Man Surgery Explained

June 24th, 2009

Shelton and I received our packet in the mail from his surgeon, the urologist, Dr. G., tonight. Inside was a stack of paperwork with instructions for the weeks and day leading up to his surgery. He can’t take anything that relieves pain, basically. No eating the night before. Abstinence for about five days prior. Pretty standard stuff. He and I both have required labs for HIV and Hepatitis that we’re taking care of on Monday.

I was kind of shocked to read that the surgery could take four hours. And the following conversation took place over dinner:

Me: Four hours is a long time. None of my surgeries ever took four hours.

Him: Take a lap top, you’ll be there for a while. This is going to suck balls.

Me: Ha… Ha…. you said suck balls. And your surgery will literally be…

Him: Nice one!

If you can’t have an immature puntastic laugh once in a while and share it with the Internet, what fun is this anyway?!

Here is my VERY layman’s attempt to explain the surgery. The purpose is to obtain the sperm, since they don’t have any other way out. (Basically has a natural vasectomy.) They’ll make a small incision in the aforementioned body part, insert a small “vacuum,” and draw out the sperm. A rep from the fertility clinic will be on hand to assess the quality of the sperm, and Shelton will remain “open” the entire time. They will not “close” until they are certain they have everything they need.

This will also be the first time we’ve ever seen his sperm sample, so fingers crossed we’ve got a few Michael Phelps swimmers in there!

Surgery takes place July 14; also that morning I take my very first shot of Lupron. What a really fun day that’s going to be!! Maybe we’ll go to Home Depot and Bed Bath and Beyond too if we have time!

In our original estimates, this surgery was supposed to cost us about $7,000 (out of pocket). The bill we received today (as everything has to be paid in advance) totals $4,467 (out of pocket). More unexpected savings making our total investment $3,000 less than originally expected.

See here for a running total of our IVF expenses.

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