mouse is coming!â
âA mouse is coming!
I make my hand into a mouse, creep it close to her, then run the mouse-hand under her arms, begin to tickle. Soonthe mouse-hand bounces up and down on her tummy.
âIâm not a trampoline! Iâm not a trampoline! Iâm not a trampoline! Iâm a person!
âOh, OK.
âDo it on your nose!
The mouse-hand bounces up and down on my nose.
âYour nose is a trampoline!
Motherâs Day was a punch in the gut.
I had a friend also doing IVF but in Europe, who was much more sanguine. She said her whole family was in good health, she had amazing friends, she loved her work, she lived in a wonderful city, and after much heartbreak she now spent every day alongside her beloved new husband. âToo much for one person, donât you think?â They were seriously considering adoption. Perhaps if Iâd had that optionâadoptionâI would have been less fervent. In a country with extremely tight adoption laws I reckoned my chance of adopting at approximately zero. Anyway, selfishly, at the outset I wasnât that keen on adoption.
And now it was my donorâs turn to begin his visits to the clinic. He had an appointment with the doctor; an appointment alone with the counselor; and we did a joint counseling session together. There were consents to consider. (A donor always owned his sperm and could withdraw his consent at any time.) The quarantine had to beverified and the blood work reviewed so that it met all the standards of my clinic. His genetic screening also had to be reviewed. It turned out that since weâd both done our initial screening for cystic fibrosis a new test that covered a greater spectrum of mutations had become available and we needed to do that. I also redid my AMH and a lot of other things. Because of my donorâs family history the genetic counselor advised we needed to consider a range of potential chromosomal problems. There was a test that could be done at a hospital lab on the other side of town. I hesitated to overburden my donor, fearful he too might change his mind, so I decided I would be the one to take the test. If the results proved negativeâwhich I expectedâthen the genetic counselor had advised I could put it out of my mind. Both parents needed to have the mutation for there to be a risk of passing it on to the child. Another thing had changed since my donor first froze his sperm. The law now required that at birth all donors be registered so that a child conceived with donor sperm could one day trace the father. He was happy with that.
The straws of sperm were shipped from one clinic to another. One precious straw was tested for the spermâs motility and possible deformations. Under the microscopeeverything was swimming. When it was already too late I was ready to go.
After consulting with the doctor I chose to proceed with an IUI, intrauterine insemination, at a cost of AU$2,040 (US$1,832) of which around $670 (US$602) would be reimbursed by Medicare. I would do it with a nudge of Gonal-f, 75 IU, to boost my chances. On Day 9 the clinic would start monitoring me for my LH surge. I also had an ultrasound. It was similar to using a turkey baster at home (although I had heard the best way wasnât a turkey baster but a plastic syringe acquired at any local pharmacy). Why did I involve the clinic, why not try at home? Well, I wanted the donorâs sperm to have cleared the HIV risk, andâmore than thatâI wasnât sure he would have been comfortable making home deliveries. And why not go straight to IVF? My thinking was that my eggs had never had a chance: the problem had been my husbandâs lack of sperm. I hoped that if my egg was exposed to healthy sperm then I wouldnât need to undertake the more invasive, and expensive, IVF.
On the appointed day of ovulation I arrived at the facility. A nurseâthere was no doctor involvedâtried toinsert a fine
âA mouse is coming!
I make my hand into a mouse, creep it close to her, then run the mouse-hand under her arms, begin to tickle. Soonthe mouse-hand bounces up and down on her tummy.
âIâm not a trampoline! Iâm not a trampoline! Iâm not a trampoline! Iâm a person!
âOh, OK.
âDo it on your nose!
The mouse-hand bounces up and down on my nose.
âYour nose is a trampoline!
Motherâs Day was a punch in the gut.
I had a friend also doing IVF but in Europe, who was much more sanguine. She said her whole family was in good health, she had amazing friends, she loved her work, she lived in a wonderful city, and after much heartbreak she now spent every day alongside her beloved new husband. âToo much for one person, donât you think?â They were seriously considering adoption. Perhaps if Iâd had that optionâadoptionâI would have been less fervent. In a country with extremely tight adoption laws I reckoned my chance of adopting at approximately zero. Anyway, selfishly, at the outset I wasnât that keen on adoption.
And now it was my donorâs turn to begin his visits to the clinic. He had an appointment with the doctor; an appointment alone with the counselor; and we did a joint counseling session together. There were consents to consider. (A donor always owned his sperm and could withdraw his consent at any time.) The quarantine had to beverified and the blood work reviewed so that it met all the standards of my clinic. His genetic screening also had to be reviewed. It turned out that since weâd both done our initial screening for cystic fibrosis a new test that covered a greater spectrum of mutations had become available and we needed to do that. I also redid my AMH and a lot of other things. Because of my donorâs family history the genetic counselor advised we needed to consider a range of potential chromosomal problems. There was a test that could be done at a hospital lab on the other side of town. I hesitated to overburden my donor, fearful he too might change his mind, so I decided I would be the one to take the test. If the results proved negativeâwhich I expectedâthen the genetic counselor had advised I could put it out of my mind. Both parents needed to have the mutation for there to be a risk of passing it on to the child. Another thing had changed since my donor first froze his sperm. The law now required that at birth all donors be registered so that a child conceived with donor sperm could one day trace the father. He was happy with that.
The straws of sperm were shipped from one clinic to another. One precious straw was tested for the spermâs motility and possible deformations. Under the microscopeeverything was swimming. When it was already too late I was ready to go.
After consulting with the doctor I chose to proceed with an IUI, intrauterine insemination, at a cost of AU$2,040 (US$1,832) of which around $670 (US$602) would be reimbursed by Medicare. I would do it with a nudge of Gonal-f, 75 IU, to boost my chances. On Day 9 the clinic would start monitoring me for my LH surge. I also had an ultrasound. It was similar to using a turkey baster at home (although I had heard the best way wasnât a turkey baster but a plastic syringe acquired at any local pharmacy). Why did I involve the clinic, why not try at home? Well, I wanted the donorâs sperm to have cleared the HIV risk, andâmore than thatâI wasnât sure he would have been comfortable making home deliveries. And why not go straight to IVF? My thinking was that my eggs had never had a chance: the problem had been my husbandâs lack of sperm. I hoped that if my egg was exposed to healthy sperm then I wouldnât need to undertake the more invasive, and expensive, IVF.
On the appointed day of ovulation I arrived at the facility. A nurseâthere was no doctor involvedâtried toinsert a fine
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