paging, dr. freud...

the other night i had a dream
not the martin luther king jr kind of dream, but a dream nonetheless
the kind that sticks with you
the kind that haunts you throughout your day
the kind that makes you try to explain it to other people
and still they have no idea what the hell you are talking about
the kind that follows you straight into the next day
and leaves you thinking that the only way to release it
is to write about it

so here i am
and here we go

i had a dream
(yes we’ve covered this already)

i had a feature role
but i was not the star
there was someone else
someone ive never met, someone ive never seen before
and a face that i cant get out of my mind

even now i can see her so clearly,
like the face of a long lost friend
a face for which every freckle and every scar
....you were a party to its creation

in my dream i wanted so much for her to connect with me
to see me
to run to me
to hug me

but my nightmare was that i couldnt remember her name, i couldnt gain her trust

i knew she had an unusual name - a beautiful name
but i couldnt speak it
i wanted to bond with her but this lapse of mine was keeping her from recognizing me
what was this “thing” that kept me from retrieving her name?

i wanted her to trust me
but who will you trust who doesnt speak your name?
your name spoken provides validity
it acknowledges your existence
and as desperate as i was ...desperation did not equate to anything but frustration

with trepidation i approached her
i thought if i got closer she would recognize me, and id remember
id remember her name and she, in turn, would remember my voice

but it didnt happen
and my dream ended without resolve


she was mine
a child of about three years old
and she was beautiful
i can tell you this very clearly because i know her face
it is the face of a child that i cannot get out of my mind
it is not the face of the daughter i had imagined
she wasnt a fair-haired, green-eyed child ~ bearing that distinct family resemblance
but she was mine
this was unmistakable

she had been separated from me
and i was there to take her home
but i couldnt say her name
feeling like a conservationist approaching an endangered species, fearing it will spook
i couldnt gain her trust
and i failed to convince her to place her dimpled little hand in mine

the dream ended, but the memory is vivid
a face ill never forget and a name ill never know ~
she was mine,
and i was there to take her home...

welcome to my world

i thought i was having a bad day when our douchebag landlord (we had to rent for a year while relocating for work in the middle of a real estate crisis and waiting for our fabulous house to sell) won at arbitration stating that we did not give sufficient notice to end our tenancy.

yes apparently, telling his wife one month earlier that our home had sold. or having his wife present as we faxed our offer to purchase our new home did not give them any indication that we were leaving. who knew.

so the douchebags, whom we mistakenly thought were our friends have been granted another month's rent according to a director with the residential tenancy board. wtf?

i could hardly sleep that night. seething with anger. and anticipating my doctor's appointment in the morning.

slimebags, they'd get theirs - i thought.
you see, i am a firm believer in karma

but why did she have to bite MY ass the very next day?

yes, it was a sunday and i had a doctor's appointment.
about a week earlier i felt like i was walking in someone else's shoes when i was told, if you are serious about having a family we need to start IVF and we need to be aggressive.

but if that was what it was like to be in someone else's shoes, then after a full course of two daily needles and oral drugs i was left too puffy & swollen to wear them.

the first appointment hadnt been great. perhaps ill elaborate another time.
the short story is that they had only found four follicles... FOUR - wtf?!

but its okay, deep cleansing breath now. we've got the drugs
the full meal deal
ill go back and they will see me for the overacheiver that i really am.

and this was that day
my chance for my ovaries to prove their worth.
and show how much they appreciated the hormone cocktail i was serving up daily like it was happy hour.

my husband sat staring quizzically at the ultrasound monitor (trying not to acknowledge what the doctor was doing in order for him to have that blurred incomprehesible view)

and there was that moment of
oh, lets see if we can have a better view this way
or this way
or maybe...

with each second the room grew quieter and the facial expressions dropped exponetially

there was no discussion
the doctor and his assistant left the room, saying he would be back in a moment to discuss the results

what was there to discuss
we were right there
there were no secrets, i mean we may not be gynecologists or reproductive specialists but anyone with a brain could tell the prognosis wasnt good

what had happened to my overacheivers?

i cried - i didnt know exactly what he was going to say but i cried
and my husband hugged me
in this stupid ultrasound room, where we had only moments earlier been giggling schoolkids making ridiculous remarks about the equipment
i started crying then
and ive barely stopped since - except to laugh
because i have great friends
you know the kind
the kind that make you laugh when youre already doing the "ugly cry"
and ive got to say, if you think the ugly cry is ugly... you should see it with a laugh thrown in

one
One?
yes ONE follicle

forget someone else's shoes, im pretty sure i was in someone else's skin at that point

the ivf cycle was cancelled
and the rest is a blurr
which keeps coming back to me in waves

one tidal wave
being the moment i called my mother to let her know the whole story
i hadnt told her any of our reproductive woes up until this point
even though they were years in the making

these are the words that broke over me like a surfer being sucked in the vortex of a big ole white cap
after i spilled my story of dissappointment and devastation
the sentence that she uttered to me, her only daughter,

"well honey, i guess you just waited too long"

welcome to my world:
if it's not one thing ~ it's ...your mother