Life Olympics

Making a baby is fun but the fun can wear off after many months of no success. The younger you are, the easier it is and this applies to men and women. Life is ironic - literally! Some girls get pregnant at fourteen and have the baby while they are still children and living at home, while some women get pregnant easily and for reasons that are individual to each woman, don't want the baby, have it aborted or sadly lose it. Some women yearn, dream and hope of having baby, yet cannot have one after months or years of trying. They get tests done, their husband or boyfriend has tests and one or sometimes both people have a problem in conceiving. The solution is to get help via scientific methods, 'via in vitro fertilization' (IVF).

We had this problem but had not tried for years but rather left it late to have a child. This is both good and bad. If I had a child when I was in my late 20's I would have been too selfish and immature to have coped with looking after a kid. Now I am older I am more mature and can cope but luckily for me it's my full time job. On the bad side, I will be older than other dads when junior is a teenager and I am sure I will be mistaken for his lost senile old grandfather who sits in the park talking to trees. Little could I have known that one day I would be doing it full time and in Moscow Russia and I fact I do sit in the park now and talk to trees, so the change of future old age should be easy. We don't have a nanny I do it myself without magic or mirror's but on my own as a hairy, knuckle scraping alpha male.

We tried IVF and it failed. It's an unpleasant process for the woman but easier for the man.  I had to go to the clinic and make a 'deposit' it's a bit like putting cash in the bank but a lot more fun. This activity is something I have always done from an early age and have pursued this hobby with great enthusiasm. The only thing is, when you have to do it next to a waiting room full off people it not such fun. At the clinic, you have to walk through the waiting room where couples sit reading through magazines about boating, DIY and health and beauty. I sat down and started to read a DIY magazine which seemed appropriate for my task in hand! I flicked through instructions on how to make a coffee table, how to build a bed and others useful DIY tips but found nothing on making life. Then my name was called and an invisible stage spot light fell on me, I got up from my chair while people looked at me and applauded me with pats on the back and wishes of good luck as I made my way to my sperm sample room. This is of course not true, instead, people sit in the waiting room with with their faces hidden behind magazines, everyone look embarrassed and rather desperate. My sperms would be kicked out of their wheel chairs, put on a strict salad diet and forced to hit the gym to get ready for the big race and a gold medal of life.

I was led into the room by a pretty nurse where I would produce my sample of life. I felt like asking her in with me to help me on my quest but decided that would be a bad idea. She gave me a small plastic pot, showed me hatch in the wall and asked me to leave my sample pot in the wall hatch and left me alone to do my job.

On the other side of the hatch was another room where the nurse would collect the sample pot and take it to the lab for sperm debriefing and marathon training for the future egg race Olympics. On the table were a collection of dated porn mags that looked very used. The women in the magazines looked as tired as their readership and posed on tables, beds and in the standard positions for maximum titillation. You have to try to get inspiration from such magazines, a job I had done with ease and great happiness in the past but the situation I found myself in made it difficult to do. As I said, they give you a tiny plastic pot for your deposit, try stopping an express train with a feather. Once you have made your deposit, you leave the tiny pot in the hatch and leave the room to go back to the waiting room while you wait for your wife to return from her tests. I have never felt so guilty in my life and it makes no difference that other men are waiting to do exactly the same thing that you have just done, embarrassment is carved into your face, you sit down cough and try to act as if you have just been to the coffee machine. Of course this embarrassment is all in your mind and you should not feel ashamed.

Some women and couples see IVF almost like buying a new TV or a pair of shoes, some men make a baby with a woman they have only known a week. IVF for the desperate, is a last attempt to reach their dreams of having a child. Either way, without IVF, adoption would be the only way. We tried IVF and it failed. Five months later and totally naturally, junior swam the Olympics and won. The rest is history and I probably would not be writing this blog about being a stay at home dad and about living in Moscow. It's a lot harder for the woman with daily injections into the stomach done by herself every morning and the indignity of going to the clinic to be inspected at regular intervals by a group of strangers in white coats. The mans job is very easy.

My reason for writing about this here is to share the experience of IVF with others who have tried it or who want to try it. Who knows, in a few years time it may be a lot easier and lot more successful? Life is a miracle and I don't care if I sound like cheesy TV commercial but it truly is. Life is even more precious when it's produced in difficult circumstances. Enjoy it, respect it, protect it and value it. Don't give up and keep trying if you want something badly enough you can get it. IVF is not fun but without it, having a baby would be impossible for many people so lets thank Robert Edwards who pioneered it even if it did not work for us, can I have my money back Robert?

Note: Clinics will be different in quality, service and in price from country to country. IVF Moscow.
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