theoddsock.com

We are currently in the throes of a heatwave here in East Anglia. And I hate it!

Our back garden, mostly lawn, is now golden, dry and spikey on the feet; like a large door mat. I’ve not ventured out much other than to give my fledgling lavender bushes a drink. I really do not like this heat. I do like being warm but when its freezing cold outside. You can put more on to get warm, there is a limit to how much you can take off when its hot, especially if you are at work.

The commute back from Cambridge has been pretty horrible. I leave the office around 3pm for the train station which is just under a mile away, perhaps closer. However, there is no real shade, so by the time I have reached the station I feel baked right through. Also the office dress code and my own adversion to wearing a skirt in public without tights doesn’t help. Then I sit and bake on the train from Cambridge to Hitchin for about 35 minutes and then wait for 20 minutes for my train to Biggleswade which is at least a 10 minute trip. Then another shadeless hike home which is about 15 minutes away. By the time I get to my front door I feel quite giddy from the heat and madly fumble for keys while the sun bakes my back. Then I need to be alert to prevent an elderly stone deaf cat from sneaking out.

It is due to this self-same cat that we are unable to open any of our windows beyond a crack as she will be up and out of them before you know it.

Our old idea of going to the artic circle for a holiday is becoming more and more attractive, but with various commitments we will have to content ourselves with looking at the brochure while sitting in front of the open freezer.

They, or so I am told by my mother in Ireland, keep promising that the weather will break (I think its pretty broken as it is) I do hope so. Today it is cloudy, that continuous low blue-grey off-white, but still very bright, it reminds me of the construct program in The Matrix. Added to which I’ve had a continuous headache since Monday.

Sunday, however. was very nice indeed. Not least because there was a decent breeze, but because we spent most of the day up in Peterborough at the home of a work colleague of mine. Well technically my boss in that she is the internal coms manager and I am the intranet code monkey. However we both have similar interests beyond work, which if you look at code for a living you need to have in order to fulfil the living part of life. We spent the whole day outside under their lovely cherry tree which had been bedecked the previous day for her daughter’s birthday.

We had some fabulous lasagna and some naughty deserts, Amanda had made a wonderful homemade fruit brulee, I made brownies out of a box (I’m not a good desert maker, which is just as well if I want to keep what figure I have!). We, assorted husbands and children (not mine of course not having any but we were very impressed with Amanda’s children; at 13 and nearly 16 they were definitely young people, friendly, personable and eager to join in on the conversation; not the usual brand of non-communicative hunched-up sullen mobile phone addicted teenagers that seem to be sadly so prevelant), hit it off immediately and had such a good time chatting that 7pm crept up on us and we had to go home.

Hopefully however it won’t be long before the 6 of us get together again.

Well not quite, but they should be soon!

On Monday we had our appointment at Bourn Hall, a private fertility clinic. After nearly 3 hours there we came away feeling that we had spent the best £150 in our lives and felt that each and every member of staff we had encountered fully deserved their cut of the initial consultation fee.

Everyone that we met was very efficient and friendly. We were booked in for an hour session with the counsellor prior to the consultation. However, due to the amount of research Jon and I had done by reading articles on the Donor Conception Network site, and the fact that Jon was raised by a stepfather, and our intention to not hide any potential childs genetic origins, meant that the session was wrapped up neatly in about 30 minutes.

We then had a very good talk with the consultant and decided that to begin with we would try using IUI. While this has only a 10-15% success rate, less than IVF it is a far less invasive procceedure requiring less drugs and general poking and prodding; it is also cheaper. He urged us to not give up after 3 cycles as the more cycles you do the more your chances improve. Since I will only be 27 when we start I may be lucky. But I’m making no assumptions; to be doing anything about it will be fulfilment enough for the time being.

We will not be starting immediately. But the knowledge that when I phone up on day 1 they see me on day 3 and the cycle of treatment starts when I want, is extremely heartening.

The reason we will not be starting immediately? Well it seemes that my history of irregularly lengthed cycles, possibly anovulary (where there were no eggs) is a sign of PCOS, Polycystic Ovarian Syndrom so I will be taking medication that I was on before that evens things out. They want to make sure they don’t over stimulate the ovaries as this could lead to a condition where your blood vessels become porous! It is an endochrine problem and related, it seems, to insulin resistance, which explains alot! So for 3 months I will be taking medication and after that has had time to ’set the stage’ I just phone up and let them know I want to do a cycle!

Yes, I am, in effect, being asked to wait another 3 months. But in all honesty with the way work and other bits and pieces are at the moment (super-mega-hyper-busy). I wasn’t considering starting until October.

So, all in all, feeling very good and positive about it!