Low

My fertility monitor arrived yesterday. I put the batteries in all excited to start ‘er up and then I sat down to read the instruction booklet. First it said several thousand times on the box, on several pages of the book and even in the flyer inside the box of test sticks, that no product can guarantee conception. Yeah, I was hoping for that money back guarantee myself. Oh well.

I read about how to turn it on, how to use the test sticks, what the little symbols mean and what you are supposed to do in response. I read about low days, high days and peak days. I read about how you aren’t supposed to store the monitor in the bathroom because moisture could get into the machine and screw up the electronics. That is just so damn convenient isn’t it? An appliance that requires pee sticks to function should not be stored where, you know, you pee!

I read that I must wait until this morning to press the M button. The M button sets the time that you will use the contraption on a daily basis. You have a six-hour window of opportunity here. If you think that you will be making your first morning pee sometime between 6 am and noon then you hit the M button (does that mean menstruating, morning or motherfucking irritating? I’m not sure yet.) at 9am which gives you three hours before (6am) and three hours after (noon) as a window of waking times. Now, normally I get up between 5:15 and 5:30 during the week. I typically sleep in until 8 or 9 on the weekends but I have been known to sleep in until 10 on very rare occasions. I decided I needed to push the M button at 8am which would give me the 5 to 11 window. 8am no problem right? Well, except that at 8am I have already been at work for an hour. So, I smuggled the monitor into the office in my purse. I watched the clock like a hawk for an hour (yeah, I got a lot done) then I stuffed the monitor into my sweatshirt pocket (Friday is casual day, I LOVE Friday) and walked very casually toward the ladies room as if that green tea had just all of a sudden become noticeable in my bladder.

I turned on the monitor, I pushed the M button and set it for CD5 and it gave me the Low reading for the day. OK, I’m good to go.

My period started on Monday. Well, sort of. I started spotting Sunday, pretty normal dark brown, thick but with lots of mucus this time. Monday was more spotting, very thick and still mucus-like but it picked up and thinned out in the afternoon so I called it CD 1 and started a new chart. Tuesday was very light, then Wednesday I was back to spotting again. Yesterday I didn’t even wear a pantyliner. Of course my mind thought, wow, I wonder if it was actually implantation instead of AF. I didn’t have the usual cramps and have been feeling very cysty the last few days. Hmmm. So this morning I checked my chart and we are 13DPLSE (13 days past last sexual encounter) which wasn’t anywhere near what O should have been so I’m finding this highly unlikely. Probably annovulatory, maybe.

Tomorrow we will repeat T’s SA. Yes, I said we. I am very involved in this whole process apparently. No magazines or movies for my man, he wants it live! He noticed that I didn’t wear underwear to bed last night. The sign that AF is in town. He said “So, can you get some now?” I hesitated and said “Well, yeah, but I think we might jumpstart things again if we did it this soon.” He thinks it is highly unfair that he wants some, I can have some but we have to wait because of the SA. Poor guy. Last night in his sleep he rolled over to my side of the bed and I thought if he didn’t wake up the test would be shot and we would have to reschedule it. I was able to push him away from me and he rolled back over and continued sleeping. (He does that a lot actually, will roll over to me IN HIS SLEEP and start things and then wake up half way through and realize what we are doing. I of course am awakened right from the beginning and usually start out annoyed by the interruption in my sleep, but he is asleep and doesn’t respond to my protests. Sometimes he even remembers it in the morning. The thing is, its usually good, so I don’t mind so much.) The last SA was mostly good. Morphology was good, motility was good, the count was… low… according to the lab standards. We are hoping that the vitamins have done their job and he will be in normal range this time.

What else is low? Hope. I’m not depressed; I just don’t feel optimistic in the least. I mean nothing at all would convince me that all we need to do is this one other thing and then we’ll get pregnant. I just don’t see it. Of course, this goes back to my whole reverse psychology theory. Pregnancy will come up from behind and whap me on the back of the head like a 2 x 4 when I am least expecting it. Isn’t that how it goes?
OK, anytime then, I’m ready!
I’m NOT expecting it so, you know, whenever is good for you…
Hmm.