Last night was the second of our parenting classes, Newborn Connections. The class is in the basement of a hospital in San Francisco. It’s mainly for parents who plan to deliver in the hospital, but we chose to go to a class in San Francisco hoping that we wouldn’t be the only gay parents. We were.
The class was good. Maybe not $95 good, but I’m glad that we chose to take it. When we arrived and I saw the infant-sized dolls on the tables I thought, “Oh Lord… This might suck.” But the props turned out to be a good addition to the class. I discovered I’m pretty good at holding a baby (although I don’t recommend the American Academy of Pediatrics-approved “crotch hold” which sounds like an illegal wrestling move and not something you’d want to use to carry around your baby), but I am terrible at diapering. I’m not sure how it happened, but somehow I got her shirt tucked deep into the diaper. Like, right in harm’s way, so to speak. Then, while attempting to pull the shirt out of the diaper it came loose and slid down her legs, exposing her little butt to the elements.
I will practice more at home. We have a small watermelon that’s approximately the right size. Of course, the melon isn’t wearing a shirt…
The class opened with a discussion of the first moments after birth. Like most articles, books and websites I’ve read recently, this discussion was very mom-focused. For the first hour after birth, the child is supposed to lie on the mother’s bare breasts. Skin to skin contact is supposed to increase the production of helpful hormones and begin the bonding process with the baby.
I’m not sure how this is going to work in our situation. B. is not supposed to bond with the baby, for obvious reasons. Am I going to rip off my shirt and lie down with my daughter in an empty hospital bed? I don’t want her to be deprived of those helpful hormones. But it also might be a little odd if I’m barreling through the hospital, half-naked, carrying a newborn, and looking for a spare bed.
I’m sure there will be plenty of time for bonding, but the emphasis was on that first hour. It’s probably just one of those things that we are going to have to realize we can’t provide for our child. And one of those things that in the scheme of things is less important than what we can provide.
April 21, 2013
A lot has been happening in our lives, but not so much with the baby, which is why I haven’t posted in two months. I guess this part of the pregnancy is uneventful if everything is going well. I shouldn’t say it’s uneventful since the baby isn’t growing inside of me. I’m sure B. would have a very different description of the last two months.
We still Skype with her every Sunday. And although the camera isn’t pointed at her belly, she still doesn’t look that pregnant. I’m comparing her to the server at the Mexican restaurant where we ate last night. She looked like her water was going to break all over my chips and salsa. But she said she still has a month to go. We have two more months to go, but B. is considerably smaller than I thought she would be by now. She has a noticeable bump, but her face doesn’t look much different.
Apparently the baby has been very active. We’ve been calling her “Philipa” because we are not sharing the name we have actually chosen until she is born. We’ve found that people are judgmental about names when the names are disassociated from the person they describe. When people put a face with a name they are more kind. I’m not sure if this is because the name is suddenly synonymous with an adorable baby or if because at that point the name is on the birth certificate and it’s a done deal.
In any case, I’m concerned that Philipa is going to stick around as a nickname. And let’s be honest; that is an ugly name. I don’t care how cute she is, she’s not going to transform a name like Philipa into a thing of grace. But our family has started calling her that, with the exception of my mother-in-law who calls her “my princess” (we’ll get to that in another post…).
In other news, we both live in California now – which is great because neither one of us was doing well with the long distance thing. We have sold our house in Massachusetts and I have been hard at work in my new job for a little more than three months now. We’ve renovated and decorated our new house. We’re settling in to our new life. Just in time for it all to be transformed again.
We still Skype with her every Sunday. And although the camera isn’t pointed at her belly, she still doesn’t look that pregnant. I’m comparing her to the server at the Mexican restaurant where we ate last night. She looked like her water was going to break all over my chips and salsa. But she said she still has a month to go. We have two more months to go, but B. is considerably smaller than I thought she would be by now. She has a noticeable bump, but her face doesn’t look much different.
Apparently the baby has been very active. We’ve been calling her “Philipa” because we are not sharing the name we have actually chosen until she is born. We’ve found that people are judgmental about names when the names are disassociated from the person they describe. When people put a face with a name they are more kind. I’m not sure if this is because the name is suddenly synonymous with an adorable baby or if because at that point the name is on the birth certificate and it’s a done deal.
In any case, I’m concerned that Philipa is going to stick around as a nickname. And let’s be honest; that is an ugly name. I don’t care how cute she is, she’s not going to transform a name like Philipa into a thing of grace. But our family has started calling her that, with the exception of my mother-in-law who calls her “my princess” (we’ll get to that in another post…).
In other news, we both live in California now – which is great because neither one of us was doing well with the long distance thing. We have sold our house in Massachusetts and I have been hard at work in my new job for a little more than three months now. We’ve renovated and decorated our new house. We’re settling in to our new life. Just in time for it all to be transformed again.
February 12, 2013
Due to the massive snowstorm in the Northeast (that people are calling Nemo for some reason), I missed our baby shower yesterday. Over two feet of snow fell on our town in Massachusetts. I am in San Francisco now (Alberto is moving out in a couple of weeks after finishing up some business in Massachusetts – including the small matter of selling our house) and although I moved my flight so that it landed several hours after the snow was projected to end, the airlines cancelled flights for three days because of the storm.
So Alberto and some of our other friends sent me pictures of the shower and I attended via text message from my desk at my new job.
Although it sucks to have missed the shower, we have incredibly generous friends. They didn’t just get us great gifts (although they did get us great gifts) but they showed their love and support for us. We will miss them all when we are living in California, and we hope to be able to visit often so that they can be a part of our daughter’s life.
So Alberto and some of our other friends sent me pictures of the shower and I attended via text message from my desk at my new job.
Although it sucks to have missed the shower, we have incredibly generous friends. They didn’t just get us great gifts (although they did get us great gifts) but they showed their love and support for us. We will miss them all when we are living in California, and we hope to be able to visit often so that they can be a part of our daughter’s life.
January 28, 2013
Today was our 10-week ultrasound. We flew to Atlanta on Saturday and drove to Chattanooga, TN yesterday so that we could meet the OB-GYN, spend a little more time with B., and see our baby live on the fetal monitor. We went to dinner on Sunday evening with B. and her family and then met her the next morning at the doctor's office.
Okay, I’m totally burying the lede: It’s a girl!!
That’s right. Alberto has some exchanges to make because we are not having a boy, we are having a girl. While we were watching the fetus moving around on the ultrasound, we kept using the pronoun “he” to describe what we were seeing. The OB broke into our conversation and said, “What’s all this ‘he’ business?” (The OB is kind of a character. Picture Octavia Spencer’s character from The Help. Then picture her delivering your baby.) “That is not a boy. That is a GIRL. See this right here, that’s a VAGINA.” (She said it vah-JINE-uh.)
I immediately started laughing. I’ve always heard that God laughs in the face of your best laid plans. I have never once pictured Alberto and me with a baby girl. But that’s okay because I am nothing but excited about this development. I was inexplicably excited, actually. I think the shock made it more real somehow. It shook me out of my vision of how this process would unfold and that made it more vivid.
I’m a little perturbed that the OB didn’t admit her error. She seemed to not understand why we assumed it was a boy. Honey, we got that information from you! We didn’t just come up with it in our sleep. I can’t see anything on those grey, ultrasound photographs; I was not about to speculate about parts and organs.
All the way back to the airport in Atlanta Alberto kept saying, “A girl…” quietly, under his breath. We definitely need to reorient. And to get started on those returns.
Okay, I’m totally burying the lede: It’s a girl!!
That’s right. Alberto has some exchanges to make because we are not having a boy, we are having a girl. While we were watching the fetus moving around on the ultrasound, we kept using the pronoun “he” to describe what we were seeing. The OB broke into our conversation and said, “What’s all this ‘he’ business?” (The OB is kind of a character. Picture Octavia Spencer’s character from The Help. Then picture her delivering your baby.) “That is not a boy. That is a GIRL. See this right here, that’s a VAGINA.” (She said it vah-JINE-uh.)
I immediately started laughing. I’ve always heard that God laughs in the face of your best laid plans. I have never once pictured Alberto and me with a baby girl. But that’s okay because I am nothing but excited about this development. I was inexplicably excited, actually. I think the shock made it more real somehow. It shook me out of my vision of how this process would unfold and that made it more vivid.
I’m a little perturbed that the OB didn’t admit her error. She seemed to not understand why we assumed it was a boy. Honey, we got that information from you! We didn’t just come up with it in our sleep. I can’t see anything on those grey, ultrasound photographs; I was not about to speculate about parts and organs.
All the way back to the airport in Atlanta Alberto kept saying, “A girl…” quietly, under his breath. We definitely need to reorient. And to get started on those returns.
January 11, 2013
It has come time to register for our baby shower. At least, the East Coast baby shower (yes, there will be two). Alberto and I both thought that this would be one of the most exciting parts of this experience. We looked forward to getting our hands on that gun. I’ve seen so many people (well, women) in movies and on TV joyously registering for wedding or baby gifts. I've always felt jealous, hoping that someday I, too, could shoot things and they would magically be delivered to my house.
It did not live up to expectations…
Alberto and I have very different philosophies when it comes to the purpose of registering. Since we didn’t register for wedding gifts, we didn’t find that out when we were married almost six years ago. He wants to fire that gun with abandon, like a villain in a movie about the Wild West. I want to curate a list of products that fit our life and style. He wants to register for multiples of everything – two cribs, four changing mats, three of those adorable towel things that you drape over your baby’s head after a bath. Then if we get multiples of items that we don’t need, we can return the excess. I thought the whole point of registering is that you don’t have to return a bunch of crap.
Anyway, this lead to a discussion. We left Target the first time with nothing on our list (the gun wasn’t working properly anyway, which may have added to our frustration). A second trip, last night, was more productive. I resigned myself to the fact that we may have to return some things and he was a little more selective in what he chose.
I also found out that Amazon.com has a registry, which allows me to do a lot more research on products before I add them to my list. That is much more my style. But I’ll admit it’s not quite as much fun as shooting your prey at Pottery Barn Baby.
It did not live up to expectations…
Alberto and I have very different philosophies when it comes to the purpose of registering. Since we didn’t register for wedding gifts, we didn’t find that out when we were married almost six years ago. He wants to fire that gun with abandon, like a villain in a movie about the Wild West. I want to curate a list of products that fit our life and style. He wants to register for multiples of everything – two cribs, four changing mats, three of those adorable towel things that you drape over your baby’s head after a bath. Then if we get multiples of items that we don’t need, we can return the excess. I thought the whole point of registering is that you don’t have to return a bunch of crap.
Anyway, this lead to a discussion. We left Target the first time with nothing on our list (the gun wasn’t working properly anyway, which may have added to our frustration). A second trip, last night, was more productive. I resigned myself to the fact that we may have to return some things and he was a little more selective in what he chose.
I also found out that Amazon.com has a registry, which allows me to do a lot more research on products before I add them to my list. That is much more my style. But I’ll admit it’s not quite as much fun as shooting your prey at Pottery Barn Baby.
January 4, 2013
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December 21, 2012
In the two weeks since we’ve announced on Facebook that we are having a baby there has been such an outpouring of love and prayers and positive thoughts that it has almost been overwhelming. The Monday after the announcement, I spent all day checking to see who was the latest to make a comment or to hit “Like”. Each click brought happy thoughts.
Since then, there hasn’t been much to report. I hope those of you who came to the blog in the days following the Facebook post will keep checking back, as I will continue to update the blog throughout the pregnancy (and also, maybe, after; if I can stay awake long enough to write something).
The one thing that has happened in the last two weeks is that the Holidays are wearing down our resolve not to purchase any baby clothes until we know, definitively, the sex of the baby. Last Saturday we were just a few miles from the Wrentham Outlets and we decided to take a peek inside some of the children’s stores there.
Lordy, that was a mistake. We tried to keep everything unisex. I could write a whole Gender Studies paper about the onesie that we bought with a dinosaur on it. A girl could pull that off, but had we bought a onesie with a butterfly on it we wouldn’t put it on our baby boy. What, exactly, makes a butterfly a feminine symbol? There are male butterflies and female dinosaurs. A tyrannosaurus with ovaries is just as likely to bite you in half as a butterfly with a penis is to flutter around your daisies.
Well, either way, we saved receipts.
Since then, there hasn’t been much to report. I hope those of you who came to the blog in the days following the Facebook post will keep checking back, as I will continue to update the blog throughout the pregnancy (and also, maybe, after; if I can stay awake long enough to write something).
The one thing that has happened in the last two weeks is that the Holidays are wearing down our resolve not to purchase any baby clothes until we know, definitively, the sex of the baby. Last Saturday we were just a few miles from the Wrentham Outlets and we decided to take a peek inside some of the children’s stores there.
Lordy, that was a mistake. We tried to keep everything unisex. I could write a whole Gender Studies paper about the onesie that we bought with a dinosaur on it. A girl could pull that off, but had we bought a onesie with a butterfly on it we wouldn’t put it on our baby boy. What, exactly, makes a butterfly a feminine symbol? There are male butterflies and female dinosaurs. A tyrannosaurus with ovaries is just as likely to bite you in half as a butterfly with a penis is to flutter around your daisies.
Well, either way, we saved receipts.
December 10, 2012
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December 6, 2012
Today was B.’s end-of-the-first-trimester appointment and we are officially in the second trimester. That means that the risks associated with the pregnancy are cut in half. It also means that it’s time to start telling more people.
We had planned to make an announcement on Facebook on Monday. Good thing we didn’t. We would have been overshadowed by The Royal Baby. Yes, Kate and Wills announced their pregnancy on Monday, prompted by a trip to the emergency room for Kate’s extreme morning sickness. The Barcenas-Smith baby will not accede to power through hereditary means and thus our announcement will not be covered, for three days no less, by the Today show. Of course we also won’t have to deal with radio DJs impersonating our parents and confusing the hospital staff.
I’m not sure how people announced their pregnancies before Facebook. I guess I have received postcards with ultrasound pictures of fetuses on them in the mail. And a traditional pregnancy announces itself at some point in the second trimester. Although if the bearer has not made some sort of formal statement there could be some awkward dancing around the subject of weight gain.
But like most of the modern world, we’ve decided to make it formal on Facebook. Now we just need to come up with something clever, but not too clever. Cute, but not too cute. There should be a visual component. It needs to maintain B.’s anonymity and it can’t identify our surrogacy agency. It needs to be informative enough that people aren’t confused (wait a minute, neither one of them has a uterus…), but it doesn’t need to go into any uncomfortable details (that’s what this blog is for). I feel like I’m directing a short film for Oscar consideration.
In any case, we’ll post it – whatever it is – in the next few days. And I’ll post a copy here for those of you that aren’t on Facebook.
We had planned to make an announcement on Facebook on Monday. Good thing we didn’t. We would have been overshadowed by The Royal Baby. Yes, Kate and Wills announced their pregnancy on Monday, prompted by a trip to the emergency room for Kate’s extreme morning sickness. The Barcenas-Smith baby will not accede to power through hereditary means and thus our announcement will not be covered, for three days no less, by the Today show. Of course we also won’t have to deal with radio DJs impersonating our parents and confusing the hospital staff.
I’m not sure how people announced their pregnancies before Facebook. I guess I have received postcards with ultrasound pictures of fetuses on them in the mail. And a traditional pregnancy announces itself at some point in the second trimester. Although if the bearer has not made some sort of formal statement there could be some awkward dancing around the subject of weight gain.
But like most of the modern world, we’ve decided to make it formal on Facebook. Now we just need to come up with something clever, but not too clever. Cute, but not too cute. There should be a visual component. It needs to maintain B.’s anonymity and it can’t identify our surrogacy agency. It needs to be informative enough that people aren’t confused (wait a minute, neither one of them has a uterus…), but it doesn’t need to go into any uncomfortable details (that’s what this blog is for). I feel like I’m directing a short film for Oscar consideration.
In any case, we’ll post it – whatever it is – in the next few days. And I’ll post a copy here for those of you that aren’t on Facebook.
November 20, 2012
November 19, 2012
Today, B. had her second ultrasound. She texted as she was leaving the appointment and said that she would email me the photos (which I’ll post tomorrow). She also said that we would probably want to call her after we read her email (but not to worry because it was something exciting).
That was cryptic. Before the email came in, Alberto and I exchanged several texts wondering what she could mean. We basically decided that the doctor had found another baby, crouching in the corner of B.’s womb where he or she had been missed in the prior ultrasound. Although I have said through this entire process that I would be happy to have twins as long as they are healthy, I have settled into the idea that we are only having one baby. I had visions of becoming buried under a giant, overflowing diaper genie.
But B.’s email came with an even bigger surprise. Although she is only 10-weeks pregnant, the doctor had a guess as to the sex of the baby. She wanted to know if we wanted to know.
Yes, we want to know. I can appreciate couples who want to be surprised, who will enjoy the months of suspense. We are not those people. A little suspense goes a long way. I can wait until the end of a movie to find out who the murderer is. I can wait until the end of a baseball game to find out who wins (Alberto is bad, even with this). But I don’t think I could ever wait a full nine months to find out whether the nursery will be blue or pink. Plus we need to get working on names now.
So B. told us. We are (probably, maybe, more-than-likely) having a boy. The doctor said she thought she could “see something growing down there” (presumably she means a penis). We are thrilled!
That was cryptic. Before the email came in, Alberto and I exchanged several texts wondering what she could mean. We basically decided that the doctor had found another baby, crouching in the corner of B.’s womb where he or she had been missed in the prior ultrasound. Although I have said through this entire process that I would be happy to have twins as long as they are healthy, I have settled into the idea that we are only having one baby. I had visions of becoming buried under a giant, overflowing diaper genie.
But B.’s email came with an even bigger surprise. Although she is only 10-weeks pregnant, the doctor had a guess as to the sex of the baby. She wanted to know if we wanted to know.
Yes, we want to know. I can appreciate couples who want to be surprised, who will enjoy the months of suspense. We are not those people. A little suspense goes a long way. I can wait until the end of a movie to find out who the murderer is. I can wait until the end of a baseball game to find out who wins (Alberto is bad, even with this). But I don’t think I could ever wait a full nine months to find out whether the nursery will be blue or pink. Plus we need to get working on names now.
So B. told us. We are (probably, maybe, more-than-likely) having a boy. The doctor said she thought she could “see something growing down there” (presumably she means a penis). We are thrilled!
November 15, 2012
I’ve started reading "What to Expect When You’re Expecting". Although the book claims to be for expectant fathers as well, I can’t believe how much of this book is dedicated to caring for and explaining the changes that are happening to one’s nipples. I can’t say that I find this to be overly relevant to my situation.
But it is fascinating, and alarming, to explore the mutations that pregnancy visits upon a woman’s body. It’s like a Victorian horror story, teeming with corporal mortification and oozing with humanity. The chafing, the bloating, the gas, the hair, the varicose veins, the mucus, the nausea, the saliva, the sweat. And I'm not even to the part about the delivery yet!
Don’t get me wrong. It’s a beautiful thing, and I’m not being glib when I say that I would gladly undertake similar alterations if I could carry the baby myself. I know that is a cliché that husbands have said for millennia, safe from having to make good on their claim because of the limitations of science and creation. Perhaps someday “Junior” – not Arnold’s best work – will not only be a travesty of filmmaking, but also a technological reality. Presumably by then my childbearing days will be behind me. But future generations of fathers should be careful what they wish for.
But it is fascinating, and alarming, to explore the mutations that pregnancy visits upon a woman’s body. It’s like a Victorian horror story, teeming with corporal mortification and oozing with humanity. The chafing, the bloating, the gas, the hair, the varicose veins, the mucus, the nausea, the saliva, the sweat. And I'm not even to the part about the delivery yet!
Don’t get me wrong. It’s a beautiful thing, and I’m not being glib when I say that I would gladly undertake similar alterations if I could carry the baby myself. I know that is a cliché that husbands have said for millennia, safe from having to make good on their claim because of the limitations of science and creation. Perhaps someday “Junior” – not Arnold’s best work – will not only be a travesty of filmmaking, but also a technological reality. Presumably by then my childbearing days will be behind me. But future generations of fathers should be careful what they wish for.
October 26, 2012
B. had her first ultrasound today. I got a text from her a couple hours ago saying that the doctor heard a heartbeat! That means the pregnancy is now considered “viable”. We’ll still probably wait to tell most people until the end of the first trimester, but we may begin to increase the number of people that know.
Also, the doctor only mentioned one heartbeat. B. didn’t ask about that distinction, but I’m sure the doctor would have said something if he or she had heard two heartbeats. I consider that to be good news! It’s possible that both hearts were beating at the same time, and the doctor will check again in a few weeks, but it seems likely that there is only one baby.
B. still has to drive two hours to get to a local IVF clinic for these appointments. I hope that soon she can start going to her OBGYN in the city where she lives. I also hope this means that future appointments will be covered by the additional insurance policy we bought.
Also, the doctor only mentioned one heartbeat. B. didn’t ask about that distinction, but I’m sure the doctor would have said something if he or she had heard two heartbeats. I consider that to be good news! It’s possible that both hearts were beating at the same time, and the doctor will check again in a few weeks, but it seems likely that there is only one baby.
B. still has to drive two hours to get to a local IVF clinic for these appointments. I hope that soon she can start going to her OBGYN in the city where she lives. I also hope this means that future appointments will be covered by the additional insurance policy we bought.
October 25, 2012
I discovered an interesting fact today that I had missed in my 34 years: When a woman says she is 8-weeks pregnant, that is the time since her last period. It is not the time since conception.
Two weeks ago, I signed up for an online service that sends you updates on your child’s development in the womb. Two weeks ago, our embryo was the size of a poppy seed; last week he or she was the size of a sesame seed. (I’m looking at bagels differently these days.) This week, our baby is the size of a lentil and I literally found that out while eating leftover lentil soup. In the future I’m not going to open those emails while eating lunch, at least until the baby grows to be too big to fit in my lunch bag.
But I realized there was a problem when I entered our due date (we don’t have an official due date yet, but I counted nine months from fertilization). The website kept telling me that we were two weeks further along than I thought. At first I manipulated the due date so that the development chart showed the right number of weeks, but then the due date was way too early.
So, I Googled it. “How do you determine how far along your pregnancy is?” I asked. Every response detailed the fact disclosed above. Of course, that’s not relevant to our situation. B. has been on ovulation suppression drugs for months.
I should have started with the IVF sites because I finally found that a good rule of thumb to convert an IVF pregnancy’s development (in terms of weeks pregnant) to the scale normally used is to add two weeks to the date of conception.
So we’re six weeks into this thing and not four, like I thought. That means that the ultrasound B. is having tomorrow will determine the viability of the pregnancy; we don’t have to wait another two weeks. That makes me both more excited and more nervous.
Two weeks ago, I signed up for an online service that sends you updates on your child’s development in the womb. Two weeks ago, our embryo was the size of a poppy seed; last week he or she was the size of a sesame seed. (I’m looking at bagels differently these days.) This week, our baby is the size of a lentil and I literally found that out while eating leftover lentil soup. In the future I’m not going to open those emails while eating lunch, at least until the baby grows to be too big to fit in my lunch bag.
But I realized there was a problem when I entered our due date (we don’t have an official due date yet, but I counted nine months from fertilization). The website kept telling me that we were two weeks further along than I thought. At first I manipulated the due date so that the development chart showed the right number of weeks, but then the due date was way too early.
So, I Googled it. “How do you determine how far along your pregnancy is?” I asked. Every response detailed the fact disclosed above. Of course, that’s not relevant to our situation. B. has been on ovulation suppression drugs for months.
I should have started with the IVF sites because I finally found that a good rule of thumb to convert an IVF pregnancy’s development (in terms of weeks pregnant) to the scale normally used is to add two weeks to the date of conception.
So we’re six weeks into this thing and not four, like I thought. That means that the ultrasound B. is having tomorrow will determine the viability of the pregnancy; we don’t have to wait another two weeks. That makes me both more excited and more nervous.
October 16, 2012
To keep myself from worrying too much about our embryo gestating over a thousand miles away, I went on a mission today to calculate its chances of survival. (I know that may sound grim to some, but I respond well to statistics; unlike Han Solo, I need to know the odds.)
It is true that we have passed the largest hurdle – successful implantation of the blastocyst on the uterine wall. The chance of a failed IVF cycle was 20%. Since a blood test confirmed the pregnancy last week, the chance of miscarriage has fallen to 10%.
As previously mentioned, the pregnancy isn’t considered “viable” until 6-weeks after fertilization. If we make it past that stage, chance of miscarriage will fall to 2.5%. We probably won’t announce the pregnancy to the general population until after the first trimester. At that time, the chance of miscarriage or still-birth will have fallen to 1%.
I’m generally reassured by these odds. I’ll feel a lot better in three weeks, though.
(The source for these statistics was www.americanpregnancy.org and www.pregnancycharts.org . I tried to take into account B.’s age and the fact that she has had successful pregnancies, with no history of miscarriage.)
It is true that we have passed the largest hurdle – successful implantation of the blastocyst on the uterine wall. The chance of a failed IVF cycle was 20%. Since a blood test confirmed the pregnancy last week, the chance of miscarriage has fallen to 10%.
As previously mentioned, the pregnancy isn’t considered “viable” until 6-weeks after fertilization. If we make it past that stage, chance of miscarriage will fall to 2.5%. We probably won’t announce the pregnancy to the general population until after the first trimester. At that time, the chance of miscarriage or still-birth will have fallen to 1%.
I’m generally reassured by these odds. I’ll feel a lot better in three weeks, though.
(The source for these statistics was www.americanpregnancy.org and www.pregnancycharts.org . I tried to take into account B.’s age and the fact that she has had successful pregnancies, with no history of miscarriage.)
October 12, 2012
It’s official. B. is pregnant with our baby. We are expectant (not just intended) fathers.
I got the call from the IVF clinic yesterday. I was at my department’s annual “End of Audit” party (I work for a non-profit and we are audited every year). I checked my phone just before I sat down for dinner and saw that I had a missed call from the IVF clinic.
I left my drink and my coat at the dinner table and ran (as casually as possible) outside. I tried calling the clinic and got a “This number is no longer in service” message. (I don’t know what that was about. Can a business have an outgoing-calls-only line?) I hung up and didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to go back into the party without knowing what the clinic had to tell me.
I decided to stay outside for five minutes and wait for them to call back. I thought they also might have tried our home phone, in which case they would have gotten a hold of Alberto. But in less than a minute they called again.
The nurse on the other end of the phone played it cool, like an American Idol judge telling a contestant he’s made the Top Twelve. She had a somber tone as if she was going to deliver bad news. But she got to the point faster than Randy Jackson. She started talking more quickly and raised her vocal pitch until she finally said, “B. is pregnant!”
I resisted the urge to shout or cry or whoop out there in front of the restaurant (I may have performed a little hoping dance) but obviously I was excited. I may have said that over and over to the clinician on the line. I got all the relevant details from her and then called Alberto with the news. It's cliche to say that we "breathed a sigh of relief", but that is what we actually, audibly did.
Now, it’s not like we can quit worrying. Realistically, I probably won’t quit worrying for the rest of my life about this child. The pregnancy isn’t considered “viable” until six weeks has passed from the day of conception. But we’ve cleared the biggest hurdle in the process. As time goes on, the risk of miscarriage will rapidly decrease.
The next milestone is in three weeks when an ultrasound can detect a heartbeat. Keep us in your prayers!
I got the call from the IVF clinic yesterday. I was at my department’s annual “End of Audit” party (I work for a non-profit and we are audited every year). I checked my phone just before I sat down for dinner and saw that I had a missed call from the IVF clinic.
I left my drink and my coat at the dinner table and ran (as casually as possible) outside. I tried calling the clinic and got a “This number is no longer in service” message. (I don’t know what that was about. Can a business have an outgoing-calls-only line?) I hung up and didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to go back into the party without knowing what the clinic had to tell me.
I decided to stay outside for five minutes and wait for them to call back. I thought they also might have tried our home phone, in which case they would have gotten a hold of Alberto. But in less than a minute they called again.
The nurse on the other end of the phone played it cool, like an American Idol judge telling a contestant he’s made the Top Twelve. She had a somber tone as if she was going to deliver bad news. But she got to the point faster than Randy Jackson. She started talking more quickly and raised her vocal pitch until she finally said, “B. is pregnant!”
I resisted the urge to shout or cry or whoop out there in front of the restaurant (I may have performed a little hoping dance) but obviously I was excited. I may have said that over and over to the clinician on the line. I got all the relevant details from her and then called Alberto with the news. It's cliche to say that we "breathed a sigh of relief", but that is what we actually, audibly did.
Now, it’s not like we can quit worrying. Realistically, I probably won’t quit worrying for the rest of my life about this child. The pregnancy isn’t considered “viable” until six weeks has passed from the day of conception. But we’ve cleared the biggest hurdle in the process. As time goes on, the risk of miscarriage will rapidly decrease.
The next milestone is in three weeks when an ultrasound can detect a heartbeat. Keep us in your prayers!
October 11, 2012
I’m at work, but I’m barely getting anything done. I got up from my desk a couple of minutes ago to walk around outside for a while. I can’t shake the feeling of suspense. This is much more nerve wracking than a job interview.
B. went to her local clinic this morning to have a blood test that will end our Two Week Wait. Either we will be pregnant or we will have to start the process over again. She will need to have hormone injections for two months and then we will travel to the IVF clinic in December for Round Two. Besides the delay, Round Two costs $10,000.
Please let her be pregnant.
We had a little bit of good news last week. B. texted us during the day on Saturday to say that she had taken a home pregnancy test. The results were positive, but the pink line she was looking for was very faint. I have no idea whether that indicates uncertainty about the outcome of the test, how soon after implantation she was taking the test, or some other hormonal glitch caused by the embryo transfer. The IVF nurse told us that there are a higher number of false positives with IVF and we need to wait until the blood test.
So we’re trying not to get our hopes up too much.
I thought that we would have heard by now. I thought that the lab that did the testing would do it in-house and that it wouldn’t take very long. I know B. has concluded her appointment because the charge has already shown up on our credit card.
I’m trying to remain calm, but it’s not working. I know we will hear soon. Just a few hours more.
B. went to her local clinic this morning to have a blood test that will end our Two Week Wait. Either we will be pregnant or we will have to start the process over again. She will need to have hormone injections for two months and then we will travel to the IVF clinic in December for Round Two. Besides the delay, Round Two costs $10,000.
Please let her be pregnant.
We had a little bit of good news last week. B. texted us during the day on Saturday to say that she had taken a home pregnancy test. The results were positive, but the pink line she was looking for was very faint. I have no idea whether that indicates uncertainty about the outcome of the test, how soon after implantation she was taking the test, or some other hormonal glitch caused by the embryo transfer. The IVF nurse told us that there are a higher number of false positives with IVF and we need to wait until the blood test.
So we’re trying not to get our hopes up too much.
I thought that we would have heard by now. I thought that the lab that did the testing would do it in-house and that it wouldn’t take very long. I know B. has concluded her appointment because the charge has already shown up on our credit card.
I’m trying to remain calm, but it’s not working. I know we will hear soon. Just a few hours more.
October 1, 2012
We are at the beginning of the famous “Two Week Wait”. That’s the term the fertility blogosphere uses to describe the period between an embryo transfer and the blood test that confirms pregnancy. Most couples confronting the two week wait face worse odds than we face. Infertile couples that seek out IVF often have underlying factors that don’t apply to an egg donor and gestational carrier with demonstrated fertility and a biological father with sperm that has been tested and is presumed effective. But that doesn’t mean we’re not going to be stressed out for these two weeks.
On Friday, we traveled to the IVF clinic so that we could be present for the transfer. Our attendance wasn’t required – I’d already performed my end of the deal – but we wanted to be there to see B. again in person and for moral support. We didn’t realize we would also be able to watch the procedure.
B. arrived just after we did. She didn’t even have time to tell us about her trip before the nurse entered the waiting room and called her name. As B. got up, the nurse looked past her to us. “Are you Jonathan and his partner?”
We looked around to see who she was talking to.
“This is Philip and Alberto,” B. said.
“Oh, okay,” the nurse said. “Come with me.”
We followed her to a consultation room, but I was thinking, Who the hell is Jonathan? These people better not transfer Jonathan’s embryos into our carrier.
The nurse left us in the consultation room and went to get some paperwork. B. told us about her drive. She came with her boyfriend and their two kids, who were waiting back at the hotel. They were able to spend the previous day in New York City and they had a good time.
When the nurse returned, she held out a clipboard and asked, “So which one of you is Jonathan?”
Honey, there is no Jonathan. Go find the paperwork for Philip and Alberto.
Before we could say anything, she checked the clipboard again. “I’m sorry, Philip, which one is Philip?”
I raised my hand and took the clipboard. She gave paperwork to B. as well. “Are you two going to be present for the transfer?”
We turned to B. The nurse assured her that it would be modest. We would remain above the neck and watch the procedure on the ultrasound. The whole process would take about five minutes. B. said she felt comfortable with us being in the room.
The nurse gave B. some instructions regarding medication and behavior following the transfer. B. was going to need to take it easy for the next 48 hours, not walking very far or lifting more than 15 pounds. She was not to swim or even take a bath (showering would be fine). Then for the next two weeks she shouldn’t exercise, but other than that her life could go back to normal. I want to assume “normal” means strictly healthy behaviors and an excessive concern for safety.
The nurse left the room to get us the sterile garments we would have to wear over our clothes while in the operating room. Very soon after that, the doctor came in with pictures of the two embryos he would transfer. Most people have to wait for an ultrasound to have the first picture of their baby, but we have pictures of our child(ren) when they were only 8 cells big.
The doctor asked B. how she was feeling and she said she was a little nervous. The doctor assured her that the procedure would be completely painless, but I don’t think she was concerned about pain. I think she was thinking about her responsibilities that were about to begin. Until that point, her obligations were to give herself daily injections of hormones, drive to the monitoring clinic once a week and speak to us on Skype. If the transfer worked, she would now be responsible for a human life.
The nurse returned with hairnets, shoe covers and a gauzy apron for Alberto and me to wear and took B. to a separate room to change into her hospital-type gown. We were given approximately 30 seconds to put on those items before another nurse appeared and hustled us out of the consultation room.
The operating room (do you still call it that if there’s no scalpel involved?) looked like a standard office in a depressing office park – drop ceilings, harsh lighting, beige walls, bland art. The exception was the gurney and stirrups in the middle of the room with an old-looking monitor attached to it. A frenetic Paul Simon song was blaring from hidden speakers. Alberto said the song reminded him of the bakery where he worked during college.
A different nurse entered with B. and got her situated on the gurney. She asked B. again how she was feeling. B. said she was fine, but looked more nervous than before. Alberto and I sat behind her and focused our attention elsewhere as they put her legs in stirrups and shined a spotlight beneath the sheet that covered her. I didn’t blame B. for feeling uncomfortable and thought that maybe it would have been better if we had waited somewhere else.
But then the nurse switched on the monitor and put the ultrasound wand up against B.’s belly. As the white lines that signified her womb appeared on the screen I realized that I was about to witness something profound. Not the moment of conception, that had already happened. I'm not even sure what to call it, but certainly it’s a milestone in the life of my child. A different kind of starting point.
The doctor came in and again asked B. how she was doing. He again assured her that the process would be painless, missing the point. He asked for something more calming to be put on the radio and the nurse switched on some dramatic classical music. It was the sort of soundtrack you would expect to hear as the Starship Enterprise soars through space.
The doctor set about doing something beneath the sheet that I ignored, concentrating on the monitor. After two minutes, a door opened in the back of the room and a woman came through holding a catheter. “B., Alberto and Philip,” she announced. The doctor nodded and she handed him the catheter. I was glad nobody mentioned Jonathan.
After handing the catheter containing the embryos to the doctor, the woman disappeared through the door again, her participation in this task apparently complete. I cynically wondered how much we had just paid for the woman to carry the embryos from the lab to the operating room and how one gets that job. Is the main requirement that you can walk without tripping over your own feet? (I’m imagining a Mr. Bean episode where Rowan Atkinson is hired in this capacity and hilarity ensues as he stumbles about accidentally impregnating things.)
We returned our attention to the monitor as the doctor guided the embryos to their resting place. On the ultrasound monitor, the tip of the catheter looked like a bright, white speck of light moving through the darkness. I’m not sure if the catheter had an actual light at its tip – wouldn’t that burn the embryos – or if it was some kind of material designed to show up as a light on the ultra sound. The doctor watched the monitor as he maneuvered the embryos into place in the upper third of the uterus. I don’t know how he picked the place where he finally set them down, perhaps it had good feng shui, but again, the whole process took less than two minutes.
Then he removed the catheter, switched off the spotlight and they wheeled B. out of the room. The doctor shook our hands and wished us good luck. The nurse led us to the recovery room where B. would have to wait for an hour before she could get out of the bed.
We waited with her in the recovery room and finally got to spend some quality time with her. She said that she had lain awake the night before thinking about how this could change all of our lives. I admitted that I wasn’t even thinking about that. I had been up worrying about whether the procedure would be successful.
And that’s still where I am. I think I’ve already done the thinking about how much my life will change when the child is born. For the time being, I’m spending all of my worrying just hoping we get good news in two weeks. It’s going to be a long wait.
On Friday, we traveled to the IVF clinic so that we could be present for the transfer. Our attendance wasn’t required – I’d already performed my end of the deal – but we wanted to be there to see B. again in person and for moral support. We didn’t realize we would also be able to watch the procedure.
B. arrived just after we did. She didn’t even have time to tell us about her trip before the nurse entered the waiting room and called her name. As B. got up, the nurse looked past her to us. “Are you Jonathan and his partner?”
We looked around to see who she was talking to.
“This is Philip and Alberto,” B. said.
“Oh, okay,” the nurse said. “Come with me.”
We followed her to a consultation room, but I was thinking, Who the hell is Jonathan? These people better not transfer Jonathan’s embryos into our carrier.
The nurse left us in the consultation room and went to get some paperwork. B. told us about her drive. She came with her boyfriend and their two kids, who were waiting back at the hotel. They were able to spend the previous day in New York City and they had a good time.
When the nurse returned, she held out a clipboard and asked, “So which one of you is Jonathan?”
Honey, there is no Jonathan. Go find the paperwork for Philip and Alberto.
Before we could say anything, she checked the clipboard again. “I’m sorry, Philip, which one is Philip?”
I raised my hand and took the clipboard. She gave paperwork to B. as well. “Are you two going to be present for the transfer?”
We turned to B. The nurse assured her that it would be modest. We would remain above the neck and watch the procedure on the ultrasound. The whole process would take about five minutes. B. said she felt comfortable with us being in the room.
The nurse gave B. some instructions regarding medication and behavior following the transfer. B. was going to need to take it easy for the next 48 hours, not walking very far or lifting more than 15 pounds. She was not to swim or even take a bath (showering would be fine). Then for the next two weeks she shouldn’t exercise, but other than that her life could go back to normal. I want to assume “normal” means strictly healthy behaviors and an excessive concern for safety.
The nurse left the room to get us the sterile garments we would have to wear over our clothes while in the operating room. Very soon after that, the doctor came in with pictures of the two embryos he would transfer. Most people have to wait for an ultrasound to have the first picture of their baby, but we have pictures of our child(ren) when they were only 8 cells big.
The doctor asked B. how she was feeling and she said she was a little nervous. The doctor assured her that the procedure would be completely painless, but I don’t think she was concerned about pain. I think she was thinking about her responsibilities that were about to begin. Until that point, her obligations were to give herself daily injections of hormones, drive to the monitoring clinic once a week and speak to us on Skype. If the transfer worked, she would now be responsible for a human life.
The nurse returned with hairnets, shoe covers and a gauzy apron for Alberto and me to wear and took B. to a separate room to change into her hospital-type gown. We were given approximately 30 seconds to put on those items before another nurse appeared and hustled us out of the consultation room.
The operating room (do you still call it that if there’s no scalpel involved?) looked like a standard office in a depressing office park – drop ceilings, harsh lighting, beige walls, bland art. The exception was the gurney and stirrups in the middle of the room with an old-looking monitor attached to it. A frenetic Paul Simon song was blaring from hidden speakers. Alberto said the song reminded him of the bakery where he worked during college.
A different nurse entered with B. and got her situated on the gurney. She asked B. again how she was feeling. B. said she was fine, but looked more nervous than before. Alberto and I sat behind her and focused our attention elsewhere as they put her legs in stirrups and shined a spotlight beneath the sheet that covered her. I didn’t blame B. for feeling uncomfortable and thought that maybe it would have been better if we had waited somewhere else.
But then the nurse switched on the monitor and put the ultrasound wand up against B.’s belly. As the white lines that signified her womb appeared on the screen I realized that I was about to witness something profound. Not the moment of conception, that had already happened. I'm not even sure what to call it, but certainly it’s a milestone in the life of my child. A different kind of starting point.
The doctor came in and again asked B. how she was doing. He again assured her that the process would be painless, missing the point. He asked for something more calming to be put on the radio and the nurse switched on some dramatic classical music. It was the sort of soundtrack you would expect to hear as the Starship Enterprise soars through space.
The doctor set about doing something beneath the sheet that I ignored, concentrating on the monitor. After two minutes, a door opened in the back of the room and a woman came through holding a catheter. “B., Alberto and Philip,” she announced. The doctor nodded and she handed him the catheter. I was glad nobody mentioned Jonathan.
After handing the catheter containing the embryos to the doctor, the woman disappeared through the door again, her participation in this task apparently complete. I cynically wondered how much we had just paid for the woman to carry the embryos from the lab to the operating room and how one gets that job. Is the main requirement that you can walk without tripping over your own feet? (I’m imagining a Mr. Bean episode where Rowan Atkinson is hired in this capacity and hilarity ensues as he stumbles about accidentally impregnating things.)
We returned our attention to the monitor as the doctor guided the embryos to their resting place. On the ultrasound monitor, the tip of the catheter looked like a bright, white speck of light moving through the darkness. I’m not sure if the catheter had an actual light at its tip – wouldn’t that burn the embryos – or if it was some kind of material designed to show up as a light on the ultra sound. The doctor watched the monitor as he maneuvered the embryos into place in the upper third of the uterus. I don’t know how he picked the place where he finally set them down, perhaps it had good feng shui, but again, the whole process took less than two minutes.
Then he removed the catheter, switched off the spotlight and they wheeled B. out of the room. The doctor shook our hands and wished us good luck. The nurse led us to the recovery room where B. would have to wait for an hour before she could get out of the bed.
We waited with her in the recovery room and finally got to spend some quality time with her. She said that she had lain awake the night before thinking about how this could change all of our lives. I admitted that I wasn’t even thinking about that. I had been up worrying about whether the procedure would be successful.
And that’s still where I am. I think I’ve already done the thinking about how much my life will change when the child is born. For the time being, I’m spending all of my worrying just hoping we get good news in two weeks. It’s going to be a long wait.
September 25, 2012
If you believe life begins at conception, I am now a father of nine.
Our egg donor flew to Connecticut on Friday night and underwent lab tests over the weekend. Yesterday, she was “retrieved”. That means that the IVF clinic took eleven eggs from her. It seems weird to say that the eggs were “retrieved” – that makes it sound like I was hiding them in her ovaries for a while and now I want them back – but that’s the terminology they use. Of those eleven eggs, two of them “degenerated”. I’ve seen pictures of this online and it’s not pretty. They look like broken chicken eggs, like the doctor dropped them on the way to the petri dish.
The 9 remaining eggs were ICSI’d and resulted in embryos. Now we wait for them to grow. If they divide to 8 cells or more, they are eligible for transfer. B. leaves for Connecticut tomorrow and will undergo additional lab testing on Thursday. If all is well, the transfer could happen on Friday. If the embryos need a little more time to grow, it could be Saturday.
The embryos that aren’t transferred will be frozen. With current technology, a frozen embryo is just as likely to result in a pregnancy as a “fresh” one, so we will have these embryos available as a back-up if the first transfer doesn’t take.
It’s hard not to think about the embryos growing and dividing in Connecticut while I’m sitting here at my desk in Massachusetts. Is this the way the entire pregnancy is going to be?
Our egg donor flew to Connecticut on Friday night and underwent lab tests over the weekend. Yesterday, she was “retrieved”. That means that the IVF clinic took eleven eggs from her. It seems weird to say that the eggs were “retrieved” – that makes it sound like I was hiding them in her ovaries for a while and now I want them back – but that’s the terminology they use. Of those eleven eggs, two of them “degenerated”. I’ve seen pictures of this online and it’s not pretty. They look like broken chicken eggs, like the doctor dropped them on the way to the petri dish.
The 9 remaining eggs were ICSI’d and resulted in embryos. Now we wait for them to grow. If they divide to 8 cells or more, they are eligible for transfer. B. leaves for Connecticut tomorrow and will undergo additional lab testing on Thursday. If all is well, the transfer could happen on Friday. If the embryos need a little more time to grow, it could be Saturday.
The embryos that aren’t transferred will be frozen. With current technology, a frozen embryo is just as likely to result in a pregnancy as a “fresh” one, so we will have these embryos available as a back-up if the first transfer doesn’t take.
It’s hard not to think about the embryos growing and dividing in Connecticut while I’m sitting here at my desk in Massachusetts. Is this the way the entire pregnancy is going to be?
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