Coming off the happy pills!

I had my second-to-last counselling session yesterday and my counsellor gave me the okay around coming off the happy pills! Yay - I'm looking forward to being chemical-free again. However it's going to take six weeks to wean me off the anti-depressants. I've been on them for five months and my counsellor wants me to take them for another two weeks and then to start slowly weaning myself off them over a four week period:
Week One: Take one pill one day, take half a pill the next day, one pill the next day...
Week Two: Take half a pill every day for a week
Week Three: Take half a pill every second day
Week Four: Take half a pill every three days til end of week/packet finished

So around April 6th I will be off those babies! I'm so pleased. It hasn't being so bad taking anti-depressants but I am ready to come off them. I feel like I have made some major break-throughs around SIF.

As part of my counselling homework I had to share my insights of late which are quite huge, I think:

I realise my old mechanism of withdrawing from others is no longer relevant. I am reaching out and connecting more with those around me. I am trying to see my pain as something I can share appropriately with others.

I spent quite a lot of time within my SIF journey focusing on the child I didn't have. Now my time and energy goes into the child I do have.

Pain/hard times are part of life and sometimes it takes a while to work through things. SIF was a big thing for me to go through and now I think I've got it in perspective eg: there are other little everyday things to deal with; my depression wasn't completely to do with SIF.

SIF was one ot the worst things I have been through but I've survived and I'm okay. I'm stronger and focusing on positives in my life such as my art. There is a flip-side to "bad times".

I don't resent MOTs and bumps as much as I once did - I used to be eaten up with envy. Facing others who have what I'd hoped for isn't so painful now. I am able to be around pregnant women and MOTS a bit more.

My affirmation of late is: I will be okay. I'm not sure what's going on with my body right now and I'm trying not to obsess (too much!) about maybe being pregnant. I no longer trust my body or mind. I have to kind of just see it all as a bit of an experiment. This cycle was perhaps the first time I have ovulated in a long time so you never know...

I'm still on the fence around seeing the infertility specialist. My counsellor didn't give advice on whether I should go or not but did say to take it with a grain of salt if I choose to. I feel so much at peace knowing I get to choose - I don't have to go and I don't feel desperate to go. I believe now if I am meant to get pregnant (now my cycles seem to be back on track), I will regardless on whether I see the specialist or not. I am not sure I want to know where my FSH levels are for example. If this appointment had come up six months ago I may have been more interested in going as back then it looked as though I was going through early menopause. It would have been useful for my herbal treatments to have some blood results to work with. But now I'm not sure how relevant it is to have all that information.

I now accept that I don't know what's up with me and my hormones. For so long it was sooooo important to me that I knew what the f**k was up with my god-dammed body! But the information I have received over the last two years or so has mainly been incorrect! Specialists have attempted to explain what was going on but no-one figured it out or was on the right track. My current herbalist is right on track with it all as she looked at my hormonal state in a holistic sense - not just from a SIF perspective. My counsellor has also encouraged me to look at the bigger picture. My hormones are more settled now than they were at the beginning of 2007 and I cannot predict what's going to happen next.

I am excited about the future as who knows what, how, and when God is going to orchestrate things. I no longer dread possible disappointment like I once did. I am not consumed by the Am I, Aren't I pregnant? line of thinking. Sure I have gone there a bit lately but I can't do anything about the outcome can I so I may as well let go of it and carry on, trusting that God has it all sorted out.

Still hoping

Now that I've had three cycles in a row after a good year or so of erratic periods (including a six month absence of AF), my hope levels have crept up a notch - hope that I could conceive again, that is. There was fertile mucus this cycle and my boobs have been really sore the last two days...I'm day 22 on my cycle.

I found myself dreaming about pregnancy today at work. I shouldn't do it, I know I shouldn't, but I couldn't help it. I've had the sore boobs a lot of times over the last year. It's a hormonal symptom but whether it be connected to a hormonal imbalance, AF on the way, or you know what - I don't know.

I have to keep reminding myself that God has the plan and the timetable. This is just one cycle. And I would certainly take a second prize of another visit from AF over erratic cycles all over again. Perhaps there are a few more cycles after this one - you never know.

I still have the hope of conceiving again yet the resentment and jealousy towards MOTS and bumps out there seems to be waning. Not completely - I am only human afterall. Who doesn't envy those who have what we want from time to time. But lately I seem to be able to connect more with MOTS and pregnant women. I'm still not about to host a MOT and bump party but I feel like I have come out of MOT hiding.

I did end up taking a pizza last week around to my neighbour who has just had her second child a few weeks ago. She was very appreciative. Her first child is six months younger than mine and they seem to get on ok. I also see my pregnant eighteen year old neighbour a bit too. Somehow it is not quite so painful facing what I have dreaded facing for what felt like a very long time. Both women have been very sick during their pregnancies and I have even been able to talk about my pregnancy with my young neighbour. For a while it was too painful to remember what might not be again.

Another wee break-through is I gave my daughter a very basic account of the birds and the bees a few days ago - an age-appropriate version for an almost-four year old. I told her she came out of Mummy's tummy and was born in the hospital. Tonight I put a sheet over us and we pretended she was in my tummy. So I've told her our neighbour has a baby growing in her tummy. My daughter is quite fascinated by the concept. She's starting to click about little sisters and brothers and calls some of her friends and cousins sisters. I'm not going to be too worried about correcting her at this point.

I think it was the right time to do the birds and the bees talk with my daughter. Obviously had a sibling come along before now then the topic would have come up. But she hasn't been interested in bumps at all or even babies so there was no burning need. Guess what I'm trying to say it has been a natural thing to do with my daughter - I was ready, and so was she. I'm not so sure I would have been able to do the birds and the bees talk with her six months ago when I was right in the midst of SIF hell.

I have an appointment to see an infertility specialist in March. But I am on the fence about that. It's $200NZ and I'm not sure it is where I want to go. Really my philosophy these days is God is the one in charge around all this - all I can is TTC and hope for the best. I'm not doing all the things that drove me crazy for so many months like charting ovulation - it has been so much better not having that pressure. I think perhaps I am ovulating some cycles (like the one just gone) but I'm not sure I want to hear from another specialist how dismal my chances are. If all he is going to do is run a course of bloods to determine the viability of my eggs and if I'm ovulating then I'm not convinced I want to go there. We've already given ourselves a time-line of around two years to complete our family and I prefer having our own cut-off date and letting things evolve gently rather than giving all the power to a man in a white coat all over again. I have a week or so to think about it - I have to cancel the appointment before early March if I don't want to go otherwise I'll be charged $50NZ if I pull out after that.

I continue to have other dreams to focus on. I've applied to hold a stall at another market in seven weeks so need to get painting as it might just be me this time. We're in the process of applying for a preapproved loan to buy a house. We are kind of on the perimenter of getting into the property market. But I think we can make it work if we shuffle things around a little. This is in Gods hands too of course. It hopefully will be sooner rather than later, but it might be a few months away yet.

My daughter has been on my mind a lot and I have been quite worried about her ASD. I suppose I have been posting here a little less lately as a lot of my time and energy is going into her. There is so much to read - one of the early intervention teachers gave me quite the pile of books and photocopied chapters and so much to do - continued meetings with specialists and courses for us to attend as parents of a child with autism. I think my pain as a Mum of an autistic child is starting to come out. Up until now I have just loved her for who she is and have just put one foot in front of another. But I have had tears brimming for my daughter the last two days. I fear for her future. I know she's in very good hands at the moment but the older she gets the more obvious some of her ASD traits are. I hate that kids look at her strangely already. It breaks my heart.

A little fear that has crept up lately is around conceiving another autistic child. It's possible - autism is genetic. Not only that, families with a few kids often have autistic kids with varying traits across the spectrum. Could we manage another autistic child? I know we could and we would love that child for who it is. But it would be hard. I saw a baby with Downs Syndrome the other day with her much older sister (maybe eight years old). She was gorgeous yet it is so hard to not feel sorry about a child with an obvious disability. Autism isn't so obvious - not at first glance anyway. There is so much educating to others involved as a parent of an autistic child - it is exhausting on so many levels.

I took my daughter to Music for the first time in six months last week. I had to stop taking her as I wasn't coping very well with all the bumps and MOTs. The last time I went I burst into tears when I went there and saw a sea of bumps and siblings. But last week I was okay. I enjoyed it. Most Mums can sit down and have a coffee after Music quite happily but I was continually walking around supervising my daughter who did eventually "act out" so I had to leave with her kicking and screaming.

I do sometimes wonder if God has just given us the one child up til now because He knows we struggle with the one with have. A few people have commented that handling our daughter is equivalent to two children. I do trust that God knows what He is doing. I'm doing my best to take it all One Day At A Time.

It's all good

It's quite amazing, really, this turnaround I seem to have gone through. It feels as though a huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders and that I am so much lighter. Life seems brighter and more hopeful now.

I have even connected with the couple of neighbours I've been keeping my distance from this week as I was unable to handle their pregnancies for quite some time. One has reached the three month mark and I have asked her to look after our daughter when I go to do a couple of one day courses on autism next month. I even said I would offer to babysit her baby once it arrives and I'm genuinely looking forward to that. The other neighbour has a three week old newborn. My daughter and her three year old said hi to each other the other day so we ended up popping in for a little while. I could see the new Mum-of-two was struggling a bit so I will pop in with a dinner or some baking sometime soon.

Myself and a couple of friends held a stall at a market today - our second one in a couple of months. I didn't make any sales at the last market but today I sold seven out of the nine paintings I was selling so I am pretty rapt! The market was a family fun day so there were loads of families arounds - lots of bumps and families of twos or three roaming around. I do still get that initial pang of jealousy and have to remind myself that perhaps another child wasn't part of Gods plan for me. Obviously I don't know that for sure yet. But up until this point, for whatever reason, I wasn't meant to have a second child.

I read an interesting article in a magazine recently in the waiting room at the vet's when I was taking our cat in to have a free dental follow-up. (He had three teeth removed last year). A Malaysian woman had close to twenty five children (!) within a very short of time and claimed it was God who decided how many children we should have. A while ago I may have resented that comment but now I think there is some truth in that. I do think some positivity and faith doesn't go amiss when TTC but really, we as women are basically powerless around falling pregnant.

I feel 2009 is a bit of a healing year for our family after the going-ons of the last year or two. We have respite care in place for our daughter with the neighbours which means my husband and I can go out for dates every couple of weeks. We were granted respite care because of our daughter's ASD. She absolutely loves the neighbours and doesn't want to leave when she goes there! They have three children older than her who she is besotted with - a seven, nine and an eleven year old. Valentines Day my husband and I just went for a walk for an hour - just the two of us and it was great. I know we have needed to do that kind of thing for a while so it's good we have regular date time in place now.

Yesterday some other neighbour's boys popped over for a play. They are six and eight years old. Our daughter loved racing around the garden with them too. There is no shortage of children around in this neighbourhood, that's for sure!

Because our daughter is an only child and also has ASD, I feel I am more open to kids dropping in and have more of an open-door policy than I might have been had she had a sibling. It's really important to me that she gets a lot of opportunities to socialise. She is doing really well connecting with a variety of children and adults.

At the same time we hang at home, just the two of us quite a bit and I do cherish our mother-daughter times. The older she gets, the more blessed I feel. Particularly when two infertile friends of mine have both bought new pets recently. They both seem so excited by their new furry children yet I cannot help but feel sad for them, knowing that may be the only form of mothering they get to experience. I am blessed and so, so lucky to have my daughter. I have always felt this but even more so as she approaches her fourth birthday. I am so fortunate to have been able to be an at-home Mum for the last four years - I have loved it!

Finally I feel as though I am operating from a place of gratitude, rather than a place of resentment. But I have worked hard to get here, and it hasn't been easy. But my persistance has been worth it.

Letting go of a dream

I can honestly say that I am in a really, really good space. Some big stuff has shifted these last couple of weeks. I feel like I have reached in, grabbed my fear by the horns, looked it in the eye and discovered that it is not the end of the world for me should my baby dreams never happen.

I had a counselling session today and revealed my awarenesses to my counsellor. She was pretty pleased with my progress. I may only have one to two sessions left with her then hopefully I can look at coming off the happy pills.

I have realised my SIF journey has been about more than just not being about to conceive another child. It's been about how I cope within a personal crisis - how I do tend to withdraw and isolate from those I care about it - who happen to be the people who care about me. It's given me an opportunity to see there are several areas I can grow in because of my reaction to SIF. The pain was real, as were the feelings of loneliness and feeling estranged from most people I know. I think I will be doing things differently from here on in.

I seem to have some peace seeping in around maybe just having one child. Not only that I now want to put all my time and energy into the child I do have - not the one I don't. My daughter needs her parents very much right now as she approaches four years of age with her mild ASD. She is doing really well but there's a lot more we can help her with to prepare her for school next year. She is my key focus for 2009.

I guess you could say we are unofficially TTC. I'm not charting - no temperature charts or scrutinising of curves to see if I'm ovulating or not. The thing is - I may be some cycles, I may not be other cycles, or I may not be ovulating at all. I'm choosing to listen to my body and to take it's cues and to act accordingly...I'm also settling in to living in this gray space. It took me a while but now I just think I have no idea what my body is doing, if I'm fertile or infertile, I'm just going to take it one step at a time.

Yes we are still waiting to hear about the next step in the adoption process. I am really keen to go through the process yet it may not be for us - who knows - and also it may not work out. There is no guarantee an adoption will happen for us. But I want to give it a go.

The bottom-line is I've done everything I could possibly do to TTC - for my situation anyway. I've beaten myself up - thinking I could have tried harder. I've fumed and raged at God for not listening to me. I've tried positive thinking and visualisation. Not to mention all the people I've asked for help along the way - herbalists, a gyno, Dr's, an acupuncturist and a vibrational healer. It seems the harder I pushed, the less likely a baby was going to come along.

I've come to this place naturally. I wanted to be here oh so many times over the last two and a bit years. I'm hands off now. It is entirely up to God. If He wants me to be pregnant then He will orchestrate things somehow so I will be. It's that simple.

I've also been able to see the funny side recently around a scenario in which I won an on-line auction for some tickets to see The Wiggles for our daughters fourth birthday. The tickets include a baby seat and my husband and I have been joking as to whose baby we could take - or maybe we should just take the cat...

I dunno. Things just don't seem so bad right now. I wanted the baby, I really did. But if I don't get the goods there will be other blessings coming my way. I can see and feel that now. Life is simply going to carry on.

I will be okay

I've been processing a lot around my SIF journey lately. And where I'm at is I've been facing my fears (through some recovery work I've been doing). I have been so afraid all this time that I wouldn't get pregnant again - or become a mother again - that I've lived in that place of fear.

Recently when I answered the question If my worst fears came true, how would they impact me? things shifted a little. Maybe it wasn't the outcome I'd hoped for, but if approx two years from now (our chosen cut-off date for having another child) there isn't another child in our family then I will be okay. I feel that today. I have been through the devastation and all the hard feelings - they crop up from time to time but I am getting lighter around that as time goes on. I'm still getting there with acceptance. Yet I can somehow see some light at the end of the SIF tunnel.

It feels good to be putting all my SIF angst and energy elsewhere - on other dreams and personal goals. I think when going through a personal crisis with intense emotional pain it is hard to think one won't ever get over it. I believe I will be affected by SIF years after the chapter is closed. But the depths of pain I've been to and the courage to look at all that was brought up for me emotionally as a consequence of SIF indicate better times are ahead.

At this point I have no idea what my body is doing. I suspect I'm a little low on my iron levels with three quite heavy visits from AF in the last two months. I've been a bit dizzy, have been weak and a bit breathy - ironically all familiar symptoms from my full-term pregnancy when I was iron deficient. I spoke to my herbalist via Skype on Thursday afternoon and she agreed that the return of my periods is a good thing: "whatever that means." She said the infertility specialist I've been referred to is excellent. So I'm not sure where I'm heading with all this. Trusting God and just been led to where I'm meant to go.

My outlook is very different from last year though. In 2008 I was so very, very desperate and didn't want to do anything "wrong" to affect my fertitility. Now I feel like I've done just about everything there is to do around TTC. I don't want to repeat any of my past methods of TTC either. It may sound blase, but I just don't want to obsess about ovulation dates either anymore. I may or may not be ovulating again - and if I am, it certainly isn't every cycle. I am tuning into myself and listening to what my body is telling me around that rather than plotting my temperature.

I just think if God wants me to get pregnant then it is going to happen regardless of what I do. I just don't want to try so hard anymore. The trying hard bit was what caused me so much stress in SIF days gone by. I keep handing this dream of another child over to God and each time I let go a little bit more. Right now I'm in a "if it happens, it happens mode". If it doesn't, I will be okay. I trust God that I will come out of this eventually feeling stronger, happier and more grateful for all I have - rather than all I haven't.

Focusing on other stuff

I have felt a lot better around my SIF lately. I've been reaching out a little more and that is helping. By reaching out I don't mean I've been spilling my SIF guts either. More like I've just been phoning friends, and catching up with friends in person. It really does help bring me out of my SIF isolation.

My SIF journey has shown me many things about myself. But one of the biggest lessons is how I tend to isolate and withdraw when I am in great emotional pain. So I'm a WIP around making regular contact with the people I care about.

After the gym last night I went and had a glass of wine with a fellow MOO friend. Her husband and daughter are away for the week on a father-daughter holiday. So it was lovely just to chat for a few hours about this and that. It was nice to talk about SIF in a general kind of a way too. It just one of many topics and not the overriding theme for the night, that's for sure.

I'm at the point where I don't know what my body is doing anymore. AF arrived a few days ago so it's my third cycle in a row except AF came on day 20. So I've effectively had three periods in two months. I'm looking forward to chatting to my herbalist on skype later today. As I discussed with my friend last night, my periods returning could mean several things: it could be good news or it might just be part of going into menopause. I have no idea whether I am ovulating or not.

I've given up trying to figure out what's going on. I will wait til I hear from the infertility specialist I was referred to for an appointment and who knows if he'll be able to shed some light on my situation. I haven't heard yet about the information sessions for prospective adoptive parents (which is our next step in the adoption process). It's meant to be sometime in March or April so not too far away hopefully.

In the meantime I've been thinking about the bigger picture more - as in, other family goals besides an addition to the family. Since we set the approximate cut-off date for adding to our family (two years from now) - it has helped free me up to concentrate on other things. Last year SIF was still very much my main focus as it took up a lot of my time and energy. Now I feel although SIF is still very much part of me, it isn't the only thing going on in my life.

Adoption horror stories

I've been quite open I suppose around our adoption plans. This has meant a few people have put in their two cents around adoption. Most recently a friend shared about an adoption that from her perspective didn't work out because the adopted child was from a "bad" family - which resulted in lots of issues later in life for that child and family.

It's the nature vs nurture debate isn't it. With my BA (Hons) in Psychology and Education, my own philosophies and beliefs as well as life experience, I do think every one of us is genetically programmed from birth in many areas (nature). But I also believe our environment (nurture) can affect and shape us - whether that be in a good way or a bad way. I've argued, discussed and researched this very issue many times as a university student. And now I'm going through a nature vs nurture experiment around my daughter with her mild diagosis of ASD. She was born with it - it is a genetic condition yet we have proven and are proving that with the right tools, we can reshape her in a positive way.

I guess I have thought how it is a little odd not knowing the back-story of an adopted child. In New Zealand, I do not know how much information the adoptive parents get about the birth families. But it hadn't occurred to me to reject a possible adoption because of a child's background. I told the friend who brought it up that there is alcoholism, depression and autism in our family - we are not going to be pointing the finger I'd imagine because someone doesn't reach our standards now are we!

And I don't even know if we have any standards. I haven't even discussed this with my husband yet. There are some things you have no say in as adoptive parents. For instance, if we get chosen by a birth family we cannot tell the birth Mum not to smoke or drink during her pregnancy. That kind of scares me, actually. I cannot let myself go there about prenatal development in the womb and all the vulnerabilites that come with it.

I haven't heard anyone's adoption horror stories in great detail - just some tight-lipped responses around adoption when it's come up. Such and such had a bad experience...Something like that.

Anyway, I've been in a better space the last few days. I've been in a sorting out mode. I started with my daughter's room and have been thinning out books, clothes and toys that are young for her now. Some books and clothes I will pass on but some I have just put away on the top of her wardrobe. I cannot bring myself to let go of her toys just yet though. I guess the toys really symbolise her early years and the different ages and stages. I would feel like I was throwing a part of her away if I got rid of them.

I've had a bit of contact with my young (eighteen year old) pregnant neighbour. I actually felt excited for her the other day which was nice. I thought too it'll be nice to have a newborn around here (as in nextdoor) in about six months time. Because it's her first baby and she is a sweet girl - my resentment and jealousy isn't so bad. It's my other neighbour whose daughter is the same age that has had a baby recently (I'm pretty sure) that I am in no rush to visit.

I've realised how bad I have been at isolating and this hasn't helped with my depression. So I am making more of an effort to phone friends. I don't need to talk about SIF all the time. In fact, just connecting with someone gets me out of my head and I think that's a good thing.

We're planned a family trip up to Hamilton for a week in May around my Mum-in-laws 60th. It means exposure to quite a few families-of-two including some new babies. I'm not sure how I will go. But at this point it feels very brave of me to put myself in the very surroundings that get me in a SIF spin. Hopefully this is part of my acceptance with it all. That I can't avoid family and friends forever that have what I wanted. It feels good to put friendships/relationships ahead of my SIF pain at this point. I've had to do it the other way around for quite some time.