I'm not even there

This morning my husband went to our fertility clinic for a pre-cycle semen analysis, while I stayed home to wait for my Fed Ex package of injectible medications.

I'm a little depressed. I've gotta say, this is worse than sleeping through it. This time, I'm not even there.

A few thoughts occur to me. One is, if there's any compensation to be had for all those years -- before I grew out of it -- of being embarassed to buy feminine protection products from male store clerks, this has to be it. Most of the technicians at our clinic are female.

In fact, riddle me this, Batman: In this large and busy clinic, most of the employees are female, except for the almighty doctors. I can't even think when I've seen a man in there other than the doctors, and the slightly shamefaced husbands trailing after their wives, avoiding the eyes of all others. Go figure.

So, I'm imagining this: My husband walks up to this strange woman, says, "Where do I go to...?" and gets his little cup and magazine or whatever. He must feel.... Hold up. What am I saying. He's not me, he's a man. He's probably enjoying the whole thing. *sigh*

One of the subtle humiliations of infertility treatment is, your sex life (what's left of it) and your privates are everybody's business. People call you in your cube at work to ask about your last period, or to scold you for having unprotected sex during a cycle. Now that's hilarious, that is. You're infertile and someone's on you about unprotected sex like it's prom night? Not to mention how often you have to climb into those stirrups. I wish they gave frequent flyer miles for those things.

You can't help but distance yourself from this process. You have to set aside modesty and pretend that no, it's not you half naked and exposed in this room with a doctor, a medical student, and a nurse who stands against the wall with her hands behind her back, watching your crotch intently to make sure nobody misbehaves.

Yep. In so many ways, I'm not even there.