And I promise not to name it North, Rocket or Pear

When I was little I used to dream about when I was big and what my own family would look like. Having come from a broken family it was mostly all I wanted – all the pieces to fit in the puzzle. Me, the dad and the two, maybe even three kids. I’d dress my Sindy doll up in her best frock and she would proudly drive her babies in her plastic pink car to the shopping village under my bed. She had a little boy named Fred and a little girl named Samantha. Fast forward a dozen or so years (okay so maybe a few more) that dream got almost entirely realised before being ripped away and then years later re-imagined in the most incredible true-life fairytale way and now, as I loom ever closer to the year that spells the end of my thirties there’s only one teeny little piece left to fit.

I can’t help it and I don’t know if it’s because like John Lennon, I’m a dreamer. Or because I’m one helluva Stubborn Scorpian Bitch, or because like that little girl I still believe in fairytales having good happy endings but I can’t help being the constant Fertility Junkie who is waaaay too intimate with her cycle than she’d like to be (and no, I don’t mean the cherry-covered seat of my pink cruiser). Sure we’ve got everything we could ever want and don’t think for one minute I’m not more grateful than Kris Jenner at Kimye’s wedding because I have the most incredibly gorgeously spectacularly wonderful mini human being in my 11 y o but for him, for me and mostly for the totes amazingly brill’ adult human being on the planet, The Vet, I need our own final puzzle piece.

So far I’ve pretty much tried every shit-assing thing that every shit-assing person can suggest on why/how I could get up the knock. Emails ping at me every time I look at my laptop telling me ways of ‘Increasing my fertility by doing cartwheels naked on a beach before sucking on the sweet nectar of a rare African fruit’. It’s my thyroid, they say. It’s my mindset – it needs to be completely free of stress (good, how do you suppose I do that when all I can do is stress over trying to get myself up the knock?!) It’s gluten they tell me, eat a shitload of spinach/kale/wheatgrass for breakfast, lunch and tea. It’s colouring my hair they say…hang on there are limits and not being able to touch up my regrowth is one of life’s necessities this slowly-finding-more-grey-hairs gal ain’t about to give up thank you please. It’s microwaves, cellphones and toxic paint fumes. It’s everything and anything but what they don’t tell you and what I don’t see ping at me when I open my inbox every morning is this: ‘Luck. It pretty much all comes down to a shitload of luck so go out and find yourself a leprechaun’.

We’ve tried trigger injections, we tried steroids, still it just slaps me in the face every single month. I do sincerely wish my cycle and I were not so frenemy-close each month but as it stands I can tell her every move being that she’s about as subtle as a Nikki Minaj bandage dress. Sadly there has been no false hope lighting up my ovaries for quite some time now as this month marks three years since I learned fertility junkie would become a regular part of my vocab. Before that I hadn’t much been exposed to it apart from watching the desperate suffering of a few close friends and a very dear family member. Shit I felt sorry for them alright but I never knew jack about their actual suffering. I had little to no idea exactly how much fertility resembles flies hovering over fresh dog shit…until I myself, skipped not-so-merrily down that sharp fork in the road. Now it’s all I can think about even when I’m not thinking about it.

I’ve lost count of how many chlomid rounds we’ve done and even exactly the number of IVF cycles that have littered our fertile past seem to have all congealed into one. The only thing I do remember is that we had One. One successful attempt and even though that little frosty barely made it past the seven week-mark it is a teeny tiny weeny flicker of hope. Dr Babies has, at one last ditch attempt, put me on Letrizole for this cycle hoping that might have some miracle affect on my little eggie speggles. Let’s all take a moment to quietly wish upon the Fertility Gods for some goodness. To all my faithful fertility fans who keep me pepped up on this shitful battle, big ups to you all your words of wisdom and hope fill my heart. Love n’hugs, Lady MamaG xox

Happy face

Two months is waaaaay too long to keep a secret and seriously, there have been so many moments in the past eight weeks or so where I nearly almost probably did put my foot in it. Luckily for me, the 11 y o was oblivious. Up until about an hour ago, he thought we were going to tuck into his fave St Kilda churros in Melbourne. At dinner time I told him to sit up at the bench.

Guess what…? I asked. We’re not going to Melbourne. His face dropped. I think he thought we weren’t going anywhere so for a moment there he might have even chucked me a boy’s version of the stink eye. I handed him his little travel wallet and said, nope, not Melbourne…we’re going to…Disneyland!

He pretty much flipped out like Kanye at the Grammy’s except waaaay more graceful like. He looked at The Vet and he looked at me. He looked back at the vet as if to double check I wasn’t making it up. ‘No…! What? Disneyland, really…is this a dream…am I dreaming?’ There were firecrackers going off in his little heart like the fourth of July. I’m pretty sure I might have even seen one or two actual stars twinkle out of his eyes. And yes, Mama had to choke back a few tears. I spose there’s not too many times in life where you get to lay a surprise on your kid as big as this and hells to the yes it was worth it. He asked again, ‘Are you sure I’m not dreaming…?’ No buddy, this ain’t no dream this be real true life.

He’s off to pack his backpack for the biggest and bestest holiday of his life. His words. While mama is still caught between two or three pairs of fawn coloured ankle boots…and deciphering how many pairs of jeans I will actually need…(so far it’s seven). Come on, it’s LA, you never know who might brush past you on the sidewalk. If my luggage comes in at oversize, I may just have to stow away a few pairs of boots in 11 y o’s suitcase which seems well-proportionally light to make room for all his mama’s shopping. Look out LA, here comes de Lady MamaG! xox

My lil’ Mr Incredible…

Me? I’m a shocker with surprises….I am abso-freaking-lutely shittingly useless. I get all too excited and from time-to-time might accidentally let something slip (because if I hold in too much I may just wee myself) which is why it may come as some surprise to you that I’ve managed to keep this one for a whole two months. Quiet fairy clap for me, please. I’ll share it with you but be sure to keep your trap shut until Thursday morning at around 11.30am. Before I tell you the surprise though, I need to fill you in on a bit of background.

When 11 y o was about three or four, I can’t remember exactly because some parts of those years are all but a blur…but he wouldn’t have been much more than three and a half because we hadn’t long lost his Daddy. He came into my room one night, carrying his trusty Big Ted under his arm he climbs up over the side of the bed and is whimpering. I miss my daddy, why did he have to leave us? I want him to come baaaack,’ he’s crying into my ear. It wasn’t unusual for him to wake up in the night like that but he’d got himself so worked up that it took me a bit to get him calm again. I held him tight and told him ‘One day very soon, mummy’s going to take you to the happiest place on earth…it’s so magical that it can take away all your hurt and all your sad. It will make your heart feel all warm again.’

The tears were soon forgotten but the promise was sealed. For years after that night I would tell him one day we’ll go there, one day all your happiness will come back into your heart. There has been pain and heartache in his short life and I’ve spent the past eight years trying to heal that sadness, make him better, fill the hole left behind, give him enough love of two parents.

And once The Vet came into our lives, the big grey clouds were gone…there’s been nothing but sunshine ever since. How the 11 y o has grown into an even more incredible being than before. The Vet is the one, and the only one who could fill all our dreams, take us to the happiest place on earth. Heal our hearts, our sad, our fear. There isn’t enough space in the interwebby for me to bang on about how flippin’ great he is. How he has rebuilt our lives like a kit of lego. How kind, loving, nuturing and gentle, yet ever respectful he is of us both…it’s the biggest reason I keep going back again and again for nine, ten even, rounds of fertility shit because the world just needs more people like The Vet in it.

The small person thinks we’re going to Melbourne this week on a 12-day holiday. He was like the Carpenters at a folk festival. ‘Can The Vet come for some of the time…?’ he asked. When I told him we were all going for the whole time I think his head almost rolled off his shoulders, his grin be so big!

Wednesday night I get to finally share our secret, I got him a little navy blue travel wallet with the words ‘never stop exploring’ on it. Inside is a vintage Disneyland ticket, an Alcatraz ticket and one for Universal Studios.

And you know what…? He still thinks we’re going to Melbourne…

It’s taken me nearly eight years to come true on that promise I made him all that time ago but in three more sleeps we are going to the happiest place on earth. A place where he can, we all can be kids, be happy, fill our hearts with the warmest feelings like midday sunshine and firecrackers all at once. Heal our bodies and our souls. I can’t wait to see his face… Love n’hugs, Lady MamaG xox

I’m sorry, I’m like that friend that never returns calls, or worse…that returns calls with a text, instead. I know I haven’t been in touch for like forevs’ but I been a busy lil’ bee, I have. Parts of this year seem to have flown by like a pair of granny’s underpants off the line, then other bits have been like waiting for the Divine Upstairs himself.

For nine months I have been working on a baby, unfortunately it probably wasn’t quite the baby we were hoping for but it is certainly one that will house our hopeful-one-day-peanut. As it stands I know every single tile, sink tap, carpet and benchtop sample ever made. I am also rather more intimate than I prefer to be with a whole host of plantlife, grasses and decorative rocks. Yep you guessed it, we (well mostly me because I’m a control freak n’ all that) have been building a house. Nine little months was all it took to incubate the most incredible digs you could ever lay your divine lil’ lashes upon.

It is the house of our dreams and I have put every ounce of my heart, soul and OCD perfectionism into it to make it one that makes my belly go all warm whenever I walk inside. It’s got lots of bedrooms and just as many bathrooms (which means my new year’s reso is to hire a cleaner) and lucky it has too because we had about four hundred and fifty three people staying for Christmas.

No really, we only had 17 for Christmas day and 13 people staying – yet we didn’t manage to fall on top of each other, or stab anyone with a kitchen skewer. Lucky. It had been a bloody tough old year twenny one four, not so kind to us in some ways yet a great year in others so I got on to the old fandamily and said ‘y’all need to get your asses over here for Christmas’. And they did. Almost every single one of them. It was the first year I can remember where my whole family was together and our blended tribes could mingle like Prince Andrew in a harem. It meant so much to me to have them here. And to the 11 y o who has managed to be more spoilt than North West at Disneyland. I hold genuine concern for when the last of them leaves and he is back to boring old Mama. His life will seem quite shitful, I expect.

We had friends come with their divine little bunch of hooligans and liven up our house with their delighted screams. We’ve had time with family who I haven’t seen for a couple of years because I haven’t been home. It has been a truly lovely holiday. Even Marley has grinned his lovely golden lashes at loving so many people pat him daily. Nothing like the holidays to make me realise I am truly blessed to have such incredible people around me, my friends, my family and of course the absolute cherries on my sundae, The Vet and the 11 y o.

This summer I’ve worked very hard on a seamless no strap-marks tan, laying the final interior design touches on our home and finishing up opening a new business…oh and bumping into Chris Hemsworth in Byron Bay (see pic below) we be like old friends now.

Already we are part way through the first month and I’m no closer to deciding when it is we go for our ‘last go’. It’s looming. If I’m honest it’s actually becoming a big fat pain in my arse, nagging in my ear like an old fish wife. One of my new month’s resolutions is to stop looking at my many six gazillion fertility apps to see where I am in my cycle and if it’s ‘time’. Nope, now I’m going all Thelma & Louise on this goddamn baby making shit.

To everyone who has made my year go by easier than it could have…who put the wheels back on when they so frequently fall off…who put the pop back in my candy, you know who you are and even tho I don’t need to…thank the hell out of yah, you are gems, every single one of you.

Twenny one five…come what may, biatch! (but just make sure there’s a small sized person please). Happy Nu Ye-ah to you and your own fandamily. Lov n’ hugs, Lady MamaG xox

the world’s handsomest dog

Lady Hope herself…

Infertility is really starting to get on my tits. The way she controls my life like some possesed she-devil, belting me with her whip whenever I get anything like close to thinking I’ve beaten her there she goes again and reminds me with a good sharp stab between my toes that indeed, she is control and no, no you are not going to beat her. It would seem I have become what they call a Hope Slut.

It has such a lovely ring to it doesn’t it, but really there is no better way of describing how you feel with each passing month you find out yet again, you are a failure….and still infertile. It’s like a giant light above your head screaming ‘loser uterus inside’. I blame it on chlomid. I also blame it on my lucky shrine I’ve built beside my bed. Oh and I blame it on being somewhat of an optimist too. And you know what, I damn well blame it on the fact that so clearly my heart is ready to have a baby but apparently my body is not. Get your shit together and kiss and make up you two…time is getting away on us here.

The fact I am truly a Hope Slut is also evident in the fact that despite it having been well over two-and-a-half years since the nasty witch of infertility cast her shitty spell over us, I still find myself punching in baby names under the ‘notes’ section of my phone – and no there is no South West or Pear on the list. Nor for that matter is Blue, Green or Pilot Inspektor (yes, an actual celebrity baby name). I’ve planned a ‘baby nursery’ for our new house and I still sneakily imagine what our little person will look like. Damn it I wish I wasn’t constantly drawn into the web like some crazy junkie but I dangle each and every month under the pendulum of hope and it doesn’t look like – unless we give up all together – that I’ll ever get free of it.

As if time itself is not the ever present constant ticking inside my fertility-challenged self, in a little over two weeks, I will be on the latter part of thirty-something. The veeeeeery latter. And as we all know…time, she be not kind to those of us over 35. While on the one hand it is my birth-month and this does mean it is my time to be abso-fricking-lutely spoilt shitless – lavished with all manner of my favourite things – it does also mean something else. It will mark the last year of my thirties. Shhh, don’t tell anyone I said that because I’d like to think I’m still 32 (that’s either my mental, my fashion, or my horoscope age) but dammit if the veeery latter part of your thirties doesn’t spell the stupid assing end of your ability to make good eggs.

Two cycles of chlomid and not so much as a flutter of embryo implantation. Even if I did put on my sexiest heels, pasties and a pair of French knickers…

I read somewhere this week about a woman who had tried for 15 years to get pregnant. Bloody marathon I know. She’d been through some ridiculous amount of fertility specialists and tried almost every single thing you could think of, and then some. Finally, and yes it was with IVF, she got the baby she had been hoping for. Probably the biggest part of her story that resonated with me was she said ‘I refused to give up’. I mean really, if she can keep going back for 15 years, what’s a couple of years between friends? Hardly seems to be scratching the surface does it? So, it seems back I go to being a Hope Slut. Wish me luck (both with the almost farewell of my thirties and the next round of chlomid), Love n’hugs, Lady MamaG xox

How do you cram fifteen whole years of memories into just five minutes? It’s impossible, you can’t. There are so many lifetimes full of happiness, joy and sometimes heartache in that decade-and-a-half. Tomorrow is pretty a momentus day for me…It’s the first milestone we haven’t been together in my entire adult life. We spent first our 16th, then 18th, 21st and our 30th birthdays together…and there were the engagements, weddings and the birth of our son dotted in between. We traveled the world, built our first home and launched a business. We followed our dreams and crossed the Tasman. It was half a lifetime but, boy was it one led to the full.

Tomorrow Mark would have turned 40. Except he never quite made it. He told his mates only weeks before he died, ‘He who dies with the most hair wins’…and he must have had a real chuckle to himself because yep, he sure did have a mighty damn fine crop of hair. Now he will be immortally 32. No grey hairs, no wrinkles, no balding. Just 32 forever.

There’s heaps of things I’d like to say, to tell him, remind him but he’s been asleep for 2920 days…and while it might have taken me a long time to accept it – for years after, I kept thinking I’d wake up from this shitful nightmare, he’s not ever waking up. Still, it doesn’t stop there being one single hour of any single day when I don’t think about him. It’s impossible. You don’t get to simply forget someone who helped shape your life. He taught me so much about strength and courage. About believing in yourself and following your dreams. He had a heart that was full of love and probably one of the kindest natures you could ever be lucky enough to meet.

On what would have been your big 4-0, Didley, I know you would have knocked the top off a beer or two, maybe even celebrated a bit…but only because I would have made you! There are so many things you missed – our son learning to ride his bike, going off into the big wide world on his first day of school, losing his first tooth and scoring his first goal. Learning to drive his own little rubber ducky and zooming round on his scooter like some crazy daredevil (that bit, we know he gets from you). He’s old enough now that he wants to know every little thing about you and loves hearing the lads tell stories like when a bunch of you took the race truck for a spin down the bottom of the property, hanging on by the skin of their teeth. He wants to be just like his Dad…his little eyes beam brightly whenever someone tells him how much he’s just like you.

We are lucky enough to have the most incredible, beautiful and wonderful man who lights up my life just like you did. Who loves me, adores me and heals me, just like you did. Who takes our son as his own and honours your memory the way you deserve…but hey, what am I telling you this for…? Course, you knew already because you sent him.

So now all we have left are just the memories…but no one and nothing can take your memories, not even death himself. Lov n hugs, Lady MamaG xox

http://https://vimeo.com/107674443

keep going…

So a long time ago, like forever ago, before the word ‘infertile’ was even uttered between these four walls, I was a relatively ignorant girl, yes okay perhaps verging on a little naive and it wouldn’t impress my fifth form science teacher, Mr Chisholm to know that I really knew jack shit about fertility and all its winding roads…who knew there are only two days a month that a girl could get up the knock? It seems writing my initials beside my boyfriend’s in vivid on my folder was much more interesting than biology, chemistry or reproductive learning…my bad.

Now I’m a walking bloody encyclopedia (that’s the book form of wikipedia for those born after the nineties) of all things fertility. Some of it I really don’t want to know. Like here, have your FSH, your natural killer cells, your lapraoscopy, hysteroscopy and any other ocopy that causes so much pain it feels as if your insides have blown up inside you. And while you’re at it, take your figures, your stats and all your bad news and shove it fair up your bum.

We had though last month was our last round….except fate has a funny way of intervening. Just two days before I was due to go for an endometrial scrape (I’ll let you work out the logistics of that yourself) which was meant to help any little embies that might make it down the bumpy ride to fertile stick their guns in tight to my uterus. Stuff happened and then we didn’t get to go through with the round. Can’t lie and tell you I wasn’t a little bit disappointed because when you get your mind set on something (particularly if you’re a bordering on control freak Scorpian) and it doesn’t go to plan, shit can get real preeeetttty quickly. Around this point it’s best to lock up all sharp objects and hammers. So even though our minds were pretty much made up for us, we decided to put it off for a few months. Work up the courage. And the funds.

After a brief visit to Dr Babies office for one of his lovely internal scans one morning he looks up at the screen on the ultrasound and utters, ‘mmm well, this is interesting’…no girl ever wants to hear that when someone is scooting around in her insides but it seems it was positive. I had developed eight (yep, count ’em…one, two, three) follicles all on my ownsome. I COULD NOT believe it. Don’t go planning the North West proportions baby shower just yet. He sent me off to the lab for some bloods and the nurse called that afternoon to say they looked great. What? I thought I couldn’t pump out my own eggs? Maybe the bin juice, the acupuncture and the Buddhist Monk’s stone have helped.

But there’s one rule with infertility: Don’t Get Ahead of Yourself. It didn’t work. Despite my thinking my ovaries, tubes and uterus had miraculously recovered overnight and turned into those of a 21-year-old, it wasn’t to be. Back I go to the office of my beloved Dr Babies who I’m damn sure if nothing else, admires my perseverance. He sends me for an HSG. For those who’d rather I didn’t share the details it’s basically like shoving a plastic tube through yourself, blowing up a balloon once up there and then running dye through it, slowly and painfully. Sorry, too much?

With little to no time to prepare myself, I was flat on my back before I knew it, without even so much as a little foreplay. The good news is, the lovely lady doctor who performed my carnival ride of an x-ray discovered that my tubes are in fact not blocked. Yes you heard me right, not blocked. Or no longer blocked. One is slow but they be working like a regular fire hydrant. I waited until I was outside the x-ray room before I side-ankle-kicked to myself but whoopty shit, I got me some working tubes. And some follicles. Life is good, yeah? Well as good as it can be when the odds that were stacked higher than the Berlin Wall, suddenly seem a little bit less…where the hell are Dorothy’s ruby slippers when you need them?

Armed with my good news I would be adding yet another drug to my ever-expanding (yet possibly not retaining) knowledge bible…let me introduce you to my little friend, Chlomid. She is going to make me ovulate rather than the normal once, a few times….the thought of Octomum did cross my mind but the likelihood of any, let alone seven of my little embies sticking is next to zilch so that’s out. As are my reality TV show prospects, bugger it. 

I’m glad to say this month there are no needles, no anesthetics, no hospital gowns. No mortgaging my left breast to pay for the next round. No Britney meltdowns. The roads are safe from my hormonal episodes of rage and the male population of my household may be free from the firing line (though I make no promises). Love n hugs, LadyMamaG xox