Triplet boys on Christmas Day

I did a quick skim through my past posts and couldn't find this story anywhere, so here it is:

A million years ago (like, last spring) when M and I were first planning our TTC adventure, I was crazy. I'm crazy now, but it was a different kind of crazy then. It was the pathetic, naive kind of crazy.

I had all these conditions. Specifically, I really wanted a girl. To be honest, it wasn't so much that I wanted a girl as that I didn't want a boy. What the heck would M and I do with a boy?! So, I read up on all the gender selection tricks and discovered that we could increase our chances of having a girl by restricting our inseminations to a couple of days before ovulation actually occurs. Granted, this decreases your overall chance of becoming pregnant because the closer you inseminate to ovulation, the more likely you are to be successful in general, but it was a trade off I was willing to make. I figured if we could increase our chances of having a girl by letting it take a few extra cycles to work, it would be a worthwhile trade off. See? Crazy.

Another of my conditions was that I did not want a baby born between October and December. M and I both have birthdays during that time, as do many of our family members and close friends. Between all those birthdays and the general holiday frenzy, I just figured it was too crazy of a time already and there was no need to add another (planned) birthday to the mix. Cue more craziness: I just figured that if we weren't pregnant by the time those potential due dates rolled around, we'd just take a break until January came into focus! In all honesty, our first potential due date month was July and I honestly think it never actually occured to me that we might still be trying in October-due-date range, but still, it was my plan at one point.

And the last condition, put in place to avoid my greatest fear of all: I was terrified of the idea of multiples. The idea of twins was enough to make my blood run cold, let alone more than that. Based upon this fear, I decided I would never use fertility drugs. I mean, it's just not worth it, right? Even if it takes us an extra year or more, it's just not worth the risk! Yup, I actually thought that at one point.

...And then we had a few failed attempts and I got a grip on reality. My TTC co-worker (now pregnant) and I were talking several months ago about how our perspectives had changed after a handful of failed cycles and I told her how unbelievable it was to me that I'd ever thought the things I listed above. I said, "At this point, give me triplet boys born on Christmas day and I'll be the happiest woman in the world!" Ever since then it's been a slogan of sorts for M and I. Every time we have to jump through a hoop or do something we never thought we'd do, we look at each other and repeat the mantra. When we very first talked about switching donors and I was totally freaked out about the possibility, M said "This is just the latest 'triplet boys on Christmas day' compromise - how badly do we want this?"

So that's the story. I know it's kind of lame, but it sums up what I consider to be a significant evolution in my perspective. The craziest part of it all is that I really mean it. Give me the freaking triplet boys! I'll take 'em! Of course now, we're looking at something more like Easter or Mother's Day or something, but whatever. You get the point. :-)