How writing a journal can help heal, grow and thrive

November 1, 201511 Comments

This month I am challenging myself to write a blog post every day as part of National Blog Posting Month. And without a doubt, it will be a challenge for me! I am not a natural ‘writer’. I am a scientist! I like facts, I like being to the point. I rarely read fiction, I have little interest in poetry or story-telling. But I recognise the benefits of writing a blog and so this is why I am pushing myself to try it for a month.

My blog is like my personal journal that I choose to share with others. The benefits of writing a journal are well founded in the treatment of depression, stress and anxiety disorders. In addition, journaling can help with day-today problem solving and clarify the mind. Dealing with infertility means dealing with all of these issues as well; so as well as taking medications to overcome the physical, blogging is my way to overcome the mental.

It has been scientifically proven that people who write about their deepest thoughts and feelings about events that upset them have stronger immunity and visit their doctor half as often as those who write only about trivial events. So I shall also be challenging myself not just to write something every day, but write something deeper.

I’m not sure what the coming month holds for my blog posts but I am excited to try it!

You can’t know where you are going if you don’t know where you are

Happy NaBloMoPo-ing everyone!

Find more bloggers like me participating in NaBloPoMo here: http://www.blogher.com/are-you-posting-every-day-november-nablopomo-add-your-blog-blogroll-now

IVF round 2 – December/January 2016

October 28, 2015October 28, 20156 Comments

We met for our follow-up appointment with our doctor yesterday. There were no surprises. Which is a good thing! So the plan of attack is a fresh round of IVF…get a couple more embryos frozen:

Schedule a Hysterosalpingogram (HSG – if you would like a refresher what this procedure entails, check out my post from last time here) – I will do this as soon as I start my period (who knows when that will be!!!). It is very unlikely that my fallopian tubes will be blocked, but she wants to be sure. Fair enough. However, I am NOT looking forward to this test. Last time I was completely naive to the potential pain ahead for this particular procedure, now that I know exactly how much it can hurt I’m a wee bit nervous!
Plan to start Birth Control Pills to regulate my cycle in December with an egg retrieval date for early January 16. There is a period of 3 weeks that the embryology lab is closed over the Christmas period. Seriously – how unlucky am I?? Last time my cycle was delayed because the embryology lab was being refurbished. Oh well – I guess everyone needs a holiday.

There is a potential chance we could start Birth Control Pills in November, and do a retrieval before Christmas, but I think it will be close to my 3 month period of ‘no baby making’ because of the methotrexate shot I had affecting fetus development. I have been researching this, and I would be willing to go ahead a week or two earlier because doctors are overly cautious with this 3 month time stamp. As long as I keep taking my folic acid I should have no problems. However, this is something to be discussed once we have a better idea of a) when my period is likely to be and b) assuming my HSG test is all clear!!!

There will be no change to my protocol, perhaps a slight increase in some of the medication dosages to mature more of my eggs. As a reminder from our first round we had 9 eggs retrieved, 6 of these eggs were mature, 4 of these eggs were successfully fertilised by ICSI, 2 good 8 cell embryos were transferred on day 3, and 1 of the 2 embryos made it to Day 5 blastocyst and was frozen. Our doctor mentioned that she would consider waiting to Day 5 for the transfer this time around, especially as our frozen one is Day 5 – she wants them to be the same. We like this plan!

This gives me some time to concentrate on work for a little while, get my body healthy and start growing some strong eggs! What is amazing is what the horrrorscopes says for me next week…

I was already planning on going back on my sugar free, healthy diet next week! Freaky! Sooooo….which old friend should I Skype on Sunday next week and wants to reveal a long-held secret to me??!!!?!

My Mountains Monday Memoirs: Healing Holidays Days 1 to 9

October 27, 2015October 27, 201511 Comments

This is actually a very recent memory! But there there were lots of mountains in this holiday and we pretty much remained at altitude as we spent the majority of it on the Colarado Plateau. So here we go….!

This holiday was never meant to be a healing holiday. We had been planning this road trip for almost a year, we even delayed it from May to October because of the infertility treatment. But we decided to bite the bullet and book it for whatever stage we were at. We were cautious and kept things less adventurous and a little more comfortable just in case I was anywhere up to 5 months pregnant. We didn’t imagine that we would be leaving for this holiday with a cloud of sadness over our heads. But yet despite the sadness, this holiday came at a great time. It has been a chance to reset and refocus. I know not everyone can afford to take the time off work or even have the money to travel afar, but I highly recommend getting away somewhere, switching the phones off and avoiding the rest of the world to help heal the mind.

This road trip was always planned to be epic. And it sure was! Here is a brief run down of our adventure:

Day 1: Excitement sets in (NV). Finished work early (Friday)! Fly to Las Vegas, arrived late and stayed at nearby airport hotel. Teased by the sights and sounds of Vegas!!! There are even slot machines in the airport baggage terminal. Do people really get that addicted?

Day 2: Trippy & Valley of Fire State Park (AZ). Picked up our rental campervan – AKA Trippy! Can you guess why we called her Trippy??!

This was our 'cosy' home for the last two weeks - AKA Trippy.

This was our ‘cosy’ home for our holiday AKA Trippy.

We were upgraded from the small campervan we originally booked – woohoo! When I say upgrade – I mean we got an extra two feet of storage space! Which we were grateful for. Trippy had a table and chairs in the back that converted into a queen size bed and took up the whole width of the van. Cosy. In the boot (trunk), Trippy had a sink, mini refrigerator and gas burner. All that was left to do was sign our lives away on a dotted line and Trippy was ours for 13 days. We were off to our first stop – the Valley of Fire. It truly was like the valley had been set on fire, the rock was a beautiful orange/red in the midst of a green flat plateau.

Over looking the valley of fire

Day 3: Zion National Park (UT). Change of time zone. Travelling five states in 2 weeks that are in different time zones soon became confusing!

We hiked up Angel’s Landing – a challenging climb if you were to have vertigo.

We hiked and scrambled to the top of Angel’s landing

Some people turned around as their fear got the better of them. Chris and I on the other hand love this kind of hike/scramble. It is easy to tell why this park was called Zion.

If you have vertigo this is not a great hike for you!

The view from the top of Angel’s landing

Day 4: Bryce Canyon (UT). The weather turned and the rain came in. Our first disappointment came when we got the phone call from the horse riding tour company that they had to cancel the pony trek. We were gutted because this is something on our bucket list! It is also not a good idea to be in the lower rim of the canyon due to the high risk of flash floods, so we didn’t hike too far down into the canyon either.

Bryce canyon and the Hoo Doos

According to the native Americans the ‘hoodoos’ formed when a tribe who did bad things were turned into stone by Coyote. We don’t know the exact story because the story can only be told during winter time (according to tradition – the park upholds this out of respect for the tradition) – we will just have to go back some day in the winter to find out! Despite the disappointments it was one of the most unique and spectacular places I have ever been to.

Day 5: Grand Canyon North Rim (AZ). The rain followed us, and the clouds too. Our first sneak peak of the Grand Canyon was somewhat disappointing.

A view of Angel’s point on the North Rim – it was pretty cloudy. There was a whole canyon hiding behind this!

We were teased by little breaks in the clouds, but we could not get an impression of its greatness. We waited for three hours at one of the view points for the clouds to break. All of a sudden there was sunshine and we ran to the view point! It wasn’t completely clear, but we could see a bit further down in to the canyon.

Chris got a great shot with the canyon in the clouds

So we gave up and checked into the campsite. This was when I got the phone call from my clinic telling me I should be having weekly blood tests. I felt a bit emotional after this call because it was the first time in days that I had really thought about what the future 9 months wasn’t going to be.

As there was a bar at the Canyon lodge we decided to hike the 1.5 miles from the campsite to the bar just as the sun was setting. As we reached the lodge, we were blessed with the most incredible sunset as the clouds dissipated! It was truly magical – great things come to those who wait came into mind!

Finally! This is what the Grand Canyon looks like!

After our first alcoholic beverage of the holiday – and my first drink in months we hiked in the dark back to Trippy. Chris took some wonderful starlight photos from across the canyon. Just as we made it back it started to tip it down with rain. What an incredible day – full of highs and lows in emotions.

Day 6. Horse Shoe Bend & the Antelope Slot Canyons (AZ). Wow. The drive from the Grand Canyon to Page, Arizona, was spectacular! Along the way we stopped at the Colorado River Horse Shoe Bend. It was busy with tourists, but we were able to sit down for about 30 minutes whilst we waited for the shadows to move out for Chris’s photoshoot he wanted to get. We sat and people watched. So many people literally took a picture and headed back to their car. It made me sad that this amazing feat of nature was not really taken in for all it’s incredible glory. But hey. We can’t all be nature lovers right?!

Horse Shoe Bend in all its glorious colours

Following the incredible drive we arrived at Page where we had booked a Native American tour guide into the Antelope Canyons. The canyon itself was impressive. We were hearded through quickly like sheep. Our tour guide was informative, but the crowds made me sick. Apparently there are many other slot canyons like this in the Native American reservations but this was only one of two open to the public…and it is incredibly popular, apparently over the last year or so business has been booming because of the internet. It’s great that so many people want to appreciate it, but I worry about the conservation of it.

Chris took some beautiful shots of the formations

it’s a guitar….

Day 7. Four Corners and Monument Valley (AZ, UT, CO & NM). We spent most of the day on the road, but managed to stop at the four corners monument…

One limb in each of the four states – CO, UT, NM & AZ

…put all four limbs in each state all at the same time! We also visited Monument Valley which is where a lot of wild west movies have been filmed. It was truly an outstanding park.

Monument valley – everything image you had of a wild western was shaped by this landscape

Sadly there was not enough time to do a hike to one of the ‘monument rocks’ and we couldn’t drive.

Day 8. Mesa Verde National Park (CO). A.M.A.Z.I.N.G. We managed to shake off the crowds, Mesa Verde was a lot quieter, there were no coach tours bugging me (I am completely selfish when it comes to enjoying nature – I want to enjoy it in peace and quiet without Japanese and Korean tourists shouting and selfy-ing everywhere I looked). A lot of Mesa Verde had closed for the season, but we did get a tour round one of the more ‘adventurously located’ settlements of the cliff dwellers. What struck me as really odd was that what we were looking at were rock dwellings that seemed to be from thousands of years ago. But in reality, they were only 800 years old…it was amazing to compare the dwellings in Europe at that time and how different life was for the Puebloans (what I mean is how undeveloped they seemed compared to Europe).

Cliff Dwellings at Mesa Verde

Our tour around one cliff dwelling was a little ‘adventurous’ I was super impressed to see an 87 yr old lady climb this ladder successfully! Go Girl!

We hung around the park to have dinner in our campervan and watched the sunset over the mountains. Chris took some more amazing starlight pics.

Trippy under the star light at Mesa Verde

Day 9. Santa Fe (NM). We weren’t really sure what there was to do in Santa Fe, we had a walking tour planned and knew we wanted to try some New Mexico cuisine. We were surprised at the incredible art galleries here. We also saw America’s ‘oldest church and building’ (considering we had just come from mesa Verde I am not sure they could claim the oldest building title). I chose a mexican restaurant and was excited to be eating Mexican food that was actually spicy! Where we live in Virginia the Mexican food has little spice to it and is covered in cheese – more Tex-Mex than Mexican. So it was a real treat, and poor Chris ate it despite his ‘sweating’ from the spice.

America’s oldest Bell in the Oldest Church – with whole bunch of Milagros (representing miracles) pinned into the wood

How lucky are we? Just 9 days in and it was already epic! Days 10-16 to come next week!

Mountain Lesson #8: Enjoy the journey. Sure the infertility journey can be a long one, but sometimes you need to take a little diversionary break to feel the power of mother nature and help lift your mood to higher states of happiness. Take a breath, take a rest, soak up the sun – let the beauty of the mountains reset you.

A discovery – How far are we willing to go?

October 26, 201515 Comments

Whilst on our epic South West USA road trip, Chris and I had lots of time to talk to each other. You could almost say we lived in each others pockets for two weeks…some couples might break…but for Chris and I we kind of thrive on it, and it brings us closer together. I think we only had one small ‘argument’ on this trip, but you could probably describe it as more of a strongly heated debate rather than an argument as such. Anyway, the point is, we had lots of time to talk about some of the bigger things in life. Surprisingly, we didn’t talk about our future as prospective parents for several days. It wasn’t until I received a phone call from our fertility clinic that we got around to talking about it again.

The topic of conversation was how much more can we deal with all the infertility treatment? Can we deal with another miscarriage or ectopic pregnancy? The likelihood for another ectopic pregnancy almost doubles after you have had one. What about dealing with a negative result? We discussed whether to transfer our one frozen blastocyst or to go for another round of IVF/ICSI. Yes, a frozen transfer would require injections, but I would avoid the egg stimulation and egg retrieval process which, for me, was very painful the last time around. Chris wants to avoid me being in pain as much as possible. He hates seeing me in that way.

I understand his point of view, it is hard for a partner to see their loved ones in pain over which they have no control. But I feel differently, I feel like I know what to expect, how to better deal with the symptoms and feel overall less anxious (although I think I was pretty cool in my attitude about the first IVF cycle). I feel ready to get some embryos frozen into reserve.

I am 32 about to turn 33. If we go for the frozen transfer and we succeed in a pregnancy (!!!!! That would be awesome!!!) then I will be 35 by the time we are ready to have a second go at it for child #2 – my egg quality is likely to reduce and we could be facing an additional factor to our unexplained infertility. So I figure it is best to do one more IVF/ICSI cycle now and we have one in reserve. Perhaps I sound a little greedy in this respect – we are lucky to have one frozen right now! I don’t mean to be – but I am an operational analyst after all, so I can’t but help try to figure out the optimal solution to a problem.

I explained to Chris my reasoning for going ahead with another round, and he gets it. He admitted he hadn’t thought about age related factors for the future. So we have both agreed that tomorrow we will ask our doctor about going ahead with a new round of IVF/ICSI.

But this isn’t really where the story ends. I think Chris and I have different ‘lines’ to draw under how far we are generally willing to go to get our own baby in our arms. How many times is enough to say we gave it our best shot? How many times can we deal with sadness? Will we ever become numb to it? Depending on the nature of the outcome for round 2 will create different visionary paths in our heads for each of us, we discovered that they are not aligned at the moment.

This isn’t an easy topic to talk about without accidentally hurting each other with words that first come to mind…. so we are going to try writing down our feelings on paper and swapping our ideas so that we can understand each other’s perspectives. I don’t know whether it will work, I hope it will help us at least gain a respect for each other’s feelings. Love and marriage is unconditional, but feelings can easily get hurt when we are talking about something so passionate as becoming parents and how to do it. Infertility knocks you for six when you discover that you can’t become a parent the ‘normal’ way. So I think it is healthy to have this exploration of feelings and keep things open between each other.

Perhaps we will share these letters to each other on the blog at a later date, but for now we just need to focus on getting to the same place together.

6 weeks post methotrexate treatment

October 25, 201519 Comments

It’s been 6 weeks since I was treated with methotrexate to terminate my ‘ectopic’ pregnancy. The first few weeks involved dealing with miscarriage bleeding and pain. Pains that made me worry about ending up with a burst fallopian tube. Pains that I had never experienced before. Then there was the emotional pain that accompanied it; sadness and grief over the failure of what could have been. Finally, at what would have been my 13th week of pregnancy my hCG levels are below 5 and I am officially out of any danger.

Progression of my hCG levels over time

But although I am grateful I have had zero complications (i.e. no tube ruptures or not needing a D&C) it hasn’t been the easiest of rides.

4 weeks ago I fell ill with what seemed to be the usual cold/cough that one catches in September time. Methotrexate can lower the number of white blood cells, which increases the chance of getting an infection and being able to fight it off effectively. I haven’t been able to shake off this cough completely and it got worse over the last four days of my work travels to Germany. I think my cough has gotten worse because my stress levels increased due to the nervousness of the upcoming conference, and my poor sleep due to flying/time zone changes. Basically, I haven’t been good to my body. I had to avoid my multi-vitamins until my hCG levels were below 5 because the Folic acid in them can interfere with the effectiveness of methotrexate. So I have been dosing up on Vit C, but I have been missing out on all the other immune boosting vitamins and minerals.

The morning of the beginning of the conference and the day I was presenting was when I felt my worst. I had to run out of the conference during the key note speech because I was about to puke up my guts from all the coughing. I wasn’t sure I was going to be able to close the day with my presentation….which I was already stressing about because it was in front of my about 100 of my peers and various other important people I need to make an impression with. Fortunately, I managed to survive and my presentation went down well – I had lots of excellent feedback. But the stress of it all was just making my cough worse.

On the evening before my flight back to the US I took some nytol/night nurse at 8pm and was immediately fast asleep. I woke up at 1005 AM and realised I had slept through my alarm. I was supposed to already be at the airport by now, my flight was leaving at 1215 PM! I had been in a deep sleep for 14 hours! Aghhhh!!!! Panic!!!! It is not like me to sleep for long, I am not the kind of person who likes to lie in. So there I was hacking my guts up and had a temperature running. But I needed to get home! So I threw everything into my suitcase – higgledy piggledy- checked out of the hotel and ran to the train station. 1 hr after waking up and freaking out I was standing at the airport check-in desk with 10 minutes to close! I made it, but I was lucky to catch the train that I did, 3 minutes later I would still be in Germany right now!

I felt awful for the poor German teenage girl sat next to me on the flight (it was a completely full flight) because I was coughing every other minute the entire way. Cough medicine, flu medicine, cough sweets, water – everything I tried, just could not stop me. I felt like I had done 1000 sit ups! My abdomen was aching and my throat shredded.

So here I am, finally tucked up in bed, at home, with magazines (thank you Chris :-)) and hot tea, relaxing. I may be my worst enemy when it comes to being ill, but I will say that I totally blame the methotrexate. My white blood cell count was already below the normal level before I took the shot – so I can imagine it was severely lowered afterwards. I could have wrapped myself up in a cotton wool ball – but I would have been bored as hell and probably missed out on our epic holiday. So, yes, I kind of did this to myself…but today I am FINALLY chilling out.

(Who wants to bet I have caught something else from the last few days to add on top of my cough?)

I am excited about next week though because the only meeting I have in my diary is our doctors follow up appointment. Being out of office for three weeks does have its advantages! Fingers crossed I wake up tomorrow feeling better and I can start everything -work, life, infertility – all afresh 🙂

Who is Dib Dab?

October 21, 201512 Comments

On my last day in the office before our road trip a friend and colleague gave me a small gift and note. The gift was a small stuffed toy cat with two different coloured eyes. I am not an expert in kids toys and I have seen these cats around and but I still have no clue behind their story! But anyway, this gesture was incredibly sweet and I welled up with tears at that very moment.

This isn’t the first gift we have received since receiving the sad news of our non-viable pregnancy….

One friend sent me a guardian angel – Angela, to put in my purse…she has been with me ever since and holds a special place with me.

We received an anonymous ‘donation’ of twelve big Cadbury’s chocolate bars (finally discovered it was from my parents!). We have scoffed a total of three bars between us so far. I have hidden all but one of them from Chris when I left for Germany to make sure there was some when I got back!

We also received a wonderful box of chocolate biscuits (cookies) from two friends shipped fresh all the way from the UK that spelled out ‘We love you’…they were incredibly crumbly and delicious, they didn’t last long!

A friend and colleague of Chris’s scoured the internet to surprise me with 6 Cadbury’s (UK) Crunchie bars after I had posted on facebook my cravings for one and my inability to find them in our local vicinity!

A lovely blogging friend sent me some haribo (my favourite sweets in the world!), digestive biscuits and a figurine of hope. Hope is something I need reminding of a lot and was just what I needed particularly at that very moment in time.

We also received countless cards, letters, messages and hugs from friends and family across the world.

We were not alone in our sadness, friends and family went out of their way to show us they were with us. It has been incredible.

So what has this all got to do with a stuffed toy cat? Well I took that stuffed toy cat with us on our road trip, and we named him Dib Dab. Dib Dab came with us everywhere we went…up a mountain, through the desert, amongst the hoo doos, in the camper van, in the museums & restaurants – everywhere.

Dib Dab was just a small representation of our friends and family at this time of healing.

Thank you for your kindness, love and thank you for just being there.

Dib Dab ended up having quite a bit of fun 🙂

…at Mesa Verde

…at the puebloan ruins

…at antelope canyon

…at Bryce canyon

…at Zion National Park

…In Santa Fe

…at the petroglyph national park

…on a petrified log

…in the Petrified Forest

…in my back pack

…on the Grand Canyon Train

Just 2!

October 20, 20159 Comments

My hCG beta level is down to 2! No more blood tests for a little while now 🙂 Is it weird that I felt like picking up a bottle of bubbly on the way to celebrate? A little bit weird.

So the next steps for us is a follow up appointment next week with our Doctor 🙂

I was a bit selfish at work yesterday. I found out that an instructor had pulled out last minute from teaching one of my courses in Germany, I probably could have volunteered to stay in Germany an extra week (I’m heading to Munich this evening for a conference I’m presenting at this week), but I remembered our scheduled follow up appointment and didn’t want to delay it. Our Doctor is a pretty popular lady and we don’t want to wait another month! So I was pretty selfish in that respect and silently didn’t volunteer to fill in. Plus, I’m already missing my kitties (and Chris too of course-having spent 24hrs together for the past 16 days I’m feeling a bit lost without him!).

All in all though, I’m very pleased with my results!!

My Mountains Monday Memoirs: Seneca Rocks

October 20, 2015October 20, 2015Leave a comment

I almost forgot about Seneca Rocks, West Virginia…and yet they are the backdrop photo on my iPhone! I forgot about it because rather than hiking Seneca Rocks, we climbed Seneca Rocks. I really miss climbing. So I must have put it to the back of my mind. But that was until our recent road trip out to the Wild West where I reminded myself how insignificant the mountains on the East Coast truly are!!!

September 2013

It actually wasn’t that long ago that we climbed the spectacular Seneca Rocks out in West Virgina. We took a long weekend and camped it out. The days were warm and the nights were blinking chilly! But we were blessed with some wonderful weather.

A view from the valley of Seneca Rocks, West Virginia

Seneca has the highest ‘true’ peak on the east coast. What this really means is that the peak is only reachable by climbing – you can’t just walk up it! What else is really cool is that it is only reachable by ‘traditional’ climbing. This type of climbing is where you place your own protection in the rock cracks using your own gear and rope as you climb….if you fall, then you are relying on your own ability to place the protection in a secure place, as well as relying on the rock remaining in place to save your life! This means that in general you stick to climbing route grades that you feel confident climbing.

“All the gear, no idea!!!” Just kidding…we know how to use this stuff.

Anyway before I get too carried away with talking about climbing! Let me tell you that on this mountain I was brave. Actually we were both brave. BUT! The climbs we faced were highly exposed (i.e. the empty space below the climber that if the climber were to fall is a great (often psychologically) distance) and this creates great fear in most climbers!

Chris and I took turns to ‘lead’ (the climber who places the gear in the rock first, the second is the climber who follows and removes the gear the leader placed so nothing is left behind). Leading is more often harder than seconding because the climber has to pick a route up the rock face. It is actually like one giant puzzle, but on a rock face.

It was my turn to lead, all was going well until I reached a point where I needed to climb up and squeeze between two fallen boulders and ended up the other side (not before coming face to face with a huge unknown spider, I just don’t want to know what type of spider!). Now I was unable to see Chris who was holding the other end of the rope…and Chris was unable to see me or the route I was planning on taking.

This was anything but ideal!

Is this my happy face?!?! (Photo not taken at the exact same time!!)

Climbing requires a lot of communication and it helps to have a visual on where your partner is, otherwise you rely on signals passed through the rope. We had the basic signals down to an art, we work well as a team. But signals that required me to say –

‘What the F#*%?? I can’t see where my next move is!’

…was not one we had practiced. So I was shouting to Chris asking him where the route was supposed to go (according to the guide book). All I could see above me was flaky, crumbly rock, and below me, an exposed drop so far down I knew it would be the end of me and potentially injure Chris if I was to fall at that point. It was at this stage that I got the old climbers ‘Disco legs’ – my leg muscles were shaking, adrenaline pumping, my breathe quickened to the verge of hyperventilation. There was no escape route… down climbing the way you came up is often harder than climbing up.

I was alone – and then a piece of rock came away from beneath my foot. I screamed ‘BELOW’ just in case there were climbers below me.

Oh crap.

I was stuck. No way up, no way down.

Chris was only the other side of the two boulders, but he felt a million miles away. He was trying to talk me out of my predicament. Trying to get me to focus and solve the puzzle.

My heart was pounding. I had to find a way up. I could see the ledge above where I was supposed to be next: the safe point. It felt like I was clinging on to the wall for hours – it probably was only 15 minutes of attempting multiple ways up, but it felt like an eternity.

I gave up, carefully squeezed back through between the two boulders to see Chris’s face again. I was one hot sweaty mess!

In my whole climbing career this was the first time I was genuinely scared for my life, our lives. The heights usually give me a thrill of adrenaline, but I always climb within my limits so I rarely get truly scared. This time, I thought I was climbing within my limits but instead, I found a surprise dead end – a dark scary (lonely) dead end. Fortunately it was not literally a dead end! (My mum is probably cursing me right now as she reads this 🙂 hehe ).

With a bit of patience and caution, we managed to down climb a little way and we then tried another route up. With success this time!

Chris leading the easier route around.

The pinnalces were spectacular and wonderful to climb

The pinnacles were spectacular and wonderful to climb

Mountain Lesson # 6. When you think everything is going just dandy, a dead end crops up unexpectedly on you. It might be scary as crap. You might feel alone. But take a small step back from the shadows into the sunlight, turn around, take a deep breathe, and try again. You’ll get there, it just might take you a little bit longer than you anticipated.

Mountain Lesson # 7. Good communication in the mountains is crucial. Practice, practice, practice so you both know what to do when things get a little hairy.

Home Sweet Home!

October 19, 20154 Comments

The cats are alive and well. The house survived the storms and is generally still in one piece (apart from a few gross piles of hairball vomit and one chewed up oven mitt). The suitcases are unpacked. We are surrounded by piles of stinky washing. But there is nothing better than the feeling of climbing into your own bed after two weeks of being on the dusty road, cramped up, sleeping in a camper van!! (Albeit a wickedly amazing campervan)

This was our ‘cosy’ home for the last two weeks – AKA Trippy.

Home sweet home feels great right now!!

Our 2200 mile road trip is sadly over and I have much catching up to do. Apparently a lot happens in 2 weeks when one has stepped away from the internet and phones!

I am absolutely stoked to be back blogging again after my long 2 week break. I have had a lot of thoughts running around my head because, well, I have had a lot of time to think! Most days we were hiking somewhere, occasionally in the ‘wilderness’, so there was plenty of opportunity to go off into my thoughts in the deep, dark, corners of my brain…and of course there was also ample opportunity for Chris and I to talk about some of the deeper and meaningful things in life.

There was the odd occasion when it was just the two of us for miles alone.

So with all that time ‘alone’, I have some future blog posts in mind I will be writing over the next few weeks…

1. A discovery – How far Chris and I are both willing to go with fertility treatment

2. The future size of our family

3. Pregnancy and Infant loss awareness month & the wave of light (I missed the wave on the 15th October as we were camped out somewhere in the desert, but Chris and I had a long discussion about it) 😦

4. Recognising the signs and symptoms of depression

Source: http://www.cwmt.org.uk/parents-guide-to-depression/

5. What are we gambling? (inspired by our stay in Las Vegas!)

Our grand total winnings from the Ultimate Poker Table – 2 x Half Dollar Coins

6. An introduction to Dib Dab – our traveling cat

Dib Dab at Bryce Canyon

Dib Dab at Mesa Verde

Our holiday was just what the doctor ordered (Well not what my doctor ordered, who actually wanted me back at home for weekly beta blood tests!! Ha!).

Tomorrow I am back in the thick of work, as well as hopefully my last beta blood test (fingers crossed it is 0 now) 🙂 Also there is some catching up to do on reading some other wonderful blogs! I’m hoping to read some good news !!!

My Mountains Monday Memoirs: Highest Peak in Northern Ireland

October 12, 2015October 12, 20153 Comments

The highest peak in Northern Ireland is called Slieve Donard. I’m not sure it can truly be called a mountain at only 850m high; but it certainly is a commanding peak. However, this beautiful ‘mountain’ has one of my favourite stories from My Mountains Memoirs…..

Not long after we wed, Chris and I went to visit our friends L & A in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Knowing how much we love the mountains, L & A took us to the highest peak in Northern Ireland – Slieve Donard. Honestly, I had never heard of it before that day. But apparently it was a lovely walk and so off we hiked. Chris, L, A and their adorable dog – Elvis (I love this dog :-)).

Actually, Chris and I have rarely hiked a mountain with other friends, we usually find ourselves venturing off alone together, so it was a really nice change to hike with them.

The walk up was long, gradual and pretty beside the Glen River – through woodlands of pine, oak and birch.

the way up through the trees

As we were climbing, Chris noticed that L was having a hard time with her back and her back-pack: so being a gentleman, he offered to relieve her of her heavy burden. But L was not going to give up easily, and in fact was overly defensive. Putting it down to her niceties, Chris thought nothing more of it.

L was determined not to let Chris carry her bag up the mountain!!

Once we were out into the moorland, the path became rockier and steeper – and noticeably greyer. There was no end in sight! Chris suggested we should turn around. Particularly with L’s back playing up. But L & A convinced us to keep going – perhaps the mist would clear! Perhaps it we would rise above the clouds once we got to the top!! And so we carried on. Despite the poor visibility and the ever chilling and biting wind, it still felt good to be going somewhere in the fresh air.

Starting to get grey and misty – where is the summit??!!

We finally hit what is known as the Mourne Wall which sits within a saddle that leads to the final summit of Slieve Donard. We could not see the summit. But there were peeks of wonderful views back down the mountain and across the Irish Sea. It is not often we get to climb a mountain with sea views! And so we settled to not climb the peak and took a breather.

Almost near the summit, but it was clouded over 😦 so this was the highest we went

L & A had got us this far, there was no reason to keep going to the clouded summit just to ‘bag it’ – we had got the view we had come for.

But then came the real surprise! L pulled out of her back pack a bottle of Moet & Chandon Champagne! She had carried it all the way to the top, knowing this was one of our favourite places to be (at the top of a mountain!) as our wedding present.

Like you do – popping open the champers!

Did I tell you my husband is classy?

A wonderful gift to celebrate together

I cannot tell you how heart warmed I felt right then. Yes it was freezing cold and the view was less than perfect, and we hadn’t quite reached the true peak! But we were there with our friends and having a real good laugh – all those things we typically “seek” out of a mountain just simply didn’t matter. Friendship and love is all that mattered. Sounds cheesy, but this is what I remember the most.

Mountain Lesson #4: Your dearest friends will keep you going in spite of the fog of it all; they will cheer you on and help you see beyond the wall you face in front of you.

Mountain Lesson #5: Every so often you need to let your friends come with you on your journey up that mountain…living life with a wall around just the two of you is not always fun. Sometimes, there is unknown, unseen fun on the other side of that wall!!!

L has been a poorly bunny recently, so I just want to say to her – We are thinking of you my lovely and hope you feel much better soon. Big hugs and kisses XXXX

Read my previous Mountain Monday Memoirs blog posts…here….