man.

Happy Valentine's Day! - Month 4, Day 14

I'm about ready to head to bed on Valentine's Day night (for sleeping). I thought I'd do a mini recap of the first part of the weekend. Friday night I came straight home after work because we had tickets to the very first home game of the Columbus Destroyers. That's the new Arena Football Team in Columbus. We bought season tickets and this was the first game. Our neighbor Martin bought a ticket to the game too, so he rode with us, but our seats weren't together so we didn't see him again until the end of the game. It was pretty exciting, although they lost. The other team scored with 2 seconds left to win the game. That took up all of Friday night.

Today was really busy although I didn't get much done in the way of domestic chores. Eric and I slept in a until about 9:30 a.m. Then he went to work and I went to the gym, where I must say I made up my cardio I skipped on Friday, plus did lower body and abs. After I got back from the gym I picked up lunch and wrote my receipts for the week in the checkbook. We had an appointment to do our taxes at 1:00 p.m. We were there until 3:30 p.m. It took along time, because they did the return both filing jointly and separately, and we determined that we'd get back about $450 more if we filed separately. We're pretty happy about out tax return as we'll be getting back about $4000. Get to make some major payments on some bills. After taxes we came home showered and dressed and then decided to go to Outback for dinner. We got there at 5:15 p.m. to put our names in for a 2 hour wait. Then we left and went to Blockbuster to get a movie and went and walked around Bed, Bath, & Beyond. We then went back to the restaurant to wait some more. We got in at about 7:30 p.m. and had dinner. After dinner we came home and watched our movie "Out of Time" with Denzel Washington. Good movie. That's about it. We just bought each other cards and stupid little stuffed animals for V-Day. Neither of us really saw the need to go out and spend tons of money. We love each other all year long, we don't need a "Hallmark Holiday" to tell us to do something special.

Not much going on yet on the baby front. My CM pattern makes me think it may still be a couple of days until O-day. I'm trying not to focus on that too much. All the plans are nice, but right now I think it's more important to focus on the big picture. It'll happen when the time is right, although we've only got one more month if we want it to be a tax deduction next year!

I'm off Monday, so I still get too more days of weekend! Yippee! I'm also going back on BFL tomorrow. Boy do I need it.

Month 4, Day 12

Well, the first thing out of Eric's mouth this morning was I'm sorry. He said he woke up at about 2:00 a.m. and realized he missed his chance. Oh, well, we'll have to work on it tonight after we get home from the neighbors. We always go over to their house on Thursdays to watch Friends, Survivor, The Apprentice, CSI, and ER using TiVo. Last week we skipped ER because it got to late, we may have to this week too because of the "Operation Rabbit" plans.

Month 4, Day 11

Just thought I'd say that so far my "Operation Rabbit" plan is not working. It was supposed to go into effect tonight, but my husband is not cooperating. He decided this would be a good evening to fall asleep on the couch at 7:30 p.m. He does that about once every two weeks. Anyway, I am about ready for bed and he shows no sign of waking up before morning. All I can say is that it's a good thing I'm still in the "sticky" phase. He knew the plans tonight, seriously, how important is sleep?

So you don't know what "Operation Rabbit" is? I didn't want to be too graphic, but I bet if you think about the nature of rabbits, you can figure it out. Hint. Hint.

Weekend Recap - Month 4, Day 8

This turned into a really good weekend. I thought I'd give you a full recap for the record. To start, I've been feeling really "blah" since I took an entire week off of my diet. I feel so yucky though, that I can't wait to get up tomorrow and have a fresh start. Here's how my weekend went down.

Friday - Came straight home from work and totally skipped any workout. I'm not sure what I did until about 7:30 p.m., but it probably involved computer games. Then Eric and I decided to order a pizza. I order from Pizza Hut online and it said that the pizza would be delivered in about 30 minutes. After an hour had went by I decided to call and see what was up. Apparently the internet sent our order to the wrong store, which doesn't deliver here, so they cancelled our order. Nice, didn't even call. The plus side, the guy on the phone rerouted our order to the appropriate store and gave it to us free, but we had to wait another hour for delivery. But hey, free pizza! I kind of felt bad for the delivery guy, because I was planning to pay via debit card and had no cash for a tip. Anyway, we also watched Titanic, amazingly it was Eric's idea.

Saturday - I slept in which was wonderful and then planned on meeting Samara at the mall at about 1:00 p.m. for some shopping. I had an appointment at the day spa to get my eyebrows waxed at 12:30 p.m. and then we hooked up to do some shopping. We had dinner reservations and wanted to get something new to wear. We ended up shopping until the last possible momement, but both ended up with sexy/hot outfits. Mine was from the Limited and I got a very sexy black top and some winter white slacks. It's cool because I can wear the pants to work, so it's not a one time deal. I also wore the boots I bought in Chicago (2nd time) and can I say my calves certainly aren't getting smaller. I also bought another pair of pants and top that is appropriate for work. Samara got this sexy satin lacy blouse and a skirt. We were definately hot mommas. We then went back to my place and changed for dinner (the guys were waiting). We had dinner reservations at 7:30 p.m. at Cameron's and dinner was great (expensive, but great). I got the "special" soup, some kind of spicy potato, followed by the Grilled Filet Mignon. It was great, also served with Garlic Mashed Potatos, asparagas, a portabella french fry, and a rich port wine sauce. I ate every bite. I also got creme broule for dessert. Very tasty.

Sunday - I made plans to go to church with April, but Eric said he would possibly join me, so I decided to drive separately. I got up at about 9:00 which really felt like sleeping in, and asked Eric if he was going. He decided to sleep in and I got ready. I was running a little late so got to the service right when it was starting and slipped in and sat on the side. I saw April a few minutes later and waved, but ended up sitting by myself. It was the first new Praise & Worship service for the church. It was nice, but apparently a very new type of service for this church. For me it just felt like home. I knew it had to be good when I was disappointed when the sermon was over. I thought he could have talked a little more. He was discussing evolution a bit, and I find that debate fascinating. Then I headed up to Sunday School and again had a good time. They are discussing the Apostles Creed, which I don't think I've ever read, but really dug into what every word really means. I like those deep discussions sometimes much more than being preached at. All in all a good day. After I got home it's been the normal go to the grocery store, do laundry, etc.

So that was my weekend, doesn't sound like much, but felt really good. I just wish it wasn't over tomorrow. I have a work meeting that I'm kind of dreading. Oh well, it'll be over soon enough.

Month 4, Day 4

Not a whole lot happening yet. I had a really good weekend with our Superbowl party. We ended up having 9 people over and had way too much food. That was the beginning of the end for me. I stuffed myself and it was not a pretty sight. Then I tried to get back on the diet track on Monday. I did fine at work, but by the time I was ready to go home, I had no intention of going to the gym. I had to have chocolate and wanted it NOW! I ended up eating about 4 slices of pizza, a king size Hershey's with Almonds, a couple handfuls of Goldfish crackers, and a whole pint of Ben & Jerry's cookie dough ice cream. I think PMS hit with a vengence. I made sure to indulge. I'm trying to do better now, because that did not do good things to my diet and I'd rather not destroy a month's work of weight loss in a 4-day binge just because it's that time of the month. This can't happen every month or I'm doomed.

I'm hoping February will be a good month. I could find out I'm pregnant within days after my birthday, so that would be cool. If the baby doesn't happen, I hope it's a good month in other ways. We're a month into the new year and I haven't done all that great on my resolutions. Dieting was one of them, and I'd done good on that until this weekend and this week. I also said I'd be going back to church and haven't made it yet, I'm planning on going this week though, so hopefully, that will get me back on track there. Does it ever seem like you spend your whole life trying to catch up and get "back on track"? I guess if we were always on top of things, we wouldn't have a chance to grow. That's what I want to do. Grow. That should be my new goal. Whatever happens this year, I want it to make me a better person.

Month 4, Day 1 - Ok, this time I mean it.

Yesterday was a fluke, but AF did arrive today. Arriving today, officially gives me a 12 day lutal phase. That makes me happy. All the same positive feelings as yesterday, with a correction that Erica and I are now 2 days apart. Glad it happened this morning, so I don't have to sit around all day waiting. Now if these cramps would just go away....