cindy's world

Wednesday, I had a tremendous tire adventure. I changed all 4 tires for the first time on the Lexus, pretty good considering the car’s 5 years old and has 32,300 miles on it. Apparently those high-performance stock tires were only meant to last 15,000 miles. I’d brought the car into the dealership for a recall check, and they observed that my rear tires were almost bald and the fronts were worn pretty badly on the insides (normal wear on sports suspension, which tilts tires inward in the front for better traction). They quoted me $885 for the 4 tires including mounting and balancing, plus $169 for alignment. I don’t know whether this would include the mandatory tire disposal fees and taxes, and it was already too big of a number for me. I’m used to the Accord Coupe’s tires costing $110 each.
I left to go shop around, and after researching, ended up buying the exact same tires (Bridgestone Potenza RE760 Sport) from Discount Tires, and they installed, mounted, balanced, disposed, taxed for just under $850. Their inspection revealed that my suspension is perfectly fine, so because they saved me an alignment, I was fine paying an additional $70 for their replacement program on all 4 tires. I never thought I’d think a grand on tires is a good deal, but that appears to be the norm from my research, and I got away with really good, high-performance, higher-wear tires for under a grand, and if anything happens to them for the next 3 years, they’ll be replaced for free.
The young guys working at Discount Tires/America’s Tires were very knowledgable, friendly, and professional, and many of them have those same tires on their own cars, which they take on the race track on weekends and drift. They must’ve looked at me and my old tires that lasted 32K+ miles and thought, “Man, this car’s wasted on her, the old folgie.”

After my tires were done, I drove my suddenly quiet car over to Ann’s new house and she, her hubby Mark, and I went to the Orange County Fair. The goal was to let her try this year’s new gimmick, deep-fried Kool-Aid balls. When I saw this in a news article, I’d sent the link to her, and we’d been talking about it since. Last year, I’d discovered a deep-fried butter article and sent that to her, and she did go to the fair and try that, too. I wonder what they’re going to deep-fry next year. But anyway, we weren’t sure we’d find it since a friend was just recently at that Fair and had never heard of the Kool-Aid balls. As luck (good or bad, I’ll let you decide) would have it, it was one of the first things we came across. Ann spotted a giant sign immediately:

(BTW, at 5.5 months pregnant, I weighed myself this morning and I weigh 131.6, up 0.1 lbs from what I weighed 2 weeks ago, when the doctor told me to watch the weight gain and restrict it to half pound per week from this point on. Yay.)

There were a lot of large people in the fried foods line, we observed. I lined up in a significantly shorter line farther down for crepes, and ordered a grilled chicken pesto salad crepe, and noticed that everyone in line in front of me was fit or slender. Interesting. Anyway, I didn’t try the Kool-Aid balls. Ann wasn’t too impressed, saying the fried butter last year was better. The Kool-Aid balls were apparently just donut holes in which red punch Kool-Aid powder was mixed into the dough, then deep-fried. She said the doughy innards didn’t have much taste, altho the more fried outside seemed to have been sprinkled with Kool-Aid powder and did achieve more tang of flavor. She felt sick after eating those and some globules of deep fried zucchini strips, and didn’t eat anything else. Mark had a giant hot dog in a giant bun buried in giant amounts of condiments. I’d never thought of mayo as a hot dog topping. At one point Mark got up and left the table to look at some exhibits, and Ann and I were approached by an elderly couple, the woman in a wheelchair. The gentleman asked politely if they could share our table (I guess the farther back ones would make for difficult wheelchair maneuvering) and I told him of course. It then occurred to me I didn’t even check with Ann, but she didn’t seem to mind. The couple had purchased deep-fried Oreo cookies and offered one to me as I was curious to them. I did not allow Allison to have that, but the two of them said it was good and showed me a cross-section of one they’d bitten into. It looked like fried yellow cake (batter) with a doughy black center (Oreo). Ann said she’d had it before and the oil makes everything soggy inside.
It was fun wandering around the fairgrounds with them, people-watching, exhibit-examining, animal-observing. At the livestock section, a goat had just given birth to two little does about 45 minutes before we’d gotten there. She had already licked her girls clean, altho her rear was still seeping some bloody goo. Animals are so resilient. Mama goat doesn’t even look tired, and the baby goats were already walking their tiny, wobbly fuzzy bodies to mom’s teats and nipping at them, eyes open and everything. Farther down in another pen, some giant sows were laying on hay sleeping on their sides. Their tender sat on the gate, explaining to a bunch of onlookers that the sow behind him is expected to give birth the next day, signs being the changes in her behavior, teats, and she’d begun lactating a bit. Mark leaned against this gate and watched the sow, as Ann and I wandered around all the pens and looked at other goats, chicken, chicks, etc. We returned to the sow section a couple of times and had a good laugh at how many people were gathered around the pregnant sow, just staring, when she was on her side asleep the entire time. What are they looking at? Nothing was happening or going to happen, apparently, until the next day.
Anyway, I think I’m now vegetarian again. The Fair does this to me every time.

After Riley sent my mom flowers for her birthday last week, I asked Mr. W, “What if it’s a girl, and she finds all this ‘Riley’ stuff later on and gets all offended?”
He said, “You overestimate how much a kid would care about what you thought. They’re the center of their own universe, they don’t care to read your old blog posts or your old photo comments.” Hmm. And here I’d thought it’d be such a cute college present to print up selected blog posts about the kid in an album or book. Here’s a book about you, what we thought, how much we loved you, starting from before we’d even met you.

I scheduled my full screen ultrasound with radiology for today, my birthday. That way, I’d have the whole day off. What a great present to myself, I’d thought. Mr. W had to work it a little with his supervisors to get it off as well, and by a few minutes after 10am, we were in radiology with a doctor taking tons of photos of the baby’s head, hands, feet, heart, stomach, organs, spine. Everything checked out fine. At one point I saw a little knee raise just slightly, almost like a flinch. I felt it at the same time I saw it on the screen. It was surprising how little movement the baby needed to make for me to feel the twitch. This does not bode well for when the kid gets REALLY active later on when there’s less room. =P
“Do you want to know the gender?” the radiologist asked.
“Yes!”
And she made us wait another 15 minutes while she silently took photos of other stuff. At one point she rested the ultrasound on the left of my abdomen, then turned to look at Mr. W. From my angle I couldn’t really see what he was looking at, I could just see movement and shades of gray, but I turned to look at Mr. W, too. His face spread into a charmed-looking smile. “That’s the baby’s face,” the radiologist explained.

Finally, toward the end, she turned the monitor toward me. “You want to know the gender, right?”
Mr. W said “Yes!”
I felt nervous. I tried to mentally prepare myself to be okay with both genders, reminding myself that I had always wanted a girl, but had gotten used to it being a Riley in the past 5 months of pregnancy, so really, that means I’m happy with either. Right?
We were shown this angle on the screen.

I saw the “hamburger buns.” (I’d done research previously on what boy and girl genitalia would look like on ultrasound.) The radiologist said, “To me it looks like a girl.” I was a little stunned. I couldn’t look at Mr. W, knowing that all along he’d wanted a boy. When I finally turned to look at him, he looked fine. Normal. Still happy.
“Now you won’t have to work hard to stay young enough to throw the baseball around with the kid all the time,” I said to him.
“How accurate is the gender reading?” he asked the radiologist, as I got ready to leave.
“It depends, I may be wrong. But to me it looks like a girl.” She then explained about the hamburger bun looking anatomy between the legs when viewed in from the feet (like the photo above).
Later, in the car, I asked him if he was disappointed. He said, “No, because like you said, now I won’t have to do all the coaching, and all the sports leagues all day long, and driving the kid to and from practice every day. Unless you want her to get involved in softball or something.”
“You’ll have to do a drop-off at piano lessons once a week.” He chuckled but seemed fine with that.

I texted college roommie Diana, who’d been following closely on my whole pregnancy thus far. “So far Rebecca’s accuracy is consistent…looks like an Allison.” I’d told Diana (who’d had a couple of sessions with Rebecca) that Rebecca’s accuracy is claimed to be 85%, although in my and friends’ experience, that’s far too modest. However, Rebecca had always warned us that her predictions of unborn children’s genders are something she’s least accurate at, despite the odds being a 50/50. “God’s sense of humor,” she’d laugh at the disclosure. Rebecca sees the person’s spirit and identity, not an anatomical gender, although in reading past lives she can see an physical image in her head so she was able to tell me that this child and I have had at least one past life together before where I was mom and he was son and took good care of me.
Diana replied immediately, “Wow! Really. Very cool. Congrats. Everything else good?”
“I feel all weird now. Like, what happened to Riley?”
“Haha. Remember, girls will take care of us. Guys will take care of their wives later.”
“Good point.”
Still, I almost cried as I thought about it. Where’d my boy go? It almost felt like a loss, which is ridiculous, and I had to remind myself that the “disconnect” I feel right now is an illusion — it’s still the same soul, same physical baby even, inside of this growing belly that it’s always been. And considering it’s a girl, WOW have I had a blessed, smooth pregnancy. And it’s a good thing that despite being set on “Riley” for a boy name, I still kept running girl names by Mr. W just in case. I liked Ally for awhile, and figured I’d make it Alice, for long, which Mr. W vetoed (along with Kayla, Lilah, Leila, just about every girl name I ran by him). But he was fine with Allison or Alison. I wasn’t as taken with Allison, though even Diana said Alice is an old-woman name and Allison is better. So I looked it up.
Alison – the light of the sun.
Allison – of noble birth.
Allie – The defender, or helper of mankind.
I can live with that. Although I can see confusion coming now — my cousin Diana’s adorable baby girl is Elizabeth Lynn. They call her Elle for short. For the older generation of Asian relatives, they’re going to think Elizabeth and Allison sound the same, and Elle and Ally (I may go with Allie) sound close, too. =P But I guess it was meant to be like that, cuz the name I’d always thought I’d have for my girl was Isabella, Belle for short (which I threw out the window, thanks to the raging success of the “Twilight” series).

Okay, happy 35th birthday to me. A day off from work, AND the discovery of our little Allison with perfectly normal, working parts. Now when I walk by baby stores, I won’t have to point and say all resentfully, “See? Baby girl clothes are SO MUCH CUTER than baby boy clothes!”

I’d meant to post this email exchange from last week between me and my dad in honor of Father’s Day, cuz it’s cute. But I didn’t get a chance, so I’m posting it now (Tues, 6/21) and pre-dating the post to Father’s Day Sunday a few days ago. Yes, I’m cheating by controlling time. But at least I’m open about it.

Some quick background. My mom brings up on occasion that my dad doesn’t know when her birthday is, or didn’t do anything special for her on her birthday. My dad’s rebut is always the same — how is he supposed to keep track of all her birthdays when she goes by the lunar calendar, the solar (Western) calendar, AND there was an error Immigration made in her paperwork on her DOB that instead of correcting, my mom instead just went with to make things easier, so there’s an actual birthday and the erroneous birthday? (I didn’t even know that the “legal” birthday I’d always thought was her actual birthday wasn’t the correct day until adulthood.)
~ * ~
Me: Do you want to go to San Diego for that seafood buffet brunch on Sunday for Father’s Day? I can treat you and [Mr. W].

Dad: Is sunday your mom’s birthday ? And 29 is your birthday? So every body had some reason to happy ?

Me: Sunday’s not mom’s birthday! Her bday is next Wednesday. But we can do advance celebrations.
Also, the Service Dept at Lexus is not open on Sundays, so to save you a trip on Saturday, [Mr. W] and I will go over after work on Friday, I’ll leave mom my car and take hers, then I’ll get her car navigation reprogrammed at Lexus on Saturday, then on Sunday when you come over for the brunch, you’ll bring back my car and later drive mom’s car back home. (Confusing?)

Dad: Mon’s bday make more confusing, As I know grand mom said your mom’s bday is jun 22. And she said is jun 26 and you said is next Wednesday. and I know she was born May 01 at intercalary month that is the reason (excuse) not to know which day is her bday. haha
For Lexus it is much easy to understand you and [Mr. W] home Fri. Me and mon to your home Sun. see it is easy. One more thing the save beal on driver side need to fix too. It is face wrong side.

Me: mom said her bday is actually June 22 (next Wednesday) but that immigration made a mistake when doing her paperwork and wrote June 26. So her “legal” birthday is June 26, which is what I always thought it was until one day I found out it was a paperwork mistake. So now I ignore the mistake birthday and celebrate the “real” birthday. And now you say it’s May 1. So I have no idea. I want 3 birthdays, too.
Oh, that’s right about the safety belt. I’ll have them fix that, too.

Dad: you know what one day mom ask me to pick up Savon for her, The counter asking me what is your wife’s bday? and then every body lol because they understand been marryed for so many year(don’t remember how many years) old man alway can not know wife’s bday.

Me: Why would Sav-On need mom’s birthday, anyway? You should’ve explained that it was an unfair question for you, because you remember 3-4 different birthdays, so you should get more credit.

Dad: As you know Sav-On when you pick up some times asking zip. or tel last 4 # or…to see it they give you the right medicinal. never had any one asking for bday but because I pick up for my wife so they think the other way to have fun (I guess),
When I drop prescription the old man (druggist) see the prescription is for shawling and try to verify I told him “Jun 26 1951” he lol and said “close enough I been marry so long and still had problem to remember my wife bday” then when drug ready the lady asking the same question and said it is not the corrct should be Jun 22. How would I know which day mom use for different place ? and how to explain one people had 6 different bday?
1. May 1
2. May 1 lunar year.
3. Jun 22
4. Jun 22 lunar year
5. Jun 26
6. Jun 26 lunar year
And your mom actually bday is lunar calendar Intercalary month May 1 so in Solar calendar is Jun 22…… How you think I may use my poor english to explain to some one don’t know lunar calendar ?? To make thing’s easy just laugh on it. right ? ha ha did I make it clear ??
~ * ~
Did you guys understand that? Do I need to translate? 🙂 Longest emails my dad had ever written me. Usually his emails are stuff like “CINDY: GOT EML. WL TALK TO MOM RPLY. THKS”

Mr. W and I took my mom, grandma, and dad out for dinner on Friday night for Mother’s Day. I felt bad because with all the doctor appointments and running around we did in the past week and a half, I hadn’t been able to buy my mom and grandma a Mother’s Day gift. They’re also really cheap dates; Grandma chose Boston Cafe (although it turned out she meant the affiliated restaurant Boston Kitchen a few miles away, oops), so the entire dinner with tax and tip included came out to just over $50.

Mr. W and I drove out early Saturday morning to spend the weekend with his side of the family in Vegas and just returned today. We gave his dad a 1-day advance warning (we were supposed to be on vacation all next week, but changed our minds last minute and gave the days back, altho keeping Monday to drive home) that we were coming, and his dad said that just the day before, my mother-in-law had remarked, “I have a feeling they’re coming down to see us this weekend.” Very intuitive of her! We arrived Saturday late morning and ate lunch at Mr. W’s must-have restaurant every time we go to Vegas: Aurelio’s Chicago pizza. Mr. W’s parents and Gamer Bro were with us. Then Sunday, most of the family (all those who didn’t have to work) took my MIL to a champagne brunch buffet at South Point Hotel & Casino. There’s free mimosas and champagne with our meal, pre-poured, and Mr. W and his mom both told me that given my inability to drink, I should grab a champagne/mimosa anyway and give it to them. All of us walked up to the beverage table and got an OJ and a champagne, or so we thought. Turned out the OJ was a mimosa so we ended up with WAY too much alcohol at the table. Mr. W, his mom, and Rocker Brother did their best to drink the table dry, but didn’t do all that well; Gamer Bro finished what he took, his wife and I didn’t drink either one, and the kids’ end of the table drank surprisingly little given that they’re used to drinking and partying. I guess champagne isn’t their thing. Mr. W drank so much that he ended the brunch with a cartwheel at the elevator lobby and dance-swirled his way to the car in the parking structure while holding a laughing 2-year-old niece. Now I know how to get him to take care of babies. I’ll make sure the house is fully stocked with champagne.

This weekend also marks the day I “came out” on the social networking site. I had been pondering how to do it, and thought maybe I’d just jump right into it with a status message that says, “Cindy says goodbye to the first trimester and hello to the second.” However, Mr. W gave me an unexpected opening opportunity. I posted this photo instead, with the following caption:

Hubby surprised me with my first Mother’s Day present.

At first the only comments that drew were from people who already knew, such as Rebecca (who knew before we had even begun the process to get pregnant) and some coworkers (I’ve already been outed at work). I started to think that my coming out post was too subtle. But soon, and then like wildfire, others caught on. I got a bunch of congratulatory remarks, questions, comments, and a bunch of Happy Mother’s Day well-wishes. I hadn’t considered this my first Mother’s Day, but everyone else said it counts, including Mr. W. I even received a voice mail from my cousin Olivia, who put both her young daughters on the phone to wish me a happy first Mother’s Day. It was very sweet. 🙂

My prenatal gym trainer asked me yesterday how many times I’d worked out since I’d seen him last week. I drew a blank, then realized it was because aside from a day of pilates, I hadn’t worked out. My week has been filled with a variety of doctors and patients instead.

First, a vet: Dodo’s been scratching and pawing at his ears, and altho I Q-tip it to clean it out, the tips come out purplish-brown each time and he’s been shaking his head anytime I graze his ear. So I decided I need medication. Yup, two ear infections, bacterial and a touch of yeast. I was given (or rather, allowed to purchase at high cost) ear drops and was instructed to administer drops in his ears twice a day for two weeks. Meanwhile, the vet flushed out Dodo’s ears really well. Dodo did not appreciate that and sulked in his cat condo when he got home:

Next, an urgent care visit: Mr. W started having a lower back pain last Wednesday, and he had an accupuncture appointment Thursday, so he told the accupuncturist about his complaint. She supposedly treated him for that with needles in his knee and somewhere else I can’t recall. She not only didn’t cure it, but it got WAY worse. By Friday he had overall body discomfort, his skin and scalp hurt, he had a headache, and a fever started. All of that was secondary to the increased back pain that became so aggravated he couldn’t stand or sit or lean by Sunday, AND he was having difficulty urinating. Unable to sleep the past nights from pain, fever and discomfort, he finally agreed to go to Urgent Care on Sunday. Given the symptoms and confirmed fever, the doctor took a urine sample to check for a urinary tract/bladder infection, which came out negative. The doctor also ordered a urine culture anyway, to see if bacteria or flora or something would grow so they could figure out what the infection is. In the meantime, Mr. W was prescribed a 2-week course of Cipro antibiotics to kill whatever may be causing the symptoms, as the culture wouldn’t be done for a few days, and was instructed to call his regular doctor on Wednesday (today) if he doesn’t feel better. When we went to the lab, turned out the doctor had also ordered a urine sample to test for the STD chlamydia (which probably wasn’t mentioned in front of me so as to not breach patient confidentiality, and who expects an honest answer if a doctor asked a patient in front of the patient’s wife, “Have you had extramarital sex in the past few months?”). Since the appointment on Sunday, Mr. W’s discomfort and back pain did not alleviate, he continued to not sleep well, not pee well, and his fever raged on. He’d take a few Tylenols to bring the fever down, and it’d work, then the Tylenol would wear off and immediately his temperature would shoot up again. My mom and prenatal gym trainer both suspect kidney stones. (This is a primary reason I gave up drinking sodas years ago, among some other health reasons.) He took both Monday and Tuesday off work, althought he’s back at work today. I wanted him to see his regular doctor today, but he’s being stubborn and he *thinks* his fever broke and he’s feeling less agony. I’ll see if I could convince him to make an appointment for this evening.

My first OB visit: Now for some better doctor visits. I had my first OB visit with Kaiser yesterday. The doctor was very nice and Mr. W liked him a lot. He studied my blood test results, ordered some other routine tests, and did a vaginal ultrasound and physical checkup. Turns out I’m too early in the pregnancy for the anemia to be of the baby’s doing, so I AM anemic. He encouraged me to supplement my prenatals with iron, so I’m back to my vegetarian liquid supplement Floradix (which I LOVE). I lost some weight so I’m actually a pound less now than pre-pregnancy which I was concerned about, but the OB wasn’t concerned. He said I’m healthy and way ahead of his other patients, with whom he has to spend hours explaining proper nutrition, as the trend of pregnancy problems in the OC is overeating, not undereating. The nutritional needs of the baby right now are minimal.
So now the fun stuff: ultrasound. At my angle laying down I couldn’t see the screen in detail, but I did see that the baby was now filling up the previous black void in the uterus. And then this conversation:
OB: This kid is going to TOWN!
Me: What do you mean?
OB: It’s moving around so much that I can’t get a still picture to take a measurement.
[Seeing a profile, then a back, then a butt, then feet. Then a head, a heartbeat, then feet. Then profile, then back, then hands.]
Me: I thought that was YOU doing that, moving the ultrasound around!
OB: No, it’s the kid. Watch. [Holding the ultrasound still. Seeing the front, then the profile, then the back, then feet.]
Me: Does this mean it’s gonna be a kicky kid?
OB: Well, it certainly has that possibility.
Me: Can you tell where the placenta is attached?
OB: It’s hard to tell that right now, but it seems to be anterior…but let me get this measurement first, it’s important.
[Mr. W takes out his phone and starts filming the screen, getting the following footage after the kid stopped dancing quite so much.]

So the good news is, Riley’s developmentally right on schedule, and the placenta does not seem to be over the cervix, which is how it looked in the last ultrasound video. And, he’s sure alive. I thought it was adorable he was all happy and playing in there (which I can’t feel), but Mr. W in his sickly stupor put a damper on it. “I don’t think it’s a good thing that he’s rolling around so much. There’s still a lot of room in there for him to move around, what if he wraps himself up and gets tangled in the umbilical cord?” WAAAAH!!! Well, the doctor didn’t seem concerned. :/

The day after I was cleared to exercise again was a court holiday, Cesar Chavez day. (Don’t hate me just cuz you don’t get ethnic days off.) The stepkidlet left early for class as I was in the kitchen, and I suggested kayaking at the lake when she returned that afternoon. She loved the idea, and Beau said he may join us after his workout scheduled for noon. Turned out Daughter’s last class was canceled, so she was home by noon. She didn’t think Beau would make it since his workouts are sort of a career thing as he’s a basketball person, and his workouts take practically a full workday. (He didn’t get out of the gym until 5pm, so he did miss the lake, altho he stopped by afterwards.) Daughter meanwhile had also invited one of her best girlfriends, Kylie. So basically, I was going to end up kayaking with my stepdaughter and her boyfriend and/or her best friend. When did I start being one of those parents that hang out with their teenage kids’ friends? Maybe I should invite them all to go clubbing with me with the promise that I will buy them beer. =P (I mentioned this to them at the lake, and they both thought it was really funny, until Kylie told a story where a schoolfriend’s mom really DID offer her to share a bong. Kylie told that mom uncomfortably, “No thank you, I don’t do that.” I’m not gonna be one of THOSE moms.) It turned out to be a beautiful day, 90 degrees out and sunny. We all soaked up the Vitamin D, drifting in our kayaks, dangling our toes in the water.

The day before, Mr. W and I scored free tickets from a coworker of mine to see “Wicked,” and he had texted Daughter something like, “Nyanny nyanny nyah nyah, guess where I’m going after work.” “Wicked” is one of Daughter’s favorite Broadway musicals, if not absolute favorite. So while we were at the lake, to get him back, I had Daughter take a photo of me in my kayak. I sent that photo to Mr. W via text along with the message “nyanny nyanny, look where I’m at!” Mr. W was meanwhile at mandatory training in downtown Los Angeles, 50+ miles from home. He wrote back, “You suck. Who are you with?” I guess it was pretty obvious I wasn’t alone, cuz you can see both my hands in the photo on my kayak. Right on cue, Daughter then sent him this photo:

We (those of us on the lake and not at work) got a good laugh. And okay, I admit, there is ONE advantage to the iPhone: front-facing cameras so you can see what you’re taking a photo of, and be sure to get in the frame.

After an hour kayaking, we all decided the perfect way to end our day of leisure is to go to Coldstones for ice cream. I almost bought an entire cookie dough ice cream cake, thanks to college roommie Diana, who DID end up buying an entire Coldstone ice cream cake to enjoy over the course of a few days with her new hubby. But Daughter (thankfully) talked me out of it. She said I should just get a small thing because she knows I don’t normally eat ice cream, and I’m just having cravings, and the moment I get some ice cream in me, I’m gonna be over it. So to not go overboard. I was SO GLAD she had some sense that I didn’t have at the time (I must’ve been out of my mind with heat exhaustion and a blood sugar low), because I took her advice and she was right. Halfway into my small-size mint ice cream with waffle cone mix-in, I was sure I was about done. I’m so glad I didn’t have to figure out how to store an 8″ ice cream cake in the freezer that I’m gonna feel guilty about for the next month.

This morning was the ultrasound appointment to check on the baby’s heart. It’s amazing to think that last week this time, he was just a black dot. This morning, I expected to see flashes on the ultrasound screen, which is what I was told the heartbeats would look like. Today, I saw a bubble inside a circle inside a larger black dot. The bubble was dancing rhythmically all on its own. It’d shrink halfway down, then pop back out and be full and round. Then it’d shrink half way, then pop back out, in quick succession. I asked Mr. W to video it on my phone, and he did, but we couldn’t find the video afterwards. He must not have saved it. 🙁 BUT, the doctor did print out an ultrasound picture and give me another little photo folder! There are 2 x’s around the heart, cuz the doctor (female doc who discovered the polyps) was measuring the kid. He’s about 2 mm big right now, the size of a small seed. The circle around the quickly pulsating heart is the yolk sac, and the large black dot is the cavity the baby’s in, about half an inch big right now. Sorry about the glare; I took a cell phone picture of the ultrasound picture:

My multiple attempts to send the cell phone photo above to my email so that I could post it kept failing, and as I was IMing Flip Flop Girl, she offered for me to text it to her and she’ll email that to me, so this photo appears courtesty of Flip Flop Girl! She said it was cool I’m seeing all these early stages of the baby, because in standard pregnancies, the OB wouldn’t do all these early ultrasounds, if they even see you at all.

So the baby is growing at the rate expected, yes there’s only one in there, for all you who “predicted” that going the in vitro route would give me triplets, and I’ve been released from my daily baby aspirin intake and the estrogen patch. They told me to go ahead and rip it off today, so I did. I did briefly consider, since this patch still had 1 day of potency left, how funny it would be to stealthily stick it on some unaware male coworker. But they (male coworkers) probably wouldn’t enjoy the extra emotions and breast tenderness the way we women do. I had a blood test today to check progesterone levels, so I’ll be getting a call later letting me know whether I can stop getting my nighttime progesterone shots. MEANWHILE, I’ve been specifically cleared from my no-exercise restriction! She said I can do light pilates, gentle yoga, light weights, cardio as long as it’s not something extreme like boot camp, AND I can even start running again, as long as I limit the runs to 30 mins. That’s great; I can get 3 miles in, which is my minimum run anyway. (Anything less and I feel like, “why bother?”) WOOHOOOO!! Hello, endorphins!

On the way into the courthouse this morning, a coworker friend caught me and asked if we’d like two free tickets to see the musical “Wicked” tonight, 7pm show. She had two friends cancel, and their tickets would go to waste otherwise. I wasn’t interested in musicals in general, but I know Mr. W would DIE of excitement. So I asked him, and he did. He came back to life soon enough to take up my coworker’s offer. Here’s the tricky part — I have to get my nightly progesterone shots around 8pm. If I get a call from the nurse later and she says I have enough progesterone in my system and can stop the shots, then this show tonight came at the perfect time. If not, then I’m gonna have to figure something out, maybe get home first to package up the shot and try to get it done at intermission or something. But the way things have been going, I wouldn’t be surprised if Riley’s made these arrangements as another “hello” gift, like the dolphins, so that we can celebrate seeing his heartbeat/ending the meds/my returning to the gym by seeing his daddy’s favorite musical tonight. He DOES have a very big heart, my little son.

I will update when I get the nurse’s call.

*** UPDATE (2:32p)
The nurse called. Riley has spoken (har). My progesterone level is 48, and they’re looking for a number above 20. I asked how they know what part of that is me and what part of it is the progesterone shots. She said the progesterone dose only accounts for a quarter of my total progesterone, which means my body is producing plenty of progesterone on its own, like it’s supposed to. She cleared me to stop the shots. YAY! Wanna hear more “coincidences?” The pharmacy I had ordered the meds from gave me EXACTLY the right number of syringes and needle tips; I have one extra syringe at home, but no extra needle tips since Mr. W hit blood one time and had to start over with a new needle tip. They couldn’t have known how many syringes I’d need, since that was up to the doctor, and the doctor’s orders are conditional on my timing and hormone levels. Basically all of the extra free syringes and needle tips my clinic phlebotomist gave me last week are untouched, so I can return them all to the clinic with my thanks at my next appointment, 2 weeks away.
The nurse then said, “Have we told you your due date?” I said no. They calculated it at 11-21-11 (whereas Flip Flop Girl and I both came up with 11-25-11), and she said it’s based on the first date of my last cycle (which Flip Flop and I used) taking into account the dates of fertilization and implantation in a more complicated formula than the one Flip Flop and I used. This puts the baby’s arrival date even more squarely into November, as even if he were a week late and the doctors had to induce, I’d still be in November.

I had my ultrasound appointment this morning to check on the sac. The doctor found the sac without issue. It pretty much looks like just a black dot. He measured it and said it is at the right size for this time frame, then turned the vaginal ultrasound wand toward my ovaries. He said the ovaries look slightly enlarged, which concerned me, but then he said quickly that this is good; he’d expected some enlargement due to the process I’d undergone and am going through, but that it’s not overly enlarged, which is what he did not want to see. He went back to the black dot in the middle and zoomed in. With the mouse pointer, he circled the border at a part of the dot and said that this is the yolk sac. I didn’t see anything distinguishing this black part from any other black part, but then, I was looking at a wall-mounted monitor with poorer resolution than the one he was looking at. Mr. W was looking at the same monitor the doctor was, attached to the ultrasound machine, and told me afterwards that the “color” was different around the yolk part. I asked the doctor whether he could tell where the sac was attached in my uterus. He said he couldn’t yet, since he can’t observe the placenta yet, but that it’s somewhere at the top of my uterus. That’s good, because I read in my baby book that I definitely do NOT want it to attach at the bottom. That would create lots of complications if it’s too close to my cervix. So, according to the doctor, we are seeing what we expect to see at this stage, and everything looks good and normal. Yay! I’m successfully growing a black dot!

When I got dressed and met him out at the nurse’s station, I was given a printout of the ultrasound, which they’d placed into a little photo folder. We laughed, it was so cute. “It’s your first baby photo!” the nurse said. Here’s the inside of the folder:

I went to the phlebotomist station and had a blood draw so they could check my hormones. If the hormones (progestin, I think) look high enough, they’ll start weening me off the Progesterone shots at night. Currently I’m still getting 1cc injected into my butt muscle each night, followed by a nice butt massage and heating pad session, courtesy of the baby’s daddy. Mr. W must be doing a good job with the injections and massage, because altho I’d been warned by others who had walked my path and by nurses and doctors alike to expect tangible lumps or knots inside my glute muscles from the injected Progesterone in sesame oil (which my body should fully absorb and work out within months, they say), I don’t have any as of yet. I’ll update when the nurse calls me later with blood test results.

I had a brief chat over IM with Rebecca this morning. She ended the conversation with, “gonna have to go…sending love and good thoughts…and just for the record, I think this one is gonna take. I do want to remind you that I am not always right, but I am having a sense a fullness right now thinking about you and that’s why I think you are pregnant…xoxoxo”
People in the know have been asking me this week how I’m feeling. “I feel nothing,” I tell them quite honestly. “I don’t know what all these women complain about; pregnancy’s a breeze!” (Yes, they know it’s a joke.)

*** UPDATE:
The nurse called with my blood test results.
Progestin level: They’re looking for a number over 20. Mine is 74.8.
Estrogen level: 1327.
I’m instructed to reduce the nightly Progesterone shot from 1cc to .5 cc. They’re weaning me off! Yay! They also gave me a fistful of free syringes today cuz I was about to run out. I asked for a prescription for syringes, they gave me freebies. Yay!
I’m also instructed to reduce the estrogen patches from 2 (to be torn off and replaced every 3rd day) to 1 (to be torn off and replaced every 3rd day). My body is responding and making the proper hormones, so the doctor is halving all my doses! Yay!

Email from me to my dad, mom’s work, and mom’s home email at 9:30 this morning (since she has very limited access at work):
Subject: First baby picture
Here is your first photo of your grandchild.

Reply email from mom’s work to me:
We can see the baby already? I can’t open it!

Reply email from me to my mom’s work:
awwww, I guess you’ll have to wait until you get home!

Reply email from my dad to me and my mom:
Dear Cindy :
Wow ! look’s just like you ha ha ha

Reply email from me to my dad and mom:
I know! That’s what I look like at night after I take off all my makeup! Mom says she can’t view the picture.

IM from Flip Flop Girl (whom I showed this string to):
hahahahahaha
you and your dad are so mean!!!
but SO funny

IM from me to Flip Flop Girl:
hee hee!
she’s probably called my dad by now and has wailed, “I can’t see it! What does it look like? Can you print it out and fax it to me?”

I had no idea what to wear that Saturday morning. What does one wear when one meets his/her child for the first time? I suppose the impression you want to give of your identity would play a factor. If I dressed business-casual, does that make people think I’m professional and responsible? Maybe a little cold and unmotherly. If I dressed athletically, do I appear sloppy? I didn’t think I wanted to wear anything trendy, or anything remotely uncomfortable or restrictive. So I opted for a loose red hooded tunic (sort of my signature color now) and black cotton drawstring yoga pants. It’s sort of a homemaker, casual look. Maybe something that says “I’m ready to roll up my sleeves, jump into the midst of the action with both feet, and be mom.” Plus it’s roomy for optimal comfort.

The lobby at the Redondo Beach branch, the place my kids have called home for the past 5 days, was empty when we walked in before 11am. I was eventually called into the back into the same room I was in the last time I saw my doctor. He had agreed to come back for this procedure, but was coming from his office in Beverly Hills. A nurse walked me through some consent forms, then handed me a Valium pill. “I didn’t take this when I did the trial transfer,” I said. I don’t like being drugged up.
“No, you wouldn’t have. This is to relax you, and it also relaxes your muscles. Since your uterus is a large muscle, this will keep it from cramping while we’re doing the transfer.” Oh, it’s for the kid. Okay, then. I popped the pill and swigged the water. Then I changed into the provided gown and when I reopened the door to let the nurse know I was changed, I felt the panning delay of my eyes, like I was getting a little loopy.
“I can feel it working already,” I said. She looked surprised, as it had only been about 5 minutes. I explained it’d been hours since breakfast (I probably slept 2 hours the night before, and it was an odd insomnia as I was not nervous, I just wasn’t sleepy) so the medication hit me fast. She told me to climb into bed and that she’d check on my doctor to see where he was. Turned out he was just leaving the other office. He arrived only 15 minutes later than the planned time (although the nurses and embryologists jokingly gave him a hard time about it), which meant it had been about half an hour since I took Valium, but it had worn off. I wasn’t dizzy or spacy or anything anymore. That’s some powerful liver I’ve got there. I tried my best to relax my muscles on my own as the doctor played classical music, inserted the cold speculum (“Just a warning, this is going to feel cold,” he said. The nurses all said, “Well, it was WARM when we set her up but it’s cold NOW by the time you got here,” haha) and cleaned what he needed to inside with some cotton swabs. Meanwhile, the embryologist came in from another door wheeling a big clear box that looked about the size of a large treasure chest on legs. I knew what was inside was more valuable to me than any pirate’s booty.
“Is that the embryo?” I asked.
“Yup,” she said. She looked inside the box through a microscope attached to the side wall of the clear box. “Wanna see it?” she asked Mr. W. Of course he wanted to see it!
“That’s a really good-looking embryo we’re putting in you,” the doctor said as Mr. W looked.
I joked, “Oh, I’m sure you say that about all your blastocysts.” Mr. W later told me it looks much like the photo they had taken for us, but less clear. Here’s the photo attached to a report that the nice embryologist had shown me before the doctor got there:

Oh, speaking of this report, the embryologist had also told me that they would be freezing 3 embryos that day; 2 top-notch quality blastocysts (“A”s), 1 mediocre blastocyst (“C”). The C blastocyst has rather thin walls, so it’s likely it would not survive the freezing and thawing process. There are 2 more embryos they’re watching that are growing slowly, and the embryologist is going to give them more time to see if they grow into blastocysts. If they do, they will be frozen with the other ones. So with 1 embryo going in, 3 frozen, 2 being watched, that leaves 5 more that are not accounted for. I assumed those 5 did not survive the 5-day waiting period.
The doctor very, very carefully, using a surface ultrasound on my stomach controlled by a nurse to guide his movements (all my ultrasounds had been vaginal before this point) threaded a thin tube called a catheter through my cervix into my uterus. I didn’t feel a thing, but only knew what he was doing because he explained every step to me as he was performing it. He looked at the ultrasound screen and referenced a white line in the middle of a tight C-shaped dark mass, saying “That’s me.” The catheter. I could SORT OF make out what he called “the white line” but only because he insisted it was there; if I were looking at the screen without direction, it would’ve all just been various shades of gray fading into other shades of gray to me. Mr. W seemed to see better, since he was sitting closer to the screen. The doctor described his actions, how he was going to bring the catheter in a little farther, and said that there was a little polyp he had to go around to get in.
That dropped my jaw. “But they said there were no more polyps, that they were all gone!” He didn’t seem concerned and said it was fine, he just went around it, that’s all. So I guess my body just makes and then gets rid of polyps between cycles? At least the polyps had disappeared in time for me to catch this cycle, even if one came back later. =/ The embryologist then brought the embryo to the doctor. I didn’t see how it was administered, but the doctor told me to expect to see a small white flash at the end of the line, and that would be the embryo in some fluid going into my uterus. I COMPLETELY missed it. I was looking, I just didn’t see anything. But somewhere in there, it hit me the magnitude of what we’re doing and emotions suddenly rose to the surface and choked me. I didn’t make a sound, but I saw the convulsion on my uterus in the ultrasound. I forced myself to calm down and it did not happen again. After the doctor withdrew something, he kept the speculum in me, backed off a bit, and the embryologist quickly rushed back to the big clear box and looked through the microscope again.
“She’s checking to make sure that the embryo’s not still in there,” he explained. In a few percentage of cases, the embryo for whatever reason did not get released with the fluid, and is still stuck in the instrument. Soon, she gave the all-clear. “Okay, the embryo’s not there, which means it’s in YOU,” the doctor said with a smile. He carefully pulled out the speculum and lowered the bed.

They wheeled me to the recovery area where less than a week ago I listened to another patient throw up. The nurse told me to prop my knees up, and tucked me in under the warmed-up blankets. I was directed to lay there for half an hour before they released me. I was kind of surprised they just squirt the embryo in there and it somehow magically sticks. Too bad no one’s come up with some sort of dissolving tape. They can put the embryo up against my uterine wall, slap some tape over it, and let the tape melt away in a week. I guess nature’s more efficient. So as the embryo presumably burrowed itself into all its surrounding nourishment, Mr. W leaned against the railing of the hospital bed I was laying on and looked at me adoringly. We just chatted until the nurse came by and asked me if I had to use the restroom yet. I sure did; in order for the abdominal ultrasound to work well, I had to drink 16oz of water an hour before the procedure and hold it. That fluid was ready to come out now. After I returned to the bed and my doctor popped his head and the arm in the curtain to squeeze my toes “for luck” and to tell me to rest up for the next 48 hours while forbidding me to exercise until they see a heartbeat, I was soon discharged.

I started my bedrest downstairs in front of the TV in the living room. That soon hurt my back. In the evening, I was shooed upstairs for my nighttime Progesterone shot. Luckily, it was a relatively uneventful shot, unlike the night before when Mr. W said “Hmm” after he withdrew the needle. “What?” I’d asked. He said there was blood in the syringe, but he hadn’t noticed blood when he drew back after first stabbing me to check for blood. “Maybe it’s too dark in here, and I’m not wearing my glasses,” he’d said. I demanded to see the syringe. Soon I took a picture of of it and sent it to Bat for a nurse’s opinion.

Bat seemed initially confused that there was blood in the syringe AFTER the injection, but then said if Mr. W truly hit a vein and accidentally gave the shot intravenously, first of all it’d be a miracle, and second, we’d see a lot more blood than that. So I felt a teeny bit better. He said likely we just went through a couple of little capillaries on the way in and out. =P

I bed-rested for a FULL 48 hours. I was bored, I watched way too much wedding-related shows on TLC, and texted photos of my constant companion, Dodo, to people who probably had better things to do, like work.

Mr. W had planned to work out for 4-5 hours on Sunday, the day after the embryo transfer, but after seeing that I’m literally put on “strict bedrest,” meaning NO getting up at all except to use the restroom, he decided to stay home. He stayed downstairs and played computer games, played on his iPad, read outside while sunning in the backyard, but popped in anytime I texted him. I tried to keep the requests to a minimum. I felt guilty being waited on. I texted for water and an orange, asked for vitamins once, and he brought me my meals on trays and ate next to me on the bed before he brought everything back down and disappeared to his own devices again. He’d reappear for shots, and when I texted about how I watched the entire day start, peak, and wane right outside my window and I felt like I’d never even started my day. He slept in the spare room the last 3 nights to allow me to sleep sideways on the bed with the TV on. I guess when I laid like that, there was only room for me and this guy:

If you’re over 6 feet tall, you’re outa luck on this bed. I also joked about wanting a bell.
Somewhere in there, the lab called. An embryologist I was speaking with for the first time explained the following:
18 eggs extracted
12 were mature and fertilized
11 became embryos
4 embryos became blastocysts
3 were “A” quality, 1 was “C” quality
1 “A” was implanted, 2 remaining “A”s and the remaining “C” was frozen on Saturday
The remaining embryos had stopped growing and the cells had stopped dividing, despite the extra day in the lab they gave them to see what would happen. She asked for my permission to dispose of those non-blast embryos; I said of course. And then I asked her: If out of 18 eggs, and 11 embryos, only 4 survived to become blastocysts, that’s only a 22% survival rate. Does this ratio apply/transfer to my eggs if I were going through natural pregnancy? If I released 18 eggs, would only 4 get to this point, meaning chances are it’d take me up to 4-5 months of “trying” before I get pregnant? She said this was not a clear ‘yes’ or ‘no’ answer, because there are so many factors that went into this; there was all the artificial meddling I’d done to my hormone levels, there’s the fact that ICSI was performed and not natural sperm selection (I guess ICSI is a delicate operation), and, as Mr. W pointed out, the quality of his sperm may have had a lot to do with the fact that some of my embryos met with early cessation. And maybe if these embryos were conceived inside my body, the conditions would’ve been more conducive to their continued growth. There are too many variables to know for sure. “But we put a really pretty blastocyst in you yesterday, so hopefully everything will turn out great,” she said comfortingly. “Good luck!” That’s the second medical professional who has praised the attractiveness of this embryo. Hope it doesn’t get to Riley’s head.

I moved so gingerly after the transfer. Although “bedrest” means I can lay on my side, front, back, however I want as long as I’m horizontal (thank goodness or I would’ve lost my mind), I was paranoid every time I moved and got up to use the restroom. I’d check the toilet immediately after using it to make sure there’s not a little round embryo bobbing on the water surface. I know, I know, I wouldn’t be able to see it. But I didn’t want to see blood, either. About 26 or so hours after the embryo transfer, I suddenly felt like the insecurity was gone. Things sort of just fit into place, not in a tangible physical way, but more as a “feeling” I have that things are right now. Like the kid has burrowed itself into my uterine wall now. Things happen fast, from what I understand; when the embryologist showed me the photo of the blastocyst they were going to transfer, she explained that the actual thing measures bigger than that now. I asked when the photo was taken. She said 9:30. “This morning?!” “Yeah, they grow fast.”

Mr. W came up and curled up behind me at around 11:45 a.m. this morning. “Harro!” I said.
“I came up to join you for the countdown,” he said. “Fifteen minutes!” Finally?! The first thing I did off bedrest was take a shower. Then I carefully peeled and stuck my first two estrogen patches on my lower abdomen (thank goodness SOME of these meds are in the form of pills and patches; one shot in the heiny a day is quite enough). And then, the three of us (including my girlie stepkidlet) went to The Counter and had a burger. Yum.

It’s been a tough 48 hours without being able to reach a computer. =P