Weddings, Baptisms and other less happy events

Well, in the grand tradition of the (in)fertility blogger (unless you're a really good one like Julie http://www.alittlepregnant.com/ or Julia http://julia.typepad.com/ ) a long silence usually means bad news. Actually that's not strictly true; sometimes it means that you've had the long awaited baby and are using blogging time to catch up on sleep. Anyway, in this case it's the former. The bean measured only 6 weeks or so, and two subsequent blood tests showed falling HCG levels, so all over bar the shouting really. Unfortunately the "shouting" has not yet begun, so I am effectively waiting to miscarry. It will add another dimension of terror to furture pregnancies, as before I could relax as long as there wasn't any bleeding , whereas now I'm 9 or so weeks in with no bleeding, but I know it's all wrong. The waiting is hard to bear, as I like to move on as quickly as possible, and I'm in limbo at the moment. I'm seeing Dr G on Monday, and will be asking him what the options are. I'm not really keen to have a D&C, especially as it's unlikely he'll send any results for testing anyway, but I'm not sure what the alternatives are.

At least I'm not blithely skipping along to the 12 week scan thinking everything is fine, that would have been awful.

In better news, although all rather overshadowed by my own misery. Our friends Jenny and James tied the knot last Saturday, so congratulations Mr and Mrs W.

Also, our good friends had all three of their children baptised last Sunday. We had a lovely barbecue afterwards and the sun even deigned to shine.

This weekend we've had visitors in the form of Michael and Kirsten, who are expecting their first baby. It was lovely and nostalgic re-living all of the excitement of first being pregnant. Little M had a joint birthday party to attend and then today we've been doing odd jobs, punctuated with a bit of a shopping spree and lunch at Pizza Express, mmmm.

Slacker

See, I started all enthusiastic and then "poof" gone! Well, I've been busy, and lazy, getting worked up about work and then going on holiday in a desperate attempt to relax on behalf of... well, more on that later...

Work saw the unholy juxtaposition of a major conference/survey announcement/fight with the market leader over false advertising. The boss actually told me to "unleash hell" in a very Gladiator stylee, but seeing as I'm so genteel, I simply unleashed PC Pro, trustedreviews.com and the channel magazines. Still, I officially provoked "no comment" with my actions, so can't complain.

Then it was off to the merry old Isle of Wight to give my parents some quality granddaughter time. Can I just officially BLESS MY MUM who got up every morning to give M her breakfast, thus leaving E and me to enjoy the unique wonder of a nice lie in. Grandad did sterling work also, and Great Grandnana kept little M entertained and only freaked her out once when setting her hair in green and blue rollers!

While we were down on the IOW we had a visit from a friend who lives in Sydney. It was great to see Helen Melon again and find out that she hasn't changed a bit.

The reason for the vain attempts at relaxation is the continued absence - so far - of a girl's worst friend. Now this would have some ladies whooping with glee and rushing out to buy the latest Bugaboo designer pram. However, in this household, such tidings are greeted with typical Northern gloom and a fatalistic attitude that reckons "things'll get worse before they get better". Such is my pessimism surrounding all things reproductive that two friends who I mentioned it to had to remind themselves to say "congratulations", such was my dour presentation of the news.

This would be pregnancy number 4 you see, which doesn't exactly tally with the one little treasure of a darling who has just woken up for a wail upstairs. The other two were early miscarriages, which mean that I refuse to get excited about anything until at least 10 weeks. Even seeing a hearbeat isn't good enough for me, as we had that with #2 and it still fizzled out.

By this stage with M I'd already had spotting, two blood tests and two ultrasounds, and it worked out fine. With the ones that went wrong, I had no spotting until about 8 weeks, and then it all went wrong. I am in the latter camnp at the moment, so on Thursday morning it's off to Dr G to beg a ride on his lovely ultrasound machine where, if there is anything to see at 7.5 weeks, we should see it. If it measures wrong, we are scr3wed. Ho hum. Unfortunately despite my attempts to stay emotionally detached from it, its pretty hard, and as I said to a friend just after I had M, you don't know how much you wanted a baby until it is taken away from you.

My fabulous friend Liz, who has sufered the joy of 2 m/cs herself, has a great way of looking at it though: If I had had either of the other two babies, little M wouldn't be here (I kept trying to conceive very quickly after the m/cs) and she is the light of my life right now.

Poor little M though, had to have her MMR and PCV injections yesterday. She did cry, but just for a couple of minutes. She seems OK but just has a little red area on one of her arms.

Well I'll update with news post Thursday.