A Baby: From Infertility to Adoption
Shots in the butt
peeing in cups
tests that turn blue
cash spent
hospitalized, anesthetized, traumatized
elusive eggs
failed again
abdominal scars--
and no baby
Jay was the first man I ever imagined being a Daddy. We decided if I got pregnant, we'd get married. I wanted a wedding. I wanted wedding presents. Most of all, I wanted a baby. I was thirty-four. Six months later and gynecological shadows from the past suggested that maybe there was a problem.
On the way to a meeting, I purchased an ovulation predictor kit. This didn't seem too intrusive. No big deal. Our lives incorporated my early a.m. potty visits. I peed in a cup at 6 a.m. and bungled a test that only had three steps to it. Right away, I was a failure. My test turned a color that wasn't even included in the chart. If it's light blue it means this. If it's dark blue it means that. They don't tell you what it means if it's the color of your couch. Then it was fertility pills. And then it was that ever-pleasant test where my fallopian tubes were blown up with air, like an old tire. This test is a must if you haven't experienced excruciating pain in that area of your body. It was all the thrills of labor--and no baby.
We find out my tubes are both shot. Now comes major surgery. Three hours under anesthesia and my tubes are "fixed". Three weeks in bed, six months before feeling completely human. Meanwhile we have a huge wedding and get lots of presents. Have regular sex, Dr. Newman says. "Regular" is hardly the word that leaps to mind when I think of temperature charts and endearments such as, " We have to do it right this second." Eight months go by--and no baby. Dr. Newman mentions adoption. I bite his head off.
It was time to see a specialist. The specialist had lots of pictures of miracle babies on his walls. None of them adopted. Adoption is not considered to be the miracle that it is. This guy wants to get a look at my insides. Laparoscopy number one. Little scars. Freezing in the surgical hallway. Nice nurse holding my hand and asking as I went under, "What will you name your bay?" "Rebekah" I answered. My first screen credit was a video of my uterus. The doctor took particular pleasure in showing it to my husband. Bustiers, garter belts and a video of his wife's fallopian tubes really make a guy feel amorous. To add to our passion, there was the aphrodisiac of seeing Jay's frisky sperm streaking across the microscope slide. We were told that In Vitro Fertilization was the answer for us. The only answer. Did we want to go to an orientation class at the hospital? Hey, what's eleven thousand dollars when there's a six percent chance of success? The hospital orientation staff de-emphasized (failed to mention) the fact that the people who succeed usually spend eleven thousand dollars over and over and over again. Of course they don't tell you it's eleven thousand dollars. They tell you it's six. And then you're billed for the rest, which includes such wonders as the hundred-dollar sanitary napkin. Your insurance is supposed to cover these overages. It rarely does. Infertility is not an illness or a disease. Neither is being a jerk, which is what we felt like when we got the bill.
© Brook Simons Dougherty
