Ordering Sperm

It's time to make the Big Purchase. I'm on-target to start ttc this month, with the cycle that started TODAY. That means in approximately 18-19 days (I ovulate late in my cycle), I could be PREGNANT, or at least the little guys could be on their way to find their girl. But I need to order those swimmers. I know this, and I'm working on it, but...

For some reason, I'm having a bit of a hard time with this part. It just seems like such a Major Step, for some reason. I've been jumping through so many hoops in preparation for ttc, but this sperm purchase is stressing me out more than any of it!

Yesterday, I took all my new client forms for the cryobank to work so I could use the fax machine there late at night when no one else was around. I started to look through everything, and realized that I needed my midwife's license number. Crap! I thought I'd have to wait until today and call the office, but a work friend who knows my plans reminded me that you can find that kind of info online. So, she helped me look it up, and my plans were back on track. It was slightly hard pressing the dial button on the fax machine, but I eventually did it.

Then today I wanted to call to make sure the forms had all been received, and for some reason it was a little hard to pick up the phone to make that call. I honestly don't know why, just that this whole sperm ordering part has felt so Momentous that it took me a while to do each step. I finally called, then called back a little later with more questions I forgot to ask the first time. Already it was easier.

Then I had to actually Make The Purchase. Now, that part took forever... Well, ok, to be honest, it hasn't even happened yet. :) I spent part of last night and today re-looking at sperm donors, reading some of my favorites' profiles and then of course double-checking to make sure I hadn't "missed" anyone really good who should replace one of my top contenders. I had pretty much already decided on my favorite a while ago, but of course I've been overthinking it and all of a sudden wasn't sure. For one thing, he's not "proven", in that he doesn't have any pregnancies yet. But, he's a new donor, so I think it's just because he hasn't been "on the shelf" long enough. You have to start somewhere, right? SOMEONE has to be first! Plus, I'd actually like my child to be one of the first children born from a donor, so that he or she is one of the first to turn 18 and make contact with him (assuming he or she wants to), instead of having many children before him/her.

Really, the only thing holding me back from using this particular donor is that the part of his profile with the medical chart with info for his whole family had very little info on it. I was worried that maybe he'd left something out on purpose because he was afraid he wouldn't be accepted into the program if he put it on the form. Or that maybe he just doesn't know much about his family medical history, but that there's something huge that he doesn't know about. I keep trying to tell myself that maybe his family really IS just very healthy! But of course my head likes to go in whatever direction it wants and not listen to reason. Somehow. So I got myself all stressed out about it. I called a friend and reviewed my top 3 donors with her, and we discussed the medical info issue, but she agreed that my #1 choice is also her top contender, regardless of the medical thing, and the other 2 guys were in the same order for her as they are for me. So that helped.

And then I went to make The Purchase, and started the ordering process, and then realized I had to decide how many vials to buy. And whether to ship them all to my clinic or leave some in storage at the cryobank. This calls into play how many tries I think it'll take, how many IUIs I'm going to do per cycle, whether or not I think I'll want to have a second child (WHAT?? I need to even THINK about this decision NOW???), and weighing all the options given the costs involved. And math is NOT my strong suit! I was thinking 6 vials, and I can store them for free at my clinic or at the cryobank for up to a year, so that's even steven. But once they leave the cryobank, there's no buy-back option. And if I leave some at the cryobank, I have to pay shipping costs more than once ($185 a pop). Alternatively, I could transfer the vials to the local branch for $150, but then it's $50 each time I pick up a vial, plus I have to return the tank. Pain in the ass. And probably not worth it. So should I ship 3, store 3, leaving buy-back as an option? What's my plan here, exactly? As of now, I'm thinking maybe I'll try two cycles of single IUIs, and if that doesn't work, then switch to B2B IUIs for the next two. Which means shipping 3 at a time doesn't make sense. So ship 4, store 2? But then does paying for shipping again for only 2 vials/one cycle make sense? Or would I maybe just order more vials at that point? How many? UGH. I ended up kind of freaking out about the whole thing again and couldn't deal, so I closed the tab, shut the laptop, and turned on the tv.

A little while later, my SMC friend P, who just figured all this stuff out for herself returned my call. So she helped me talk through it, and I decided that I'm just going to buy and ship 6 vials to all be stored at my clinic. For one thing, even if I do get pregnant right away and have to pay for storage, it's only $200/year at my clinic vs. $440/year at the cryobank. And chances are, it'll take me several cycles to get pregnant. And if it doesn't (yay!), chances are I'll eventually want a second child, so it makes sense to just have the vials here and ready to go. And I'll save on shipping by only paying that fee once. And P said that when she finally made her purchase, it felt really good. Ok, good to go. So I go to log back in and really, truly, finally, actually Make The Purchase.

And the cryobank's website isn't working. I log in, go to my favorite donor's page, and click to add 6 vials to my cart. And then it says I'm not logged in and have to log in in order to add things to my cart. WTF? The same thing happens repeatedly, and I'm beginning to think maybe it's A Sign. Which I don't really believe in, but whatever. So I figure maybe because I just closed the tab earlier, and didn't log off first, it's all confused when I try to log in again. Does it even work like that?? No idea. But I can't get it to work so I can finish the damn transaction and move on with my life! Finally, I got some sort of "system maintenance" error message.

So, I'll try again in a little while, and if it still doesn't work, I'll try again tomorrow, or just call and make the purchase over the phone.

Ridiculous, I tell you!

I seriously need to relax. I don't know why I get so worked up about all this stuff. Yes, I do realize how stupid it is!