You can read Part 1 here, and Part 2 here.
2004 was a big year for us. I was working at Half Price Books, which gave me awesome health insurance and profit sharing. Aaron was hired by the State of Ohio to do the highly dangerous and stressful work that he continues doing to this very day. Oh, and they gave him some pretty sweet benefits as well.
Four years of marriage was nothing. Being insured had made us grown-ups, at last. Since we were grown-ups, the next logical thing to do was to go get us some babies. Spontaneously generating offspring were clearly not in the cards for us, so Intrauterine Insemination (IUI) was suggested by our fertility doctor(s).
I was naive enough to believe that we would be attended by a kind and forthright doctor, someone who would see us personally through the whole process. That's not how it works. The sweet, balding little man who we met with at our first appointment was replaced by a rotating selection of cold, stern, doctors. One of them had a snow white handle bar mustache. He waxed the hair on his face and twisted it up like SnidelyWhiplash and yet he possessed zero personality and no sense of humor. How can a man with a handle bar mustache be so serious?
Anywho... IUI involves the use of a drug called Clomid and frequent ultrasounds. We're talkin', up the hoo-hoo ultrasounds, not those cute belly scans you see on TV. Maybe I've been spoiled by an attentive lover, but I like to think that it's polite to remember a woman who's vagina you've peered into. But, every time I went in for a scan I had to introduce myself all over again. Dr. Handle Bar repeated the same question to me each time I saw him. Looking at my exposed crotch he would say, "Oh, you're a red head! Do you have endometriosis? It's more common with red heads."
"Are you an insensitive narcissicist? It's more common in men with snow, white handle bar mustaches."
I paid $100 for each and every one of those invasive, impersonal, vaginal ultrasounds. Good times.
2 weeks ago
