Up until Moana stole a lot of my heart (because it really is a fantastic movie), Tangled was my absolute favorite of the new Disney Renaissance. I could go on for roughly a decade about everything I love about this movie (and the issue I take with the way it ended, which, while I understand the writers’ reasoning, still took a great deal away from the message of the movie–as has the latest animated series, though I assume that’s the point of the animated series BUT I DIGRESS), but that would be its own blog entry and would have exactly zero to do with this blog.

(though I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love the TV series and its preponderance of they’ll never confirm it but we know it’s true lesbians)

What I’m thinking about today is quite possibly one of the best scenes in modern media, the “I’ve Got a Dream” scene. In this scene, Rapunzel and Flynn Rider enter a very seedy tavern filled with ruffians and thugs. These questionable fellows (one has blood in his mustache) at first seem very threatening and, in fact, are fully prepared to beat the tar out of Flynn… until Rapunzel thwacks the one with Brad Garrett’s voice (“Hookhand”) and begs them all to empathize with her position–she’s trying to fulfill her dream, and she can’t do so if the ruffians and thugs beat the tar out of Flynn, who’s serving as her guide.

To Flynn’s surprise, the ruffians and thugs not only listen but break into song about their own dreams (being a concert pianist, falling in love, becoming a florist, interior designer, mime, cupcake baker, etc.). And at the end of the song, the ruffians and thugs, having found common ground with our heroes in their “grotesque optimism,” help them evade capture and continue in pursuit of their dream.

And it’s hilarious.

(no gif can adequately sum up how hilarious this scene is)

In line with that, I was watching Disney World’s new fireworks show, “Happily Ever After,” earlier today.

(they animate the castle and it’s trippy and wonderful and makes me cry like a baby)

It’s probably one of the best shows they’ve ever done, easily replacing IllumiNations as my favorite (IllumiNations is awesome, but it’s also extremely dated–here’s hoping they update it for Disney World’s 50th in the next four years). The general message of the show is that you should reach out and grab and fight for your “happily ever after,” no matter what it is–breaking with stereotypical Disney, all sorts of happy endings are shown, not just romances (which have like… two minutes of screentime). Mulan is a hero to all of China. Woody and Buzz become the best of friends. Hercules finds his identity. Nick and Judy become cops together and make the world a better place. Vanelope gets her trophy.

It brought back why Disney makes me so happy and why I constantly go back to Disney everything, even when I’m aware of (and not fond of) certain aspects of the company (again, another blog entry for another blog). Disney’s overall message is one of aggressive optimism, not just that you’ll find your one true love or love’s first kiss or anything like that, but that things will turn out okay, that you will find a way to be happy, that your dreams can come true.

And man is that refreshing among today’s media. The world is kind of crap lately. North Korea’s throwing missiles around like confetti, weather is getting so extreme that it’s making the 90s jealous, and people are furiously politically divided. That’s reality. When that’s reality, I’d rather my escapism be less DARK and GRITTY and REAL and more very fucking optimistic. I want to come out of the theater–or emerge from my movie coma–with a sense of “hey, the world isn’t that bad after all.” Heroes can exist. Your dreams can come true. You will be happy.

So. What does all of this have to do with the price of kumquats in Tibet?

Yesterday, we met with our RE to iron out our plan for the next cycle, for which I’m already on hormonal birth control. As I’d mentioned before, we can’t afford to do PGS anymore, so this is another cycle where we’re just keeping our fingers crossed and hoping for the best. I also had a lot of questions about medication because my medications got bungled and messed up last time, and I got pretty sick.

But we did manage to iron out a plan that should work for us. I’m starting at a lower dose of Gonal-F than I did last time (last time I started at 275 and bumped up to 300, and my ovaries responded by throwing a lot of eggs at me).

(and I was roughly the size of a barge)

I’m also doing a combination trigger shot with mostly Lupron and a little bit of HCG that should be enough to make me ovulate without causing me to develop OHSS. And we’ll do a fresh transfer of two embryos because I’m hedging my bets.

All of this gives me a theoretical due date in late April, which is… sort of stressful, but not really. May and June are my crazy months (May has Mother’s Day, Sam’s birthday, and Kyle and my anniversary; June has Father’s Day and Kyle’s birthday), so starting that insanity in late April isn’t such a wild idea. It’s kind of like the holidays at the end of the year–two months of WILD AND CRAZY TIMES and then basically nothing for six months. That’s awesome.

We also got our test results back, and everything is looking even better than it was before. My bloodwork came back perfect–hormones are fine, my thyroid is fine, my glucose is fine. Everything is exactly where it should be. Kyle’s results were even better. He had a repeat semenalysis because it’s been more than a year. Last time, we learned that he had low motility and morphology, which meant that his guys weren’t going anywhere and they were weird looking. This time, we found out that both issues have cleared up completely–everything is swimming as it should, and everything looks as it should. The bottom threshold for motility is 40% and his motility is at 58%, which is awesome.

The depressed and cynical part of me doesn’t want to, but I’m choosing to be grotesquely optimistic about this cycle and to have some flavor of hope, because if I don’t, what’s even the point of doing it at all? I’m having that dream and imagining a sweet spring baby, another little Taurus in our house (and the first one is usually so darling). Hopefully this will be the happy ending to this journey.