A place for DP's. - Page 3

[indigoscot]

i totally agree with osker and megincl - for us it has been wonderful as the bio parent and the ng parent. everyone treats us as equals. i remember asking dp if she felt left out when i was nursing and she said no because she still had bonding time. this time around I don't feel left out either while she's nursing perhaps because i nursed ds1? i do get plenty of bonding time too.

attitude has a lot to do with it too i think. if you present yourself to others as equal parents (or equal parents to be) it sets the tone. of course there is no accounting for family - it took my mum a LONG TIME to come around. dp's family has been completely accepting from the get-go.

g

[osker]

Thanks Megan, for adding your thoughts. Do you think that part of it is our location? I often forget that not everyone lives in an environment like ours. How much do you think that adds/subtracts from the experience?
For example, we went to an info night at CBC (think we're transferring there for care !!) and there were TWO other lesbian couples there! What are the chances of that?!? I think that being around people who don't blink twice (or even once) about us being married really makes things a lot easier. In my opinion at least. We've been openly welcomed and accepted in every situation thus far, to the point if where we don't even consider the option of not being accepted. And, I feel that there are so many others same-sex couples around us who are parenting that it's nothing new in our area. I think that is a big part of it for me.
I think another huge part of it is that H and I have been together nearly 12 years and have really talked about absolutely everything! I feel free to say when I feel annoyed about rubbing her feet, yet again... and she feels free to say when she feels annoyed by some other thing I might do or not do. I feel so lucky to have a partner like her!

... okay... I'm getting back to dissertation work now... but it's so much easier to avoid it and hang out here all day!!!

[jenmostoften]

Good Morning! (or afternoon or evening as the case may be )

Originally Posted by CassnBeth

Jenmostoften -- I haven't said this yet just in case you didn't want to hear from people about your miscarriage but I AM SO SORRY. That whole early miscarriage+doctor insists on waiting two cycles thing just sucks. I hated wanting so much to be a mommy and feeling a connection to the community of parents and ending up with months of trying and delay and miscarriages. I remember being weirdly jealous of straight people who had sperm just walking around the house! For free!

Thanks for your kind words, I don't mind hearing it all, it is actually quite comforting to know that lots of women out there have gone through this stuff. It helps break up the pity party.

Originally Posted by smilingsara

Jenmostoften: I'm SO glad HCG went down to zero, thats wonderful news! Has the convincing happened? Are you girls trying next week?!

I don’t think we are going to try this month, because DP seems to be having a bit of a tough time determining the timing on everything, but from what I’ve read it’s totally normal for the cycle right after a MC to be irregular. So, luckily I didn’t have to try to fend off the convincing too much this round…but we’ll revisit the topic once she is sure of CD1 for next round. We might be trying in June with you gals.

CassnBeth: I am also interested to hear if DD liked the movie…..

Osker & megincl : It’s really nice to read your positive experiences, they offer a different insight, which is always so good for me to know. I wonder if some of it has to do with where we are all at in the process, specifically if we have children already, or are pregnant. Like I wonder if childless couples still TTC #1 have more in common emotionally with each other until they are actually successful. Granted, I know that everyone’s situation is pretty unique, so maybe there is no real generalized commonality. But part of my emotions is frustration and fear of the unknown in the conception process and wondering when it will be our turn…. and I am almost certain that my negativity and insecurity will melt away once there’s actually a baby in the tummy. I have become so jaded.

We did at-home insems, just the two of us, so I was the one who 'got her pregnant'

My emotional state would be entirely different if I had been able to get her pregnant myself by at home insem. But the fact that we tried that over half a dozen times unsuccessfully makes me sometimes feel like I wasn’t inserting the sperm right or something, and I translate that into “ I can’t get my DP pregnant, now somebody else has to do it” And I know that’s my issue to deal with, but I was far more optimistic and relaxed about the whole process in the beginning until it started taking forever. It seems like every attempt that goes by that doesn’t result in a baby makes me more anxious and gives me time to dwell on these little things that I suspect will be insignificant once our little one does materialize. Once I have a pregnant wife to dote on, I don't think I will feel so left out and displaced, because then I will have a role. While I know I am the role of support system now, it’s such an abstract role it’s hard to feel like I’m doing anything at all to contribute to making this baby. So I do tend to feel like an inactive outsider.

OK, this rambling could turn in to a ridiculous tangent pretty soon!! It’s so easy to get lost in a posting when I am sitting at my desk and don’t want to work
Anyways, Thanks again for everyone's participation in this thread, it is immensely helpful.

[jenmostoften]

Originally Posted by osker

... okay... I'm getting back to dissertation work now... but it's so much easier to avoid it and hang out here all day!!!

How funny Osker! i was typing my post while you posted yours and I said something very similar at the end of mine!! I second that motion!!

[osker]

My emotional state would be entirely different if I had been able to get her pregnant myself by at home insem. But the fact that we tried that over half a dozen times unsuccessfully makes me sometimes feel like I wasn’t inserting the sperm right or something, and I translate that into “ I can’t get my DP pregnant”

Jen, I totally hear you on that one! It took us 13 cycles over three years to get where we are... and often H would get to decide if we would try again the next month or take a break, depending on what she felt she could handle. We would talk about it, and sometimes I could change her mind, but most often, she was in charge of the when of it all, which was frustrating at times. I think what helped me to feel like I was an active participant was that I was always the one who called the sperm bank and placed "an order for delivery" each month. I also invested a lot of time and energy into research on supplements, exercises, added whatevers that could have helped us.... so some of the time I felt that I was teaching H the things that would possibly help us out. In the end we think it was the getting riotously drunk that worked... but hey, research would have easily proven that one!

I wonder, too, how much frustration and failure for you is wrapped up in the miscarriage. We luckily never had to deal with that, but I know if I was in your position I would totally feel that I had done something wrong and that I was continuing to do something wrong in not being able to take away my partner's pain over it all. I imagine that that, on top of the feelings of failure about having to go doctor-assisted (btw, have you thought about at-home IUI? that's what we did!) would be huge, and painful, and not any fun at all.
In the middle of our ttc years (ouch!), I found a therapist and went to talk about my anxieties and frustrations etc... It was SO helpful and wonderful just to have a place where I could talk about MY experience of the whole thing, rather than OUR experience or H's experience. Having a little something just for me was awesome.
I don't know if I would say that the actual getting pregnant part took away some of the not-so-fun parts of ttc. It did take away my feelings of anger toward the easily-fertile set, as well as my feelings of guilt and anger at myself over not being able to just ask-for-and-receive a pregnancy. It helped for us to have travel together while we were on this crazy roller coaster. We probably went on ... four vacations a year over those three years and we needed every one of them!

Apparently, I also still like to talk about it all! (and avoid my work!!!)

[Bunnies]

Hi everyone! This is my very first post. I have been lurking for a few weeks, but I wanted to introduce myself before I put it off any longer. I have read through a good chunk of this thread and am looking forward to reading the rest.

My DP and I are TTC#1 with her carrying. I plan to carry our second child. We are using a non-anonymous donor from a sperm bank, whom we plan to use for both pregnancies so the children are biological siblings.

So far we have done two cycles of ICI at home with frozen sperm, two inseminations per cycle. We thought we nailed the timing on our first attempt but have since realized we jumped the gun. This cycle our timing was much better, so we're really hoping for a February baby!

Right now we are in the very beginning of the 2WW and trying to keep ourselves busy.

I look forward to getting to know all of you!

[Bunnies]

FYI, I was getting a little overwhelmed trying to keep track of everyone's situation (this is why I've never been a "forums" person), so I did a quick roundup of the people who've posted in this thread so far:

TTC: jenmostoften, smilingsara, citygirl144, and me (Bunnies)

Pregnant: megincl, osker, megan_sacha, Cassnbeth, beo, and erthe_mama

And everyone else has already got little ones running around, I believe.

Please correct me if I misread your information!

[osker]

Thanks Bunnies! And Welcome! February babies are lovely!

[megincl]

Osker, I definitely think the area that we live in has something to do with it. You're right -- I don't really think twice about being a queer family, which helps my natural level of comfort at being DS's mom. Really just his mom, and nothing more, no qualifiers, etc.

As a personal aside, we go to CBC and LOVE IT!!! DS was born there 7 years ago and we can't wait to have our daughter there. We see Connie there. Love her sooooooo much! I'd highly recommend requesting her. They'll take requests when you transfer if there's a particular midwife you'd like to work with.

Bunnies -- welcome! I think you've got us categorized correctly, though we do already have a not-so-little one running around (or reading around, as it is most days now) in addition to being pregnant.

[indigoscot]

we also live in a queer-friendly area.

welcome bunnies! i hope your tww isn't too terrible.

g

[CassnBeth]

DD LOVED the movie! There were maybe 20 people in the whole theatre, a big handicapped access platform for crawling around and babies on the screen the whole time; what could be better?

Megin and Osker -- DW and I are in MA too and we definitely did not dodge the bullet of exclusion with DW's pregnancy. It is true we didn't think twice about people accepting us as a family but people did tend to assume DW was "The Mommy" or "The Girl" in our relationship since she was the pregnant one. Don't get me wrong, I can see where they got the assumption but it drove my wife insane. In fact, the amount it bothered her seems to have set her off on a reassessment of her thoughts on gender roles; she wore the butchest clothes we owned for about six months after our daughter's birth.

Jen -- please do not worry at all about the conception circumstances; you're right, once once the baby is on the way it won't matter. When our LO was conceived, my wife and I were certain we had botched the timing for that cycle so I stayed home with an awful head cold and DW drove three hours, alone, to our KD's house and insemmed herself. She laid there for an hour with her legs flung up on the wall while correcting a manuscript that was overdue and then drove home. We were so sure it hadn't worked DW's period was almost two weeks late before we noticed enough to test. It was the stupidest thing ever and I am sure DD will love the story when she is big; just as much as your LO will love the story about how hard you worked to have them.

[CassnBeth]

Oh! And Bunnies? Thanks for the category roundup (I find those so useful) but I think you've got us in the wrong spot. Our little girl turns one in June but no one here is pregnant; we're thinking of trying for a second small person this time next year or so. Good luck with your TWW! May it go by quickly!

[gamitzer]

Hi all! One of these days I will get everyone's names down! I definitely think there is a difference in attitude before and after babies arrive. I hated the TTC process, and each BFN, and each attempt, and all the hand-wringing about what we might be doing right or wrong. My wife was way cooler about it, which probably drove me nuts, but I don't remember anymore. Personally, when we decided to go with a fertility clinic, I was very happy. We had tried at home a few times, and when it didn't work, I felt responsible and like I was messing it up. Of course, that's not the case, but it's hard to get yourself out of that mindset. At the time I felt like putting it in the hands of a fertility doc got me off the hook and let me put the "blame" elsewhere. I don't think that's the best route for everyone, but it was great for us.
Since my first post was so positive, I will point to a post from when Noah was 3 months old, and I was feeling a little frustrated by being the not-so-needed mom.
Now things are certainly better, and we have a very independent boy who will not only tell you he can do things himself, but he will tell you to go away. Sniff sniff! So much for wishing I could be the one he always wanted for comfort and loving! Anyway, I certainly want to send supportive hugs to anyone in the TTC process because I know can be so hard. Especially when it's not your body. But I also want to send hope because it can be a hopeless time when you are making plans for the "what ifs" and pondering a childless life. Keep the faith, and try to stay positive!

[Bunnies]

Thanks for the words of encouragement, gamitzer. The TTC process is certainly all-consuming. We're doing ICIs at home under the guidance of an RE ("Okay, now!"), but I'm very curious to know from those of you with kids and those of you who are pregnant which strategy was ultimately the one that worked for you. If you'd be willing to share, I'd love to hear your TTC success stories, even if it's just one sentence!

[megan sacha]

Welcome Bunnies! You have us categorized partly correct. I'm pregnant but we also have a little one running around already too.

As far as our conceptions, DW got pg first after 8 tries at home with a KD. On our final and successful try, we did two at home insems and one IUI at the Dr. office. The IUI ended up being the day before ovulation, so I'm not convinced that's what did it, but we'll never know for sure.

This pregnancy was achieved after one at home insem (with me inseming myself as DW was at work) with the same KD on ovulation day. It was the very first try and we were shocked that it worked so quickly since there were a lot of perceived barriers. You just never know!

Hope your ttc journey is short.

[osker]

Our lucky shot was good ole number 13!
We did 13 cycles with (various) frozen anonymous donors. We started out with ICI, then moved on to IUI when we realized that H's cervix is pretty severely tilted (or at least it was!). I think, that the lucky cycle was the fifth IUI, but I don't wanna go look it up.. so we'll just say, yes, it was the fifth at-home IUI. We used one vial of IUI prepared sperm that was probably .3ml

We also had toured an IVF clinic a few weeks prior to this insem, they told us we could be pregnant by Christmas if we went with them, but we weren't ready yet and got pregnant at home by Christmas after all!

[jenmostoften]

Originally Posted by osker

I wonder, too, how much frustration and failure for you is wrapped up in the miscarriage. We luckily never had to deal with that, but I know if I was in your position I would totally feel that I had done something wrong and that I was continuing to do something wrong in not being able to take away my partner's pain over it all.

Hmmm, I think you are probably onto something....very insightful, thanks. I do actually currently see a therapist and she thinks I have not allowed myself to deal with the MC because I am too busy "being strong" for DP and distracting myself with moving on to TTC again. I figured I just dealt with it very simply and quickly, but maybe not so much.

Bunnies: Yes, thanks for the round up, that was helpful indeed. It was informative to just get the general idea that we really are a mix of people at every stage, but that's awesome, because it makes for a more enriched thread

gamitzer, megan sacha, and osker: Your encouragement and stories are much appreciated. I have to keep reminding myself that while lots of gals get pregnant right away, lots of gals don't.

CassnBeth: Your movie does sound like a great time....were there other babies crawling around with your DD on the platform? How cool! And thanks for the support!

AFM: We've pretty much decided that just going with the 2 month wait is probably best, although not because the dr said so (so there, dr!) We've both kind of just realized in the past day or two how stressed out we are over the whole process and we need to just take some time to chill out and regroup. So I guess our next attempt will be sometime the first half of July. We had the one IUI at the docs, and he was really cool about showing me when he did it. DP wants me to learn how to do the IUI, but I think I'm still recovering a bit from feeling like I did something wrong the first half dozen ICIs at home. So maybe I will watch very closely this next time in July, and if we don't get our BFP I will try to do an IUI in August.

[megincl]

Oh, the roller coaster of this process can be so very hard sometimes. I so understand the feelings of stress on the partner who is trying to "manage" the TTC as opposed to actually being the one to get pregnant.

We got pregnant with DS on the first try. Fresh, at home ICI. With DD (still to be born), it took us 3 years to get pregnant. That involved trying ~15 times, though I'm not certain if that's the actual number. It also involved four losses. It was heartbreaking, hard, numbing, life-changing, and awful. All at once. And frankly, when we finally moved on to IVF, I was so RELIEVED to have someone take the process out of my hands. By then, I had had enough of trying to figure out whether we had done things right, what else we should add into the process to prevent the losses, etc. IVF worked the first time for us. We did a process called PGD, where they test a cell from the embryos, to look for chromosomal abnormalities that cause early loss. We did this based on our history of early losses. It turned out that more than 50% of the embryos had abnormalities of some sort, which explained all the losses. We basically had an over 50% chance of loss each time. We would never have known that had we not moved on to IVF, and I'm so very thankful that we did. It was right for us, at that time.

Jenmostoften -- sounds like a good decision on the wait. And I'm glad that it's YOUR and DP's decision, not just a default doc decision. Makes it more powerful.

Be well all.

[indigoscot]

ttc is extremely stressful! we have been amazingly lucky in that we acheived our bfps on try #2 for me and try #3 with dp. however, we did have some medical challenges along the way.

for me we decided to use a local women's clinic to do the iuis. i did a lot of research prior to that and we felt that at home insems just wasn't for us, plus doing them at home is illegal in our state and would have negatively impacted second parent adoption - basically we would have had to admit to a felony!! don't even get me started on how crazy the american legal system is. anyway during all the testing the clinic did we found out i had slightly elevated prolactin. the clinic said not to worry about it. first iui i took letrozole - i had one follicle and it took until cd16 to be ready to trigger. bfn. i asked about checking my prolactin again and the clinic had forgotten about it! i also had a cyst so i had to sit a cycle out. my prolactin was still elevated but the clinic still didn't want to treat it, so i got a second opinion at a highly respected re. she said ttc on hold until the prolactin is back in range. in the end i sat out 2 months. the very next cycle i had 4 follicles on letrozole and we got our bfp.

with dp, we decided to use the same clinic again. we didn't think dp would have any issues - her 2 sisters have 7 kids between them plus we have 2 great nieces and 1 great nephew. first thing we found out was dp's tsh was insanely high at 128 (normal is 0.5-3.5) and she was diagnosed with hashimoto's - a thyroid autoimmune disorder. she had to have an u/s, a fine needle biopsy (to ensure she didn't have thyroid cancer) and synthroid treatment. then her pelvic u/s showed a polyp. since she already had an autoimmune issue, we also tested for some common m/c issues - factor v leiden, mthfr and apl. dp had factor v leiden hetero and mthfr A1298C. an aspirin was prescribed for the fvl and extra b vitamins for the mthfr, plus cessation of caffeine (ie no more coffee for dp). we did one try with the clinic which was bfn and then we decided to move to the re for 2 reasons - 1) the clinic was not equipped to deal with all of dp's problems and 2) the re could spin our remaining ici vials to iui and this was the same donor we used for ds1.

our re tested dp's tsh again and it was still whacked out. it took 2 months of dosage tweaking to get it right, plus dp had a polypectomy and put on metformin for her mild pcos. FINALLY we could try again! our next try we didn't get the trigger shot and that was bfn. try #3 dp took 100mg clomid and had the trigger shot and we got our bfp.

my advice to everyone ttc is to take control of your body and your decisions. without the testing we had we would never have known about our issues.

g

[erthe_mama]

colsxjack: The thing where kids look/act like their non-bio parent even happens sometimes when DP comes into a relationship with older kids; like in our case. DD is so similar to Sonja in some ways, it's scary. lol I think that people can probably cosmically pick their parents before they are born knowing who they will be even later in life. That may possibly be a little woo-woo for many of you, but it rings true for me. On another note, there is absolutely no way to control what one's birth will be like. A person needs to need to let go and trust hir body to do its job. There is no achieve or fail here. I agree with the poster who said to attend some ICAN meetings... this will more than likely help.

Originally Posted by smilingsara

He got so sleepy sometimes that he decided that he could have nanas from his ya-ya (me) and wanted so badly to not have his bottle, but insisted he could have them from me.

Do you mean he wanted to breastfeed from you? Cute! If so, did you bf him?

Originally Posted by megincl

Bunnies -- welcome! I think you've got us categorized correctly, though we do already have a not-so-little one running around (or reading around, as it is most days now) in addition to being pregnant.

I'm practically in the same boat here. DP's preggers, and we have a seven-y-o reading around.

Originally Posted by CassnBeth

In fact, the amount it bothered her seems to have set her off on a reassessment of her thoughts on gender roles; she wore the butchest clothes we owned for about six months after our daughter's birth.

Haha!! My partner can totally identify with this. Right now, her favourite coat is our really butchy flannel, plaid, button-up jacket.

gamitzer: Thank you so much for linking to that post! We're planning to co-breastfeed, and I knew about the waiting 6-8 weeks before introducing my bbs into the mix, but it did not occur to me until I read that that I wasn't going to be able to bf our LO in hir newborn stage. Now I have time to deal with that way before it's happening. *whew* That could have been bad. I'm kind of upset about that right now, but I bet I'll be over it by then so I can enjoy the little time between bfing with our LO.