I am a Mutant--But I'm not Cool like Wolverine

You probably think the title of this blog is some kind of clever joke--but it's not. I'll explain in a moment.

Brian and I had our first visit to the Reproductive Endocrinologist (aka special baby making doctor) on Friday morning. It was all the way in Troy, so we had quite a hike from here. We are going all the way to Troy because that is the only clinic on this side of the state that our insurance will cover. And since we are VERY fortunate to have coverage for this at all, obviously most people don't, we felt we couldn't discount that coverage merely to go someplace closer to home. The reason that our insurance will only cover this place is because it is considered the best of the best when it comes to this stuff. So that's good! If I have to go someplace, it's nice going to the best.

So, we get there, and all the paperwork is done, insurance card was scanned in, etc. The front office ladies seemed very impressed with our coverage. On a side note--obviously many of you have never looked at prices for IVF, etc (I'm very glad you haven't had to). Did you know that a first round of IVF costs $10,000? And subsequent rounds, if you already have embryos stored, still cost $4,000? We will not be needing IVF (and we wouldn't do it anyway--that is where we draw a personal line), but if we did, wow. I now fully understand why many people have to mortgage their homes to have children. (Although, I wish they would just take that money and adopt and help a kid that's already here. That is our personal feeling on it.)

Anyway, we meet with our doctor, Dr. Miller. He's probably in his early to mid 40's, pretty normal looking white guy with a female resident with him who was sitting in on our consult. So, we start going over my medical history and the history of all the losses. The first thing that I notice about this doctor is that he's REALLY intense. Like, he would NOT break eye contact with me. It was so much, I had to look away at times, you know what I mean? But at least I felt I had his whole attention, which is nice. Brian agreed. We went over all those tests Dr. Thai ran on me over the summer, and he told me that she was really quite thorough in her testing. And this is where the mutant part comes in. Well, Dr. Thai never discussed this with me (she just told me everything was fine and I didn't see it in the records until a few days ago--long story), but it turns out I do have a gene mutation called MTHFR.

MTHFR is the name of a blood enzyme that is screwed up when you have this particular mutation. I have 1 bad copy each of 2 different genes affecting this. Now, you can have 2 bad copies of these 2 different genes--that's really bad. My scenario is borderline. Dr. Miller said that Dr. Thai probably didn't say anything because its not proven to be a cause of anything. If I had the two bad copies of those genes, that's a different story. Anyway, this can cause blood clotting, and what it definitely causes is bad uptake of Folic Acid. So, she had put me on baby aspirin and progesterone, which he seemed to feel were perfectly appropriate. He is also going to put me on mega high doses of Folic Acid, which may help the situation and would definitely protect my baby from neural tube defects if we do have a viable pregnancy. When I say mega high, I mean 4 times the normal amount a pregnant women should take, so I'm going to be swallowing a ton of pills. I am fine with that given the alternative! If I had those 2 bad copies of the gene and had the definite issue, I would need to give myself shots of blood thinner every day when I'm pregnant. I wasn't looking forward to that, but I'll do what I have to do, obviously. But, he stated its not indicated with me (although I know from my research some RE's will prescribe it anyway), and actually, a ton of people have this gene mutation and never have a problem. (So you may be mutants too and not even realize it!)

Anyway, he seemed pretty optimistic about the situation. He stated that he feels my prognosis is good to have a baby. He is going to do some more testing on me. On Cycle Day 3 next time, I have to go in for blood testing and a basic ultrasound to check out my ovaries. (See how the follicles look, etc.) The blood testing will check my LH, FSH, prolactin, estrogen and progesterone at that point in my cycle. Those are all hormones that affect ovulation and pregnancy, and they will tell a lot. He even said depending on how those levels come back, the possibility exists that I could be put on Clomid. I'm not EXACTLY clear why I would need that when I have no trouble conceiving, but it has something to do with inducing a stronger, better ovulation, and helping the hormonal and chemical conditions be ideal in the womb BEFORE you ovulate, rather than just treating it after. And then, a few days after that, I need to get another ultrasound, but with this one, they're going to shoot saline water up my hoo-ha and check out the structure of my uterus itself. There could be some uterine malformation going on that could be causing this and inhibiting growth. Some that are fixable and some are not. I've been told this is "uncomfortable," which may mean "horribly painful," so, we'll see. We hope to have this testing done before we go to Florida the first week of March (a post on that is upcoming). So I'm really hoping my cycle is regular so that can happen.

Before I go, I wanted to thank everyone for the support and well wishes. We really do appreciate how kind everyone has been through this mess. I will keep you somewhat up to date, although I hope you all do understand that if we do try again and get pregnant, we keep that to ourselves until we're ready to tell, for obvious reasons. Bye!

Robbery!! (Don't Worry--Not our House)

As I said in the title, yes, there was a robbery, but don't worry, it wasn't at our house, or anything directly belonging to us really. As many of you know, my mom owns a gas station/convenience store up in the thumb, in Otter Lake, which is sort of near Davidson. So, I was talking to my mom last night after Brian left, and she casually says, "Yeah, we got a phone call from Randy (one of her workers) this morning at 7 am." Then, she stops. So, I have to prompt her and say, "Oh yeah, about what?" To which she replied, "Oh, the station was robbed last night." Lovely.

Her worker Randy got to work on Sunday morning to find the side door of the station completely broken out. It's a full glass panel door with a handle all the way across on the inside, as many of you are probably familiar with. Some of my readers are intimately familiar with it, given that you've worked for my Mom! Anyway, come to find out they weren't the only target; the same person tried to break into the other little store in town without success, due to window positioning and crazy homemade locking systems, made by Ed, who owns the Superette in question. Anyway, my mom has cameras in the store, and whoever did this must be local, because he knew exactly where they were, and kept his face hidden the whole time, and dodged through the aisles at exactly the right places. The police think they know who this person is, because earlier that night at the Superette, he had tried to steal beer, and they kicked him out. So, the theory is, he then came back to the Superette and tried to break in, failed, and then came to my mom's place. This is the funny part--the only thing he took was 2 30 packs of Bud Light. She would have been out more money if he'd taken 2 cartons of cigarettes. Also, he broke that window, went to the cooler (leaving the big back door open, which my mom was pretty peeved about), took 60 beers, and left in 31 seconds flat. My mom reviewed her tapes, and told me that. It killed me--so fast, 31 seconds, shows a total disregard for conscience. Wow. Also, despite the door being completely busted, the only other creature that came in the station all night was the black cat that lives around the area and feeds in the dumpster. Apparently, the poor little scrawny thing came in out of the cold several times. As my mom put it, "Well, I'm out an insurance claim, and 30 bucks in beer. If you're going to get robbed, I guess this is the way you want it to go."

And I was just thinking about this--my parents have owned the station for 13 and a half years, and this is only the second time they've been robbed. That's not too bad, actually, particularly considering the area it's in (poor and rural--I would almost expect robberies from people looking for drug money or something). I mean, don't get me wrong, other things have happened--one of their clerks was assaulted, they've had numerous gas drive offs obviously, and even a naked gas pumper of all things. Also, my mom fell outside on the ice one year and broke her leg (as she put it--at least it was her that was hurt and not a customer), and one particularly hot summer when the air was broken, a completely disgusting redneck guy asked my frequent reader A if he could lick the sweat off her. But, all in all, its been a fairly uneventful place to be. So, if you're ever in Otter Lake, Michigan, stop at the Marathon station, ask for Marie, and tell her you know me.

Movie Reviews

So, I thought I'd spend a few minutes sharing my opinion about a few movies I've seen recently. You may have been thinking of seeing these movies, so I wanted to give my fair and unbiased take on these flicks. Don't worry, I'll not give away the ending of either movie!

Gran Torino
Brian and I went to the movies on Friday night to finally see Clint Eastwood's Gran Torino. Good ol' Clint is both director and star of this movie, the same as he was in the absolutely brilliant Million Dollar Baby (which could make me cry again right now just thinking about it). Mr. Eastwood has stated that this may be his last movie as an actor, and that he will focus on directing only, as he is in his late 70's, after all. Well Clint, if this is your last movie ever on screen, or even as a director, you have a tremendous amount to be proud of. Gran Torino was pretty much a masterpiece, I think particularly to those of us who live in the Detroit Metro area and understand the history and dynamics of how the area has changed in the last 50 years. It is the story of Frank Kowalski, a Korean War vet whose wife has just passed away and is now all alone in his home in Hazel Park. He's distant from his sons, and hates the fact that his neighborhood, that used to be all white, is now predominately filled with Hmong immigrants. Hmong people are an Asian culture who immigrated here after the Vietnam War (this is explained in more detail in the movie). He hates these people and calls them every racial name in the book. You really want to hate Frank, but you don't. Then, he unwillingly gets to know the two Hmong teenagers next door, Sue and Thao, and begins to change. Obviously, Frank's beautiful 1972 Ford Gran Torino factors predominantly in the story. As I said, I will not give away too much of the plot or the ending, but all I have to say is WOW. Go see this movie immediately.

The Love Guru
As for the other movie I'm going to review--I have a message for Mike Myers: Unless you get your funny back, QUIT MAKING MOVIES. Brian and I watched The Love Guru last night, and it was a complete and utter waste of about an hour and a half of my life. About 10 minutes into it, Brian and I looked to each other, and went "Do you think this is funny?" Neither of us really did, but we wanted to give it a chance. I have liked Mike Myers so much in the past (I still headbang every time I hear Bohemian Rhapsody), I didn't want to think he could put out such a piece of crap, but alas, it is possible. The Love Guru is about Guru Pitka, a white guy who was raised in India who wants to become the next Deepak Chopra. He's hired by the owner of the Toronto Maple Leaves (played by Jessica Alba--yeah right) to fix the love life of her star player so they can win the Stanley Cup. In this movie, Myers tells all the same jokes as he ever has, and now they are VERY OLD. This stuff hasn't been funny since Austin Powers (the first one, not the two substandard ones that followed). Plus, the weird fakey Indian voice he talks in through the movie was weird and off putting. The ONLY slightly funny part of this movie was seeing Justin Timberlake play a rival goalie, a French Canadian guy named Jacque "le Coq" Grande, who worships Celine Dion and has an enormous schlong. When the movie was done, I was pissed I wasted my Netflix subscription on it. DO NOT see it.

Bye until next time!

Baby Trial Run

So, Brian's brother Ryan and his girlfriend Jen had a daycare emergency this week (their daycare lady had to have emergency surgery Monday) and they needed somebody to watch baby Kelsey this week. My mother in law Dena is watching her tomorrow and Thursday, but they were stuck yesterday and today. Brian and I were both home and not busy, and our house is actually not that far out of the way for Ryan to go to work. So, we were nannies to a 10 month old for the last couple days.

The days started early, at 6:30. Of course, she refused to go back to sleep after Ryan dropped her off and left, so I was up and about early. Both days we had to go upstairs to get Brian out of bed an hour later. She liked crawling in the bed with him and trying to get the cat. (He was actually relatively good with her--no hissing and he actually touched her finger with his nose once, and then ran away. For him, that's fantastic. Ask Holly.) Then came morning bottles and cereal. Lunch time and afternoon bottles also went well. She's a pretty good eater, so mealtimes went pretty well. The hardest part of the whole deal was nap times. She did not sleep very well at all--the first day, she slept an hour in the morning (good), 30 minutes after lunch (terrible) and then 20 minutes later in the afternoon that she shouldn't have needed had she slept better earlier. Today, she slept 25 minutes in the morning (terrible), an hour tops after lunch (15 minutes of that was me trying to get her BACK to sleep when she woke up after half an hour) and then 15 minutes on the floor of Brian's office after her late bottle, which, again, she shouldn't even have needed. In my mind, not enough for a baby her age, but I did the best I could. Also, Kelsey is teething, so today especially she was crabby. If one of us wasn't holding her, she was screaming, especially this afternoon. I did oragel this morning, and when it wore off, boy could we tell. Overall, a fine couple of days, but I have to admit, I'm looking forward to sleeping a bit later tomorrow and not having a 20 pound creature clinging to me constantly. Brian said to me, "What will we do when we have our own kids?" My reply was, "It's different when they're you're own, plus, we'll have some time to adjust."

Brian was a ton of help. Yesterday, I got my exercise while she was sleeping, and he watched her while I showered. Then, he watched her while I got groceries for an hour. Today, he watched her for an hour and a half while I went to yoga, and held her at various times so I could do stuff. He changed his first diaper ever today while I was gone, and it was even a poopy one. Good job honey! I knew you could do it! It's funny, though. I can already tell that when we do have kids, there will clearly be a good cop, bad cop vibe in our house, and I will be the bad cop. Our kids will hate me and love dad. Oh well.

Back to work tomorrow finally!!

Dreary January Days

2009 is upon us. I'm sort of glad Christmas is over. We ended up having a fine time at Brian's parents and my parents and grandparents, but neither of us was truly in the Christmas spirit this year. Brian took the tree down in a flash on New Year's Day, which is really unlike him. He wants me to take the Christmas cards down from the window I display them in, but I said they can stay up for awhile. I like looking at them; they're really cheerful and happy. We spent New Year's Eve at Jeff & Candace's, which was a very nice low key evening with them and another couple we know, Chris and Katie. Brian drank beer, and I drank sparkling apple juice, and we were home by 1:30. However, we came home to find cat vomit all over our bedroom floor that had to be cleaned up before we went to bed. Oh, the joys of pet ownership. Now, I really HAVE to have the carpets cleaned.

I'm not back at work yet, but I am starting up again next week, which is great. I work three days next week, and in those three days, I have to drive to Muskegon, Saginaw, and Lansing. If the weather is fine, I'm good with that; it's a nice mileage check in my pocket. If the weather is bad, I will be one huge ball of stress. But, I'll deal with that when the time comes. Here is what's been occupying my time the last week or so:

1) my brother Grant is having this huge situation at school in which he is failing chemistry and may not be able to run track in the spring, which is his favorite thing. And it seems mostly due to the fact he has a woman for a teacher who seems to be a complete moron. My mother told me the whole story when we were up there with them, and I was very upset. One of my old teachers is now the principal of the high school, and my mom said that when she went to the principal for help, she got no response. So, I sent this old teacher of mine (who freaking thought I walked on water, because all the teachers thought I walked on water) a slightly bitter email (that I stand behind, I don't regret the tone at all) saying I thought she cared more for her students, and that this Chem teacher shouldn't be teaching. I finally got a response back today that didn't really say much other than they are working on the problem and are offering tutoring. I passed that info onto my mom, and told Grant he better get his ass to some tutoring, or else I'm going to look like a complete a-hole. And if the kid makes an a-hole out of me, he WILL face my wrath.

2) My Grandma (my mom's Mom) had to have a biopsy on her left boob today as her annual mammogram found an abnormality. So, we have all been a bit nervous about that, especially my Grandma herself, obviously. My Grandpa is in such a precarious state, I don't know what we'd do if something was wrong with Grandma too, and she was in need of serious treatment. Well, the surgeon who did the biopsy today removed three small masses and sent them off to the lab. He told her that while he's not a pathologist, he's been doing biopsies a long time and he strongly feels that from the look of these things, they are most likely harmless calcium deposits. So, Grandma will wait for pathology results, but we all feel much better.

3) Finally, today Candace had to take baby Oliver for a couple shots at his doctor's office, and I said I'd go with her for moral support. She needed it more than he did! He cried for about a minute after getting poked, then when she gave him a bottle, he was fine and dandy. He slept in the car on the way back to their house, and was happy as a clam in the swing afterwards when we were visiting. Way to take it like a man, Ollie!