The Lemonheads are moving along. I still haven't gained any more weight than the 7 kilos (15 pounds) I put on in the first 12 weeks, and I know I keep going on about it but I simply just don't look 4.5 months pregnant with twins. The other twin moms at similar growth rates that I see in pics look two or three times my size already. And I do eat, I really do. But the only things that I crave are fruit and Fig Newtons (which Beach Girl and Angela have been kind enough to send over, because the fig rolls you can get here? Not the same.)

We got scanned yesterday, actually. It wasn't planned but based on various symptoms I was showing I rang up the hospital and they said they'd like to see me. So off Angus and I trooped, where we checked in to labor and delivery, and I got fingered by the doctor (I had no idea they check your cervix. Seriously. I'm about as woefully ignorant about birthing as I am about welding. In fact, I might be more clued up about welding. Lemme get my goggles.) Then we got the fun with goo and ultrasound wands as they checked on the Lemonheads.

Both Lemonheads were alive and kicking.

Literally, actually, as Lemonhead #2 was kicking its sibling in the head.

What came out of the hospital visit-besides us seeing the babies, who look more like the Alein bad guy Giger drew than real babies-is that the little Lemonheads, they just keep going. Even with a severe cough that's so bad I've sprained both of my abdominal muscles, they keep persevering (the abdominal muscles are the reason why we got to go to hospital at all.)

Today I'm exactly 18 weeks pregnant. For twins, this means I've met the halfway point. Single babies, they get to party in the uterus for 40 weeks, but twins generally get the eviction at about 36 weeks.

And if I can follow the old cliche, I'd like to say this-I can't believe I've made it this far. We're a long way from being done and are certainly not out of the woods-should something go wrong and I go into labor today, the babies would not survive. But still-I got to see them do Tae Kwon Do in utero, and that's something that will live with me always.

Being pregnant has suddenly opened my eyes to certain elements of how people react. I think it's the case with all pregnancies in that suddenly you are the world's oyster, but with twins you somehow get shuttled into a different category, one in which people's mouths get unplugged from their brains. It's happened again and again and I can tell you a few things that already annoy me:

1) When people say "You'll never sleep in again." or "You'd better sleep now, while you still can!" Actually I will be sleeping again, thanks. The first few months may be a bit sleep deprived but that too shall pass. We're not heavy duty sleepers in this house anyway-although lately we've been sleeping late because we cough all night long and aren't feeling well, we typically wake up around 7 am. If our kids wind up sleeping 7 hours a night soon then we'll all be on the same schedule.

2) When people say "Ooooh twins! You have an instant family!" OK, see, twins are not a Carnation breakfast drink. Yes, twins + adults = typical family, complete with dog, house, and picket fence. But I had a family before I will be having babies. I have a boy and a dog and two pain in the ass cats. I have two stepkids. I have a family, I'm just augmenting my existing one. Saying that NOW I have a family denigrates what I currently have.

3) The big one for me-when people find out it's twins, it becomes all about Angus' sperm.

See, now, I can't really explain why this winds me up so much, it just does. Yes, Angus has fantastic, wall-splitting, super hard-working sperm. We do actually know this, because unlike most men that get to imbibe too much beer and grope the Mrs before landing a little Budweiser Junior in the hot pocket, Angus was offered a sad choice of porn (including, he says, some car magazines, which I find all kinds of strange) and a tupperware container (I begged him to stick his head out the door and shout an inquiry as to if they had any Asian porn, but he refused). So Angus does actually know how his little guys are doing, since we got a print-out result of it.

This is some of the following used to assess an acceptable sperm analysis (as according to the World Health Organization):

Volume:
2.0 mL or more

Total Sperm Count:
40 x 106 spermatozoa per ejaculate or more

pH:
7.2 or higher

Sperm Concentration:
20 x 106 spermatozoa / mL or more

Motility:
50% or more motile (grade a+b) or 25% or more with progressive motility (grade a) within 60 minutes of ejaculation.

Morphology:
WHO Criteria for assessing normal sperm morphology defines the following:
Head:The head should be oval and smooth. Round, pyriform, pin, double and amorphous heads are all abnormal.
Midpiece: The midpiece should be straight and slightly thicker than the tail.
Tail:The tail should be single, unbroken, straight and without kinks or coils.
A minimum of 100 sperm must be counted that qualify the above criteria.

Vitality:
50% or more live.

Also, you shouldn't have any pus in the sperm.

That totally makes you want to swallow, I know.

Angus met the criteria. It's gotta be pretty nerve-wracking for a guy to hear how many sperm were present, how many of them were lazy couch potatoes and how many of them were short bus. But my guy, he exceeded the norms, which for a 45 year-old has to feel pretty good (or for a guy of any age, really).

But upon finding out that I'm packing twins, the general response from my colleagues and, indeed, from pretty much most of the men we know, is this:

Duuuuuuuuuude! Way to go, Angus!

Excuse me? What, it's all thanks to the amazing sexual potency of the man? Do people think his semen has the high velocity impact of a fire hose and I am helplessly plowed into the wall when he ejaculates? No one seems to give a shit about the male aptitude when a woman has a single baby, why is it such a big deal when there are multiples?

I've heard it again and again from other men (Angus, thankfully, is not of the "It's all down to me" category). "Tell him great work!" or "He's really a man's man!" or other such comments along similarly chauvinistic lines.

Let's do a little bit of biology, shall we?

Say I was carrying identical twins (which I'm not). You know how many of Angus' Super Grip Action Men would be used in the fertilization process? One. One single determined sperm. True, the egg would be under attack from lots of swimmers, but two kids will come out of one sperm. It's the embryo that divides (generally speaking. There is an occurance called semi-identical twins, which takes two sperm and one egg, but it's extremely rare).

In that scenario, then, it's my body's contribution that does all the work.

So in our case of fraternal twins-to have our two babies, we need two sperm. Yes, again, there are 400,000 billion all having a stag do in my uterus (or, in our case, a petri dish). But only two are actually used. And as far as eggs go you need two of those as well. So we have equal contributions to what's happening.

In other words, Angus' sperm hasn't rocked the fertility world any more than my eggs have done.

Yet for men this is not essential information. It doesn't matter that good egg quality is a very important issue, too. I am the innocent bystander, the recipient of the incredible fecundity known as the male reproductive system. I am lucky I can catch his virility in a bucket, I guess. Color me blessed.

It's true that almost no one in our real life knows we've been through IVF, and I don't really see that it's any of their business, either. And it's true-my eggs this time were a bit shite (we donated 4 to another woman and so far we're too chicken to find out if it worked for her. The last time we donated eggs the woman didn't get pregnant and I was pretty cut up with guilt about that.) It's true that Angus' sperm were "washed", a process in which only the best and the brightest were presented to my 10 pack-a-day smoker eggs and his Head Boys had to do a lot of work. But I'm a bit pissed off at the resounding good ol' boy back-slapping going on with regards to sperm acknowledgements. Yes, Angus is a great man. Yes, his sperm can unite villages in remarkable peace processes.

But it took two to tango.

I asked my therapist about this, not because I had any emotional angst about this, but because I couldn't figure out what the fuck was up with the "Way to go, Angus!" remarks.

My therapist - a nice older man with 5 grown children of his own - offered me this:

"I know you're not going to like this, and unlike all the other things we talk about, this has no basis in psycholigical analysis or depth. The reason men react that way to Angus has one explanation only-it's because we're men. Generally speaking, we don't do well with emotional situations like this. While women celebrate the pregnancy, men have to connect on a level that other men understand."

"So it's just basically because 'boys will be boys'?" I ask. I wonder if this is when I start practicing my shebonics and burning my bras in protest. I wonder if I can start educating the men around me or, failling that, if a good smack will do the job.

"Sorry, but yes," he replies. "This is how a lot of men relate to each other, you can't change it."

So I guess I'll have to start working on just accepting that this, this is going to be the male reaction to the rest of my pregnancy and, I assume, the rest of our twins' lives. Good thing I love Angus a lot, otherwise the temptation to shout that it's not all about his sperm would be overwhelming.

Today I'm 18 weeks pregnant with the magical love sperm that Angus donated to my egg basket.

I'm doing well so far.

When people ask when I'm due, I tell them that foaling season starts beginning October.

I find that very funny.

So far I'm alone in finding that very funny, but I'll let you know how I get on with that.

-H.

Posted by: Everydaystranger at 07:24 AM | Comments (15) | Add Comment
Post contains 1851 words, total size 10 kb.

1 Helan... You have in your lap (literally something you've sought after for a long time.. You have THE home... dogs,cats, cool stepkids, that nice male fellow, and now your own... ::Huzzah!!:: Not only do you probably own every children's movie worth watching... you are a caring loving person who will be your kids favorite person (excluding ages 2-3 and 13-1 in the world..

Posted by: LarryConley at May 30, 2007 10:56 AM (ntinS)

2 Oh I'm not too angry, honest. And I owe a huge portion of my children's films (and gratitude!) to you and your nice post surprises

Posted by: Helen at May 30, 2007 11:05 AM (2nilo)

3 LOL. That is funny. I think its ok for the one going to give birth to say it. But I think if someone had posed the question (say in my eighth month) in that manor, I might have smacked them lol. Oh and when I was pregnant, people really couldn't tell until I was well into my seventh month. But oy,then I really showed! I am so glad that everything is going well with you!

Posted by: justme at May 30, 2007 11:08 AM (PLhEU)

4 One of Adam's co-workers, upon hearing we were pregnant, slapped him on the back and said: "Way to go! Must have been a little extra thrust thrown in there, huh buddy!?" Uh.

Posted by: Teresa at May 30, 2007 01:09 PM (TKarh)

5 People say all sorts of stupid things when they find out you're pregnant, like, "Whatsamatta honey, doncha have a television set?!" or "Don't you know what causes that?" But the one I failed to heed and have ringing through my head when I look at my almost-grown kids was, "Enjoy it now, it'll be over before you know it!" So that's my advice to you. One moment they're born and you're exhausted with keeping up with their needs, then you're teaching them their colors and abc's and numbers, then you're holding them close as they get their first teenage heartbreak then you're watching them graduate. All the time your head is spinning, where did the time go? Parenthood--it's the most wonderfully heartbreaking joyous exhausting thing ever. You'll love it!

Posted by: Julie at May 30, 2007 01:42 PM (2TlT5)

6 Just wait. After their born, you'll get a whole other class of stupid remarks about twins. My brother and I are boy/girl twins, yet I can't tell you how many times we've been asked if we're identical twins. I always offer to draw people a picture to illustrate exactly WHY we can't be identical. I also get the "Can you feel it when he gets hurt?" question a lot too, which I just roll my eyes at.

Posted by: geeky at May 30, 2007 02:50 PM (ziVl9)

7 That was hilarious. I love the names you gave the spermies. And justme is right. Your first baby(ies) dont't show up on the Goodyear Meter because you have really strong muscles that haven't stretched to hell and back. Yet. I remember that, by the time I was pregnant with the third baby, I popped out in a manner of weeks. Call it "muscle memory" if you will. In my case, it was more along the lines of "flabby," but the other sounds better. Aheh.

Posted by: Margi at May 30, 2007 03:38 PM (qd89Z)

8 Too funny. My favorite comment when I announced to my parents I was pregnant (with my third) was "just like bunnies"... Thanks. Really. They didn't say anything when I had my fourth. Glad to hear all is going well. I think guys make those comments just because they're jealous. YOU get to actually carry the baby... they feel they are missing out.

Posted by: sue at May 30, 2007 04:54 PM (WbfZD)

9 "You'd better sleep now, while you still can!" GAH! People said that to me when I was preggers too, along with, "enjoy your time in the hospital because you'll be happy somebody else is taking care of the baby." Okay, One) I hated them saying that more than biting the inside of my mouth accidentally and making it bleed, and, Two) It's not true; I did get sleep at home with my new baby, even if it was at odd times while I got NO sleep AT ALL in the damn hospital. Plus, I WANTED to take care of my own baby! I hated the hospital staff doing it. So there. GAh. People are stupid. As for guys bragging...I chalk that up to the fact they can't get pregnant; they have to have SOMETHING to crow about, you know? So they talk about their dicks and their sperm. It's all they've got, yanno?

Posted by: The other Amber at May 30, 2007 07:40 PM (zQE5D)

10 I can attest to the fact that Margi's #3 made his presence known Very early! And you made ME laugh with the foaling thing.

Posted by: caltechgirl at May 30, 2007 11:06 PM (qPLLC)

11 this entry was pure genius! thanks for making me laugh out loud!

Posted by: SuperSarah at May 31, 2007 01:01 AM (udcGR)

12 Eh, you don't sleep that much in the beginning, but the good thing is that you'll be off, and you both work from home most of the time anyway, so you'll be able to sleep in shifts to a point and yeah, after about three months, give or take, they'll be sleeping in bigger chunks. The bad thing is, the first few weeks seem to crawl, the good thing is, after that it seems to go by at warp speed. That said, I don't think I ever will sleep again, at least not without the help of narcotics, but that's just me. And no matter what people tell you, you'll definitely sleep better right after they're born than you will in the third trimester. The third trimester can suck my fat cock.

Posted by: statia at May 31, 2007 01:18 AM (LxnAA)

13 Well, I think it's funny too. My daughter has twins (now age 11) and they are fabulous - and worth all the jokes and having to listen to idiots who say stupid stuff about sperm, and all that. I am so pleased for you!! Happy 18 weeks!!

Posted by: kenju at May 31, 2007 04:28 AM (DBvE5)

14 Hi Helen! My sister had twins through IVF in 2002, a boy and a girl who are now 4 and totally insane and lovely. She said the same thing, since not a lot of people know she had IVF she got (and still gets) that wide range of comments. The worst one according to her is "do twins run in your family??!" That one drives her crazy! When she simply states that yes, her husband's mother was a twin, they argue about the twins gene being passed down through the mother's side. So then she finally has to go into detail about her IVF (and that's normally to total strangers!) So, in short, you'll get those comments forever!

Posted by: Juls at May 31, 2007 06:33 AM (3ouud)

15 Funny how when things go well in this department the guy gets the credit, but when they don't it's automatically assumed it's a problem with the woman. Humph. I think people say stupid things because they can't think of anything else to say other than what they've heard already. There is a serious lack of creativity in this world. Loved this post, H.

Posted by: Donna at June 02, 2007 01:51 AM (lQSbL)

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