The Cook's Belly

Showing posts from March, 2017

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How do you keep the clock ticking?

St. Anthony's B&B - Westport - Mayo

Tales of a Fat Boy - 96'-17' - Part 2

Where to eat in London - Warning Picture Heavy

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My Popular Posts

IVF & Our Story - Part 1

All you can really do in life is keep trying. There are times in your life when you’ll fail, for sure. It happens to all of us. Failing isn’t the important thing. What’s important is that you just keep trying. As long as you never give up, then everything will work out for the best. You should always do your best no matter what. It may seem like it’s a never ending battle sometimes. It feels that way for me a lot of times.

Unknown author

This has to be the hardest thing I have ever tried to write. I feel this because when I write blogs I talk to you as if I am a friend if that makes sense, I write the way I actually talk. This time however I don't feel I can talk to you like that, this time it is different, this time I am talking about something only I have truly been able to open up to Joanne about and vice versa. This is my perspective on what IVF is, how it affects you, your partner and the bond between you both. Joanne has encouraged me time and time again to open up about my side…

IVF & Our Story - Part 2

I am thankful for our struggle because without it we wouldn't have stumbled across our strengths.
Unknown author

On the 19th of August 2015, 2 weeks before we went on our holidays to Spain we had our first appointment with the fertility clinic in Dublin. In the days that lead up to the appointment we had become so excited, not so much nervous just sheer excitement. As if we were about to receive the keys to the kingdom of parenthood, this was it, this was the fix to everything that had held us back since we started trying. The day arrived and we met with our fertility doctor, it was a long detailed chat and full analysis of our medical history. The meeting ended after about an hour, the doctor delivered a wave of information on fertility options available to us based on our tests, we were so bombarded with the level of information it became so overwhelming. In essence you are led all your life to think you have sex without protection, hay presto you better get the pram and nappies …

IVF & Our Story - Part 3

We must accept finite disappointment but never lose infinite hope.
Martin Luther King, Jr.

It was April 2016, and I had decided on the off chance to call the clinic IVFSpain in Alicante. The day I called them I got through to some one who was a British ex-pat, so it was easy to talk through our previous treatment and what we were looking for. They ran through a number of possible options we had available to us, but the best thing we needed to do was go over and speak with the doctors in person. I called Joanne, I told her everything about my call and without hesitation she said let's do it, let's at least meet them when we are over in Alicante in May for our annual family trip, what was there to lose. Over the next few weeks the clinic in Spain sent on a lot of material for us to read to through and prep for our meeting, they also asked us to gather up our full medical history from our Irish clinic and forward it on to them so they could analyse our past before we arrived in May…

IVF & Our Story Part 4 - The long goodbye

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,
Robert Frost

That title for some reason makes me think of the Paul Brady song, I am not a fan but for some reason that song is stuck in my head this evening. I promised last week I would finish up with this post, I want to tie up some loose ends about the whole fertility thing, between then and now, perception and next steps. I could spend weeks thanking people for their kindness and advice since I started writing about our story. I could have never have dreamed i'd get such a response. It is one of those things that is not spoken about enough, from my perspective a male one or even to a high degree on the female side. There is a…

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