Join the Crowd

Crowdfunding.

A term I hadn't related to baby-making until just this week. I had participated by donating to others without being aware that it had a name or that it was a thing. I thought it was something a start-up might do to get investors to buy into their business. I even thought there was something illegal about it!

If this sounds like you, join the crowd.

In literal terms, crowdfunding or crowd sourcing is the collection of funds through small contributions made by many parties in order to reach a set financial goal for a particular venture. Wikipedia describes it as the collective effort of individuals who network and pool their money, usually via the internet, to support initiatives by other people.

It's fundraising. It's asking for donations. UGH.

Christmas Time

This Christmas just seems to blend into the last.  It's true that time moves so quickly that if you blink even just for just a moment, you might miss a lifetime.  My eyes not only fluttered, they have been closed.  Shut tight.  Closed so that no light nor darkness can enter my soul.  So when they open, I find myself as though time has stood still in my mind; same time, same place, same situation.  But it's an illusion.  The contiuum marches on - and I, in the middle.


So THIS is the time.  Time to WAKE UP.  My time is NOW! 
Make something of it, Gina.  Start today.  

Christmas and a Baby

Like so many holidays for me, this one plowed through my life without much inspiration.  No reason to stay up late on Christmas Eve.  No reason to get up early on Christmas morn.  A day just like any other day marked by the entire town shutting down and my husband and I left alone.  This year it was just me while Todd was at work.

While I have tried to start my own traditions in my house of two, they are never met with much enthusiasm and die a slow death alongside the fireplace embers.  So every year, I put up the tree by myself, gulping down a bottle of wine sipping on a glass of wine to get me through it.  I play holiday music on my iPod so as not to disturb the football game going on in the next room - or better yet, this year, my other half just left the house to do something he found more exciting.  Each year, I go a little crazy with the tree decor.  It is, afterall, all mine.

We join my husband's family on Christmas day and for this I am thankful.  I enjoy SO much the laughter of their sibling rivalry displayed through our hours of board games, the older kids now joining us at the 'adult table', and the hugs and filled lap from the kiddos that are still young.

We have a small get-together at my mother's - more of an open house.  You never know if either of my step-brothers will join or not.  It could be a houseful.  More often than not it is just a few.  I think this must be heartbreaking for my parents.

So this year, as I ready for 'just another day', I looked out my window in time to see cars pulling into my neighbors house.  I have known them well, moreso, in the past than of recent days; a tight knit family who has been very lucky in love and light who seem to pull through anything that gets in their way together.  They have been met with some financial troubles to one of their own in just these past weeks. 

As I watched this part of the family get out of their vehicle, I noticed a flash of bright pink.  Not above being easily distracted by glittery things, I found myself stalking staring in anticipation!  As they became more visible, I realized it was a baby wrapped in the most gorgeous shade of preciousness I had seen all season.

This baby has come into their life in the past year as an immediate part of the family.  Loved and spoiled as if it were their own blood.  As I watched, I notice my eyesight get blurry.   Something deep down in my heart was speaking and I couldn't stop the tears.  I'm not sure what it was trying to say - a mixture of joy for the family, a yearning for that baby to be my own - for a reason to stay up late on Christmas Eve and get up early the next day, and reverence of what she represented...HOPE.

Hope and a REASON to celebrate.  Brand new eyes from which to view the world with an innocent little soul.  Little hands and little feet to discover a NEW path in life.  A helplessness and frailty that asks us to take the journey with her without even saying a word. 

As if as a sign from God himself, the gray sky opened up and sun surrounded us all.  Silent Night started playing on my stereo behind me as the one and only holiday song that never fails to make me weep (so much so that I typically and immediately change the channel!).  I let it sink in.  I stood there at my kitchen sink and cryed; tears washing away my darkened heart.

Isn't that what Christmas is all about?  Had I forgotted the most important baby of Christmas?  Had I failed to remember that it is CHRISTmas?

My mind wandered to another family needing a Christmas miracle...my own.  And how ironic and poignant that while my uncle still lie in a hospital, hanging on to every day of sweet life - that he does so to see his unborn grandson.  The circle of life will not end with either of them...but go on as an inspiration to both of them.  They are forever connected in HOPE.

So as I move forward with this last week of the holiday, I will not forget the HOPE and love and little Chrismas moments of wonder that surrounds each of us now and throughout the year.

Merry Christmas..again..to you all.

Merry Christmas!

...wishing you a day full of calm JOY.

Namely Coincidental

Good men must die, but death cannot kill their names.. ~Proverb

Following the recent passing of my Grandmother, Eva, I took a few days of berevement to take care of family...and most of all myself.  I had not taken any time off when my dad died, none after the auto accident and none to gather my wits after losing my job.  As selfish as that sounds, my year has just been heartbreakingly insane and has been rushing by way too fast - seemingly starting to spiral out of control and I just needed to gain back some healthy perspective; to regroup and refocus my energies.

I started to release some of the tension buried deep down to my bones with time spent floating aimlessly and repeatedly around the lazy river.  Starting the day numb and in a gray foggy daze, the fresh air and sunshine worked its magic as I began to again hear the laughter of children, feel the warmth from the hot sun wrap me up like a thick familiar beach towel, taste the saltiness of chlorine in the air and see the brilliant bright blues of sky and water all around; replacing the dark and dull blue of my mood. 

In keeping with the color theme, my husband suggested that we take in a bit more of summer with the boys in blue!  While I'm a sucker for baseball at The K, our budget barely puts us in GA.  I reluctantly agreed to splurge since I'm an even bigger sucker for fireworks and after letting go of so much lately, I thought ending things with a bang would be just the spark I needed to get things moving again. 

Bickering over which ticket line would get us in the stadium faster, we were interrupted by an "Excuse me!" from softly behind.  "Excuse me!", we heard again, growing slightly more urgent each time.  Realizing the voice was addressing us, we finally answered.  "Are you two needing tickets for the game?", a young blonde asked.  Not your typical scalper, I thought.  "I have two here in my purse that I'm not using you can have", she continued, "I'm not trying to sell anything!  The only catch is that you have to sit by us", she gestured to her equally young and cute blonde little friend.  She explained that her family owned season passes and that they were unable to join her that night. 

We took her up on her offer for the tickets and to escort us to our new and FREE seats!  We followed her past general admission...past all the yummy food courts...past the view level seats until finally we turned to walk down the stairs towards home plate - down, down some more and down even farther until an attendant stopped us before we could walk down even MORE.  I looked at our tickets (did I mention they were FREE..woohoo!) and picked my jaw up off the floor and contain my utter (and yes, BLUE COLLAR) excitement.  These seats rocked!

We got settled, offered to buy the girls their ballpark dinner and drinks as a small token of our thanks before heading back up all the million stairs to fetch the feast.  Failing to introduce ourselves sooner, I reached out my hand and asked them their names.  "Oh sorry!" the petite ticket-giver-outer squealed!  "So nice to meet you, Gina!  My name is Eva!". 

Not only did she not run away when I rushed back through the isle, tripping over my own two feet to give her a big hug; she genuinely hugged me tightly back.

The night was perfect, the company the best, the Royals won and the fireworks reignited my soul.  Thanks Grandma!

C is for Cervical Concrete!

While nothing has been found to explain our infertility, the outcome of my last visit to Dr. Mooney-Smith was more voodoo than science.

I was ordered to have intercourse (presumably with my husband) no more then two hours before my appointment with the good doctor. Not a morning person in the last bit, this meant I had to wake up two hours earlier than normal while trying to look and feel sexy to fit it all in before 'poor Todd' had to leave for work. He of course did not feel put out in the least and so the sun rose with a smile for one of us!

This was all in preparation for a Postcoital Test; done as a last ditch effort to figure out what our big holdup has been. It is not a test that is often performed and is basically the only thing left when everything else checks out normal with both partners. The idea is to check my cervical mucus (CM) after sex to make sure there are sperm present and moving normally. Swabs are taken from several different places both in the vagina and cervix for comparison.

So I was mopped up while slides were prepared for the microscope and taken back to the lab. My doctor gave me a pat on the back for "my" terrific stretchiness (as if it was something i controlled). She quickly ran back to my room within a few minutes beaming - so ecstatic, in fact, that she wanted me to see for myself what she had discovered!

I felt important as I followed her back to the lab, but a bit like a voyeur spying on the little guys. There they were! I was relieved to see so many swimmers in one little area. She counted over 25 with 80% of those being viable! But as hard as they tried to move, they just couldn't....forever stuck in the quicksand that my body produces. What she found was that my CM is more like CC (cervical concrete)!

While this may sound odd to most, I always suspected something awry. It's not something you discuss with your girlfriends - comparing post intercourse messes, that is...and I guess that is why it was easy to believe the first doctor who told us that it was Todd who had 'lazy sperm'. But I 'secretly' knew better. Unfortunately, I did not meet my husband as a virgin and I had experienced that same 'mess' with others after sex. It's like my body not only physically rejected any outside fluids..lol...but made efforts to push it right back out!

So what voodoo do my doc do tell for me to do? Take medicine - have intercourse on my head and do a little dance afterwards. Seriously....