…or Begins. Depending on how you look at it. After almost a year of blogging all the news your womb can use, this will be my final week here at Fertility Notes and at b5media.

Sniff.

But don’t you be sad! You can still find me at my private blog (you can email me for details) and at www.nationalparksonline.net, our newly revamped blog chronicling Michael’s and my two-year road trip to all of the National Park sites across the United States and keeping you up to date on national park news. If you’re interested, I am working on some pretty neat things over at www.par.net for folks looking for autism or intellectual disabilities services here in Pennsylvania.

And here’s even better news: for those of you following my personal fertility journey, we received two very nice hCG (aka “pregnancy hormone“) numbers this week. While I’m wary of celebrating just yet, things are looking pretty good. We have an ultrasound (!) scheduled for later this month.

Since this will likely be my last post, I wanted to leave you with some of my favorite all time posts and helpful hints. Here is what I learned writing Fertility Notes:

• Even though some people can be mean and irrational, if you are struggling with or living with infertility, you never need to feel alone.

• Telling your partner he is “seriously F-ing with your fertility feng shui” tidies up the bedroom far faster than nagging.

• Acupuncture (and my acupuncturist) is awesome.

• Sometimes struggling with fertility gives us compassion and brings us closer to people in unlikely ways.

• You can still enjoy a fabulous foot massage from your husband while pregnant.

• This may have been the hardest post I’ve ever written.

• There is not nearly enough information available in schools regarding infertility.

• Estrogen is not all bad. In fact, sometimes it’s kinda nice.

• The end result is more important to me than how I get there.

• Cultivating my Qi is important. And it can be fun.

• It is possible for joy and sorrow to occupy the same space.

• You ladies love learning about herbal tampons.

• The Barren Bitches Book Brigade may be one of the best online meeting of minds I have ever participated in. A monthly opportunity to read, reflect, respond and most importantly gather the thoughts of beautiful, intelligent women. You should join the next one!

• Raising a child is relatively inexpensive, once you get to that point.

• I will never stop caring about Choice and the environment, getting angry about misinformation, or boycotting products that do not respect women (that means you, Tampax) And I hope to goddess that my children are rabble rousers too.

• My top ten random reasons for wanting to have a baby are still 100% accurate.

I invite you to comment here or email me at polchic@hotmail.com to tell me what you have learned. Don’t be a stranger!

Post from: Blisstree

Here’s Where the Story Ends

Wednesday, July 23, 2008
      PA-New Hope: Attachment Strengthening Activities for You & Your New Baby or Child 10:00 AM
      Tele-Seminar: Making the Decision to Adopt 9:00 PM

Thursday, July 24, 2008
      PA – York: General Infertility Peer Support Group 7:00 PM

Sunday, July 27, 2008
      PA-Scranton/Wilkes-Barre: General Infertility Peer Support Group 6:30 PM

For more information on support, events and other information on the family building issues important to you, visit http://www.northeast.resolve.org/.

Post from: Blisstree

RESOLVE Events and Activities in PA Next Week

So many women who are trying to conceive wonder if quitting their jobs would reduce their stress, and, therefore, enhance their chances of getting pregnant…Here’s the problem. So much of what we do for a living shapes our ego identity…

This got me to thinking…

Am I defined by my job? Is what I do from 9-5 Monday through Friday (and then some) what I choose as the most important part of my identity?

For me, that answer is no.

I like what I do. I care about the work that I do. But if someone were to ask me, “who are you?” I probably wouldn’t refer to the job that pays me until much further down the list.

At the same time, I had a hard time with posting during Celebrity Week because I didn’t want to define hard-working women by their fertility and methods of conception above their careers and considerable accomplishments.

So then, what defines me?
A few months ago, I made the conscious decision to stop using the term “infertile,” because I don’t think it’s productive or helpful to define myself as something I don’t want to be.

The other evening, on the eve of our anniversary of ten years together, my partner and I sat on our little balcony, popped open a bottle of champagne (FET cycle hasn’t started yet) and started listing our favorite moments, times, events, things from the last ten years. Everything from life-changing experiences (trekking to Macchu Picchu) to mundane moments that have simply stuck in our collective memory (shared jokes, strange friends).

We were there until the sun went down.

Ladies, this little celebration was so affirming, so energizing, so necessary.  Not only did it remind me that I am not defined by my lack of ovaries, it gave me example after example after example of how wonderful my life has been, and is, in so many ways.

And that there is more to life than the next cycle, the next shot, the next two week wait. Those things are a part of me, but they aren’t all of me.

Beyond fertility, what defines you?

Post from: Blisstree

What Defines You? Is It Your (In)Fertility?

If you haven’t noticed, I am loving this book. Just loving it. It is at my bedside. I read at least a few pages every day. It soothes me. It makes me feel just a little more in control of my destiny by allowing me to accept that I am not in control of some aspects of it. Does that make sense? When I first received a copy to review, I had every intention of using it as a future Freebie Friday gift.

I am really sorry ladies, if you want this book you will have to pry it from my hands, or get one for yourself. Because I refuse to part with it.

I love the actual feel of the book. (Sorry, I do judge a book by its cover, and the quality of paper it is written on, and the size and the heft of it in my hand…) I love the things I have learned about my body and my self. Most importantly, I love the way reading Fully Fertile makes me feel. Peaceful. Content. More ready to accept a child into my life, even if its not in the way I originally dreamed.

When I showed the book to my (very pregnant) best friend when she was over for a visit, she remarked, “This feels like something that reaches beyond fertility. These lessons feel like they are for your whole life.”

Holistic = whole body = whole life

Beth Heller, one of the three authors of the book and founders of Pulling Down the Moon recently emailed me when she noticed Fully Fertile mentioned here at Fertility Notes to let me know that:

we’re encouraging women across the country to read our book together in Fully Fertile Book Groups.  We piloted the program in Chicago last October and it was great!  We have another group up and running in a Chicago suburb and lots of inquiries from folks interested in starting groups across the country.   In the book clubs, women agree to meet for 13 weeks and work through the book together.  They can meet at a coffee shop, the library, someone’s home…wherever.  Each week a woman from the group “leads” the chapter.  We provide a journaling exercise, discussion questions and a group exercise/”ritual” for each week.  What unfolds is a really unique support group experience as women find motivation, friendship and discover their inner goddess.

One of our biggest missions at the Moon is to provide community and sanctuary for women who are struggling to build family.  Folks can contact us through the website if they’d like to start a group or find one in their area.

These reading groups are peer-led and free and participants receive additional discounts on PDtM products and services.

I heart these ladies.

I’m feeling like I should add some sort of note here that lets you know that I am not affiliated with PDtM in any way and I’m not receiving any sort of compensation for my mentioning or promoting their book. I did receive a complimentary copy of Fully Fertile to review, which I feel has been a priceless gift.

Stay tuned for more thoughts on Fully Fertile and how I am incorporating it’s lessons into my current cycle and beyond.

Post from: Blisstree

Start a Fully Fertile Book Club

flows within us and around us, giving all things life, animation, warmth and form. Similar to electricity, Qi is invisible but its effects can be seen. When the Qi is flowing in harmony, the body is able to take care of itself. However, the flow of Qi can become obstructed or unbalanced.

And balancing and freeing up that Qi is a big part of what acupuncture can do for you – get it flowing smoothly again throughout your body and more importantly, to those baby-making parts that need it. But you don’t need to rely on those little needles to get your Qi back in check. There are lot of things you can do to help.

Perhaps I shouldn’t say “do” because what restores your Qi isn’t necessarily doing, it’s just being. More from Fully Fertile:

most of your daily activities deplete Qi. Working, playing, worrying, and exercising all cost us some Qi. We develop or cultivate our Qi by eating nutritious, well-cooked foods, meditating, practicing Tai Chi or yoga, walking for pleasure, appreciating art and music and other types of restorative or non-activities.

In other words, its about finding a balance.

Fully Fertile recommends keeping a Qi Drain/Qi Gain journal, if only for a week or so to recognize which side of the equation is off for you. It didn’t take more than a few lines for me to figure it out.

Lately, I had been feeling a lot of anxiety related to work and multiple pending projects, and that had begun to seep into my personal life, I am sure to the detriment of my fertility (and my relationship with Michael). “You are being awful,” he said to me at one point last week. And I couldn’t argue. Do you ever have those moments when as words are actually coming out of your mouth you think to yourself, wow, I am being an *sshole, but you keep talking anyway? I was having a lot of those moments. So reading this chapter and really thinking about that balance and working towards even-ing it out again couldn’t have come at a better time. I was putting so much of my time into doing, that there was really no time left for being. Every time I sat on the couch with Michael, I felt guilty. Every moment I wasn’t at my computer I was seeing as a lost moment, when really it is the opposite.

So this is what I have been doing to cultivate my Qi:

• I went kayaking – a smooth, midweek, peaceful jaunt up the river and back, through the reeds. Being in the water is my ultimate meditation and I think I somehow forgot that;
• I bought a kayak - in the hopes of not forgetting that again;
• I spent all of Sunday morning sitting on my balcony in the sun reading a book (guess which one) and gently reminding myself that Monday didn’t matter, at least not yet. This moment in time was for me; and then
• I spent Sunday afternoon playing with my in-laws dogs and basking in the sun. Weekends are not made for working. This is my new mantra

This week has been easy to fit in some Qi time because my boss has been on vacation. Let’s see if my resolve and my balance maintains once she’s back.

What are some things that you do to cultivate your Qi?

Post from: Blisstree

What are You Doing to Cultivate Your Qi?

“be straight about the facts so that a new generation of young men and women can be aware of their basic ability to conceive (or not)…”

Word.

But what about you? What about us? Where have you received your “education” on fertility issues? It wasn’t school. Now that “school’s out,” many of us have been forced to school ourselves on our bodies, our selves. How did you do (how are you doing) it?

For me, it was blogs. A year or so ago, there weren’t a fraction of fertility/infertility blogs out there as there are now, but they still popped up on the top of my google searches – and for that, I am so thankful. Better than any Fact Sheet or FAQ on infertility (what I was really looking for), far better than any expose of the business of donor eggs (not what I was looking to read), blogs helped me understand the processes, procedures and most importantly, what I might be in for if I decided to pursue the idea of trying to have a baby.

Now, of course, no blog can take the place of a medical professional and your own RE, but blogs are what I looked to before I even made an appointment with my RE. Gosh darn it, personal experience counts for a lot.

After I became a little further entrenched in the fertility thing, I supplemented my blog reading with books – some good, some ehhn. To learn more about how my body does (and why it might not) work.

So that’s me. Tell me, dear readers, where do you go for your sex and fertility education?

Post from: Blisstree

b5media Theme Day – School’s Out! What are You Doing to Continue Your Sex/Fertility Education?

For those of you who were left speechless, or at least at a loss for a snappy comeback, go visit  DC at Lupus Pie. She’s compiled her own set of (least) favorite phrases and shared her best responses with you all in her post, “Ten Things Never to Say to Someone Dealing with Infertility.” I read them and for most of them thought,

“D*mn, Why didn’t I think to say that?”

Post from: Blisstree

Comebacks for Those Phrases You Hate to Hear

Of course, I can rehash the who used IVF and who didn’t and point to some current folks that everyone has their eye one (and the week’s not over, I might). But that info seems tired. Old. Not really helpful.

Unlike this article in the New York Times today.

Which is relevant. Fresh and well-written. Which are some things that can never be taken for granted in an article that discusses infertility or living childfree.

This article happens to star my blogging friend Pamela Jeanne whom many of you may already know from her excellent blog Coming2Terms.

And I think if you get a feature in the NY Times, you count as a celebrity.

Not quite the 15 minutes of fame that Pamela envisioned, she said. But I, for one, am so thankful that a rational piece has been written that counters the assumption that adoption is the natural progression of things after failed infertility treatments:

“It’s not a binary — you either have a child or adopt. It’s not that simple,” she said, recalling the struggles of friends who pursued adoptions.

It is unclear how many women are involuntarily childless. The stigma attached to infertility and living without children pressures many women to remain silent about their struggles, Mrs. Tsigdinos said, adding, “It’s not something you want to drop into conversation at a cocktail party.”

I will be sharing this article with several colleagues. I invite you to go check it out, then visit Pamela and let her know what a great job she did.

What do you think about the article? Let’s talk about it.

Post from: Blisstree

Taking Ownership of a Childfree Life

Next week here at the Health & Wellness channel, we’re going to make it a little easier to focus in our your favorite TV star, movie actor, singer. We’re trying something out called “Celebrity Week” and each blog will have at least a few posts about celebrities in relation to their topic.

Just in case you can’t wait until tomorrow, here are a few Fertility Notes celebrity posts to tide you over:

• The Kentucky Derby – Contrasting Joy and Loss
• Who’s Your Baby Mama?
• Thoughts and Conversations on J.Lo (She Doesn’t Have Infertility Cooties)
• Did She or Didn’t She? Does It Matter?
• Screw You, Tyra
• Having a Baby – When the Old Fashioned Way Isn’t Working
• Breaking News: Teens Can Get Pregnant After Having Sex
• A Dixie Dialog

See you tomorrow!

Image: Newscom

Post from: Blisstree

“Celebrity Week” at the Health & Wellness Channel Begins Tomorrow

But better late than never, right?

For those of you who aren’t familiar, each month, bloggers can sign up to read and review a book, usually related to infertility and/or pregnancy loss. Everyone is welcome to join. You just need to have a blog (not necessarily related to fertility, infertility and/or pregnancy loss). Bloggers/readers submit questions. Each participant selects a few to answer. Sometimes, when we get lucky (like this month), the authors themselves join the discussion.

This month’s read was Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen, a book which follows the life of Jacob Jankowski from the classroom at Cornell to his present status as a nursing home resident. The years in between just happen to be as a member of the Benzini Brothers traveling show.

I spent the first hundred pages scratching my head and wondering where the connecting with infertility was going to appear. Was the circus a metaphor? Was Jacob’s abrupt loss of his parents and unlikely future path symbolic of how life has thrown us all a curve? I felt as if my analytical skills were really being put to the test until Mel said, Gab, chill out. It doesn’t have anything to do with infertility or loss; It’s just a book that a lot of people wanted to read.

Oh. Ok. That made me feel a little better.

And with that, here are my responses to Water for Elephants:

1. Originally forced to share quarters, Kinko (Walter) seems to have an intense dislike for Jacob. One day, Jacob helps Kinko’s dog Queenie and Kinko becomes his friend because of this small act of kindness. Has someone performed a simple act of kindness that changed your feelings toward them? How did this small act affect you? Can just a small and simple thing have a profound effect?

I must be incredibly lucky, because I am having trouble focusing on just one instance.

Right now, I am thinking of the time that I sat on a plane at Heathrow Airport, waiting to take off after saying goodbye to a year of independence and more importantly (at the time) my boyfriend who I thought I would never see again (oh if only, but that’s another story for another blog). I was 21. My heart was breaking. The journey home was the last one I wanted to be taking. I was sitting there, blotchy-faced and miserable, when someone sat down next to me.

And proceeded to talk to me for what seemed like forever. I had no interest in his story – he was traveling to the States and unlike me, was excited about it. He told me all about his upcoming summer job, all the places he wanted to see on his week off (the Grand Canyon, New York, Las Vegas….) and went on and on and on. I had to look annoyed. I had to. But he wouldn’t stop talking.

And because I was busy being annoyed with him, I didn’t have time to cry, or feel sorry for myself, or realize that the plane had taken off, was in the air, and I was almost home and guess what, I was still alive and able to function. Once dinner was served (my gosh, can you remember a time?) he instantly handed over his little wine bottle to me. In response to my puzzled face, he replied, “C’mon, you look like your heart’s about to burst. You need it more than me.” At that moment, it became clear to me that his chatter was completely a diversionary tactic, meant to make just a little bit of that 8 hour flight go a little faster. Which it did. As soon as I realized that he was going out of his way to ease my sorrow, my irritation faded and a real conversation ensued.

We talk a lot on fertility blogs about abiding, and in fact, Mrs. Spit has a wonderful post about this subject. And I think that what this man did for me was a kind of abiding. Being with me in my time of grief. I don’t remember his name. I may have not have even told him mine (I was like that). But the act itself obviously had a profound effect. 13 years later, I still remember it.

2. What does the title mean to you? Why do you think Sara Gruen chose it as the title?

There is a situation at the nursing home, where Jacob goes absolutely nuts on a new male resident who claims to have brought water to the elephants when the circus came to town. The phrase is also used derisively by the owner of the Benzini Bros. when Jacob asks for a job. As is, what? You’ll bring water for the elephants? To me, it feels like a euphemism for something that everyone claims to be familiar with, but may not, in fact, actually exist. Kind of like the Emperor’s Clothes. Perhaps like a Perfect Childhood.

I’m not sure why Ms. Gruen chose it as a title – I would love to hear her response.

3. What is your favorite circus related memory?

Riding on the back of an elephant with my best friend, Jaime. I must have been around 5. She was 2 years younger. We were at the Barnum and Bailey show with our moms. A clown came and took our picture but when it printed out, it was of two owls, not two little girls. Our moms thought it was hilarious. I was confused. Jaime may have been close to tears (she was always close to tears). Seeing that his joke didn’t go over very well with its intended recipients, the clown asked if we’d like to be a part of the show. What?!?! We were escorted back behind the scenes and climbed a metal scaffolding ON TO THE BACK OF A HUGE ANIMAL. There were other kids there with us, and we stacked up, each straddling the kid in front of us, all lined up on the elephants back.

I honestly cannot remember where the elephant went after that. Did we enter the main ring? Did we just sit there for a while? I haven’t a clue. All I remember is smelling straw, and animals, and caramel corn, and trying to understand why the novelty photo of the owls was so darn funny.

**

Hop along to another stop on this blog tour by visiting the main list at http://stirrup-queens.blogspot.com/. You can also sign up for the next book on this online book club: The Empty Picture Frame by Jenna Nadeau (with author participation because she’s a blogger!)

Post from: Blisstree

It’s the Barren B*tches Book Brigade! Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen