It's in the mail...

I heard from our fabulous friend Cindy at California Cryobank (where I used to work) that according to her "the kids have left the building". She gave the sperm a pep talk and me a calming talk and they are on their way. I do have the tracking number (because Cindy is fully aware of my anxiety issues...even knowing that she gave me her cell number again) so I can obsessively watch them make their way to Oregon tomorrow....currently they have left Menlo Park, CA about an hour ago. Think happy thoughts for a safe journey.

The tank will be coming to Salem as we are staying with our family this weekend. I am going to a class with my cousin, Jessica and Taylor will hang out at the house with our nieces and their dad. Seeing Brinsley and Brooklynn and what great parents Jessica and Travis are, always reinforces our decision to parent.

I promise more updates as they occur!

Faux Marriage and then the Baby Carriage

So I forgot to mention that we registered for the Oregon state domestic partnership. Or as we like to say we got "faux married" this week. Before all of the sickness occurred we had our friend Ingrid, who is a notary, sign our papers for us and then we had a fabulous dinner with her and our friends Mike and Alisyn at a vegan restaurant. We didn't get a chance to file until Tuesday before going to see our lawyer to finalize our estate planning. At this point we are all set legally as a couple which is nice and the opportunity to have a state partnership is great too but I have to admit to a lack of excitement about the registration process. We have registered so many places now that it has lost any real feeling of accomplishment or celebration. I save that for when we can actually have federal rights. I don't mean to sound whiny and ungrateful for all the wonderful work that has gone into securing these new domestic partnership rights because I am grateful. I just would love to be able to be legally married. Anything else starts to seem like an insult after awhile.

In terms of the babymaking the sperm is set to arrive in Oregon on 3/8. This is Day 14 of my cycle. I have not ovulated this early before but have had a positive test (which indicates ovulation with occur within 24-36 hours) on Day 15 and more frequently on Days 17 and 18...so we will just see. Thank goodness the tank is good for seven days! When I have positive test (testing in the early afternoon) the plan is to call our doctor and she will come to the house and do an insemination that night and the following day/night. Then we can do a pregnancy test in 12-14 days. If I am pregnant, yay!!! If not, I will get my period and try again in approximately 2 more weeks.

It is getting so close now. :)

The Sunday Curse

Lately I feel like the weekends are not relaxing because I can't seem to get well! Three weekends ago I developed a case of the stomach flu and missed Monday to spend some quality time in our bathroom. The weekend before last I got a nasty nasty cold which meant I missed a bunch of work that I can't afford to miss and this last weekend I was recovering from the cold still and got my period to round the weekend out. Although we did have a moment of "this might be the last period for awhile!!!".

To update; we did get to see my cervix. Kinda felt like we were in a 1970's self help group with a hand mirror but it was interesting. Even more interesting Taylor was excited once she was forced to look. :)

Everything still looks good to go for March, probably the week of the 10th!!! We are so so excited. Tomorrow we go to the doctor so that she can pass a uterine sound through the cervix as a trial.

We are realistically hopeful about the insemination and we will keep you updated. Thank you for all of your kind thoughts. :)

Damn Ovaries

So I ovulated early this month. Only by a day or two but still it is annoying. Very annoying. My body has been exceedingly predictable up until this point but of course this month, the month before the actual insemination, it does something funky. Especially annoying as I have an appointment on Tuesday for our doctor to check out what my cervix looks like when I am ovulating. Sigh. This has been a weird month at work in terms of getting people pregnant too, all the donor egg cycles seem to be a little off. Is there something in the air? Let's hope better things for next month! I feel like we are in countdown mode and I am excited and nervous and then nervous about being too nervous. As a side note, I would like to recommend the Clearblue Easy Digital Ovulation Kits with the smiley face. SOOOO much better than staring at two blue lines and trying to figure out if one is darker which invariably leads to you muttering in frustration at a stick you just peed on. Good times.

Legal Stuff

I thought I should write a post about all the fun legal stuff we are dealing with. Especially as our very good friend and future honorary uncle of our baby, Andy, keeps asking me for information. As some of you know there was a domestic partnership law (Oregon Family Fairness Act) that was to go into effect on 1/1/08. An out of state private christian special interest group (The Alliance Defense Fund) got an injunction that prevented it from going into effect until a judge ruled against them last Friday. Registration opened today but my understanding is that the Alliance Defense Fund will appeal the decision. Coincidentally, we had scheduled our first appointment with a lawyer for last week, the day after we went to a rally to support the domestic partnership law. The meeting with the lawyer was really good (she is queer and super nice) although spendy, we will meet with her two more times until it is all finalized. We are getting wills, health care directives, financial directives, and disposal of body directives ($1500) and our lawyer will be able to do the adoption as well once the baby is here ($1000). It is really frustrating and crazy making to realize that even if the domestic partnership law stays in effect we will still not be protected if we leave the state. Hence needing the health care directives in particular. The law is a wonderful step and when we are registered means that we have more protections and rights as a couple in the state but is not the same as marriage and does not equal marriage. The adoption aspect illustrates this as well. Taylor has to adopt our child. This has becoming increasingly stressful and sad as we are closer to being parents. Taylor really has been struggling with it lately as it is so insulting to plan our family together, select a donor together, to plan to be together for the insemination, pregnancy, birth, and parenthood but to be told that Taylor is not a legal parent until an adoption is finalized. If we were a married heterosexual couple using anonymous donor sperm the non biological parent (in this case the husband) would not have to adopt their child. We learned that we need to visit the lawyer when I am in my second trimester so that I can fill out an interim document that will state that my wishes are that Taylor is the parent of our child if something happens to me during pregnancy, during birth, or after birth until the adoption is finalized. It isn't 100% but since I have no family opposition it should allow Taylor to make decisions about the baby as well as me. As soon as the baby is born one of our first calls has to be to the lawyer so that she can come to where we are and have us sign papers to file. It then takes 1-2 months before the adoption is finalized. As much as I liked the lawyer I would rather be calling family and friends at that time! Good news is that the home study (where a social worker comes to your home and inspects it and you) can be waived as there is a biological parent retaining parental rights in the adoption. The bad news is that Taylor also has to have a criminal background check which seems like so much bullshit. At least we feel informed about the process and we feel all grown up having a lawyer. It also reinforces that much work still needs to be done to achieve equality for queer families.

Appointments

It was a week of appointments. I had a brief physical, pap smear, pelvic exam, and blood work (thyroid, CBC, cholesterol, rubella immunity, etc.) through my insurance primary care provider. Then we had a two hour counseling session, we do two hours every two weeks. I felt like we covered a lot of issues which was fabulous. I had my second (and since then my third) acupuncture appointment and then we had our first real appointment with our naturopath who will be doing the insemination. I don't know if I have posted about this but we are working with a naturopath who is going to do IUI (intrauterine insemination) at our home and also do some guided visualization exercises for relaxation and fertility. I had a full physical and medical health history and am to go in next month to have a vaginal exam so that she knows what my cervix looks like for the actual insemination. Good Times. Actually, it was rather exciting!! Having all of this done makes me feel like we are on our way. I wish that we could plan to start next month but work...in this case a conference...prevails. All the tests looked good (cholesterol is a little high but that is normal for me and not diet related apparently) and all the doctors/providers see no reason why I shouldn't be able to get pregnant which was reassuring. Now I just have to remember to relax. :)

Resolutions

We went to our friends' (Amelia and Sarah) house tonight for the season premiere party of The L Word (in case you are not a viewer this is a lesbian drama/soap opera on Showtime that varies from great to a guilty pleasure to really really bad but still a must see as it is pretty much the only lesbian option out there). I had this moment where I had to pause when talking about our baby plans in which I realized that we could be a couple weeks pregnant by the end of the season of the show. This has been happening more and more lately...Thanksgiving, Solstice all times where we pause and say..."we could have a baby or we could be pregnant this time next year." I know that it is common that everything becomes about the pregnancy, about having a baby when you are in the process of trying and it is starting to be true for us. I think we had mentioned in earlier blogs that we had a list of things we wanted to do to prepare for the pregnancy (probably the reason that we...mostly Taylor...made only one New Years resolution this year; we already have a bunch of them). We have been working on the list in the last couple of months; I have started acupuncture to optimize fertility, we are in couples counseling to improve communication prior to a baby and to have a therapeutic relationship in place if there are problems conceiving, we have improved our diet and exercise plans, we switched insurance, we are tracking my menstrual cycle, I have had blood work and am in the process of having several physical exams, I am on a prenatal vitamin, we bought and relocated sperm, and we are planning on making an appointment with a lawyer soon. All of this understandably focuses our attention on the baby making and yet I find myself trying to focus more on the steps to get there than the thought of being pregnant. I think that I am scared that if I think about actually getting pregnant that I will jinx it somehow. Silly, I know but when you want something so much and for so long it sometimes seems impossible that it could actually happen. Instead I work on the things I can control, the things that I can plan. Those of you that know me will know that this is nothing new and that planning actually calms me down from my usual anxious state of being. So feel free to ask me what daycare options are near my work or on average how many cycles it takes to get pregnant using frozen donor sperm but if you ask if I am excited about the insemination I am likely to look at you blankly and stammer...or better yet ask Taylor because she is on the excitement train and ready to go! If the combination of our different personalities works as well in parenthood as it does in a relationship, this baby will be very lucky. :)