A fornication fifty-fifty

As the saying goes, time flies when you're having a mental battle with utter misery. Or something vaguely similar at least.

Time does fly, it seems like just yesterday I was crawling backwards out of a champagne bottle in a feeble attempt at sorrow drowning.

Today is day 7 of a new month, 'CD07' for those into the lingo.

This means that it's almost ugly bumping time, time for the mattress mambo, time for a frank exchange of bodily fluids, time for a squelchy session.

Which brings us to a dilemma, of sorts. You see, for 13 months, we have copulated ourselves senseless with no notable results.
That is of course unless you count aching wobbly bits, an increasingly disgusting rancid under-the-arse cushion at the foot of the bed, and a realisation that the bedroom ceiling is badly in need of a new coat of paint.

None of these were the actual desired result, of course.

Basically, shagging doesn't bloody work. We have taken every approach known to man, even some only known to woodland creatures, and nothing works.

Not to worry, we have a follow up appointment with our reproductive specialist in a little over a week, and by hook or by crook we are going to get somewhere with her, even if it means I have to tie her up, and raid her cabinet for drugs and needles and stuff.

Where does this leave the humping? It is, for all intents and purposes, useless in this case.

So, the question is do we stop and take a break and have a 'copulation kit-kat' so to speak, or do we carry on 'carrying on'?

Stopping, would mean that this cycle is screwed, blued, and tattooed before it's even gotten started, leaving us bouncing off the walls for a month.

Continuing, means that we are signing up for the stick pissing Olympics again before the month is out, reading too much into every single gurgle, belch and yawn that emits itself from ET's fornication riddled body, all the while knowing that it's 99% certain to be futile.

In the midst of a rant I was having the other day, I blurted out something along the lines of the following. When I removed the expletives and spittle from the sentence, it rings genuinely true to me, and probably answers the very question I've just asked.

When you first realise you want to have a child, you unwittingly pawn your free will in return for a dream, but no one tells you that you can't ever have it back until the dream is realised.

Well fuck it anyway, pants off Spencer my lad, I've got a little job for you.

I said 'Nappy', dammit

"Nobody ever told me that."

I've said those words to myself countless times over the last year.

'Trying to conceive', or more accurately 'trying and failing miserably to conceive' not only brings about the standard old side effects you read in the books or on websites, but there are hidden and unexpected side effects too, particularly for us gentlemen.

I've found, not all of them to be quite what I had imagined

It makes you a randy badger....

I haven't used that word since I was about eleven, but it does. Trying to conceive basically gives you the horn and reveals to you the real reason behind sofa cushions.

Unless your pre-TTC rate was at porn star frequency, you are probably at it more than ever, and despite the often dreaded 'timed' occasions, you soon realise that you actually can't get enough.

The primative urge to spread your seed, even though it's as useless as tits on a bull, is all powerful.

If the regular thirst isn't quenched, you are frequently in danger of poking your own eye out.

You lose all sense of shame....

Quite self explanatory if you read through previous entries.

Even outside the topic of trying to conceve, you find yourself diving into conversations where no sane and/or hetrosexual man belongs, and being totally unphased by situations that would previously have resulted in you soiling yourself.

Imagine leaving your sister so horrified that you can sense a 'gasp' via MSN when you tell her about her baby brother producing semen samples, or visiting your GP to discuss providing said samples whilst wearing two odd shoes, or actually using the words 'tilted cervix' to your office manager.

These are just a couple of things an idiot would do. Yes me. Sod off.

Prolonged trying to conceive desensitises you, and reduces any sense of acceptability, respectability and sensibility in relation to biological matters, to shreds.

Basically, the downside about becoming practically qualified to perform reproductive surgery in 14 Eastern European states, is that you become the person people really don't want to tell a knob joke to, for fear of the repercussions.

You hear the words 'too much information' 8 times a day

You become over-sensitive and soft....

I have already rambled on about this in some detail, but indeed, with the exception of genitalia, trying to conceive turns a man to mush.

You blub watching the neighbours out and about with their kids, you blub on a sunny day, you blub when somone takes your parking spot. (You know who you are you bitch.)

You become uber sensitive to the point of paranoia about people who don't have snot bags hanging off them, "maybe they have, you know, 'issues' too", when in fact they very possibly just can't be arsed.

I've used the word 'cute' so much in the last year I should be carrying around a feckin chihuahua in a dolce & gabbana purse, and I've uttered the word 'sweet' so often I am writing this from the midst of a diabetic coma.

It's probably all the testosterone focussing on your jolly rodger that leads to a deficiency in your brain and turns you into a 12 year old girl.
That's my quasi-qualified medical opinion anyway.

You'll try absolutely anything....

Logic flies out the window. Actually no, correction. Logic pulls down your pants, kicks you up the arse, blows a raspberry in your face and then flies out the window.

This goes far beyond having Ms. shagee remain horizontal for about 4 days after bumping uglies, with her backside hoisted aloft seven cushions.

This goes into the realm of counting and waving at magpies.

This goes into the mad realm of ordering fertility dolls off the internet.

This goes into the realm of two grown, educated and semi-intelligent people in their thirties, sleeping on yellow knitted booties, incredibly generously hand made and sent to us from the other side of the planet.

One under each bloody pillow.

I know it's utterly illogical, but God help you if you try to remove them, I'll bite your non-believing fingers off and feed them to the frogs.

You get what you wish for...sort of....

The observant among you will have put two and two together and come up with the logic behind the name, Xbox4NappyRash.

For those who haven't, bless your cotton socks, I'll explain. The idea was to sacrifice using my xbox in return for nappy rash(preferably on the arse of a kid).

Well, maybe the Gods of fate have a cruel sense of humour, or perhaps they are hard of hearing, or most likely they just can't understand my funny accent, but they have given me what I asked for, almost.

Instead of nappy rash, they have provided me with a nasty rash. On my bloody fingers.

Yes indeed, it's a joy to share the news that I have developed a charming wee reaction on my right hand. Excema-esque in appearance, some bright sparks attribute it to stress and frustration.

I've no doubt in my underdeveloped mind that it is due to the lack of penile contact (with not one, but two, notable exceptions) This naturally arises from the absence of acts of self love, which are rightly forbidden during these trying times.

Incidentally it's also frowned upon by my buddy, the pope, but frankly, I fear the wrath of ET a million times more.

Are these male side effects of trying and hopelessly failing to conceive common, or am I just odd? Scratch that, the oddness is a given, some things I don't need to be told.

For those who feel the urge, "judge not lest ye be bitten on the calves by a chubby Irishman, for skin is a real bitch to remove from my braces".

And yes, I said 'for skin'. Smart arses.


EDIT: It appears that the deceptively named Newbie nominated this for post of the week and it's been shortlisted along with 5 very different other posts on other interesting blogs. Go check them out.

Champagne & pizza

Friday was a beauty of a blow, and I wasn't quite sure how to handle it when I got home from work.

I must be living away from home for too long because it took me at least 5 minutes to come up with the good old Irish solution. Drink. Stereotypes don't come out of nowhere.

When ET arrived home we popped open a bottle of champagne and called for pizza. Then we popped open another.

You may think it a spooky coincidence that we chose to eat pizza on the evening of the biggest disappointment so far and it also was what we ate on the evening we decided to start a family, but no, there's no coincidence, we are just greedy, lazy pigs.

The days that followed have been a bit weird, not really sad, but a bit indifferent. Energy is at a premium, and laughs are few and far between.

I do wonder when will the energy return, or even if it will return.

Yet another irony of trying to conceive is, even when there seems to be no point anymore, you can't stop yourself thinking in cycle days, ovulations, luteal phases and all the rest.

ET claims she is now having trouble taking a piss without a stick in her hand.

I've read a statistic which puts the percentage of couples still trying to conceive by the time cycle 12 comes around at 1.7%.

We are into number 14. Two weeks from today we return to the reproductive specialist.

Which brings me to infertility.
I've joked a lot about it affecting us, and I even hinted at it way back in the 'early days'.
As much fun as it was to poke fun at myself about it, I don't want to anymore, I want this to be a story of snotty noses and shitty arses, or even back to the days when it was just about constant humping and jokes about wobbly bits and ice packs. I don't want this to be the story it's become, the one we just have to admit to, a story of infertility.

I wonder would the dudes at Alltop or Cre8Buzz create a section for malfunctioning man-bits or wonky woman thingys.

"My name is Xbox4NappyRash and I am an infertility blog."

To those of you who have commented on the last entry, or mailed, or made outrageously generous offers, all we can say is thank you. We are both overwhelmed and grateful. Thanks.

Better than Christmas

We have had some wonderfully gonad squeezing moments over the last year when we've found out we are not pregnant.

We've had this particular joy around my birthday, ET's birthday, before going on holiday, and the humdinger of course, back on Christmas day.

Christmas day was a particularly spectacular kick in the guts.

After that point I stopped believing the significance of dates in this great plan of ours.

There would be no breaking the news while visiting family, or at Christmas, or on Paddy's day, or on someone's birthday.

After Christmas I lost all inclination to be genuinely hopeful, and resigned myself to the idea that we would be relying on experts to do the job for us.

Cold and calculating perhaps, but easier to handle at a time when energy was getting low.

So I thought.

This month, cycle 13, saw optimisim sneak back in for the first time in months.

We had the turnaround in semen analysis results which told us we could do it naturally, we had our first session with the specialist which took the pressure off our shoulders slightly, and we got our ugly bumping timing and quality absolutely spot on.

It was game on.

Cycle day 27, 28, and 29 came and went, when 26 or 27 is the norm.

Long time unspoken excitement began to bubble to the surface.

Names were written on scraps of paper to visualise them alongside my surname before being hastily torn up and binned.

Minds allowed themselves to wander to the other side of 'trying to conceive', the side where people are visiting you and shaking your hand and slapping you on the back. The side where the almost overwhelming bubbling excitement I feel from time to time really belongs.

This was it. Finally. Surely.

Cycle day 30 came and went. Still no positive test result. Doubts creep in.

As if on queue, on a sunny Friday of a long weekend, it comes to a dead end.

One spot. Followed by the inevitable.

Christmas had left us staggering dazed around the ring, but cycle 13 has callously kicked our buckling legs from under us.

If my brief teenage phase of reading the classics serves me well, I believe there is a reference in Dante's 'Divine Comedy' to a sign over the gates of hell reading 'Abandon hope all ye who enter here'.

I want that sign painted over the gates of 'trying to conceive' world, as it's the only advice that I can see really helping anyone get through it.

The house is emptier than it was twenty four hours ago, who knew such little hope took up so much space.