I just stopped by to give a little update. I've started going to acupuncture again for regular treatment as I wasn't feeling that great and my cycles have been odd. I wanted to help build myself up for our TTC effort. They have me on a Chinese herb mix that is compatible with nursing to help build my blood. They diagnosed me as blood and yin deficient -- but having a child and nursing both require a lot of blood and yin.

I've also started going to qi gong again. We are doing Soaring Crane at school. I went last week for the first class and I felt my body working through some things.

Warm

Just back from acupuncture and shopping. Both activities were productive. Acupuncture made it so I finally warmed up and I'm not feeling freezing cold and shopping, well I got lucky with a sale plus two dresses and a pair of shoes.

Along the TCM line I'm making progress. My tongue coating is thinning some, I'm feeling more emotionally even, and my digestion has been improving some. My lung qi is weak, still fighting that virus from two weeks ago. All of my spleen points in my legs are sore, I had needles up both my legs from my feet to my knees. She asked me if my feet were cold and I said yes, basically since I came back from Fiji. She told me to do nightly foot soaking, then use that time to meditate or do qi gong breathing. That I think I can manage, heck while I'm at it I might as well do the castor oil pack ;P

I'm actually not a big shopper but this time of year I tend to notice the gaps in my wardrobe and I am willing to do what it takes to help fix that problem.

Work is going well, I usually only complain about it, and not much here, but over all its doing well. I'm feeling knowledgable, experienced and useful (mostly).

Feeling poorly

I'm on cycle day three of my 38th cycle charting. I've been feeling so poorly these past couple of days that I finally looked up dysmenorrhea (painful periods) and I fit the definition to a T this cycle. What's up with that? I've got stomach pain, lower GI discomfort, headaches, I'm not sleeping well. Its actually not a normal pattern for me. I've also still got symptoms from that virus that's been going around the office, others have the same symptoms -- sore back, sinus congestion, faint numbness in hands and feet. One of my employees saw her doc about it today and was told it was indeed a virus and that it might take another 2 weeks for the symptoms to clear out.

I had an acupuncture treatment this afternoon and she treated me for blood stasis in my abdomen that was causing me a lot of menstrual pain, as well as my immune system and also to help stimulate follicle development. They told me to take a break from the herbs for a wee while and see how my body does. I told her about how when I was younger and stressed out my stomach would hurt me (I spent many hours in the nurse's office in 6th grade with stomach aches when my parents were fighting constantly and close to divorce and I wasn't doing my homework), and sometimes if the emotional stress was intense I would get diarrhea (first bad breakup I couldn't eat for a month and when I did I had diarrhea -- I lost 10 lbs). Certain types of really bad stress would even cause me to have mid-cycle bleeds, but never annovulation, I never missed a cycle. She said that it fit in with what she knew already that I have an overactive liver but that normal Western testing wouldn't show any dysfunction and it ties in with my other complaints as well. In TCM the liver is associated with emotions and I'm such a freaking sensitive person and a bit neurotic as well (but I'm sure you noticed that by now). Its just who I am and while I've made lots of changes I don't know how much more I can do. To think that sometimes just being can be the thing that throws you off. I don't even want to know about it. I fell asleep during the treatment at any rate, for a good 40 minutes, which felt good.

While sweeping our back porch the other day I was thinking to myself about what someone on the boards wrote to me after my first loss; she said "God must really love you to put you through so much." I too know that I'm stronger in some ways, maybe more wise to the ways of the Universe and my connection to the world around me. My losses are a part of who I am now.

Sometimes lately I've been thinking of just getting used to the idea that we won't have kids. It's been such a very long road so far. At least I'm needed at work and I'm getting to do more consulting work. I don't know what the future holds and I talked to my great-aunt about it when I was in New York. There are places for all kinds of mothers in the world, and not all of them are biological. You don't even have to be an "adoptive" mother to make a difference. You know I've heard that for troubled children even a 15 minute positive encounter can build esteem enough to help that child find hope and change direction. Maybe there's a place for me there in the world. I just don't know yet.

Tonight I did a brief liver qi cleanse as I missed my qigong class for the second week in a row. This time because I wasn't feeling well, last week was due to traffic and class just not being at the park where they were supposed to be.

spot.spot.spot.
when's it gonna
stop.stop.stop?

My temp went down to a new low of 97.3 F this morning, a nice pre-ovulatory temp if I ever did see one. I don't get lower temps than that, if I did it would mean there was something wrong with me.

I can't wait until AF shows so that my system will be fully cleaned out. Hopefully then I'll slide back into a normal temp.

I did qigong while I was camping and it was so weird, I could feel my deficiencies. Earlier this year I could feel my liver qi excess and stagnation, this time it felt kind of empty. My heart qi was weak and on Monday morning my Spleen qi was deficient. I'm not feeling any excess, just deficiency. I've got to keep my practice up.

I've got acupuncture tomorrow AM (not today like I thought) and hopefully things will be ticking along better than normal soon enough.

Slow slow slow.

I did some qigong again last night after nothing much happened yesterday and even the spotting was slow. Spotting picked up right away after that. Still slow.

This morning I started stimulating some of the acupoints that are forbidden during pregnancy. A couple hours later I had a little more spotting with a touch of pink.

Now I feel still a bit blocked. I want thing to flow. I'll have to do some more qigong.

I have a meeting tonight but I think I will cancel so I can deal with this instead. It's a reasonable excuse, no? Well, but the excuse I will give is that I am sick. I'm not actually, but I don't feel well. I feel ick and stuck and not like dealing with an evening meeting.

I just called and cancelled my scan. The nurse Debbie at the RE clinic I go to said that was fine and she understood. I told her that I would wait a week to see if things resolve on their own and then we could decide if we need to do a scan or bloodwork or anything.

My partner dropped me off at the office on the way to his consulting gig. That was nice of him. I'll have to take the bus home (or a taxi) but today has been pretty uneventful.

By the way, I really don't think at the end of the day that my liver qi stagnation had anything to do with my loss. I think something just went wonky with it. Maybe it was the delayed ovulation, maybe late implantation. Someone else I know had a beta level at 350 or something on CD14 and while I know that beta levels are all over the place for me it might just be a sign that something wasn't right. Maybe it was because I waited until CD 8 to supplement my progesterone. Maybe it was just messed up DNA.

I'll do some more qigong when I go home this evening to see if that will move things along. I can't remember if I mentioned it here (I must have) but in October when I went to a health resort with my friend and we first tried qigong, several hours later I passed a chunk of my retained tissue that how I know that it can move the immovable.

We are climbing Jacob's ladder,
We are climbing Jacob's ladder,
Higher, higher.

Saturday Morning

I came home from work last night and took a nap for maybe an hour. I just needed to give my nervous system a break. After I got up I realized that I just felt blocked inside so I decided to do some qigong. My acupuncturist told me that I needed to be careful what I did since certain types of qigong movements can cause you to miscarry. I haven't practiced in months but I had to try something, nothing was moving in my body. I did a portion of the Jade Body routine I learned at the beginning of the year and right away I started getting that shivery feeling of energy starting to move in my body. I felt a lot better afterwards. Later after dinner and a movie we had a bath in our new jetted tub and soaking in the warm water helped me feel more relaxed.

My breasts hurt. They have continued hurting, but not in the same way from day to day. Last night the pain started building again and this morning they are killing me, almost like that knives sensation again. How fun. How completely distracting.

Here is a list of my symptoms as they peaked and what I've noted over the past week:

Fatigue -- was needing to take naps from the week after AF was due until Tuesday after Memorial Day when I strangely didn't need them anymore.

Sore Breasts -- On and off but became significantly less a week ago Wednesday though the pain picked up again today.

Swollen Belly -- peaked Memorial Day weekend and gradually has receded so that you can't really tell but I'm still more bloated than normal.

Hair growth -- My chin hair (yes, it's true) was growing so quickly up until last week that I needed to tweeze every day because a new hair would show up. It was freaking me out.

Nausea -- only faint boughts, last episode was at the beginning of this past week

Thirst -- I normally don't get thirsty very much but I've noticed that the increased hormones make me more thirsty. I wasn't thirsty for much of the past week.

Increased need to pee -- I was having to pee lots all the time, though thankfully not at night. That wasn't really happening this past week.


Who the heck knows. My partner wants me to go for the scan on Wednesday. I asked him if just he and my uterus could go and that I would stay home. Either that or that I be able to be drunk when I go in so I don't have to deal. I'm not a big drinker at all (to such a degree that many of my friends don't think I drink at all) but it is just that painful and stressful to be dealing with all this.

As for the prospect of a c-section delivery, I am trying to be true to myself and at the same time true to the situation and reality. My fibroid was preventing me from getting pg and I had to have it out if I want to have babies. Having it out changed the situation for delivery and since I've gone to such extremes to "make room for baby" I should just relax about it and focus on getting pg firstmost and then getting the best surgeon I can find and get along with.

I've been feeling a lot better over the past week though energy-wise so I've started running/walking with my dog each day around 5:30 or 6pm, right before the sun goes down. It really helps clear my head and help my body shift gears from work. The furthest I can run is 2 blocks but then we walk -- my dog and I are getting more exercise though this way than just walking and she (old girl that she is at 14 1/2) is loving it. I've also been practicing my qigong and doing acupressure to help with my stagnation.

I had Qi Gong practice last night and my instructor explained how to use the five elements. It was very interesting to learn how each organ system is associated with colors and elements and I think this will really help me out with my meditation. Here's a great page that explains the basics of the Five Elements.

Then this morning I had my acupuncture appointment. Some things had markedly improved from my treatment last week but I had some other things that needed adjusting and he totally knew what to do. I had swollen glands in my neck from my cold that were bothering me and now they feel clear and normal. From the moment he put in the first few needles I felt my body start shifting my energy around, it felt like I was going from disorganized to synchronized in a matter of minutes. Now I feel warm, smooth and even more happy. I have a faint headache just behind my eyes though, I bet something is still kinked up somewhere.

I'm doing both Qi Gong and acupuncture to try to regain health, rebalance after all of the health problems from last year and also to try to get my body to be stronger and less flimsy in general. Meditation is more sporadic but I do it with a friend of mine when we get it together. Improved health is going to take a lot of ongoing practice but I'm hopeful that I'll get balance someday.

Meditatations

Most of the alternative medical practitioners have recommended meditation to me and it is refererenced in a lot of information about infertility as well as for fibroids. Here are some links to info that I've found along the way.

MEDITATION

Anji - highly praised relaxation CDs
http://www.anjionline.com/

Guided Imagery
http://www.guidedimageryinc.com/guided.html

What is Guided Imagery?
http://www.healthjourneys.com/what_is_guided_imagery.asp

Learning Meditation - Meditation Room
http://www.learningmeditation.com/room.htm

Cultivating Positive Emotions to Optimize Health and Well-Being
http://journals.apa.org/prevention/volume3/pre0030001a.html


SELF HYPNOSIS

Hypnosis Downloads
http://www.hypnosisdownloads.com/
Low cost MP3 files you can use to do self-hypnosis. My friend recommended this site to me.


LABRINTH - Walking Meditation
A labrinth is a type of maze that you walk for medidation. I found that if I walked and thought about a particular thing, like my fibroid or my miscarriage, my mind would show me truths and I could release fear and accept hope. Here are a couple of links to learn more about them:

The Labrinths of Grace Cathedral
http://www.gracecathedral.org/labyrinth/

Worldwide Labrinth Locator
http://wwll.veriditas.labyrinthsociety.org/



QI GONG - Chinese Meditation/Movement
Qi Gong (pronounced chee gong) was my real favorite while I was on my health spa retreat, the thing I did every day except for the one day where the instructor had off. It was amazing and helped me feel open, relaxed, stronger, and peaceful. I had never done it before but I could completely feel the energy flowing through my body on the first time. It also helps you to open up and use the whole of your lungs in a way like I've never felt before -- most of us do only shallow breathing normally. What was even cooler was that I found out that the sequence we were doing was developed by a buddhist pristess named Kwan Yin and that she is also a goddess of fertility in Buddhism. The thing that was most amazing about it was that while doing these slow flowing, graceful movements my body was telling me to keep doing them and it would help with my fibroid -- this was days before I heard about what Kwan Yin was.

The Mission of Qigong
http://www.shengzhen.org/the_mission_of_qigong.htm

Kwan Yin
http://www.crystalinks.com/kwanyin.html

About Kwan Yin and images of statues
http://www.siamese-dream.com/page/siam1/CTGY/Kuan-Yin-Statues

I didn't feel like I was praying to another religion, I felt like I was tapping into the energy of the universe. It was amazing. There is a book on the shenzhen.org site, also available through Amazon that has all of the movements and descriptions of what they are for.


Dr Northrup's site has a bunch of different audio/video materials for sale that might be of interest as well:
http://www.drnorthrup.com/health_store-cr-video.php

The HealingFromFibroidsNaturally Yahoo Group also has lots of information about alternative treatments for uterine fibroids, you might look there as well:
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/HealingForFibroidsNaturally