Onwards and upwards

I'm not giving away any secrets by saying that it's New Years Eve.

Days like this always make me a bit nervous. Last days. Last days at a job, last days of a holiday, even bloody Sundays leave me feeling a bit odd at this stage.

Although, that could be the hangovers.

It's really been the fastest year ever, and at times the most excruciatingly slow one.

I look through the blogs I read and I see such an eventful year has passed, some in good ways, and some in not so good ways. Births, deaths, traumatic times, and upheavals.

In all that time, with all that has gone on out there, you keep coming back here. That is humbling, exciting, and not to mention a tad creepy. I jest of course, it's truly encouraging.

This whole thing was not part of any plan, but has turned out to be a very nice distraction along the way.

In the course of 2008, you lot have dropped about six and a half thousand comments here. Some of you just once, others religiously.

I have no idea how many of you read silently. I'd love if you commented just the once, so I could say hello, welcome, and thanks.

Considering that this is just one story, a very simple one, and very repetitive one, I am very, very grateful for all of your input, reassurance, kindness, and something I would have never said was possible, friendship.

At risk of repeating once again, today, New Year's Eve, is CD25. Our best guess is that Saturday, the end of the cycle is due, and we start again. Or, the end doesn't come, and, well, you know the rest...

For those on this side of this messy carry-on I can only say 'heads up', next year could be the one, we can only hope.

For those on the other side of it, I say 'Enjoy it', you've earned it.

For everyone else, I know your own plates are full with troubles off all kinds, so I wish you all the very best for the year to come.

Thank you.

The gift

"It's just what I always wanted!" she cried, tossing the wrapping paper to the floor and wrapping her arms around my neck.

"But it means so much to you, I don't know if I can accept it" she said, the glistening Christmas tree lights reflecting in her watery eyes

"For you, pet, anything" I replied. "It's served me well, and now I think you should have it, you deserve it"

"Wow" ET breathed in disbelief reaching for a tissue, "No one's ever given me a man cold for Christmas before"

"Well you do know" I responded, "That it isn't quite as serious as a man cold now that you've got it"

"Oh, really?"

"Yes, really. Now crack open another bottle like a darling will you?"

The secret

As Christmas eve wraps itself around us (a foggy one too, just like the song), I get drawn into thinking about all the magical and mystical and amazing stories we hear that happen at Christmas.

Unless you've just tuned in, or have incurred a severe head injury of late, you may know we are holding out for one of those wee Christmas miracles of our own. (Although, if we have to wait for the January sales to get 20% off, then how bad eh?)

With all this festive reflection, I have realised something that has eluded me my whole life.

I can't be sure if it was for my own good, or the good of the planet, or the good the season, or the good of all the children of the world, but it was kept from me all this time, and now I know.

Santa Claus is real, and I am he.

Yes, it's true.

'Idiot!' I hear you cry, 'Drunken arse!' I hear you yell, but no! if you look at the evidence, it is as obvious as the face of the virgin Mary in my scrambled egg.

-Who lives alone with his wife with no children that we know of?

-Who finishes his nightly adventures all breathless, exhausted, and red of face?

-Who seems to be engaging in the same futile exercise over, and over, and over, and over?

-Who can be heard yelling about Hos and cracking whips into the night sky?

-Who is guided solely by the throbbing red extremity of his favourite personal beast?

-Who spends his evenings squeezing up and down in, before finally shooting off up, a tight dark space?

-Who has been obsessed this week with delivering the contents of his sack to exactly the right place at precisely the right time?

No question is there?

Now you know.

Sleep well kiddies, I'm on the case.

A very happy oh-shit-I-forgot-the-AA-batteries-and-everywhere-is-shut day to you all.

Romance isn't dead, it has the flu

It's been quite the interesting weekend.

Not so much interesting in the 'oh how unusual, delightful, or interesting that is' kind of way, but more in the 'sweet lord is that meant to happen?' kind of way.

If a child proves to have been conceived in this cycle, I may just offer it, or myself, to a passing circus.

We had a slight dilemma. I drifted into a man cold induced hallucinogenic coma while ET drifted into a state of ripeness.

She was ready for plucking, I was fit for burial.

There was no option, no choice, no way we were going to miss the window of opportunity this month. So even in my demented state, I decreed to put my wife to the sword.

Ladies, you haven't known true pleasure until you've been clambered upon by a fever laden sweaty man, wheezing upon every thrust of passion.

You haven't been caressed in every way that a woman should, until you've felt the tickle and trickle from a runny nose on the nape of your neck.

Never before have you heard a true groan of pleasure until you've heard your man collapse beside you grasping his own aching flu ridden hips.

Don't be fooled into thinking that the physical and mental delights were not just gifted to my good wife this weekend, I too experienced wondrous moments.

Gentlemen, never will you experience such a boost to your manhood, such an indication of your prowess, such an ego lift and sign of encouragement, as when at the moment you finally deliver your 'finest', you hear the words "oh thank God".

Only three, or four, or five days to go....

Pathetic or sympathetic?

We've all heard of funny stories about men having sympathetic pregnancies.
This is of course, where they display similar symptoms as their partners.

Well, I don’t know why I should be surprised, but I believe I've taken this sympathetic symptom thing to a whole new extreme.

I believe I am suffering from a sympathetic ovulation.

My temperature has soared and I have mucous free flowing out of me.

Granted, my temperature is somewhere around eyebrow singeing temperature and the mucous is coming from my upper body and not my lower. (Although, that is hardly surprising seeing as I don't actually have a willy warmer to ooze from.)

So while the maggoty OPKs refuse to co-operate, (possibly a faulty batch,) it seems that ET is ovulating and I've joined in for the hell of it.

There is another possibility, so dark, desperate, and chilling to imagine, I am afraid to speak it's name.

Man cold.

Has our world ever heard tell of seed of man taking root and flourishing during a period of such great evil?

Infertile carol singing

In the first month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
A good old shag, contraception free.

In the second month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the third month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the fourth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the fifth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the sixth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the seventh month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the eighth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
An eight am laparoscopy,
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the ninth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Nine days of post-op abstinence,
An eight am laparoscopy,
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the tenth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Ten days of constant knicker checks,
Nine days of post-op abstinence,
An eight am laparoscopy,
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the eleventh month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Eleven months of charting BBT,
Ten days of constant knicker checks,
Nine days of post-op abstinence,
An eight am laparoscopy,
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free.

In the twelfth month of TTC, my true love gave to me:
Twelve more months to do it all again!
Eleven months of charting BBT,
Ten days of constant knicker checks,
Nine days of post-op abstinence,
An eight am laparoscopy,
Seven inches of a dildo cam,
Six million motile swimmers,
Five fingers and a sample cup,
Four different types of vitamins,
Three dozen ovulation kits,
Two pairs of baggy boxers,
and a good old shag, contraception free!



(bite me Maxi...Not Always Safe For Work)

Two little ducks

I'm going out on a limb and hoping everyone is a bingo call expert, otherwise 'two little ducks' will mean nothing to you.

Two little ducks is the number twenty two. Picture it, see?.

Anyway, here we are again, cycle twentyfeckingtwo and CD09.

I'm not quite sure why I thought it would be otherwise, but Christmas markets are not the best place to visit to take your mind off of that wee minor issue of childlessness and a long and lonely existence stretching out in front of you.

Relax, I'm being facetious. I'm allowed, but I am glad it's over.

It's time for another week or more, of ET pissing on thermometers and shoving OPKs into her gob. Or vice versa, whatever works.

The battery is feeling a little bit flat this time. More so than in a long time. While technically the mechanics will operate as they should, it's better to be looking forward to it.

Hopefully it's just a temporary thing and I'll be (s)laying ET with stallionesque prowess before you can say 'droop'.

So here we go again, one more time into the big bad world of trying to conceive.

Not a certainty in sight, but we'll go anyway, waddling off, two little ducks.

Subfertile sarcastic Christmas donkeys

Wednesday we were back at the specialist for a post operation check up.

Everything is just dandy! isn't that fantastic?

(Give me a few moments to scrub the oozing sarcasm from my useless torso.)

Apparently, we are subfertile, not infertile, which was positively delightful to learn.

I've started to notice the difference already.

What?...don't tell me you can't see the family simply sprouting up around us as I type these very words!

The previously dangled carrot of an IUI in January or February has been ushered further along ahead of us, the pair of fine subfertile donkeys that we are.

We go back in March now, when we can discuss it. Ironically, the appointment which falls on March 11th, will take place just after the end of cycle 24.

This is of course, the magic two year mark when Dutch medical professionals emerge from their cocoons made from pushed paper and recited statistics, and bloom into magic weaving and baby-dust sprinkling butterflies.

Moving along from one donkey display to another, tell me, what do sensible people do?

What do they do if they've had a lousy week, and are facing into Christmas and the end of another year fruitless and weary, and recoiling from the thought of seasonal festivities?

They stay home, rest and relax, shut the world out, and take refuge as much as is possible, don't they?

Now tell me what do stupid people do?

Stupid people forget that they have a long standing arrangement to go and visit with friends in Dusseldorf this weekend, home to the huge Christmas bloody market.

This evening we will drive with some friends to Dusseldorf, Germany to engage in 'festivities'.

Fake snow, fake Santas, fake chestnuts roasting on fake fires, fake trees, and fake elves.

Fake smiles.

Real alcohol though.

It walks like a duck, and talks like a duck, but...

This may give you cause to gasp and clutch at your pearls, but here goes, I'm no John Wayne.

I have many manly moments, mostly involving beer, or football, or breasts, or a glorious combination of all of the above, but I don't really ooze testosterone.

This never really bothered me, there is always someone bigger, or stronger, or faster than you, no matter who you are.

In the beginning of our attempts to conceive, I was quite accepting of the possibility that there could be a problem, and relaxed about what I thought that might mean.

It seems I hadn't thought long and hard enough. I can't get ET pregnant. Twenty one cycles negate any need to dispute that.

Mojo, virility, potency, whatever you want to call it, it's missing, or at best, knackered.

How does a thirty-one year old man like me stand among his peers and not feel, at least a little, inadequate?

This isn't a sexual issue, thank Thor for small mercies, although I wonder does that make it even worse?

Everything works, yet doesn't. Plenty bow-chika-wow-wow, but no bite.

I look at younger guys with their kids, boys that are barely half my age, but they have 'proven' their manhood for all the world to see.

I'm jealous.

Jealous of what they have done, what that makes them as men, and by contrast what that must make me.

I listen to scandalous home town gossip of how some 12 or 13 year old has become a father after a fumble that went too far, and I cringe.

Where previously, I would have been cringing for the situation from my social viewpoint, now I cringe because it reminds me yet again of where I fall fundamentally short.

What I'm not able to do, despite my experience, intent, or tactic.

Yes, there are medical ways around these obstacles, be they on the male or the female side, and ultimately, success in that regard should dissolve any of this self doubt. I can technically impregnate, by all accounts, but I still feel like a dud.

It's almost come to the point where it doesn't matter where the biological issues lie, a real man would be able to knock up any woman, right?

I know this is pithy, has no small amount of self pity, maybe even pathetic, but nevertheless it's just how it is.

Waddle, waddle. Quack, quack.

Am I nuts?

Insert witty and moving title here

So yeah, 4 days eh?

Maybe not. 3 was enough.

You all know how this goes by now, and I really haven't got the energy, so you can fill in your own entry.

[Insert witty euphemism for ET having gotten her period a day early here]

Another one bites the dust, another up, another down, another maybe next f*#^ing time.

[Insert just the right words to say how ridiculously hard this is, and how utterly spent we feel, here]

Again, no doubt, we'll mope for a bit, and start again. Hopeful, rightly or wrongly.

[Insert rousing statement of how even though we feel like we've missed the last train and there's no other way to get home, we'll button up our coats and start walking in that direction anyway, as far as it may be, here]

Weary and sad, and no longer looking forward to the next few weeks like we should have been.

[Insert thoughtful closing statement about life and not getting a chance you deserve here]

4 Days

Today is CD24. You know what that means, give or take.

4 days.

In between talking complete rubbish about offering menstrual blood to pizza delivery folk, and dragging my samples of vomit covered office wear around to various fashion buyers, something has struck me.

4 days.

Like being at a party where everybody is talking to somebody, or dancing like a wally, or pouring more drinks for everyone, and then suddenly someone turns the volume dial on the stereo to zero. Silence.

4 days.

Tomorrow is Friday, followed unsurprisingly, by the weekend. They all tend to pass quite fast these days, but this time, when it does, it will be up. It.

4 days.

I seems like years since we've been able to try due to the operation, and now all of a sudden the trying is done and the reproductive jury are retiring to consider their verdict.

4 days.

After ET's operation, we were given probably 3 attempts to change the status of one the few remaining unknocked up Irish Catholic women on the planet by natural means. After this, the doctor says we move on to less romantic methods. Strike one will be called soon.

4 days.

In one scenario, we get to prepare for the coming Christmas incessantly jibbering like the bloody Gilmore girls, excited and nervous, wrapping our heads around what's ahead, but all the while ridiculously, irritatingly, and probably sickeningly, happy.

In the other scenario, we prepare for just another holiday, another reminder, with yet another 'hard luck, do play again'.

4 days.

Everything that's happened before this aside, this is a real chance. It's probably the biggest one, and the one we can have the most genuine hope for, and be most optimistic about, for over a year. Thanks to the laparoscopy, this can actually, really, physically, mindbendingly, and absurdly be the one.

4 days.

Seriously, God, or Krisha, or Justin Timberlake, or Yaweh, or big bird, or whatever you call yourself, we get the joke. It was really funny, we all laughed and poked fun at the short, pale, over-sexed and under-pregnant couple.

Can we stop now though, please?

I don't want to sound pushy or demanding, but you've had a good run with this one, think of us like your 'fawlty towers' and quit while you're ahead. We'd really appreciate the break. Really.

You can take a little time to think about it if you like. How about 4 days?

Making that list, checking it twice

With Christmas fast approaching, I'm sure you are all frantically worrying about what to get that special 1 in 6 buggered childless couple among your friends and family.

What does one get for the infertile in their life who has it all?

If you are observant, you'll have noticed a lack of advertising targeted at the knackered egg and disorientated semen owning community.

With an eye on the gap in the market, I can't believe that merciless entrepreneurs haven't pounced upon the desperation and misery. There's money to be made in tattered testicles and crippled cervices you know.

There are plenty of companies with whom you can arrange the 'day of a lifetime' - flying a helicopter, swimming with dolphins, becoming an extra on a day-time soap opera etc.

What we need is a company who don't offer you these expensive days out, but do offer you all the evidence that you've been and done it.

http://www.sorrywecantmakeit.com/ could be especially aimed at couples who really can't face another friend's christening, birthday party, or baby shower and who just need to stay home and sulk.
Of course, just turning down the invitation would be rude and insensitive, so being able to say that you already have arrangements to drive a formula one racing car that day, and will have photographic evidence on Monday to prove it, is a good solution.

Painting the illusion that you both still actually live a life is also great for all those who prefer to stay in denial.

Infertility fashion has been largely ignored too. I know I'd be quite chuffed to wear the 'We Relaxed..' t-shirt range, with '...and it still didn't happen' on the back.
For the deeply disturbed infertile in your life there is the 'spit up' label, which is a range of designer office wear for him and her with fake baby spit and vomit on the shoulders. Never again do we need to feel that our tidiness and fashion awareness should make us feel inferior in the workplace.

Movie makers need to get their act together and put together box sets in time for Christmas. What childless festive season isn't complete without an all day 'Children of men', 'Baby mama', and 'The hand that rocks the cradle' movie marathon?

Speaking of Christmas misery, what could be a better gift than the 2 CD set of baby and child noises?
Just like some people like to listen to sounds of the Amazon or whales burping, playing a cd of baby gurgling and laughing noises is a sure fire way to mask the silence of a pitter-patterless Christmas morning.

When it all becomes too much to handle and you realise you are borderline certifiably insane, you can put on the 2nd cd which is filled with screaming, and crying, and yelling, and the sound of Tonka trucks being smashed on sibling’s toes. That’ll bring you to your senses.

Remember though folks, infertility is not just for Christmas!

Dominos Pizza could launch their 'Failure Friday Special' especially for couples who don't manage to get knocked up in a month. This consists of a large pizza of your choice and 7 bottles of dreadful wine, all for just 9.99.

A further 50% discount can be claimed at delivery upon presenting a sample of undesired fresh menstrual blood.

It would reduce the number of pizza delivery guys getting robbed at least.

Not to be seen to be only cashing in on the infertile misery, they might also promote a new range of pizzas to aid the hungry TTCing couple.

The 'Getcha Freak On' pizza to help encourage copulation when the will, or willie, is failing.
One topping. Oysters. 4 inches deep.

The 'Super Swimmer Special' is bound to be a hit. It's an egg white base, topped with 6 quartered limes for vitamin C, fish eyes for vitamin E, sliced baby carrots for beta carotene, and a generous sprinkling of crushed zinc.

For a few extra cents you can upgrade either of these to the 'No Family Feast' and get a shot of mucous thinning cough syrup for her, and a triple shot of espresso for him.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I must go finish my proposal for an infertility version of 'The Apprentice'.

"Hump with Trump".