Hoping for a Big Fat Negative :(

Last week I caused a near-disaster at our house. I have to boil my nebulizer cups to sterilize them after each use, and I have six of these cups so I only have to boil them every 3 days. Last week, I fell asleep while boiling them!

I awoke at 2 AM thinking, "What’s that smell?" and woke up Greg. He immediately said, "YOUR NEBULIZERS!" and ran into the kitchen. Not only had I boiled off all the water and melted the plastic cups, I had vaporized the melted plastic! There was nothing left in the pot except for some little blue rubber pieces. The living & kitchen were full of plastic smoke, and it smelled awful (and our smoke alarms didn't go off!). We opened all the windows and spent two hours outside waiting for the house to air out. We finally made it back to bed around 4 AM.

However, our house still stank of burnt plastic for several days afterwards, and there was a sticky film all over our laminate floors. We spent three days cleaning the floors and everything else in the house, I bought a new carbon filter for the air purifier, and we spent a lot of time with the windows open. The filter in the AC unit had plastic strings and beads all over it! The house stopped stinking this weekend. Phew!

Greg and I, being environmental engineers and knowing about the toxic things that can be found in plasticizers, knew this could be bad for us, and definitely for any baby that could be growing inside me. So, now we are hoping for a BFN this month. Sad :(

My ENT Appointment

Three words about my ENT: He is hot. During my appointment, he kept saying, "you are always smiling!" and I thought to myself, "maybe that's because you are so dreamy."

Anywho, he performed a nasal endoscopy on me and said that my left sinus (the one that has been hurting) was swollen. He wanted to perform a CT scan to see what's going on, but told me I needed to wait until I knew for sure if I was PG. Which means I'm either going back when I get my period, or not going to get one at all. He said, "it would probably be fine if we did one now and you are pregnant, but I would feel really guilty if your child ended up having three arms." He also told me he knows I am going to have a boy :)

Something I Didn't Think About

When we decided to TTC, I knew there would be risks because 1) carry a baby is hard on a woman's body and 2) my medication options would be limited if I got sick.

Last week made me realize something I didn't think about: The face that #2 is true for the entire time we are TTC, because I could get pregnant at anytime.

Last week, my doctor told me to not even bother coming in for a sputum culture because there was only ONE antibiotic they could give me for my sinusitis. Being on that antibiotic made my thrush come back, and my options for thrush meds are limited as well.

Funny story about my thrush….I wrote a little while ago that I was going to ask my doctor for a prescription to wipe out my thrush and then I would prevent it with Biotene mouthwash. Well, I started using the Biotene right away, and it got rid of my thrush on its own! So I never did call my doctor for the prescription. On Saturday morning, I noticed it was back despite my continued use of Biotene. I did not want to wait until Monday to get a prescription, so I called Greg's brother, who happens to be a doctor.

I told him what was going on and he said he would call in a prescription for Diflucan. After I handed to phone back to Greg, I realized didn't ask him if it was safe to take Diflucan while TTC. So Greg asked and he said he would check and call back later.

I also happened to get a positive OPK on Saturday, so, a little while later, while Greg and I were cuddling, he called back and told Greg that Diflucan is a pregnancy class C drug, so it may be ok to take, but, if it were his wife, he wouldn't want her taking it. He wanted to know if I wanted Nystatin instead (this is a mouthwash that doesn't work quite as well as Diflucan). Greg said, "I'll ask her and call you back."

I told Greg I wanted the Nystatin, and Greg called his brother back right away and left a voicemail. Then Greg and I got busy ;) About two minutes later, his brother called Greg's cell. We ignored it. Then our landline rang. We ignored that too. Then he called the cell phone again. Then the landline again.

A little while later, I listened to his messages on our answering machine. They were something like this:

"Greg - where did you go? You JUST left me a message! Call me back.”

And then:

"Greg - ok, I've called you four times. Where are you? My guess is you either fell in a hole, don't want to talk to me, or Kristen is ovulating and you guys are humping right now." Of course, then Greg had to tell him "You guessed right!"

Our Wedding Album is Finished!

Finally, over a year later, our photographer has finished our wedding album! Greg and I are very happy with the results and can't wait for it to arrive. Here it is electronically (the first slide is the front and back cover).

4 Hours Sleep Also = Blah

I woke up at 3:30 AM because my sinuses were draining so much that I had to move to the couch for a little while so I could clear my throat without waking Greg. I was able to go back to bed and prevent more drainage as long as I had four pillows under my head so I was pretty much sitting upright.

Then my freaking muscle in my side started twitching from my armpit down along my ribs. The only way I could make it so it didn't feel like someone was poking me in the side was to stretch out by putting my arm up over my head. But, because my head was propped up, that just made my arm fall asleep and was very uncomfortable.

Two hours, lots of tossing, turning and readjusting, and a few mental cuss-words later, I decided to just get up and go to work early. Fun times :P

Sinuses = Blah

I suffer from on and off sinus headaches, and I notice they are worse when the mold count is high. However, the past few weeks they have gotten worse. The sinuses below my eyes hurt all the way into my teeth, and the drainage is killing my throat and keeping me up at night. In the past, whenever I have called my CF and/or ENT doc about this, they said, "Take Advil and Mucinex and rinse your sinuses" so that's what I have been doing. (Actually, I do that anyway when my sinuses are not as bad as they have been lately.) I finally caved yesterday and called the doctor when I woke up feeling like crap, had been dreaming that I had body aches, and I took my basal body temperature and it was 99.5.

My ENT can't see me until Wednesday, so my CF doctor decided to put me on an antibiotic now. The phone exchange was rather amusing because I communicate with my CF doc via the CF clinic coordinator, (I'll call her Jane). Here’s how it went:

Jane calls and says, "The doctor wants you to come in tomorrow to get a sputum culture so we can identify what meds will work. He also wants to call in a med for you now, but needs to know if you are pregnant" I explain to her that I am not, but I may be about to ovulate and we had sex two days ago, so even if I used a condom now, I could still become pregnant at any time. She tells me she will call me back.

A few minutes later my phone rings and she says "The doctor doesn’t want to take any risks and is going to prescribe you Bactrim" to which I respond "I am allergic to Bactrim" she then says "Oh, well then I will call you back again." The phone rings a third time "OK, we found a med we can call in for you, but you don't have to come in for a sputum culture anymore because it's our last option!" So now I am taking cefuroxime for two weeks. I’ve never taken this one before.

She also told me I should not be taking Advil (ibuprofen) while TTC, and I should take Tylenol (acetaminophen) instead. A quick Google search taught me that Advil can interfere with ovulation and implantation. Good to know!

And I must add that I am wondering if:

flying stresses + being sick + advil = not ovulating anytime soon

Oh well. We will be shagging tonight anyway ;)

Finally Back from Vacation!

What a week! Last Wednesday Greg and I left for Pawley's Island, South Carolina. His family has vacationed there every year since he was three. It was a nice vacation. It rained quite a bit so we didn't get much beach time in, but it was nice to visit with Greg’s family.

My stomach was bothering me on and off Friday and Saturday. I think I may have picked up a mild stomach bug, but several people asked me if I was pregnant :P

Here are some pictures from this weekend:

Greg and I on the Dock at Night

Wow...Look at all the Stars

Now for the story of our trip home: It was awful! We were supposed to get home on Sunday night, but we did not make it back until last night (Tuesday). We stopped over in Atlanta on our way home. However, some storms in Atlanta shut down the airport for several hours, which cause tons of chaos.

When we checked in at Myrtle Beach, we were told our flight to ATL was 3 hours delayed because of the storms, and we were rebooked on an earlier flight to ATL so we could make our connection to Austin. However, as we were taxing to the runway, an engine caught fire and the cabin filled with smoke! At first we didn’t know what was going on – it was just very hot and smelled as if someone had gotten sick. Then the flight attendant told us what was going on and pointed out the smoke. Scary! Thank God we were still on the ground when this happened!

After deboarding the smoky plane, we saw the gate agent, who told us our flight from ATL to AUS was also delayed and we should make it, but he got us confirmed seats on a later flight to AUS just in case. He said that, if we miss the first flight, we just needed to get our boarding passes printed at the gate for the second flight in ATL.

So, we flew to Atlanta and then sat on the runway for an hour and a half. Then we sprinted (as much as we could…the airport was SO crowded!) to the first AUS flight, which is cancelled about 15 minutes after we got to the gate. So we went to the gate of the second Austin flight and wait in line for THREE HOURS to get our boarding passes printed. However, when we tried to board the plane and the gate agent told us "whoops, you don't have seats on this flight...you have seats on the TUESDAY NIGHT flight" At this point it was 1 AM and it was all I could do to not cry.

Delta wouldn’t put us up in a hotel because the delay was weather related, but I was able to find a hotel with available rooms and made a reservation. We then waited in the taxi line for another hour, got to the hotel and waited in line to check in for a half hour, and finally make it to bed at 4 am. We took a cab to the mall the next day because Delta wouldn’t even give us our luggage during our two day wait to fly home, so we needed a change of clothes and some deodorant, (and I used this as an excuse to buy some fancy moisturizer ;).

The airport was INSANE on Sunday night. There were thousands of people in the same boat as us. The line to be rebooked was over 5 hours long, and all it did was go to a bank of phones that called India! One man said he waited in that line only to wait on hold for another half hour. Another woman we talked to waited in line to speak with a gate agent for four hours, was five people from the front, and the agent said, "We’re closing, come back tomorrow morning."

Now, I completely understand the airport had to be shutdown for safety, flights were cancelled for safety, and we couldn’t get on a flight for two days because there simply wasn’t enough room for us. I even understand why Delta can’t afford to put a few thousand people up in a hotel room. But:

Dear Delta,

Please hire more employees to help us stranded passengers. Standing in line for 3-5 hours just to learn what the heck is going on is unacceptable. In addition, please include more baggage handlers when you do this hiring, because, the least you could do is give us our luggage if we are going to be stuck for two days. I would pay a lot more for a ticket if it meant that I wouldn’t have to go through this again.

Sincerely,
Pissed-off in Texas

The 5 Hour Rebooking Line - The Length of the Entire Terminal, in Both Directions!

Going on Vacation (Again)

Greg and I are leaving for South Carolina this afternoon! His family has vacationed there every summer since before he was born. It should be some nice time for me to read and relax on the beach. After we get back, things should be a little less busy in our lives, and I will have more time for blogging. I'll be sure to post pictures from our trip!

Onto Cycle #2

Well I got a wonderful 4th of July present: AF arrived. Luckily, I wasn't upset because it means one more month that we can save some money and buy some things we'd like for the house. I think I'll have this attitude for at least the first few months. (Although, I will be over the moon if we get PG.)

A summary of my second cycle off BCP (our first TTC): This cycle I was more bloated than the previous one, and my skin broke out right before AF - that's something that never happened to me while on BCP. Hopefully, the skincare products I bought this weekend will take care of that ;)

In other news, I have thrush again :( I am not pleased about this! I just got rid of it two weeks ago, so I decided to go the alternative medicine route and picked up some Orithrush at the homeopathic pharmacy. I also started taking a probiotic. The Orithrush sort-of works, but not 100%. I think I am going to ask my doctor to call in another prescription for me, and then start rinsing with Biotene every time I use Advair. I read on the CF forums that Biotene works to prevent thrush, so hopefully that will do the trick!

CF Pregnancy Board!

I know I posted about the CF Forums a few weeks ago, but today I finally got around to really surfing through them, and they have a message board specifically for pregnancy! I'm so excited for this wonderful resource! Now I'm off to surf through past posts.