Mommy Wrist

I don't recommend taking care of a baby OR teaching a class a few hours after a wisdom tooth has been pulled out. OUCH! I was bleeding for hours and in pain the whole day. I think after a procedure like that it would have been nice to spend a few hours in bed or on the couch. I wish I hadn't agreed to let him extract that tooth but too late now! At least I don't have any more wisdom teeth, so hopefully that was my last tooth extraction. It does reinforce my decision not to do some of the other things on the list he gave me a couple of months ago! No thank you! It was a good diet for dieting though. I ate less than I had been lately, and really had to force myself to eat anything. Eating was really painful even if it was oatmeal (which is what I had for lunch). Thankfully I feel better today, and eating is also not as painful.

This morning I saw an orthopedic doctor (hand specialist). I was 30 minutes late due to getting lost. Mapquest directions are not always accurate! I wouldn't have any trouble getting there again if need be as it's right by a mall I have shopped at before. I didn't have the doctor's name or phone number with me (only the address). I called the insurance company, but they weren't able to help much. I found another orthopedic doctor's office in the same town and thankfully they were able to give me directions to where I was trying to get. Nadia was a champ! She was awake the entire 60 minutes we were in the car but didn't cry at all!! I took her in the doctor's office in the umbrella stroller and that worked out well. They did 3 x-rays of my left wrist. The physician assistant saw me and diagnosed me as having mild carpal tunnel plus some other diagnosis that had the word nerve in it which is also called tendonitis. She said it's very common for new mothers to have both together. She said the brace I tried was great for carpal tunnel but made the nerve situation worse. She said they could either give me an Rx for anti-imflammatory pills OR a steroid shot. I have tried Advil so I opted for the shot. I have a follow-up appt scheduled for 5 weeks from now, but she said that if I am feeling better I can cancel it. I made the next appt with the same doctor but at a different clinic (near my RE). The Doctor said he used to scoff at the term "Mommy wrist" until his wife had a baby and he experienced some discomfort in the same area as a new Daddy.

If the Lord allows us to have another baby through ivf or adoption, I am going to try to switch back and forth more when I carry the baby as I carried Nadia 99% of the time with my left arm so my right hand would be free OR I will use the sling and snugli more inside the house. I have lost a lot of sleep the past 5 months over the pain in my wrist. It's so bad when I first get up that I cannot even change Nadia's diaper. My fingers just won't move. Thankfully within about 10 minutes I regain use of that hand. Hopefully this shot will do the trick, and I'm also going to really try to give that wrist a break as much as possible.

Usually Nadia's morning nap starts 2 hours after she gets up in the morning. This morning she was up for over 3 hours before she fell asleep. Last night Paul put her down at 6:45pm. Last night she woke up once at 3 something which hasn't happened in a long time so I went in her room to see if I could smell a poopy diaper. I didn't smell anything, and she fell back asleep in less than 5 minutes. She was awake at 5 something for another 5 minutes or less but then didn't wake up again until 7:03am. WOOHOO! I went and got her immediately since I planned to leave a little before 8am for the doctor. She has still been taking 3 naps for the most part. She didn't on Sunday since her 2nd nap was later (and longer) than usual due to church.

Eight is Too Many

When I first heard that a woman had given birth to octuplets, I assumed she had gotten pg from inj/iui as some doctors are willing to do an iui when you have 10 or more mature follicles. I did it myself a few times. Many RE's won't do that, and in other countries it's illegal. I was stunned to learn that she got pg from IVF. The general rule is that if a woman is under 35 years old then only 1-2 embies are transferred. The number "allowed" rises with age. My clinic allows you to transfer 3 if you are 35 for example (which is what I did in August 2007 when I was 35). She was 33 years old. They also take into account whether you've had previous success with IVF. I had a friend who had many failed ivf cycles so they did continually increase how many embies were transferred back. That doesn't apply to this woman either as her other 6 children were from ivf, and she had already had one set of twins. So what possessed this woman to want to have 6 embies transferred back and what possessed her RE to agree to it, is beyond me. I agree with her decision not to use "selective reduction," but I think she should have done three transfers of two embies each or two transfers of three embies. Even if she still ended up having 14 children, at least she wouldn't have 8 at once. Those eight are going to have health issues that they wouldn't have had if she gave birth to 2-3 at a time rather than 8 at once.

Of course the other issue that comes up with this story is why an umarried, unemployed woman who already has 6 young children (one of whom is autistic and therefore requires more attention than an "average" child would) would be doing ivf again. I don't think she would have been allowed to adopt even one more child in her situation. It just doesn't seem fair that a woman who wants to adopt has to jump through SOOO many hoops to prove she will be a suitable parent, but a woman (or girl) who gets pregnant on her own doesn't have to jump through any hoops, and a woman who pursues IVF only has to prove she doesn't have HIV. Other than that there are no requirements. I am not saying I want women who want to do IVF to have to jump through a million hoops, but it just seems unfair that if that same person wants to adopt in the US or abroad that she has to prove she's "good enough" - financially, emotionally, physically, etc. Well even though I am married, have a job, and only have one other child, I wouldn't agree to transferring back 6 embryos at once (not that my RE would allow it anyhow). I don't want to do something that is going to lead to serious health issues for my children if all the embryos make it.

Yesterday Nadia slept in the car on the way home (6:25-7:40pm), and then I fed her and changed her so she was up for about 45 minutes before she went back to sleep. I thought that meant she would sleep in this morning. Nope. She woke up at 5:45am and started to get fussy around 6:15 so I went and got her a little before 6:30. She got really fussy around 8:15am so I decided to skip Sunday School so that she could have a nap. I let her sleep one hour and then had to wake her up in order to get to church on time. After the choir sang, I went to check on her in the nursery, and she was screaming. They said they had tried everything including giving her a bottle to calm her down to no avail. I warmed her bottle in a microwave in the kitchen and then took her in with me to church for awhile. After she finished the bottle and started to get "chatty," I took her back to the nursery. When I went to pick her up she was crying again, but they said she had been happy until they changed her diaper. They asked if she was teething. She might be, but I think she's just very sensitive to "strangers" these days and the nursery workers today were ones she hadn't met before.

She did really well eating today! She had oatmeal for breakfast and ate a large portion of yogurt plus one serving of homemade baby food (apples). She also really likes the zwieback toast from Grandma. I made the mistake of having her pose for a picture after she ate which is the reason her dress looks so wet in the first picture (I had just cleaned her up). Daddy is reading to her in the 2nd pic. Her favorite book these days is definitely Miss Mary Mack. Her face lights up when you start reading the first page of that book. The 3rd pic shows the evidence of her feeding herself toast today. The 4th pic shows her first time eating toast with Grandma at Shawn's 13th birthday party, and the last pic shows Grandpa letting her sit and watch everyone roller skating. She loves to watch people! I had her decked out in her Steeler stuff. We are the Champions! :-)

The dress she wore today was a Christmas gift from her other Grandma. It's size 9 months and doesn't quite reach her knees. I guess she needs to move into 12 month sized dresses. Paul objected to his daughter wearing a miniskirt. I think she could wear black leggings under it and it would be like an oversized shirt instead of a dress. This way we can get more use out of some of her 9 month size dresses. She's growing so fast!

I am getting much better at doing her car seat. It didn't bother me today. Of course it's a lot easier when she's not wearing her snowsuit. It was really warm today! The snow that has covered our grass for many weeks actually melted today (most of it anyhow). I can't wait for spring! Spring and fall are my two favorite seasons.

12 Years Ago

Paul and I met 12 years ago at a ballroom dancing lesson at a Boscov's department store. The first photo is of me with Barbara Snitzer who was teaching the class. She attended our wedding reception in 2001. I just wanted to learn how to do the waltz. I had no idea I'd meet my hubby there! The class cost $12 for six weeks ($2 per class). That was a very well spent $12. Barbara taught the foxtrot, swing, waltz, tango, rhumba, and cha cha. We went to another of her classes after that one finished. Ironically in 2001 I bought a house within walking distance of where she taught her other class, and although we went very faithfully that first year we were dating, we went less than 5 times total during the 3 years we lived within walking distance. Go figure!


All of these photos are from 1997. The 2nd and 3rd are from a trip to MD. The one in the restaurant is at the Macaroni Grill in Annapolis with Kim and Joanne who were former roommates of mine. The fourth was taken at Hawk Mountain (in PA). That was a very memorable day as we encountered a LARGE bear during our hike. It was rather scary even if they don't typically attack humans.


Last night Nadia went down at 6:45pm. She woke up at 5:45am and periodically cooed until I went and got her at 6:45. It's nice knowing I don't have to get up as soon as she wakes up and she won't cry. Today she did really well with eating solids. She had oatmeal for breakfast (no puffs needed) and ate 1/2 a container of fruit at each of the next two feedings plus some yogurt.


We left around 2:30pm for Shawn's birthday party at the roller skating rink. Nadia slept on the way there and the way back (75 minutes one way). Our nephew turns 13 later this month! We saw our niece Holly (who is due in September). It's still strange for me to think that Paul's brother is going to be a Grandpa in a few months. Paul's mom brought Nadia some zweiback toast. Nadia loved it! She did really well at getting it

into her mouth and holding it there. I did better with Nadia's car seat this evening. I am getting used to the buckle, and it was easier without her wearing the snowsuit. Paul tried it and couldn't get it. I'm not the only one who finds it challenging!

I'm adding a couple of photos to yesterday's post at Donna's house. It seems she was grabbing Olivia's cheek. Sorry about that, Olivia! Tomorrow I'll post some from our trip to the roller rink today.

Lunch with a Friend

Last night Nadia went down at 7:15pm, and she first started talking at 6:15. She was fairly quiet though (chattering very sporadically) until 6:55am when I went to get her. I put her down earlier than usual for her first nap (8:30) because I planned to leave the house at 9:45am. Lately her morning nap has been one hour long. I thought she'd wake up at 9:30 which would have given me time to change her diaper, feed her, and get her in her snowsuit. She decided to have a long nap this morning. She woke up at 9:55 which was the latest I figured I could let her sleep and still have a chance to get to my 11:00 meeting on time at work. My friend, Donna, had agreed to watch Nadia during my meeting. As expected, she got tired around noon and fell asleep in Donna's arms, but she wasn't able to fall asleep in Donna's pack 'n play. While I was in the meeting, Donna's daughter and granddaughter (who turned 8 months old today) came over. Nadia had her first experience "playing" with a baby her age (they are 18 days apart). Donna's daughter was a student of mine in two classes at the university so it was good to see her and her daughter. Nadia was very happy to see me when I got back about 2 hours later. Of course I want her to be happy while she's being cared for by other people, but it's hard to express how wonderful it feels to have a little girl so happy to see me. :-)

Donna had made some vegetable soup, and so we ate lunch together and visited some before I needed to get Nadia home for her nap. It was so great to have time to chat with her (and the soup was delicous!). The last time I had lunch with a friend was in September. It's not that I had a booming social life before we moved, but I had two friends I did things with from time to time - a colleague at work (she's the one I had lunch with in September when Nadia was still going to work with me) and Cheri, whom I met in a Bible study (whom I haven't seen since we moved). Cheri and I are planning to go to a concert later this month, and I am looking forward to that. I always enjoy lunch with a friend, but I really enjoyed it today since it's a very rare treat these days. I appreciate Donna's willingness to watch Nadia from time to time. I know she's very well cared for when she's with Donna! Donna will be watching her on March 12 while we have our tests at the RE. She lives a stone's throw away from the hospital so that will work out very nicely. Hopefully Nadia can take her morning nap at Donna's that day. I brought my camera with me, but forgot to take any pics. Thankfully Liesl took some pics with Donna's camera. :-)

After I got Nadia in her snowsuit, she fell asleep in my arms before I even left Donna's house. She slept most of the way home, but her nap was only 30 minutes long. So I fed her and put her back down and thankfully she fell back asleep for 45 minutes in her crib. Nadia gets an A+ for flexibility today!!! She also took a few bites of food without puffs. She ate 1/2 a container of baby food today. Many babies her age could polish that off (or more) in one meal, but I am happy that she finished that amount over the course of three feedings today. Progress!

Growing Girl!

Nadia has been promoted to a regular car seat! She had outgrown her infant one; actually we should have "promoted" her awhile ago. I bought this car seat 4 years ago, and I have to say I can't stand it! OOPS! It is really hard to fasten. I am sure in time I will get better, but I am adding a car seat to my birthday wish list as #1 it would be nice to have one for both of our cars and #2 if we do receive a 2nd one then this one is going in Paul's car as I have such a hard time putting all the pieces together. Honestly it's like a puzzle! I don't think Nadia is too happy about the new seat as it doesn't shield the sun from her eyes as much as the old one. She's also probably a bit colder as we had a cover over the other one. I should have put her in her snow suit today. I didn't realize it was less than 20 degrees out. OOPS again!

The one plus of her wearing her sweater is that it's much easier for her to sit up straight in the grocery cart. We went to the gas station, and I made funny faces for her through the window while I pumped the gas which amused her and meant she didn't cry (she's usually happy when the car is in motion but isn't happy when I get gas). 

Another evidence that she's a growing girl, is that I think our days of three naps are over. Yesterday she cried and cried, and I eventually gave up on the 3rd nap. So she fell asleep in my arms at 6:10 which was earlier than I wanted, but she had been up for 5 hours straight at that point so I just put her to bed. Thankfully she slept a full 12 hours before she woke up. I let her chatter for 15 minutes and got her at 6:30am. So I think I need to move the starting time to her 2nd nap to a later time if she's not going to have a third nap. I think I'll aim for 9am for the first nap and 1pm for the second one. She has been going down around 12pm for the 2nd nap.

I figured out a way yesterday to get solid foods in her mouth. I offer her a Puff or a Cheerio and then put that in her mouth with my left hand while I put a bite of veggies or yogurt or fruit in her mouth with my right hand. Today she's already eaten as much fruit and veggies as she had the past 4 days put together so that's a BIG improvement. I hope in time she'll get used to eating solids, and I won't need to offer her a Cheerio first, but for now I'm just glad she's eating. I'm going to wait a couple of days before I try green veggies again. I'm just going to work on orange veggies, fruit, cereal, and yogurt for the time being.

I have to say I can't fathom working full-time right now. I feel very busy with caring for her, cooking, cleaning, shopping, and working part-time. Tomorrow I have a committee meeting on campus. I didn't go to a meeting last Friday as I am trying to say "no" more. It was hard not to go in the sense that I usually go to every meeting that I am supposed to attend and I felt strange skipping it, but I know I would have been bored (it was the type of meeting where you just listen to presentations for 90-120 minutes in contrast to tomorrow's meeting which is interactive), and I am working part-time so I need to say "no" more. I think I've been doing well with that. I feel like I am only working part-time this semester which is good since I'm only getting paid 50% of my previous salary.

Wish List

Yesterday I started working on my birthday wish list. Many of the items are things for our trip to Antigua in May. I thought I'd put some of what I've come up with so far here so that I could get input in case I am forgetting something important OR if you have advice regarding any of these items. I plan on getting her sunscreen for our trip. Last summer I bought some 12 month summer clothing on clearance so I think I have enough for her to wear in May.

1. Swimsuits (2) (How do sizes run? She's wearing size 9 month in most things and will soon be ready for 12 month dresses).

2. Swim diapers (how many for a 7 day trip and do you recommend a certain type?)

3. Swim vest or life vest for Nadia (any recommendations on a particular one to get?)

4. Hat and sunglasses for Nadia

5. Liquid Image underwater digital camera mask (Has anyone used this or know of someone who has? It costs $99 and you can take pictures or videos while in/under the water. I had purchased a special bag to keep a camera dry in the water a few years ago, and it worked for a few years but either I did something wrong or it stopped working, as our camera was ruined in it last year. I know I could buy a special casing for my current camera, but given my "luck" with cameras - we had one stolen off of Paul's arm in Italy and then I ruined one in St. John a year ago, I am not inclined to invest any more money in our regular camera per chance something would happen to it. I was thinking of asking Paul to get me this for my bday to use while snorkeling, etc.).

Last night she went down at 7pm so that has started to become her regular bed time, which is an improvement! She was quiet until 6:30am. I let her chatter for 15 minutes and then went and got her at 6:45 before she started crying. I've been able to get a few bites of baby food (Gerber carrots and Parent's Choice fruit) in her mouth if I give her a Puff or a Cheerio first, but it's still proving to be a challenge to get her to eat fruits, veggies, yogurt, or cereal these days. She seems to only want milk, Puffs, and Cheerios.

Clark (friend of mine from work) came over this morning so I could help him file his taxes (not that I've done ours yet). As you can see from the picture of them, she still likes to stick her tongue out a lot! Today I want to get back in the routine of cleaning on Wednesdays, and tonight I plan to go to choir rehearsal (I didn't clean or go to choir rehearsal last Wednesday).

Spectrum of Light

This morning I had Nadia on my lap while I was playing the piano. She kept turning her head, and I finally looked to see what was capturing her attention. She had fun looking at the pretty colors on the dining room wall. When her hands are extended straight out - that's usually a sign that she's excited as she puts her arms in that position and starts flapping away when she's happy or excited. Aren't the lights beautiful? I had a hard time picking which pictures to post as I took a LOT of them!

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I don't know what the deal is with Nadia eating solid foods. We seem to take a step forward and then a step backward, etc. Last week we had a few days of her doing a good job eating (Thurs-Sat) but now the last three we're back to her not wanting to eat anything aside from sweet potato puffs. I have to work really hard just to get a couple of bites of yogurt or carrots in her mouth. What is her deal???

In terms of sleeping she is sleeping at least 10 hours before she starts making any sounds. Last night she went down at 7pm and her first time of chattering was a little after 5am. Thankfully it lasted less than 1 minute and she fell asleep for maybe 30 minutes and then the same thing happened again. When she started talking for the third time at 6:30am, I could tell she wasn't going back to sleep, and since it had been 11 1/2 hours since she went down I decided to go get her before she started crying.

IVF Prices

When I spoke with the ivf nurse last Monday, she said she'd have the financial lady call me. She never did so I called her this morning. The good news is that the price for ivf hasn't gone up - $8,200; I was pleasantly surprised as I figured in 2 years it would have gone up. Our insurance will pay for about $2,200 of that so our cost after getting the refunds would be about $6,000. The bad news is that the other fees that aren't included in the package went up. ICSI (which we definitely need due to Paul's morphology issues) went from $550 to $650, assisted hatching (which we had for the frozen transfer but not the fresh transfer and I think we should use for a fresh transfer this time) went from $250 to $400, and freezing embryos went from $600 to $1,000. If we used ICSI and AH that would put our cost at $7,050. The perfect scenario in my mind would be that we had 3 embryos make it to blastocyst and we had those transferred (fresh) without any being frozen and had a pregnancy result from that fresh transfer, but obviously it was very wonderful that we had a frozen embie this last time since Nadia was that frozen blastocyst! So if we end up freezing an embryo then probably we wouldn't get any refunds. The total cost would likely be very close to the $8,200 we need to pay by March 12th.

The scariest part is the thought that we spend all that and it results in no pregnancies from fresh or frozen transfers. That's a definite possibility, but even knowing that I want to proceed as I feel we'll have regrets later on if we don't. I wish there was a shared risk option, but this clinic doesn't have those and even if they did I probably wouldn't qualify as usually 35 is the oldest you can be to qualify for one of those, and I'll be 37 by the time we get to a retrieval. It will be a really tough call at that point whether to try ivf a third time or switch back to trying to adopt (if we don't get pg from any fresh or frozen transfers from ivf #2). We have to resume our contract with Cathy by 12/14/09, or we're out the $4,900 we paid her in June 2007. If we resume our contract with her then we need to create new profiles and do our fourth homestudy. Ugh. I am hoping and praying ivf #2 results in a sticky bfp. That will make the decision easy!!!

I am still on a high about losing 5 lbs in 7 days! It will help keep my resolve strong. This weekend on one occasion I was eating carrots while Paul was eating Doritos and on another I was eating green beans while he was eating pizza. Pizza and Doritos would have been tastier, but I am very glad I chose to eat veggies instead!

Sixth Ring!!!

For those of you who didn't watch the game, the Steelers won last night! WOOHOO! We are the only team in the NFL to have won SIX Superbowls!!! This means I get new socks, which is good as my Steeler socks from Superbowl XL are getting pretty worn out. :-)

Last night Nadia went down at 7pm, and she first woke up a little after 5am. I let her talk then cry for awhile. I still have a hard time letting her cry, but I was exhausted and knew 10 hours of sleep wasn't enough for her either. Thankfully she did fall back asleep eventually and slept a little less than an hour more so I didn't actually get up and get her until a little after 7am. It helped me feel a little less awful about letting her cry when she greeted me with a big smile.

Superbowl XLIII is Today!!!

Today's the day!!! Well like I said two weeks ago, either I will be realllllllllly happy or reallllllllly bummed when I go to bed tonight. There's really not another possible emotion to have at the end of a playoff game (especially the Superbowl!) when your team is playing! I hope when I go to bed our team will have just won their 6th Superbowl - no other team has done that yet!

In keeping with the black and gold theme, you can see from the piece of food in her mouth that she was eating a yellow sweet potato puff, LOL.

Nadia woke up at 6am, and I let her get up as I could tell after letting her chatter for awhile that she wasn't going back to sleep. She had slept 11 hours and 20 minutes. I put her down for her first nap a little earlier than normal so that she would be getting up from that nap in time for us to leave for Sunday School at 8:45.

This picture was taken when I went to get her after her first nap. When I come in she's usually in a crawling position, and she gives me a big smile when she sees me. I love going to get her after her naps! Her smiles and laughter just melt my heart.

I finally got a picture of her two teeth that she's had for almost a month! I am sure eventually more of the teeth will be showing, but this is how much came through a few weeks ago.