Silicon Valley Moms Blog

Could I have had her baby?

I have a friend who, like me, went through agonizing years of infertility. Mine ended in my son Zachary through IVF,  followed by the double whammy of my two girls conceived of naturally just 18 months a part after that.  Three babies in four years. Whew. Blessed overwhelmingness.  Hers, instead, ended in endless failed attempts at staying pregnant, and then a vigorous double pursuit of her own child by a surrogate and the adoption of a child from a foreign orphange. The surrogate backed out. The orphanage came through, twice. Two brothers they now proudly parent.

Though she was on the East Coast, she was pursuing surrogacy in California, which apparently offers more flexibility in dealing with surrogacy than her home state did. Since I was in Palo Alto, we talked frequently during her visits of her process, its ups and downs, its “gotcha’s” around every corner. The surrogate’s psychological tests weren’t favorable. The next surrogate changed her mind just before the final stages. It was in these days that my friend, hit rock bottom emotionally. It was unbelievably sad to hear how so much disappointment could be shouldered by one person, two when you include her heroic husband who weathered it all with her, in such a brief time period.

Divide and Conquer - the motto for our family of five

My husband and I have never had the experience of having two parents for one child, having started our family with twins. I remember when the twins, B and L (now 4-years-old), were about 19-months-old, we were on vacation in Tahoe with some friends. Our friends had a daughter the same age as the twins and had just had a new baby. We felt like we had finally made it over the hump of twin babyhood. That weekend, the twins slept in until 8am! After swimming at the Northstar rec center, where we were staying, B and L sat on a picnic blanket - by themselves! - and ate PB&J sandwiches - by themsleves! - while J and I just looked on. Wow. About a month later, we found out we were pregnant with #3. Surprise....

It was a happy surprise, one that I had always wished to have. The surprise of finding out you're pregnant when you least expect it. Personally, I never dreamed about what my wedding would be like as a young girl, but I did think about

Baby on the brain

Since Darius was born, I've been saying that he would be an only child.  And if not an only child forever, at least for a very very long time.  I was 26 when D was born - and in Silicon Valley, I felt like a teenage mother.  The women in my office and the women in my mother's club were, on average, 10 years older than me.  Darius was a surprise pregnancy.  My birth control failed after an antibiotic interaction.  10 days on penicillin and wha-la my precious baby was conceived.  So needless to say, we weren't in a phase of our lives where we really thinking about children.  We wanted to travel, to live through our twenties as care-free young adults, to pursue our careers.   And while my son has changed most of that picture, I didn't want to jump into my "baby-making" phase of life just because we made a baby.  One was enough, thank you.  I didn’t need to start having more.

I have held steadfast to my opinion that we wouldn't have more children until my spouse finished grad school and Darius was in school.  Until now. For the last month I have daydreamed about getting pregnant.  I have this fantasy about it.  About quitting work and staying at home for a year to nest and make a family.  About staying fit and having a clean house.  And doing crafts with the kids and going to the park.  And having a clean house.  Like I said, it's a fantasy.

Wanted:Inner Sex Goddess

Has anyone seen my inner sex goddess?   I lost her some where along the way after getting pregnant.  She doesn't seem to exist anymore.  I have been missing her lately and searching high and low.

My husband and I are ready for baby #2 but how can you have a baby when you have no sex drive?  Getting pregnant is never fun.  Well, it can be lots of fun but it is always so planned that the fun seems to disappear quickly after month one.  We both want it so bad but we can seem to find our inner sex god/goddess.

First of all, when you have a child, sex is hardly

Rose Garden Couple Expecting Sextuplets

Not sure if you all caught the media coverage on this local, Silicon Valley couple awhile back, but I heard about Brian and Gracie Soldani's situation on the Willow Glen e-list just last week. In trying to have their first child, they ended up expecting six, which I heard would make them the country's 16th set of sextuplets. My world was totally turned up side down with one baby, so I can’t even imagine all the challenges medically, physically, emotionally, and financially they have ahead. In thier case especially, I think it really will "take a village." The official diaper drive just ended, but you can see their baby registry and other ways to help on their website. Forget the Bugaboo how about the Runabout 6-seater for only $1600!

For John, Elizabeth, and Rose

In 1997, I was 36 years old.  My high school debate partner had just died of AIDs, and in the course of his death, his friends and I had gotten back together.  Which is why I was talking with Rose.

Rose is very smart.  She's got a degree from Berkeley in languages (fluent French and Italian), but she's always discounted it. When she was younger, she collected Barbie Dolls and wanted to be a trophy wife.  I kid you not.  That was a stated life goal.     Although Rose can (conceivably) talk about philosophy and literature, she prefers fashion.  One of those "friend of a friend" relationships where everyone is friendly, smiles a lot, and then escapes to their separate corners.  (Seriously, I might try to stab myself in the temples if I had to discuss fashion for prolonged lengths of time.)

But after John's death, we started talking on the phone.  About life stuff.  One day, she told me that she was getting a  mastectomy.  At 39, she'd found a very small lump, and when she mentioned it, almost casually, to her doctor, she found her butt speeding into an extremely intense treatment program.  As she told me, younger women diagnosed with breast cancer often have a very aggressive form of the disease -- and hers was very aggressive.

Two months later - when she was in the throes of treatment - I was diagnosed with infertility.  It was handled in what I now think of wryly as a "boot camp central" way:  I did a stimulation drug cycle, went in for testing, heard that my lining wasn't quite thick enough, got more drugs -- and when I went back, the doctor measured my lining, told me that "you'll never have children," gave me a drug to make me ovulate some time in the next few days, and waved goodbye.  It took only about 12 minutes -- very efficient!

I called the doctor back, of course, and made him explain the "you'll never have children" part of things. My memory is a little fuzzy, but I believe that he was the doctor who compared my internal workings to a toilet.  (Yes, he could have used one of those "sensitivity" classes.)  "You know that little bar that tells the toilet when to stop filling up?" he said.  "Well, yours is stuck on "full," so it tricks your body into thinking that you don't need more lining.  Embryos live in lining.  They cannot live in your body - there's not enough to eat.

His first treatment was to give me estrogen patches.  Three of them.  Estrogen, you see, is what makes your uterine lining get thick. 

But I digress. 

First off, yes, sure, infertility is hard.  But not when it's put right up on the table next to a friend with aggressive breast cancer.  Secondly, Rose just about bit my head off when she heard that I was pumping myself full of estrogen.  "You're WHAT?" she yelled.  "THAT STUFF MAKES CANCER!"

We both went through our respective treatments, and I learned some things:

First off, Rose was made of strong stuff.  She didn't complain, didn't moan, just put her head down and fought.  After her divorce, she was working for an extremely well-known (and nasty) designer who actually begrudged her her chemo treatments.  She lived by herself in New York City, with very little money or friends, and it was heartbreaking to watch her fight.

Secondly, I realized that there are a lot of women with breast cancer who fly under the radar. They're someone's mom, grandmother, aunt, and they don't "do" the internet. They can't take advantage of the internet groups and support networks that the rest of us use, and the only advice that they get is from people that they see.  I was part of a 400-strong internet group of forty-ish women with infertility, and the group blew my socks off. Founded by a Columbia professor of Linguistics, the group was full of highly educated, smart, very motivated women from all over the world. You could go onto that list and post all of your test results, what your doctor had prescribed, and so forth, and other women would tell you exactly what their doctors had used in the same situation, would send you the medical study that talked about the protocol, would send you contact information for their doctors, and so forth.  I'm still in touch with friends I met there, and they live in DC, the south, Canada, Finland, South America, and Germany.

Rose, on the other hand, had one support group. Her group met in the cafeteria one floor above her doctor's office.  All of the women went to the same doctor. And presumably, they talked about their feelings (because they were all getting their medical advice from the same doctor.)

I did what I could. I researched for her, send support packages, and so forth.  And after I had my son, I spent two years of my time doing independent medical research for individuals.  It was my personal way of "giving back."  All of the work I did is on my website.  Here's the medical page, and here's the overview page, which is aimed directly at people who have been diagnosed with something like cancer (or their friends).

So what happened?  Rose's breast cancer metastacized to her spine.  She fought, and began a new treatment regimen with a new drug called Herceptin.

It worked.

She became cancer-free (yes, even after having it on her bones), got a job and moved to Paris, and she's fine.  She's symptom-free, and it's been years.  Herceptin worked.  Just like I hope it will work on Elizabeth Edwards. Because there really is hope.

I know that many of the svmoms met with Elizabeth Edwards this past year, and she sounds like quite a lady.  I'm pretty amazed that they're still campaigning, but not surprised, and my heart goes out to her, her family, and everyone that this remarkable woman has touched.

There's just one thing.  My friend Rose cannot afford to come back from France because she has to continue on Herceptin for the rest of her life. And it's too expensive here in America.  She worked in France, and their National Health Insurance takes care of her.  If Rose moves back to America, she won't be able to afford her medicine.

So... Elizabeth, once you've beaten this, and when your husband makes it into the oval office, could you do Rose a favor?  Help to set things up so that our less-fortunate Americans can have access to the medicine that they need?

Thanks.   With a big dash of energy-filled great vibes, luck, and wishes, from your friends (and fans) in the silicon valley.

A Salute to Single Women Over 30

I've been spending a little more time lately with a few of my single women friends - because they're good friends and I enjoy being with them and I refuse to not spend time with them just because they don't fit the same demographic I do... and every time I go to an event where the majority of people in the room are couples, I admire the courage of the single women who attend solo.  I think that takes an extra level of self-confidence.  On top of that, those who are in their thirties have an extra challenge if they want to become moms, so I want to salute single women today.

These close women friends of mine are incredibly brilliant, beautiful, talented, capable and fun.  There's nothing wrong with them except possibly that they have high standards and haven't settled for less than they want (in nearly every case, they've been very close to getting married but it just didn't work out.)  Most of the people who read this blog are married with children and we tend to forget the dilemma of the single woman, but for those in their thirties and forties, they tend to fit the following molds:

- Childless and not interested in having children but would like to eventually find a life partner (I realize that being single is not a bad thing; it can be incredibly liberating and fun, but most people still want a partner in some respect)
- Childless, feeling the clock ticking but want to find the right person before having a kid (and usually willing to undergo fertility treatments at that point)
- Clock's ticking and they're willing to settle for less than they want in order to have a child before it's too late
- Willing to go solo to have a kid, no matter what it takes and look at that as a separate issue from finding a life partner
- Already have kid(s) from a previous relationship or encounter but seeking a mate and possibly another child

Apparently Madonna wants to adopt another child from Africa, and here's why I don't care.

Well, “don’t care” is harsh. I care about the welfare of the child she will bring into her family, but I don’t care about any of the controversy.

I am, however, excited as a schoolgirl that adoption is getting so much attention in the media. People are talking about it. People are thinking about it. It is mainstream! These are all good things.

What’s next?

We now need more celebrities to start talking about having done IVF. Having used donor eggs or donor sperm to conceive. Having used a surrogate. There are so many non-“traditional” ways of bringing kids into the world and into your family and they all need more attention.

Can you imagine a day when all of these methods are commonplace? Well, they are commonplace now – but do we really talk about them? Nope.

Apparently we are a society obsessed with celebrities. So let’s use that! We can get them to do public service announcements for anti-smoking campaigns. Why can’t they talk about the way the built their family?

Use your voice like we do

Bloggers do this every day, but most of us don’t have the reach of your average movie or TV star. Celebrities have great access to the media, so I want them to use it. Go ahead, make crappy movies that go straight to video, but if you live your life out loud I will respect you for it.

So come on celebrities. Talk. Want to go on Oprah to do it? Fine, whatever it takes. But let some of your “secrets” out and I’ll respect you for it.

Who’s with me?

Plain Jane Mom lives in the Bay Area with her husband and 3 sons, Mike (almost 5), Robbie (4) and Chip (2). For stories of life with the boys, check out Plain Jane Mom.

Hey did you know that January 22 is "Blog for Choice" Day?

Oh no! I was just reading Lindsay Beyerstein's Majikthise blog and read her post about today being Blog for Choice day.  Jeez.  I almost missed it.

I'd like to take a minute, on this Mommy blog, to thank all of the feminists who fought for women's rights and for abortion rights. I'd like to raise a glass to the 34th birthday of Roe v. Wade --  the decision that took away back-alley abortions from our country and gave women control over their bodies.

With freedom comes responsibility.  Here is a toast to educating our youth about safe sex - for their health, and to prevent unwanted pregnancies.

My third toast is to the incredibly brave men and women under red-state seige (and some blue-state locations), who actually provide abortion services.

During our long fertility journey, my surrogate mother became pregnant after our third IVF.  When she went in for an exam at 15 weeks, we discovered that the fetus had died.  My surrogate mother tried to get a D and E procedure up in the very conservative portion of Northern California, where she lived.

The next day she called me, crying through angry tears. She had gone for the procedure and was told that she needed to go through "counseling" before she could get one.  "The fetus has died!" she said. "I'm not terminating a pregnancy!" 

"I'm sorry, maam, but those are the rules," said the nice nurse.  So we brought her down here to the silicon valley, and we found a wonderful doctor - both a fertility specialist and someone who performs abortions - to perform the procedure.

The entire situation was horrifying.  In the long, cold, Republican crazy years, it started to seem possible that, even if you had worked for years to HAVE a baby, but the fetus died, you might have the proper medical procedure withheld from you because someone had managed to have their interpretation of the concept of "God" have more power than your personal freedoms.

Absolutely terrifying.

So my last toast of the night is to all of the Americans who voted the Republicans out.  Thank you, for ending the biggest seige on our country that I have experienced.  There's still a chill in the air, but I'm hoping that we reclaim balance, retain personal freedoms, and uphold our country's tenets in the coming years.

Scroll through some of the very personal posts at the Blog for Choice site, folks.  Check out the amazing posts from Amanda at Pandagon, talking about a woman undergoing a court-ordered C-section (VBAC was not allowed),  Jill at Feministe, with a gut-smacking post about exactly what list of things makes her pro-choice, and finally, with Liza in Culture Kitchen, writing a post that will make you cry, it's so full of mother love.

And as you read, remember one, very small, teensy thing.  Politics is personal.