Ocean Dreamer

Hey Folks,

Yes, I’m still here. It’s been a busy month with school. Sorry for the lack of updates.

I’m heading in to the doctor in a couple of hours for my next insem. I’m crossing my fingers that it’s the right time. I got a very odd reading on my OPK last night - it looked like it was reading peak, but the lines (both of them - the control and the test) only appeared in half of the window. Bizarre. Anyone else had that? This morning my fertility monitor still read high, not peak, but I’m going for it anyway. It feels like now is the right time, the other signs line up, and it’s friggin’ cd 18. So maybe I’ll be too early, but maybe I’ll miss it if I wait too much longer. Oh, and I think they got rid of the scheduler I don’t like at my doc’s office. Or, at least, she wasn’t the one answering the phone. Everyone else in that office is so sweet and wonderful, but she is always pissy and unwilling to be at all flexible. (As in, last time, I asked if I could drop off my spermies in the morning so they could be thawed for my afternoon appointment, as opposed to bringing them in 30 minutes before, and she refused. Then the nurse called me back and said that it was no problem.) I was so dreading having to speak with her to make my appointment, and so relieved not to have to talk to her.

In other news, I’m on break this week, which is giving me a bit of time to take care of some much-needed non-school/non-baby stuff. Ah, nice. Plus, I finally have time to see my friends a bit more. Yesterday I had a lovely lunch with one friend and then a lovely walk around Green Lake with another.

I’m still catching up on everyone’s blogs.

I’ll post later about the insem.

First, thanks so much for your comments on the last post. I really appreciate it. I just wanted to let you all know things have gone better the rest of this week. I’m really excited about my student teaching placement and have gotten out of the funk I was in. It helped so much just to write it out a bit. This is just a short post because I have several books to read this weekend. I hope you all have a fabulous weekend.

It has not been a good week.  I’ve kind of debated about writing on here about this, but in the end I decided to.  As a result of all the crap that’s happening at school, I’ve been dealing with a lot of internalized homophobia.  I suppose I dealt with it before I really came out to myself and when I first came out, but since then it hasn’t really been an issue.  Until now.  So I’m not really sure what to do about it.  I find myself, horror of horrors, wishing that I could be like the other people in my cohort - i.e. straight*.  I’m also a bit embarrassed and ashamed to be feeling this way, which is the main reason I didn’t want to post anything about it on here.  In the end, though, I decided that the best way to work through something is to talk about it, so here you go.

Maybe this will go away next quarter when I’m student teaching?  I’ve written before about how I love the class and teacher I’ll be working with.  It is so nice to be in her classroom, where things are not so gendered, where there aren’t expectations or boxes for the kids to be in based on what their gender is.  Everyone just is, and I love it.  The kids - and all of us - have so much more freedom to be true to themselves.

I was talking to my friend E about how I was feeling recently, and she said she thought it made sense, since the straight folks in my program are treated so much better than I am.  Still, I want to be someone who can just be strong in the face of all of it, who will know in her heart that they are wrong and only need that knowledge to get through it.  I mean, I do know they’re wrong, but clearly there’s a part of me that doesn’t believe it and that is leading me to wish I was different.  I know of a queer woman a little while ago who sued my school because of their homophobia (she got all her education paid for, too.)  She really seemed to be having a rough time still and said they took a part of her soul.  I don’t want that to happen to me.

Until last summer, I really existed in a world that almost exclusively consisted of queer folks.  Those who aren’t queer are very queer-friendly.  I got used to it, it was comfortable and easy, and I always knew people either identified with or at least understood where I was coming from.  For the most part, we share the same values and ideals.  Consequently, when I suddenly started spending time with more straight people (some of whom turned out not to be so queer-friendly), I wasn’t as guarded as I perhaps should have been.  Although, really, who wants to spend their time guarded?  Watching what I say all the time makes me miserable.

For the time being, I’m trying to surround myself with as many positive queer images as I can.  I’m also thinking of taking martial arts again (at least until I’m preggers) - I used to train and got so much out of it (self-confidence, awareness of my body, etc.).  Most of the women who trained there were also queer and were really role models for me when I was first coming out.  Now my bad ex trains at that school, so I don’t think I’ll be going back there, but I may seek out a different place to train.

I’d love to hear if y’all have thoughts or suggestions about how I can work through this.  And thanks so much for listening/reading.

——————

*Note to the straight folks who read my blog: I don’t have anything against straight folks, it’s just that I’m not one and so it concerns me that I would in any way wish to be one.  By saying “horror of horrors,” I don’t mean to imply that being straight is a bad thing, but just that it’s not who I am or who I should be.

I’ve been vegetarian for about ten years.  In that time, I only ate chicken on a trip to Italy, because I wasn’t sure what gluten free food I would find.  In all that time, I never had any craving for meat.  Not once.  Yet for the past week, ever since visiting my lovely locally-owned co-op grocery store, I have had an intense craving for the chicken dinner they were selling in their deli section.  After debating about it for most of the week and then getting my negative pregnancy results, I decided to go ahead and get it.  I needed some cheering up after the preggo results.  So yesterday afternoon I went out and treated myself.

After I ate it, I buried the bones in the kitchen trash (to keep them away from the pups) and headed out to meet my friend A for tea.  (Tea was lovely, by the way, and it was great to see her - and learn she’s thinking of becoming a history teacher!)  I returned home, was pretty exhausted, and went to sleep early.  I didn’t step foot in the kitchen.

This morning, I got up, let the dogs out and discovered they had left me a little surprise in the middle of the kitchen: the bag I had buried the chicken bones in.  And just the bag.  As for the bones, they now live inside my two sweet pups.  I called the vet and this afternoon took my girls in to get exams and X-Rays.  It turns out Miss Zoe ate most of the bones.  I am now quarantined in my house until further notice (minus school tomorrow when the girls will be at the vet) so I can observe them.  Apparently should they start vomiting, they need to get surgery *immediately.*  They seem to be doing okay for now, and I am crossing my fingers that everything comes out the other end okay.

So, let’s recap.  I had my chicken dinner.  And then, in response, I get two sick pups, a $500 vet bill, and am not allowed to leave the house.  Think someone is trying to tell me something?  I sure won’t be eating any more chicken anytime soon!

I just got a call from my sperm bank with some good news.  When I ordered my IUI vial last cycle, I asked about changing over my pre-purchased ICI vials to IUI vials, since I’ll now be doing IUIs instead.  At the time, they told me they didn’t have any more IUI vials!  They had some still in quarantine, but the donor was sick and hadn’t been back in to have his next round of testing.  They kept telling me they would call me the next day, in a few days, in a week to let me know the status.  Well, when I hadn’t heard anything from them in two weeks, I called on Friday and left a message for them.  They just called me back and said the IUI vials are out of quarantine!  So I now have six prepurchased IUI vials waiting for me.  :)  This is so nice, because I really like this donor and I was worried that I’d have to switch to someone else.

I do think I’ll take this cycle off so I can make an appointment with my doc and get things figured out.  But it’s a relief to know that I have all six vials waiting for me.

Yup, not-so-lovely Aunt Flo appeared this evening.  This is only cd25, only 11 days after I inseminated.  I really thought I might be pregnant this time - had all the cramping and bloating I had with my chemical pregnancy this summer - and actually got my hopes up a bit, so Aunt Flo’s arrival this time is harder than usual.

I am definitely going to call my doctor on Tuesday (tomorrow if they’re open) and insist that they actually run some tests because clearly something is wrong.

In happier news, Zoe started her allergy shots.  She’s only had 3 so far but already seems to be doing better!  She’s significantly less itchy and hasn’t coughed all weekend.  This could be coincidence (they said not to expect any progress for the first 6 months), but I’m going with it.

My sweet Miss Zoe has been diagnosed with a number of allergies.  You may remember that she has had ongoing health problems.  Well, she’s also had a cough since she was about one (she’s now four).  Vets kept saying it must be kennel cough, they’d treat her for it and it wouldn’t make a difference.  She also has very itchy skin and gets dandruff.  Last fall, she was having some kidney problems and her new vet took an X-Ray of her stomach.  It happened to also include her chest, and the vet found that she had a slight inflamation: Asthma.  So that’s what’s caused her coughing all these years.  Anyway, eventually she got tested for allergies and will start allergy shots in another week or so.

I have many, many allergies, so I definitely feel for her!  I’m just glad we finally figured out what was causing the problem.  She’s on a steroid/anti-histamine right now, but my hope - and the vet’s - is that she won’t need it long-term as a result of the allergy shots.  I was also surprised to learn that dogs can be allergic to people!  She’s not, thankfully, though she is allergic to cats.

By the way, as I’m writing this, I’m listening to a story on NPR about perfume for dogs.  Definitely *not* something I will be spending my money on.  They just interviewed a vet who said, well, you should be careful because it can interfere with the dogs’ sense of smell.  Seriously, folks, I know dogs can smell bad at times, but perfume?!?

Hi Folks,

Thanks so much for all your sweet and supportive comments about my school experience.  The school crappiness continues - most recently having a fit at me because I *dared* to request that people bring a list of ingredients to an upcoming potluck so I - and other folks with allergies - would know what we could eat.  However, I am really excited about my student teaching placement.  I start next quarter, but am there one day a week right now.  The kids and teacher are great *and* the teacher is a lesbian who says in all her years of teaching, she has never had a parent be concerned that she was teaching their child.  In your face, stupid MIT program that knows nothing.  I wish I could spend every day in that class.  Only six and a half weeks until I can do just that.

My friends at school are also really supportive.  When they heard about the school flipping out over my allergies yet again, one woman proposed that we all bring in laminated ingredients lists, displayed on placards.  Just to show how *not-difficult* the whole process was.  Another woman - who happens to have a nut allergy - said she was going to fake an allergy attack and then exclaim, “oh, I *wish* I had known what was in these dishes!”  They rock.

First, thanks for all your sweet comments about the homophobia and everything at school.  I really appreciate them.  I have some updates - check back tomorrow for them.

Also, sorry for not posting sooner!  Things have been crazy busy with school; this quarter is supposed to be our busiest of the year.

And now for the real purpose of this post - I had my first IUI today!  So cross your fingers for me.  After the craziness of my cycles in November and December, when my cycles lasted 24 and 42 days respectively, I decided to take a cycle off.  Then, this cycle I started TTC again.  My acupuncturist has been focusing on improving my fertility and so my last cycle was 29 days and this one looks like it will be regular, too.

When I met with the nurse practitioner at my obgyn in December, she suggested switching from ICI at home to IUI in their office, so that’s what I did.  I was nervous going in today because I’d heard that it was painful.  It was a bit painful for me because she had to use a clamp, but it wasn’t that bad - at least, the pain didn’t last that long.  I’m having a bit of cramping right now, nothing too bad.  I’m also enjoying yummy celebratory gluten free pizza from my local allergen-friendly Italian restaurant.  And now, the waiting begins….

Also, a question for y’all.  So, I was doing OPKs 2-3 times a day, which meant that yesterday I did one while I was at school.  The problem, however, was that I couldn’t wait in the bathroom for ~3 minutes while the OPK calculated its results.  Thankfully it was actually pretty quick - thank god for the definitive positive - so I had my result before I left the bathroom.  However, what if it hadn’t been so quick?  Have y’all had this problem?  I don’t exactly want to carry the pee stick around with me waiting for the 3 minutes to be up, but I’m not sure what else to do if I don’t get a quick result.  Thoughts?

I haven’t written on here much about my experiences at my grad school, mostly because they have been rather difficult and I haven’t wanted this blog to turn into a place for me to complain about things.  For much of the past quarter, however, I have experienced a lot of homophobia and ablism by many of the school’s professors and administrators.

At the beginning of the year, the program director refused to help me ensure that I had food to eat (I’m gluten-free) at a required retreat.  She literally told me that “they’ll have vegetables and you can eat that.”  Um, hello, I can not eat just vegetables for two days.  I have no problem eating the same meal for a couple of days (not ideal, but I know kitchens are busy places).  However, that meal has to actually be a full meal, not a plate of vegetables.  Not to mention the fact that my diet is covered under the ADA.  After the whole experience, the program director and another prof wanted to meet with me and basically told me they didn’t agree with the way I’d advocated for myself.  Ugh.  Neither of them have food allergies, and unless they do, they have no place telling me how I should be advocating for myself.  I wasn’t rude, I didn’t yell, etc.

The homophobia has been more ongoing.  In general, the message around any sort of queer issues - especially around issues of queers having kids - is “be careful, that’s really controversial.”  WTF, this is Seattle?!?!  Some of the worst was in a social justice class where we were supposed to do a project on a social justice issue.  The prof wanted us to present both sides if it was a controversial issue.  The examples he gave were marriage equality, abortion, and the WASL.  Now, I don’t disagree that same sex marriage is controversial but as far as I’m concerned you can’t have different requirements for different issues: doing so is discriminatory.  So, I decided to say something in class, and here’s how the conversation went:

Me: Could you please clarify what you mean by asking us to present both sides of controversial issues, because it seems to me that all social justice issues are controversial and they wouldn’t be social justice issues if they weren’t, and that by only requiring both sides for certain issues, you’re condoning hate speech against my community.

Prof: Um, well, uh … [then, something about how slavery was not a controversial issue so it would be one where it would be okay to only present one side.  (Now, I'm not going to argue with him about slavery because I don't want to add to the rift that seems to exist between white queer communities and straight people of color communities.  However, it also seems clear that slavery is "controversial" in some areas because it still continues today - that is, obviously there are some people who think it's okay.)]

Me: But you can’t have different requirements …

Another student: What she’s saying is that the other viewpoint is a religious one that’s discriminatory.

Prof: Not everyone agrees with that.

A third student: Yeah, I don’t.

Prof: See?

At that point I got up and walked out of class.  Several students followed me out.  I have never walked out of a class before, never even thought about it.  But staying in that class would have meant condoning his homophobia.

Afterwards, at the encouragement of my two favorite professors, two other students and I met with this other professor.  In that meeting, he said he doesn’t believe that homophobia exists, essentially because sexual orientation is a choice (at least that’s what I surmise from his explanation) and that he doesn’t feel he has any responsibility to create a safe space in his classroom.  That last part was pretty explicit, as in I said: “Do you think you have any responsibility to create a safe space in your classroom?” and he responded: “no.  That’s your responsibility.”  By this point I was crying.  I could not believe that someone in a professional capacity could say the things he was saying to my face.  I mean, hello, this is not 1950.

There have been a number of other homophobic things that have happened, but I won’t list them all here.

So, then, the school decides to send me a letter telling me that I’ve been unprofessional because I cried in the meeting with that professor and I’ve been unwilling to hear and consider other people’s perspectives.  Um, since when do I have to be open to considering that someone’s homophobia is justified?  They have now placed me on an “assistance plan.”  What that actually entails I’m not sure, but they want me to get counseling and they want me to talk to other teachers about their experiences.  I already have a therapist, though it’s also inappropriate for them to suggest I get one.  I actually think the thing about talking to other teachers is a good idea, though not for the reasons they’ve listed.  I had already asked my two favorite profs to connect me with other queer teachers (which they are in the process of doing) because I want to hear about their experiences and get advice from them about being a queer teacher.

The thing is, I’ve worked in schools before.  I’ve had a lot of good experiences.  Generally speaking, I don’t come out to the kids, either - not because I’m hiding it, but just because it doesn’t come up.  If it does, then I’m honest, but it’s not been an issue for me.  I’ve never had kids or parents respond to me  homophobicly.  If any parent were to have an issue with me being queer and teaching their kid, then I would refer them to the principal because, really, it’s the principal’s job to address those concerns, not mine.