LA Part 2, Head-shrinking, Margaritas & Whole Foods

After the Weenie Wand thoroughly examined my insides, it was time for Med School. Otherwise known as "How to shoot myself full of a variety of things to make foreign baby stick and stay (foreign to my body; the fact that he will actually be at least half from China is beside the point :) )." The nurse was very nice and very informative, and went over everything in great detail, and I've forgotten at least 75% of it already. Fortunately it was mostly boring and old news to Tony, who is a nurse and will be poking me, with needles, on a regular basis in a month or two. Lupron, estrogen and progesterone, all in injectable form. Nope, doesn't sound like I'll be lucky enough to get a protocol that involves oral meds or vaginal suppositories. More on the meds when that magical package arrives. A little aside that was funny to me: I've been reading the word "Lupron" in blogs for months now, and every time I read it, I pronounce a particular way in my head. It turns out my pronunciation is incorrect, but every time Dr. R and the nurse said it, I wanted to correct them. It wasn't until later I realized that I'm the one who has been saying it incorrectly.

After talking with the nurse, we had just enough time to run across the street to grab a quick sandwich at Subway across the street (besides a pack of airplane peanuts, our first food of the day) before our appointment with the psychologist, who would be borrowing an office at the IVF doctors offices. Turns out she was running a little late, so we probably could have chewed our food. Oh well, qué será. :-)

The meeting with the psychologist went well. At times I felt like I was talking too much, but I guess I was just over-enjoying the opportunity to be in the spotlight. As a former shy kid and the mother of two gregarious, adorable children, the conversation usually isn't all about me, so I found myself grasping on to every opportunity to talk about myself, to the point where I felt like the psychologist had to occasionally turn the conversation. Oops. I generally try not to be that person when I'm not completely drunk. Regardless, I felt it went well, and after the informal evaluation, I was left to the infamous MMPI. For those of you who have not yet had the pleasure, this is a 350ish question test designed to gauge whether you have tendencies in areas such as bipolar, schizophrenia asks other mental illnesses. It features true/false questions such as "I hear voices sometimes even when I am alone. (False)" and "I feel I would enjoy the work of a librarian. (True. I love books, always have, and would love to be surrounded by them constantly)" Some of the questions are a little tricky ("Do I feel this way often or only occasionally?"), and some are rather amusing, and I'm glad I had the opportunity to take it with Tony looking over my shoulder to giggle at the more outrageous inquiries. After I finished the test, we were free for the day. We couldn't bear to give up our sweet free parking spot just yet, so Tony and I just walked Wilshire Boulevard for a bit, making it just about to Santa Monica before turning back, and then we enjoyed a giant Margarita and some yummy fajitas at a nearby Mexican restaurant. We should have stayed in the area, but I got it in my head to head back towards the hotel for dessert. We ended up walking a strip mall and picking up a caramel apple from Whole Foods before heading back to the hotel (I'm always drawn to Whole Foods). Unfortunately, even sans kids, I had a ridiculously poor night's sleep (I blame the proximity to the airport and the constant planes, because otherwise the room and bed were great. We made every attempt to sleep in, but 4 years of training by persistent kids had us up before 10, so we threw the little bit we had together and headed off to the airport. And that, more or less, was Med & Psych Screenings in LA. :-)