Mother Hen: To Be or Not To Be

Sometimes it's hard to not be mother hen, especially when I know that a particular act will cause my husband's pain to increase later. Yesterday was my stepson's Christmas party at school. The middle school is large, so they have the classes broken down into teams. There are four classrooms to each team. I am the "Team Mom" for my stepson's team, which means that I organize all the parties, act as the liason between the teachers and PTO, and contact other parents for anything that might need to be done. I had planned to organize their Christmas party, but when Tim was in the hospital I got so far behind on everything. So the teachers planned the party, and I organized a few parents together to help setup and serve food and drinks (in addition to supplying everything needed for the games, paper products for food, etc., for 120 kids). Because we were last minute on it, I called one of the mom's who I always know I can count on to get nacho cheese and chips. Tim and I arrived first, and we carried in our supplies that we brought. I always make certain to grab the heavy items before Tim can. We came in the back door, so once we got our supplies to the classrooms we had to go back up to the front office to sign in. The mom who brought the nachos was there, and she asked us to help her carry stuff in. When we got to her car she tried to have Tim carry the heavy items. She knows his conditions, but I know it's easy to forget when it's a day that he isn't having to use a cane. Because he was raised to always carry heavy items for women, he feels too bad to say no. So I jumped in quickly and grabbed the heavier item. After the party was over she asked him to carry some heavy stuff out to her car for her. I tried to jump in, but I didn't want to embarrass him. I restrained myself, but I knew what all this activity was going to mean. Unfortunately I was right. When we got home he went straight to the couch. He did not get up until late in the evening.

It's a hard position because I don't often know what to do. I want to help him and protect him so he doesn't have to deal with so much pain, but at the same time I want him to be able to feel like a man. Is it worth the physical pain that he will endure later just to protect his emotional health? He gets down emotionally once we get home and he is in so much pain that he cannot move, but at least around other people he was able to feel "normal."

On to the baby update: We had our first appointment with a fertility specialist on Monday. This was our 3rd month of Clomid that was prescribed by my ob/gyn. The fertility specialist wants us to go through a series of tests at the beginning of our next cycle. He encouraged me to take a month off of Clomid until he figures out more. He did an ultrasound to check my uterus and ovaries, and I only had a small cyst on my left ovary. Other than that everything looked perfect. So now we just wait until January to go through more tests. It makes me feel good to have so many things in the works.