And yes, it CAN get worse...

So a quick recap of the last six months makes my family look like we belong in a bubble. Fife months ago, I suffered a missed miscarriage and had to undergo a d & c. I had just gotten to the point of feeling like I was starting to heal, when my mom drops a huge bombshell on me.

I have to set this up, just to show how absurd it all was: Mom has had some hearing issues since last spring, when she got sick (cold-like) on a trip to China. Her ear closed and never reopened. She went back and forth, from one specialist to the next, with no clear answers. One doctor, clearly sensing her frustration, ordered an MRI. They thought, at worst, it was a bulging blood vessel in her hear and she would have to have very delicate surgery to correct it.

So we all got together at a festival/parade at the end of September and sat to watch the parade. It was getting late, and my daughter was getting tired, so we got up to leave. My mom leans over to my husband and says, "I need to talk to your wife before you go." It is then that she drops the bombshell that the MRI showed a brain tumor (unrelated to the hearing loss), and she was scheduled for gamma knife surgery within weeks. So as my brain was trying to process all of this, clowns are galloping by, youth riding by on unicycles, bands playing a marching tune. Unreal.

So fast forward to last week, which will be the subject of tomorrow's blog.

Officially in the 2WW

So I use Fertility Friend, which I always swore I wouldn't, and today I got confirmation of ovulation from Monday. What a mix of feelings.

I hate not knowing if we were successful, and I hate even more the fact that I won't know anything more for a week and a half.

I want to be positive about this, but all I can think of is that I was away on Saturday. Even though our chances are high, all I can focus on is that one missed day. Typical me, focusing on the one, teeny tiny probably insignificant detail.

And what if we ARE successful? Well then, here we go again. I try to convince myself that this pregnancy would be different and that I would not worry so much about the worst thing that could happen. But five months ago it never even occured to me that I would have a miscarriage. That kind of stuff doesn't happen to me. And then it did.

I can't concentrate on much else right now, which is not exactly the best thing for my job! Luckily things are really slowing down and I have no major projects on my desk.

My first blog

OK, I've never done this before, so here goes.
I guess I'll start with the title of my blog...it's a little out there, even for me. I love food, love to cook, and love to eat, so naturally I am a big Paula Deen fan. It's something I can share with my grandma, who spends most of her time watching the Food Channel. Last May, Grandma lent me her copy of Paula's biography, "It Ain't All About the Cooking," which I read in about a day. If you don't know Paula's history, the short story is that when she was a young mom, her dad died and her mom died shortly after. She was in a bad marriage, and started having panic attacks. Agoraphobia followed, and she struggled financially, emotionally, and it took its toll on her and her boys.
One of the things that got her through it was the following thought: (and I don't have the book right here with me, so I am paraphrasing) "If you wake up in the morning and you are on the right side of the dirt, it's going to be a good day."
In all I have gone through in the past year, both good and bad, this thought has resonated with me and kept my head up. If you are alive, still breathing, you have another day to make it better. So I thought it would be a good title to my blog, plus everything else that could have matched me was already taken!