Here we go again.

I thought my husband and I had a plan in place with regards to trying for another baby. He thought we had a plan too. It turns out, however, that our plans aren't exactly the same. And forgive me, but this is going to be LONG.

Originally, he wanted to start trying in September. He had this thing about wanting all our kids to be two years apart in school. D and G will be, but due to the fact that G is a spring baby, our third kid would have to be two years younger or less in order to be only two years behind G in school. I guess if we had a summer baby it would be debatable, but I think most people these days are waiting until their kid is six for kindergarten if their bday is in the summer, rather than having them be really young for their grade.

In any case, that felt too soon for me, and we had a big conversation about it a few months ago, and I thought we worked it all out. I had a list of reasons that I wanted to wait longer and in the end, he actually agreed with me. We decided (I think) that we'd wait until after the new year to start trying, which would mean the earliest we'd be having baby #3 would be in the fall (if we get lucky enough to conceive easily again - that's always the wild card with my f'd up hormones).

Then we had another converstation. I think that's where things got screwy. He came away from the conversation thinking I was going to finish this month's cycle of BCPs, then go off of them; and while we wouldn't be actively trying until January, we wouldn't prevent either. I came away from the very same conversation thinking I would keep taking my BCPs for a few more months, but stop them one month early and have one cycle where we weren't really trying, but not preventing, so we could get the artificial hormones out of my system and see what my body does in terms of a cycle.

Over the last couple of weeks he's asked me more than once where I'm at in my cycle of pills. Last night he asked me again how many I have left, so I asked him why he kept asking me about it. That is when it came out that he thought I was going to stop taking them now. We were both sort of dumbfounded, because we thought we were on the same page, when he was actually about five pages ahead of me. He had no idea I wasn't thinking the same thing he was; and I felt the same.

So now I'm in the predicament of what to do. He'd like me to stop taking them now, throw caution to the wind for a few months, and then really start trying in January. He thinks it would be good to get the hormones out of my system, give my body a chance to rev up and start working, and lose a few more pounds which will hopefully make conception easier, and certainly make a pregnancy more comfortable.

Here's where my overthinking kicks in. And if anyone is actually still reading, I'll say for the record that I'm writing this more for my own good than because I think it will make an interesting post - many times writing all my thoughts out helps me make sense of it all.

Originally, I thought it would make sense to start trying in January. If we did get pg right away (and I know I need to plan things that way, despite my past issues with infertility - we got pg right away the second time), the baby would be born in the fall at the earliest. That would give me all summer with just the boys, and they'll both be at great ages to play outside more independently. Last summer was hectic with a newborn, and this summer was spent with G mostly crawling, so hanging out outside a lot wasn't as fun or relaxing. My time was spent chasing G around as he crawled through anything and everything, getting filthy in the process and trying to eat lots of rocks. I love the idea of a summer where the boys can run around in the backyard and I can do more watching, rather than fishing rocks out of the mouth. If I have a newborn next summer, it's yet another summer where I feel like I can't relax as much.

If the baby is born in the fall or later, D will be in school and have more of a routine. Plus, I'll have time three times a week with just G and the baby. Granted, I'll have to juggle dropping D off and picking him up with G's schedule, as well as the non-schedule of a newborn, but that's basically inevitable.

We don't have 100% coverage of maternity care on our insurance, so we'll have a fairly large bill to pay. Waiting a bit longer will give me that many more months that I'm working, therefore that much longer to save up.

My family is planning a big vacation for July and I'd like to be able to go. Pregnant, I can go - with a newborn or too close to my due date, not so much.

As much as we might say we'd avoid my fertile times if we're not using BCPs, that's a little ridiculous. We don't usually go more than a day or two without having sex. And sperm lives for like 5 days, right? And I know we wouldn't use anything else. We just wouldn't.

When I first went off of BCPs to try for D, I gained a bunch of weight right off the bat. Of course, I didn't know I had PCOS, didn't know about the whole carb/blood sugar/insulin/hormone thing, so I'm sure I wasn't eating right. And I didn't have the same experience when I went off BCPs to try for G. But I worry that it's because I'd already lost enough weight that my hormones were good and not in weight gain spiral mode. This time, I'm not as overweight as I was when we were trying for D, but I'm not at the weight I was when we got pg with G either - so I just don't know what to expect from my body. And I'm trying to lose weight to make conception easier - not looking to jump up another 20.

However...

I don't know how long this is really going to take, and the thought process starts down the "if we start trying sooner, it might happen sooner" path. I'd hate for a year to go by and we wish we would have just started trying sooner. Of course, I don't know that when you start has any bearing on how long it will take. Like, if we had started trying for D sooner, would we have actually gotten pg sooner, or would we have gotten pg at the same time and the amount of time we were trying simply have been longer? Or if we had started trying for G in say, July instead of September, would we have gotten pg in July instead, or would it have then just taken a few extra months and been in September anyway. Impossible questions, obviously, but still...

Maybe my body will do better with a longer break from BCPs and a chance to start having cycles. And it would give me some time to judge when I'm ovulating (assuming that does happen) so we can more effectively try when the time comes to really make the effort.

This is sort of hard for me to admit, but I have a hard time saying no to my husband. If he really, really wants me to go off of BCPs now, it will be hard for me to say no. If I was adamantly not ready, I would tell him no and that would be that - I'm the one potentially getting pregnant here. But obviously I'm considering it, so it isn't an out and out no - which means I'm feeling the pressure to say yes, even though he's made it clear to me that he's ok with whatever I decide to do.

This is harder for me to admit, but we've talked about doing some things to "try" for a girl - mostly timing of sex in relation to ovulation. We'd both like a girl (although I'll say again that we'll both be more than happy with another boy) and kind of figured, why the heck not? Why not do things a little differently in order to possibly increase the odds of having a girl next time. Neither of us think it's foolproof, nor would we be putting a lot of faith in it - just a "why not give it a shot" kind of thing. But if we are in "not trying, not preventing" mode, I wonder if we'll just end up having sex whenever, and not give ourselves the chance to try to throw the odds in favor of a girl. And if we do start timing sex that way, aren't we actually trying - not "not preventing"? Where is that line between "not trying, but not preventing" and "trying" anyway?

There's also the feeling of excitement over the possibility of getting pregnant again. Sort of like being on the verge of the Christmas season, but not quite there yet. Wouldn't it be fun to just jump the gun, break out the Christmas tree and enjoy the holiday season a little early? There's a tingling of excitement I get when I think about just going for it and going off the pill now and I think that has a lot to do with why I'm considering it.

Then I have this (probably irrational) fear that I'm messing with fate somehow, or with God's plan for me. That the reason my husband has pushed for this is because we're supposed to get pregnant sooner - that the baby we're meant to have is just on the cusp of coming into being and if I don't go ahead and go off of birth control, I'll be missing my chance. But on the other hand, maybe my original plan was right and if I go off of BCPs too soon, I'll be messing things up that way. (did I mention I'm a little bit insane?)

Complicating matters is that I'm out of pills and if I'm going to keep taking them, I have to decide by tomorrow so I can get a refill from the pharmacy. I need to start a new pack on Sunday if I'm going to start.

Today I've been thinking about it a lot and jumping positions faster than the most fickle politician. One minute I'm feeling confident that my original plan was the best thing and I'll take a couple more months of BCPs. Then the next minute I feel like it's only a couple extra months, it'll save me the copay on another round of pills and I probably won't get pregnant right away, anyway, so what's the harm.

I'm hoping that writing all this out will help me figure it all out. It usually does.