Grumpy

The past few weeks' cloud of positivity (perhaps tainted with a touch of mania due to the fact I am off my mood stabilizers while trying to conceive) has left me grumpy.

Being grumpy may be one of the least desirable places to be when trying to conceive, I reckon. So here, today in this moment, I will attempt to get some of the grumpiness off my chest. (Actually it feels like it's settled in my female bits as a bladder infection - which I get when I'm really upset. It's a splendid little side effect my body's developed to help my mind have its way with me.)

I feel like I can't keep up with what's going on with my career in terms of the amount of reading and writing on my plate, even though developments on potential meetings which could lead to actual assignments keep getting delayed. The end result of this particular phenom is that I feel like I'm running in place and priorities are non-existent because they change with every work-related email or phone call on a minute-to-minute basis.

I feel like my body made a unilateral decision to not cooperate with me once my partner and I decided to proactively pursue conception. My past six months of menstrual charts are exactly the same in terms of cycle statistics which would have made it very easy to time all the fertility phase stuff - back then. However the last two months have been very irregular in every way shape and form and even though I spend a lot of time peeing on ovulation kit sticks, there's not any help on doing the thing they're supposed to do, in fact what they are named for, which is to predict. It doesn't help that every ovulation calculator I consult online (and there are four) offers different target dates based on the exact same data points that I enter in each one. So it's literally like shooting in the dark and makes me frustrated at my lack of control in the process and also worry that something happened to my body after the last miscarriage that really fucked my shit up good this time.

I feel like because I have the audacity to get married for a second time and have it be what I missed the first time around, nobody really gives a shit about the parts that are important to me. Let me just say this is so not because I am a bridezilla with ludicrous demands. (No one has to fly me to Vegas to wear a penis hat or sport the taffeta.) Last time I wed, I was constrained by all the absurdities of my ex's demands about our wedding to the extreme that it was a fairly miserable and unmemorable experience for me - except the fact that I sobbed all night long on our wedding night in disappointment, that was pretty memorable. This time around I want the day to be blessed by the participation of those few we asked to join us. Instead I'm constantly managing the expectations of all around me (including my partner and our mothers and my bridesmaids) when all I want to do is ask for the same love and respect that I tried my best to show at everyone else's weddings. (Except for my writing partner, who is off the hook, because I was so sedated in order to even make it through her wedding due to the fact that my then-husband was sneaking away to make calls to his lay on the side while our best friends cut their wedding cake. Classy.)

I know the first thing to do to get out of the grump is to take a nice hot bath, actually, that would technically be the second thing to do because first is a nice long walk with my pooch. Then I need to not think about any of the above for the rest of today. Start fresh tomorrow. Compared to today, it's looking pretty damn oyster-ific. Also, I need to give-up the control factor, which reviewing the specific elements of my grumpy feelings above, I see is a common thread. The sooner I stop trying to control my crazy-ass career, my off-the-charts biological clockage, and the wish to reality ratio of my wedding... the less grumpy I will be.

How I miss smoking, drinking, mood stabilizers, and sedatives right about now.

Damn it.