Nighttime thoughts

It's 4 AM and I can't sleep because my cold is keeping me up. Or maybe the meds. Or maybe the anxiety of another blood draw in just a few hours. So here are a few thoughts, mostly unrelated, keeping me company at this hour:

In a few weeks this blog will turn two years old. We calculated that if our first transfer would have worked, our first baby would have been nearly 18 mos old and we'd likely trying for #2 at this point.

There's a part of infertility that feels like you're constantly being held back. The flip side is that you feel everyone else has moved on. No one I know is still in the trenches. No one in real life or in the blogosphere I've met over the past few years. I don't hold it against anyone for moving on - it's what we're all trying to do. But it gets lonely getting left behind. It's also making me wary of trying to connect with new people.

Ironically, the people that have little kids have more of an active social life because they make time to go out, "date night" style, to get a break from the non-stop grind of parenting. We turn in early partly because of our personalities, but in part because the treatment just wipes me out and I can barely keep my eyes open past 8 pm.

Someone posted a link on fb connecting IVF with breast cancer. Obviously correlation doesn't equal causation and I didn't click on the article to find out more because it's a terrifying subject to me. I already have so much history of it in my family - I can't imagine that adding all these hormones is doing good things. But what's the alternative? Another terrifying thought to keep me up at night.

I stopped doing my eyebrows. I'm not sure why. It started by wanting to have them grow out slightly because the lady did them too thin the last time. But when it was time to go get them cleaned up again I just... didn't. It looks horrendous but I'm not motivated to go get it done. I usually do threading and it hurts so I think I'm just being a sissy and not wanting to anything extra that would hurt these days. I'm not big into makeup and I've been blessed with good skin so my biggest maintenance is managing the facial hair. I'd never let the upper lip get this bad but the eyebrows are in a free-for-all zone. It's been two weeks. We'll see how long this lasts.

I've stopped watching what I eat. I'm nauseous again these days and I often forget or skip eating which can't be healthy. I need to get back on the wagon but between cough drops and tissues I don't have the energy to care. I hope this cold goes away before retrieval so I don't have to deal with both simultaneously.

I wasn't allowed to hold or kiss my nieces and nephews at a family party yesterday because no one wanted me to spread my cold germs. Most of the kids had runny noses from day care anyway, but I understand why people would want to be cautious. It broke my heart though, if I'm being entirely honest. Then again if my own kid was healthy and I had a cold I would likely try to keep the germs to myself so I do understand.

Every year during Chanukah I try out a new recipe, usually dessert. Last year it was homemade cannolis. The year before that it was a salted caramel chocolate cupcake. This year I'm thinking maybe cream puffs or eclaires. Still looking for interesting recipes.

We're in between shows right now. We finished watching all of the original Will & Grace from 1998 - they are my favorite characters of all time. We're caught up on all our regular shows like South Park and Last Man on Earth. I have a season of Survivor I saved for retrieval recovery. We try out different stand up comedy specials on Netflix every so often but we have a short attention span and if they don't catch our attention in the first five minutes they've lost us forever.

We still haven't decided about a trip in Jan. We're stuck between wanting to do the trip and not wanting to spend the money. We're worried Tr*mp will do something insane while we're there and we'll be unable to return to the US. Now that I've seen the endocrinologist early, we're no longer bound by that appointment to wait until February for a transfer. We're concerned about the uptick in terror due to the new announcement about Jerusalem status as capital. If we don't do an Israel trip, where's a comparable alternative that won't feel like a consolation prize, especially since anywhere beautiful is still questionable zika-wise.

I read an article the other day about student debt: The Great College Loan Swindle. I'm one of those people who signed on the dotted line not really understanding the long term consequences. My undergrad loan is under control. I pay less than $100/month and will be done in a few years. My graduate degree is another story. I have a crushing monthly payment that barely covers the interest, let alone the principal, so it never goes down. Part of the reason I stay in my current job is that it qualifies me for PSLF, Public Service Loan Forgiveness. Now I'm hearing that Tr*mp has called for the program's elimination by 2018. If that's the case I'm totally screwed. This, coupled with the new tax laws about not being able to deduct student loans or medical expenses, makes everything in my life a lot more difficult. I've never hated a president before because their actions never affected me directly as much as they do these days.

So that's it for now. Gotta try to get some sleep before starting the week again. It's going to be a busy one.