Not Sure

So I'm really not sure what to do with this blog.

I originally created it thinking that I'd get pregnant within a few months and just share the link with friends/family. They'd be able to read everything, and then it would be a good place for updates during pregnancy and with baby. (I have a friend who sends an email out each week for BOTH of her kids, with a picture and a LONG story about what they did that week. It's annoying. At least with a blog people could read or not, depending on what they want to do.)

Then it took longer than I had figured to get my BFP. Followed by the miscarriage, and then all my feelings on pregnancy after loss.

While I'm not super secretive about the miscarriage -- I'd rather some people know about it, and I kinda feel like it's good for people to know so if it ever (G-d forbid) happened to them, they would know they could chat with me about it -- I don't want all the posts on here to be public to my friends & family. This has become a private space for me to share my feelings, and although I have some followers, it's an anonymous place for me to be.

Meanwhile, I'm not sure I truly fit in to the world of the infertile blogger. I got my first BFP on Cycle 5, and had an early loss. I then got another BFP immediately after. While I would have done testing at 6 months of no pregnancy, I never got there. I didn't have to deal with tests, and meds, and treatments. I didn't have to deal with recurrent pregnancy loss (thank GOODNESS). While struggling with a loss is certainly a difficult thing to do, and pregnancy after loss has its own world of emotions & fears, I'm not a pregnant infertile. I'm just a pregnant lady.

So here's what I'm thinking -- I'll start another blog, a public one for friends/family. I'll post the link over here when I do, so if anyone wants to continue to see pics and hear updates on the pregnancy/baby, you can do that. That's the only place where I'll post pics and share pregnancy or baby updates.  But I'll still keep this blog active -- although likely less so. It'll still be the place I come to when I need to share a personal struggle, problem, or question. Something I don't want to be public.

Does that make sense?

17 weeks (+ 1 day)

So here's what's going on with Curly (and me):

-- I've been feeling movement consistently for 2 weeks. Seems early, but my placenta is posterior so maybe that's helping. I can best describe it as being tickled from the inside, like with a long fingernail. During the ultrasound yesterday, I saw Curly moving as I was feeling it, so I know what I'm feeling is the baby moving. So weird! And so great. :-)

-- Fatigue hasn't gotten any better. After a long day at work, I will easily fall asleep on the couch around 8pm. I keep wanting to go to Yoga, but the classes are 6:30 - 8pm, and I don't know how I'd stay awake that long. I have 5 classes to use by the end of January; I guess worst case scenario I waste one or two. (Unfortunately, they have NO classes on Sundays! And pretty far for me to walk to go on a Saturday, it's 38 blocks.)

-- No cravings. I've actually had some bouts of nausea this past week, only at night. I doubt I'm eating as well as I should, but trying to get in some fruits and/or vegetables each day. And calcium. As of yesterday I had only gained 3 lbs on my home scale. Will see what doctor says next Tuesday. Here are a couple pics, I think I looked bigger last week actually but that the bump is moving upward now (I was also wearing a tighter tank-top last week).

-- Yesterday was our initial anatomy scan. They were testing out a new machine, so a guy who works for the company was in the room showing the tech all the fancy things it could do. And it was AWESOME! The quality of the images were amazing. You could see the difference between the bowels and the liver! We saw all the leaflets of the heart, the lenses on the eyes, the blood flow to the kidneys, all the fingers/toes, the knees and elbows -- seriously, every detail! You'll see from the pic that the quality was much better than the previous one.

(I can't decide if the face is in profile or looking at us. Looks more like an ear on the top than a nose, right? That graying streak by the mouth is b/c Mr. W folded the pic in his pocket while I was checking out.)

They said that everything was PERFECT. Curly weighs 7 ounces already! Still kinda hard to believe. We looked away when she scanned the genitalia, and I opted to not get a CD of the images b/c they would ALL be on there -- including the ones we don't want to see. So if we aren't going to look at the CD now, we for sure won't look at it after Curly arrives b/c wouldn't you rather look at the real baby? I will admit, it was super tempting to sneak a peak. But I'm happy to stay Team Green.

-- They also took blood yesterday (first stick!), for the final risk assessment for Down's and other anomalies. I'll get the results next week. Wasn't done at the hospital, so I can't look it up myself. I'm not worried, though.

-- We have a follow-up anatomy scan in 4 weeks -- well, closer to 5, b/c of the holidays. I like the way this place does the 3 scans as a series, and I don't even mind that b/c it's not at the hospital, I have to pay a little out of pocket ($60 for the NT scan). They are great there and it's so nice to see Curly doing so well.

-- I'm finally beginning to feel really attached to this pregnancy. I only think about the loss in terms of timing -- like how if I were due in March, I'd get a full maternity leave before leaving my job!! But otherwise, I feel like I'm so far out of the woods with this one that it's a little easier. (But it doesn't totally go away -- I did have a vision of them starting the scan to find that the baby was way too small and wouldn't survive.) I also think feeling movement makes a HUGE difference -- I can even feel when she responds to noises, or what I eat, or changes in my position! It's amazing.

-- I totally look pregnant. It's time to embrace my bump and not be so hung up on my size/weight gain. It's really hard; I've struggled with my weight my entire life. I saw a picture of my cousin who is due this month and immediately thought "OMG, I better not get that big!" But if the baby is healthy, that's all that matters, right? I can't do anything about my pre-pregnancy weight right now. So just need to enjoy the fact that Curly is growing inside me and not get so worried. Sigh.

-- We are traveling a LOT between now and 24 weeks, and I'm tired just thinking about it. Next weekend we leave for 2 days in Florida (visiting my family), then 5 nights in Jamaica! That is going to be unbelievable, I'm so excited. We have a week home, then flying to 'Bama for New Year's to see my grandparents again (my 90 year old grandpa hasn't been so great, so my mom insisted I find time to see him again before I couldn't travel, and this was seriously the only time). Will be home 2 weeks from that, then flying to Austin for 5 nights to visit my sister. Mr. W has never been there, so figured this would be a good chance for him to see it. After that, though, I imagine we won't go anywhere until July/August -- when we will probably be packing up and moving out of the city completely. It's gonna take me some time to get used to that.

Major Life Changes

All within one year's time:

• Get married -- check (December 11, 2011)
• Go on honeymoon -- check (January, 2012)
• Start TTC -- check (February, 2012)
• Move into new apartment -- check (March, 2012)
• Travel to Europe for 2 weeks -- check (May/June, 2012)
• Start new job as faculty member -- check (July, 2012)
• Get BFP -- check (July, 2012)
• Have a loss -- check (July, 2012)
• Get another BFP -- check (August, 2012)
• Deal with pregnancy after loss -- check (Sept/Oct/Nov, 2012)
• Lose job and decide to move to another state -- check (December, 2012)

Yup. Yesterday sucked big time. A little background -- when I graduated residency 2.5 years ago, I was told that to be hired in my division (general pediatrics), one had to complete a fellowship. So I arranged for a 2 year fellowship at my own program, with the promise of a faculty position at the end of those two years (as opposed to accepting a fellowship position at a better program at a different hospital).

Then, the person who hired me -- the chair of my division -- left our hospital. AND we got a new chair of the department. Rules changed. The following spring, they had shoes to fill in the division -- so they hired two girls who were straight out of residency, no fellowship training. Then one of those girls moved into a different spot after a year, so her job "opened up." When it came time to negotiate for my faculty position, they wanted to hire me to fill her spot. Which I didn't want to do! I have more training than that. But they dragged their feet for so long that I was basically forced into it -- it was too late to look for anything else. So I ended up with responsibilities that I didn't want, and a salary that was much lower than it should have been for someone with fellowship training. I sucked it up, knowing it was for a year, and vowed I would renegotiate for the following year. I love the people I work with, I love my patients, and I'm just not ready to leave this program yet.

So back to yesterday. I had gotten an email from the secretary of the Department Chair a couple weeks ago to set up a meeting -- I asked if it was about next year, she said yes, and I wrote back that she was clearly getting a head start! I figured she wanted to talk about changing needs of the division and where I could fit in best. But I was wrong. She just wanted to tell me that I won't be reappointed for next year -- she has to give me six months warning.

She started giving me a couple reasons -- basically all having to do with the one part of my job I never wanted to do and got suckered into doing (covering the well-baby nursery). I am sharing that aspect with another girl, and she was supposed to start in August but messed up and couldn't start til November. I thought I had been very flexible in covering a lot of extra days, but I could not cover the Jewish Holidays in October -- she was supposed to work those days, and I had always planned on being out. That was apparently not a team player thing to do, insist on someone else covering it. Then when I found out that I was being forced into keeping my Friday afternoon preceptor spot AND taking the Thursday night evening clinic spot, I had asked for Friday mornings as my administrative session, so I would be able to prepare for Shabbos. I had immediately followed that up by explaining I never intended to NOT be at work, but coming in at 8am is very different than coming in at 9:30am. She was apparently APPALLED that someone would ever ask for/state such a thing.

During the meeting, I started to explain myself on both of these. Then I just stopped. Why put in the effort to explain it? Clearly she's made her decision. She wants to hire people without any training to fill spots they are never going to keep past 1-2 years? Fine. She's making a HUGE mistake, when she would hire/keep people who have clear devotion to the program, a desire to stay in academics, and training for and the desire to do research and publish on behalf of her program. What an idiot. And a bitch.

After the BFP(s), and realizing how expesnive it would be to stay in NYC to raise a child, our plan had been to stay here another couple years, b/c I love the people I work with and my patients. After that we would move closer to my family, and Mr. W would be able to take "reciprocity" in a few other states -- pass the bar without studying for it, basically. So now my hand has been chosen for me, and we'll move this summer. I imagine we'll move sometime in August, when baby will be 8-10 weeks old. Hopefully to Atlanta, if I can find a job to start Sept/Oct. Since I won't be able to start July 1st, which is the start of the academic year, I have VERY little chance of finding an academic position. So on to private practice it is! Something I never wanted to do, but maybe I can find a part-time position that will likely pay what I'm making now to work 60 hours/week.

My assumption (and I need to find out for sure) is that I will get maternity leave through June 30th, when my contract expires. Then I"ll be on my own until starting something new. I was expecting 6 weeks paid/6 weeks unpaid, so really the loss is in the benefits -- and Cobra is freaking expensive, especially for 3 people. After 6 years there, I won't even get a full maternity leave!! Plus since the Jewish holidays are early in September this year, and it doesn't make sense to start a new job immediately by asking for 8 days off, I'll probably start something in October -- so an extra month with no pay/benefits. Plus moving expenses, and baby expenses! There goes all our savings. So I'm sure we'll be renting a place for a few years, and not buying anything. Oh well. (I could theoretically apply for unemployment, but only for as long as we are still in NY state and officially you have to be willing to accept a new job, which doesn't work for maternity leave -- so I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place there.)

It also means -- and I will for sure talk to my OB about this -- that if I go past my due date, I won't even get the 6 weeks of paid maternity leave. So either I can start leave early (before baby arrives), or I'll be looking at a non-medical reason for an induction. I'm guessing the former will end up happening, which is fine. It'll give me a firm "last day" and let me plan in terms of coverage and handing off my patients to other providers.

If this was going to happen, I guess now is the best time. I was prepared to not like what they were offering me and to leave anyway, but at least then it would have been my choice. But better to leave now and start over fresh now then to decide to leave after we have a full routine figured out with the baby. And now I REALLY don't feel bad about not buying/preparing for baby, since we'll likely be moving so soon -- no need to buy furniture or anything else that I don't absolutely need. Can buy it all once we have a place with enough room!

I didn't sleep well last night, so I called in sick today. Feels good to just hang out on my couch. I think I'm done wallowing -- although I'm not done with my anger toward the chair/department -- and ready to start figuring things out. Although Mr. W and I agreed to wait til January before really doing anything, since we are traveling so much this month. It's unlikely I'll be able to find a job now for October anyway, but I should start calling in contacts and everything. Sigh. Lots to do!

Coming later today: posts about being 17 weeks (anatomy scan!!), and about the future of this blog. :-)