Baby Bird

For the past 2 weeks (since cycle day 2 to be exact) I have been watching over a baby bird that fell from the family nest in my front yard. The first evening I found it crying at the base of its tree, the parents on the nearest branches crying out with it. Risking dive bombs from the birds in the tree, I grabbed a towel and picked up the baby bird to find a safer location for it to spend the night, out of sight from the neighbor's cats who roam our yard. It was a Scrub Jay. It did not yet have its tail feathers.

I made a warm little towel and straw nest next to the wood pile in the dog pen for it to spend the night, still close enough for the parent jays to hear it calling for food. In the morning it was still in its new hideout and a parent was there with it, leading it back to the tree.

My job was now to keep the cats away, keep the baby out of the chicken pen where the mean rooster might peck it to death and watch it grow. And it did grow.

In just a couple days it was too fast for me to catch and bring into the pen. It was able to jump into the low branches of the laurel trees, off the ground and away from the cats. One night I caught one of the cats stalking. I was vigilant. The parents seemed to let me in on the alarm calls when the baby was in possible danger.

As I would watch the clock in the evenings, waiting for injection time, I would check on the baby bird. Sometimes I couldn't find it and then other nights it would show up in the yard, in the pen, in the bushes. The longer this baby bird survived out of the nest the more hopeful I became that this cycle would work. This baby and its parents were giving me hope. So I put all of my hope into this baby bird. I would think to myself, this is working.

On the night of my trigger, the baby bird was back in the pen. It was hopping around and I noticed that it now had its tail feathers. The next night I found a small blue tail feather in the backyard. I thought maybe that meant that baby bird took flight. Our IUI would be the next morning.

Not yet. Yesterday the baby bird was in the backyard. Looking huge! I almost thought it was an adult. It still couldn't fly, but seemed as if it could be any day.

I just couldn't help but think this baby bird was some kind of sign in for this cycle. I was watching over it and it was thriving and growing, a symbol for this cycle. And everything was working. The tail feathers, my follicles. The shedding of the tail feather, ovulation. Now just waiting for flight.

Last night I said goodnight to the baby bird and started my progesterone suppositories. I am almost 2dpiui.

This morning I was devastated to find the baby bird in the backyard, lifeless. After doing so well, surviving for 2 weeks, so near to flight, doing everything I could, it didn't work.