My Lady of the Lantern

Because my doctor screamed NNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOO! for these: I am replacing all of that with the right food to get strapping pregnant! HeeHaw! ^WiseGuy^ Meanwhile, I am out to not get sued by openly claiming that I did not make the pics....got them from the sweet Berners-Lee invention and want to let the rights rest wherever they are!

My streak of super-comments is uninterrupted. One of our acquaintances has welcomed a newborn on January 26th into their family. I spent few hours with them on that day. I visited them again last night. I was coming out of the nursing home, just as the paternal grandmother was entering. I congratulated her and she replied, positively beaming Awww, now you too have to give us some good news soon. Somebody get me a drilling machine, please! This good news business is cracking me up really. ^WiseGuy^

With the riding risk of sounding profound for my hundredth post , the burden of which is gleefully abandoned, I just want to focus on the mundane barren existence that I lead. I wonder how long will it be when people/families/relatives/peers may believe that we are that one couple they know, who may never have any kids. And so even though we end up being loved uncle and aunts, we may never be loved parents. I was taking leave of relatives we (me, my parents and hubby) went to meet last evening. As I was about to deposit myself in the warm confines of the car, the parting remark made at me was And S, now give us some good news quickly! I smiled back (yes, I did) and replied whether she despised my freedom. It was a silent blow for me and a kind I am slowly learning to handle very well. I have never fumbled for answers, ever! But I used to be emotionally hit by the remarks first and then would come out with suitable responses (process taking nanoseconds). However, there seems to be some ...

I have a winner! In the previous post , I had asked for some sequencing to be done and guesses to be made at my latest pic! I want to thank absolutely everybody for making guesses. And one gorgeous lady really did crack it! It is *T* ! Hooray! I had asked that which of them was my most recent pic. The right answer is B. Several bloggers guessed this correct - Cassandra , Lindsay , awakeintheworld , K , Another Dreamer , Cara , Gina and Kev , areyoukiddingme and momofonefornow . The second question pertained to arranging the pics from the oldest to the youngest. The right answer is CDAB. Only *T* hit the bullseye here! Pic C was taken in November 2005. It is of a vacation. That time, I wore my hair absolutely straight, the way they are naturally. Pic D was taken on a cruise in November 2006. I had my hair permed then. Pic A was taken in December 2007. The perm was gone and I had my hair in steps. What is not visible in the pic is the red streaks in my hair. Pic B was clicked in Decem...

Welcome to the Show and Tell of this week… I am doing it early because I now have ICLWers dropping by (If you want a basic recap, go through the sidebar). This time, what I am showing to you is ME! There are a few pictures that I am going to post here. You have to answer two things: a) Which of them is my latest? Clue: I look like a dead fish lately [don't worry, I don't smell like one :)] b)Sequence the pictures from oldest to most recent [something like, a b c d or d a b c etc.] Note that none of my pictures is older than November 2005. OPTION - A ///Picture deleted on January 29, 2009 coz I am chicken! OPTION - B ///Picture deleted on January 29, 2009 coz I am chicken! OPTION - C ///Picture deleted on January 29, 2009 coz I am chicken! OPTION - D ///Picture deleted on January 29, 2009 coz I am chicken! He He He....Go do your answers in the comment section. Have a nice weekend. And you go back to the circle here! ^WiseGuy^ P.S. I have taken a huge personal risk this time. I ...

Saturday - DH comes home....I give a big hug - things are looking up! Hug in progress, DH gets a case of roaming hands - all units on stand-by, push hard, get away from me! Hug ends! Sunday - make prebreakfast snack - things are looking up! DH off to office, comes back for a quick bite - sees that there is a power cut, changes settings on the invertor - things are certainly looking up. Sometime in the evening, there is a mini-quarrel. Slaps (friendly fire) ensue. His hit is too hard - I bawl, things start to look down. Anyways, I am trying to let the tears continue, but again, something removes the need to be teary eyed. Next, he goes out and gets me soft drinks (Yipee) and oranges (WooHoo), things are looking up! Night, I call him to bed - why don't you get enough sleep, reduce TV watching? "Will I get something tonight?", there is the child-see-cake twinkle in his eyes. Ahem! Things are returning back to track! ^WiseGuy^ (P.S. One of these days, while the euphoria las...

This week, I am posting what I have pasted in my office cabin: This is not an original quote. I read it in Reader's Digest a long time back. However, I remembered it very recently and just put it up for fun. My colleagues still look at at quizzically. :) And the Aloha has to be said here ...where Mel has won the Best Medical/Health Weblog Award for 2008! ^WiseGuy^

Well, I have been particularly grumbling and cribbing lately. Somehow I can’t get through to DH the way I want to. I get misunderstood so fast that I have started wondering if there is something fantastically wrong with my communication skills. I have quite a temper and I when I flare, the heat can be felt from any distance. Hubby dearest has recently taken upon himself to correct my human flaws and shape me into a perfect housekeeper and wife. I hate that when I am in a sour mood, DH would much rather count further mistakes I made, rather than trying to take away the pall on me. He wants me to ‘see the reality’ . You really want me to see further darkness, when I am already in the pits? One of the recent statements he has started making is – “ Don’t take out your doctor’s anger on me ”. I hate it. It hurts so much, but nothing on my face makes him understand that he is really pinching a raw wound. I am angry. And if I can’t share my feelings unrestrained with him, what kind of compani...

I am crying... as of now, my cheeks are wet following a breakdown I had, while in a phone chat with mom. My mother is now working as an OB/GYN with the same centre where I went for my IVF w/ICSI. Today she was chatting up a nurse (who gave me most of the shots and miscellaneous), and the nurse said that S must try and lose some weight. My mother told her that I was already on that path. That is it! That's when I just cracked with seething rage. I told my mother that if ever doctors or their associates give me this crackpot advice, I am going to ask them to write 5000 times , in their own handwriting: S will get pregnant for sure, if she loses weight. Since there is nothing else to really tweak in me, the commonest jab seems to be weight issue. Hell, I am seriously considering asking DH to start smoking, just to improve my chances! By my doctor's logic, some of my SILs should have never conceived (they did!), and druggie cousins should have been impotent and infertile for 400 ...

Time: Today Morning, when we were pseudo-ready to jump out of bed. Situation: A financial review of 2008 (not exactly a dream year in a lot of respects) DH: Mmm… and the price of that land is down x percent, and the real estate rates on that house have slipped y percent….and z month’s salary has been invested into the share market, so I can’t make a deposit out of it and can’t touch it for p years…. BTW, would you be doing IVF w/ICSI again this year ? Me: ( Mentally- Damn right, I will ). Of Course. But we are not to do anything till March, you know! DH: Last time it cost us $$$$$, and still there is no guarantee that it will work out this time. Me: ( Mentally – Yeah, but what if it does? ) There is no guarantee, but I am doing it. Momentary Silence… DH: There will be no savings this year. The last statement is too severe. But I did not want to cut in and spoil DH’s sense of financial calculation superiority complex . Frankly, I know that IF treatments are pinching us financially...

I took a right turn to come to the arterial road...saw a dog barking at(?) a black trash can. The scene got inscribed. Cut to the next bend, I am still wondering what was the dog barking at? Did somebody leave a newborn inside? Of course, it is possible. There are instances of baby-throwing, thanks to abject poverty and other oft-quoted reasons. Cut to the path leading into my office parking, I have already decided the gender of the baby. If it was a baby, I am sure it was a baby girl. That's right, somebody dumped a newborn girl in the trash can and the dog was barking at it. Am I thinking cruel? Don't judge me, I am turning queer and I admit it. I actually thought all this up. Of course, it is all in my mind. The next time I pass that trash can would be a few hours from now, when I am on my way home. By that time, the dog would have disappeared and there would be no trace of the baby, because there was no baby there to begin with. ^WiseGuy^

She came! Not banging yet....hope for less bleeding, less pain and no more than five days of usual engagement! ^WiseGuy^

AF was expected on January 8th (unless my math has gone down the drain). I am still waiting for it to bang on my doors. How sad is that? The wait is unnerving. It's like being on a No-Man's Land, where you don't know where you will land eventually. I am hoping that it arrives soon, so that I can plan the rest of this month and especially February accordingly. I don't even want to mention the possibility of something else being the reason of AF not arriving. I don't get strike-lucky. Four Years in the saddle have taught me that well. ^WiseGuy^

Saw this cool thing on Sharonvw 's blog and gave it a shot. She was yellow and I came out to be ________. Your rainbow is intensely shaded green and violet.               What is says about you: You are an intelligent person. You appreciate beauty and craftsmanship. Those around you admire your fresh outlook and vitality. You are patient and will keep trying to understand something until you've mastered it. Find the colors of your rainbow at spacefem.com. It's fun! What's your colour? And this is where I was sitting on seat no. 8! ^WiseGuy^

So, I entered The Steadfast Warrior 's battlefield and got stuck in a song duel. I was told that I could get out of the warp with a song/vid that best reflected my state of mind right now. So, here it goes! Please meet the mirror mask - Annie Lennox's No More I Love Yous The original video of the song is available on YouTube, but the embedding is restricted. So, I picked up the alternate video to post here. You are tagged - if you want to continue the duel. Just let me know that you are my bro/sis-in-arms and send me a link to the post you do. ^WiseGuy^

I will tell you what I want to do right now. Go sit on a bench in a park and watch the greenery, observe children playing cricket and dogs relieving themselves. But I can’t have that comfort. It’s night already, so all the children are in, it is too dark to see the green around me and there is no park close to my home, which affords me the comfort of a bench. Sarcastic? Not really. Something is literally hanging in the air. The air around me is pregnant with meaning and thoughts and ideas. Did I use the word pregnant? Yes, without flinching at all. It looks so easy – people sit in parks and stare and then go back home to their lovers and husbands and boyfriends and pets and children and their jobs! Yeah, that’s what we see in the movies. I am thinking of enrolling in a weight loss program. I still do not think I am ‘obese’. I am certainly overweight – disproportionately but that can’t be the only reason for my infertility from hell. Doctors do not find anything else not working for me...

I have still not recounted my ICLW experience. I have been on that list for the past three months, I believe. But the December 2008 experience was the most active one. Prior to December, I had a very ad hoc way of covering the list. I only got back to people who left comments on mine (I am pathetic, I know!). In December as well, I did not really aim to be an Iron Commentator. However, what I aimed at was covering the list as much as possible and more systematically than before . And the fact that I read about 52 blogs (several of them new for me) made the exercise very rewarding. I have left comments on 95 percent of the blogs. This really was serious fun. It is easier to cover the Show and Tell participants because they are more limited and I have found that the group which is active on that list is mostly common to every week. Since S&T happens more frequently, it is easier for me to maintain continuity and a sense of direction as to what that blogger/blog normally talks about a...

I feel twitching/ghost cramps in my lower abdomen. The cramps last for a few seconds and go away on their own. Have you ever experienced it? I know it is all in my mind but I do feel them. Will it go away on its own? Is it psychosomatic? Should I talk to my doctor about it? ^WiseGuy^

The Bell Jar was what I read when 2008 was about to end. When I was in school I had a Plath's poem in my curriculum. Before every chapter, a short bio of the author(s) was provided. That is when I had heard first about this book. I finally found the book after so many years and read through. I am fascinated by Sylvia Plath's life and its tragic ending. The fact that this book is almost autobiographical increased the value of the book for me. The book's ending left me a bit dissatisfied. It actually appeared that one more paragraph would have brought it to a more conclusive ending. Maybe I hoped that a few more pages would have taken me deeper into Plath's life? Anyways there are certain parallels between Esther and me: a. Her appetite. Esther had a healthy appetite and it is such a refreshing break from women who are too fussy about how little their tiny waists can accommodate. b. The fact that she can't handle intimacy well. Esther's closest friend is Doree...

Was browsing through the newspaper today morning and they had an article on the babies born after 12 o'clock on New Year's eve. Wow! I can't really describe to you how there was photo after photo of chuggly-wuggly pink cheeked cuties! (Nine in all) The newspaper reported that the city had registered 205 births on the first two days of 2009! Some statistics that is not anything to me at all. Anyways...I was only observing the faces and what has registered to me now, is that I did not feel upset or angry or lacking. I only saw the pics, relished the radiance flowing from them and that is all. Buddhaesque? I think I must become more disciplined with my Vipassana sittings, which I have lost the inner urge for. My past experiences have taught me to expect breakthroughs only after reaching the ultimate limits of frustration. When I went for IVF last year, I believed that I had reached that limit and so, some positive outcomes would come my way as had happened in the past. But now...