So you’ve been trying to get pregnant for a while, and it hasn’t worked. You’ve decided to go to the doctors and see if there is anything actually wrong and they’ve referred you for a fertility check. This all feels like things are moving forward finally and so you’re quite excited to go to the appointment and see if there’s something actually ‘wrong’ with you or if you just need to be a bit more patient / eat more greens / do more yoga / drink foul chinese herbs (more about that in another post)
So the appointment day arrives and you go along to the clinic/hospital. Finally the appointment time arrives and the doctor calls you into the room.
‘Do you mind that we have a student in here to observe?’
‘Of course not’ you reply, thinking, only one way to learn such important stuff right? Glad I’m helping with their education!
‘Right then, lets have a look whats going on, we’ll need to do an ultrasound’
You, having only ever heard that before when applied to pregnant women and therefore expecting gel and something scanned across your stomach make to get on the bed.
‘Oh no,’ says the doctor ‘please take off your trousers and pants, it’s an internal ultrasound’
‘Its a what now?’
‘Internal ultrasound’ he repeats, waving something akin to a disappointing dildo, ‘means we can get a closer look at whats going on with your ovaries’.
At this point the room starts to feel a little overcrowded with doctor, student and partner all waiting for you to strip from the waist down. You reluctantly go behind the flimsy 3/4 length curtain and remove your trousers and pants. There is nowhere to put them so you crumple them into a corner of the room and get onto the bed. Naked from the waist down with just a piece of paper towel to cover the top of your thighs and stomach (why oh why didn’t you wear a longer shirt today!?).
‘Ready’ you say, thinking… as I’ll ever be, and the curtain is swished back and the group heads to your feet.
‘Not you!’ you bark at your partner ‘you stay up this end’, because, yes, he’s seen it before, many times but this all just feels a bit clinical and weird in the bright lights of the consulting room on a medical trolley bed.
‘Right, this might feel a bit cold’ says the doctor, applying lube to the skinny dildo wand, the student looking on poker faced (aside: she’s probably wondering how many ancient fannies she’s going to have to deal with in her career if she continues in fertility, or not, who knows what student nurses/doctors really think before they become deadened by the endless parade of humanities weirdness in front of them?)
And at this point my friend, you realise you have left your pride in the waiting room behind you.
And then the lubed up dildo wand starts having a poke around looking at your ovaries…
Yes, the first appointment is weird. Does it ever get less weird? Not really, certainly not if you’re me and you make friends with your regular doctor and talk about life etc and then you have to go back to the doctor patient role as he jabs the wand towards your ovaries to assess follicle growth (or not).
Honestly though you get to the point where so many people have seen your bits you cease to really care any more. I think its easier without your other half in the room I’ll be honest, but perhaps that’s just me.
Frankly, if you go down the IVF route this becomes a normal part of your IVF week and so you need to get over it fairly quickly along with any fear of needles etc.
And finally, everyone tells me that its really really good training if you ever do get pregnant and have a baby to have got over that embarrassment waaay before….
Happy fertility appointments everyone!