7 things… and some more

Dagny tagged me so here it goes:

Here are the rules:

1. Link to the person who tagged you.
2. Share 7 things that people may not know about you.
3. Tag 7 people to share 7 things and link to them.
4. Let them know they have been tagged.

1) When traveling abroad, people always guess I’m Russian/Slavic because of how I look. To my knowledge, there’s no Russian blood in my family but who knows if I’d be related to the czars for that matter since my grandma was adopted and my other grandfather’s father remains a mystery!

2) I have four tattoos: an eye on my neck, a scarb next to my left thumb and two tribals on my back I have drawn myself

3) I used to drive sidecar motocross with my father when I was a teen.

4) I’m superstitious and believe in horoscopes and tarot cards.

5) I have orange belt in karate

6) I usually get along better with guys than girls

7) I play lottery almost every week

Since many of my blog-world friends have been tagged already, I’m not going to tag anyone particularly but you’re welcomed to do this too if you are reading

And to now to my (boring) life… Let’s see, nothing much than work happening here. The spring sun is incredibly bright and temptating but I have to sit inside the whole day. boo…

TTC-wise this cycle was a break for us (ok, I confess poasing on an OPK once because DH asked and what do you know, it was positive right that moment) and I’m expecting AF today or tomorrow. Endo-wise this has been a really easy cycle; I had my first cramps since O on Sunday so that meant a WEEK without cramping. WOHOO! Back pain was there of course already from the O.

We are still waiting for the blood test results, I’m going to call on Friday but I guess it’ll be too early. I asked my RE about the fact that there are infertile women in my family and whether you can inherit infertility. She said that there is a possibility that infertility transmits in the chromosome level and we can discuss this issue next time we see her. I know already what the chromosome shit means; more blood tests and probably PGD with our next IVF if they find anything wrong on that side. I have no idea how much PGD even costs here, probably a zillion with our luck.

On Sunday when driving home from my uncle’s birthday party we discussed adoption again with DH. The lines for domestic adoption are 3-5 years. The good side: it doesn’t cost anything and you can adopt a 2 months old baby. International adoption costs around 11 ooo euros and the children who are adopted are usually 2-5 years old. But it would be faster. Russian adoption is a bit challenging since they only adopt internationally children with special needs and many mothers of these children have been drinking throughout the pregnancy. I don’t know would that be too much to handle since we don’t have any experience of raising any children so far.

All in all, I’m more and more convinced that if all other means fail, we want to adopt. We want to have a family with DH and if that can’t happen biologically then we’ll do it differently. I guess it was seeing the advertisement of Finnish Unicef that made me realize it; the campaign is called “be a mother for a moment” and it raises funds to all abandoned children over the world. The text naturally made me cry:” Motherhood isn’t about biology. It’s a state of mind; the willingness to take care and raise a small person”. This is so true.

My uncle’s party was great; I love seeing my aunts and uncles and cousins and partying with them. It was only when we left to the bar on downtown when the evening started to go wrong because my BIL was acting like a complete jerk towards my sister. It made me so mad. But me and sis had great time as you can see

Cat pictures and random stuff

I went to kickboxing yesterday after a break of almost 2 months. Even though I tried to take it easy I was still almost fainting just after the warm-up. But it was still so much fun and I was in such a bliss afterwards. I keep forgetting how much I need to exercise and go outside, not just sit in front of my computer every day. Which I’ve been doing a LOT, but not only facebooking and surfing this time. I have an incredible amount of work to do and more keeps rolling in. It feels strange, people calling ME if I could do a project for them But I’m really happy for this development!

Last weekend with sis was great, we got a lot of jewelry business done and now there are new really cute earrings on the site, like these foxes and matryoschkas:

Foxes

Matryoschkas

And some pics of our cats (3 of them) and my sister:

My sister crafting jewelry and the cats taking part

Little ones with grandpa

Kössi giving a hug to my sister

We visited two flea markets and some antique/glass shops.  We both found amazingly beautiful beach dresses from Thailand from different markets Mine is red with blue and white flowers, the on sis got was turqoise with pink and white flowers. With a petticoat it’ll be just perfect 50’s style party dress that I’m going to wear to my uncle’s birthday party in a week. All the family is gathering there and though it’ll be so much fun to see all them I’m scared of all the baby-questions. I hope mom has already informed everyone about our struggles.

Speaking of which, still have to wait at least 2 weeks for the blood test results before anything happens. They are making like 20-30 different tests for rare antibody/blood flow problems. No ttc on this cycle, I’m so sick of peeing on any sticks at the moment. And obviously a natural miracle is out of the question for us. We did have progesterone with the ivf cycle and 2 iui cycles before it so that’s not the resolution. RE talked about putting me on cortisone if there would be an issue with the antibodies.

I’m planning to go to summer school and take Russian for beginners, since I would love to travel there more and their culture interestes me a lot.  And because in the back of my mind I keep thinking we might adopt some day and Russia might be an alternative. I’m also eligible for a grant for a summer graphic class since I’ve already studied 2 years at the folk institute. So I guess it’s going to be a busy summer!

Next Saturday DH’s band has their first gig, he’s been so excited about it for like 2 months already I can’t wait, especially since my cousin is coming too (her boyfriend plays the bass in the same band) and we get to party together since ages.

Now I’ve spent already too much time here, got to get back to my work!

Another 2ww

It’s 3DPO, I’ll be starting the progesterone supplies this evening. So far I have the normal post ovulation sore nipples-symptom (which I’m glad is present this cycle because I think it means my hormones are working properly), I have ew cm which I don’t usually have post ovulation and then the usual mild cramps and back pains. And I have some hope!

Weekend was fun, the horror movie wasn’t that scary but more a dark drama. And quite ok, although I hate when a movie depicts old times (here 16th century) and the characters talk like these days… Brazilian restaurant was nice too, although the food wasn’t as good as the first time we visited it. Later we went to have drinks with a friend and his girlfriend who just happened to walk by the restaurant we were eating in. That never happens to us in Helsinki.

On Saturday morning we drove 2 hours to granny’s house, visited granny in the nursing home and did a few hours gardening work. My granny’s place has a huge garden but since no one lives there any more it’s becoming a jungle.  DH, my father and BIL built a fire of all the branches we’d cut down and made us a pit-roasted dinner under the fire. We stayed inside with mom and sis as it was raining and sooo cold. Went to sauna, had some red wine and talked.

Mom asked me directly where we are standing now with the ttc project and I told her we are doing IUI and if it’s not working we’ll proceed to IVF. It wasn’t so bad telling her after all. As I’ve mentioned before, there is a history of infertile women in my family. Two or three of my  granny’s (mother’s side) sisters had endo too and never had any babies. But I think the circumstances in the 1960’s where quite far from today’s and I’m confident modern medicine has improved a lot from those days and if IUI won’t work we’ll have better chances with IVF. And my sister wasn’t pregnant which was a huge relief to me. Yes I’m evil to think like this.

Today I’m having a day off from work, slept until 11AM and had breakfast while blogsurfing. Next I’ll switch my other computer on and start to finish our jewelry shop pages, I’m hoping we’ll launch them within a week or so.

I’m thinking about skipping kickboxing during this 2ww just in case. Because we do a lot of punching/kicking directly on the stomach so it probably isn’t a good thing regarding implantation/eps… Ok it might be overly cautious but still, I want to do everything I can to improve our chances. This morning I even skipped my usual coffee dosage!

Thank you

…Dagny & Kirsten, I’m sure it’s because of your comments to my eggies that this morning the OPK was POSITIVE!!! DH is at this moment giving his sample and I’m going in for IUI at 12.30. Ok I’m a little excited, must admit, but still cautious because the last 2 rounds failed. I have hope left, but I’m scared to use all of it on this one. But I’m so happy we get to do this today !

This evening we’ll go watch a Finnish horror movie Sauna, it has gotten good reviews and is basicly the first real Finnish horror movie ever made so I have high expectations on this one. And later we’ll dine in a very nice Brazilian restaurant! Tomorrow morning we’ll head to my grandmother’s house where my parents and my sister and her DH will be waiting and spend the Father’s day there and visit our granny in the nursing home. I hope nothing so much that she’ll live to hear me tell her I’m pregnant. She’ll be 92 in December. I’m sure mom will want to hear how our treatments are proceeding and I just don’t feel quite comfortable about discussing the issue thoroughly with her. I know she wants to be a granny so much I feel I’m letting also her down because we are not succeeding…Every time she calls she’s fishing for information whether I’m preggo or not but not asking directly. And I think she should know better about dealing with infertiles as her twin sister and her husband never got to have any babies.

A couple of more hours and hopefully I’ll have a few million quality swimmers inside of me !

Stuck with the flu

The flu seems not to go away. I feel like I’m sneezing my brains out. So no kickboxing today either I don’t know if this will delay O too like some other cycles. Well, that’s one of the questions I’ll ask RE tomorrow. I wrote them all down because otherwise I’ll forget them, my brain is like cottage cheese.

I also feel my endo pain coming back. It’s been 5 months since my lap and although I’ve had some symptoms all the time after it now I feel they are getting worse again. The dull ovarian pain on my left side, different from the twinging ovulation pain. I’m so sick of this, I don’t want to have another lap yet.
I want to get this fucking disease out of my body.

Finns celebrate Father’s day on November 9th. We are going to my granny’s that weekend with my parents and my sister and her hubby. For some reason I have this horrible fear that my sis is going to announce there she’s preggo. I don’t know how I could handle it, as sad as it sounds. I wished so much I could have announced mine and tell my father he’s going to be a grandfather. But I obviously can’t.

We had a munincipal election in Finland last Sunday and my candidate got elected ! I’m not politically active but I always vote and usually for a leftist/green values woman under 40. Like this time too.

I spent my Saturday evening first having the terrible mood swing and crying on DH’s shoulder, then he went to a horror movie festival and I stayed home designing my new website until 2AM. I usually never stay up that late, but the project got me into a flowing state and I was so happy doing it. And the mood swing passed I hope to get it launched soon!

Yesterday I attended a pub quiz after a break (I used to do it every other Monday for two years). Our team came second which was a little disappointment but neverthless, it’s so much fun to show off your intellectual skills

Weekend

Weekend was so much fun! On Friday evening after trying out two Kias we had the gluttony/wine feast with DH and watched In the valley of Elah. On Saturday morning we headed to Turku and DH dropped me at my sister’s and went to visit a friend of his. Me and sis did some business stuff first (we are starting a web shop for jewelry in near future!) and then had some Passoa. Then some Bailey’s. Then opened the Russian sparkling wine We had a dinner reservation at 8PM and of course we got in a hurry because we had to take the obligatory party poses before running to the taxi.

The stunning sisters

Dinner was great, food was absolutely delicious and the restaurant was cosy. We had snails with blue cheese for starters and I had lamb with two souces for the main course. Unfortunately there wasn’t any room for dessert though, so we only had coffee and helped our selves to another serving of Baileys. Then headed to the bar across the street (the one where my sister met her hubby for the first time) and danced the whole evening to Finnish rock classics. And had some salty liquorice vodka shots (a Finnish speciality). Ok I know you shouldn’t be drinking while traveling on the ttc wagon but I get to go out with my sister like once a year so it was a special occasion and I wasn’t drunk drunk. We had so much fun ! Going out with my sis is a bit like going out with a prom queen; all men would like to have her and all women hate her because of her looks. She looks like a beautiful fairy

On Sunday morning I had to drive the first half of the trip because DH was too hung over. On the afternoon their band was rehearsing and my cousin came over with her son; he had just learned crawl! Soon he’ll be walking and talking too…

Now it’s CD17, 3DPO. I have the sore nipples I seem to get every other cycle during ovulation. Last cycle I was missing this symptom; I don’t know whether it’s a positive or a negative sign. No back pain yet although I had some before ovulating. Minor cramps but nothing extraordinary. Not too high hopes because of the low sperm count, but feeling positive still that there could be a slight chance we would succeed.

Weekend (and loads of food!) in pictures

On Friday I had my first appointment to the chinese acupuncturist. First got some needles on my lower back and few in my legs, then some on my belly and other side of my legs. Relaxing? yes. Expensive? definetely. 68 euros for a 40 minutes session, ouch!!! But I still booked two more sessions for this week, first one is tomorrow.

After the acupuncture I walked home and it was surprisingly warm. In the staircase I was greeted by a very good scent of food coming from our apartment. This is what DH had cooked for us:

Fresh pineapple, zucchini pancakes, apple/nectarine salsa, zucchini with feta cheese, salad with cucumber and pepper, sour cream, mix of parsley, onion and radish, chicken skewers and spicy meatballs. And ice-cream for dessert. Yumm! All this was consumed with a nice bottle of red wine from Chile. We are total food-holics.

Saturday involved eating aswell. We drove to my parents house in the afternoon after first taking our cats to DH’s father in another town. I think I inherited my love for food from my parents, because they love cooking and eating as much as we do.

My parents' house where I grew up

Me and mom cooking. See the matching outfits.

We spent the evening eating and drinking, playing board games and watching awful embarassing home videos where I’m 13 and wearing the worst clothes ever. On Sunday morning I woke up to the scent of bacon that my father was cooking for breakfast. I never cook bacon at home but at my parents’ it’s like a tradition to have it for breakfast. After eating we headed to forest to seek mushrooms, but they were all hiding! We only got a few chanterelles.

After the forest it was time to eat again! This time grilled sausages, pork, zucchini, corn and pineapple.

It’s mid August and it’s so autumny here. I guess it’ll be quite chilly next week in Lapland, now the temps are around +10C there.

rowan tree in my parents garden

apple tree in my parents garden

I learned this weekend that my mother’s twin sister doesn’t have endo. In fact there was never nothing wrong with her, but her husband. Hearing this felt like 100 kilos off my shoulders; we aren’t a completely barren family after all. Maybe there is hope for me too. We have our first RE appointment finally on Thursday and I hope to be know much more after it.

Now I have to go. Guess where? Cooking of course

Something lighter for a change

I’ve been whining so much that I have to post something more positive for a change. Last weekend my little sister got married and here are some pictures from the wedding. I must say she was the most beautiful bride I’ve ever seen and how could she not have been, as she’s my sister

The happy couple

Before the wedding I was ready to lock my parents away for all the fussing and panicing and nervousness they were spreading. Seriously, how can organizing a small (=60 guests) wedding turn normal people into such state? I said to them I was glad we got married by just the two of us and only had a small party for the family later on, because I wouldn’t have wanted to experience that fussing twice.

On the eve of the wedding my sister was still sewing her dress at 11PM and I dipped some 300 strawberries into chocolate. But I guess it was worth all the effort, because the party was awesome, relaxed, fun, beautiful. The weather was great despite the forecasts and food was excellent. Everything went smoothly and everyone seemed to really enjoy themselves. We even danced to Doors’ “Light my Fire” with my parents! The Groom’s 80-years old grandmother was among the last ones to leave at 2.30 AM after enjoying several glasses of whiskey

Me and my husband took all the photos; I concentrated on the official portraits (like the one above) and he took the most “action” photos. When I graduated from high school I wanted nothing so much than to become a photographer, as photographing was my biggest passion at the time. I didn’t get into the art schools and then later my vision of a dream job has changed many times; at the moment I dream of opening a flower shop. Nowadays I’m the photographer only at all family parties and on holidays, and I’ve also pulled my husband into this task. I think we did a pretty good job this time

In the morning of the wedding

At the hairdresser

Lacing up my sister's dress

Me in my red dress

My sister tieing her shoes

Waiting in the church with our father

Bouquet and ring

My father's speech

Our family; women and their husbands

Buffet table..yumm..

The bar outside

Throwing the garter

Me and my sis jamming

Holiday pictures and bad dreams

More pics from our holiday can be found on Flickr. I want to go back. At work there’s nothing to do and everyone else is leaving on holiday. I have 2 days off next week because of my little sister’s wedding, I’m her maid of honour. In Finland there’s not usually an army of bridesmaids as in the US, but only one or two maids of honour. I found a beautiful mermaid-styled fuxia red dress from the sales for the occasion, it’s made of silk and the colour is awesome.

Yesterday my parents were visiting us. I know that my infertility is a huge disappointment for them also, and that makes it feel even more bitter and sad. They have been asking and hoping for grandchildren for some 4 years now, but stopped the asking when I told about my laparoscopy and endometriosis. I think my news scared the shit out of them. I would want my future children to get to know their grandparents and have them around in their lives as long as possible. My other grandfather died when I was 6, other was an alcoholist who remained distant until his death at 2001. My mother’s twin sister was never able to conceive, as weren’t two of my granny’s sisters either and mom suspected that granny’s sisters had endo, as they had had some surgery done in their youth. Although I don’t know how long has laparoscopy/laparotomy been available for endo. It’s fucked that the disease has been known from the 19th century and still doctors haven’t been able to find out how it really works and how it could be cured. If it was men who suffer from this, there would have been a cure a hundred years ago, I’m sure.

A while ago I had a dream, where my sister (she’s 1,5 years younger than me and as mentioned above, getting married in a week) announced me that she was pregnant after 1 month of trying. In the dream I totally flipped and screamed and cried how unfair it was. I really hope I can manage my feelings if/when she announces those news and not become some bitter psycho-bitch. Of course I want her to be able to have babies but as everyone suffering from this shit knows, it’s sometimes just too much to asked to be happy for other’s luck. My granny asked me and my sister a couple of months ago when will we have babies. Ok, she’s old and not totally well anymore but still it was difficult to hold my tears. My sister said then that I will have mine before hers.

We went to a Russian restaurant with my folks, I love russian food and the cosy, decorative 19th century atmosphere that is lacking from Finnish restaurants. I ate and drank so much I thought I was going to explode. A nice evening anyway and today I’m gonna have some russian sparkling wine in the evening and head to the city and party. The cramps are BAD and I know there’s no need to do any HPT.