I Can Do This All Day

Yes I am on my computer, and yes, I am way behind deadline on my screenplay. I'm doing this instead:






It's sick. I haven't spent this much time internet obsessing on a topic since that time I online stalked every ex-girlfriend of every guy I've ever dated.

It's a Vicious Cycle

This last year of missed conceptions is like nothing I've ever experienced. But if you held a gun to my head (please don't do that) I would say it most resembles very shitty dating. Also known as dating.

Phase 1: Getting Your Period is Getting Dumped

You can feel that you are about to be dumped, but you hope it’s your own paranoid brain playing tricks on you like that time you thought your next door neighbor was the unibomber and called the FBI. In your defense, he had a very suspicious beard. The about to get dumped signs are everywhere. His calls have become infrequent and perfunctory and he’s working late almost every night of the week. The last time you were together, he didn’t even glance away from his iphone when you took your bra off- and you have a great rack. Then, you get confirmation- he’s working late alright, with his new assistant. And the punch in the gut is she’s taller, thinner and younger than you. Oh, and she’s French.

Phase Two: Pre- Ovulation is a Sexy New Guy to Help You Get Over the Last Jerkhole

You're feeling a roller coaster of emotions. “It’s all my fault,” “Why did I fail like this?” “Is this happening to me because my ass is too flat?” "I suck!" There is a lot of crying in bed. You would cry other places too, if you left your bed. But you don't.

After a few days, things begin to look up. You’re still raw from the recent dumping, but you've washed your smelly parts and rejoined society. You even laughed at someone's stupid joke. That someone also happens to be the really dreamy fellow that you met at Starbucks this morning. And the best part- he asked you on a date. A proper date even. He didn't grumble out of the side of his mouth that you two should "like totally get some beers together sometime or whatever," and he did not once call you "dude." This could be promising.

Of course you're still feeling bruised from the last let down, but this new fellow has the COOLEST EYES. You gear yourself up with some Stuart Smalley style positive self talk in the mirror and put yourself out there again. Sure this guy could turn out to be a sex offender, but he could also be the “One,” and are you going to let him pass you by because you're a wimp?

Of course not, now go get that upper lip waxed girl!

Phase 3: Ovulation is a Great First Date.

It’s not just a great first date, it’s possibly the best first date you’ve ever been on. The two of you get each other’s corny jokes, you both love obscure German vampire movies and you belong to the same 24 hour fitness. Basically, you're soul mates.

You are floating on a cloud of happiness and feel bright and shiny like a new penny. A very horny penny.

Phase 4: Potential Implantation is Waiting By the Phone

You spend the first week between being confident, then pretty confident, then not so sure that he will call. How could he not? You two are great together!

He’s going to call, he’s definitely going to call. Oh god, what if he doesn’t call? He might not call.

The second week comes and you’ve totally lost your mojo. You go over the date in your mind, analyzing it from all possible angles. You berate yourself for bringing up that time you were briefly committed (voluntarily!) to an institution and that you legitimately like Norah Jones.

Your friends tell you that “He could still call.” But you’ve already begun the grieving process of another failure. You start consuming more chocolate than usual and sleep for ten hours a day. You resign yourself to a life of spinsterhood and consider taking up knitting.

The Two- Week Wait

I was just perusing the internet and I came across an article titled “Two- Week Wait Survival Tips.” I came across this because I googled “two- week wait survival tips.”

If there is someone out there reading this who doesn’t know what the two- week wait is, or tww as those in the trenches call it, it is the time period that elapses between trying to make a baby and in my case so far, finding out you didn’t make a baby.

I am currently in the early stages of my very own two-week wait. I’m still a few days from obsessing over every bodily function and emotion as a possible pregnancy symptom:

Here are some of my google search greatest hits:

“is insomnia a sign of pregnancy?”

“are very smelly farts a pregnancy symptom?”

“uncontrollable crying, early pregnancy symptom”

“I feel like roller skating, could I be pregnant?”

But I’m not too early in my tww to not obsess over so many other things.

Let’s see if this article is actually going to help me…

Two-Week Wait Survival Tip #1 – Stop Obsessing Over “Pregnancy Symptoms”
I’m sorry, who wrote this? My aunt who told me that I can always adopt?

Asking a woman who is in her two-week wait to not obsess over pregnancy symptoms is like asking a woman who is pregnant to NOT look smug. She is simply incapable of succeeding at this task.

Two-Week Wait Survival Tip #2 – Keep Busy

Oh, Don’t worry, I’m busy. I’m busy tracking my PH levels, meditating to my fertility mantra, and googling IUI success rates. When I’m not doing those things, I’m building a time machine in my basement so I can go retrieve eggs from my 24- year old self.

Two-Week Wait Survival Tip #3 – Schedule Obsessing Time

They suggest scheduling fifteen minutes once or twice a day for obsessing. How about I try for fifteen minutes twice a day to NOT obsess?

Two-Week Wait Survival Tip #4 – Get Support from People who Understand

I am 100% behind this tip. I joined an online support group and I can’t tell you how much this has helped. Knowing you are not alone in your transformation from a reasonably sane (with the help of anti-depressants) woman into a baby obsessed emotion machine is a HUGE relief. You need the kind of women who will inquire about your follicle size, your husband’s motility percentages and your most recent RE appointment with the kind of intense fervor that can only be provided by someone who has gone through this or is going through it now. Seek those women out either online or in your community and make them your friends.

I didn’t read the rest of the article because I got sidetracked researching IVF vacations in the Czech Republic, but I do have some tips of my own.

1. Always have on hand some high quality dark chocolate. I recommend Lindt Mint Dark.

2. Fashion Magazines. Vogue is my favorite because I want shiny pictures of pretty people and an article about a model from the Sudan who went back to her homeland and opened an orphanage.

3. Watch Bridget Jones Diary.

4. Yoga, yoga, yoga, yoga.
Here are five yoga poses for fertility that feel yummy.
http://www.yoga4fertility.com/yoga4fertility/poses.html

5. Drink ridiculous amounts of wine. Of course we can't do that. But oh to dream...