Specialist Update I

We had a bit of a disappointing week. We received the results from the test administered by the specialist. If you recall, our specific prayer was that these results would be the exact opposite of the results of the same test, performed earlier by a lab ordered by my doctor. My doctor had left out a key piece of information about the conditions of the test so we had a glimmer of hope that perhaps the results were due to a faulty administration and not a reflection of the actual condition.

The results of this second test were exactly the same as the first.

So, the next step is determining the cause of the problem that produces said results.

I felt a little bit kicked in the teeth when we found out. However a huge part of that was the method of notification. We received a bill with the diagnosis right on there. We've never even seen the actual doctor. This office does the test in advance so that the doctor can review the results and have something concrete to go off of at the first meeting. We didn't receive a phone call or a letter or the courtesy to make sure the bill arrived after our first appointment. Just a bill with the diagnosis right there in black and white. I called to confirm that they were indeed the test results and not what the test was checking for and the nurse confirmed that they are indeed the results. Even on the phone she was very matter of fact and not at all friendly. I guess I was just supposing that an office that deals with broken hearted IF people every day would have a clue. It's a significant, potentially life-changing diagnosis. I just think that getting it on a bill was a really crummy delivery method. My best friend did suggest that people probably don't go to this office unless they've already had bad test results elsewhere so in the initial results they're not telling anyone something they don't already know, but I still would have wished for a little more sensitivity, especially because they were partially responsible for the hope we had that perhaps the first results were faulty (it was the nurse's suggestion when I first spoke to her).

I know it's not a huge deal but it really doesn't set me up with a good impression of this office going in to our first appointment this week. I think that my frustration is magnified by my frustration with my own doctor, who also has adopted a "you're a number, not a person" mentality lately.

My DH is a good fit for me. I tend to care too much about bedside manner and he doesn't seem to care at all about it, so hopefully between the two of us we can come out with one balanced opinion. :)

We'd appreciate your prayers especially as we go in to this appointment this week. I've been willing and wishing for it to come for more than a month and now it's almost here and I'm filled with fear about the "what ifs?" Fortunately we have some nice distractions between now and then. We've got a Packer Victory to celebrate ;), lunch with my MIL tomorrow, a seminar with my BIL and his wife, and the start of my photography class, all before the appointment. I'm hoping those diversions will help the week to go quickly!

I know that perfect love casts out fear. And sometimes I'm afraid to voice these fears because they reveal my lack of trust and faith. And I hate that because I don't want to lack trust. I want to be wholly confident of God's good will and pleasure in my life. But that part of my heart is still so full of desire for a baby that I'm fearful that perhaps that desire and God's will could be mutually exclusive, and I don't know how to accept that, much as I want to. And I don't know how to find the balance between praying that it isn't so, and telling Him, "Yes, I'll love you, no matter what." Praying simply for "His will" seems empty and hollow because my heart betrays me. I want to want and do the right thing, but my flesh is weak. May His power be perfected in my weakness! That's certainly the only way I can envision any good coming from this.

I'd still appreciate your prayers for rest. I did get a lot of hours of sleep this weekend but they were broken up and I still don't find myself rested. We missed church for the third week this morning because my body physically ached too much from fatigue to get up. (I had several 4:00 and 5:00 am nights this week resulting in only 3 or 4 hours' sleep when I just could not fall asleep). I finally got up at lunch time and was able to do some grocery shopping tonight, but it took 3 hours and a lot of help from my husband because I was moving so slowly and stiffly (and in my defense it was our big, once a month trip so it usually takes a least half of that three hours). Anyway, I'm hoping the lengthy hours of rest will at least relieve some of my fatigue and that the busyness of this week will force my body to fall in to a more normal activity pattern that will produce more normal rest patterns, too. I may go to a doctor about a short term sleeping medication if I can't figure out something that will work because I'm at my wit's end with this fatigue. So, I'd really love your prayers that this cycle of insomnia would be broken!

Of course it is now 1:26 am and I am wide awake after tossing and turning for more than an hour in bed, but in the interest of at least producing the best possible chance for rest, I shall bid you all goodnight and return to my sweetly (though not quietly) snoozing husband.