I had that feeling all day.

You know that feeling in the pit of your stomach when you’re expecting something but you don’t know if its going to be good or bad… the one you feel when you’re waiting for something to happen…

Eventually I couldn’t take it anymore and I got tired of waiting- so I went and got me some KFC.

And there’s not a lot I can do.

I’ve decided to go back on the pill.

I’m not ecstatic about it, but I will learn to live with it. I just can’t take the disappointment month after month.

Yes- even though I KNOW, I know, that there is no chance of my sweetheart and I having a baby without expensive, emotionally draining and time consuming medical intervention- I still hope, and I am still upset every time my period starts.

Since my Glugster and I started trying to have a baby of our own almost 2 years ago, there have been 15 babies born to friends inside my social circle.

We stopped “trying” about 6 months ago, and I mean “trying” as in no more ovulation timing, no more Pre-Seed, no more checking the ovulation microscope… and there’s still an HPT in my bedside drawer that seems to mock me every time I come across it. That’s going to be tossed too.

At the moment it’s as if everyone around me is pregnant! Like our trying to have a baby worked for everyone else. At the moment I have no less than 13 friends and a sister-in-law-to-be all having babies before the end of October this year!

There’s a new announcement almost every week!

One of my oldest friends is turning 40 this year, and she’s pregnant! It was a surprise for her and her hubby, and they’re very excited and they’re wonderful parents, but when I got her text message I swore till there was a little blue cloud around my head and I all but threw my phone!

And then I upset my darling Glugster by phoning him in tears to tell him it happened again! And I know I upset him when I tell him why I’m heartsore, because he feels powerless to do anything about why I am upset.

My hero can’t be my hero.

I think going back on the pill may help ease my personal disappointment every month because then there’s not even a reason to hope.

I dunno how long it will take to stop being upset over other people’s pregnancies and new babies. I dunno how long that “why can’t it be me” feeling will take to go away. I dunno if it will ever go away…

But at least I may be able to do something to put a stop to my own feelings of failure, to finally get rid of all expectations.

Without Dormicum!

Okay, okay… it wasn’t that much of an achievement.

It was just to chat about the possibility of whitening my teeth, hopefully in time for my wedding. He did have a look at my teeth, and as soon as he started tipping the chair I started sweating and my heart started racing… but I stuck it out because I KNEW he’d be doing nothing more than look.

See, I smile a lot. I love to smile. People have told me a have a lovely smile. My Glugster loves my smile.

But I don’t like my teeth. Not even a little bit.

All my life my teeth have been small and yellow, and they’re getting darker as I get older. Yes I know- coffee, coke and cigarettes don’t help- but my teeth have never been white, not even before I started smoking. I have also been a grinder most of my life. My canine teeth don’t even have points on them anymore because I’ve ground them away. And when I smile and laugh, I tend to show just about ALL my teeth! I’m always conscious of the fact that they’re small and dark

🙁

Its a vanity I know, but its how I feel.

A big part of the issue with whitening my teeth is how sensitive they are. I can’t even use a whitening toothpaste and my teeth hurt within a week… so much so that even breathing is painful! Any kind of bleaching process would simply worsen this, so thats not an option. I am pretty much limited to either veneers or crowns.

Make no mistake, neither one is a cheap process. And both will involve several trips to the dentist and a LOT of drilling!

As much as I would love to have beautiful white teeth… I dunno if I could stand the stress of so many dentist appointments- even with the Dormicum!

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Update!

I got the quote from the dentist this morning- there’s very little price difference between crowns and veneers– and at R5K per TOOTH, this is SO not going to happen!

I am disappointed of course, but I’ll just have to suck it up and get over it.

Has anyone else read it?

Wow.

I read it while we were on holiday, finishing it a little while after we got home. What an incredible book!

For the first time in a looong time, a fiction novel had me laughing out loud, on the brink of tears, and frowning in sympathy with the characters.

Do yourself a favour and read The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger.

Even her surname is fun to say…

…come play on my rollercoaster…

Being the only two airlines I have flown on- and I haven’t flown much- I can’t really address my letter to airlines in general… although I’m sure your economy class is a fair enough reflection on your competitors.

I would like to bring to your attention that flying cattle class (or economy class, as you call it) is far from a pleasant experience.

Simply fitting in the seats is all but impossible! I’m not small- but I’m pretty much an average size South African woman. The seats are a tight squeeze for me- and the fact that I cannot get into the aisle without major physical exertion- especially if the seat in front of me is reclined- simply demonstrates to me that you are squishing more people onto these planes than is actually comfortable. Could the seats not at least be the size of a car seat!!?

On the SAA flights, I was on small planes- with only one aisle- and on one of the flights I was lucky enough to have an empty seat next to me. We got pretty passable food on the plane, and the stewards were always polite and well turned out. The flights were smooth and the toilets were mostly vacant. Even so, the rows are unbelievably close together, and if you’re in a window seat- everyone has to get up and move if you want out.

On the Qantas flight, we were on a Boeing 747-400. This means 2 aisles and 10 seats in a row, three seats at each window and four seats in the middle of the plane. The plane holds 416 people (if it has 1^st, business and economy class like ours did), and it has 8 toilets for the economy class passengers. Flying to Oz I had a window seat and my sweetheart was next to me. Luckily we had no one behind us as we were in front of the emergency door- but the plane was full. This meant my Glugs and the guy next to him had to get up and move into the aisle when I wanted to go to the loo. And while seated, I had to learn to do everything with my left hand since my other arm was under my Glugs’ left arm and his right hand would have been in his neighbour’s way. On a 12 hour flight- where your sleeping tablets don’t do shite for you- this gets more than a little irksome.

Coming home we again had no one behind us as we were right in front of the galley, but this time we were in the middle of the middle row. This may not have been the end of the world… BUT, I had gastro- and had to ask the guy next to me to wake up and move AND then climb over the seats to get to the aisle because the seats in front of me were reclined for pretty much the entire flight and I couldn’t simply get up and move sideways! Lemme tell you- when you have to do this every 30 minutes or so… you become acutely aware of how little space you actually have!

And I used every single one of the 8 toilets available to me on the plane during the 14 hour flight home.

Thankfully the young guy who drew the short straw in terms of seat allocation and ended up next to me coming home was infinitely patient, and I could bribe him with the unused milk on my meal trays and the sweets I’d brought on board with me!

And then Qantas’ built in individual entertainment system- which is supposed to have a selection of some 200 movies, over 100 TV programs, games, CDs and and and- didn’t work going to Oz or coming home!

The Qantas flights were smooth, the attendants polite and available and the food pretty good- and despite delays at OR Tambo pretty much on time- so I have got to congratulate them on those fronts.

But what am I getting at here? Well, my question to both these airlines is this.

Is it really necessary, for profit sake, to fit that many people on an airplane? Is it not remotely possible to remove a few rows of seats and give your passengers some space, and STILL make money off of them?

*I’m taking a leaf out of Ruby’s book here

…come play on my rollercoaster…