03.29.07

The Quest for an “Ours” Baby: Time to go to Plan B or C

Posted in Dawn's Life at 9:58 am by Dawn Miller

We found out yesterday from the doctor’s office that while live troops were still found in the encampment - the troops aren’t making it through the pipeline for deployment. Ergo - why we’re not pregnant.

The doctor offered to meet with us, but my husband wanted to break the bad news to me first. I didn’t cry - just looked at him and said, ok, well, now we know, and at least we know. And even now, I don’t really feel like crying about it, which is surprising to me. I would think I would boo-hoo about it.

Doing the vasectomy reversal was still worth it for us, and I don’t regret it.

It’s time for plan B - and maybe even plan C. If we want to have a baby together - it will have to come out of a test tube. Or we will adopt a baby.

I hate the idea of becoming those desperate people - the ones you see on TV shows who try to adopt a baby and have the mother change her mind and take it away after they’ve loved that child and nurtured him/her for years - or the ones who go through fertility treatments over and over and go bankrupt. I hate the idea of being those stereotypical people - being a  desperate and obsessed person - becoming a caricature of myself.

We can’t conceive a child together - at least not in the usual way. So there is some desperation to our situation, to be sure. But there is also much love - between us - that shows who we are - and who we hope to be in our marriage. We’ve turned toward each other through this. And we’re stronger for it.

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03.21.07

Not this month…sigh

Posted in Dawn's Life at 11:58 pm by Dawn Miller

I was just at that point where I was thinking - Saturday, I’m going to take a pregnancy test, because that’s the longest possible range of time on the window of when it could start. And was just starting to let myself get hopeful that perhaps this might be it. Then wham - it shows up.

We tried saturation deployment this past month. I can relate when StepmomLand writes about her struggles with infertility. My cycles can fluctuate within a ten-day range which makes predicting ovulation a guessing game.

Our doctor told us that it takes on average 18 months to achieve pregnancy after a vasectomy reversal, and we aren’t near that yet. We’ll keep trying.

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03.20.07

New Column Out - Stepmoms, Finding Our Place at the Table

Posted in Dawn's Life, Perspectives at 11:26 am by Dawn Miller

My new column went out last night and talks about my encounter with a mob of moms at a scrapbook store a few weeks ago - and delves into finding your place as a stepmom within a culture of moms. Read the column here.

I have to admit - I was pretty excited about visiting the scrapbook store for my first “crop” as a new scrapbooker. I took up the hobby after Christmas in the name of adding more balance to my life - i needed a hobby that was not writing, public relations, consulting, career, or dissertation-related. Something that would help me relax. We received a boatload of photos of the kids in their younger years after my husband’s mother passed away - and I wanted to create new albums for them that celebrate their lives. And for my husband too - his ex refuses to share the older photos of the kids with him and is a highly dis-organized person - I think she has spent the last six years “looking for them.” We all know where that boat’s going.  

Armed with tiny treasure trove of photos I trotted off to the scrapbook store for a little R&R at a weekly crop - it’s basically where scrapbookers work on their projects in a “studio” and socialize. Then I met the moms - who weren’t sure how to handle a stepmom - and my little bubble of enthusiasm burst a teeny bit, because I didn’t feel like I was entirely welcome, and I’m not sure they knew what to do with me, either. It was a bit like Close Encounters of the Third Kind.

Yet I can’t say that my experience is all that unique - lots of stepmoms have shared similar stories with me - where they enter events designed for and by parents that don’t feel open to their inclusion as part of a community that cares about youth. I think there are a lot of reasons this happens - some of it is that parent-centric groups aren’t used to stepfamilies, some of it is our own discomfort or lack of confidence. But I do think it is absolutely critical for us to be at those meetings and part of those conversations.

My husband nagged me for probably two weeks to write about this. He knows me so well. He knows I would let something like that fester for a long time - and writing will get it out of my system.

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03.12.07

Trying to Have a Baby: The Old-Fashioned Way

Posted in Dawn's Life, Dawn's Writing at 5:20 pm by Dawn Miller

I’ve got a new column out today offering advice we gleaned from navigating the puzzling world of infertility treatment options and our decision to schedule a vasectomy reversal last year for my husband.

One thing I didn’t mention in this column is our age difference. My husband is 13 years older than I am. Assuming I get pregnant sometime this year - by the time our child is graduating from high school, my husband will be in his late 60s. We like to joke that he’ll be hobbling in on his cane at the graduation. But truth be told - he doesn’t look his age and has a lot of energy. I’m already envisioning a mega-birthday bash for his 50th later this year. After all - the half century mark in one’s life should be noted in grand style. I’m thinking balloons, music, all the relatives, no ex-wife, and hopefully a pregnant me waddling around.

My stepkids are excited about the idea of us having a child together - and ask about it from time to time - they seem to be worried that we might have given up or forgotten the whole notion. Nope - we haven’t forgotten - it just takes time and yes, we are working on it - but we just leave it at that for now. Discussing the intricacies of basil temperature readings, ovulation charts, and peak fertilization times with them would be oh-so uncomfortably weird. Nope, no thanks, we’ll keep our cycle-tracking and deployment schedule to ourselves. It’s way more fun that way.

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03.09.07

My Columns Are Back!

Posted in Dawn's Life, Dawn's Writing at 6:23 pm by Dawn Miller

I have a new column out about our decision to have an “ours” baby. I’m glad that this was my first column after a long hiatus from writing. For three years I wrote bi-weekly columns on TheStepfamilyLife.com about my life as a stepmom.

But then my life got so crazy last year. I was working a very demanding job with a lot of stress and a horrible commute, writing other stuff on deadline (but not stepfamily stuff), and managing our business on the side. Not to mention juggling the needs of our family. When things got crazy column-writing was jettisoned. A few of my readers wondered if I got run over by a bus.

Each time I skipped another week, I obsessively re-arranged the publishing schedule in my palm pilot. I kept promising myself I would get back to it and pick it up again. But time went by - and my silence lasted a long time - more than six months actually. And all that time I felt like something was really missing from my life.

And then something changed. I decided I needed more balance in my life. Our business is doing well - really well. So I quit my high-stress job three blocks from the White House. Bye bye - stress, managing personnel, pantyhose, and office politics. My goodbye lunch at the office was last week, and I was definitely the happiest person in attendance, save my husband, who was overjoyed to see me chuck the rat race.

Now every morning I wake up - open the window in my little office to let the sun shine in - make some coffee and start my day. And it feels fantastic.

I’m back - and on a regular writing schedule. A new column will be out this coming Monday.

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02.10.07

Happy Day - Stepson Calls From College!

Posted in Dawn's Life at 12:49 pm by Dawn Miller

Today my oldest stepson called from college to tell us about his new reporting gig with a tv station. We’ll be able to watch him give the sports report next week thru the station’s Internet feed. I’m already excited about it.

After the call, my husband had a big happy grin on his face and said, “I love that he calls to tell us what’s going on in his life, don’t you?” Me too, hon. Me too.

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Stepmom to Three, Wife to One

Posted in Dawn's Life at 12:46 pm by Dawn Miller

Hi, I’m Dawn Miller, writer of TheStepfamilyLife.com. I’m a stepmom to three (2 teens, 1 in college) and wife to one. I started writing TheStepfamilyLife.com more than four years ago.

When I became a stepmom, I found the advice out there depressing - they all said that my life with the love of my life was going to suck - abysmally. They were totally wrong. Yes, there have been rough patches with the skids. And life is sometimes, well, outright cruel. But life as a stepmom doesn’t automatically have to stink.

Because of TheStepfamilyLife.com, I get email from all over the world from other stepmoms and the people who care about them. Some like what I have to say - and others write seeking advice or help. In this blog, I’ll try to answer some of the questions I get, point out news of interest to stepfamilies, and also offer some new resources.

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