An impromptu speech

September 14, 2016September 14, 201611 Comments

On the second and fourth Tuesday of each month, a group of people gather for an hour at lunchtime to practice public speaking. The group of co-workers are members of Toastmasters and each time they meet two or three members give a short speach on a topic of their choosing. The goal is to improve public speaking skills, and in the course of learning and practicing the group hears an incredible array of stories and facts from each other.

This week was my turn to speak. I had a topic planned, a humorous speech I’d given at a contest three days earlier. The contest had been a challenge, it had been terrifying and it had been thrilling. Standing in front of a room to be judged on being funny is not easy. The experience showed me that being outside my comfort zone is a good thing and so on Monday night I changed the topic of my speech. I wanted to once again go beyond my comfort zone. With an hour of drafting and pulling some pictures together before going to bed I crafted my new speech. A speech on a topic that puts me outside my comfort zone. A speech to my co-workers about the challenges of IVF.

Speaking in front of a group of relative strangers on this most personal of topics was scary. Looking back at the film I realise that my defense mechanism for fear is to smile. That explains some of the unusually times smiles or laughs in the speech. This is my speech, this is a glimpse into my experience of our IVF journey.

4 weeks of needless worrying?

September 13, 20164 Comments

Pudding Club Diary @ 24 Weeks 2 Days

Today I went for my follow up ultrasound after Rocky’s bowel appeared to be ‘echogenic’ at our 20 week scan, and again it had shown up as ‘echogenic’ at the echo cardiogram at 22 weeks. It was a relatively quick scan, Rocky was moving around a lot as usual, but the technician was able to get all the measurements needed quickly. Rocky is on track for her growth and now weighs a grand total of 1lb 6oz! At 20 weeks she was just 11oz. Hew bowel was still echogenic but the technician said she didn’t think it was very bright. And yes, Rocky is still a girl! The technician showed us her lady parts, but I said I believe you if you say so, to me it looked like a blob of grey nothing much on the screen!!!

After the ultrasound I took the lovely glucose challenge test. This test provides an indicator of Gestational Diabetes. This test is apparently slightly different to how the UK does it. I did not need to fast for this test. I was given a small bottle of very sweet liquid to drink; as I was reaching the end of the bottle the drink was making me feel slightly sick. Bleugh. The drink itself didn’t taste bad (I had the orange flavour – I could choose between orange and fruit punch!). 1 hour later I had my blood drawn which will be sent off to see what my glucose levels are at. When the phlebotomist took my blood she noticed I was looking a bit different – the drink had made me feel a bit light headed! She asked if I had eaten something (which I had) and offered me a snack before I left! Depending on the results of this blood test will depend on whether I need to take the next type test which is the glucose tolerance test which requires fasting and testing over three hours. Apparently that is what is ordinarily tested in the UK first? I think my OB told me this because she used to live and work in Ireland and knows we are Brit expats.

Meanwhile, whilst waiting the hour to finish the glucose challenge test we met with the OB and she told us everything was looking wonderful with Rocky. Phew! We went over some housekeeping matters, such as completing a pre-registration form for the hospital, pediatricians and birthing classes. I also had to sign a form that said we would not video record any part of the birth. Well I wasn’t really planning on doing that anyway!!! Then she told us that even the echogenic bowel wasn’t looking bright anymore. For some reason she decided to tell us that after we left 4 weeks ago she looked at the scan again a second time and thought perhaps it wasn’t as bright as she first thought. And now she tells us!! Could have saved us 4 weeks of worry! Sigh…..well, better to be safe than sorry I guess! But really???!!!?

Let’s hope the good news continues with the results of my glucose challenge test in a few days! Fingers crossed!

It’s been a while!

September 13, 2016September 13, 201613 Comments

PC Diary @ 24 Weeks 1 Day

It has been a while since I last wrote so this may be a bit long, but I have broken it up into chunks. I took a mini break from my blog to focus on some other things that I really needed to get out of the way. I have thoroughly missed it! I have been reading other blogs, but not actively getting involved because quite frankly I am an addict after all and it is quite amazing how much I really care that others are finding themselves well on whatever stage their journey is at. For me, my journey is literally in the middle of nowhere. I know I am somewhere good, but feel like nowhere. Here is what has happened since I last put an entry in my pudding club diary….

I am 24 weeks pregnant today. It’s insane because I am sure the last time I checked I was 20 weeks. I have lived in a strange four weeks of madness – feel free to skip to the paragraphs that look like they might be the most interesting to you!

THE NEW HOUSE. After my mum flew back to the UK, Chris and I had to finish off getting our garden in order. It was quite a mess when we first moved in. My mother did a wonderful job of landscaping the front garden (she’s a bit terrifying when you give her a hedge trimmer!!!), but there was still more to do in order to make it look truly presentable and get it up to the standards of our new neighbourhood association. We received a letter just after mum had left warning us that our garden needed tending to and this had been our 4^th warning since April this year. The association was not aware we had just bought the house so we thought – screw you we have worked hard at trying to get this all done! As our garden is on a corner plot almost all of it is on view from the street. But all our new neighbours have been commenting how lovely it is to see the garden restored and acknowledge that it will take some time to get it up to scratch. Particularly the lawn which has been overrun with elephant grass. With 100F weather the past few weeks and my pregnant state it has been slow going. What is exciting is the beginning of our vegetable garden! Chris built some raised beds and we planted carrots, turnips, radishes, squash and broccoli. Yum! We plan on having three raised beds for rotating a variety of crops. Homegrown food tastes so much better – assuming we can keep the neighbourhood wild rabbit and other various bugs away, stopping them from getting some early tastings in before us!

THE BABYMOON. We went away on our babymoon cruise from Boston to Montreal. I have written a separate post about this one. But in short, we loved it (even if Chris got sea sick!!!) and the idea of arriving somewhere new every morning was simply wonderful. There was also a lack of internet so this meant I lost touch with some blogs L But also took a break from the outside world. It was nice and I wished it could have been longer.

THE INTERVIEW. The day after we returned from our babymoon I underwent a 3 hour test for the job I had applied for in my team (this would be a promotion for me). Then the day after that was my interview. It was a tough process because as I have said before I was up against some of my very talented colleagues. I went out to dinner with all the other candidates the night before the interview (some of whom had flown across the Atlantic for the process) and it was very strange. Strange, because I would love the job, I am certainly capable of it and wanted it, but at the same time would welcome any of them to join our team. The type of community I work in is a small one, so we tend to all know each other somehow and the job opportunities are limited so it is inevitable that this happens. When my boss later told me that I was not successful I was disappointed in myself, but at the same time equally happy for my friend who was successful. Let’s call it a certain schizophrenic moment in my life. I am hard on myself when I do not succeed, but equally I am happy that I did my best and have no regrets, so how can I ask more of myself?

THE FETAL ECHO CARDIOGRAM. Back to the week of the interview, the very morning of my interview I had an appointment with the maternal fetal medicine specialist doctor. This appointment was scheduled because we conceived through IVF, apparently there is an increased risk to baby’s heart. I did some research on this issue and found that it was a very slight increased risk (like 1 or 2%) so I am not sure how essential it is, but we did get to see some very cool stuff! I was a little worried, which I think is nothing unusual, and it was also probably bad timing having the interview lined up for later the afternoon. Fortunately, Rocky was a little star – or a little show off according to the ultrasound technician. The whole thing took about 45 minutes. We got to see Rocky’s overall growth i.e. her head, brain, body etc were all measured, and the very cool bit – her heart. We were shown all the different valves and atriums of the heart, the blood flow and its direction being pumped in and out. Quite simply put, it was an incredible experience.

The blood flowing through a valve appeared heart shaped!

Rocky was still showing an ‘echogenic bowel’ (where the bowel shows up bright as a bone on the scan) – that was identified from the anatomy scan at 20 weeks. The specialist Doctor talked to us about that, she said she thought it was most likely she had swallowed some blood from a bleed I may have had in the early stages of pregnancy. Although I never had any bleeding (thankfully), it is still possible and not unusual with IVF babies according to the doc. She also asked if we had tested for Cystic Fibrosis. We didn’t test for this because we thought as it’s a genetic disease and we don’t have anyone in the family that has it that we wouldn’t bother. It turns out we were completely wrong with this assumption. We had no idea how common it can be to be a Cystic Fibrosis carrier! I looked into this some more and it is interesting that some carriers can actually exhibit mild symptoms of Cystic Fibrosis. I have had this disgusting and unexplained phlegmyness that builds up over time ever since I returned from Iraq…I’ve always been seeking an explanation for this and there is some evidence to suggest that some symptoms can be triggered by a traumatic event. Weirdly coincidental?! So perhaps I should get tested after all. We have a follow up scan scheduled for Tuesday so we can see if the echogenic bowel comes up again.

My mum pointed out to me that it was far easier in her day because you wouldn’t have to worry about these kind of soft markers for potential problems. I am inclined to be in some agreement. Ignorance may be bliss. The silly thing is that even if Rocky were to have Cystic Fibrosis, medicine is very good that she is most likely to have a very normal life. Actually my biggest concern isn’t Cystic Fibrosis as a diagnosis, it is the association of an echogenic bowel with intrauterine growth restrictions leading to pre-term labour. This is my personal biggest worry. Currently as at our last 22 week scan Rocky is within the normal percentile…and my bump is growing nicely so my worries are most likely irrational.

One last thing about our scan with the maternal fetal medicine – the doctor said there was some slight regression of blood pumping through one valve, she thought that as it was still very early this wouldn’t be an issue as she is so tiny still and can grow stronger with no problems. She said she will put it on my notes and my Obstetrician can make a decision whether or not to book another echo cardiogram later on to be sure. So we continue to wait.

MY EXECUTIVE DEVELOPMENT. So another reason I have been off the blog is that I attended my first residential course that kicked off the start of my executive development programme. I am on a programme with 23 others from across my organisation, coming from various countries with various nationalities (like me an expat working in another country) and various professions, ranging from technical geeks to financial gurus to human resource ninjas. The aim of this residential course was to ‘Know yourself’. Yikes. We all turned up thinking we knew ourselves….but apparently not after being put through a variety of exercises that required a lot of internal reflection. I was beat by the end of the week. At one stage I was feeling a little anxious at how vulnerably open I was with all these new people. I talked about IVF, my blog, Brussels attacks, my deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan – my feelings about myself and others I work with. Nothing was off the table!!! It was also intense as we were forced into exercises that meant we quickly got to know each other.

We formed teams for our project work that was based on real life organizational problems. I decided to work in a team that was tackling a big problem that was out of my comfort zone – some of the other projects were within my technical capabilities. And I am glad I decided to do that, although it might sound crazy to not take the easy path, I think this project is something I have more of a personal interest in…so when it is late at night and I need to do research and I need to find the motivation I may actually want to work on it because it interests me. I found this works well when I chose my modules for my Masters degree. Modules I didn’t choose I found hard to motivate myself to complete…modules I chose I often read around the subject more.

The distance modules start next week and the next residential course is in November…I’m excited to be doing this course, but the first week was pretty intense emotionally! I am not sure pregnancy hormones helped much :-s

PREPARING TO BECOME A MUMMY. After my list of things to do blog post several weeks ago, I have done very little to check anything off of it. Mostly because of all of the above busyness! And also I am kind of STILL in denial. Yes I know, I really need to get over that! I went shopping for some maternity clothes whilst I was in the UK (which by the way was very disappointing as most stores only do maternity stuff online…blah blah blah) and ended up in the baby section. I love the clothes in the UK compared to the US. I think it is because I feel that clothes in the US are overly girly and garishly pink. I like pink, but not that much, I equally do not like the fact that even animals in the US are genderfied (I am not even sure that is a word!!!!) In the UK, there seems to be more baby clothes that can be girl or boy. Anyway, I picked a whole bunch of stuff up. Then absolutely freaked out when I thought about the sizes I was picking….in the UK they use baby sizes ‘tiny baby’, ‘newborn baby’, 0-3 months, 3-6 months, 6-12 months etc….All I could think of was, what if I get all this stuff and something happens to Rocky?? What if she doesn’t make it? I understand that this is a common feeling amongst all pregnant women – I mean it would probably be unnatural not to have these thoughts. So I put everything back and walked out of the store empty handed and decided to go home. Now….I did let my parents choose some outfits for Rocky when we were out together. If I hadn’t let them I think they may have been a little upset because I know they want to and it was probably the only chance we would get to shop together before Rocky’s arrival. So they bought Rocky some very sweet, non-pink outfits and I love them.

This is not to say I have not been thinking about Rocky’s arrival and completely bury my head in the sand. I’ve started to do some research into the long list of baby related items we need to buy! There is so much choice out there!! I bought a couple of British baby magazines to flick through and get ideas (which by the way are waaaaaay better than the US baby magazines – I can’t put my finger on why I think that, I may simply be biased). I will pat myself on the back, however, for finally booking a weekend birthing class as well as a parenting class for the end of November, beginning of December. I really hope Rocky doesn’t arrive before this because all the classes were full up ‘til then! I’m not overly happy about these classes because I would much prefer to do something longer for the birthing side, but our work schedule is not overly conducive to regular classes. Perhaps when we eventually find a doula she may offer private classes that we could do. This is the next task on our list…find ourselves a lovely doula!

THE BUMP. So at some point during the residential course my bump ‘popped’. Two people commented – Chris and someone I had just met on the course. Chris saw my bump on skype and was like – your bump is sticking out further than your boobs now! And the other person I had just met said something had changed in the size of my bump over the week I had been there.

As I was queuing up at the airport security one of the officers noticed I was pregnant and said I should have a body scan rather than walk through the scanner (I don’t know why, but I guess it has something to do with not needing an extra search if the buzzer goes off). Also when I was on the tube someone offered me their seat. Which was very kind, but I didn’t need it. I had ordered a ‘Baby on Board’ badge to arrive at my parents’ house for my London trip, but I didn’t need it in the end because generally the bus from the hotel to the school usually had seats available. The one thing I am finding more difficult now is bending over to put my shoes and socks on. I need to sit down for starters as well as really reach to get to my toes. I think some more yoga is needed! Rocky has been kicking my bladder a lot this week and generally being a little wiggle monster. When I was sat next to one particular guy on the course, every time he spoke she kicked! It was quite funny!! But I absolutely love every single move she makes, it makes me very happy indeed.

THE END. OK, most of you have probably gone by now…but I had 4 weeks to catch up on and I am sat on a transatlantic flight! If you made it to here I give you a big hug and a high five. I will post an update after our scan on Tuesday (oh I also have the lovely gestational diabetes test then too :-S)

10 tips on how to cruise when pregnant

September 13, 201610 Comments

Tip 1. Don’t take sea sick husband with you. Even if he thinks he doesn’t get sea sick. But it can happen to anyone, so that might be a bit unpredictable. So probably best to stock up on the motion sickness drugs before departing!

Tip 2. Don’t cruise after 24 weeks pregnant…because apparently the cruise liners won’t let you sail after this. But that’s all in the small print after you book the cruise. Check with the cruise liner because each one is different.

Tip 3. Get a travel note from your OB saying you are fit to cruise just before departure.

Tip 4. Don’t travel in your first trimester, especially if you have severe aversions to smells. Cruise ships have all sorts of strange smells on board that you can’t escape.

Tip 5. Don’t cruise if you are still feeling nauseous; particularly if your cruise ship will take you through rougher seas, such as the Atlantic Ocean – or even in hurricane season – there are plenty of crazy weather systems out in the ocean!

Tip 6. Choose a zika free destination. Which is actually quite limiting for cruise options! Currently that limits you to destinations such as Bermuda (which will require heading out into rougher seas) or head North to Canada or somewhere random such as Alaska. But of course there are other options in Europe and the Far East…but if you live in the US, this will require a transatlantic flight!

Tip 7. Be prepared for old ladies who have a pregnancy radar on them and their questions! You can’t escape them! They call it their internal grandma radars. Apparently it’s a real thing.

Tip 8. Wash and sanitize your hands at every opportunity! These ships are germ spawning floating prisons. Bleughhhh, ain’t nobody got time to be sick!

Tip 9. Don’t expect the spa to cater for pregnant women. Looking to have a massage whilst on board? It’s very unlikely you will find someone qualified or have the right equipment for a maternity massage. Sigh.

Tip 10. Aaaaaand Relax. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh. What else are you cruising for?

PC Diary @ 21 weeks 6 Days – AKA The babymoon.

We have had a wonderful babymoon, cruising from Boston to Montreal…the weather wasn’t perfect, but it was not awful. It was nice to get away from 100F temperatures, but there were times when it was a wee bit chilly on deck which made the floating prison seem even smaller than I cared for. (Did I ever tell you how much I hate crowds????!)

our floating hotel for the week!

We made port calls every day except for one which meant we spent mostly only the evenings on board. Cruising made travelling to new places very easy, but it can be frustrating to not spend more time in places where there was much more to see and do. We consider it a reconnaissance trip to later return to cities we liked and spend more time there. I kind of hate the time pressure, but like the ease of being a real tourist for sightseeing in a short amount of time. This is handy for being 21 weeks pregnant!

we be cruising….

I loved the array of different foods offered. I still have some aversions to salad leaves and some types of chicken. We had an amazing evening eating at the restaurant that became ‘Le Cirque’ for the evening. Simply incredible food. I admit I did have the Chateaubriand served rare – naughty Dani! But I could not possibly have it any other way!!!

An evening at Le Cirque! Nom nom nom….

There was a warning by health authorities that certain types of Oysters from Prince Edward Island had salmonella and so told to avoid these. I have not had any raw oysters, and wouldn’t consider eating them anyway whilst pregnant, but I would have easily ordered cooked oysters which may have been OK, but apparently this could have also been risky.

I also loved the service offered on board. We really were spoiled. We paid for an interior cabin, the cheapest of cheap rooms, but I didn’t feel like we were traveling in economy. Overall, it was awesome fun, thinking about it, this was the last holiday we will take without a child. That is weird but exciting! A new chapter of our lives is coming. (Remind me that I said that at some point in the future if I ever complain about holidaying with a kid!)

PC Diary: Anatomy Scan & an Echogenic Bowel

August 17, 2016August 17, 20166 Comments

The Pudding Club Diary @ 20w3d (16 Aug 2016)

I have been really nervous about the 20 week anatomy scan for the past several weeks. I was initially worried because of my lack of weight gain, but in the last 2.5 weeks I managed to finally put some weight on! In that time I have put on 5lbs; I was worried that this could affect Rocky’s growth. But today, we found out that my worries were unfounded. Rocky is growing perfectly within the normal percentile and is the grand total weight of just 11oz!

The anatomy scan took a while because Rocky was moving all over the place and the technician had to poke her (very hard!) several times to get her into a better position. Rocky’s legs, arms, total length, tummy and head circumferences were all measured. We saw her various body parts, including the spine, heart (including all four chambers!), lungs and bowels. Very cool! Oh and she was completely spread eagle, so Rocky is definitely a girl!!!

Afterwards with the doctor she told us that everything was looking good and that Rocky is right on track. The only thing that came up on the scan was something called an echogenic bowel. This is known as a ‘soft marker’ or a non specific finding i.e. it is not an abnormality but indicative that there may be an increased risk of several associations to other issues such as Trisomy 21, 18 and 13, cystic fibrosis, infection and intrauterine growth restriction. Somewhere between 60-70% of the time an echogenic bowel resolves itself and disappears on the next ultrasound, and 90% of the time there is nothing wrong with the baby when it is born. So basically, it is nothing to worry about for the moment, especially as the blood test for the three Trisomies came back negative.

The plan is to have another ultrasound in 4 weeks time to see if the echogenic bowel is still there. Fortunately, we have an ultrasound scheduled with the Maternal Fetal Medicine specialists for Rocky’s fetal echocardiagram (because apparently as Rocky is an IVF baby there is an increased risk of heart related issues)….so we will get them to look at the bowel again then. Our doctor said the chances are there will be nothing there when we go to the specialist!!! But at least we don’t have to wait another 4 weeks, just 2 to get a vague idea of where this might be heading.

So all in all, Rocky is doing just fine, most likely. Of course the scan couldn’t have just been normal! But I’m not going to worry, if the doctor isn’t worried, I’m not worried. Hopefully. Fingers crossed.

If you would like to see Rocky the scary alien that looks like she might murder you in her sleep, and actually not too bad of a 3D pic of her face, I have put a couple of pics up on my Instagram account here: https://www.instagram.com/thegreatpuddingclubhunt/?hl=en

PC Diary: Planning for Rocky’s arrival

August 10, 2016August 10, 201611 Comments

The Pudding Club Diary @ 19w2d (08 Aug 2016)

I’ve either had my head buried in the sand in denial that this is a viable pregnancy, or I am using the excuse of a house move to have done very little for preparing for Rocky’s arrival in 20 weeks time. I think it is probably a combination of both.

Today it’s 137 sleeps to Christmas, and Christmas means Rocky will be making her appearance into the big wide scary world. 137 sleeps sounds like aaaaaages away – it is, unless you have 136 days to fit in preparing for the arrival of a newborn baby. And even worse when you are someone like me who needs to be informed as much as possible about different options! I would rather go to several shops (online or physically) before making my decision. And I (we) still have a lot of decisions to make in preparation for Rocky’s arrival! Here are some of the major things we need to decide on (some of which we have already done -phew!)

Picking an OBGYN or midwife (I didn’t have an OBGYN before). Things we considered: distance to home and work, hospitals they work with, insurance coverage (in-network), experience offered, reviews from friends, reviews online. I found that it’s a chicken and egg scenario. You need to pick an OBGYN quite early in your pregnancy so you can start your prenatal care, but that also means picking which hospital or birthing centre you want to go with (although of course you can change your healthcare provider through your pregnancy easily if you change your mind). So then I needed to think about where I wanted to give birth. We decided that a hospital is our preference as first timers, we felt more comfortable choosing this birthing experience. Again, we asked our friends for recommendations, looked at location, insurance coverage and reviews online. With that decision made, choosing my OBGYN was much easier.

Deciding which prenatal tests to have. I already wrote a blog post about this one. But this took time to research…our family history being one of the key factors in our decision. Followed by what was covered by our insurance. I liked that our doctor left this completely up to us.

Choosing a child care provider. Chris and I have talked about this one waaaaay before we started to trying for a baby, because this is fundamentally something I felt we should be on the same page on! For example, if Chris had strong expectations that I would quit work for a few years to look after baby, we would have problems. Now that we live in the US on a Visa that is dependent on my job our options are actually quite limited. We even discussed Chris taking time out of work and being a stay-at-home dad. Ultimately, we decided that we both wanted to continue to work and believe our child will be well cared for in the care of someone else during the week as they grow up. Choosing that person is tough! Our first preference was to hire an Au Pair. The idea of having an extended member of our family living with us who is culturally different to us is something we are very comfortable with, whilst also supporting the Au pair’s education. Unfortunately, we are not able to sponsor an Au pair on our visas as we are considered legal aliens here in the US. So that left us with the choice of a nanny or day care (nursery). Because Chris and I work hours that are not consistent a nanny was just too expensive for the amount of time we would need one for. So that left us with the day care option.

How did we choose day care? So this one we were told DO THIS EARLY!!!! There are waiting lists for the best ones! Especially if we wanted to use a day care on base. So the week that we closed on our new house we started our hunt for day care. We asked friends, but no one could help us with advice on day care near where our new house was. But we did get advice on first checking out the state’s department of social services child care portal to see child care providers and their registration status. Virginia has a very handy portal that provides a search facility based on zip code, with links to all inspection reports. We started here and narrowed our search down on this. Then we looked at location. Close to home was the most important criteria. We found three that were three within 3-7 minutes drive from us that we liked and so arranged visits. Once we saw all three it was easy to rule out one – as soon as we walked in we wanted to walk out, we immediately turned to each other and wondered if it was rude to do that! The other two we would have been quite happy with, in the end we chose between those two based on the teachers in the nursery. Their passion put them slightly above the rest. So put our deposit down to hold our spot for March/April 2017.

Baby moon. Some would say not a vital part of preparing for Rocky’s arrival! But for us it was, especially as we feel like we need a holiday after buying a house that needed doing up! We have worked very hard and still have some work to do. Planning for the baby moon is not quite so simple. Our criteria was limited. No travel to Zika affected areas. No flying more than 4 hours. Relaxing, but not boring (we are not sit on beach for a week type of people!). Originally the earliest we could get away was going to be October hence limitations on travel, but fortunately one of my work trips was cancelled in August. So the other week we booked a last minute cruise from Boston to Montreal. Everyday the cruise ship stops some where new along the north west coast of US and Canada, so it was perfect for us. I managed to pay for our flights using air miles and hotels using credit card points! So all that money spent on IVF bills and miles traveled for work finally pay off 🙂 BTW – if you are planning a baby moon on a cruise there are limitations on when you can go…the liner we are going with states that you cannot be more than 24 weeks pregnant, and you also need a letter from the doctor before you cruise to confirm your due date and that you are in good health. Just as well August became came free, any later and we wouldn’t have been able to cruise!

So that is really as far as we have got….and there is so much more we need to decide on – it looks like a short list, but even if we tackled one item off this list each week that would be a miracle:

Pediatrician
Doula
Nursery decoration and furniture
Classes for childbirth, nursing and infant care
Maternity leave
Baby shower – I have still yet to decide on this one. I am erring towards a welcome party instead after Rocky arrives.
Our ‘Layette’….did you know that was a word? I didn’t until I read my pregnancy book – this is a traditional word for all baby stuff that parents ‘lay up’ before baby arrival. Although I do like the advice the book offers that ‘the stores will still be open after your baby arrives’. We aim to get most things except for crib, car seat and breast pump second hand. Other things we will need are nappies/diapers, bottles, clothes, change table, bassinet or side sleeper, diaper bags (one for Chris, one for me!), monitor, carrier/sling, stroller/pushchair.

You may be surprised to hear that we have yet to go shopping for our ‘layette’…the only thing we have bought was after our day trip to ikea (a 4 hour drive away!) where we bought crib, mattress, and sheets and some storage units – that was only because we had gone there for other things for our new house and thought we should buy the basics. But they are all in boxes still. After our 20 week scan next week, we can go shopping!

With only 20 weeks left, 4 of those I will be travelling for work, 1 of those we are baby-mooning it, 2 weeks Chris is travelling for work and each of those weeks eats into two weekends either side oh and I am starting my Executive Development Programme too – aghhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!

And BREATHE Dani…..just breathe….!!!

I’m sure there is something else important I am missing from this list???!!!!!

Continuing Professional Development

August 9, 201613 Comments

When coping with infertility, you reach a point where you do what you can to just simply survive each day. Our behaviors changed, life changed-we couldn’t keep doing what we were doing because infertility eats into your life in many different ways. Sure, life doesn’t stop, but you have to make adjustments….relationships with friends and family change (in both good and bad ways)…the type of food you eat…the extracurricular activities you enjoy change (again, in good and bad ways)… sexual relations…sleep…body shapes…when you go out…when you stay in…and how you work. It all changes in unexpected ways.

I don’t talk about my work on my blog, mostly because it would bore you to death! But my relationship with work has changed as a result of infertility. My bosses and colleagues have supported me from the beginning. They have been flexible, understanding and considerate. So I have no complaints there. Fortunately the nature of my work enables me to have the flexibility I needed to deal with all medical treatments. But what has changed is the way I work.

My career goals haven’t changed as a result of infertility. My ambitions are similar to what they were 4 years ago. But I have fallen a bit behind in terms of timing and where I hoped to be. I have had to step back and not be as forward leaning, proactive as I once was through fear of letting people down. My promises to deliver have come with caveats- I over manage expectations and don’t promise too much. I’ve always been a glass half full kind of worker. I like to lead with positivity. I am the ‘yes I can’ kind of person. I’m reliable, honest and open. I like change, but get frustrated when things aren’t seen through or completed. I like timeliness, I dislike laziness. I like to try new ways of doing things, but try to articulate methodology in doing them. I like to learn new things. I want everyday to be a school day!!! (Why didn’t I feel like that at school I dont know why!!).

But Infertility broke some of this. I still got my work done, I still deliver good work, I get praise for the speed/quality of my work still. But I’m not satisfied in the way that I do it. Infertility has affected my ability to travel (and now my pregnancy to some extent!) and therefore my ability to work on all the things I want to have been impacted. And my personal professional development stalled for almost a year now and has been replaced with knitting, colouring in, tv watching and blogging. All good things for the soul that I so badly needed to help me fight this battle. Applying my mind to new knowledge generally got too challenging.

Since I left university I have always been in a continued quest for new knowledge! I took a part time masters of science in a subject that was practically unrelated to my bachelors degree. I even continued my education whilst on deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan where I was working 7 days a week already! I’ve taken language classes and various free courses online to keep up my skills. But the past year it was too much for me and I stopped to take a break.

I got withdrawal symptoms. I started looking at MBAs and Masters of Science in analytics/data science etc. I really don’t need another one! But I missed the learning. I even looked at courses that Chris and I could do together! But then an opportunity at work came up – to apply for their Executive Development Programme. I applied, not expecting to be successful this year because I had heard many others who had applied year after year were waiting to go on the programme. But somehow my application was accepted! I received this good news just before my third round of IVF treatment and I talked it through with my boss and HR – what if I got pregnant from this treatment? This would mean I would be having a baby half way through the course!!! Travel to the residential courses in Europe may be slightly problematic! Should I pull my application? Let someone else go? But there was also the issue of – what if I didn’t get pregnant? I was chosen to be on that training programme. I can’t keep placing my life on hold because I ‘may’ get pregnant. So we decided to postpone the decision to later.

When I found out I was definitely pregnant and it looked like Rocky was sticking around I needed to make a decision. Would I embark on this training programme knowing that half way through I would become a new mum?

I worked out the travel commitments (4 transatlantic trips and 1 week of training in the US). I would be 24 weeks pregnant at the first residential course in London, 31 weeks at the second in Luxembourg, 1-2 weeks postpartum at the third in Rome, 3 months postpartum at the week here in the US, so technically still on maternity leave and 5 months postpartum for the forth residential course in Brussels. And in between all that there are distance modules to complete as well as a team project (to be completed in our own spare time).

Phew! Could I do all that?? Why the heck not? Except for the residential course 1-2 weeks postpartum I could do it.

So I asked if a) I could miss one residential week and b) if I could break my maternity leave. The only risk was if for some reason my doctor banned me from flying to Europe for some pregnancy complication. I ummed and ahhhed about this dilemma for a while. I spoke with past students (who were mums and dads) to see what they thought….could I do it? In the end, I concluded I could do it and should do it. In a similar vain, I shouldn’t miss out on this opportunity ‘just in case’…anyone can get the flu and not be able to travel so why should I not do it just because I’m pregnant? I double checked with my doctor and she said I should go for it.

So no regrets!!! I’m starting the executive development programme in a couple of weeks and I’m excited to be getting back to the things I love to do for work. Continue my professional development.

In a similar vain, I applied for a job in my team which would be a promotion – I have that interview in a couple of weeks too. I’m up against some very talented colleagues so I will try my best, but again, it’s simply another step for getting back to doing things I love and pushing myself. I will take that any day.

Here’s to glass half full days 😊

What it feels like to have a little human growing inside you

August 6, 201613 Comments

***TRIGGER WARNING*** If you have struggled with carrying a child or you are not in a good place with your journey to grow your family, I want to warn you that I am going to write some things that may be a trigger for you.

I write this trigger warning because I am friends with women who will never be able to experience the feeling of a human growing inside them. I also know there are many of you who have supported me through this journey who have experienced loss and greatly fear your bodies will never be able to carry a child. I have heard your pain and sadness, I have felt it with you. I truly have. As I write this trigger warning I am reminded of an awkward situation I found myself in recently…

My local infertility support group had a bbq party for all its members. Every oneof us have struggled with the disease that is infertility. Not one of our stories or journeys to grow our families are exactly the same. We are all unique in that way. And yet still within this group of strong women, I observed insensitivities. We were warned that everyone in the support group was invited so therefore there would be babies, children and pregnant women (me) coming. I met lots of new IF-ers. It was cool to talk about and hear others incredible stories to become parents. I was talking to two ladies one who had a newborn, the other a toddler. The lady with the toddler had adopted her son as a baby. Now it wasn’t immediately apparent he was adopted but he was mixed race and the parents were both white…so I figured before even opening my mouth that this couple had a different story to tell about their path to parenthood. We talked about how her son came into their lives and the matching process, I asked her a question ‘so, was it a complete surprise to you?’ (We were just talking about THAT phone call you get confirming a match with the agency). And for some complete unknown reason to me, perhaps it was my bump on show, the other lady jumped in with her birthing story being a surprise.

I cringed. I looked at the poor girl who had been cut off mid story having to listen to a personal birthing story with disbelief. I looked around and wondered if it was just me who was sensitive to this awkward situation. I mean, I know that not all adoptive parents are infertile, but we were at an INFERTILITY support group for gees sake. It is unlikely this woman would ever get to experience her own birthing story. And it wasn’t the only time the thoughtless comments came out. When we left the party Chris and I both commented on how we both quietly thought ‘WTF? What planet are you on woman?’.

Ok so what’s the point of my randomly long winded story? My point is that my eyes have been opened on this journey to the fact that not everyone can experience what I have felt the past 15 weeks and the next 20 or so. And so I count my blessings every single day for this amazing little human actually growing inside me. I have cried at the thought that some of my friends will never have the opportunity to experience this.

I have also cried for myself. How close I was to not experiencing pregnancy. We were literally at the end of our options, the last chance saloon in getting into the pudding club. We had started talking about the next step being adoption. I wasn’t worried, this made me happy that I knew we would be parents some how. But thinking about that point in our journey now is difficult to look back on. I cry tears of relief. Like the tears I had after I survived the terrorist attacks, they were a mix of tears of fear but relief. Relief to be alive. I am crying tears of relief to be pregnant.

The past week and a half I have felt Rocky move around inside me. I’ve felt her prod, poke or kick – I don’t know what she is doing because I can’t see her, but I feel her. I’ve felt Rocky respond to the outside environment and to the world I’m living in and my inner emotions.

When the fire alarm went off in our house the other night, she wriggled and wriggled…I’m not sure if it was the noise or the fact that my heart was racing from the situation that made her move so much. But I felt like I had a washing machine thing going on in my tummy.

After I eat sweets, she moves around…perhaps I made her hyper with the sugar 😳.

when I cry, she jolts around as if to say ‘hey, mum, I’m trying to get some sleep down here, quit the bawling!’.

I didn’t know pregnancy would be like this. From a few tiny cells we couldn’t see, with the help of some specialist doctors, this is what we created and have grown. And we haven’t even really met her. I couldn’t be more grateful for Rocky, fighting to be the one who will make us proud parents, thankful I get to know her in a way I never realised until now that I will always treasure.

In the IF community we complain about the super fertile who get pregnant at the sight of some sperm, they don’t realise how lucky they are. And then there are people like me, people who do manage to eventually get pregnant and don’t appreciate quite how lucky they are to be able to experience a little human growing inside them.

It’s a…..

August 5, 201612 Comments

The Pudding Club Diary @ 17w2d (26 July 2016)

I could have easily waited until D-day to know the gender of Rocky, but Chris wanted to know before then. So I thought it would be mean to make him wait just because I would like the surprise. Plus it would be awkward if one of us knew and the other didn’t. It would accidentally slip out and then I’d be upset. One of the reasons I could easily wait is because there is a chance that they get it wrong! But there is something to be said in being prepared. After all, the shops are mostly geared toward either baby girl or boy clothes. So we planned to do a gender reveal at our housewarming party. But the plans to arrange the cake and the housewarming for the same day proved challenging, so we eventually decided to find out the gender quietly on our own.

At my 17 week OB appointment we asked the doctor to tell us the gender discovered from the Non Invasive Prenatal Test (NIPT) I took at 13 weeks. For three weeks we had the ability to find out the gender, but we waited for the right time. The doctor said she would put gender in an envelope for us to take home and open later at a more private moment – that was very thoughtful of her.

We waited a whole 15 minutes after getting home before opening the envelope. I was actually quite excited about opening it in the end….

…..the piece of paper said “It’s a girl!!!!”

It was a slightly strange moment because of course we would be thrilled with a girl or a boy! For me, it wasn’t a surprise. I had a very vivid dream at around implantation that Rocky was a girl, and had many dreams about having a girl since then. I didn’t think that my dreams were just because I really wanted/not wanted a girl, rather they felt more real. So finding out Rocky is a girl didn’t surprise me…in a different way, Chris seemed a lot less ambivalent at the news than I expected him to be. So it was a strangely less fanfared moment than we expected and it is difficult to explain why. Perhaps it’s because there is so much attention paid to this moment we expected more, perhaps it’s because we didn’t open it in front of friends and family – there just seems to be a lot of hype about this moment – but actually we are just thrilled to be having a baby – girl or boy!!!

This seemed like a good moment to announce our pregnancy. Probably 95% of our friends and family already knew our we were pregnant, but none knew the gender! So we announced it with the help of our kitty Diesel…..

Chris keeps saying ‘Girls are trouble!’…I have a sneaky feeling she will have him wrapped around her little finger 😊

We do have some names picked out, we still have a bit of filtering out to do, but we will ultimately choose the exact name on D-day. So for now, Rocky remains her nickname. Our little fighter.

Things not to google…pre term labour & IVF

July 29, 20168 Comments

I have a long list of things I should never have googled whilst on this great pudding club hunt. And there are equally as many things not to google whilst in the pudding club, especially on your Friday lunch break…one being ‘pre-term labour IVF’.

Like many IVF related research, the evidence is unclear or poor. But generally, there is a theory that IVF babies are more likely to go into pre term labour. Now how much more likely, I dont know.

I don’t want to worry myself about this stuff because really, it is still very unlikely. But today I caught myself feeling anxious about what I was reading. Some of my anxiety is caused by my lack of weight gain. What if I am not eating enough? What if my baby isn’t growing enough? Am I risking my baby’s life? Although the doctor told me earlier this week at my routine check up, as long as I AM actually eating and not puking, then we won’t worry about it until my 20 week scan when in 2.5 weeks time to see how much Rocky had grown. Every morning I get on the scales and I am not getting heavier…just the normal fluctuations I have always had.

Understanding my concerns about this Chris reminded me to finish my plate of food last night… But I just couldn’t eat anymore of it! So I need to tell myself to listen to the doctor and stop worrying about it for now.

Easier said than done!
And another thing I quickly wanted to mention as I was stupidly googling things I shouldn’t….. is how I noted the lack of research studies that separate out IVF and ICSI patients. Apart from my post on my Brussels experience, my top post that gets hits consistently is the one about the ethics of ICSI. It doesn’t surprise me because I discovered very little about ICSI and hence why I wrote about it. I mean, there is definitely something very unnatural about one sperm being selected by a doctor rather than ‘natural selection’ (nothing natural about IVF though either!) There has to be implications of this human intervention???!