i + i = beginnings

It’s been months since I’ve written. I was in a dark, confused, bleak, and lifeless place. You know sometimes when you can’t feel and if you do it’s nothing but negative emotion driving more negative emotion. The place between nothing and existing. I just didn’t care. I just didn’t know what I was doing, what I stood for anymore or even who I was.
When you lose something that has a heartbeat that you never even met or lose a soulmate; I believe my grandmother and I were connect far beyond blood. Our spirits were intertwined. I keep hearing her say to me in her lifeless, breathless conversation on the day before she left her physical body “are you going to try again, I hope you try again”. She was the mother of all mothers. She bore 8 children. How she ever became the most spiritual, calm, loving, non-judge mental human being in the planet is a mystery.
She was born into a strict Italian family. Her mother a raging alcoholic, her father intwined in the mafia. I don’t think my grandfather was into anything major but I do know he had to flee NYC and not return out if fear he would be killed. My grandmother was treated like a slave in her own home. Relatives in Italy and her neighbors didn’t even know she existed. Her mother was controlling, abusive and wicked. During the Great Depression my grandmother worked job the factories through an illness that she in her later life found out was actually tuberculosis. Every penny she made her mother took from her. Which is ironic because my gran other sacrificed her entire life to give to so many. I could write about her forever. The selflessness is endless.
She always had a dream of winning the lottery and the night before she died, as my mother helped her frail, week body to the bathroom, she muttered” I wish I could remember where I put the numbers” my mother realizing what she had said consoled her and said “don’t worry mom. I have the numbers.
You see I want to be as amazing as my grandmother and mother are when I’m a mother. I am fearful that I won’t be. That ill turn out damaging my child beyond repair. I’m also fearful that I won’t carry another child to term or that this last chance at IVF won’t work. The thoughts can paralyze me to the point At times I’m not even sure what I want.
In this moment I am moving forward with preparing for another round of IVF. I met with a naturopathic doctor and will be starting a metabolic detox tomorrow and in 2 weeks will start acupuncture to increase our success rate at conceiving a healthy baby or 2.
From all my drug use and the toxins of our environment I believe this detox is essential to giving us the best chance. I want to feel healthy as well as be healthy. It is the combination of the mind, body and spirit that will get me through this IVF cycle.

~ Jessica (cleansing)

i + i = faith

It has been a while since I have put my fingers to the keys.  I have had life coming at my left and right.  It’s life on life’s terms, not on Jessica’s terms.  Since I last wrote I lost a friend, he passed away at home.  He wasn’t just a friend he was my hairstylist.  I know in my last post I put that I hated my hair but the truth was that I actually began to love it.  He was a talented and gifted person, and he lost his life too soon.  Nobody really knows the reason, but my assumption is that it was related to the disease of addiction in some way.  And the most tragic but not tragic was the death of my grandmother on January 5th, Valentina Antoinette (Pannoni) McGrail.  The most loving, caring, kind, compassionate person that I have ever known.  She lived a long life, she was 96.

So just in case you missed it, I lost the baby in October, lost a friend in December and lost my Grandmother in January.  On top of it Phil is doing his interferon and while  I love him, it is a difficult process to go through, as it is having an effect on his mood.  Lots of stress in the Dunn home, trying to adjust to the ups and downs, both of us.  In addition to all of this our puppy, while cute and cuddly, continues to pee in the house.

My new thing is asking myself, what would Valentina do?  The reason for this is because my faith had been waning and with the passing of my grandmother all of the signs that a higher power is working in my life were present.  She is with me and I know this now.  That whole come to believe thing well it has finally happened for me.I believe, I really do believe.

During the last conversation I had with my grandmother, where she was actually able to talk, because the day she died I did the talking and she the listening, she asked me when Phil & I would be trying for a baby again.  I let her know in March or April we would try again.  And that is exactly what we are going to do.  Although I have fears of not being a good enough mother, or afraid that it won’t work and I will be led down the disappointment road again, I ask myself what would Valentina do? And what I come up with is she wouldn’t give up.  She never gave up.  Even in her darkest hour she never shed a tear, she never complained and she always asked how everyone else was.  She was so selfless.  That is the type of person I want to be.

Today I am heading back to Weight Watchers to find out my fate.  I am sure that I will be a paying customer again.  A friend of mine says that we “eat our feelings”.  Well I am not willing to keep eating, so I have to get on that scale and face my reality because that is what Valentina would do!

~ Jessica (restart)

i + i = life and death

Please forgive me for the title of this post.  See the thing is while I am excited about this pregnancy I still want to contain my joy for a little while longer. Being pregnant is definitely a blessing and a miracle.  I was pregnant once before, at the wrong time in my life, and I miscarried.  There was life and death all in one week.  I was excited back then when I took that test, and I even cried.  I never thought I could get pregnant so I knew then that it was possible.  I asked that ever pressing question, why?  Why did I miscarry?  Of course these things happen and when I look back on it, it was a blessing is disguise.  Phil and I were definitely not ready to take on a child at the time.  I myself was just getting my life on track and could barely take care of myself.  So now here we are pregnant!!  The nurse called and for a second one tear fell from my eyes.  I was in TJ Maxx my favorite store of all time when she called.  When I called Phil to tell him, he congratulated me!  Funny I know, and I said well congratulations to you too Mr. Dunn.  We laughed.  He later sent me a text reiterating and I quote… “We’re having a baby!!”  Everyone around us is so overjoyed and happy.  It makes me a little uneasy because I want to be able to not talk about this information with everyone but I set myself up for it by letting people know we were doing IVF and that made breaking the news to everyone later on impossible.  And I, I want to see the blood work doubling. I want to see those HCG levels going up.  Once I do then I will feel more relief.

You see my life has been marked by a series of life and death situations.    For instance when my sister delivered my niece, Josephine, the following day Phil’s mother lost her battle with lung cancer.  When Phil & I bought our home, the same day my father was admitted to the hospital into ICU due to his already present heart problem, and things were not looking good (he recovered but it was a good 2 weeks before he was release from the hospital).  When we went in for our transfer, we found out that one of our friends girlfriends was taken off of assisted breathing and last week she lost her battle with cancer.  So as you can see where there is life there is also death.  It is just a natural part of life. Something we cannot avoid!  I know, I know, I sound morbid but I don’t mean this in a morbid way at all.  I am a skeptic, and that isn’t always the best way to be but its just what I have become from past experiences.

Phil will be starting is Interferon in a few weeks.  This also makes me a little uneasy.  Not knowing how this will effect him scares me.  Are we crazy for doing this at the same time or what??!!   I can’t be stressed out, and he can’t be stressed out but yet we are doing 2 very stressful things.  And did I mention that my family doesn’t know about his Hep status.  We chose not to tell them, it was something we both discussed out of fear of judgement.  We also discussed that depending upon how he feels we may have to break the news to them.  But that bridge will be crossed when we get there.

Last night I had awful pains in my stomach, but soon realized it must be gas.  It frightened me. I had all these terrify thoughts running through my head.  And did I mention that I have a cold.  UGGGHhh… Not sleeping very well, sore throat, cough and now sneezing and there isn’t a thing I can do about because I am pregnant!!  The woman at the blood clinic told me that being sick is a good sign because when you are pregnant your immune system is down, and boy was she right. I am pregnant!  Woot Woot!

I want these children more than anything in the world.  I have waited what seems like an eternity for this moment.  There is also fear.  I am obsessed right now with looking up pregnancy foods and want to be sure that I am eating the right way.  That what I consume is good for my unborn children (child).  I found this great tracker on the USDA website called Super Tracker.  It helps you track what you are eating and graphs all the food groups out for you.  It tells me I should be eating 2200 calories and I think that is way too much!  I think it may be a little off.  But I like the graph it gives you.  It breaks everything down by categories and lets you know if you are eating right.

Jessica (aware)

i + i = agony

Agony that is the word that I will use to describe the after effects of the Progesterone in Oil shots.  My ass is really super sore.  The first night I acted like a complete baby but I am a pro now that I am going onto day 4.  Only day 4!  From what I am reading it is my understanding that these shots will go on and on and on.  Its more like torture.  The shot it self doesn’t really hurt, i numb it with ice first.  Then I take a hot compress and keep the area warm for about ten minutes.  If my ass feels like this now I can’t imagine what is will feel like 10 days from now, or weeks from now. Ugghhhh.  How will I exercise when I feel like I have already done a billion squats.  Did I mention that my attitude is getting a little edgy?  Or that my sleep is becoming limited?  I guess this is just a pre test for when I am actually pregnant.

I was on stand by yesterday morning for my transfer.  The nurse was scheduled to call at 9:00 am .  It is funny how my disease of addiction can play tricks on me.  As I am reading through the list of things to do on the day of transfer there is a line that says, take valium 1 hour before your arrive.  Hummm I don’t recall getting a valium.  So I walk down the hall to my box of drugs (yes a box) and look through it very carefully.  I think maybe they forgot to tell me.  My nurse calls and she tells me the transfer will not be until Monday at 10:30, a day 5 transfer and to arrive at 10:00am with a full bladder.  I ask her about the valium, and she explains they don’t do that anymore.  My mind says, well there goes that freebee.  So I decide I have to get to my meeting that I normally go to.  Instantly I am back in my old behavior of anxiety.  I change like 3 times, and head out the door.  I really need to be there even if I get there for the last 15 minutes.   I am the last person to share, a much needed hey I am here and I still need to be here.  Love those people, can’t do this alone at all!  I am so grateful that I know that today.

We went to visit my family yesterday.  I love them with all of my heart.  My parents, my grandmother, my sister, 3 of her children, my aunt and then 3 other aunts & an uncle that stopped by.  There is never a dull moment, and always great conversation and laughs. My father, and step son were a party to my agony of an injection.  My mother couldn’t watch.  They found it rather amusing, at least my father did.  My step son thinks its kind of funny too!  Ha ha I am so not laughing.    Then Phil makes a funny, and reminds me that his family has twins in it.  Yeah twins.  So what does this mean?  I could have up to 4 children in my belly.  What are the chances of that? Like 1 in a trillion?

We found our new puppy, she is 1 years old and will be traveling from Texas.  She is a yellow lab.  We will keep our fingers crossed that she and our Shadow get along. We are very excited to add her to our ever growing family.

Wish me luck tomorrow.

~ Jessica (painful)

i + i = Family

Our family consists of Jessica and I, two teenage boys ages 17 and 15, and our Dog Shadow. We are trying to add two more to the list. The baby that my wife and I are doing IVF for and we are also looking for another dog to keep our Shadow company. It’s a lot harder than you think to find a female Labrador who is around 2 years old to adopt. The ones that we like are either quickly taken or out of state. We both have faith that we will find a companion for our Shadow. He looks so lonely and it’s probably going to be worse when the baby comes because he is very attached to my wife. I have to find him a friend. I’ll keep praying to my Higher Power. Time will tell.

~ Phil

i + i = Early riser

I decided that I needed to get up this morning, early riser. Our dog has been depressed lately.  We haven’t been home all that much so I promised myself that I would get up and spend sometime with him.  I got my usual coffee in bed, although I am trying to cut back, if not eliminate the drug from my daily routine.  I only had one cup yesterday, compared to my 4 to 6 cups.  Yikes!  That is way to much, and on top of that I add splenda, another extremely toxic man made item.

We took a little bit shorter walk than usual.  I hadn’t exercise in a week and now I am starting this treatment and want to make sure that I can do everything in my power to make it a possibility of working.  I have to continue to exercise but not exceed the normal healthy version of it.  I can always take things to the extreme but I worry about gaining weight as I just lost 37 pounds on Weight Watchers.  Dieting is part of my life story as I have flip flopped on weight my entire life.  It is part of my disease and I am trying to make new and healthier choices so I don’t place my insecurities on to my child.  So back to the walk.  I realized how very much the morning is my favorite time of day.  I think I mentioned this before.  Everything is just coming back to life and this morning I saw a fawn standing in someones yard.  We live near woods but not in the woods and it is very peaceful.  We get dear, bears, fox and I even once saw a mountain lion.

The medication from last night made my body ache and I definitely got a pain in my stomach, let’s call it “gas”.  It is a side effect so I don’t envy the people who live with me.  I am sure that this will be the least of the side effects.  But I am staying in the day with it because as my last night post showed my mind is a dangerous place, making mountains out of mole hills in a second!  My husband is pretty amazing, he said he was proud of me.  We lingered with our good byes this morning longer than normal, embracing and loving each other reassuring each other that we will be ok.

Off to make my breakfast, my favorite meal of the day.

~Jessica (content)