The end of September and first couple of weeks of October were a busy mix of me going through a round of IVF treatments, William settling in at school and getting his meningitis vaccine, my birthday (while I was getting pumped full of hormones), and Alan coming over to help us with William while I was in hospital. Not exactly all fun and games in the south of france, eh? Here's a selection of photos from the past few weeks. William had a great day playing on the water slide at his friends, Ariella's, house. I took the burst couch covers into the tailor to get new zips put on them so we've not had a proper couch to sit on. It's been like the old days at Powderhall Rigg; getting the sofa-bed out during the day to lie and watch the tv. To be honest, the couch is so rubbish that we're wondering why its taken us so long to get the bed out for telly watching!
The sink in the bathroom is still leaking.
We had a meeting at William's school to go through the typical day and allow us to ask any questions. We expected it to be a one-to-one thing but it was just a big group chat with all the parents in William's class. As such, it all had to be in french and after about five minutes, we were completely lost. At least we got to see some of the work he's been doing in class though. "Simon" is his new favourite and we have even got the book from the library.
A recent delight: leftover steak was used for lunchtime sandwiches with rocket and homemade caramelised onion. And we've spent quite a bit of time just chilling on the couch (bed!) to offset the madness of hospital appointments, blood tests and daily visits from the district nurses. To be fair, William totally won them over and "helped" them do the injections. Denise even gave him some syringes to help her!
Big Alg was an absolute trooper and came over to take the pressure off. It's hard for anyone to organise their IVF schedule but when you live away from family and there's no real opportunity to just drop William when necessary, it can all become even more stressful. Alan came over for a week and it was a god-send. We did get some down-time from the madness and even managed to get to the rugby.
but got the news on Friday morning that my single little egg hadn't made it so there would be no transfer. After all that, nothing. It is such an incredibly flat feeling that you cannot begin to put it into words. As I had been led to believe, I thought that was it. One shot and one shot only. But, my doc mentioned on the phone that there might be a chance for another round as my body seemed to respond better to the treatment than he expected, but he needed to talk to the biologist and that he would be in contact. A chink of light indeed, but you cannot help but be disappointed. In the meantime, what else can you do but get on with life?
On the friday afternoon, Algy and I did just that with a big drive up into the Pyrenees, to Gourette, one of the ski stations. The route was of extra interest to Alg as it follows one of the tour etapes, and my god, what a stage it is. When your car is in second gear trying to get up the climb, you know it's tough. So impressive when you see others climbing it on their bikes though. Need to get Algy up there on two wheels next time! As you'll see from the photos, it was proper countryside, and the highlight of the day was definitely driving through one of the wee hillside towns, windows down blaring Chanson D'Amour by the Manhattan Transfer. Ra-ta-ta-ta-ta! We were howling!
Onwards and upwards.
LM :)
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