So thats why I am tired!

The results of my hormone test has come in. There seems to be nothing wrong although the test was for day 21 so I need to go in again to get the test again.

But my iron results came back and I am not surprised that I have been tired, but I am surprised I have been functioning! My iron is meant to be in between 10-30, and it was 3.2! So there you go!

Janette came up this weekend and we had a good time together. She is such a lovely person. We did some shopping, went for a walk, scrapped and watched DVDs. It was a nice relaxed weekend. I also managed to finish off a lego system that I am super proud of.

So that's what you really think!

Janette and Karen were very good friends for years. Janette even flew down from Darwin to celebrate Karen's 30th birthday which ended up being a rather non-eventful "Girls night in".

So when Janette moved from Darwin to Brisbane and needed a place to stay while she found a house Karen was more than happy to help. But two weeks turned into six weeks as they found it unusually difficult to find a house. Janette's dog Diva was fighting with Karen's dogs. So I took Diva for a month while Janette sorted their housing.

There was no blow up, but there was a negative vibe between the two of them. I don't have much to do with Janette because she lives an hour away. But occasionally she likes something on my facebook and she is a very loving person.

She has absolutely copped it these last 14 months though. She had trouble finding her house, then she found that most of her stuff she had stored in the trailer which was covered well with tarps had been wrecked by mold from the near constant rain we had. Then her eldest child dropped out of school. Her husband left her and moved to South Australia. Then her youngest child decided to move to SA to be with his Dad, which was the worst idea ever as Mark is a selfish, rough, deliberately intimidating man.

So two nights ago Janette pops up on my facebook. She has a weekend off and would like to come and visit. We talk about going to the beach, maybe catching up with Karen as she hasn't seen her since she moved out. We talk about how her oldest can play computers with Jason and my boys and everything seems great. Then she messages "had some shitty news and would just like to make some time up with u guys". I reply "Hey that sounds serious, is it your health?" and she says "yes". 

Janette is a tough girl, she has had mini strokes before, and with her taking a line like that, I am fearing for her. Obviously she wants to talk about it in person, so I am going to wait until she comes up on the weekend. 

So the next day go about setting up the coffee with Karen for Janette. It goes like this - Me: "Hey honey, how are you going? Are you free for a coffee this Saturday?". 

Karen: "Hey not bad you? Sorry heading up to meet my new niece this weekend". 

 Me: "Oh how exciting! Enjoy meeting the new little one x We will catch up soon. Jay was coming up and wanted to see you. Next time."

Karen: "have fun catching up with her".

Is it just me or does that comment sound a little bitchy? 

 Me: "She messaged me last night, shes going through a rough time. I think women need to stick together as life gets pretty rough sometimes. She wants to catch up with you but is scared you don't want to."

<no reply> Several hours later...


Karen: "I was hoping to just let this all go and we would just catch up sporadically as I don't really have the energy or inclination to explain myself. First of all I was not impressed you stepped in when it had nothing to do with you regarding Janette etc. Secondly it is up to Janette to contact me as frankly she owes me far more than an apology and I have received nothing from her. I don't particularly care if she is scared as she has to make the first move. Thirdly I don't really care that she is going through a rough time as she didn't really care when i was needing help"

"I don't expect you to understand why i feel like this and i also don't really care what your opinion of it is as this is how i feel and i am entitled to my feelings."

"As for women sticking together well you only seem to feel like this as long as it's on your terms so i really am not interested at all."

"You have asked why i don't spend a lot of time with you recently it's because you always have an opinion on my life and seem to beat me over the head with it but if i offer any advice to you well i couldn't possibly know what i am talking about..."

"I frankly don't have the energy as i have my little girl to care for and that is the most amazing thing to me so i only see people if i have the time after her needs are met and of course i have some time with rick"

"You don't need to reply to this and if we are no longer friends then that's fine too. I guess i have felt like this for a while but didn't really have the time to get it down succinctly enough without babbling or getting really angry and hurt like when i first had these feelings"

Picture me like this ????  And then I realise I am done. I can not believe she would speak like that, and I do not believe what she accused me of. It has been coming for a while I guess, and I am done. I have changed her settings on facebook so that I no longer get her notifications. I am not going to contact her, although I will respond if she contacts me. 

Even though I am done with her. I don't like to burn bridges. So I respond with this: "It sounds like I have been quite rude to you, and I am sorry as I never meant to offend you."

Karen: "Thank you so much for saying that".

"I have felt like this for a little while but i just didn't have the head space to really deal with it"

"I was just so hurt by Janette..we were friends for 10 years..."

"She does love you. I guess I laid it on too thick with the parenting advice?"

"yeah but to be fair it's not just you...Tara does too and other people. It just frustrates me because no one takes anything i say seriously as if what would i know....but i know a lot of things and i am not a moron..."

 "I think you're a fantastic mum"

"thanks :)"

Before I close this chapter I would like to add that newborns take up a lot more of first time around mother's time than second time around mums. From my perspective, she doesn't have to work, she bottle feeds and her baby sleeps 7 hours a night. I don't see where this huge commitment of "meeting baby's needs" is coming from. Karen has not yet learned that she looks after her babies needs by having a life herself and getting out and about to safe places and taking the baby along with her. It seems quite clear that she doesn't want anybody to tell her. I wish her well, I am sure I will cross paths with her in our random future. But for the foreseeable future: I am so done.
 

Its good to have a few parties

My main objective for this year was to slow down and take care of everyone's physical and mental health. So that meant not hosting any official parties.

Well that went right out the window when I realised that Jason's birthday was about to suck!

I arranged for his friends to meet him for an hour of laser tag and arcade games. Then we went out to our favourite chinese restaurant. We ordered heaps of dishes and split the bill, including dessert it was $18 each!

Then he had a surprise net con. I made jewellery with the girls and everyone felt comfortable and stayed for the weekend. I had a really good time, and the house looks great (nothing like a good spring clean before a party).

I gained a kilo from the adventure but my house is cleaner and I am motivated to keep going.

Its a balance :)

Trip to the Uni

The trip to uni went really well. Geordie was excited not to have to go to school. He was an angel all day. Hes my special little one :)   There was a lot of people there at orientation week so it had a very different feel :)  Its changed a lot since I went there in 1997, but somethings never change. Here he is infront of the beautiful sandstone buildings which line the great court. 

It was nice to show him a massive library, which is only one of 24 libraries the university has. Here he is sitting in a lecture hall with fold out desks. 

 Geordie's favourite parts were eating pizza and walking over the bridge.

That pizza place was there when I went to uni and I know it was there long before that too. It is still incredibly fine pizza :) and only $11 :) Gotta love university prices :)










I wish they had a bridge when I was living near the uni. I used to pay a dollar each way to get across the ferry.

 After going to the uni we headed to Chermide shopping centre to get some pearl tea. We both love that stuff :) Its nice to know someone who enjoys it as much as me.

I decided to let him build a bear. Here he is holding down the pedal while the bear stuffs.

We chose a sound to go in his hand and a strawberry scent patch. He had a choice between putting in on his tummy or on his butt.





 Hes a seven year old boy...what do  you think he chose?


That's right! And he found it absolutely hilarious x

Here he is filling out  Elmo's birth certificate. And they even have a bear promise as well. It was such a nice experience. I want to take Jules on his special Mum day :)





After that Geordie had a chance to see Jules' Autism Queensland School. He has been wanting to see it for a long time so he found that special.

Pretty nice digs :)

Jules loves the freedom of the spring free trampolines! The school has 3 of these big, beautiful tramps :)

Tired, so tired

Ahhh yes, now I remember the real reason why I began walking daily. So that I would have more energy. I can't believe how lethargic I have been lately. Tommorow I am going to take Geordie out of school so that he can have a tour of The University of Queensland, or UQ. I will have a good chance to get a walk in then.

My instinct is that I am not going to get pregnant this round. I am going to obsess about it as little as possible, I really don't need a repeat of last months disaster!

I had a big chat about it with Jase, We are both scared of having another little one, its been so long since we had a baby and they do turn your life upside down. I had a big chat with Jason last night trying to determine where his head is at. He said that he wants a baby, but not as much as me, and he too worries about the same things.

Let the tests begin!

Fertility tests got done today. The doctor wanted it to be timed for ovulation, but I am fairly sure the 21 day test is to check that you have ovulated. I saw the doctor to make sure and then got the test done today which is ovulation day.

This is easily the best work up to ovulation we have ever had. We have sperm from the 5th, 3rd and day before ovulation so its looking good. What is extra impressive is that Jason has managed to get there each time we have gone for it, even last night when he felt a bit ill.

I am grateful as for the cauliflower veggie soup I cooked up a few days ago. It is so yummy and its great to have insta-great-food available when we are hungry. I found tossing in some spinach leaves is quick, palatable, healthy and bulks it out a bit.

When I was in the doctors office I saw my father in law there and I really couldn't avoid him so I said hi and started chatting. He asked why I was at the doctors and I lied and said its because my arm hurts. (It does hurt, but that wasn't why I was there). Then my mother in law rang to worry about my heart, and recommended weight loss and physiotherapy. Thank god I didn't tell them the real reason I was there. I don't want people to wonder even more about when/if/how I will get pregnant.

I have no money and a messy house so it is officially a no shopping week. Instead I got a good book from the library and had a 2 hour nap and then went about washing sheets and tidying my room up.

Jules is getting a belly from eating too much cheese and cake after school. So I pointed to his belly and said that he is getting fat and that he needed to eat more vegetables that vegetables were the answer to weight loss. He touched my belly and seemed to be understanding that that is what I mean by fat. The next day he asks for a carrot from the fridge, there was none. He asked if the cucumber was a vegetable and I said yes that would be good for him to eat if he was hungry. He then gave it to me, I took a bite and he literally expected me to transform like magic into a slim person! LOL bless, kids keep you surprised and laughing :)

The girls got away!

It has been a very busy weekend :) First we took the kids to circus :) Look at these two cuties :)

Then Jason dropped me off at at Karen J's house and Michelle came and picked us and Nikki up and off went to our mini holiday!

We laughed our heads off on the drive to the gold coast. We were telling the giggly private stories that close girls tell when no-one else is around:)



We arrived at our beautiful hotel room and then set up our afternoon tea (also my lunch :). I brought watermelon and grapes and banana bread. All the food was pretty much off the calorie scale :) So I ate a couple of bits of fruit between each treat.

An amazing afternoon tea which was so comfortable and yummy. With the wine we think it would have cost about $50 a head so we were very pleased with ourselves. And we had no time limit!

After the food we just flopped on the couch, to relax and digest lol. At this point I noticed my voice was starting to go! Too much talking! So I started to pace myself, and my voice lasted the night.

The other girls were feeling the same so I pulled out my beading box for the girls to share. Sue, Michelle and Nikki had never made jewellery before so it was a pleasure to show them how easy it is to make necklaces and earrings :) All that concentrating also gave our voices a chance to recover :)

Still full from our afternoon tea, and proud of our jewellery creations we were ready for a change of pace. We had time for a dip in the pool. Swimming at night is lovely :)

We had a shower, popped on some heels and called a cab to go to dinner.

The cab arrived almost immediately :) The girls arranged for us to go to "Outback Jacks".





That's a restaurant that pretty much only sells meat lol. That's okay, I managed to order a salad with meat :)  I had a half glass of wine, and half a serve of chips. I would have preferred to go out to a Thai restaurant. That's my idea of decadence. 'Next time gadget" lol.






A super fast cab drove us back to the hotel and we settled in for a girls move...only to discover there was no dvd player! (Who does that?)


It was probably better that way as we had a great time chatting and eventually headed off to bed.

The morning started slowly and with so many Mums used to cleaning up after other people the hotel was left immaculate! This is my lovely mother-in-law Sue, and sister-in-law Margi, you know you are close when in-laws get invited to girls getaways!

Jason gave the boys a great "guys weekend"! They didn't miss out. Gawd I love that hubby of mine!

Asking for help

Wednesday I went and saw a doctor to get help with not falling pregnant. She was supportive and  ordered quite a few tests straight off the bat. She ordered an ultrasound of the pelvis, and some tests for poly cystic ovarian syndrome. At this point I don't think I have PCOS because my periods are really regular, and I don't have facial hair or acne.

The tests she ordered are: FBE, E/LFTs, TSH, FSH, LH Day 21 Progesterone, Testosterone, FAI.

That's a lot of stuff I don't know about, so I am going to take some opks and when I get the double lines go in and get the tests done. Ovulation is supposed to happen on Monday. So hopefully it does, because I don't think I can go in on Sunday lol

Part of me feels like I have an increased chance of getting pregnant now that I am starting to ask for help. However I also feel like it wont help that much, because ultimately I have to lose weight and that seems so impossible.

I have another reason to get control of my health. My blood pressure is getting too high. It was 120/92. That lower number has been high five out of seven measurements. She wanted to put a monitor on me and if it was high 30% of the time then she would put me on medication. I don't want this. I have to fix the problem not band aid it.

That said it is a problem that I need to take seriously. I have ordered a blood pressure monitor. I will be measuring daily. I have a lot of work to do on my body. I feel so lethargic lately. I would say that is largely because I haven't been doing any grand exercise. And it has been so yucky and hot.

Since I saw the doctor I have been eating really well. One of my favourite meals is my coconut veggie soup: Saute onions in stock, add in plenty of chopped cabbage and cauliflower and 1/4 cup of ground cashews. Add enough stock to cover. Add in garam masala, tumeric and a little pepper (the pepper allows your body to absorb the curcumin in the tumeric). Simmer untill veggies are done, then add in about 75 ml of light coconut milk. Blend the soup together to as smooth/chunky as you like it. Then add in some frozen corn and peas, and chopped coriander. Add a little coconut palm sugar and salt. Eat away, guilt free, Yum!

Today I had oats sweetened with sultanas, frozen mangos, frozen blueberries, chia seeds and a dash or whole soya bean milk. Lunch was about 3 cups of the soup, afternoon tea was lots of grapes, dinner was fish and veges, night snack was two cups of tea. So I am pretty happy with that. My weight is now 100.0 kilos, so I reversed most of the damage from before and I only need to lose 300 grams and I am in a new number :)

Speaking of damage... tomorrow I am going out for a girls weekend :) So I will take my boys to circus and then get dropped off at my friend Karen's, Michelle will then take us and Nikki in her car to the Gold Coast. When we arrive we will have a diy high tea, play around with make up and dressing up and then head out for dinner. After dinner we will probably have wine and a giggle and then go out for breakfast. Its going to be a naughty weekend as far as food goes, but we will survive :)

Then Margi will take me back to her house and Jason will be there aswell. We will then take the boys out to dreamworld. So its a huge weekend. Thank god I don't have too many big ones like that.

Check out Jules: "Keep talking, Im taking you very, very seriously..." lol :) --->

I have been religious with reading every day with Jules and the results are starting to pay off, its pure joy to hear him speaking more and more :)

Through the wringer

 Hi Everyone,

I have been gone because I have been through the "Am I, or am I not pregnant?" wringer. From about 9 days after ovulation (which is too early I know), I just want to know. It becomes fairly obsessive and time consuming. Its not fun because I spend about a week of my time there. I have learned to obsess silently. But it still does MY head in lol. So that's where I have been.

The reason it drives me so crazy is that there are only two ways to answer that question: either I get two lines on the pregnancy test which NEVER happens, or I get my period. And until one of those things happens I am in baby crazy land and it takes me a while to come down from the clouds and focus again.

This cycle was made worse by the fact that my period was two days late! So I had two more days to get hopes up and reach my full baby crazy potential.

My period came. Sigh.

I am going to see a GP this week and try and kick off some medical help.

See ya tomorrow.

Reflections

Hellooooo pre-period. Thanks for all the extra cravings!

There have been too many cheats, not enough salads and I know the scales are about to reflect that. Damn I am not so good at this losing weight thing.

However I am still proud of myself.

In January I managed to give the kids a fabulous holiday as well, with trips to the beach, Dreamworld, fireworks, swims, rest and visits with friends. How many holidays do we have without a weight gain? Its been a great month :)

I also went from not knowing how to jog at all to jogging 4.5 mins straight. I ate a lot better and fed the family much healthier meals. People are starting to come to me for advice on healthy juicing recipes and I am getting a bit of a reputation for someone who eats well. I snuck into the double digits (99 kilos)

Yes it was only three kilos not five, but hey, a loss is a loss and I know from the past that after that red witch shows up I tend to be past the starving crazy lady in a bakery stage and back into control. So sanity is just a few days away :)

I am also going through the grieving process of it being another month, where everything looked set for a pregnancy but still no pregnancy. I know it is too early to test (10 days past ovulation), but after 16 months of trying, I seem to be skipping the hopeful stage and just going through the grieving early. Its a little easier than the complete devastation of the 14 dpo negative test followed swiftly by the finality of the red witch.

Looking ahead I have my birthday coming up and I intend to get sand in between our toes and salt on our skin with an awesome beach experience. It will be a vulnerable time as I will be away from my kitchen. I will have to make sure I pack heaps of fruit to snack on to do some damage control.

Three weekends away is our "Girls Getaway" which is going to be awesome and potentially fattening lol.

This month I hope to get from 99 to 95 kilos. I aim to complete week 3 of the c25k program, maintain the awesome effort I am putting into educating the kids and get some projects knocked off around the house.