Pity party, won't you join me?

Woe is me. Yes, I am throwing myself a pity party. I think I have been handling the past few weeks great, all things considering. But there are those days when you can't help but feel sorry for yourself. Today is that day. With my ultrasound a week away, I'm getting nervous. I know what the outcome is going to be. I have a gut feeling that the results will not be in my favor. My body and my gut are telling me this. I am preparing for the worst, but no matter how much I prepare, it's still going to suck to get that final confirmation. To be laying in the ultrasound room, and see yet again, a still image...nothing prepares you for that. Even if I am fully expecting to see bad news, it's still a knife in the heart. And just thinking about that day and what is to come after that makes me exhausted thinking about it. It physically exhausts me. It saddens me and scares me at the same time, to think I can never be excited about a future pregnancy. My excitement will be overpowered by fear and worry. I don't care how many times people tell me to try and relax, don't worry so much...it won't happen. Because I will worry, I will be fearful, I will be scared sh!tless every time I go to the bathroom, I will worry myself sick getting my blood drawn, and I will hate getting an ultrasound. And it angers me to think that I will be feeling those things instead of excitement and happiness. It angers me that yet again I will have to tell the few people I told, the bad news and have to deal with them not knowing what to say to me. It angers me that my body will not do what it is supposed to do. A lot of things anger me as you can see.

They say out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls...I am feeling the furthest from strong now.
Pity party over,

Happy Tuesday my friends,

Takia

I have been a bad foster mommy, I haven't yet took one picture of our new foster dog! I know, bad me. I would take one now and post it but she just had surgery and honestly she looks a bit scary, so I will wait until she's all healed up.
Foster dog #2 is Takia. She is an 8 month half sharpe, half rottweiler female. She came to us because her current family lived in a small apartment and could not adequately take care of her, so they had to surrender her. I was also told she is for the most part potty trained...yeah, she was definitely NOT potty trained. When we first got her she literally peed like every 4 minutes. After the first day, I felt like something was wrong with her medically. I understand some dogs are nervous in new surroundings, but this was ridiculous! Her eyes were also pretty swollen to where she would walk into us and things because she couldn't open her eyes all the way. So off we went to the vet and sure enough she had a bladder infection. They also thought she had something called entropia (I think that's how it's spelled). I guess it is common in the sharpe breed, to where the extra fat around the eyes irritate her corneas and the swelling gets out of control. She was scheduled to be fixed so while she was under they went ahead and did surgery around her eyes, taking out the extra fat around the eyes. So here we are a week out of surgery and she is doing pretty good. She has sutures all around both eyes that need to be taken out, but that is why she looks scary, due to the white sutures all around. Her right eye looks great, but her left eye looks like it may start swelling again. She can open it at least, but doesn't get as wide as the right one. Either way, she has not walked into walls our us since her surgery, so, so far so good! Other than that, we have had to completely potty train her and also crate train her. She's such a loving dog and loves to be loved on. She gets along so well with our other dogs, and she is intrigued by the cats.
I have to admit, I liked having my two well behaved potty trained dogs. I wasn't really wanting to start all over with another puppy with potty training and basic command training. But it's all worth it when I think about where she would be if she wasn't here. She deserves to be happy and have oodles of love thrown her way. I hope she finds a loving family to call hers very soon, and until she does, she will be a part of ours.
P.S. I will post a picture when her sutures come out.

Happy Friday my friends,

Rollercoaster of a life

I'm stopping by to give a quick update and to let you all know what a rollercoaster I've been on (in cliffnotes version)! I did end up going to Vegas and having a wonderful time. The morning I left for Vegas I went and had an u/s, followup bloodwork, and a meeting with the doc. My body was still telling me a m/c was imminent but had no full on bleeding. The u/s showed a sac and that was it. So the Dr. prepared me for the worst. But the week before I had already known and had grieved already. At that point, as sad as it sounds, I was just waiting for it to happen already. So off to Vegas I went armed with medications from the Dr. for different case scenarios. A few days later after spending the day out by the pool I got a call and they said my hcg level was 20,000. What?! It was 7,000 last time. I was just waiting for the numbers to go down. So they said they wanted another u/s and followup this week. Yesterday I went in for another u/s (it was 6 days from the last). I told the tech that the Dr. thought I had a blighted ovum but my numbers increased. Then she said "well it doesn't look like a blighted ovum, it looks like a pregnancy." Apparently, in the week from my last u/s, there was a fetal pole, yolk sac and a slow itty bitty heart beat. By u/s I measure 6 weeks 1 day, but by dates I should be 7 weeks. Since I don't chart or know when I ovulate, they said it could be off by weeks. The heartbeat was slow but they said if in fact the heart just started beating, it's slow at first then picks up. I was definitely not expecting that! I am most definitely not out of the woods yet, not by a long shot. The tech said it could very well be that the heart just started beating, or it could be going to the other way and slowing down. It's a 50/50 shot.
I don't even know how to describe what I felt. It was almost a numbing feeling. I had already grieved. My expectations were so very low. It's hard to get excited when my body feels the complete opposite. I am still spotting and still have cramps on and off. Still have a backache on and off. I am having so many mixed signals thrown at me, it's hard to even try to be excited.
So for now I wait. Story of my life! I have another u/s in a few weeks. I want to be optimistic, but I am still preparing myself for miscarriage. I still feel that this will end badly. I am preparing for the worst because that's all I've known. It's a comfortable but horrible place to be. I know this feeling well, and can't imagine what being on the other side feels like because I've never been there. So again, for now I wait. And see. It's not in my hands.

Happy Wednesday my friends,

Yet another one *sigh*

Sorry I have been M.I.A from my blog for a while. I just really dreaded writing this post, so I procrastinated as long as I could. I believe I am going to go through my third miscarriage. It's very exhausting to be writing this yet again!
I found out at the beginning of last week (almost two weeks ago I believe) that I was pregnant. Had my betas done last week. My first one was 421 and then my second one (four days later) was 4,006. Definitely a good rise. So I decided to do no more blood draws since they are so freaking stressful to me! The nurse agreed that was fine and we made an appointment for my first ultrasound. Everything was going great, was actually "feeling" pregnant. Well than lo and behold at work early Thursday morning I had spotting. Then the cramps came. Then the backache came. All in a few hours of each other. I was only like 5w3d I think. I can't even describe what it felt like. But it was all too familiar. I went home and went to bed, wanting to just sleep as long as I could. I knew what was happening. Unfortunately, my body is predictable in that way. Oddly enough, the actual Dr. called me later that day to check up. Before I talked to him, I decided I wasn't even going to call the Dr.'s office until the following week, since they could do nothing for me anyway. When I told him what happened earlier that day, he offered for me to come in that day for an ultrasound. I didn't want to do that since I know what they would find. So he suggested I get my labs drawn again. I agreed to that. They came back at only 7,000, which is so way below what it should be. It confirmed my suspicions. My progesterone was fine, actually it had gone up. Well when the nurse called later she said the Dr. said my labs look reassuring and that he thinks I should come in a for an ultrasound and meet with his next week. I said "really? He thinks my labs are fine?" I was confused, and thinking maybe he had me mixed up with someone else. So I agreed to the ultrasound and meeting with him next week. And so far, nothing has happened. No more cramps even. The past few days they have been on and off. Now the next few sentences I am going to say may sound selfish. I am supposed to be going to Vegas this Wednesday for a bachelorette party. I have been looking forward to this all year. Well when I found out I was pregnant, I decided I wasn't going to go since I didn't want to risk anything, and I was content with my decision because I was so happy to be pregnant. Well now since I know my body is going to fail me, I just want it to hurry up and get it over with. I hate this waiting and see. I also think Vegas would be a nice escape. Don't get me wrong, I would much rather be pregnant than go to Vegas, but since I can't be pregnant, can't I at least have Vegas?!
So for now, I am just in the wait and see mode. Apparently my body is going to drag this out for as long as possible. Just when I couldn't get any lower, my body is going to give me one last kick to remind me who is in charge. Great.

Happy Sunday my friends,