First, I sorted out the "medical stuff" folder. In it I found receipts for several packets of pessaries I had not yet claimed from our health insurance company. Of course, I had to remedy that. So I presented my receipts to the lovely lady behind the desk, and she looked, and she said, "Ugh - progesterone pessaries. I hated those so much." And she smiled at me. Then she processed my claim and gave me $125 cash.

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With the cash, I bought spotty-dots*. Three colours - red, green and yellow. Red for Stopping Here, green for Going To Singapore, and yellow for Wait, Let Me Think That Over For A Bit Longer. To my credit, I haven't used much of the yellow.

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I then had a lovely chat with the relocation person. She sent me some paperwork, and talked me through what to do with it. My visa application will take about six weeks. She sent my details to the removalists, who will ring me directly to sort out what's going where and when. They may... and this is really exciting... be paying for the relocation of the dog (under our "air freight" quota). Guess I'll stop tossing up whether she can come and start getting her export certificates organised.

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Next, I sat down at my computer and wrote my letter of resignation**.

Dear thingamy thingamy,

I know you're getting tired of fitting in with my IVF schedule, to the point of suggesting I take an unpaid leave of absence until I'm either knocked up or given up. Which was kind of sweet and offensive at the same time. Sometimes I think it's because you're genuinely concerned for me, and to be honest you have been supportive up til now. I know you "struggled" with conceiving your daughter (in that you had to have some fertility testing but fell pregnant just in the nick of time before starting any treatments) and I guess my heart hasn't been in it for the last few months, as far as my job is concerned. So maybe it's me.

Then again, maybe it's you. I would probably be coping better if I didn't have to put up with quite so much shit, and to be honest I disagree fundamentally with much of your management philosophy - something I realised long ago but for various reasons decided to ignore. You actually have quite a high staff turnover, truth be told, and I'm certainly not hopping back out the door in quicker-than-average time.

In any case, my husband lives in Singapore now, and besides, it's high time I took back some control over my life and made a few decisions about where it's going and what's important. So I quit. Four weeks and I'm outa here. Starting Monday.


Sincerely,
Bea


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I think... something in my life is starting to come together.

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*I did have some cash left over. They weren't super designer gold-leafed spotty-dots.

**This is not the actual letter, obviously. I may want to do a few days' casual work for them when I'm visiting Oz as an IVF tourist, in order to pay my trip.

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I also appreciate the comments over the last post. So the photo is going ahead. I'm over it already. Ho hum, it's official - infertility is always going to be a part of my life. That's ok. And my mum deserves her family picture. It's just nice to know you understood.