Whimsically Crazy

First I read an article on caffeine and reduced fertility, and thought, well this won’t be fun… I’m not a real caffeine addict (well, more the I-can-quit-any-time-I-want variety) but I am a tea addict. And by tea I mean specifically black tea with milk and sugar (and by black tea I mean cheap stuff like Lipton that I grew up on), no substitutes.

Then I followed that article with Study Shows Tea Increases Fertility.

The results were pretty interesting. They discovered that women were 27% more likely to conceive if they drank tea regularly and those who drank 2 sodas a day had 20% less change of becoming pregnant. Coffee had no significant impact.

Contradiction!

But interesting too… I might be doing something right without knowing it.

However the annoying thing was the article also said, “But as long as you’re being reasonable with the types and amounts of tea and caffeine, it seems like a pretty simple thing you can do that might just boost your chances at getting pregnant.” without any mention of what is the right or wrong type and amount of tea, given the variety of teas and things people call “tea” out there. Earl Gray good or bad? Green tea? Orange Peko?

(On further research it mentions “two or more cups of ‘ordinary’ tea” – YES I’m totally doing something right!)

The most annoying thing though was the comments from a couple women saying that tea is a bad idea for them now since they don’t want to get pregnant. Come on, if you don’t want to get pregnant, you have more important things to focus on than what you’re drinking, and unless you’re one of those super fertile people whose bodies laugh at birth control, it should overpower any effects of that tea habit!

I realized for the first time that I actively dislike condoms right now, because even though I’m still on the pill they implicitly say that we’re not trying…

When I am someday interesting enough to write a memoir, the working title is Baking Cookies is Better Than Lithium. Never mind that I haven’t been on lithium in many, many years – it’s practically the icon of bi-polar disorder, while no one knows what lamotrigine is who doesn’t have reason to. (It’s primary purpose is an anti-seizure medication, which also works as a mood stabilizer.)

This assumes I eventually get famous enough from making cookies to be worthy of having my story told, because there are plenty of people who beat me to writing books about being crazy alone. I used to have thoughts of writing some kind of humorous story about living with Ulcerative Colitis, since while it pretty much tops the list of unsexy diseases, there are the occasional funny moments (usually in retrospect) if you can look at it from the right mindset.

Unfortunately people have beaten me to that one as well.

The only uniqueness I’d have going for me then is writing as a woman. The couple books I’ve read were written by men, and while of course they’d be writing from their personal experience, something about the writing gave the impression that they assumed their audience would only be other men as well. Much like the assumption that everyone in an online game is a ‘he’ because “there are no girls on the internet” I wonder if these men fell to the the myth that “girls don’t poop” and therefore no women would have IBD.

My tentative remission lasted a little under two weeks. I’ve tried not to be discouraged by that, being that it’s much less likely to be a magic switch as a cycle where the window of ‘normal’ gets larger each time.

However I’ve decided to seek out a new gastroenterologist for a second opinion. At least I think that’s what it is – I’ve always thought a ‘second opinion’ is when you don’t trust the initial diagnosis.

Doctor 1: You have lung cancer.
Patient: I want a second opinion.
Doctor 2: It’s just a bad cold, get some rest and drink fluids.
Patient: Good thing I didn’t waste all that money on chemo!

I don’t have enough experience with doctors to want to distrust mine outright, but I have issues with her approach to treatment which has always been to escalate the medications without stopping to question if what I’m already on is doing more harm than good. Now that I’m down to two, as well as the Remicade, she’s wanting me to taper the benign maintenance medication down while continuing on the steroid indefinitely.

Due to all of this I don’t trust her to respect my desire to have a close to drug-free pregnancy as possible.

I got some really exciting news today on the bakery front – the soup place I eat at all the time is interested in my cookies, after I gave them some samples yesterday. The pure giddiness from this happening while I was at lunch, overlapping simultaneously with the day-to-day work stress of the day job, made my head feel like it was going to explode.

Now my excitement’s been tempered because it feels like this whole job thing is a mental roadblock I need to get past before I can focus on anything else. I’m wondering how Andrew isn’t visibly going crazy over waiting for news on his job search. I can’t cite anything horribly bad about my day but yet I’m having trouble dragging myself out of bed in the morning to face it lately. I’m hoping after dealing with Impatient Dog Guy again tomorrow, who I’m expected to give my cell phone number to so he can impatiently call me while I drive to Customs, I’ll be able to let work mentally stay at work again for a while. Or at least the weekend.

Andrew pointed out that I essentially posted that I’m off my meds, followed by radio silence, which isn’t a good idea given the purpose of this blog. Still no crazier, just the same amount of crazy. Mostly I-want-away-from-this-job crazy, but no pill can fix that kind of thing in the first place. I kind of envy the people who can have the ‘it’s just the 8 hours that pays the bills’ attitude and not let those 8 hours feel like it consumes their life.

Actually this 5 Things Nobody Tells You About Having a Career made me feel like I’m getting the disadvantages of a ‘career’ without the benefits, or the benefits of a go-home-and-forget-it job.

Speaking of careers, we’re waiting to hear back from Andrew’s last interview. I told him when he gets a job we’re going to have celebratory baby sex!

And speaking of Cracked articles, I thought I had myself pretty desensitized to all the horrors of pregnancy, but this 7 Terrifying Things They Don’t Tell You About Pregnancy threw some new ones at me. Andrew already knew about the hairy nipple thing though so he’s more prepared than I am.

Officially drug free today! (The drug that counts anyway – still popping 7 pills/day for UC.)

Now things get interesting… or I have a very boring blog.

About socks.

Whimsically sockless!

When I went to the endo specialist I realized that he was the first doctor to see my piercing. That makes my NP the second, and neither of them were phased by it in the least, unlike Judgmental Nurse.

I feel like I should have some kind of news or revelation to report but my cholesterol and blood pressure just aren’t that interesting to reflect on. She gave me some advice I already know (timing of sex, ovulation windows), the name of a fertility tracking web site, and an interesting fact that I didn’t know – some women are more fertile right after going off the pill since the sudden stop of hormones triggers the body into ovulation time.

However I’m still on the pill… but with Arizona’s new law defining pregnancy as beginning before conception, maybe I can get excited about my next period after all!

The most useful advice was to work backwards by finding the birthing center I want to use first and then look at the providers they work with. She said to start now but I’m never sure if “now” means “now” or “soon”, “when we start trying”, etc.

On the UC front I’m tentatively wanting to declare I’m doing better but as usual afraid to commit or jinx myself. The problem is when I find myself thinking, “I haven’t had any diarrhea since a week ago!” and then realize that’s still not something a normal person says…

Also on the topic of last week, the weird baby dreams have apparently started. Oh boy, I know other people’s dreams are as interesting as other people’s toenail clippings, but be glad I’m not writing about those too.

Dream 1: Andrew and I were having Moira’s twin, and were going to name her Moira as well. Now the million and one plot holes this brings up can only be explained by ‘dream logic’. Like, how exactly were we having the biological twin of someone else’s already toddler child? And how did I know they were twins, and that they were going to look like close sisters, but not identical twins? I did think at the end to ask Andrew if he was sure it was a good idea to give them the same name, and then I woke up.

Dream 2: I was watching from the third person, a couple driving around trying to find a church to have their baby in. I wanted to tell them that I think they were confused because people typically get married in a church and give birth in a hospital. (Typically meaning that’s how you’d expect to see it portrayed on TV, not what is really expected, since I did and plan to do neither.)

Dream 3: My yearly exam with my doctor. It was in a large room with lots of other patients on tables, which didn’t bother me so much as despite telling her that I wanted to talk, she disappeared immediately after finishing the exam. I spent the remainder of the dream trying to find her and eventually crying to a nurse explaining that I was hoping to get pregnant soon and wanted to talk about next steps. The nurse told me something like, “Oh lots of people are on medications. Just do it.”

My actual yearly exam is on Tuesday and I’m taking the day off work. Partially because I expect it to be somewhat like my last appointment with the information overload I don’t want to be trying to sort out at work, and partially because I just want an excuse to take a day off.

Questions to ask:

– I’m hoping to start trying to get pregnant soon. Is there I need to know that I haven’t already read on the internet?
– Same for the medications I’m still on – can I trust what I’ve already read?
– Updates on my recent medical history – laproscopy, replace Von Willebrand’s with unnamed platelet disorder.
– What is my blood type?
– ???

I cannot call last week a long week – it was a perfectly normal-feeling length.  And I can’t call it a bad week without calling out picky whiny things.  It was just a mentally exhausting, totally ‘meh’ feeling week that needed to end, with a comfy blanket and the TV.  Even at the coffee shop I had no ability to put words on screen, and once I ran out of distractions it felt just like clock watching at work.

I can’t do justice in writing to the panic I was put through at work over our insurance potentially changing and confusion over when the out-of-pocket caps reset.  However it started with an awkwardly personal list of questions:

Hi all,

We have a medical insurance renewal coming up, and in order to keep costs down, and optimize coverage, I was hoping you would take a minute this morning to answer the below questions, so I can make an educated decision about the plan to choose going forward…

1.        Our deductible is currently $750/ year.  Do you normally meet that deductible amount in a year’s time?
2.       Our copay amount is currently $30/office visit, or $45/emergency or surgeon visit.   How many copays do you generally have in a year?
3.       Our maximum out of pocket is currently $3000 yearly.  Do you generally meet this maximum out of pocket each year?
4.       Prescriptions are $10 /prescription for generic meds.  Generally how many prescriptions do you fill a year?
5.       Do you have any major medical expenses coming up?
6.       Do you have any major dental work coming up?
7.       Do you have any comments about the medical/dental/vision coverage we currently have that you would like to share with me, to help me make the best choices?

Please take a moment and answer these this morning, as it will help me with the meeting I have at 10am today with the insurance broker.

I expected her to take my estimated 70 prescriptions filled a year as a typo.

I had the rule that Andrew has to be out of school before we have kids – this was decided when he was working at Microsoft so it wasn’t about money, but because while he’s in school, school was priority (as it should be). However when it was time for me to go off my meds I needed to know that I can be priority when necessary, able to pull him away from his computer to just cuddle and watch a movie if necessary and tend to a “meh” kind of mood before it escalated to something worse.

So I found myself wondering if I should test him that night just to see if I could. But the couch time was what I needed, cuddling optional. I also realized that Breaking Bad is not a show to watch to relax.

Saturday – I’ve always hated those anti-depressant commercials (I think Cymbalta is the offender I have in mind) with the soft, soothing voice trying to tell me what it feels like to be depressed. I’ve always been confused by the idea that depression is things other than actually feeling depressed.

But still feeling no motivation to do anything, I’d have wanted to just sleep the time away if that didn’t just bring me closer to going back to work. ‘Loss of interest in activities or hobbies once pleasurable’ – does this mean I was depressed? ‘—including sex’ – does this mean I wasn’t depressed if I still found sex fun?

Does this mean I’m overthinking normal mood variations again?

Does this mean maybe it’s just a symptom of catching Andrew’s cold, the first time I’ve been “normal” sick in years?

We got takeout Indian food, watched movies, and I got the cuddling I didn’t have to ask for. Recharged after, but not yet ready for, another week of work…

Also I had just decided that I’m feeling impatient over the baby thing just because I’m impatient to know that I can. If there was a test I could take that says, “yep you’re fertile” I’d be relieved and content for the moment. (It doesn’t help that I’m reading things that remind me there could be a problem before we’ve even tried.) However after yet another pregnancy announcement I realized I’m just plain impatient and wanting to get on with the baby thing ourselves! I was actually a little disappointed at the condom, even though I’m still on the pill, hoping for the chance that I’d ‘accidentally’ get pregnant and not have to worry any more.

I wonder if it would help to role-play as teenagers and say things like, “I hope my parents don’t come home right now,” and “I hope I don’t get pregnant, my dad would kill me!”

Maybe next time I’ll try, “I hope the condom doesn’t break, I don’t have any morning after pills!”

I had to drag myself to the gym twice last week. It felt like a chore, or an errand, something that could (or even should) be put off until tomorrow. Of course after I went I felt better, or at least better about myself. Then I spent a day working myself up to going this week before remembering that the community center is closed until the 8th. Unfortunately this means I’ve not gotten any exercise because I just don’t feel motivated to claim the TV and DDR or whatnot after work, except for baking cookies which apparently burns 150 calories an hour.

The first day last week, I was on the elliptical facing myself in the mirror and I saw an image of ‘the fat girl at the gym’. At least the fat girl is at the gym, right? But I’m pretty sure if I could have shown that image to my teenage self I would have become anorexic or something.

In contrast, I am really enjoying seeing shape and firmness come to my arms and shoulders.

Last week I found out my boss called us all fat. Friday afternoon the few of us left in the office were sitting around talking because they didn’t feel like working. Talk turned to the boss and our accounting person told us he was questioning a credit card charge for an office birthday cake and said, “You guys don’t need that anyway, you’re all fat.”

I’m not supposed to tell him that I know this.

Makes me want to eat a brownie in his face.

Baking is one thing that seems to be relaxing me and making me forget about the days going crazy at work right now. Andrew suggested it might be my replacement mood stabilizer.

Swordfish tastes even better when it’s forbidden.

So far tapering off my meds has been rather anti-climatic. I almost want something to happen to prove I’m not making the whole thing up. I haven’t even bothered to (re)announce this blog to my friends to keep a watch on me – I don’t feel interesting enough yet.

Jason came over to discuss business plans tonight. I’m going to be working for him, with my bakery name as a trade name, until I’m ready to take off on my own. Now this is getting real too.

Scariest part is I’m still holding out for that magic remission to come. Too soon to tell… Codeine sorts of throws an artificial normal into the works.

Last year to some extent was the year of body modification. I got both the piercing and tattoo I’d had in mind for over ten years, and I at least bought the boxes of hair dye that have been sitting in my bathroom. The real body modification, that is getting my body in shape and losing weight, is still a work in progress but I can at least see some shape to my arms.

Friday night I finally broke open the bottle and bleached two strips in my hair. Saturday I added the purple.

The dying:

We were calling the aluminum-hair look “fashionably paranoid”.

The purple:

Taking that first picture and posting it to Facebook was actually a challenge to myself. I don’t like having my picture taken, but I want there to be pictures of me. I realized at my high school summer at art school, when we were saying goodbye and taking pictures, that if I wanted to be remembered I had to be in people’s pictures. I’m trying to remind myself that very few people are naturally photogenic, and I only judge pictures of myself harshly. I have to resist trying to color-correct the red out of my face. There I am, it’s me on a weekend, exactly how my friends already see me.

When having a digital camera was a new thing to me, I carried my camera everywhere, and made it known that anyone was free to grab my camera and take pictures. That was the biggest draw to a digital camera – no wasting film! This was back when I was dating Gryphon who was more likely to take pictures than Andrew, who will take a camera on vacation and never unpack it. So with quantity there was a greater chance of being a picture or two of me I actually liked.

I love pregnancy and breastfeeding and all of those kinds of pictures, and I want there to be pictures of me. I’ve told this to Andrew, who will probably need some nudging to remember at first. (For that matter, this goes to anyone I know – take pictures as long as I have control of them!)

Tomorrow I can have caffeine again – yay!