it's the little things that make you stop and say...

... WTF am i thinking?

well, no, not really. but today is one of those hectic days of family-making stuff scrambled in with the usual chaos of work. and much of the stuff if of the deep though provoking kind.

much like my contemplation of caffeine this weekend. i have, successfully, broken the diet coke with lunch habit that crept back in a month or so ago. i hate the stuff, but i love the brain power it gives me. but what is worrying me more is the new cup o' coffee-coffee-coffee at 6 am. i was thinking last week that i really need to not continue to use the yummy soy creamer i discovered that made coffee drinkable since soy is not a friend of conception. trust me to avoid thinking of the much larger (as in a whole mug full larger) fact that i'm going to have to give up this form of caffeine. just because it happens when i am fresh out of the shower and barely conscious as i check email does not mean it is a free pass.

then i start thinking of what this means -- falling asleep while driving to work. huh. caffeine that is bad for me, or, dying in a messy wreck on I-95. i wonder which i can talk the doctor in to.

when you start thinking of all that crazy things that were considered perfectly normal and "safe" around the time i was born, a cup of caffeine a day does not seem that big a deal. wisdom of the late 60s and 70s suggested women gain no more than 5 lbs when pregnant. alcohol while pregnant wasn't that big a worry, nor was smoking. heck, my first 4 months of formation in the womb were accompanied with a steady dose of birth control pills since mom was in such denial she could actually be pregnant. and cars were on the highway without seat belts, never mind child restraints. for goodness sake, you went home from the hospital, held in the arms of your mother sitting in the front seat of a car with no seat belts! surely, when viewed against this, one cup of coffee? please?

but the other bigger thoughts of the day are courtesy of:

Day 10 bloodwork. will need to see if they call me back or if i give up and call to schedule followup appointment with RE. i'm still in happy denial that anything will be wrong with my hormone levels. it keeps away the massive panic i felt when thinking about "what if..."

Estate Planning. the SMC yahoo group recently brought home the importance of planning ahead and having everything lined up when a SMC recently died of pregnancy complications this past December. her son did survive, and thankfully, she was one of those planner who had everything, including life insurance, in place for her child. seeing as life insurance will not be written for a woman who is pregnant, that is my first piece to get into place.

i also had a meeting today with the attorney (K.) who handles my will. i did already have one in place because of some family estate issues, but that was drafted 12 years ago and needed to be updated. also, i knew K. would be able to handle all my questions and the best way to arrange everything now for the little wild child before daddy sperm is even chosen. sure enough, we have a plan, and now it is up to me to do the hard part of thinking and talking with some special people in my life.

roles needed to fill:

1. Guardian
2. Trustee of Estate (a guardian will most likely also be a co-trustee, but a more money manager is best in this role as well)
3. Trustee for Power of Attorney
4. Trustee for Medical decisions.

oh, and i really should figure out my own thoughts/feelings/wishes on funeral and burial for myself. cheerful stuff, and certainly something i need to explore and settle my own thoughts on. (note to self: there will be no archaeological digs in cemeteries once you bite it so after-death fame of your skeleton is a moot point; go for the modern version of the Viking funeral pyre.)

i also need to reconsider life insurance amount i'm shopping for. 10 times my annual salary is the normal starting point, but that is also taking into consideration there is another parent there to supplement that income. not the case in this situation also, my salary in years past has climbed steadily. granted, not looking for that this year, but still, where will i be 7 to 10 years into a term policy? so i'm thinking i'm going to have to bump that amount up a bit higher and see how loudly my budget yells.

Required Counseling with Social Services. tonight i get to meet with the counseling that is required for anyone using donor sperm or eggs. happily, my thoughts on this have been knocking around for 15 year. my biggest problem i've ever worried about was omg, what will people think of me, single and knocked up? and what will they think when i tell them i've been knocked up by a test tube? because yes, it's all about me. explaining to a child the vast amount of love and desire that brought them into being through this still somewhat unconventional route, not so scary.

of course the doctor hinted that this session was more to decide and discuss what if anything the child should be told.

::blink::

okay, but i tend to be of the belief that there should never be a moment in their life that the child cannot remember knowing how they came to be. maybe it's different for a couple facing infertility. for me, i'm intent on building rock-solid confidence in my child, and first and foremost in that is comfort and understanding of how they came to be. i just have too much love for them already to let a little something like no partner get in my way of bringing them into being.