No picture yet but do sore breasts count?

My plan is to ask Mr. LIW to take a picture of me that captures my hair and eyes so that you can give me some feedback. I am starting to get used to the look but I am on the fence as to whether or not I should go lighter in 5 weeks when I go for an update.

Ok, the sore breasts comment has nothing to do with the picture of me and my new dye-job (obviously.) My assumption is that these symptoms I am having are due to the Lupr.on injections. What day am I on? Hmm... I have done 5 shots so today is day 6. Don't even ask what CD this is because I have lost count and honestly, I have stopped paying attention. What's the point anyway? The only thing that matters to me now is the ivf protocol.

But, as the Wizard of Ovulation asked in her comment to my last post, I am really experiencing PMS-like symptoms. More so than normal. I even think that my breasts feel and look bigger. If I didn't know better, I would think that maybe I was pregnant. HAHA - if I didn't know that I have taken BCPS since 12/1. It's all so funny, really.

Not so much.

It kind of sucks but I don't mind. The shots were going incredibly well and then Friday night's shot in my belly (which is the area that I had been using) hurt. Alot. It was weird.

So Saturday night, I tried my leg. I am certain that I am following the instructions correctly. So why did I get a little bump that felt hot - like a mosquito bite - right afterwards? It was itchy, too. But it went down after a few hours.

Last night I went back to the belly. I am *almost* grateful that I am not as thin as I once was because I wouldn't have the cushion that I now carry around (these are the crazy things I tell myself.) Anyway, the shot didn't hurt as much but I ended up with a tiny purple bruise right afterwards. And it is still there.

Am I doing something wrong here? I do bruise easily AND I have a very low pain tolerance. Can I just chalk my weird reactions up to that?

What's weird is that I yawn more. A lot more. Just like I did when I started my ADs in 2001. No matter how much sleep I get or how tired I do - or do not - feel, I yawn all of the time. I read that Lup.ron can cause mood changes so maybe it is making me sleepier instead.

My spirits are fine, luckily. I feel relatively mellow. Well, mellow for a high-strung person like myself.

The mental rollercoaster continues, though. I go through moments when I am convinced ivf #1 will work and then moments when I know that it won't. I try to calm myself each time with the belief that ivf has to work eventually. As long as my insurance doesn't change its policy in order to limit the number of cycles it covers, and Dr. Gentle continues to authorize the procedure, then Mr. LIW and I can keep trying. TTCIVF, I will call it. We will keep trying to conceive via ivf. Of course, we might go crazy from the entire process, which would force us to change course, but I remain hopeful that we can find success within 4 cycles - and maintain our sanity throughout.

I am working what might be a full day today simply for the paycheck. Things are a bit slow for me right now so I am bored. But bored is ok, I guess, as long as that paycheck reflects my presence. The person in charge today, who is very sweet but incredibly swamped with work, tells me that she will dismiss us before 4pm. But I am not convinced. I keep offering to help because 1) I like her alot and 2) I want her to dismiss us early. But she's only sporadically taking me up on the offer.

My parents will arrive at my house tonight around 5pm for appetizers, beef roast, and dessert. I have to make an eggplant appetizer when I get home and my Dad will bring fresh calamari for me to coat and fry. We started the calamari tradition a few years ago and it is a big hit. It comes out awesome, though each and every year I struggle to remember what I added to the cornmeal last year to give the coating enough flavor (so it's only really awesome by the end because I add spices to the coating as I go along.) I never fry the entire container, so I make the rest on Christmas day for my sister and her family (and my parents, who sleep over tonight.) I also will be roasting a lamb leg and my sister is bringing her signature stuffed shells. We used to have turkey on Christmas day but my sister decided about ten years ago that Christmas was too close to Thanksgiving to have turkey again (are you getting the point that my sister yields LOTS of control in my family? If you guessed that she is older than me, you are right!). She wanted to insert an Italian tradition (from my Dad's side) into our day so she added her stuffed shells. My parents still wanted a roast of some sort, so we added lamb. Last year, Mr. LIW and I diverted from the (newer) tradition and made a seafood casserole with lobster, shrimp, etc. But in the interest of money, I suggested we return to the lamb roast.

Mr. LIW is an expert on red meat - both in terms of selection and cooking. Seriously, only 4 and 5-star restaurants do better. Each year, he very carefully selects a roast (this year he bought two smaller ones from two different stores so that we could do a "taste test") and then cooks it with care. He also makes mashed potatoes with cream and butter. I usually make an additional (and healthier!) side. By the time dessert rolls around (8pm or so) we struggle to find room for Mr. LIW's homemade creme brulee. There are SO many things that I LOVE about Mr. LIW and his love for and talent with cooking are big ones.

I am also a good cook, as is my sister. The three of us joke that we should quit our day jobs and open a restaurant. None of us likes financial instability, though, so we probably will never do it. But it is fun to dream. And it does make the holidays particularly special. When I ate at Mr. LIW's cousin's on Christmas night for the first time I almost spit out the food. It was horrible. The turkey was horribly horribly dry and all of the sides were out of packages. I remember telling my sister after that night (and this was early in my relationship with Mr. LIW) that "thank goodness our kids will eat our food for lunch so they won't have any room for his family's cuisine." I know this all sounds snobby. It's not a question of money because we are all middle class. My mother rarely cooked when I was a kid - in fact, we grew up eating frozen dinners - so I consider feeding people with delicious meals one way to show love and respect for them and for our bodies. I have worked hard to teach myself how to cook and I take pride in my accomplishments.

So, as I wish all of you lovely bloggers a Merry Christmas (if you celebrate it, that is), I also wish you wonderful food, company, and conversation. I wish I could send each and every one of you some fried calamri and creme brulee!

XOXO