played

my period is late

and yesterday my temp was still up

way up

and my hopes? ahh my silly hopeful hopes went up too.

maybe, just maybe we'd snatched victory from the jaws of defeat

maybe we'd hit the jackpot

grabbed the brass ring

but today, my temp was halfway down and I felt my heart fall, I peed on stick for confirmation (not in the mood for ambiguity or wasted hope or whatiffing), no. Negative. And now I feel played.

I wonder at my own insanity that I would even think it was possible, that I would allow myself to get suckered in by hoping for such a long shot.

I feel really stupid. Like going on one more date with that guy who seemed to have such potential even though he never calls or does anything he promises just because maybe maybe he could turn out to be the one. Yeah, no.

I had a very lifechanging holiday but am not quite ready to talk about it. Odd how vulnerable I can feel even with good things.

And today I cried hard, had a long cathartic and insight ridden talk with my wonderful sister, and then took to the woods.

I had a wonderful metaphorical hike, want to hear about it?

It was raining here, hard sometimes, light mist others, oddly warm. We still have loads of snow, so the rain just makes it heavy and slushy, and the trail was a mishmash of running water, ice, packed snow, slush, and this double layer of thick snow crust with water flowing underneath high enough to flood into my shoes when I stepped through.

Each step I took slid backwards some, and it took so much skidding slipping sidestepping effort to get up to the overlook. I sat on a wet rock and looked out through fog, and thought about how when I'm hiking, if that way does not work, I go this way, I step over the fallen log, walk around the dog shit, walk through the high snow when the trail is too icy. It is not a crisis, it is a hike. But for some reason, in *real* life, any obstacle feels like failure or the end of the road. I need to remember to just look for the alternatives as if they are part of the process not the exception. But I get so single minded. This way, this way. But now it is all about alternatives.

My referral should be all sorted out this week, so I should have an appointment with Dr. O sometime later in January. I wish I could do bloodwork or something or anything toward whatever is next sooner than that. But I guess I am- I am making an appointment and that needs to count.

2009 sucked ass in many ways. I came across a blog I used to read back in the day, it used to be called I can't believe I wasted all that birth control and is now called Uppercase Woman. And she ends her most recent post this way:

2009? Don't let the door hit your ass on the way out.

Amen.