Until
today, I hadn’t realized the kind of distance C had from this whole infertility
bonanza. He’s been nothing but supportive, sweet and generally happy to
endure/speak sarcastically of my, let’s say, ebbing moods – even when I have bluntly told him that I am having a very hard time liking him that I need some alone time. But C doesn’t have to get poked and
prodded four times in six days; he doesn’t have Chinese hamster ovary injected
into his gut; and he’s not ravenously eating for nine during
“birth-control-week.”[1] Simply put:
C is not the patient and it turns out, he didn’t quite know how to be.
This
morning we went in for our first IUI[2], which means
that after a romantic morning of must-ejaculate-into-this-small-plastic-cup-immediately,
we headed over to the fertility clinic to drop off the sample, one hour in
advance of the procedure. Because, holy
shit how on earth are we running late C went up first while I parked.
Then, as I was riding the elevator, a frantic text “What do I do? All the women
are staring at me.”
When I
met him in the clinic lobby, he looked like a deer in headlights. What was he supposed to sign/where was he
supposed to go/what is the meaning of life/etc. The questions were coming
fast and furious.
Now,
it should be said – C has accompanied me to the clinic several times. He’s even
given a sample once before, at the beginning of this whole mis-adventure. But
never has he been the patient, per se.
Now. C is one of the smartest people I know – doctor, builder of kayaks, maker
of sarcastic quips. And so it was a surprise, and somewhat baffling, to see him
so unhinged. So while I personally may have indulged ever-so-briefly in his panic-stricken-face,
I wasn’t really so keen on the entire waiting room and nursing staff thinking
that he was some sort of aloof proto-male who isn’t comfortable talking about reproduction,
let alone dropping off his sperm in a brown paper lunch bag. Because: feminist!
liberated man! Etc[3].
