Sooo I dunno, I guess I felt like writing again. SO SOON! It’s a bad time for communicating because it’s Mercury Retrograde. I had a virtual consult with Posey’s trainer and the video feed stopped working and then she called me and then the call dropped, so she had to call again. It’s Monday and I haven’t heard back from the fertility clinic yet. I’m terrified some terrible thing will have happened, like my referral fell between the cracks somewhere. But my doctor said it would be a couple of months before I see them anyway, and on their website it said they would make an appointment in 4-6 weeks.

I did a good chunk of writing today, which was good for me. I’m getting back into it. I’ve also been doing a bunch of research in the evenings on various fertility treatments and egg freezing and when eggs start losing quality and apparently the best time to freeze is when you are 37 and older eggs have more chromosomal defects and a higher chance of producing someone with Down Syndrome, and older men’s sperm ALSO has been correlated with things like a higher incidence of Autism. There’s a lot of things to weigh and statistics aren’t great for older women/people with eggs having a live birth, even with fertility treatments. Like besides quality, there’s also just way less of them, often. And I have been getting hot flashes, which could mean I’m already heading into infertile territory. The good news is that they do tests before giving you fertility drugs and scheduling you for the surgery, which is putting a needle through your vagina to your ovary to take out eggs one at a time. OMG. They recommend freezing 24 eggs, and I used this frzmyeggs calculator and according to my age they can probably get 7-10 eggs in a cycle. AND Ontario only pays for one cycle, usually people do multiple cycles. So it’s like, on one hand I have access to miracle science babymaking methods, and on the other hand it’s super limited in scope of what is covered, AND I have to pay for my own fertility drugs.

OH OH OH! Also fertility drugs cost thousands of dollars. Yikes. BUT in my googling I went on the NIHB website to see what meds are covered for Indigenous folks. And of course, fertility drugs are NOT covered. Birth Control IS covered. But my friend Melody says on remote reserves they don’t stock Plan B. So it’s like, some fucked up anti-Indigenous policy there. Like do I have to explain why that is fucked up? The less Indigenous babies being made, the better for Canada. Which is some fucked up shit.

Also obviously the Indian Act was written before people considered queer/same-sex/trans/poly families. And there’s been a notice on their website for a few years now that they are gonna update that section to make policy around how same sex families can pass on Indian Status to their kids. But I feel like there’s probably some white bureaucrat who’s been extremely hungover all this time wearing shades sleeping on his desk being like “Yeah yeah I’ll get to writing that, just give me five more minutes.” Ugh. SO yeah, it hasn’t been updated yet. Like they are probably not even at the point yet of brainstorming with a big piece of paper and some sharpies all the different ways queers get babies.

Senator Murray Sinclair had this video on CBC Indigenous today about how the biggest problem Indigenous people have is self respect, and then went on these SWEEPING generalizations about how we don’t know how to parent or be in loving relationships or good wives and husbands and we don’t know our culture or our beliefs about there hereafter and I’m like jesus christ what Indians are you hanging out with? When I look on my facebook I see so many Indigenous friends working really hard at parenting their kids and trying to deal with current issues like bullying and racism and giving them good self esteem. And people connecting with their culture, and knowing our history, and passing down old old wisdoms that our grandparents taught us, and I even had a car ride not long ago with my friend Terri where we talked about our elders who were Christian suddenly talking about old time beliefs in the afterlife that were tribally specific and fully believing that is where they are going even tho they talked about Jesus most of their lives. And I know that this isn’t an either/or, like not ALL Indigenous people have it together, some ARE shitty parents, some ARE passing on abuse that comes from residential schools to the next generation. Yeah, but I didn’t like the way he talked like NONE of us are able to do these things or be connected to our communities/families/culture/beliefs.

Anyway, yeah. There’s some internalized racism there.

And I have it too, like my Mom did parent me pretty well, there were things I wish were different, but ultimately I think I turned out ok. I have some self esteem issues but that’s also related to bullying that I was a victim of in school. Anyway. I know I can parent, I’ve been looking after these dogs for years, I’ve lived with a kid, I’ve got qualities that seem suited to it, I’ve thought about it for a long time, I feel like I am ready. But still part of me feels like oh geez who would want me to parent? I’m a bipolar queer poor single Indigenous artist, like that’s a whole bunch of things people don’t like. And I guess part of me still believes that it’s not for me, like I just assumed I wasn’t capable of it, even tho I’ve worked for years to get my self esteem back to normal and feel like I can affirm my abilities. I know sometimes my family has a low opinion of what I can do with my life. I don’t know what to do about that. Nothing I guess, and really it’s not my problem if they have those feelings.

BUT also I am in a different place in my career than even a few years ago. I’ve been getting more work. I have stable housing. Except for not having a partner, and wanting to wait another year before finally trying to fertilize these eggs so I can get some more work done on a project and stuff, I’m pretty much in a good place to have babies. Like I just don’t want to keep waiting for my life to start, waiting forever for a partner someday. I might get one, but I might not. My psychic has seen someone in my future. I just don’t know though, and I want to start doing things now to get the future I want happening.

I read my tarot cards about where my goals are, and it said something about how this problem I am dealing with right now is still being reluctant to let go of the past. And to let those old thoughts and stuff crumble and disintegrate and be ready for new beliefs and ideas to come into my life. And to some degree that’s true. If I was totally over the past and ready to move on, I would be trying to make a baby this year. But there’s just, ugh. I need a little bit of time still. Which is why I am freezing eggs.

OMG so weird, I’m one of those people who can feel when I ovulate, and I can feel it while I am writing this. That’s a good sign! I was worried I wasn’t feeling those as much, but it seems to still be happening.

When I first got my ovarian cyst, I stopped having a period for three months before it came back. It was so weird, I actually took a pregnancy test I was so confused, even tho I’d not had sex with anyone. I got it removed after I had my ablation, so I don’t know if it would have made a difference for my periods. Anyway. Weird women/AFAB stuff.