Plan Z Pre-Work
So, anyway, about a second child...
I know I have been sounding a little schizophrenic on the subject. One minute I am singing the Subfertility Fight Song (Na na na Wi-NO-na State! Very catchy but a trifle obscure) and vowing to keep screwing until the end, and the next minute I am wringing my hands and talking about how incredibly sad everything is. What with all the sadness and tear tea and everything.
So which is it? I am doleful or am I plucky?
Both, I think, although now that the hormones are finally receding I am feeling less like a battered plaything of Fate and thus more capable of sustaining a given emotion for more than two seconds. Steve no longer flinches when I flop into his office. Patrick no longer has to put up with my constantly flinging my arms around him and covering his face with kisses while enthusing, "You are everything to me, my beloved wonderous angel child. Mommy will love you forever and ever and ever. You must never leave me or my heart will break! Here- pinkie swear!"
As I am getting past the Crazies (ahem) I am able to take a cold, hard look at our reproductive future and say, oh, what the hell, let's try... something.
My emotion of choice is apparently obstinacy. Did this latest miscarriage change my desire to have another child? No. So what I am going to do? Stop trying? Nah. That's sounds like a good way to NOT have another child and, you know, see above, that is NOT what we want. Ipso facto.
So:
1. donor sperm
2. adoption
3. trying again the 18th C way (Steve plays the highwayman)
4. trying again the 21st C way (I am still Bess, the Landlord's Daughter, but Steve merely drives on a highway to a clinic where he is then obliged to seduce himself- not much of a challenge)
These scenarios all assume that the last miscarriage was genetic, by the way, and I am 99.39% positive that it was. We had: slow rising hcg (eventually); slow growth; and a slow heartbeat. If it looks like a duck and waddles like a duck and quacks like a duck it is probably a duck. A genetically improbable duck.
I suppose you are thinking, perhaps with an indulgent smile, "No, no, Julia, you forget. You did PGD this time. You tested the embryos ahead of time to insure that they were genetically normal. Silly girl."
R-i-iii-ggg-hh-t.
So the thing is, PGD has a 1 in 10 error rate. The dearly departed tested normal with PGD but could, in fact, have been carrying Steve's unbalanced translocation like a piece oversized carry-on luggage. That's one possibility. The other possibility is that it had a completely different, and therefore random, genetic problem. They ONLY tested for Steve's issue so that leaves a whole raft of chromosomes unaccounted for. We should get the genetic results from the D&C back next week and then we will know for sure (I hope- sometimes they are not able to get a karyotype, to which I say Gak!)
Where was I? Oh yeah: 1, 2, 3 and 4.
1. Donor sperm. No. Steve sticks his fingers in his ears and says La La La La LA. I no longer have the energy to argue with him.
2. Adoption. See donor sperm.
3. Eh. Much as I like getting dirty with my husband, the idea of just having sex and seeing what happens alternately bores and terrifies me. I am not psychic and I hate to sound all fey but I am having a hard time visualizing good things coming from this scenario. I mean, besides all the hot highwayman sex.
4. Well... maybe. Although, huh, look at that. I've sort of rejected all the other options, haven't I?
Have I left something out? In the No Column we have: Giving Up, Donor Sperm, Adoption & Trying On Our Own. In the Maybe Column we have: ART [ed. Assisted Reproductive Technologies].
Feel free to tell me if you have any other ideas. The only thing you need to know is 1) I really am not going to change Steve's mind and 2) miscarriages don't scare me any more.
Also, I am sure you don't do this, but there are few things more irritating than having one's choices interpreted as a condemnation of other people's choices. So the fact that WE are not going to adopt simply means that WE are missing out on all the joys of adoption that YOU might have. My friend Karen's life is a huge paean to the magic of parenting through adoption and every time I read her blog I think about how we are just shorting ourselves by not considering this. Ditto that with donor sperm. So if you think we are assholes not to know that there is no need to have a genetic tie to a child you are right. I agree. But please do not take umbrage and assume that I am criticizing adopting, or donor sperming, or egging, or whatever ok? Because I am not. In fact, I am jealous of you. So, cool. Peace out.
