The Choices We Make...

Have you ever sat down and looked the choices you have made and how they have shaped your life to this point? Then as you go over everything in your head, you think to yourself “How could I have been so stupid/careless/reckless? If one thing went the other way I could have been hurt, locked up, or worse, dead.” I’m embarrassed when I look at how many times I flipped the coin with my life and tempted fate.

What really got me thinking about this was an article I read on CNN.com. Basically, an off duty cop was helping his father at the family deli when someone parked in the deli’s lot and went across the street. Apparently the street is very busy and the lot was specifically marked for deli customers only, so the father goes out to ask the guy to move his car, the guy refuses, things get hot and escalate to a scuffle which escalates to the guy pulling bat on the father. The son who is the cop sees this pulls a gun and shoots and kills the guy with the bat. He goes to trial, the shooting wasn’t justified so he is sentenced to 29 years to life. He serves a few years and another judge overturns his conviction and he is released. He gets a job, finds a girl, gets married and tries to start over only to have a higher court overrule his overturned conviction eighteen months later and send him back to jail. I obviously wasn’t there and I don’t know all of the facts so I can’t pass judgment, but what struck me was that if it wasn’t for that one choice he would still be a free man and the whole thing never would have happened.

The whole thing just made me very thankful that all of cards fell my way, when by rights they shouldn’t have. One wrong choice could have changed everything and I never would have met L Bird and never had A Bird. So here’s to making good choices…

A Bird The Snowbunny

I know that this is probably a little hard to believe, but yesterday afternoon was the first time A Bird has gone outside and played in the snow. I know, crazy right? We tried a few times when she was younger to take her outside, but she didn't like the cold and the snow blew in her face so she would cry and want to go back into the house.

Then came the battle of the boots. A Bird absolutely flat ot refused to wear snow boots. We would put them on and she would throw a huge hissy fit until she kicked them off. Well I guess it wasn't just the boots, it was a winter hat and mittens too. She would just take them off as quick as you could get them on.

So then finally this winter comes and she is actually excited about playing in the snow. She wants to do it, she just can't wait, and then what happens? No snow. This winter has been one of the mildest winters of my life. In a normal year we would be buried with snow from November to the end of March, this year we didn't get anything more significant than a dusting until January 13th when we only got about 4-6 inches.

So this past Sunday afternoon we bundled up into snowpants, boots, hat, mittens and winter coats and made the best of it. We couldn't stay out long because it was single digits, but A Bird thoroughly enjoyed herself.

Who knows, maybe if it keeps up like this we may tackle sledding next.

Taking off my tin foil hat...

So it’s safe to take off my foil hat now, I’m not being invaded by brain reading aliens but I’ll get back to that in a minute. Let’s just say yesterday was a little crazy. I started working out and eating better (healthier, I think) this week, so I’m a little sore and a little irritable but still moving along just fine. I’m still working on being happier, but I think I have come a long ways from where I was and I wasn’t letting my muscle fatigue and food (beer) cravings get to me. Then yesterday hit.


I get home from work yesterday and I hear a real high pitch whining in the dining room. I do a quick preliminary search and I can only hear it in the dining room. It sounded like when a hearing aid has feedback and you get that annoying screech that is just barely enough in the audible range to drive you bat crap crazy. After not finding anything I figured maybe it was just my ears ringing and went on about my business. When L Bird got home I asked her if she heard it and both her and A Bird agreed that they could hear it too, so it wasn’t just me and I wasn’t going crazy.

So now I’m going crazy trying to find this sound. Both L Bird and I are trying to listen and getting irritated with each other and everything else because neither one of us can find it because while we are trying to be quiet to listen A Bird is talking or the dogs are walking through the kitchen and you can hear their nails on the wood floor, or Orange Cat is right under your feet with the scummiest of scum cat meows that just grates at you. Finally, I gave up and started calling everyone I knew for ideas of what to check. I checked with my dad who had me unplug and shut everything off as well as flipping the breaker for the dining room, I checked with Capt. Insano who told me that I should wear a tin foil hat just to be safe, because, “you know, you don’t want aliens reading your thoughts.” Then he was a little more helpful and suggested flipping the Main breaker to rule out the electricity. I talked to my Stepfather and Grandfather and they suggested flipping the main as well as checking the water main coming into the house as maybe it could be a high pressure pinhole water leak. When none of these things worked and the ringing was still there my Grandfather appeared to join Capt. Insano’s camp and asked if I could see any little green men hiding in the trees outside.

Finally, frustrated and defeated we went to bed. L Bird gets up to use the bathroom shortly before I get up for work and comes back into the bedroom huffing about the noise is still there and its driving her nuts as I am trying to enjoy the last 4 minutes of my 9 minute snooze button. So I’m a little huffy myself when I get up for my shower. I take my shower and am on my way back through the dining room and the noise is louder. So I stop and start looking for it again, if anyone could have seen me I would have looked like a mental patient. Here is a bald, fat guy in nothing but a bath towel standing chairs, getting on his hands and knees and crawling under the dining room table, just looking mentally unstable as he is hunting this “phantom” noise. I was just about to give up when I start going through things on the table, I picked up my camera, nope that’s not it. But wait, when I moved the camera the sound got louder, I’m getting closer. I turn into a five year old on Christmas. I am whipping through things on the table like a mad man. A Bird’s craft supplies go, then her coloring books and then finally victory.

I moved a couple of magazines and there under them was a small game that A Bird’s daycare had given to her. It was small enough to be concealed by a magazine with no visible bump, but loud enough to drive me nuts. I was so overjoyed that before I took out the batteries I took it into the bedroom and woke L Bird up to listen to it to show her I found it. I muffled it under some clothes as I got dressed then went out found a screwdriver and as gently as possible at that moment removed its batteries. Sweet relief!

So like I said in the beginning I can take off my foil hat now, but I may just keep my eye out for little green men in the trees.

Friday Follow-ups

After our appointment earlier this week at the fertility center, I was referred back to my urologist. As soon as we got out of the fertility center I jumped on the phone to the urology office. I got extremely lucky because there was a cancellation, so I was able to get in yesterday. If I hadn’t taken that appointment I would have had to wait until the middle of February.

The urology office is an interesting experience in itself. You walk in and check in with the receptionist who hands you a sterile cup. You have to run into the bathroom and give a urine sample, then come back out and wait in the waiting room until you are called into the exam room, Then depending on what the issue is, you may or may not have to drop you pants. Luckily yesterday I was able to keep my pants up.

The urologist came in and we discussed my situation. Because my counts had dropped so drastically and I had success with hormone therapy previously she suggested that we repeat the hormone therapy with a higher dose to see if my counts will come up again. Starting Monday, I have to pick up a prescription that will elevate my testosterone levels to stimulate my FSH levels to produce more sperm and increase my counts.

Now when I went through this treatment course the first time I was in the swing of P90X. So I was working out like crazy, and eating healthier. I wasn’t drinking beer or coke and was basically living off of water and a high protein diet. I think those factors also helped with my counts going up. Then after the first few months of  that I fell out of working out because of some life events happening, and my counts went down. I don’t think that the decrease is directly tied to the decrease in quality diet and exercise because the effects of the hormone therapy only last 3 to 6 months, but I definitely think it didn’t help the situation.

So this weekend is my weekend of relaxation. I am going to smoke a cigar or two, have a few beers and relax. I’m going to eat what I want and just forget about the world for awhile. Then on Monday it is back to the grindstone, I am kick starting my high protein diet and working out again. An added bonus of testosterone therapy is the muscle growth from working out, so that’s cool. I have to stick with this to give myself the best possible chance to get my count as high as possible and give us the best chance for our last IUI’s.

Wish me luck!!!

Friday Follow-ups

After our appointment earlier this week at the fertility center, I was referred back to my urologist. As soon as we got out of the fertility center I jumped on the phone to the urology office. I got extremely lucky because there was a cancellation, so I was able to get in yesterday. If I hadn’t taken that appointment I would have had to wait until the middle of February.

The urology office is an interesting experience in itself. You walk in and check in with the receptionist who hands you a sterile cup. You have to run into the bathroom and give a urine sample, then come back out and wait in the waiting room until you are called into the exam room, Then depending on what the issue is, you may or may not have to drop you pants. Luckily yesterday I was able to keep my pants up.

The urologist came in and we discussed my situation. Because my counts had dropped so drastically and I had success with hormone therapy previously she suggested that we repeat the hormone therapy with a higher dose to see if my counts will come up again. Starting Monday, I have to pick up a prescription that will elevate my testosterone levels to stimulate my FSH levels to produce more sperm and increase my counts.

Now when I went through this treatment course the first time I was in the swing of P90X. So I was working out like crazy, and eating healthier. I wasn’t drinking beer or coke and was basically living off of water and a high protein diet. I think those factors also helped with my counts going up. Then after the first few months of  that I fell out of working out because of some life events happening, and my counts went down. I don’t think that the decrease is directly tied to the decrease in quality diet and exercise because the effects of the hormone therapy only last 3 to 6 months, but I definitely think it didn’t help the situation.

So this weekend is my weekend of relaxation. I am going to smoke a cigar or two, have a few beers and relax. I’m going to eat what I want and just forget about the world for awhile. Then on Monday it is back to the grindstone, I am kick starting my high protein diet and working out again. An added bonus of testosterone therapy is the muscle growth from working out, so that’s cool. I have to stick with this to give myself the best possible chance to get my count as high as possible and give us the best chance for our last IUI’s.

Wish me luck!!!

Trips to the fertility center...

Trips to the fertility clinic are never fun. There is a lot of poking and prodding if you are a woman, and if you are a man there is a lot of awkwardness because everyone know what you are doing when you are giving your “sample”, plus the whole process is very clinical and sterile feeling. All of the couples are in different states as you sit there in the waiting room stealing glances at one another. Some couples are beaming and full of hope, because they just know that this is the cycle that is going to make it happen, while other couples are nervous about the whole procedure and fidget with their phones waiting for the doctors to call them in, then there are the couples like L Bird and I, the seasoned vets. They have been through numerous cycles and don’t have a lot to show for it, so some are very reserved, and some are just downright depressed as they walk out after an insemination with little to no hope of it actually working. L Bird and I are very fortunate that we did get lucky enough to have A Bird, so we are actually one up on quite a few couples, but it still doesn’t help to ease the want of having a second child and giving A Bird a sibling to face the world with.

This most recent trip to the fertility center was especially tough because I am at the center of why we are not getting pregnant. Now I am going to delve a little into a very personal area for me and you may not want all of the details or play by play, so if that’s the case stop reading here.

OK, now if you are still reading this, I am writing this because maybe something I write here will resonate with someone else struggling with male infertility and they will know that they are not alone. Some history to start, L Bird and I were referred to a fertility center around ‘05/’06 because we had been trying for over a year with no results. I got referred to a urologist who is great and happens to be a woman. It was a little odd having a female urologist, because she is poking, prodding, squeezing and holding you in a lot of areas that anyone other than your wife shouldn’t be touching but that’s a whole other post. She very quickly identified me as having a varicocele which was leading to low sperm count and low motility and set up surgery for me. I went through the surgery to repair it and then a few months of waiting to heal before having a semen analysis to see if my counts had improved. My counts went up, but I was still abnormal (shocker, right?) in having lower sperm counts but we were still good candidates for fertility treatments. L Bird and I dutifully went through the treatments with hormones that sent L Bird on an emotional roller coaster and both of our stress levels through the roof. We went through 4 cycles of our allotted 6 lifetime tries (my insurance only covered 6) like they were nothing and we weren’t getting any closer. At that time L Bird had just started a new job which wasn’t helping her stress level at all, so we decided to take a break for a couple of months until things were a little more settled. Then through God’s grace he blessed us that next month with a miracle, A Bird. She showed up without any other intervention other than God’s.

Fast forward to today, L Bird and I have been trying to have another child. Before we started really actively trying hard, I went to the urologist and requested a semen analysis to see where I was at. I have to say that I wasn’t entirely shocked to hear that my counts had dropped again. That was 9 months ago. Since then the urologist identified that I had low testosterone and a vitamin D deficiency, she started me on a three month hormone/vitamin regimen and my counts came way up to where I was close to the lower levels of normal. L Bird and I were ecstatic, and actually hopeful for our first few cycles.

Then reality set in. Every month my count has dropped, or I should say plummeted. It takes roughly 10 million sperm to saturate the path to the egg. Once you have 10 million healthy, motile sperm it is up to the egg to grant entry and thus fertilization. It doesn’t matter whether you have 10 million or 50 million the odds are the same because you are at saturation level. Then everything below 10 million lowers your percentages of fertilization and becoming pregnant.

The first two months everything looked good, but then everything went into the tank. L Bird and I went back to the fertility doctor because we are down to our last insurance covered IUI try. The doctor looked at my results and basically told us we had slim to no chance and we shouldn’t waste our last try. That really took the wind out of our sails and was really a punch in the gut to me. I feel incredibly guilty that it is my fault that we are not getting pregnant. It hurts in so many ways. It stings my pride, because any man can make a baby, right? Then I throw a pity party and rack it up to just something else to add to the list that is wrong with me. Or I start to think that I’m being punished by God for all of my sins, and that adds to my guilt. It is just a painful roller coaster for me as I deal with these things because no one really has the answers, and no one can give me a magic pill that will fix me and make me more fertile.

But there was light at the end of the tunnel, a dim, single bulb hanging and flickering in the wind, but still a light. He laid out two options, the first being go back to the urologist and see if she could get me to repeat my success with more hormone therapy or switch to IVF which is not covered by insurance and is roughly $12,000 per try. IVF isn’t in our budget at the moment, so I am heading back to the urologist to get her input and see if she thinks I am treatable. I am really hoping that she can repeat some treatment and help me again, if not our only other option is me banking my sperm at a cryogenic bank for a year or two and saving up the money (I know we could take out a loan, but I think that for me "financing" a baby is just wrong) for one round of IVF, which brings its own set of emotional struggles.

So that’s it. That’s where we are and why sometimes we aren’t so happy or nice to be around. But here’s to cherishing our time with our own little miracle, A Bird and praying to God for another one.