Tag: fertility

Sperm donors aren’t dads.

“They’re donors,” says my counsellor. “They’re not Dads. Now, your kid may have a dad, someone whom you meet, and who becomes a parent. That may happen. But the donor is the donor.”

My counsellor is emphatic.

And yet, how many of my friends have said, “why not go to a bar and get someone to knock you up? For the price of a gin and tonic, you could be done with this!”

In fact, two different men (hearing of my situation) have explicitly come forward and offered to be my sperm donor. You know….the “old fashioned way.”

They want legacy, they want a child, and they’re willing to give me their vital fluids to make it happen. They’re also attractive, successful, and seem kind. Now, they may also just want to get in my pants, but I do have a deep feeling that the sex perk is secondary to their biological urge to leave an heir.

“I could help out, you know, I’d like that, when you needed it,” one says. “I’ll sign whatever you want, I don’t need legal rights.”

Now, when you’re staring down the barrel of single mom-dom, who wouldn’t want a benevolent extra support person in the wings to swoop in for some occasional babysitting or camping trips? The men and I travel down this road. We talk it out. The details, however, are fuzzy. Would they give financial support? Would I even want them to? And if they didn’t, why do they get a legacy while I’m them one doing all the heavy lifting? Would we tell the kid?

When artificial insertion costs upward of $1500 per pop, getting pregnant the old-fashioned option seems tempting.

But the consequences loom.

The baby daddy could decide all of a sudden that they want partial (or full) custody of the kid. While men may seem less prone to baby fever than women, expectations and desires can radically change once a baby is born. A disinterested donor may suddenly feel the roar of paternal duty and, whamo, my cheaper-than-the-medical-turkey-baster-option has now created an unexpected adversary in a custody battle.

Even without a worse case scenario, having an in-person donor makes the “dad” aspect real. With a medical sperm donor, they feel like a “donor” – not a dad. I bought some genetic material, got is shoved up my cervix…it’s no big deal. It’s not emotional. I’m the mom, I’m the parent, I’m the family. The sperm was the tool for the job.

But getting pregnant from a real live person means that I know the father. The sperm is connected to a face, to a body, and to an intimate moment. I know who he is. The donor – in my mind – is the “dad.”

When I spoke to these men and considered the “au naturel” option, I suddenly realized that I’m the lucky one. Despite all my fear and drama, I actually have it easier. After all, finding a surrogate woman to bear your baby is a lot harder then paying a fee for a sample in a cup.

I think of my gay friends – men and women – who are on the family path, searching for options. I think of the lonely bachelors out there who always wanted a family, and find themselves single and without the resources to pay a surrogate to carry their child to term. I realize that I’m lucky to even have a choice.

I tell my therapist,”Men have offered to be my sperm baby daddies… but, it seems too complicated.”

She looks me straight in the eyes, “Rachel, I think you have good instincts.”

This is a blog in a series called, “Doing It Alone,” to share some of the trials and tribulations of my attempts in 2017 to get pregnant as a single woman. 

I’ve been peeing on sticks.

Although I have a vague sense of my own fertility cycles, I’m now tasked with being more diligent about detecting my “surge.” The word “surge” sounds wonderfully romantic, as if I will overcome by a mystical hormonal tidal wave each month that makes me ripe for mating.

Kind of like Spock during pon farr in Wrath of Khan. 

In reality, “surge” describes the wave of luteinizing hormone (LH) that causes the release of your ripest egg from your ovaries (ie: ovulation).

The old fashioned way of detecting fertility (and the “surge”) is by paying attention to the timing of your cycle and logging the physical changes of your body. For those of you who didn’t pay attention in 8th grade science class (I certainly didn’t), a woman is most fertile 1-2 days before and during ovulation. The egg can only live about 24 hours after ovulation unless it’s fertilized. But since sperm can live 3-4 days, if you have sex before you ovulate, you might be in business. For most women, ovulation occurs about 14 days before the onset of your period.

However, a general understanding of timing is not enough. Every woman’s cycle is different, so you have to fine tune your analysis by paying attention to other tell-tale signs. One of the most obvious indicators of impending fertility? The quality and composition of your vaginal secretions.

Okay, I’m sorry, this next section is a mild digression. Do you mind if I use a word that is not “secretions?” I’d rather not equate my secret honeysuckle sauce to something that could be from Aliens. A quick look under in urban slang yields the following possibilities:

• pooter pudding
• box snot
• cunt custard
• vulva chowder

I am dissatisfied with these terms, as they verge on misogynistic. I’ve come up with a few of my own (and thank you Eve Ensler, for ever inspiring name reclamation).  You are free to use these in your next conversation with your gynaecologist:

• vulvambrosia
• babe butter sauce
• ardent spirit (a la aqua vitae)
• honeymead

Thank you. Moving on. 

Common descriptors of our, ah, joyjuice are poetic: “egg white,” “sticky,” “creamy.” Right around ovulation, the consistency reaches a thick and irrepressible “egg white,” which is designed to create a more hospitable environment for sperm survival. (More info.)

Another important fertility indicator is temperature, as your basal temperature increases about a half degree a day or two after you ovulate. One of my best friends planned both her pregnancies impeccably (to the month) with both of her kids by tracking her temperature. She’s a fertility ninja. Cervix height also changes with impending ovulation. You reach up into your vagina like a world champion spelunker to assess if your cervix is low, firm and dry or high, soft and wet.

Like many of us, I had assumed it was fairly easy to get pregnant. Sure, I’d heard stories about fertility challenges, but I’d been so freaked out by the “safe sex” and unwanted pregnancy campaigns of the 80’s and 90’s that I figured having a kid would only take a round or two of unprotected sex. Of course I’m wrong.

Here are the sobering notes I took during my first appointment with the Olive Fertility Centre:

Natural pregnancy: 5-10% chance of pregnancy every month

• by age of 41, 50% of women are infertile
• by age of 45, 95% of women are infertile
• 35 and under, 20-25% of women are infertile

So if I’m going to do my best to get pregnant, I have to hone in on my ovulation day with laser like precision. Guessing at the “egg-white” quality of my secretions and palpating the height of my cervix isn’t going to cut it. Although it has been very gratifying to discover that there is a wildish organic orchestra playing within my body every month, I am going to maximize my chances and also rely on science.

Hence, peeing on sticks.

The sticks (available online or at a local pharmacy) measure the amount of LH in the urine. They’re like pregnancy sticks, but they detect ovulation rather than pregnancy.

Here’s the plan:

Once the stick gives me a thumbs up that I’m about to ovulate (usually through a comforting smiley face), I call the fertility clinic.  They can prepare my pre-selected sperm for, uh, what’s the word? Insertion. The rest of my life gets put on hold and I beeline for the clinic the next day. Clear my schedule, cancel appointments. And bam, like that, we’ve got our one shot for the month.

The shot is still pretty long. Even given ideal factors, less than 12% each  month.

I’m peeing on sticks, and halfway through my cycle, I start bleeding. What the what? Is this spotting, is this menstruation, is this stress? Wouldn’t you know, the very time that I need my body to perform with some semblance of regularity, everything goes nutso. #timingiseverything

I take a breath. Could just be a glitch, right?

So what else can you do?

I keep peeing on sticks.

This is the first installation in a series called, “Doing It Alone,” to share some of the trials and tribulations of my attempts in 2017 to get pregnant as a single woman. 

I  look at the list of sperm donors and start crying. I don’t mean to cry, it just comes upon me, unexpectedly.

I push myself back from my computer and fall on my floor. A distant part of my brain is noting that my actions seem very dramatic. But it’s beyond me and impossible to control. I cry. Big, heaving sobs. I’m mourning for the expectations I had from the time I was a girl: I would marry a great guy and we’d have a family.

I don’t want to be looking at this list. I’m supposed to have a loving, supportive husband. We’re supposed to be holding hands, stepping forward into our brave new future together.  Instead, I am 42, single, and live in a small basement suite in one of the most heinously expensive cities in the world. My company has just cut my hours, I’m paying off my Masters Program, and now I have a crazy scheme to finance an expensive version of turkey baster inception.

To make it worse, I’m angry with myself. After all, it’s not as if I haven’t had the opportunity to make the leap to motherhood in the past. There have been good men in my life. Men who would have gone on the journey with me the old fashioned way. I hate myself for being foolish, for not figuring it out earlier, and for feeling ten years behind my own destiny.

So I cry on the floor.

And when I’ve worn myself out, I pick myself back up, wipe off my snotty face, and go back to my computer. I buck up. I may live in an expensive city, but I’m lucky enough to have health care thanks to Canada. I may live in a studio basement suite, but I also live two blocks from the beach. I may be single, but I have a great community of friends and a loving family. Okay, my family lives 2000 miles away, but right now I am going to focus on the positives.

I look at my strapping list of possible sperm donor daddies.

They’re all under 25.

Before you select a sperm donor, you have to go visit an approved counsellor. I guess so they can make sure that you aren’t crazy.

My fertility clinic provided me with a list of therapists and sent me on my way to make my appointment. My deep ambivalence about having a kid as a single mom was exposed in my procrastination; it took me a a couple of months to make the appointment. By the time I finally put on my game face, I was in the middle of teaching a month-long yoga teacher training intensive. Having finally mustered my courage, I did not want to wait another three weeks to see her. I was suddenly racing, on the clock. Late for everything, including my life.

I squished the appointment into a lunch break and dashed to see her.

“Oh Rachel, your poor foot!”

I had also fractured my foot that morning. Rushing to get out of my apartment (rushing for everything it felt), I had slammed my foot into my bedpost. I had wrapped it up haphazardly with tape, but it had bruised and swollen alarmingly. I looked at my foot. I noticed that it hurt.

I sat down and burst into tears.

“I’m so scared….” I wailed. Everything came rushing out. “My boyfriend and I broke up six months ago, and now I feel like everything is gone. I wanted to have a baby with someone I love, to share that. Not like this.” Everything that had been pent up started pouring out. The anxiety, the longing, the regret, the fear. I’d been fighting with depression for six months, hating myself for finding myself in this situation and resisting the reality that, well, fuck it, here I was. I was a dunce, an idiot, a failure.

“Of course you’re anxious!” She said, “Oh my God, Rachel, of course you are! If you weren’t, that would really be a problem!” Sarah gave me the sympathy that I did not want to give myself.

In the warmth of her presence, my hidden, horrible secrets came rushing out. I confessed everything: my ambivalence about even having a kid, my depression, my suicidal thoughts, my financial insecurity, my anxiety over the future. How much I missed my ex-boyfriend and tortured myself over our break up, how I was now spending time with a man who didn’t want kids at all. How I thought I would be failure if I wasn’t a mom. How I was afraid of ruining my life, afraid of regret, of bitterness, of missing my chance.

The deluge slowly stopped.

If this was a sanity test, I wasn’t sure how well I was doing. I became worried that Sarah might tell the fertility clinic to ban me.

“Rachel, no, this is normal,” she said firmly and quietly. “Most women who come and see me are confused and anxious. Ambivalence is okay.” Our time was up already, gone in what had seemed like a moment. “Let’s meet again,” she held me by the shoulders reassuringly, “so we can go over the actual sperm donation part of it…when you’re ready.” She hugged me at the door. ” You are not alone in this. Most women I speak with share the same fears and anxieties. Now, take care of your foot, okay?”

I looked down at my poor bruised foot.

Right.

I hobbled back out to the street.

It was still raining, my foot was still fractured, I was still anxious and confused. But I knew now that I hadn’t known before.

I wasn’t alone.

See the other blogs:

•  Doing It Alone, Part 1
• Doing It Alone, Part 2
• Doing It Alone, Part 3