Jenn Unplugged

Last year my resolution was to live in the moment more with Carter and just enjoy his second year as much as I could. I feel like I did that well. Props to Scott Noelle, Alfie Kohn, and Naomi Aldort for for helping me find my path to relaxed, peaceful, joyful parenting. :-)

This year: We're planning an IVF cycle in the summer, and so my goal is to get as healthy as I can before June. I set a goal of losing 50 pounds back in October, and have lost 20 so far (though I'm betting I've put 5 back on over the holidays). So I guess my personal resolutions for this next year are:

1) Get healthier (lose 30 more pounds, exercise more regularly, eat better)
2) Get pregnant!
3) Learn to cook healthy food more creatively. (I need to branch out from steamed veggies and baked chicken, SRSLY.)

Happy New Year, everyone!

I was waiting for Mothering Magazine to say something about the recent news items about the relationship between circumcision and HIV. As usual, they lay out the facts and talk about what the science really says: The Truth About Circumcision and HIV: Some argue that recent studies support universal circumcision. The evidence disagrees.

If you've been reading this LJ for any length of time, you know that I was committed to a natural birth before I developed pre-eclampsia with Carter. Unfortunately, his very small size meant a vertical incision was required, which rules out a chance of a VBAC in the future. (I am aware that there are successful HBACs after vertical incisions, but I'm not willing to do a home birth after my experience -- and that's if I'm lucky enough to go full term AND if I'm lucky enough to actually get pregnant again.)

I was pretty devastated about the loss of my ability to give birth, but I'm moving on. And part of my moving on is reading about planned c-sections that are gentle, respect the baby's journey into the world, and are family-centered and baby-friendly (in the WHO sense). In other words, as close as I can get to the birth experience I used to dream about. Here are some interesting links:

http://www.ican-online.org/pregnancy/family-centered-cesarean
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/health/article6028478.ece
http://www.eheart.com/cesarean/oliver.html

Until reading this stuff, I never thought about writing a birth plan for a c-section, or having a doula present. This is really giving me hope that I might be able to have a positive birth experience someday!

I bought a Diva Cup 3 months ago, and as of today, I can finally say I've mastered it!

( Cut for TMI )

This morning Carter had his 6 month well baby visit with his pediatrician, Jill Nichols of the Austin Diagnostic Clinic. Up until today, I've been happy with Dr. Nichols. But this morning she told me he was old enough to start sleeping through the night, and that I should start cutting out his night feeds. When I told her it wasn't a problem for me, that I didn't mind nursing him twice at night (for ten minutes each time), she lit into me. I argued back, because after all I've actually read a lot of the research that contradicted what she was saying. We went around and around about cosleeping: she thinks Carter sleeps in a cosleeper sidecarred to our bed (I started lying about that one after the first visit when she made her opinion on bedsharing clear), and she thinks that's bad because OMG he might still be sleeping in our room when he's two!; nursing at night: she said it would cause tooth decay, despite the fact that there's not much evidence to support that for breastfeeding infants; pushing him to sleep through the night: she thinks I'm doing him permanent damage by "conditioning" him to wake up to eat overnight, despite the fact that research suggests human babies NEED to eat overnight, and so on.

When it became clear that I wasn't going to back down, she said, "Well, I'm very anti-attachment parenting. I think it's a horrible way to parent and produces children who are clingy and far too dependent on their parents." At that point, my jaw dropped, and I stopped talking. I decided there was really nothing more I could say to her. She checked over him, but I only nodded or shook my head at her from there on out. She came back and apologized before we left,
and said she had strong opinions and understood that I might disagree with them, but I still left the appointment thinking this was no longer the best pediatrician for my family.

I will only see her for a few minutes every few months, but I don't feel like I can be open with her now. I'm afraid I won't be inclined to tell her things I probably should, because I'll be concerned that she's judging my parenting. So I think it's time to move on. (I posted about this on a local AP group, and already have several recs for new peds, all of whom are much closer to my house anyway.)

But still, yuck. You know? I'm completely confident in my parenting choices, but it's still no fun to be confronted in that way. I'm thinking I might send her an email when we transfer to explain (in a very reasonable way, of course) why I'm leaving the practice. Or should I just quietly slink away?

Since I've got a few months before IVF, I'm going to try to lose a little weight. My goal is ten pounds, which isn't a lot, but the real goal is to eat healthier and more reasonably, which I figure will really help me if I get pregnant. Doug and I eat pretty well about half the time; we eat a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables, we cook with quality ingredients, and we use olive oil almost exclusively. Of course, we eat too large portions when we cook, and when we don't cook, we tend to eat fast food because we're busy and tired. So we have good intentions, but we don't quite get there most of the time.

( So my first goal is to try to become more conscious about the amounts of food I eat. )

( I made yogurt! )

I need to get over my bitterness about this whole infertility thing. It's really difficult for me to talk about it or even think about it without getting upset. I've spent the last couple of months pretending like I don't want to have children and not thinking about it at all, and I've been happier than I can remember being for a while. That says something, I think.

I had a moment during the vacation where I started thinking about the IVF thing, and I got so upset that I had to to change my mental subject. The unfairness of it all is something I just can't seem to let go of. I keep thinking that I must have traded in my fertility for one of the other many wonderful things in my life. There's a sense in which infertility almost feels karmic. I feel like I've led a charmed life in many ways, and I've always been waiting for The Bad Thing to happen to balance it all out. I expected the Bad Thing to be losing a loved one too soon or being diagnosed with cancer, so I suppose if this is really my Bad Thing, I should consider myself lucky. Not that this line of reasoning helps, of course.

I'm not posting this for sympathy comments, btw, so don't feel obligated to respond. And I'm not looking for advice, either. (I know I ought to seek counseling, but I'm barely home these days and I really don't want to talk about it any more than I have to.) Mostly, I just needed to say it. Sometimes it help to put your thoughts in writing.

Apparently seven doses of hormones injected into one's system within 24 hours is enough to wreak havoc on the body. My digestive system is freaked out, I'm tired, and earlier this evening, I sobbed for several minutes after the cell signal was dropped when Doug called from France, just as I was answering the phone. I hadn't talked to him in two days and I miss him terribly, and I was afraid he wouldn't call again because it was midnight there, and I burst into tears. He did call again, for the record. It actually took me a few minutes of talking to him before I stopped crying. Yikes.

Starting tonight it's two doses again. Maybe I won't spend so much time in the bathroom tomorrow... :-P

In other news, the conference is going well. My talk turned out to be today (so last night was a late night, heh), and I got a lot of great feedback on it, including some really encouraging comments from two well-known people. It's amazing how much of an impact that sort of encouragement has, isn't it? I try to do that for other people, and when someone else does it for me I'm just reminded of how important it is.

ETA: Rita, I keep seeing the new UCC commercial on CNN! It's making me a bit teary. ;-)

This is the worst part of the whole trying-to-get-pregnant thing, and the fact that I've done it... *counts* ... at least 30 times now does not make it any easier.

( Cut for angsting )

Gacked from wordplay. I'm not particularly feminine, so I was curious how I'd score.

( Am I more masculine or feminine? )

Doug is far, far away and I miss him. So I pulled out some photos and decided to share them. :-)

( Lots of photos here )