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2008-07-10 - 10.22pm��previous entry��next entry
First PP cycle update (please contain your excitement, hehe!)
Just (unexcitingly) updating on my first cycle since Nathan was born. Anybody crazy enough to be stalking my chart at this stage (!!) might be finding it a tad confusing, and anyway, I like to write about everything that relates to anything fertile - you know me! ;)
So my chart says I am now 11 days past ovulation! Which I am not, I'm pretty sure of it. I haven't even ovulated yet, I don't think.
My temperatures are pretty stable in general, whether I'm having babies, breastfeeding ten children or what, which is helpful! But for the first week of temping since my first postpartum period, my temps have been lower than usual for me. Then they picked up to more like my norm and stayed around that level, and the shift made the chart think I had ovulated since it's sorrrrt of a biphasic pattern. No fertile CM before "ovulation" though, and I'm having more of that since then, which is another sign for me that I did not ovulate when they think I did.
Also, my history shows that on my first PP cycle (and the next couple too) each time I have a baby, I do not ovulate till late in my cycle - pretty much somewhere around the 25th day of my cycle. So it's hiiiighly unlikely that I went and ovulated on CD13 on my first PP cycle!
I have been having weird symptoms this last week or so that I have wanted to write about (but didn't get around to it), like crazy appetite and extra tiredness, and even frequent urination (day and night) for a few days there. Also I'm pretty crampy and have been for most of the last week or so. I had a big temp dip after the alleged ovulation at "5DPO". I have even felt kind of pregnant. BUT, I remember feeling pregnant a couple of months ago too, and I mean I REALLY did. I am starting to wonder if for some reason I'm going to find that a norm as I gear up to ovulate. I can't think why, but maybe that's the reason? This time around, I have had actual morning sickness from CD15 or so, on and off! ;) I know that's CRAZY! And it ISN'T morning sickness, because I am not pregnant and haven't ovulated yet! But it comes on between 4 and 5pm (typical for my morning sickness) and I tell you, it's exactly like morning sickness in the way it feels. Now, I have had a zillion different variations of nausea in my time for all manner of reasons. NONE of them feel the same as morning sickness. The first day I felt it, I was walking into the kitchen and felt a sudden wave of morning sickness. I thought, "Yeurgh." and continued as though it was normal for another step or two, but THEN stopped dead as I remembered I'm not pregnant so that isn't something I should be feeling!
The next day I felt queasy for the whole latter part of the day and evening, and I also noticed that earlier in the day my nose was very sensitive to hand soap. When I was pregnant with Matthew, we used Carex hand soap (the pump kind) at the kitchen sink. I can not (ever) be near that stuff ever again. It is permanently associated with feeling extremely morning sick and thus every time I even get a whiff of somebody whose hands have been washed in it, I instantly feel a wave of yeurghy nausea and need to get away from the smell. I still can't play Zoo Tycoon, which is what I played a lot when I was in my first trimester with Arthur! Just looking at the graphics makes me feel horribly queasy, and it still hasn't gone away! So weird.
Anyway. So we obviously don't have Carex anymore, but I smelled some sort of hand soap perfumey smell and said to Neil, "Have you been using Carex?!" Of course he replied that he hadn't, but I guess I must have caught a whiff of something similar. Anyway it really was an instant flashback to morning sickness.
The NEXT day I was queasy again late in the day and that's the first time I thought to look back and see what time I had been feeling queasy the last couple of days. It always kicked in late afternoon and lasted the evening, just like when I'm actually pregnant. Which I can't be!!!! So why the "morning sickness"?!?! It's so weird. It even came on one afternoon when I was going round Tesco getting some food shopping. I knew it wasn't all in my head then because I was busy and distracted, and suddenly I thought, "Urrrgh, I feel queasy again" and then realised the feeling was becoming familiar (several days in the last week), and looked for the clock near the tills and saw that it was 4.30pm. Hmmm.
But NOT HMMM!! Because I haven't even ovulated yet! The only thing I can think is that maybe it's a new thing for me, possibly related to ovulation starting to gear up?? That sounds so lame, and is thus unlikely! But I can't think what else. Anyway, isn't morning sickness linked to HCG and not other reproductive hormones? I'd only have that in my system when pregnant, so that just is too weird. In any case, I never get morning sickness till exactly 5 weeks and 6 days pregnant (which, again, I am NOT!!).
Anyway that is just a weird thing that I don't know how to explain.
But, back to reality! :) I have had more EWCM lately and some cramping, and so I'm thinking that I might ovulate soon. Today I checked what cycle day I'm on and it's CD24 already!!! Which is about when I might expect to ovulate this cycle, based on my history, or any day after tomorrow, for about a week. I have never ovulated later than CD30 (a postpartum cycle after Matthew I think), and even then it wasn't a usual cycle - I seemed to attempt to ovulate and then give up for a few days and try again later! So, soon, I think.
In my latest entry at my arthursmummy diary, I finally wrote about the whole "leaving the number and timing of children to God" thing. My heart is 110% convinced that this is right for us, and God's heart for our family. Neil isn't quite there yet. He agrees wholeheartedly (except maybe not the wholeheartedly bit?!) and then a couple of days later he is definitely not on the same page. When we pray and read the Bible and really focus on what God would have us do, then we both agree that it's simple - to trust him entirely with our fertility, and have uninhibited parsnips (ETA: new readers should know that parsnips is a code word to prevent perverted googlers! ;) )without ever worrying about contraception. In the States they call it "Birth Control". I like that term better because it speaks of who is in control! Certainly not God! And that's what we want to change. BUT, when Neil is not in that place (ie. we haven't prayed together for a day or two, he never really reads the Bible anyways, and he's feeling overwhelmed or anxious about something and not particularly close to God) then he goes back to the worldly view of "how will we afford/cope with lots of children if that's what we end up with" (italics my emphasis - denotes no confidence in God! We won't "end up with" children! If we put our trust in him and ASK him to bless us according to his wisdom for our family, then he will open and close my womb in just the right timing, and just the right number of times! Also if he knows we can't cope with more children, I believe he won't allow us to have them - but I also believe he'll enable us to cope and to provide each child he blesses us with, with a happy, balanced upbringing, full of love, and ways to make sure that they get quality time and attention through it all).
I know it is very NORMAL for a man to be concerned about the financial aspects of raising a family and providing for them, but (non-Christians are sure to disagree), it is not a godly viewpoint. Normal, but not in line with God's will for him, if it means he goes about with anxiety and feels he must bear all to make sure his family is clothed and fed, etc, and if it is interfering with trusting God. GOD is our provider, not Neil. God uses Neil's work as a big source for us, but he has plenty of other ways to provide for us, and he is in control of that whole area anyways. We have clear evidence of God's ability (and desire!) to provide amazingly for our family as we lean on him for all that we need, over these past 8.5 months without an income. Neil got a job this week and he starts in 10 days time. It's better pay and bonuses than we've ever known, in a great location for our family to move to, and to bring up our little ones. God knew. He is on our case! We can surely trust him over EVERYTHING else in our lives, and I WANT to and feel it's absolutely right too. I want God to have the control over conception and birth in my life, not us. It feels like back to the roots of how it all should be. But anyway. That is where we are for now.
Neil agrees 100% in theory, with the reasoning, but is wavering in the faith dept I think. And that's okay. I am praying for him all the time! We are also newly open to the possibility of adopting in later years, as God leads us. That was neeevvver on the scene before! God is really changing our hearts so much this year!! It's so exciting! Our lives are going to change so much through all that he's doing in us.
I feel such RELIEF in handing the control to God re. the TTC and the "how many babies will I get to have?!" and so on. It's so freeing!! I will have as many as God wants me to have. I really hope that will be a good few more. But I also know it could mean no more. I would have a hard time with that, I think, but knowing that it was God's plan for us, having given it all to him in the first place, would make it more bearable I hope. And then maybe we'd adopt. I definitely do not get the feeling that our "quiver" is full at all, yet. But only God knows the size of it! And that's so exciting!
The one thing I'm reluctant to give up is the charting!!! I know, that's a potential "control" thing, and I should let it go. The main reason why I can't bring myself to right at the moment is that I love knowing I'm pregnant and experiencing that joy every second from right when it starts. It's also exciting to wonder if I might be this month, etc, by looking at my chart and symptoms. It would be way better, I'm sure, to just quit looking at anything and have random parsnips as and when, and then be joyfully surprised one day when I find out I'm pregnant and wonder how far along I might be! But I would feel like I'd "missed" some of it. I love seeing the implantation dip and then in hindsight having that record to SEE when my little ones first attached themselves to me (Matthew didn't have one though)! I still look back on those charts with fondness from time to time - they are part of my journey with my babies, and without that early part, it would just be.... well, missing. I don't want to miss a single tiny bit! I love the "maybe" excitement - I wouldn't like to miss that either!
So, for now, I am ready to just bear babies till God closes my womb, whenever that might be - no age cut-off or number-of-kids cut-off, or anything like that any more (so exciting!!!!!). Neil is sometimes with me on that, sometimes not. We are about to talk and pray in more depth about it on Monday evening (scheduled in and everything, lol!). But even so, we seem to be currently having the uninhibited parsnips without anxiety, even though I have the EWCM and the HSO cervix! So I guess things are different than they used to be, even with Neil saying he's not 100% on board. Obviously, my luteal phase is usually crazy short at first after I have a baby, a long way too short to support a pregnancy, and that's how it stays for a good few cycles (till my baby is about 9 or 10 months old). So any conception that did take place would not be able to make it due to my short luteal phase. I expect the same thing this time, and so parsnips that happen to coincide with fertile signs and ovulation are still unlikely to result in pregnancy. I know that God can do anything, though!
Nathan is 6 months old the day after tomorrow. I am not scared about a shorter age gap, because I know God will equip me for the task of whatever he sends my way. It's so exciting! Not likely quite yet, but vaguely possible so still exciting! :)
Recent entries.....
Babies 7 and 8! :) - 2016-01-10
Babies 6 and 7! - 2013-02-17
Baby #5 !! - 2010-04-03
Nearly 3 months postpartum! - 2009-10-05
6 weeks old already! - 2009-08-25