Cycle update - 6 months postpartum! :)

Thank you all SO much for the lovely encouraging comments on my last post! I was so uplifted by them, and they made me think not to make my blog private over some horrid people and their comments. Thank you for the perspective! :) I really like my blog to be open anyway, so I'm glad to have felt comfortable with keeping it open for now. THANK YOU! <3 p="">
So Rosie-Posie is SIX months old!! Already! Half a whole year has passed since she was born. She is rocking on hands and knees now, and rolling over and over in both directions to get where she wants to go. I am obviously getting more slack now that I have had 8 babies, or else just more relaxed and wise (!!) because she hasn't had any food yet. Normally I whip out a half peeled banana on the day they turn 6 months old, and it has become a tradition, whether they want to start trying food yet or not! I don't offer food before the day they turn 6 months, and some of them have chosen not to be interested for another few weeks or even a few months after that first banana. I think Lydia and Elijah were both more like 8-9 months exclusively breastfed, so I am honestly not in a hurry with Rosie. On the day she turned 6 months, all the bananas were not quite ripe, so I waited. Then, having blinked briefly, locusts - ahem, *children* - must have descended on them because several bunches went within 48 hours. Fast-forward two weeks and I still haven't got around to The First Banana! I did order a new booster seat for her to sit at the table like a big girl (*sob-gasp*!), which arrived this morning, so if I ever have a ripe banana in the house which isn't being devoured, I will be able to make a big deal of her first food and take some photos! :) I'm expecting her to show interest, mostly reject it, and prefer milky for a while longer yet, and that's fine with me. :) She's sooooo chubby and squishy and yummy! I think she is my squishiest baby yet, which is saying something! Benjamin and Arthur were probably equally squishy, but she's my squishiest GIRL for sure! ;)

I haven't been charting because... I think I said last time I wrote here. I just didn't feel the need. Which, of course, only lasts until I have the urge to KNOW what's going on with my cycle a bit more closely. Last few cycles my luteal phase has been 3-4 days. Reeeally short. I haven't confirmed with temps, but I had ovulation pain and obvious fertile signs leading up to ovulation (and sudden cessation of said signs right after the ovulation pain), so I've charted those.

I had one cycle in there which was like 23 days long or something crazy. It made me straight away think of menopause... apparently cycles get shorter towards menopause, and it's one of the signs to look for. Hmmm... That was the cycle before this one. This cycle has been longer because I didn't ovulate until Cycle Day 28 (normal for me this soon after having a baby). Worst ovulation pain I ever had, for some reason. Because parsnips occurred in the obvious fertile time, it sort of triggered my memory to temp from the next day onwards, but not to check whether I might be pregnant, more to confirm when I ovulated and also to see exactly what was going on with my luteal phase.

So now here I am at 7 (seven!) days past ovulation. My temps have been flat (FLAT!!) - as in 36.4-something - for the last FIVE days straight! :-O I was bizarrely hormonally weepy at 2DPO, which is obviously too early for pregnancy symptoms, but which nonetheless occurs for me in many of my pregnancy cycles at specifically 2DPO, and sometimes 4DPO too. Yesterday and today I am craving Belgian buns. Like I woke up, came downstairs and opened the kitchen cupboard to start breakfast, and literally could only think of eating a Belgian bun IMMEIDATELY, which of course we didn't have. Today I wasn't overwhelmed with the thought of Belgian buns until mid-morning, when I actually ended up phoning Neil at work and asking him to please please bring me some home from work. ;)

Late last night I was minding my own business when out of the blue I had a sharp pinching pain in my lower back on my right side. After maybe 30 seconds it bored right through to my front over the right side of my pubic bone. That gave way to a general periody crampiness for an hour or so. I wondered if I was getting my period, but there was nothing when I went to check. Today I have had the same kind of discomfort on and off, but it feels more like one-sided period pain, and I would go so far as to call it "bad cramps" this afternoon. I went to resettle Rosalie when she woke too early during her nap, just maybe 30 minutes ago, and while I was lying in bed with her and breastfeeding, the discomfort I was already having increased until it was a sort of nauseating hot vice-like cramping, like actually having my period. I so hoped she would hurry back to sleep because I didn't like the idea of having my period and just lying there for ages before being able to go to the toilet and deal with it! At last she settled back to sleep and I hurried to the loo, to find absolutely no sign of my period. I still have the cramps. It was right sided (back and front) in bed, but it's settled to more general across the whole of my lower back and the pit of my abdomen now.

I lay there feeding her, thinking, "But I can't be!... I *can't* be pregnant already - she's only 6 months old!" The earliest I was pregnant before was when Elijah was 7 months old, but I checked my chart and I did have a chemical pregnancy the cycle before when he was 6 months old. I got a faint positive at 8DPO the day before my period showed up.

I totally expected nothing from the parsnips that occurred this cycle - didn't even give it a second thought, because as far as I recalled, I don't conceive at 6 months postpartum. I forgot that I did conceive before Elijah, but I knew I wouldn't be able to sustain a pregnancy at 6 months in any case.

But, 2 days in (I don't care what anyone says), I knew. The other things that are typical of my pregnancy cycles - the flat temps, the weepy day, the pinching pain at 6DPO and the cramping, especially today at 7DPO, only serve to convince me more, but none of them surprise me because I have that feeling in my knower, which is more sure and reliable every time, it seems, as I've been there and felt that more and more times.

I haven't mentioned it to Neil because a) he will totally not be expecting it and therefore *may* ever so slightly freak out, lol! ;) and b) I'm pretty sure it can't stick. Never had a sticky baby with previous cycles having such short luteal phases. :( Also, c) I don't know... I just like that it's a secret deep within only me, and nobody else can know unless I tell them. I won't get to keep it for long, so I'm indulgently enjoying and cherishing it while it lasts. I think I was only 3DPO when I talked to my tummy - I told myself "just in case it's true", so as to avoid the feeling of daftness that came over me, being only 3 days after ovulating with no actual proof of conception and a history for doing this whenever it feels like I've conceived. But, I'm right, just like I was right the other times. A mama knows. Well, this one does, anyway! ;) Talking to my little one and saying hello and I knew this hello would only last a few days, but that I was so glad that he or she had the chance to LIVE, and I would see him or her one day, eventually - I realised that, for me, that's another sign of my "knowing" that there's someone in there in the first place. I don't just talk to my tummy on random other cycles, in case pregnancy occurred! ;) I didn't sit and think about doing it before doing so - I was lying
and just realised I was doing it without thinking.

I didn't expect to get to 6DPO, let alone 7DPO, and I guess now that I've blogged about it, I pretty much guarantee myself a temp drop and a period tomorrow! ;) I am also beginning to be wary of bleeding that looks like a period - I have had that enough times at implantation to know that I shouldn't presume it a period until my temps agree in a *sustained* manner! With Elijah my temp dropped like a stone the day I started bleeding heavily (7dpo), and I stopped temping and felt sure it was a period. It wasn't! ;) So I temp until it stays down!

I ordered 2 packs of First Response Early Pregnancy Tests today, but they won't be here until probably Wednesday (the day after tomorrow, and thus 9DPO, which I can't fathom actually getting to, so I might not need to use them after all). When Rosie woke from her nap (I had to stop typing this to get her while the kids were playing in the garden, and am now back to finish off, an hour later), I carried her into the bathroom to rummage through the cabinet in search of pregnancy tests. I had boxes and such left over that I hadn't thrown out (tsk! So disorganised!), but I was delighted to see that one of the boxes has a FRER still unused inside, AND in date! Yay! So, at least I have that to use if I should want to, but I fully expect to get my period, maybe even tonight, or if not then at least a drop in temp to herald it in the morning.

It feels weird ordering pregnancy tests, like... almost like I feel guilty and like I want to do it as secretly as possible. I am surprised by my own response - I've realised that I have this bizarre expectation that it's All Change now I've hit my 40s - no more easy conceptions, no more babies, even - maybe? And I feel self-conscious about being pregnant in my 40s even though I totally disagree with my own brain on that one!! Such a weird feeling, lol! Being pregnant in one's 40s is a true blessing, and you're not to old to bear children until you're too old to bear children, in my opinion - by that I mean physically incapable of conceiving due to menopause. That's God's design right there, so before that point, it's all good as far as I'm concerned. But I guess society (darn society!!) has strong opinions and they seem to have filtered down into my subconscious. Otherwise there would be no reason for me to feel odd about being pregnant in my 40s.

Somewhere under the surface, I must have honestly thought that there would be some sort of switch going off as I turned from 39 to 40, haha! I don't know... I guess I did not expect to just carry on as usual once I turned 40! Not sure why not, now I think about it, and my body seems to be doing the same thing as it did at 37, 38 and 39, sooo....

Anyway, I'm sure I will get a period - my body surely can't sustain a pregnancy yet, but I also feel sure that I've conceived (slightly cringing because of the mockery I've had for always saying that - it's just that when I feel that way, however often it has happened, I'm always right!!! ;) ). So I will update tomorrow probably. I didn't want to miss blogging about any of my little ones, whether they stay with me or not, and also I had a private message about my chart, urging me to update my blog! ;) Thanks, sweet! :)

I'm just going to save this and not post it until I've been to the loo to be 100% sure that my period isn't starting, lol! I feel so paranoid now I've written this, and also have that feeling that I am starting my period. So far it hasn't been, it's always just CM. Incidentally, my usual "pregnant" CM. :)

Finally had chance to check (an hour later!), soooo sure I would see at least some spotting, but nope! :)