If found, please return mind to its rightful owner
Captain's Log, Day 7. We're steadily approaching uncharted waters, and boy do they look rough.
My body and my mind no longer belong to me. My pituitary gland has teamed up with these foreign hormones I keep injecting in my body and they have taken over. I did so well last cycle. I really thought I would confidently navigate through this one.
I was actually cocky going into this second round of IVF because I kicked last cycle's ass. No we didn't end up pregnant. No we didn't have any embryos to freeze. But, I for the most part, kept my wits about me.
For me, IVF hormones were much harder on me physically, but emotionally they were a walk in the park compared to the oral hormones. I've done some crazy ass shit on Clomid and Letrozol, so when I didn't become a complete sociopath from the injectables, I saw it as a win.
Granted, I looked four months pregnant, couldn't sleep and had a 24 hour migraine, but I was nice. I was little sensitive and cried easily, but surprisingly upbeat. Maybe I was just too tired from the lack of sleep and didn't have the energy to be crazy. Either way, I was somewhat in control.
I went into this cycle hopeful that it would be a similar, if not identical experience. I don't know why I can't accept the fact that NOTHING is predictable through infertility treatments. What happens once, probably won't happen the same way again. You'd think I'd learn my lesson by now.
I knew I was a little past teetering on the edge of crazy the first time I hulked out on my husband. (My screaming about our porch furniture on day 3 of hormones was just a preview. Now the feature horror film was about to begin.) We were on our way to acupuncture during rush hour. I aggressively insisted that we take MY way to get there. After sitting in standstill traffic for over 30 minutes, he quietly made a HUGE mistake. He spoke.
"It just always bottlenecks by the bridge during rush hour. That's why I suggested..."
I didn't even let him finish. I was holding a sleeve of saltines in one hand a ginger ale in the other. I gritted my teeth and simultaneously squeezed both the can of soda and the crackers. After I verbally berated him for a solid 15 minutes, I tired myself out. That's when I realized that in my hormonal rage I actually crushed the entire sleeve of crackers into tiny, little crumbs that were now EVERYWHERE. This threw me into another "terrible twos" tantrum.
This cycle continued between raging and crying until we finally made it to acupuncture. Luckily for my husband the acupuncture needles were a like a tranquilizer gun to a rabid animal. When I came out of my appointment, sedated with oils and calm energy, I apologized.
Since Monday my "spells" or "flip-outs" have continued to grow stronger and more violent. Basically the bigger my stomach gets, the bigger the flip out gets. The only thing on my side (or everyone around me's side) is that I'm so exhausted from the hormones that they don't last very long.
I cried at our third wedding anniversary dinner because Michael spent too much money on a designer bag for me. I flipped out before dinner because I broke a sweat wrestling to get on and zip up my "fat" jeans, that now basically look like a child's size 2 on me. And I went ballistic on a man who knocked on my door and asked me to move my car. He actually threatened to call the cops.
But none of those examples were the worst. Oh, no. I had my shining moment yesterday morning when I was woken by a man cutting concrete with a gas powered saw at 6 am. In my defense, I feel like even without hormones I would have been pretty jacked about it. I just wouldn't have handled it the same way.
When the guy refused to stop after Michael went outside and politely told him he was waking everyone up, I saw red. I bust out of my house, no bra, no shoes and my hair closely resembling Nick Nolte's famous mug shot. I ran up to his truck screaming that I needed his bosses number because this was NOT going to continue. He quickly made it crystal clear that I was a joke and he genuinely did not give a shit if he woke me or anyone else up.
He kept repeating that he wakes up at 4:30 am so it's "not his problem" that I don't get out of bed until after 7. This is when the who can scream "FUCK YOU" louder contest began. This is also when people in the luxury apartment complex across the street started opening their windows to watch the show.
Now I had an audience and they were cheering. Our intense screaming battle turned into us just blatantly insulting each other. He would scream that I was a crazy asshole and I would scream that I felt sorry for whoever it is he goes home to because he's a little baby bitch. (exact words) It was no longer about him waking up everyone with his saw, or the fact that he was a complete ass hat about it, it was deeper than that.
Once he finally put the saw down and agreed to come back later, I still wasn't satisfied. Joe Schmo thought he had pissed off a woman who was sleeping. Little did he know he awoke a beast. My rage turned into angry tears, which completely caught him off guard and 100 percent made everyone watching uncomfortable.
At this point he was pleading with me, asking me what is I wanted from him. He had stopped the saw. He was leaving. WHY was I still outside, screaming, and now ugly crying in the middle of the street? I had nothing. He could do nothing for me. It was no longer about him.
Thoughts raced through my mind. I almost blurted out, "CAN YOU PROMISE ME THIS IVF CYCLE WILL WORK?! CAN YOU PUT MY MIND AT EASE AND PROMISE I WILL BE PREGNANT THIS TIME?!"
Luckily the small shred of sanity I still had told me to keep those thoughts to myself. In a panic I told him I needed an apology, and not just to me, but to all of the neighbors he woke up at 6 am. The poor guy (still an asshole, but an unsuspecting asshole) swallowed his pride and apologized to me, Michael, and everyone else witnessing my meltdown.
While I watched him packing up his equipment, through my tears, it dawned on me that I had gone off the deep end. I was an insane person, completely out of control, and I didn't care who knew it.
As Joe Schmo pulled away, I watched a little piece of my mind go with him. There it went, packed in tightly, right next to that fucking gas powered concrete saw.