CD1

For realz this time! CD1 started the day after Christmas. I might even say on Christmas but for the sake of not being able to say I got AF as an X-mas present we shall say the day after. I'm excited. The new year is going to start off as a new cycle. Clean and fresh. I've always had a thing for the new year. I always feel hopeful. Like this year will be better than the last. I'm going to go out on a limb here and just say that in a lot of ways 2009 just wasn't my year. I felt like I made a lot of seemingly good decisions but all ended up being lemons. I'm in the process of fixing those mistakes and making lemonade with the ones I am going to have to live with. I hope that a lot of things happen in 2010. So without further ado my resolutions:

1. I want to get pregnant and have a healthy and happy pregnancy.
2. I want to start losing weight. If you have read my blog for any amount of time (prior to me starting over) you know I have gotten started on this a couple of times. However, now that the holidays are over I don't have anything standing in my way. My goal is to lose 20 pounds. This is 5 pounds less than what I weighed on my wedding day. I felt good and looked good.
3. I want to take a vacation. This is already in the works. I think we are going to take a cruise to Mexico. Its going to be a huge family vacation with my mom, dad, sister, her boyfriend, and us. We all have so much fun together so I think we would have a blast.
4. Help change the world. This one came from watching Evan Almighty the other night, ARK. Act of Random Kindness.

God: How do we change the world?

Evan Baxter: One single act of random kindness at a time.

This is something I think we all can handle.

5. Work harder. I work from home and I admit that although it has its perks it is not always easy, especially for me. I get distracted a lot by means of blogs, gossip sites, and FB. Sometimes I even get distracted by the things I have to do in the house too like cooking, cleaning, laundry. It happens. But this year I want to find a schedule that works for me and enables me to be productive.

I know I could make a list a mile long but 5 will be good enough, afterall they are pretty big goals.

Yup...

Still spotting. I haven't temped for a couple of days because I have been having weird sleep patterns AND I have been so tired that when my alarm goes off to temp I shut it off and am back asleep in less than a second. I am also now at my parents house, brought my thermometer with me but didn't take it out of my bag last night. Temping fail haha. I'll get back into the swing of it here. I came prepared with preseed at least. We shall see if we will need it. I'll make sure to watch my CM closely. I think we should at least BD every couple of days for good measure since we don't know whats going on. I would hate to miss my O date. I can't wait until this cycle is officially over. I'm ready for a fresh clean start and hopefully a normal cycle.

Soooo...

Its been awhile since I have posted and mainly thats because nothing has changed. I'm still doing this weird spotting/SUPER light AF thing. I have been temping, which has told me nothing. Everything is just kind of at a stand still. I have been super stressed out lately though so maybe that has something to do with it. AF needs to shit or get off the pot....

Maybe not?

Alright so I was cramping and had bright red spotting yesterday but now they are both gone. Maybe I'm not on CD1. I did however have a wicked temp drop so I am assuming AF will be here in a couple of days...I hope!

CD1 again

And actually happy about it this time. I feel good. After this 40 day cycle I am ready to get back on track. I have been charting again. We are going to use preseed this time around. I am currently on weight watchers. I am of course still taking my prenatal and B6 (100 mg) for my luteal phase. And thats where we are at.

Cheers to CD1 and hopefully ovulating one more time before 2010! Who knows, a BFP could be one heck of a way to start off a new year!! Come on sweet lord baby Jesus let this be it!

Spotting

Alright I officially have no idea what is up with my body. I'm spotting. If this turns out to be a BFP it will be a total shock. I'm not banking on it though. I hope its AF because if it is I could ovulate again before 2010!! And...well...now with the preseed in the mail we might as well have some slippery sex haha!

My head is pounding like a nail...

Happenings from last night are a bit...foggy this morning. As my alarm went off to temp I tried to go over the night...First, dinner. Check. Deciding it was Saturday and with no work tomorrow we might as well finish off the beer in the fridge (lots of beer). Check. Mario Party. Check. Ordering preseed? Uh? Having sex doggy style? Uh? The next thing I was sure of though......my head was going to explode. Check. So first things first I drag myself downstairs for some much needed ibuprofen. After that is taken care of I go to living room where my laptop is out and laying on the sofa, I open it, and sure enough I bought preseed last night. The tab for my order is open along with an e-mail notification. Nice. I'll have to wait for Andrew to get up to check on our sex style status but I'm assuming that happened as well. Oh beer brain whatever will I do with you and your crazy notions...I should at least be glad is was only 20 bucks worth of stuff rather than one of those ovulation monitors or something haha.

I'm off to make hangover food. On the menu this morning? Nachos...for sure

Crazy Thought...

I'm not going to ovulate again (well hopefully I can squeeze out the one that was due in NOVEMBER...stubborn ass...) until 2010!!!

Charting

I have started charting...AGAIN. So ladies next time I'm like oh no more charting blah, blah, blah be like you have tried that twice and neither time it did ya any good. I was officially supposed to started on Saturday according to my normal 32 day cycles but this cycle is going to be anything but normal. Maybe its a fluke and my cycles will go back to normal after this or maybe we will catch our eventual O day. I mean if it doesn't come by the end of December I'll have to call the doc. For now and poor hubby doesn't know this yet we are going to have sex every other day until O. Why every other day and not everyday? Because we don't know how long this can take! So getting a break in there will help. In the meantime, my temp is 97.39, well below my usual coverline somewhere around 97.5. I have started to notice more CM lately too. I had sticky last week and I would say creamy over the weekend. Maybe I will see some EWCM and O this week. LETS HOPE SO!! Its funny...if I O this week we could stand in line for the fantasticness that is a Christmas BFP!

BFN

Not today actually, yesterday. I know, I know...I shouldn't have tested, I don't even know when or if I ovulated for sure. But it was negative. I approximate if I ovulated on my average of CD17 I was 11 DPO. I am still not sure if I ovulated though. My temps were low and they still are but since I haven't been charting consectutively or at all for most of the month those few temps don't mean squat. But to add...I have been having tons of CM. It has ranged between creamy and sticky on some days. No EWCM though. Ugh, this is a total crap shoot. For the life of me I just can't figure out whether or not I want to chart. There are many reasons that I don't want to, lets review. I have control issues. By charting I feel like it is me just trying to control the uncontrollable. Yes, it makes me feel better but is it me not trusting God? Like He doesn't know what he is doing. Or He isn't in control of my life like I should let Him be? Or are most of you reading thinking sheesh its just charting!! I don't think I am truly stressed when I chart so that isn't a reason. I don't wake up earlier to chart except maybe on the weekends. Sometimes around O or the 2WW I get anxious to wake up and see what my temp is for the day but I don't see that as stress.

I don't know what I'm going to do. Again. I wish I didn't have to make a decision haha, just get a BFP...I'm gonna go munch on some ice cream and ponder...

Remember?

Remember those cramps that I often get in the middle of the night several days before AF arrives? Well I got those last night. They didn't wake me up but when I would wake up to roll over and what not they were there. I wish they weren't. I'm pretty sure that means I am out for this cycle too. At least thats been the pattern. I will wait until AF to officially call it of course but I'm not really hopeful anymore. The next time I will probably ovulate is Christmas. Thats going to be hard...we will be at my parents house that week. The best thing would be for AF not to show and for me to be finally pregnant!! You hear me AF? STAY AWAY!

Happy Thanksgiving

I have so much to be thankful for...yet there is something missing...

Alright temp be that way

I tried to temp again this morning to see if I could see a rise. It was actually lower today than yesterday. Needless to say, I don't know whats going on. I'm going to just stick with my no charting guns and trust that if its God's plan it will happen. I mean come on 8 days in a row now? I'm exhausted. We both need a break. According to other charts I should have O'd by now and I'm going to go with that. This should be a fairly easy 2WW (if there is such a thing). I got a new job as a cheer coach at a local middle school, Thanksgiving is here in a couple of days, I have a ladies breakfast at my church the first week of December, and in the mean time make flyers and setup tryouts. I'm going to be very busy and thats a good thing. I don't know if I will get around to blogging again before Thanksgiving so I hope you all have a Happy Thanksgiving!!

97.47

Yeah, I took my temp this morning to check and see if I could tell if I have ovulated or not. And...I can't. My previous charts show that this is either a coverline temp or my very first couple of temps after I have ovulated. I'm pretty sure I ovulated Saturday seeing as this was a coverline temp only once in like 10 charts. Still to be on the safe side I believe Mr. Hosey and I will be romping it up again tonight. And if you are counting tonight will make 8 days in a row. I do think tonight will be our last night though. My usual day to ovulate is cycle day 17 (Saturday). Today is 19 which is my latest day to ovulate. I don't know what to do but my lady bits and his man bits have had enough.

Thoughts?

I have an announcement

Alright so I'm pretty proud of my sex effort so far this month and I of course have to report on it! I have had sex 3 days in a row and tonight will make 4! Now to a lot of you I am sure you're thinking pshhh but I don't think I have ever had sex 3 days in a row let alone 4. Even better is that last night Andrew didn't get home from work until around 11 and we still got busy! Go us! I am thinking I might be Oing around Saturday, Monday at the latest so we are just gonna keep on trucking...

I also found an article posted on GP and thought I would share it here as well.

http://www.reuters.com/article/oddlyEnoughNews/idUSTRE55T4TV20090630

So get strong little dudes we got work to do!

Oh and a half a bottle of wine and a bath went a long way the other night. I am no longer feeling as jealous and bitter. I'm happy for her and me....well I'm just gonna keep doing what I'm doing. Andrew and I will get there.

My BFF

is pregnant. Yeah we just had lunch last weekend and she was telling me how her and her husband were going to start trying this month. We were set to ovulate around the same time and she was like maybe God was waiting for us to get pregnant together. I kind of laughed it off and was like yeah maybe...

I get an e-mail today that she is pregnant. I am so excited for her. Really, I am. But at the same time I am having conflicting emotions. I am so ready to be pregnant myself and she got pregnant without even trying. I'm sad, I'm happy, I'm bitter.

All I can do is pray that Andrew and I will get pregnant soon. I don't want to be bitter. I don't want to be that girl but every month it gets harder. And now, well, it would be awesome being pregnant together. Even at a few months apart just sharing these moments together would be a true blessing.

Sorry for the incoherant babbling and mix of emotions....I think I'm going to go take a nice hot bath...with some wine...

Comfort

I still feel comfortable in my decision not to chart and to just breath this month. At the moment I am just waiting to ovulate...again. But just so you know I'm still here!

CD1

Yup, CD1 again. Not long after I posted I started spotting and it has continued through to AF. I kind of got upset at first, a little. But I am much calmer this time. I don't know what has happened the past couple of days but I just kind of...I don't know...relinquished the control. I might be ready to stop charting, stop drinking business juice, etc. Not because I am giving up but more so because I just feel different...I can't explain it. It's a strange kind of calm. I like it. I am not "trying to relax." I'm not saying necessarily "it will happen when it happens." Its more of...it's up to God. It's not up to pomegranite juice, green tea, or what ever other things I can come up with. If it were I would already be pregnant by now. God has a plan. I can't be mad at that. I can't change that.

It's going to be okay.

Proud of Myself

For the first time since we decided to TTC I did not test at 10 DPO. I did not test at 11 DPO. I did not test at 12 DPO. And I do not currently have any tests in the house. I fought off the urge to go out and buy some yesterday. A lot of this was due to the fact that I had a temp drop yesterday, still above my coverline but on some of my other charts (of course all BFNs) 11 DPO my temp drops and AF is usually on her way. It did come back up today but honestly that's what my other charts did too but then it's just a jagged decent until AF shows. I figure that will happen this time too and if by chance AF doesn't show by Thursday then I will take a test. I am not having any symptoms, phantom or AF, not even cramps anymore so we will just take it day by day and see what happens.

Cramps

Well the past couple of nights I have had cramps. I can only assume AF is on her way. I think tomorrow if my temp is still up I will have to run out for a test or 2. Maybe Monday morning I will test. Also depending on if my temp is still up and looking good and if AF doesn't show her face by then....

On a brighter note, HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

98.36

Here is my chart for your viewing pleasure. By now you have seen my epic fail for a sex-a-thon, and that my BBT is loving 98.36 the past few days....I don't have any signs or symptoms so the nauseousness was just a one time dealio. I did have another headache yesterday but I'm not really counting headaches as a symptom. They are pretty normal for me.

I don't know when I am going to test. Maybe after my temps do something besides make a pretty line. If they do. This is pretty odd for me. I have been charting since last december and I have never had flat temps before, might be time for a new BBT.

5DPO

Here we are 5 DPO. Andrew and I did not make our 10 day sex-a-thon run. We had a busy week. My friend who had been staying with us while she interned was moving out so needless to say we were just about exhausted. I also didn't get to drink my green tea. I had a couple of glasses the couple of days before O but I don't think it helped much. My EWCM was little if not nonexistent. For me it is always extremely hard to tell the differance from semen and EWCM so I didn't chart my CM this month leaving me with dotted cross hairs (CH). Our timing wasn't bad this cycle but we would have been better off at least getting close to our 10 day sex-a-thon. When you see my chart you will understand...I'm very dissapointed in our sex effort.

I am having phantom symptoms already too. They started in the middle of the night last night. I got woken up around 2:30 and probably didn't get back to sleep until around 4. I had a horrible headache and was extremely nauseous. Even though I was finally able to get back to sleep I still had the headache and nauseousness when I woke up for work. I ate some oatmeal around 9:30 even though I was still nauseous but I was so hungry I couldn't wait any longer. It took me until about 11:30 to finally took some Tylenol. I was hungry again around 12:00 but still not feeling too hot so I decided that maybe some saltines and soda would help...nope still nauseous. I laid down for a nap this afternoon and was surprized when I woke up 3 hours later!! Headache gone, nauseousness still there...On top of this I am definitely feeling some happenings in my ute. Who knows...it's way too early to tell!

I am down with the nauseousness, acne, all around feeling of yuck if it means my BFP is around the corner though!

The Drs

Has anyone seen this show? The other day I was watchin Rachel Ray cook up some grub and decided to channel surf a bit. I checked out what was on afterwards and its was a show called The Drs. I read the little blurb about it and the last part of the sentence said "magic hour" to conceive...I thought wow I should watch this maybe learn a few things.

The show starts out with 4 doctors at a table talking about different things, answering audience questions, taking street people questions, and there is usually a guest doctor wither by phone or in person who comes out as an "expert" on whatever the case may be.

After probably 50 minutes of the hour long show not one thing has been mentioned about conceiving and so to not miss anything I haven't changed the channel so I have forced myself to watch numerous mind numbing commercials....then finally an audience question....

A woman stands up and talked about her husband and her trying to conceive and asks a question (I don't really remember, something about timing) and the doctors are like just have sex around ovulation...UM DUH! The woman who was asking a question was already on clomid and they told her to have sex around ovulation and relax. BRILLIANT! Not only was this the only question they didn't have an "expert" opinion on but this is what they told her? Yup, and then the show ended.

So ladies...stick to Fertility Friend and Taking Charge of Your Fertility...

We don't have to go outside or anything...

Lets talk positions. I have actually noticed a couple of places online where the only thing a couple has done different to get their BFP (big fat positive) is switch up their position to...doggy style. This made me curious so I googled me some best positions to get pregnant. The top few are:
1. Missionary.
2. Missionary with a pillow under the butt.
3. Spoon.
4. Doggy style.

All positions are thought to introduce the most sperm into the cervix. And yes it only takes one but at this point there needs to be no sperm left behind. I have also read that the female orgasm is fairly helpful as well as it helps to push the sperm up.

While we are avid users of positions 1 and 3 it seems as though 2 and 4 are on the table this month. However, the only thing I can think of is in Knocked Up and how they are trying to have sex while she is pregnant and he offers up doggy style and she says, "NO I DO NOT WANT YOU TO EFF ME LIKE A DOG," and he says, "It's not like a dog we don't have to go outside or anything, it's just a style, it's doggy style." Haha!

Who knows if there is any truth to this but hey I'll give it a shot, never hurts to switch things up.

Business Time

So I am not sure if any of you have heard of Flight of the Conchords (I guess they have been around for a bit; however, I had no idea who they were until a couple of weeks ago) but they have this song called Business Time. Hilarious. Pretty much sums up the TTC process. And here it is for you enjoyment.





P.S. The pom juice is now being referred to as "Business Juice."

Waiting to O

Not much to say...I am anxiously on cycle day 7. I have 10 days before I usually ovulate. Andrew is taking his multivitamin everyday and drinking pom juice. I am taking my 100 mg of B6 and pom juice. I''ll start drinking green tea this weekend and sexfest 2009 officially begins...

So I'm still here, just, waiting.....

CD1

Its officially cycle day 1. I have started charting again and am ready to TTC this month. Andrew and I both are. Its a good feeling. I am back up to 100 mg of B6 to extend my LP and taking my prenatals as usual. Andrew is also taking a multivitamin every morning. Also on the table this month is green tea, pomegranite juice, and loads of sexy time.

Often times women use green tea to increase cervical mucous. I have tried this a couple of months and notice a difference, so for me, it works. Pom juice is supposed to aid in both women and men. I have heard that for women it helps to thicken uterine lining and for men it is supposed to increase motility and sperm count. Cheers!

I think this month we are going to up the sexy time as well. We usually do about every other day around O but I am thinking we need to move to every day starting around maybe cycle day 12 through cycle day...22? I usually O between cycle day 17 and 19 so that should cover us. 10 days of sex everyday really doesn't sound too bad but I'm sure after consulting with the vag that week she will have more to say on the subject....did I just refer to my vag having a lot to say? Now I don't think we needed that visual....

I have tried the pineapple core thing with obviously no success and for those of you wondering what pineapple core is supposed to do it has an ezyme to help with implantation. Chop it up and eat it for 5 days after O. There are recipes for smoothies online so you don't have to just eat the core but its really not that bad. I little more chewy but tastes the same. I might try it again this month for shits and giggles.

Thats all I got so far. If I have anymore crazy ideas I'll make sure to toss them your way.

Cramps&Cold

Well I still have those pesky cramps on and off during the day but no AF yet. I know she is lurking....the good news is the longer she holds off the better my LP is looking. On another note, I woke up at about 6:00 this morning with a stuffy nose, headache, chills, and a quesy stomach. I believe these would be the first signs of a cold. But let me ask you....how in the world with prenatal vitamins do we still get sick?!

Two Fifty Six

Thats what time it was this morning when I woke up with cramps. This happened last cycle and a couple of days later along came aunt flow (AF). I have had cramps off and on all day so I'm sure its over for this cycle. I have cried little today but after some much needed Mexican food and new episode of Gossip Girl (although its not as good this season am I right?) I am feeling better. Now its just a waiting game until AF officially arrives. And since it hasn't been a week since I ovulated I'm thinking that 50 mg of B6 needs to be doubled back to 100 mg.

Andrew and I have been talking about what next month will hold for us, whether or not we should pull out all of the stops, relax, or just chart again.....

decisions....decisions

Pills Regime

So, I wanted to drop in today with a post about what my pill regime is looking like these days. I have been taking a prenatals, Nature Made, since January and up until a couple of months ago that's all I was taking but then I started noticing how short my luteal phase (LP) was. It started out a good 14 days back in January and has slowly shortened. One month my LP was a whole 3 days long. I researched a little and decided that I was going to try to add B6 to regime. My mom had previously bought some for the most recent diet craze (apparently it stimulates metabolism?) but she didn't like them because they would make her hungry all the time so off to me they passed. They were 100 mg tablets and I took one a day. The first month on them I didn't really notice that much of a difference. I was no longer at a short LP of 3 but more around 11. The second month is when I noticed a tremendous improvement from 11 to 15! Woo! I did run out though and had to run out for a new bottle this cycle. All they had were 50 mg and yes I could take 2 a day to reach my 100 mg but I am hoping at even 50 mg it will have the same effect. You have to be carefull with B6, no overdosing for moi. And if this month my LP seems short I can double up next month.

If at first you don't succeed...

Now that we have the intro out of the way I want to give you an overview of the past few months trying to conceive (TTC).



I stopped taking the pill in June 2008. I knew it took a while for your body to regulate after going off of the pill so I wanted to get a headstart. Sure enough I went through cycles of 78 to 40-something, and finally landed on 32 day cycles.



I started charting and takin prenatal vitamins in January. Charting is a way to monitor your body so you can pinpoint ovulation and maximize chances of conception. For more information go to http://www.fetilityfriend.com/



Our first official month trying ended up being in February. I was set to ovulate around Valentine's Day and since we had a little weekend get-a-way planned we decided to forego the condoms and see what happened. I tested about 10 days after and got what I believed was a faint positive. Since I didn't know for sure and Andrew was still debating whether or not there was a line there I waited a couple of days to test again. Well, there was no mistaking this one, negative. So whether or not this was a chemical pregnancy or no pregnancy is still up for debate.



After this we made the decision to stop trying until we got into our new house in May but I still continued charting just to make sure I was ovulating regularly and see the average day of each cycle I was ovulating. Now we have been trying for 5 months consecutively. Last month we had a little bit of a setback with charting. We had well-timed sex and my chart looked amazing. Everyday I woke up to a higher temperature and from the charts that I had seen that turned out to be positive I was well on my way. I got my hopes up but it was only a matter of time before they came crashing down. AF, that wench...I was upset, as well as Andrew. I stopped charting for the month of September. I mean if it wasn't going to do anything except get my hopes up why chart?



As of now I am in the 2WW. According to my old charts I ovulated this week, probably around Tuesday, and at the very latest today. I am definitely feeling the effects of not charting. I just wish I knew when I ovulated! So, if this is not our month we decided I would chart next month but only up until I confirm ovulation. Fingers crossed that this is our month though!

P.S. I promise not to be so boring next time, just had a lot of catching up to do :-)

The Hosey's

This, is us. The man on the left is my adorable husband, Andrew. And yes, that's me, Bethany, on the right. We have been together for a little over 5 years now and were married on July 21, 2007. We recently moved into our first home in May and decided to start trying for a baby. For now its just us and our furbaby, Sophie.