Don't Cry Over Spilt Wine; or, Choose Your Own Ending

Last cycle (cycle 4 post-miscarriage, for those counting), I made a decision. I decided I was taking a break. I was packing up Pissy and putting away the basal body thermometer and reclaiming my life and trying that hot new "just relax" technique that gets the kids all excited these days.

And then I cracked and went back to peeing on things. As you do.

This cycle, I made no pronouncements. I made no decisions. I made no declarations. Nope. I just forgot to refill my box of Pissy's peestrips. And lost my BBT at a hotel.

Look's like the break's on me.

* * *
I truly thought I was going to be fine on the m&m's due date last weekend. By this point, I understand that my first pregnancy was not meant to be, that something else lies in my future, that I've got to look forward rather than back. I greet every month with possibly misguided optimism, even if I don't always convey that here. And I don't even think to myself, "I wish I hadn't lost the baby" anymore, because I don't know who I would be right now if I hadn't lost the baby. Acceptance, right?

On Friday, Lawyer Guy and I had date night at a steakhouse before the welcome cocktail party back at the hotel. We had a great time and drank some wine and laughed together and I looked very pretty and all was well. Then we made our way to the hotel and met my friend the bride's family and her wedding party, and since I'd had pinot noir with the steak at dinner, I broke my 9-year streak of never ordering red wine at a party and got a glass of cabernet.

Fifteen minutes and one wildly gesticulating bridesmaid later, said glass of cabernet was empty and said cabernet was all over my hair, arm, chest, shoes, and the rather expensive, beaded, embroidery-embellished silk tunic I bought from a little one-of-a-kind shop on my trip to London last summer.

The bridesmaid felt terrible and frantically tried to find a 24-hour dry cleaner (none in Tampa, it appears), to dab the giant, blossoming stains with club soda, and to convince me it would come out when it was washed. But I knew the outfit was ruined (as indeed, it is) and was trying to hold it together until I could be alone. I didn't want her to feel worse about her accident than she already did.

After she left and I changed for bed, I pretty quickly began sobbing about my tunic, much to LG's dismay, and then somehow started keening "I miss the baby" over and over. The two things of course, as LG rightly pointed out, having nothing to do with one another. But in my mind, the fact that I was coated in cabernet rather than blood on the eve of my baby's due date had some deep three-in-the-morning kind of significance.

* * *
The break isn't quite as drastic as I made it out to be before. I had a few of Pissy's sticks left and was using one sporadically every few days, contrary to her methodical likings, as I waited for the new box to arrive. I took my temperature three or so times before losing the thermometer in Florida. And I added a new element to my already burgeoning pre-ovulatory routine: vitex (aka chasteberry root) in an herbal supplement, said to help regulate ovulation.

On Saturday, the due date, I went to the wedding. I wore my 30th-birthday purple petal dress. I danced to Madonna and Michael Jackson with my friends and Cole Porter and James Taylor with Lawyer Guy. I drank just enough and not too much. No one spilled anything on me. Everything that night was easy and happy and--yes--relaxed.

And then the next morning, with my very last peestick, Pissy gave me a Peak. On CD 16. About a week earlier than I expected.

* * *
This might turn out to be the ever-irritating story of The Accidental Break Cycle, Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Got My BFP. This might turn out to be the amazing story of a Very Sad Day and Its Very Happy Ending. This might turn out to be your run-of-the-mill story of The Girl Who Spilled Wine on Her Tunic, Cried About It, Went To a Wedding, Woke Up the Next Morning, and Got Her Period Two Weeks Later.

As always, anxiously awaiting that last page.