Ramblings of a trying-not-to-go-crazy lady

One of the cruelest ironies of IF/RPL is that while experiencing one of the most unbelievably hard and stressful situations imaginable, you're surrounded by messages that that very same stress can be your undoing.
  
Don't stress, you won't get pregnant. Don't stress, you'll kill your baby. You better relax or this is all your fault. Why don't you just relax already?
  
And yeah, I get it. Stress is bad. It does bad things to your physical and mental health in lots of insidious ways. It plain makes you feel like shit. If you have the choice between being stressed and not, of course choose "not stressed." But it also creates a pretty big mindfuck for a gal in my situation. Part of me believes it, or at least is scared not too, and part of me finds the research directly linking stress to IF/RPL flimsy at best. Yet it's like this bitchy little monkey with its hands constantly tightening around my throat.
  
I feel the smallest inkling of stress. Which makes me worry. Which causes more stress. Which makes me worry more.Which makes me feel more stressed. And on and on, stress escalates,and it's harder to come back down the longer it takes me to get a grip.
  
Mostly I'm feeling like I've been managing it pretty well this past week, at least relative to past pregnancies. I'm on a steady diet of deep breaths and listening to my yoga/meditation music. I've kept myself heavily distracted by Net.Flix (we're on Season 3 of Mad Men, I know, I know...). Work is manageable. I'm getting myself out of the house and seeing friends. I can think of the pregnancy and what might be without instantly spiraling into a panic attack.
  
But then there's times like last night. Nothing special running through my thoughts besides the usual dull hum of the barely suppressed constant dialogue of "is this the one or merely our next miscarriage." But I could not get my body to relax. My heart was beating too fast, my breath felt tight, my stomach in knots. The more I tried to relax and failed, the more anxious I became. It started out as purely an uncomfortable physical feeling, but then the thoughts got going. Is this causing harm to my fragile little embryo? Or the real doozy, is this actually the restlessness that I often feel when my progesterone drops pre-period and pre-miscarriage, and my embryo is already dead? With the help of some back rubs from Mr. B. I finally relaxed enough to fall asleep, but *ping* woke up at 4am and the anxiety was back. I made the smart call to choose distraction over futile tossing and turning, and turned to crosswords and stand-up comedy shows on netflix for the next 2 hours until I finally fell back asleep. When I woke up a few hours later I fearfully checked my BBT and it was still high, somewhat reassuring me that my progesterone hadn't dropped, maybe everything was still okay. The physical anxious feeling seemed to be gone at any rate, thankfully. 
  
In retrospect, Dr. B. upped the dose on my thyroid meds Thursday - maybe that caused the anxiousness? I also had somewhat salty spicy food for dinner last night - maybe it was just that? 
  
Who knows. At any rate, I hate feeling like a ticking time bomb. That something can go wrong at any second. Or even worse, that I can cause something to go wrong just like that.
  
It doesn't help that I'm feeling disturbingly normal so far. Shouldn't I be nauseous? Shouldn't I be tired? Shouldn't I feel something?? Some recognizable sign that something is actually happening in my body?
  
The not knowing is maddening. The not knowing whether I should be on cloud nine or already working on Plan B.
  
Our next step is an ultrasound on Thursday. I haven't had a good date with the cooch cam since pregnancy #1 so the fear is already seeping in. But at least we'll know more. 
  
Deep breaths. One day at a time. Zen zen zen zen....
  
(p.s. Thank you for all your support, again and again. I know pregnancy announcements, even in this community, even from an RPL-er, can be hard to take so don't feel bad if you need to stay away for a while. But since I've decided to keep this quiet from loved ones in real life for now, I'm so grateful to have this place to vent and spew my crazy and get it all out. So thank you, a million times thank you. xo.)