PinkHope

Oops I did it again... or more precisely we did it again.

 Whilst still deciding whether we were even going to have a 4th child with DH's travel schedule and living in a new town, it was very much up for debate, Nature took her own course and we are PG. Well I am PG, so decision made!

 So no PGD no Microsoft, no special diet, no swaying, nothing, just conceived in love (and lust and a drunk wedding anniversary). Guess we will get what we'll get.

 And bizarrely I am at peace with it being a boy. If we're going to have 4, it will be easier for me if they are all the same gender. That said, I would be estatic if it was girl but not disappointed if its boy, not like I was twice before.

We will find out (mainly for mental health reasons!) and I guess it will be January which will be fabulous as my parents will still be here as part of their month long stay!

Life is an adventure! And we're definitely living to the max!!

This has really become a stop-start journey for me. The quest for a daughter isn't going away. I think it is something that will be a part of my life, of who I am until I do something about it, or I die. I'm 37, DH is 37. Is it now or never?

 I've tried so hard to bury it, to drown it out but its like the drums for the game Jumanji - they just keep beating. Sometimes close to the surface, sometimes ever so faintly. But still there, still beating, worrying, ever present.

What next?

This has really become a stop-start journey for me. The quest for a daughter isn't going away. I think it is something that will be a part of my life, of who I am until I do something about it, or I die. I'm 37, DH is 37. Is it now or never?

 I've tried so hard to bury it, to drown it out but its like the drums for the game Jumanji - they just keep beating. Sometimes close to the surface, sometimes ever so faintly. But still there, still beating, worrying, ever present.

What next?

As you might have guessed from the complete lack of posting for 6 months +, I've been ridicously busy. We did end up selling and moving house, which in the current economic climate and a Presidential election (back in Nov 08) was NO FUN! But its done, and since Thanksgiving we've had house guests for all but 6 weeks!! In that short time, we changed our car and went on vacation to Disney World.

 Therein lies the problem. DIsney World is the 'real' world. Well Fantasyland really, but it contains a true mix of real people. I was fine with all the girl stuff in the shops, I was fine with all the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique dressed up girls, really I was, I didn't even bat an eyelid or even really think about it. What floored me was going into the Ladies restroom on my own towards the end of the vacation (DH was off with DS 1 & 2 on Test Track, and friends had DS3), and seeing young girls in there, doing what you do in a restroom. Yep, THAT reduced me to floods of tears. Thank god it was sunny and I could hide my grief behind sunglasses.

That was the moment - the blinkers that have been on since June '08 have been whipped off in a band-aid kind of removal way. I've realised, especially with starting again with the house move, that I've unconsciously placed myself in a 'boy world'. My sons do taekwondo and soccer for sports, which on the whole, are more 'boy' oriented. I've not been in shops as I really have been that busy and I avoid 'girlies' shops anyway.  I think, I've been subconsciously protecting myself by building a safety zone. Which is fine, as long as you don't have to 'live' in the real world.

As long as I stay away from schools, shops, Disney World, public restrooms, anywhere where there is a realistic mix of children, I'll be fine.  But truthfully I don't think its a realistic way to live my life.

Yes I have 3 kids, yes, the thought of how the hell I'm going to cope with 4 scares the crap out of me but I think I have to do it or at least try. Alternatively I can hide away for the rest of my life. Or seek therapy.

I was contacted by Microsort a couple of weeks ago as we'd originally said April 09 but I had to say it wasn't happening then due to a house move.  I need to talk with DH. We need to talk. I think he knows something has happened and I'm not holding it together like I have been.

 We might just be about to board a rollercoaster of a different kind.

I've been distracted from "Project Girl" recently as DH's job is probably moving location. It'll be 65 miles away but we can't deal with that commute so I've been looking into selling our home and relocating. It fills me with dread but I guess it's got to be done.

But back to the OOPS. My youngest son turns 1 in 2 weeks. We stopped nursing 6-7 weeks ago. AF had already come back, and I've been having 44 day cycles since March (5 months) tracking my fertility signs using "Take Charge of Your Fertility" software (its the best!!) - I'd O on day 34/35 and then bleed 10 days later. 

So on Friday (cycle day 12) when I drank a little too much vodka and we BD'ed au naturel, I really didn't think much of it at all. I mean heh, I'm in the Low Fertile zone right? Not so much, Saturday I got masses of cerical fluid . Yes it was clear and stretchy like egg whites and was not just left over semen. My cervix was high, soft and open.  Sunday too - loads of EWCM.  I've not been tracking my basal temperature as I've basically forgotten to do it, and I was going to start in October time so I'd have 6 months of charts ready for our MS/IUI attempt in April.

 OOPS.

I never flipping ovulate this early even when I've not nursed - I have a 31 day cycle and O on CD18.

CRAP.

So I think I might be in the 2 week wait. DH did go a whilter shade of pale when I mentioned it last night.

We might be looking for that 5 bed house after all.

I was reading an article in our gym's magazine and decided it was totally meant for me... an "AHA!" moment as they call it.  The editorial summarized a book called Five Wishes by Gay Hendricks http://www.5wishesbook.com/wishes/index.php - the premise is:

• Imagine looking back on your life from your deathbed and identifying the important things that might have kept your experience in this lifetime from being a complete, totally satisfying success
• Next, translate each Major regret ("I wish I had experienced A or accomplished B or not screwed up C") into a positive, powerful, present-tense statement that would be true, assuming you had created successes in the areas you currently feel lacking E.G. "My life is a total success because I have experienced A, or I am enjoying B or I have come to understand C"
• Once you have articulated each area of desire, ask yourself why that goal or experience is so important to you. And finally, assuming it really is important, take ownership: Commit yourself fully to making these life-affirming wishes a reality by supporting them with your decisions and actions - starting today.

 Another phrase that is offered by the author is "No show, no glow" - it's only by showing up fully for what's going on in our lives right here and now - and for the choices and commitments that we've decided are important to us - that we get to collect the glowy, energizing, feel-good satisfaction that makes life worthwhile.

It spoke to me

• Although I love my 3 boys to the ends of the earth and back, I would regret not experiencing bringing up a daughter
• Positive statement: "my life is a total success because I am raising up a daughter." 
• Yes, its' really that important to me!  Really? Why? So I can use what I have learned from my relationship with my mother; I come from a long line of strong women and I want it to continue; I want to be totally included in society;  I'd like to have someone in my immediate family to pass our jewellery onto; so someone might call me on my birthday without being nagged by his wife to do so; because we are good parents and have so much to offer; so DH can experience having "Daddy's little girl" and for her big brothers to have a sister, and for all to be better people for it. 
• So I'm taking ownership by moving forward with our high-tech journey. We're on the MS West list, down for April 2009. I will start a saving account today so we can do this without financially hurting our family. I am getting healthier and fitter at the gym so I have the best PG possible, and life beyond with my 4 kids - 3 DS and 1DD!

Last Friday afternoon, I was at Swim Team practice with my boys, and chatting with a very pregnant acquaintance of mine who has 2 adorable boys already. She had deliberately not found out the gender of this third baby. Her words were "I'm going to assume its a boy, but yes, I really would like a girl".

Within 24 hours, her baby had arrived (OP so a hard labour, but baby turned so all went well), and she had a beautiful baby girl named Nina.  

One of her first thoughts, upon just delivering her daughter, was "Oh, Becky's going to be so mad!".  I don't talk about my GD at all. Not outside DH and the IG website. I am just the "boy mom" with my crowd of 3, one still on my hip.

I assured her when I called with congratulations, that "No, I'm not mad, I'm just jealous". And I cried when I hung up the phone, and I'm crying now whilst I type.

In olden days, well at least before the 60s and birth control, you just kept having kids and eventually one would be a girl - the odds had to come up sometime!  Today's society is not so inclined! It's also bloody hard to bring up a large family and financing them through college and so set them up for a successful adult life.

Today, the technology exists to prevent conception (birth control) which is acceptable to pretty much the entire population. So maybe with time, the technology to chose the gender of your baby, if you so desire, will also become more socially acceptable.

I never thought I would be looking into a high-tech conception but we're tried Shettles twice (3 day cut-off), the girl diet and checking my acidity with pH strips! This is DH's reservation, That our daughter will not be conceived the 'normal' way. The fact that there will be a doctor involved in an act which should be about our love for each other. Bit of a passion killer. That the act of making love, and making a baby will be stripped back to the bare mechanics of "Hi Ms Egg, let me introduce you to Ms Sperm, and please go forth for the next 40 weeks into the the happy land of Uterine Lining."

But we've talked about it - how his support of my desire (OK, obsession) is a wonderful way for him to express his love for me, and for our family. How he will endure the embarrassment of producing into a cup and hand it over to a nurse. I would lhave liked to point out I'd given birth 3 times, and that don't compare with a private room with mags and a cup for 'sharing with the world!' but that wouldn't have helped our conversation!

No, she won't be conceived in passion but she will be conceived in love.

To set the scene - a busy Chick-Fil-A restauarnt this evening with my eldest (6), having dinner and spinning our wheels a little in the hour between his Tae Kwon Do pprivate lesson and his next group TKD class - he tests on Wednesday so he's been cramming this week.

 "Mom?"

"Yup?"

Scanning the surrounding seats, he says "Nearly every other family has a girl in it. Ours doesn't."

"Does it?"

He is such a sweet tender hearted sensitive boy (hence the TKD so he doesn't get his butt kicked) but god, he's perceptive at times.  I wasn't even thinking about a girl!  Honest!

Or maybe it's not just me, maybe all good big brothers needs a little sister too.

Where do I start? I guess at the beginning. Here are the facts m'am: I am a Brit who has lived in the US for 5.5 yrs and intends to stay.  I'm hoping by writing that this will be a cathartic experience for me, and help me understand where I do stand on gender selection and disappointment. Or even just what our next move is. We have 3 lovely boys (1 born in the UK, 2 born in the US) who I would not be without for the world. They are all very much wanted and loved.

But

There is an overwhelming desire to have a daughter. To have someone who 'like me'. To not be the only female in the house (DS1 take some delight in saying there are 5 boys inc. the dog in our house, not realising he's breaking my heart every time). To not be excluded from a whole part of society - clothing, parts of stores, Barbie's, brownies, passing on my knowledge of what I've learnt in this modern age about what it is to be a girl/woman, to have someone to leave my jewellery to, to see grow up and probably give birth herself. To just not be quite so lonely in this cars, Lego, star wars, soccer, B.O. boy household. To be balanced, To lay quiet to the Gender Desire Beast that howls within my soul.

 But

Are these the right reasons? Is it enough? Am I just being selfish? Will GD go away in time? Is having 4 kids (regardless of gender) the right thing for me, for us, for our family (my mom tells me she can't cope with the 3 we've got, not that they are bad or that she sees them much anyway due to the pond in the way), for this world? DH says 4 kids is good with him but 5 is a no-no.  Would I have believed you 10 years ago if you said I would be considering 4 kids? No way in hell. But then I couldn't imagine us with one. Could I imagine us with 3 boys? No, always thought we'd have at least one girl.  Could I imagine using artificial means to gain a child? No, but here we are. Nature's had her chance and I love her for it. But now it's my turn to help myself.

But

Should we have a biological child? Shouldn't we consider adoption? After all, there are thousands of unwanted children (which I can't get my head around) out there. I don't know. I have the utmost respect for people who adopt, I know 2 families who have done so. From what (little) research I have done, it looks like the cost is the same, so why not go down that route? Give a child a home. I don't think I'm strong enough. I'm not sure I couldn't ever hold it against her in the time of absolute stress. That medical problems we would encounter, the pain of her knowing her real mom didn't love her enough to bring her up herself, to say when's she's older "I don't know my medical history" like my 2 adopted teenage friends had to do. Or doing an open adoption, seeing someone else greedily drinking in your child, and all that she is.And from a practical point of view, I'm not sure how we could stand with our residency status anyway. The GD beast inside of me wants a girl to be mine and DH's own child.

So

We start out on this scary journey. To find out more that we ever wanted or thought we'd have to know about gender selection. To take our first baby steps towards our daughter.