10.30.2004

My Latest Obsession

OK, so I've really tried to set this aside. To not think about it, but I suppose it's the proverbial elephant in the room that I can't ignore no matter how much I want to. I lay in bed trying to fall asleep, and it just circles around and around in my head.
I desperately want to be a mother. I have dreamt of my children. I don't know if my dreams are just my wishful thinking or if they were a promise of children to come. How much of this desire for children is me being strong-willed and wanting my way in the matter, and how much of it is the frustration of a perceived promise delayed? I doubt myself, I doubt my promise, I doubt...everything. I sincerely believe that children are a gift from God, and I live in fear that at some point, I will be blessed with a pregnancy only to do something to mess things up. That the medicine I take to control my arthritis will hurt the baby, that I'll clean out the kitty boxes without realising that I'm pregnant and I'll lose the baby I've dreamt of for so long.
I was double checking the medicines I was taking after being prescribed a new one. I realised that I had not asked whether or not the medicine would be safe if I became pregnant, and I wanted to look over all the medicines I was taking to try to make an informed decision about whether or not it might be safe to take them. Every month, I desperately wonder if this is the month we conceived. I take pregnancy tests wondering if the heartburn that's lasted a week is because I'm pregnant. And then it's like a new heart break when the test comes out negative. I want to be certain that nothing I am doing is standing in the way of a successful conception and a healthy baby. Then I realise obsessing over it is of no use; obsession won't get me pregnant, and the stress is actually bad for my chances.
Anyway...I realised that one of the medicines I was on, a progesterone replacement, is listed as an FDA class D Drug. Meaning: we have done enough studies to know that if you take this medicine while you are pregnant, your baby has a higher risk of birth defects. Now, my husband has tried to reassure me that those types of effects are only for women who have an excess of progesterone in their system. That I don't have enough progesterone in my system anyway, so the drug won't be dangerous for me or my child, that it won't act as contraceptive (which all the information I've read seems to indicate is one of it's uses, and one of the brand names is Depo-Provera...which IS birth control). That this drug is not taking my progesterone levels to the levels that are dangerous...that it's just getting to the levels that should be normal. I went to my doctor's office Friday morning to get some answers, but he wasn't in. The longer I sat there, watching pregnant women come and go, seeing a young woman who didn't look pregnant walk out with a "mom-to-be" kit. I was jealous. I was frustrated. I want to be the one carrying the "mom-to-be" kit. I want to be the one for whom the doctor was delayed...delivering my baby, so I could bring him or her home and take care of him or her. I won't be a perfect mother. No one is. But I know I could be a good mother, a loving mother.
I want an answer. I want my doctor to explain to me that everything my husband proposes is right, and here's the blood test I ran to be certain I gave you the right dose. I trusted him. I want to find out that this fear is insane and irrational. I'd much rather have crazy fears that can be explained away. I'm going in Monday to talk to him, hoping that it won't be too awkward in the office after I behaved badly there Friday. I was very upset, but that doesn't excuse me behaving like a two-year old throwing a temper tantrum. I just don't know.
I'm tired. I'm sore. I refuse to take any pills until I've figured out how much I should be concerned by their side-effects. Everytime I lay down, the questions run around and around in my head.
I made myself a glass of cocoa with warm milk hoping I'd fall back to sleep this morning...and thought about how my kids would say when they got older "Mom used to make us rich warm cocoa at night before bed," and so it goes. So here's hoping that blogging the obsession helps to get me over it. In the meantime, I'm gonna go try to rest on the couch and maybe get some sleep. I hope.

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