I wanted a baby. I got a promotion.

At the beginning of August, I was picturing my life the first week of October. I optimistically imagined that I'd be walking around work with this secret pregnancy, throwing up every morning like I did with my daughter, somewhat oblivious to the state of my industry because I'd be much more focused on the incredible new life happening within me.

By mid-August, the picture changed. After our donor fell through, I asked to go part-time to put more focus on the child we already have. She has always grown up having to be stuffed into the time around our work schedules. That's not that unusual, of course. But with a husband who works nights and weekends, and my job that requires almost 24-hour attention, it's frustrating for both of us.

I imagined this life where I'd focus on work while I was at work and on her while I was home. Maybe I'd actually be able to get the laundry into the dresser drawers. Maybe I'd be able to help her with homework. Maybe I'd be able to fix dinner at night.

Well, that plan didn't work either.

At any other time of my career, I'm sure I'd be overwhelmed with joy over what transpired for me professionally. My request to go part-time turned into an offer to be the Edi.torial Pa.ge Ed.itor.

That's a big deal.

Many ne.wspap.ers use edi.torial pag.e jobs as a way to reward the best employees. It was a nice promotion with a raise. A huge honor. It means they trust me, they value my opin.ion. It's a big deal.

But there's still so much frustration for me. No matter how hard I try to change my life -- to take control of things that I think are somewhat within my control -- I just can't get a grasp.

I go to what seems like extreme lengths to have a baby and can't even get to retrieval stage.
I try to pull back on work and instead get more challenging, time-consuming assignments.

My new boss is a fantastic guy. He knows that this job change started with a request to go part-time because I'm not going to put my daughter in after-school care. But he's also got very high standards. He expects a lot of people. He's smart. He will challenge me. And this is a job that I've never done before. It's not going to be easy -- especially at first.

I have always told my reporters that the easy stories are never the good stories. Great jou.rnali.sm should be hard.

I guess that could also mean that a worthwhile life is hard -- full of hard choices, challenging days, difficult decisions.

But I was really hoping for things to just slow down a bit. I could use a little downtime.

It's been a terrible, terrible year.

It's hard to be a Tigger

I know all of you have seen this.

But, just in case there's even one person who finds their way here who hasn't seen it, here it is. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ji5_MqicxSo

It will change your life.

I'm feeling much more Eeyore than Tigger these days.

The election doesn't help. Elections just remind me how selfish and ignorant most people really are. That becomes particularly obvious when you're taking calls at a daily ne.wspa.per in a conservative community.

But I'm trying.

It may be over for me, but I'm still pulling for my cyclesistas

For about a year, the bottom drawer of my refrigerator has been filled with fertility meds. These are all from my canceled IVF cycle. Thousands and thousands of dollars worth of drugs. The Repronex expired. So did a few other things. But there was plenty of Follistim with another year before expiration. I hated looking at it every day.

I heard about someone who was single, recently broke up with her partner, embarking on a donor cycle without insurance coverage. I didn't know her. I still don't. But I thought I could maybe ease up some of her burden.

We emailed a few times. I boxed it all up with cold packs to keep it the right temperature and shipped it off to Seattle or Portland or someplace like that (I can't even remember.)

She used the Follistim. It probably saved her thousands of dollars. Her donor produced a bounty of eggs. She's getting her pregnancy test this week.

This is where that lack of jealous gene helps.

I really hope it worked. I really, really hope to be part of something good happening to a peer whose journey through infertility ends with a happy story. Knowing that I helped make it even a little bit easier for her would make me feel like all of my emotions, frustrations and sadness were somewhat worthwhile.

Good luck Judy. Let's all send positive thoughts her way.