The Return of My (in)Fertility

I had a nice break.  Between pregnancy and breastfeeding, it was nice to be without periods, without looking at my body for signs of fertility, without wondering if I could be pregnant.  But alas, that time has passed.  A little less than a month after quitting breastfeeding, and exactly six months after my daughter was born, my period came back.  With a fucking vengeance…

And even though I really don’t want to be pregnant right now (oh my god, can you imagine a six month old while pregnant?  How about a newborn and a 14 month old???  Scary!!!) I was a little sad when I saw that first bloody tinge.  Because two weeks ago when I saw the gobs of egg whites in my undies, I did what any good infertile does.  I headed to the bedroom and attacked my husband…  How quickly we get drawn back into the TTC world.  I have spent the last two weeks wondering, and even the hubs asked, “Could we be pregnant?”  And we allowed ourselves to fantasize about having a second child so quickly.  The biggest fantasy is being able to get pregnant so easily, without going through the torture of last time.  I’ve spent the last two weeks fantasizing about becoming that urban myth that all the infertiles hate.  “I once knew this woman who struggled to have her first baby, and then she just relaxed, and bam!  She was pregnant – even before getting her period again!”  Oh wouldn’t that be amazing???

But instead, here I sit at work (because I can’t take any time off – I have almost no PTO after my kid was sick!) in agony from cramps, the kind that I never remember having, running to the bathroom every hour to change my tampon (the super kind!), in misery.  And resigning myself to the fact that we are officially back on the TTC bandwagon.  Well kind of.  I absolutely refuse to take my temperature, or chart anything.  But I’m hyper aware of the signs my body puts out, and we have agreed that we’ll spend the next six months trying naturally.  And as soon as Alex turns 1, we’ll go back to the RE for a consult about doing FET’s.  Or maybe before so we can be ready to do the FET shortly after her birthday.  This time down the TTC road, I have a very important safety net: 5 lovely embryos waiting for me on ice.  The original plan was to not even try naturally at all, and do FET’s after I weaned Alex at a year old.  But since breastfeeding was quit abruptly, our plans have changed. 

I’m resolved to do it differently this time, especially during the 6 months of natural TTC’ing.  I will not take random supplements other than prenatals and extra folic acid for my MTHFR.  I will not stick a thermometer in my mouth.  I will not get a subscription on Fertility Friend.  I will not pee on anything – ovulation stick or otherwise.  This is TTC Light, and I hope it calms my shit a bit.  I need to keep telling myself that having a baby so quickly after Alex will be hard – I don’t want it as much, or as urgently, and hopefully that will kill the obsession a bit.

Why start so quickly?  Because I HATE TTC.  I want it to be done.  There are other reasons: I want Alex to have a sibling that is close, I’m not getting any younger, blah blah blah.  The real reason is I want to be DONE with this part of my life.  I hate every second that this goes on.  Yes, I want another child, but I don’t want the obsession that I can’t seem to control when it takes over my life.  I think this time it should be easier, as my life is filled with my little girl.  I know that no matter what happens, I will have her in my life, so it doesn’t seem as bad if we fail on this TTC journey.  Last time, I was wondering when it would end, when I could stop living my child-free life.  But now, I will always have my little Alex, and although I feel like our family is not yet complete, it’s not the end of the world if we don’t have another child.  But we have to try, and so it begins…