Megan and I have been working on a little project together since the beginning of the year. One that is very near and dear to our hearts. One that has sent us for a little bit of a ride. We have been trying to get pregnant!
I did’t share this on here at first because…truthfully, I wanted share just the news that we WERE pregnant and move on from there. I didn’t want to share we were TRYING because by saying “trying”… in my head (and heart) it implies there is a chance we wont succeed. I will let that emotionally charged thought simmer while I catch you up on the details.
Right after the wedding we went into our primary care doctor and told her we wanted to start out on the journey towards parenthood. She led us down the path of IUI and recommended some clinics we could go to. We did some calling around and found a clinic near to us which was covered under our insurance. Something I have been so grateful for throughout this process; our insurance covers all of our clinic visits 80%. Everything but the sperm.
We found our sperm from a bank. There were a few things that both Megan and I were looking for in a donor. Blue eyes for Megan, wavy hair for me, a little taller because we are both on the short side, adventurous spirit, enjoys the outdoors, driven, kind…after all those details it starts to feel a little bit like an online dating site. I will spare you that. We told our clinic on the first visit our intentions of using donor sperm. Due to this we needed to attend a psychiatric evaluation “for parents using donor sperm” to address the seriousness of this decision. It sure felt a lot like discrimination. I mean this person could literally “stop, pause or go ahead” our family planning process.
The psychiatric evaluation landed on the day after the election…. We gathered ourselves and put on our big girl britches and out psyched that LMFT the whole session, we are psychiatric nurses after all. Every question she had for us, we had a well thought out answer. Every detail she asked about, we had several solutions. She even shared she once worked at the same hospital as we currently do, and likely had Megan’s mother as her boss. (Who, by the way, is our day care provider, ready and willing, living 2 miles away from us, in good health.) This therapist didn’t mention sperm, or donor sperm once. It was completely and evaluation of whether or not Megan and I would be good parents, our strength as a couple, and if we had enough resources to adapt to a child. Infuriating, but we passed and continued on our process.
Our fertility doctor suggested some preliminary tests we could do, but didn’t need to do in order to ensure Megan’s body was doing all the right things to produce a successful pregnancy. She also indicated she had no reason to believe her body wasn’t doing all the right things. We opted out of those tests. Everything is regular and she has had no issues with her period so Megan and I felt safe (and excited) to just have a go.
The last test we waited on was Megan’s CMV status test. She turned out negative. Our donor is Positive. Usually they recommend you go with negative donor sperm if you are negative yourself. We talked with our fertility doctor and she said there is little chance of the mother contracting the virus through pregnancy and isn’t harmful to her. IF the fetus also contracts the virus in utero (which is even rarer) there may be congenital defects (even rarer still) such as developmental delay or deafness. We decided to move forward. The chances were small and we really jived with him. Last thing we had to wait for was CD1.
The clinic we go to is an aggressive fertility clinic. Meaning they do all they can to get their patients knocked up. Including fertility drugs. Which they have Megan taking, hopefully increasing our odds at this pregnancy thing. Clomid; its cool, helps create follicles. Ovidrel; subQ shot (which is fun, as a nurse, to administer to my wife :)) to trigger ovulation and… Progesterone. Nobody likes progesterone. Not in this house, at least. We call them “vagi-pills” to make light of how much we dislike progesterone.
Three unsuccessful cycles of this. Each one had special meaning. The first was the new year, the second vacation, Megan’s birthday…Valentine’s Day, the third grandparent’s birthdays and St. Patrick’s Day… The clinic keeps wanting to do the same thing and we trust them so we do. Though, we do get scared because that awesome insurance which covers everything? The catch is, they only cover six tries. So we do what we can.
Through the first few times trying, there were things that rested on our hearts about our first donor. He wasn’t Irish, at all, and Megan is very Irish and proud. 6’10 beside our 5’1″ started to look alarming distant in real life. Also, carrying a baby who’s donor was 6’10” might not be so easy on a 5’1″ body. He was anonymous.
Being anonymous at first was appealing. Then we talked to friends who were adopted, and watched that popular movie about the kid from India being adopted by the cute Australian couple…After that we Totally got hooked on a new TV series about twins or triplets or something… (side note, I very well know the names of these movies/series, but I don’t want to type them out for fear they come up on someone’s google search) The anonymity weighed the heaviest on my heart. I don’t want to deny my future children the opportunity to one day meet the other half of their genetic make up. Its a natural desire to want to know where you came from. If I have the option to give them that opportunity, I want to give it to them. Also, that CMV thing… if we were thinking about switching things up, might just as well do that to. So we did. And instead of his number (like we did for the first one) we’re calling him “Cork.” Megan said it was a good Irish name. I went with it.
We inseminate tomorrow. Try 4. Pray for us, send good vibes, burn some sage or incense, meditated on it…do what you do… if you are inclined. Also, throw some ideas out of what we could do during a TWW… they are the WORST things to wait on.
