Loser sperm: balls over brains

We decided to change sperm donors for our most recent attempt. This will be our 4th donor I think?? Lost count I guess. Well, let's go back, donor #1 was a chiropractor from California Cryobank, donor #2 was a rocket scientist (literally) also CC, donor #3 was the molecular biologist from Midwest Sperm Bank, and yes, donor #4 is also from Midwest.

One of these things is not like the other. One of these things is really not the same.

We'd been talking about changing donors for days. Finally, we were sitting on the couch watching TV at like 9:30 at night and she's like, 'hey, I thought we were going to change donors this time?'

'Yeah, get on the website and pick one.'

Literally two minutes later, 'okay buy this one.'

This was very quick for my partner, who is the one obsessed with the donor selection. When I asked what his deal was, she said, 'I think he's a loser. Maybe he has viable sperm.'

Donor #4 is officially our first non-advanced degree, science or math professional. I think he has a high school education and likes skateboarding. He might have red hair. Maybe he smokes a little weed. Not a lot of weed, that would be bad for sperm count. He's just relaxed and has no responsibilities! He sounds refreshing! Hopefully he's a little smart, somewhere, deep down inside. But hey, if I gave birth to the next Tony Hawk or Shawn White, that would be awesome too. I guess it's fine if the kid doesn't go to MIT on a scholarship.

'Okay, perfect.'

Diarrhea of the mouth

Since my last post, I've had a few outbursts of anxiety, but nothing that my partner and I couldn't work through in maybe 30 minutes max. I am starting to figure out that I can't go on keeping my feelings inside; I need to let them all out as they happen....which is startling to both myself and my partner....and my staff (those poor people who had no idea I had critiques stuck in my brain). I am a new, outspoken, positive AND negative woman with concerns and fears that are spewing out.

Let's see, what has happened lately that could remotely relate to making a baby.....

We went for our 6th IUI  a week ago on Friday....less than a week more to wait. It was our first time with fabulous donor #345 from Midwest. He is a late-30's Phd who's field of study is biology. Our visit to Dartmouth was great. The same lady did our IUI again, and we had a nice, long chat about our journey to this point. She still thinks that it's odd that I haven't gotten pregnant yet, and since she's the one who looks in my hoo haa every time, I believe her. She said that we might want to get another doctor's opinion about our experience and had a great recommendation for a young woman fresh out of school at their Concord location. We have an appointment with her on Tuesday this week. I am sort of excited to hear another doctor's opinion, but honestly, I think she's going to tell us the same thing....we have to be patient.

I had an appointment with my PCP about the anxiety. She sensed that I crave information about what's going on in my body, so she recommended that I go and see a nutritionist. The appointment is later this month. I am REALLY excited about this appointment. I have always been fascinated by what we eat and how it affects our bodies and I can't wait to ask her all sorts of questions about what I should be eating while trying to get pregnant and beyond. I am so fascinated by nutrition that it was going to be my focus for getting my masters degree...but then the flower thing came along and the rest is history. Oh, by the way, I just ate a huge piece of cake for breakfast. Thank God birthday week is almost over and that cake is almost gone. *sigh* at least I recognize my faults.

The view from here

We're almost to a point where we can smile when we think about Jack. Our other cat, Boomer, has had a few random flash backs where you can tell he's re-living that night...sort of like kitty-deja vou. Our dog, Ali, hurt her back in a big scuff on the stairs that night. She's been gimping around ever since. Finally this morning, she's almost back to normal. Life is almost back to normal, but there will always be the memories.

Today is day 11 in my cycle and we are ready to move forward with our next IUI. We have purchased our new sperm from Midwest SB and he should be landing in Hanover tomorrow. This donor is also handsome and well-educated, just like the others. He has a PhD in molecular biology (wow, and I just play with flowers. And you could say that my partner just 'draws'. Crazy smart.) According to the receptionist I spoke with, he resembles Andre Agassi. Okay, not bad, but I suppose not amazing either, not that I'm very picky at this point! He stood out from the pack in the donor catalogue, but my partner had some doubts. As we read through his long profile (free people, free...love it) we enjoyed all of his responses but noticed he left some blank. One that he left blank was regarding illegal drugs. They had a chart for you to check 'yes' or 'no' on all of the most popular drugs. He checked 'no' on everything except one. POT. I suppose we should be happy that he's not a crack or heroin addict. But my partner, being neurotic, says that since he left it blank, he must smoke pot and therefore has a reduced sperm count so he just wont do. I agree that he's probably a stoner, but according to the same receptionist, he had twins lately, so I'm fine with that. He's obviously relaxed. Bring it on.

My birthday is next week......happy baby to me?

I'm off to renew my driver's licence.

Shopping our baby around

We are not cheap people. We are of the school that less is more and quality over quantity. Our home is very sparsely decorated with little to no clutter or knick knacks. Tag sales are something that we don't partake in. We don't do lawn ornaments and have no random collections displayed in china cabinets. The material items we do have are ones that we chose because of their lasting, classic style. We would rather save our money for a few additional months and get the nice, expensive item over the cheaper item; it will surely be worth it in the end.

By the way, we're cheaping out and changing sperm banks. California Cryobank is a rip-off.

After five months of attempts at pregnancy, we figure that we've invested around $5800.00, of which $1500.00 was unnecessarily spent. That is a huge percentage, no? The reason is that with California Cryobank, we've paid a premium for sperm. Now granted, the reason that we chose them in the first place was quality: their website was and definitely is by and far the best and most user-friendly. They offer many additional items for 'free' to help decide on a donor. However, after learning about how every sperm bank is governed by the same group and every specimen must pass the same testing nation-wide, we decided to venture onto other banks websites.

Midwest Sperm Bank's website is lame. The interface looks like it's from the 80's. There are no bells and whistles. They only have about 35 donors total to choose from. There are no donor-composed essays to read or celebrity photos to compare. There is barely enough information to get a basic idea of the person: ethnicity, hair color, eye color, height, weight, level of education, field of study. Done deal. They will offer you a medical history if you ask for one, but I'm thinking it isn't digitally available or it would most likely be on the website already.

The deciding factor? Every specimen is the same price, $350.00, a savings of $235.00 from what we're currently paying. There is no popularity contest amongst donors like on CC's website where supply and demand jack up prices on the super-amazing-perfect donors. And shipping? $125.00 for our location on the map; a savings of $60.00.

Total monthly savings: $295.00. All we're missing out on are cheesy donor descriptions and even cheesier Q&A's about why they wanted to become a donor and what their favorite color is.

Instead, we can take our savings and put it toward baby gear and mommy-to-be work clothes. Shopping never felt so good.

Dizzy......Seriously, again?

Needless to say we can't wait until this Friday to take a pregnancy test (and yes, we both agree that we will test on Friday morning). The past several days of our unknown pregnancy state have been exciting. I feel as though I may have had some noticeable symptoms for the first time since IUI #1. They come and go, but I can't help but be a bit more optimistic than usual.

'Usual' is defined as follows:

Day of IUI: Smiles and happiness. Cup overflowing.
Day 3 or 4 after IUI: Optimism. This might be the one!
Day 8 or 9 after IUI: Neutral. No emotion one way or another. If it's meant to happen it will.
Day 12 or 13 after IUI: Pessimism. Cramps. PMS. Bloating. Mentally preparing an awesome martini.

As you can see, I am in day 8 to 9 post-IUI, but am still in the optimistic stage. Truly a rarity. Potentially a devastating one.

Dizziness. As I laid on our couch the other night trying to shake the spins, the first thought that came into my head was, 'what the hell did I hit my head on this time?' After I was able to negate that option, pregnancy was my second thought. Achy boobs, weird dizziness, nausea, ridiculous thirstiness, oh and strangest of all, a lack of interest in my favorite morning/afternoon/border-line all day food, coffee. Sort of tastes nasty these days.....but who's keeping track of these silly things anyway, right? Maybe I'm just dehydrated. Same symptoms..... !!!!!! Coo-coo crazy.

Regardless, we're thinking proactively about the potential of a sixth IUI. We're trying to decide if we would initiate intertility tests a little early (our provider has stated several times that they typically wait six full, unsuccesful cycles before any testing, but ever since we've decided to take charge of my health care, it seems as though they are willing to test early). We're also trying to decide if we would switch sperm banks. We literally are paying a premium for sperm with California Cryobank. And since I now know that all sperm is governed by the same entity and processed under the same guidelines, ALL SPERM IS actually EQUAL. Half the cost elsewhere, and apparantly high price hasn't produced high results as of yet.

IUI #5 is hopefully the one. This will be the first time that I am emotionally crushed if it isn't. Bracing for impact (with fingers and toes crossed)!!!!

Sperm: it works better with alcohol.

Today is day 8 in my cycle.....it's time to stop what we're doing and buy sperm.

Tonight when I got home, I found it important to pour a giant cocktail. Perhaps it's due to my crazy busy career choice at this point. Lots of gin, a little triple sec, a little lime juice and cranberry. Sort of a 'oh crap, we're out of vodka' cape codder. I asked my partner to remind me that we HAD to buy sperm today or we'd have to pay extra for speedier shipment. So I got home, poured my drink, and announced that 'I'd be half in the bag and buying sperm' shortly. 'Isn't that how it's supposed to work? Doesn't everyone do it this way?' It is so easy to catch a buzz lately. I hardly drink anything alcoholic at this point, sort of training myself for the next stage. So basically I smell a stiff drink and start giggling.

The clomid is going well so far. Today is the third day of my five-day stint. I had a headache on the first day, really bad. But since then, no complaints. Oh, and we've had a huge conversation with our point-of-contact at Dartmouth. More to come on that.

We're going with the same donor as last time.....we're debating naming our child after him.....LOL. Every kid wants a number for a name, right? Sort of unique and catchy, right? A little buzz every now and then is a really great thing. My stress is melting away with the ice cubes.

Life is so frickin' busy.

Well, if I were you, I'd be very upset with me. I've dedicated no time at all to sharing our latest day-to-day baby making journeys. Essentially, I've gotten up at O'Dark-Hundred, gone to work, worked my ass off, come home in the dark, eaten, maybe watched some stupid summer TV reality show (seriously bachelorette, give me a break) and gone to bed only to get up and do it again the next day. I suppose, they say you have to make hay in the sunshine, right? Well if that's the case, I think I have heat exhaustion.

So..... baby making...... right.

We went for our fourth IUI last Thursday, which was amazing timing for my crazy weekend schedule with weddings at the hotel. We've had only two different people do the procedure with us this whole time: Elizabeth, who has helped us with our first, second and fourth IUI, and Katy, who has been our main point of contact as well as helped us with our third IUI. Elizabeth is that quintessential nurse OB figure; middle-aged, a little overweight, shoulder-length wavy chestnut hair, very pleasant, and loves to chat about what's going on inside your hoo-haa. We did in fact decide to switch sperm donors for this go, which was a good idea, especially when Elizabeth comes in the room after looking at the sample under a microscope and announces that 'this one is a keeper. It looks like this sample could be fresh not frozen!!'

Ah yes, our new donor is still from California Cryobank. I feel as though I've cheated on our original donor simply because he couldn't get the job done. Very shallow of me. LOL. He is some sort of genius rocket scientist with a PhD.....my partner would have nothing less. I'm not sure he's as handsome as the first donor could have been, but I suppose we might just find out.

So our sperm sample was superlative and according to Elizabeth my hoo-haa was as well. Every time I say, 'Elizabeth, you tell that to everyone,' but she claims not to. So why hasn't it worked yet!!??

Not all sperm is created equal.

Today is day 3 of my cycle. We'll probably buy our sperm today. However, all weekend we've been thinking about switching our donor.

Somehow, I feel as though it shouldn't really make a big difference. We're getting our sperm from California Cryobank, which is not exactly an un-known sperm bank. Shouldn't all of their sperm be equally suitable for pregnancy? Back in the very beginning when we were talking with our doctor about when we should be getting concerned and start taking further steps to get pregnant, he said that we should get through 6 months of unsuccessful insemination's before freaking out. So far we've only been three, but for those of you who know my partner, that's long enough. LOL.

On my to-do list today is a phone call to our primary contact nurse at Dartmouth. She will have more info on this. I feel as though I've heard from somewhere that some sperm might not 'jive' with every egg. Is this true? Maybe I just need a different California surfer boy grad student. Back to the short list for inspiration.

Lesbians, meet your daddy.

Our sperm came from the west coast. Their website at California Cryobank was wonderful; lots of diverse specimens to select from. Not surprisingly, they were all very young, mostly college or graduate students, and all shared a love for the ocean. Ahh yes, they all surfed or scuba dived or sailed, no matter their eye or hair or skin color. A bunch of true California guys.

Our donor was, at the time of his deposit, in graduate school studying science and was a chiropractor professionally. Olive complexion with thick, brown hair, with a smaller stature at 5'9", and a fairly slim body type. A well rounded person, he had a love for travel, music and animals. We thought he was perfect.

The day I called to book his flight to Dartmouth I was reminded of the last several scenes in 'If these walls could talk' when Ellen's character is going to the sperm bank to get their vial. It was this huge canister with all these big red letter's all over it stating 'this side up' and 'hazardous materials'. Nitrogen to help keep the sperm cold. I remember laughing as she seat-belted it into the front seat of her car, as if it were a little person. It was so big and awkward. And that's why I didn't even flinch when the lady at the sperm bank calmly told me that it would be $175 to ship my vial to New Hampshire. Fine. A small price to pay, honestly.

And then the big day arrived; the day we met our donor for the first time. The actual vial, found somewhere lost in that giant canister, was about the size of an electrical fuse, maybe just a touch bigger. The numbers on the vial matched the donor number we had ordered. And so we were good to go.....

Yes please, I'd like to make a withdrawal.

I don't know if I should be freaking out or what, but my partner and I just had our first IUI yesterday. I might be jinxing it, but I already feel nauseous and it hasn't even been 24 hours. Hmmm....I must just be anxious, or maybe I caught a bug from the hospital yesterday.....called pregnant???!!!

Intro-Uterine-Insemination, as they call it, is done as soon as your Leutanizing Hormone (LH) levels have risen, indicating ovulation. A catheter is inserted directly into your uterus to deliver the package. Insemination, as I call it, sounds like something you learn about while studying to be a dairy farmer. The word just sounds like something you do to a giant herd of heifers to me. But yes, that literally is what it is; inseminating... with sperm from an unknown donor from thousands of miles away.

After many long nights of my girlfriend searching through different sperm banks, we finally decided to use the California Cryobank. She was amazingly diligent in her search efforts for the right bank. The website had to be perfect; user friendly and full of lots of information about the donors. I have to admit, from that point, I sort of let her roll with the sperm selection. She would ask me to sit with her and plan and pick, but I couldn't get over the dart-throwing sensation I felt. How could I prodict the outcome? And it's so cold, the act of looking through all these donors like their super-valuable sperm is on the auction block. It's like a dating website for sperm, these websites. There was no sense of personability throughout this process, or at least wasn't for me. Literally, you sign on to the website, and the first thing you notice is a pop-up stating, 'Donor #12345 is back! Supplies are limited!'

And how do they determine cost for these pricely, little vials? Some sperm was much cheaper than others (and I'm talking from the same website!) There was probably a couple hundred dollars of variation. Can you imagine the poor guy who figures out which donor number he is, then proceeds to get on the website only to find that he has cheap sperm? HA! THAT must feel good. I think it's based on number of successful pregnancies. So basically, supply and demand ladies. Get in line. First come, first served.

Many months into our serch for the golden sperm, my partner created something of a short list that we then went through together. It was so much less overwhelming for me to have five or six 'girlfriend pre-approved' options, as opposed to hundreds to search through aimlessly. After much deliberation about saving on shipping costs and having more than one child, we finally decided to buy only one vial, one chance. Perhaps it's all we need right now.

It's a big, straight world people

Dear average, intelligent, coupled lesbian,

My partner and I did not decide yesterday to get pregnant. As a matter of fact, we are well on our way to becoming preggo. Just this morning I tested my ovulation for the second time this cycle. We anxiously awaited the 2-3 minutes until the test was complete. But no, today is not the day. However, today is the day I decided to start this blog. I have noticed many aspects of our journey to baby that are so ridiculously and blatantly heterosexual that we literally look at each other and laugh out loud.

What really frosted my gay cake and inspired me to write was reading the directions to our ovulation kit. Like many gay couples, we bought a leading brand kit at a leading chain drug store. We were sure to buy the really expensive, digital one in hopes that it was the best choice. Here is a brief synopsis of the instructions in my words:

Step 1: Start your period and count that day as 'Day 1' of your cycle.
Step 2: Count each day until you get to day 11 or 12 of your cycle.
Step 3: Test your tinkle.
Step 4: If your test kit reads just a circle, throw it out and try again tomorrow. If your test kit reads a smiley face in the circle, congratulations! You're ovulating! Now go home quick and bang your husband.

I was so carefully reading each and every little instruction until I got to that last step and realized that this major, national brand kit literally thought that everyone reading their instructions was straight. How could that possibly be? In the heterosexual world, people just have sex and then have kids. It's so easy and straight-forward. If that were my case, we'd have 10 kids by now. Jeez.....

I mentioned to my best friend, who happens to be a nurse, that we had started 'tinkling on sticks'. He got really upset and said 'you're pregnant?!' thinking that I had left him out of this huge, important process of my life. I said, 'no, we're testing my ovulation.' Now, my best friend is a happily married, straight man with two kids. And he's a nurse professionally. He knows how the process of reproduction works. 'Oh, I must have slept through that class...' was his response, to which of course we both chuckled. My point is that no normal, healthy heterosexual couple uses these expensive ovulation kits unless necessary, and the really successfully re-productive may not even know they exist. But every single lesbian who wants to get pregnant does know and will continue to use them for all time. Why would this company assume I am going home to have intercourse to reproduce?

Let me reassure you all right now, I am not out to be a crazy, feminist, straight-folk hating dyke. I am out to share my joy, humor, challenges and confusions of pregnancy as a lesbian. After all, we must laugh in order to get anywhere in this world. And it's a big, straight world people.