Pregnant (IVF) Worriers (part two)

[Shazzamattazzerly]

Hi everyone,

This thread is for all you incessant worriers out there, not necessarily limited to IVF-ers, although I get the feeling the people who have had trouble TTC are more prone to worrying than others! We have filled our first thread (www.mumsnet.com/Talk/pregnancy/1721178-Pregnant-IVF-Worriers) but there is more worrying to do so here we are.

A few of us graduated from the IVF thread (link below) and are having a go at our own thread to get out of the other IVF-ers hair! So get your roomy jogging bottoms on for some virtual hand holding, mutual symptom spotting and staying sane until the next scan date.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/conception/1691674-Excellent-Egg-Buddies-continued-Anyone-having-IVF-ICSI-in-Jan-Feb-and-March-2013-please-join-us

I'm also public sector but no 6 months full pay. I do have annual leave though which is good and they are so supportive.

I'm not sure about dead dog bacon at the picnic but thanks for the offer Mariana . Where on earth do they get the ideas from?

Thanks for all the encouraging words re parenthood. Expat I'm with you with the whales and turtles. What about Japan, safari, outer space etc etc!!! Even closer to home we can't afford a holiday on our own pre baby and I'm worried that this will have a lasting effect on our relationship. If I'd have known that last year would have been our last holiday alone I wouldn't have spent a lot of it crying about not getting pregnant. Oh the irony

Gin sorry about the pm. I'll have a look on the proper computer when I get home. The app is pants for pm's.

just a quick post from me, I didn't get the PM

will ctach up later

I have just snorted my lunch all over the place at dead dog bacon. mariana that is just genius ! Though I would caution against hiring her out for mass catering events.

vall oh your poor back door. I do hope popping the bullets up the front entrance brings you some sort of relief. How are you doing today ?

shazza the cast sounds very exciting. If I did anything like that, I would end-up in A&E and would probably fuse limbs together with plaster cast. I'll avoid it like the plague ! I didn't get the PM either -sorry.

One thing did occur to me.....I am making cakes for eight preggo ladies. Will someone lend me a truck to transport them ?

expat 15 weeks is fucking pants for maternity. You can do nowt in 15 weeks. I fully endorse your do nothing strategy.

gin I hope you enjoy my cakes ! Please do have a look at the JJM sale again as it's rather spesh.

Right got to switch pages to finish this message.....

Oh......I don't think I have any more name checks to do.

I shall continue work on my cake list for Saturday then !

LOL Nokkie - go on, make me what's in the oven (bar mini-Nok)

vall it's a state secret. It will involve chocolate and it will involve cream. Is all I'm saying.

Nice! I am desperate for a really dense victoria sponge with at least an inch of buttercream....I don't think this is a craving...if it is I have been pregnant for years.

I suspect DD1 will not become a successful chef. Unless eating roadkill becomes fashionable.

shazza, you and DP clearly don't spend your holidays sniping at each other the way DH and I do! Seriously though, why not try thinking of the ways in which having a baby will improve your relationship, as overall I think it does. Totally get the travel regrets, I have decided we'll do all that when we have paid off the mortgage... Only another 18 years to go.

The bump cast sounds marvellous. Could you turn it over and use it as a fruitbowl? Or perhaps a birdbath?

vall, yes Preparation H is your friend. But oh god the horror.

Gin, I'm taking the full 12 months which with AL is 13. I don't get paid at all for the last three. I very much want as much time off as possible so we will be living very frugally then and supplementing ourselves with our meagre savings. It feels like an indulgence but I'm never doing this again and I wanted to make the most of my employers very generous deal.

noks, share your cake list in case there's any recipes I can swipe.

Right ladies, I have very sneakily logged on at work to a proper computer and not the rubbish app and resent the PM. Hopefully this time you will have received it. Otherwise my smugness at my first time multiple pm'ing success will be wiped off my face following a double failure.

Looking forward to the now famous Nok cakes .

Mariana, I have set up a bookmark called 'frugal living' on my pad to save websites. They are mainly American and mainly telling you to buy sacks of rice, make vats of tomato (said to rhyme with potato) sauce and making your children's clothes out of your nan's old curtains but there are a few good ideas. All in prep for those lean latter maternity leave months. However the overwhelming message is that spending time with your family massively outweighs having pots of cash to swim in so we can think of that as we eat tomato sauce and rice for the umpteenth night in a row sitting in our matching Von Trappesque outfits. Am loving the belly bird bath!

Also thanks for reminding me that Shazlett will actually enhance our lives and not just hinder all our fun! She has been so active today. maybe reminding me that she is still around and planning to join us very soon.

Have a good afternoon. xx

I do like the sound of the frugal living sites. (As long as none of them involve my archnemesis and High Tory Kirsty Fucking Allsop, queen of disingenuous thrift. I'd like to tie her up with home made bunting and feed her dog bacon.)

Mariana - not sure where you work/ed or what you did/do but I was pleasantly surprised by how not commuting, eating out so much etc, saved me money without even trying. DH cutting down on the beer habit saved us a small fortune too. It also comes to the stage where your darling demonic baby means you don't spend so long in cafes etc.

I am still really stressing. Boobs suitably sore and sense of smell still verging on the K9 sense of ridiculous but no sickness. Called the clinic, just to say I was really anxious and was there anything they could do or recommend in advance of my scan next week and they said I could come in tomorrow . So, 1pm tomorrow.....

vall oooooh tomorrow at 1pm it is then, I didn't have a sickness until 6 weeks some don't ever have it with you on the K9 smell, er went to a patients house and man the smell nearly knocked me out, only the fleas nibbling on my cankles took my mind of it

shazz I have PMed you, I am unable too stupid to work out how to bulk send so I shall do drinks as I am the least preggo

mariana at dead dog bacon, I shall certainly view my next bacon sarnie with suspicion

gin 6 months full pay I didn't realise there were reasonable employers out there, I haven't thought about going back to work as I don't know where I will be living

noks looking forward to your cakes no pressure

waves to everyone else

expat wow, 15 weeks is unbelievably stingy. I do know someone who recently went back to work 2 weeks yes weeks not months after giving birth!!! but most people do seem to take 6 months if not the full 12. Can you take longer unpaid? I am another public sector person so get 6 months at full pay which simplifies decisions. I know we're very lucky.

shazz the bump cast sounds amazing. I definitely want to do one when I get a bump (only 14 weeks so nowt to see yet). Left to myself and plaster I would be in A&E with noks I think, but DH is more practically minded. He wants to photograph my bump weekly which I am not mad about but a bump cast would avoid documenting my cellulite for posterity so might be a good solution. No idea where we'll put it at home though or frankly where we're going to put a baby if we get one :-)

vall fingers tightly crossed for you for tomorrow. Great news that they have brought forward your appointment. maybe I hope you are holding up OK too.

Hi to everyone else too.

Great stuff, vall. I hope that makes the rest of the day bearable.

How anyone could go back to work after two weeks baffles me.

My commute / lunch / coffees cost us £150 a month. I hardly spend any money otherwise except the occasional cafe visit. Oh and make up, but this is where the Boots points come in!

Yay vall! I have everything crossed for you. I'm so pleased you don't have to wait as long.

at tying up the arch Tory in her own bunting! We could then guild her. I'm sure there was an episode when she covered everything in sight in gold leaf... Cheap yah?

A great thrift website for recipes is a Girl Called Jack. We did a couple this week and our weekly shop was muchos cheaper.

I'm hoping to take off 39 weeks and then a month's annual leave. Like you say mariana I won't be doing this again so will try to make the most of it. We can't afford the last 3 months with no income at all. And guess I may be desperate to get back to work < unlikely face>

I have the pm now shazz. I'll bring some French bread and preggo friendly cheeses? Plus a blanket and bottle of something? Was thinking about m&s picnic foods like those feta parcels, but the MW has put the fear of god into me re pre packaged deli food...

All this cake talk is giving me serious cravings...

I have the pm too and have replied but couldn't manage "reply all" (in awe of superior IT skills of those who can). gin I was also struggling for picnic-friendly foods that aren't on the get-your-listeria-here banned list. Cheese and French bread sound lovely. Would olives be OK from me, and strawberries and cream? (I can get the cream in London and bring a freezer bag with me.) I'll bring a bottle of something too, if several of us do then nobody ends up too burdened.

The cake sounds mouthwatering and is making me hungry. Though if noks is still auctioning off slices in exchange for baby kit info, I will be watching hungrily whilst eagerly listening and learning!

Could you guys please stop talking about food? It's just mean!

Ooh balls, I don't have the PM! Can someone ping me the where and the when? I will bring snacky bits (bites, stuffed peppers, quiche etc.), basically will make like gin and clear out M and S. xx

Ps sorry Expat! X

Gin thanks for that blog link. I was very moved by her description of her poverty (and the recipes look great). This is why Allsop makes me so angry with her fiddling with doilies when so many people (especially children) are so desperately poor in what's one of the richest countries in the world. It's made me look up my nearest town's food bank and see how you donate, they accept all non perishable foods like tinned tomatoes or pasta.

Rant over. You need cocktail sausages at your picnic!

I was just going to put the drink in my backpack, easy way to carry stuff do people have a preference to what they would like to wash down this delicious food with ???

mrsh I shall PM you now :)

vall good luck for tomorrow. I really hope everything is ok and it puts your mind at ease. Please let us know how you get on.

mariana double fucking teehee at Kirstie bloody Allsop. She definitely is on the bus with Nicholas Cage, Cliff Richard, Ferne fucking 'SPENDS ALL HER TIME YELLING' Cotton, Holly utterly talentless Big Old Norks, Alan 'gives me the right old creeps' Titchmarsh, Fernando Alonso, Arsene Wenger and anyone who is cruel to animals. The bus that I push over a very steep cliff.

ceara don't worry. You will still get cake !

buzz no, no. No pressure. If I do a Vincent and cut my ear off because of the pressure, don't you go feeling bad

expat mrsh shazza gin HELLO !

Hello to all the lurkers too. Xx

Thanks Buzzy! Received! X

Nokkie I have a 'lift list'. As in who I'd least like to be trapped in one with. It's an ever-changing and very lengthy list. However, these days I mostly watch cbeebies and go to bed at 8pm so am less troubled by the media world. .

Even though it's half four in the morning I could easily go a piece of cake.

Good luck for today Vall. Please let us know. My boss is on hols so I can check in guilt free.

I can't believe all the 6months full pay! Mine is 4 weeks then I think a few at 90% then it goes down until its just stat.

Ceara I'll tell you how to do the cast on sat if you can make it. It is very easy. I've been taking pics of myself as well. Spot the artist!

£150 a month Mariana is excellent. I'm still saving my boots points on your recommendation.

Thanks for the website gin. Sounds brilliant. I'll check it out. By the way I'm not yoga'ing this week cause Hypno birthing starts tonight!

Noks that is some list. I hope for their sakes that they never come across you on a dark night

Thanks for the foody lists ladies. All sounds perfect. We just need sunshine now.

Have a good day. Fingers crossed again Vall xx