Pinch Me

I often tell the story of how when Lena and I were only just beginning to fall in love, I brought up the subject of how many babies I wanted to have. I'd been on a mission to find a wife (not just a girlfriend), mind you, so the question of quantity of children wasn't quite as off-topic as it might have been for the average college-student, babydyke couple.

"So, about babies? I've always thought that I'd like to have four; what about you?" I asked, hopefully.

Lena raised her eyebrows, "Um, I've never really thought about it, actually."

I could live with that answer. While not necessarily in alignment with my own personal dreams, it left plenty of room for persuasion. It wasn't as if she had her mind set on the eco-conscious choice to have only one child. She hadn't spent years fantasizing about her perfect future with two perfect children. She simply hadn't thought about it yet. She hadn't come to any conclusions at all. I felt there were plenty of reasons to hope that we might one day see eye-to-eye.

As it turned out, this was a conversation that would repeat itself and plague us for many years to come. While I'm sure that it is a slight exaggeration, I also like to tell the story about how the only thing Lena and I have ever fought over is how many kids to have. Granted, having two at once the first time around did kind of throw a wrench in the plans. Having twins is, in some ways, like skipping all of the intro-level classes and jumping right into Advanced Placement, Honor-Level, Accelerated Parenting. After Luke and Jaz arrived, it took two-and-a-half years for Lena to get on board with the "3 kids plan." And after Zeben was born, she assured me that she was done.

"You can talk all you want about a fourth baby, but I'm telling you, you're talking to a brick wall. I am not going to budge this time."

While recovering from my pregnancy with Zeben, I agreed that my baby-making days were over. Despite the fact that I have spent my entire life fantasizing about pregnancy, the actual state of being pregnant does not agree with me. When Zeben was only weeks old, we made the choice to get a lesbian vasectomy: we sold our remaining vials of sperm to another family who had used the same donor (the sperm bank had long been sold out of our donor's sperm). While this move wasn't entirely irreversible (we could always choose to use sperm from a different donor), it felt like a final decision, and we both agreed that it was the right decision to make. For Lena, it symbolized closure on the "how many babies should we have?" argument discussion, while for me, it simply opened up the "what's the best way to approach adoption?" folder.

And thus, the occasional disagreements continued. Eventually I accepted that my optimal timing adoption plan was not going to work out (I hoped to adopt a newborn by Zeben's second birthday, so that I'd still have a plentiful milk supply and be able to breastfeed the baby), but I held out hope that my wife would have a change of heart eventually. I knew there would be another baby for us someday.

But I can't convey with words the level of surprise I felt early this past summer when Lena came to me and said, "Love? Don't get too excited, but I think I want to get pregnant and have a baby." Don't get too excited? Seriously?! I had never even dared to hope for this particular scenario.

After "coming out" to myself at age 15, I went through a bit of a grieving process, namely in regards to what being a lesbian would mean for my reproductive future. I would not be able to effortlessly make babies out of a combination of mine and my partner's genes. How truly devastating. The consolation prize at the top of the list? The possibility of one day having a pregnant wife. When Jaz and Luke were about a year old, Lena briefly considered--somewhat seriously--the idea of getting pregnant herself. She spent a summer thinking about it and ultimately decided that pregnancy was not for her. It was difficult for me to let go of the dream of having a pregnant wife, but I certainly did not want to trade my wife in for a new, pro-pregnancy version, so I moved on, feeling only somewhat wistful about what might have been. Over the years since then, I've occasionally reminded Lena that she could always change her mind and reconsider pregnancy, but for the most part my comments have been met with silence and eyes that say, "do you really want to go there again?"

My response when Lena told me in June that she wanted to get pregnant?

"Really? Like, right now? Okay!"

We planned to start trying in August and once again found ourselves searching through donor registries in search of the perfect sperm. After several hours of reading donor profiles, it dawned on me that perhaps one of the kids' donor sibling families (soon after Luke and Jaz were born, we learned about the existence of the Donor Sibling Registry, where we immediately found 3 other families who had used the same donor as we had. In the 5 years since we first joined the DSR, we've found a total of 14 donor sibling familes with 25 children between them. We keep in touch through a yahoo group, and I think our connection will be an amazing resource for our kids as they get older) had some left over sperm that they weren't planning to use and would be willing to sell us (as we had done after Zeben was born). I thought that the chances were slim, but as it turned out, there was one family, with one vial of remaining sperm that they were not planning to use and would be happy to send our way.

A few awkward logistical phone calls later, the tiny vial of 7-year-old frozen sperm arrived at our local reproductive biology lab in Lena's name. It was hard not to feel stressed out about our single attempt at creating a biological sibling for Luke, Jaz and Zeb. While we knew that using sperm from a different donor wouldn't result in any less love for the baby we'd conceive, the idea of being able to use the same donor was just so cool. We also worried that if we had to use a new donor, our fourth child would feel like the odd kid out, especially when it came to things like the donor sibling family. Nonetheless, we tried not to get attached to the idea of our first attempt being successful. The odds were not in our favor at all since generally the chance of conception when using frozen sperm and intrauterine insemination is only about 15% per cycle.

We ended up delaying our first insemination until early October due to our move (and resulting stress level) in August. After an odd follicular phase that lasted 25 days, it finally seemed as though Lena was ready to ovulate on October 2nd. We dropped the kids off at school and drove in to the city to pick up the sperm. It all seemed so surreal. Once we got to the lab, we signed the sperm out of the freezer (much the same way as we sign Zeb out of nursery school), and proceeded to wait forever for our appointment. I kept the sperm warm in my bra while we waited, and tried to fill it, energetically, with my love while simulateously trying not to panic about how long it was taking for them to call us in. Ideally, the insemination would take place as soon as the sperm was brought to body temp. We waited for at least 30 minutes. But then they finally called us in, and the procedure went very smoothly. It seemed our timing was perfect. All that was left for us to do was to hope.

For 12 days we tried to remain optimistic while also preparing ourselves for the distinct possibility that we had not just made a baby. We went ahead and picked out a back-up donor from the sperm bank catalog, and tried to get excited about using him if it came to that. While neither Lena nor I is particularly spiritual or religious, I think we both put a lot of faith in the Universe while we waited for our fate to be revealed. If our fourth baby was meant to be a genetic sibling to our other 3 kids, then our single attempt with our last vial of sperm would be a success. If not, if our fourth baby was meant to be made out of an entirely different mix of genetic material, then Lena would not be pregnant. Everything happens for a reason. Lena seemed to be experiencing plenty of early pregnancy signs, but of course they also matched up pretty well with her usual symptoms of PMS. Finally, on October 14th, she peed on a pregnancy test, and came back to bed to share the unbelievable news. I ran into the bathroom to read it for myself.

October 14, 2008

As crazy as it feels for me to type this out: we are indeed expecting a baby in June!

We initially planned to wait as long as possible to tell the kids about their new sibling, but we ended up telling them on the day that Lena first began what would become her daily throwing-up routine, at 6 weeks pregnant. They were all very excited and happy. Or, at least, Luke and Jaz were. I'm not entirely sure that Zeben really had any clue what we were talking about, though he does seem to have some idea of the basic concept at this point.



Today, Lena is 13 weeks pregnant, and this morning we got to hear the baby's heartbeat for the first time at our midwife appointment! It was just about the most amazing sound in the world. I feel like I am still walking around in a state of dazed amazement. I never could have predicted that our life would take this turn 2 years--or even 6 months--ago. I feel so lucky.

It was only after she'd peed on the pregnancy test on that fateful day, as we were lying in bed at 5:30 a.m., giddy and wide-awake while our children slept around us, that Lena realized what she'd done. "Oh wait!" she exclaimed, "I just realized that this means we're going to have four kids! How did that happen?!" I'm not really sure how it happened, but I am absolutely thrilled about it. I can't wait to be a mama to four. I couldn't ask for anything more.