Episode 526, in which our heroines are found unworthy

Last week I received a call from the IVF Australia counselor, wanting to ‘check in’. Having no reason to object to being checked in on, I spoke to her. She told me the nurses had informed her that we were doing another cycle with ‘egg sharing’ and, apparently, ‘egg sharing’ requires us both to speak to a counselor.

OK. Sure. We were forced to go through ridiculous counselling sessions to access donor sperm (featuring thought provoking questions, like, “Would you tell your child it was conceived with donor sperm?” and “Do you mind that you don’t know the sperm donor?” As if my theoretical progeny isn’t going to get the memo that egg + sperm = baby, or that I haven’t understood what ‘anonymous donor’ means.) So, I figured it was another ridiculous box ticking exercise and played along.

Counselface said she’d be calling C in a couple of days to see how SHE felt. By then, we should have discussed to whom the theoretical embryos were going. (As if we hadn’t… see previous post). We had, of course, discussed it. We had reached an agreement on what would happen.

Between then and C’s ‘chat’ we didn’t have a lot of time to talk, so I told C to expect a call and not much else. Oops. Apparently THIS WAS A TEST! And, if we didn’t answer the stealthily disguised ‘assessment questions’ identically, we weren’t fit to participate in egg sharing, an arrangement we requested merely so that the idiot doctor could not justify throwing perfectly good embryos away. (They will only transfer 2 embryos maximum and sometimes, randomly, the doctor will only agree to transfer 1 – when you’re on your umpteeth IVF cycle, or are simply a rational person, you really do not want good embryos going in the bin). Solution = multiple embryos in multiple uteri. No brainer, right?

C had her chat. By the end of it, she was in tears, having been told, half way through an IVF cycle, that this self-important moron of a counselor, “Could not approve egg sharing at this time. You’ll have to freeze the embryos until we approve you.” C and I, and this shitty counselor know that our embryos cannot be frozen. Basically, she was saying that C would have to complete the cycle and NONE of the embryos could be used.

We are unworthy because we had different feelings and preferences which we were honest about. Because married couples need to have the same thoughts. Because the only couples who are worthy of having children never disagree and, thus, never have to make compromises on anything.

Ahem… what??

So, I have to be assessed by a psychologist to see if I am worthy of having my wife’s biological material placed in my uterus for the purpose of making OUR CHILD. Our mutual child.

I wonder, if I was a straight lady if I should have to be professionally assessed before making this choice. Would having my husband’s biological material placed in my uterus for the purpose of making OUR CHILD warrant assessment and intervention? LOL.

Thanks to the makers of Orgalutran for this image of the happy couple. Presumably that weirdo lady is taking Orgal and having a great time. Weirdo.

Similarly, if C was a man/brimming with sperm, would she need to be cleared to put her biological material in her wife for the purpose of making OUR CHILD.

Nope, people can stick their biological material wherever they want, *unless* they are a couple of infertile, feeble minded dykes who can’t possibly make informed adult decisions without assistance.

Did we get approved? In the end, yes. We had a third Skype meeting in which we sat side by side repeating pre-rehearsed ‘happy committed couple’ phrases ad nauseum.

“We recognise the challenges of our choices and we will work together to solve any problem we come up against.” (Like the fertility bureaucracy, in which we are treated like moronic children.)

“We love each other and just want to bring a child into our family, however that happens.” (Noting that throwing away perfectly good embryos will not result in children.)

We realise we might have a range of feelings if the other gets pregnant, but we will work through them together.” (As if anyone’s getting pregnant from this IVF scam.)