TMI

This post isn't about veterinary medicine. 

In a few posts, I've mentioned some things about trying to start a family and where that is going. Unfortunately, it still is going no where.

Joe and I have been together for over 7 1/2 years and married for one. We're ready for a family. Add in the fact that I'm 30 and starting to freak out about the fact that I don't have kids. Everything else (almost, I'd still like a house of my own) has come together-husband, career. So yeah, we're ready.

I stopped taking birth control like last August or September and thought that I would just let things happen as they will. Nothing happened. In fact, I didn't even have a period after stopping birth control. I wasn't too worried. For several years prior to starting birth control, I didn't have a period through the fall or winter. It was actually very convenient. In February, I went to the OB/GYN for just a yearly exam and mentioned this fact to her. She wasn't too worried because I told her that normally by the end of February or March, I normally started again. She also assured me not to worry about getting pregnant. That for most people, it took a year of trying and not to be too worried. 

By April, I hadn't started yet. So I called the doctor (actually a nurse practitioner-a google search told me I should just call her by her first name unless they introduced themselves as something else) (On an vaguely related topic, everytime I introduce myself as Dr.Leslie, I die a little inside. But it doesn't stop me from doing it.), and told her. I went back down and had a thyroid level and prolactin level checked, I peed in a cup for a pregnancy test and was put on progestrone (provera) for five days. 

I took the progesterone, blamed it for some weight gain and started a period like a good little normal woman. After about ten days, it was done and I thought/hoped all would be good. Then a month went by, then five weeks, then six weeks and then I went back to the doctor...um...nurse practitioner. 

NOW...I am to take progesterone for 12 days a month for the next five months give or take some. The idea is to hopefully trick my body into cycling normally once I stop the progesterone. I can stop it whenever. If from there I don't get a period, I'm to see an actual gynecologist or go to a fertility specialist. 

So this is my plan: August, September, October, November and December (December being optional)-take progesterone. January and February let my body do its thing. (Hopefully do its thing.) March, April, May, and June try to get pregnant. Have baby following winter-this works best for me (i.e. no farm calls in the icy cold) and for my boss (she told me so...I'm pretty sure she was serious). Of course, if I would get pregnant before that...well, that's fine too. If I don't get pregnant in that time frame, as long as I have my period, that's not great but acceptable. I'll probably start calculating my ovulation and things like that but won't get to excited. If by some stroke of bad luck, I don't have my period in January/February, then I'll go to the doctor. Probably not jumping into the whole fertility specialist thing just yet. 

I'll be honest. I'm not liking where this is going. I'm not liking the idea that my body can't get its shit together long enough to fulfill its one most basic urge. I'm not liking the idea that I might have to do fertility treatments of any kind no matter how basic. I'm not declaring myself infertile just yet. Its probably just some sort of flukey thing and everything will work out. I feel bad for women that really are infertile. I'm not ready to lump myself into that group because I know there are people that are having much more problems than I am having right now. Eventually, I might be there but right now, I just have messed up hormones. And I need to lose some weight. (This came from my nurse practitioner as something that might help.) 

Also, across the street from the doctor's office which is really a doctors' complex in front of the hospital, there are several cemeteries. However, this time some pro-life group chose to put a thousand plus little blue and little pink crosses in the lawn representing a day's worth of aborted babies. I find this in extremely poor taste. While I don't think that this office performs abortions (at least not when they are elective), I still think that its in poor taste...what about all the women that can't have a baby that see that? What about all those women that miscarry that see those crosses? What about all those women that have their babies die and have to continue to carry them for days? Did anyone think about that? I'm normally not a politically correct person, I'm normally all for free speech and think people are too sensitive. But seriously, use your heads sometimes and be sensitive.