Finally, A Reply

As you know, I've been patiently waiting for my company CEO (Mr. M) to reply to my insurance inquiry e-mail from late June. I know he's been busy, and I haven't been in dire need of an immediate response, so I've just been leaving a respectable amount of time before sending a follow-up e-mail. On Friday, I sent one.
At work, Mike's department is adjacent to the executive offices, so I asked one of his close co-workers, Pam, to let me know when she sees Mr. M. I didn't want to just send an e-mail blindly, taking the chance of him being out of the office and having my e-mail get lost or overlooked again. So, early Friday afternoon, Pam sent me this e-mail:

Hi! The Eagle has landed. But he may not be in for very long ~ I believe one of his grand-eaglets was born this week....

I thanked her and immediately sent my e-mail to Mr. M. I wrote:

Hi, Mr. M. I'm just following up on an e-mail I sent you in June (attached below). I know you've been extremely busy with the acquisition, and I don't want to take too much of your time, but I was just wondering if you've had a chance to look at my e-mail at all. Thank you again for your time!
Sincerely, Lauren

Within 13 minutes, he sent the following reply:

I never got your note cause the e-mail adress was wrong. I will give to benefits and ask them what can be done. Not really anything I have been asked to look at directly. I or someone else will get back to youi.

I shot back a quick, Thank you so much. Any input or suggestions are greatly appreciated.

I don't quite know how to take his reply. First of all, I sent the followup e-mail to the same e-mail address I sent the initial request to, so I don't know how he didn't get it. Perhaps he accidentally deleted it, or upon seeing my second e-mail, realized he never responded to the first one. No matter. I now know he read my request.
After I showed Mr. M's reply to Mike, he asked me how I felt. I said, "I feel....weird." I mean, Mr. M is the CEO. I said in the e-mail that I'd already checked with the benefits group and there was nothing they could do, which is why I appealed to him. What would him passing it back to them accomplish?
I'm really not expecting much from this whole thing, but at least I know I gave it a try. At least if we have to go on to finance this ourselves, I can have some peace knowing I tried to get something from our insurance first.

I Want

A few months ago, one of my co-workers became a dad for the first time. He and his wife had an adorable little girl. Recently, after sharing a phone call with his wife -- where they were obviously trying to coordinate some upcoming plans with regard to the new baby -- the co-worker remarked to me, "Boy, I picked the wrong time of year to have a kid. We can't go on vacation or anything."
Now, I know what he meant, and he doesn't know my situation, but all I could muster was a polite smile to his statement and went on with my work. His remark started me thinking of all the "inconveniences" parenthood would bring, and I began making a mental list. In the end, I decided those inconveniences sound pretty good to me....

I want to bounce from one doctor's appointment to the next and get poked a prodded and get stuck with needles for blood draws.

I want to endure the bloating of ovarian stimulation.

I want to be sore from PIO injections.

I want to endure the torture of the two-week wait.

I want to wait for the dreaded call from the doctor's office the afternoon of my pregnancy test.

I want to impatiently kill time from one ultrasound to the next.

I want to have sore boobs.

I want to get morning sickness and throw up each day, have my stomach turn at the sight of a tuna fish sandwich.

I want to be so tired I can barely get through a day of work.

I want to have headaches and backaches and have to pee every 45 minutes.

I want to cry at the drop of a hat.

I want to have heartburn.

I want to miss out on a planned vacation because I can't fly while pregnant.

I want to grow out of my favorite, most comfortable jeans and have not a thing in my closet that fits.

I want stretch marks.

I want to have to pass on drinks with the girls, and just order caffeine-free ginger ale.

I want to have trouble sleeping and trouble getting comfortable in bed.

I want to worry that we won't have the nursery finished in time, and wonder if we're ready for the big day.

I want to feel contractions.

I want to wonder if the pain is ever going to end.

I want to spend two, four, six, eight, 10 -- however many it takes -- hours in labor.

I want to feel the exhaustion of just having brought our son or daughter into the world.

I want to endure one sleepless night after the next.

I want every inconvenience being a parent can bring. I want all of it, because then it simply means I'm a mom.

Killing Time

Things have been up and down during the last couple weeks. My anxiety about things has gotten a little better, and I've been enjoying the nice summer weather with lots of beach time. But still not having any kind of concrete plan in place for another IVF cycle is getting the better of me. Each day I trudge off to a job I don't particularly like (but am still grateful to have), come home to spend time on the computer or watch TV, do some odds and ends around the house, then go to bed for the day. Each day isn't much different from the day before. My life feels like "Groundhog Day." I know I can't complain about the mundane too much -- in my life, dull and routine is always preferred to our all-too-familiar stressful and uncertain spells. Mike and I have re-opened the IVF dialogue in the past couple nights. I just want to know what he's thinking, and what his expectations are for our future. I know he wants what I want, but does he want it as urgently as I want it? Each day I feel like I'm killing time until the life I've been dreaming of finally arrives.

Our main stumbling block to IVF is financial. I'm still awaiting an answer to my appeal e-mail to my employer. In the meantime, I'm also not holding out much hope that it will do any good. So, that means we have to have a plan B. Our thoughts for plan B are all complicated by the fact that Mike and I have been on the Dave Ramsey "Total Money Makeover" plan for the past couple years, and we're trying to get debt-free. Adding a fertility treatment loan would only compound our debt, and simply saving towards IVF would not only keep the rest of our debt at its current level, but it would also mean waiting a considerable amount of time before we could save enough for a cycle. What's a broke girl to do?

Mike has already told me that he is willing to go further into debt for the chance at having a baby, and for that I love him. It's the one thing we both agree is worth going into debt for. He told me a little while ago that he would give me a baby tomorrow if he could. I just love that man. The other day, after we got home from his nephew's Christening, he said to me, "Are you finding it harder and harder to be around other people's kids?" It's little statements like that which remind me that I'm not the only one who aches for a child.

Thought for the day: I heard a stat the other day that at any given time, there are 3.4 million pregnant women in the U.S. Doesn't sound like such an exclusive, elusive group when you hear it in those numbers, does it?