Chris' Magnificent Sperm!!! Est.Utah 1977

I cannot have an honest BLOG without the above mentioned sentence. It kind of sums up my entire journey thus far and by the end of this entry you'll hopefully understand why. And no, it is not so I can mortify my beloved Chris, whom will probably never know this journal exists. For those of you, like myself, who are new to BLOGs these go in order of newest to oldest, so please start at the beginning or this story will make no sense.
Ok onto Dr. H. It may be a bad sign that the person who referred him to me never did get pregnant.....Hmmm, nevertheless, as I was sitting in the waiting room watching upteen pregnant women sign in, I reflected. I reflected on how much I don't like pregnant people, but it was probably rude of me to glare at them. Did I mention that Chris and I went to Bennigan's the other day and the waitress said, "Just the two of you?" and I replied, "Yes, " and muttered to Chris, "Yes, alright, yes! There are JUST the two of us, but if you don't mind we are trying to fix that, thank you very much!!!!" To which he laughed and I thanked God for the millionth time, that he is my partner in crime in this life. Wow, did I get off the topic! Ok, I am waiting in Dr. H's office and I pick up this photo album off the magazine table and inside are picture after picture of Dr. H in delivery rooms. In this one he is holding a brand new baby, in this one he is posing with the new mom, dad and baby, in this one....Oh my gosh--in this one the poor new mom's nether regions are exposed. I instantly decide that if/when my time comes, I will personally choose which picture goes into Dr H's hall of baby fame, and I will make sure that I am not doped up at the time as I assume this other lady was. I can only assume she must have been on some pretty powerful drugs for her to tell someone, "Ok take the picture, don't forget to get my goodies in there. Hey wouldn't it be neat, if hundreds of strangers saw this picture someday?" Give me some of whatever she took. So after depressing myself thoroughly, I was called into the office, for THE EXAM. You know the one that's so invasive that you end up asking for a cigarette afterwards, thinking, the least he could have done is buy me dinner first. And let me just add that this was the first male OB/GYN I'd ever gone to in my 28 years of life and I was so nervous that I cracked the first 3 plastic speculums in half and he had dim lights and put on some Barry White before I could relax. So after that is done, having found nothing visibly wrong, (and no such luck on him declaring "Hey there is a baby in here" -- hey it could happen) he ordered a million tests for me and one for Chris. As soon as he told me there is no point in proceeding with out a "sample" from Chris I thought, game over. I really didn't think I could convince Chris to donate. I said, "Does it matter that he is only 26 and he only wears boxer shorts?" I don't know why doctors always look at me like I am insane when I ask that. So, I have him call Chris in from the waiting room and he delivers this speech to Chris on how it is pointless to proceed until Chris does the test. Chris, is nodding and agreeing and I am thinking, whew, this will convince him. We walk out to the car and he says, "Not a chance." You know, the funny thing about marriage is that when the wife sits down in the middle of a doctors parking lot, sobbing incoherently about tests, babies and Barry White, the husband will agree to just about anything to get the wife to stand up and quit making a scene.
So, I went to get my first round of tests. Chris didn't get his done. Then I got my second round of tests. Yet, my beloved had still not gotten his ONE test. I reminded Chris that I was a bit emotional as of late, and did he want a recurrence of the "parking lot incident". It's interesting, he went out and got the test that day! So flash forward through another failed preg test and onto my appointment to go over the test results with the doc. Chris and I are waiting alone in the room, for the doc and Chris is looking around at the various diagrams and displays, and I don't think I have seen him more uncomfortable. So Dr. H comes in and he says he will start with Chris' test. And he proceeded to tell us about CHRIS' MAGNIFICENT SPERM. The doc had never seen such fine sperm. Normal "good sperm" is 82% good his was 91% It is normal for I think 60 some % odd sperm to be swimming the right way, 72% percent of his sperm were going the right way. He was just amazed that 84% of Chris' sperm looked perfect as opposed to the norm which was somewhere in the 70 percentile. Doc just couldn't say enough about Chris' "Marine Corp Sperm" and yes I swear, he actually said that. So every example of how great Chris' test was, I sank lower and lower in my chair, because I knew what was coming. It's my fault. So then he turns to me. "Your progesterone is too low to sustain a pregnancy and before we can rule out other factors you have to have a hysterosalpingiogram to rule out blocked tubes. Also we need to do a laproscopy because I think it's possible you have endometriosis." So, I set up my appointment to get a HSG. Now, we are paying for all of this out of pocket, which so far hasn't been so bad, but I will have to pay for the entire cost of the HSG. No problem, I think. How much can it cost to squirt some dye up in there and take a few pictures. A lot it turns out. $6000 to be exact and I do not nor will I ever in the near future be able to come up with that kind of money. I was devastated. Here I finally got a "why" and I hit a wall, because the nurse said we could go no further without the HSG. I cried and cried and cried. Then I got mad. No. I was not going to stop here. I knew I may be "watering a garden without seeds" but I thought, this is my garden and these are my seeds and its my time to waste if I so choose. I went to see the doctor again and I said, "I will not be able to afford that. Period. I want to go onto the next step. I know it may not work but let's try it." So he prescribed Progesterone Suppositories for days 14-28, (so much fun.) I asked if he could throw in some fertility drugs for good measure, so I am also taking Clomid (tm) on days 3-7. This only increases the chance of having twins, not a litter, so I'm like, bring on the twins! Then I'd be all caught up. It be a ready made family--just add water. So, we will be trying that for a few months, then if still nothing, I will have a laproscopy. This will be covered under my insurance because it is designed to find endometriosis and that's a medical problem. While he is in there he said he could take a quick "detour" and check to see if my tubes are blocked--so then, voila, no more needing the $6000 HSG. Then in a last ditch effort we would try 3 months of Artificial Insemination--at $250 a pop, what a deal. If that doesn't work we will begin the long road to adoption because we can't afford the $14,000 per In Vitro attempt when it often takes several tries (I've become convinced only the rich can overcome severe infertility.) I have my next doctor's appointment Monday, because he has to do an ultrasound to make sure the Clomid (tm) didn't make my ovaries hyperactive. Then on Thursday I take my pregnancy test, which will be negative, ( I can just tell.) and shortly thereafter, it's off to start all over again, joy. Sooooo, now we are all caught up and I will post again on Monday after I get the ultrasound results, (which of course I am hoping he will say, "Hey there's a baby in here!"--It could happen.) I'll have a lot to tell you because I also am going to ask him a gazillion questions such as, how bad does the laproscopy hurt, is it true you'll go through my belly button, is it general or local anesthesia, how many of these have you performed, any pending lawsuits, that kind of stuff. Also I have a few questions about the Artificial Insemination. I'm talking logistics. I won't know when I ovulate until the day before, so do I just show up with almost no notice? What if I ovulate on a Sunday, is that whole month just out? Getting Chris and I in the doctors office on a weekday with no notice, at this point, seems almost as difficult as getting pregnant so..... well, we shall see. Goodnight all, (Mom) talk to you Monday.
Quick comment, I just used spellcheck and as an alternative to "goodnight" is suggests "Codington" How bizarre is that. Like I'm going to say, "Oh, silly me, I didnt mean goodnight, I meant Codington." Weird.