When I tried IVF a while back, I dreaded the shots and surgeries, but I also felt some relief — relief that I wouldn't need to have sex to get pregnant. I know, that sounds horrible. It's not that I don't like sex. I love a good roll in the hay when it's lusty and spontaneous, or even just lazy and comforting. Procreative sex is a whole other story.
We've been trying to conceive a second child for more than two years now, and other than our failed forays into IVF, most months we've tried the old fashioned way. Well, technology-assisted old fashioned: I use a ClearBlue Easy digital monitor that detects my most fertile days — usually the five days leading up to ovulation and then the two days when the egg is actually present. So that's like seven days in a row when I feel obligated to have sex, which is about six days in a row too many.
As parents to a high-energy 3-year-old whose bedtime has been sliding perilously close to ours, finding energy for intimacy is challenging. We do not have a lot of time for preliminaries like flirting, foreplay or grooming. Often, we have to just cut to the chase: Wham, bam, thank you, sperm! Then, after the mid-month shagging spree, we basically go on sex fast because we overdid it and before you know it I'm ovulating again. Romantic, huh?
…mandatory intercourse for the sole purpose of baby-making can really take the wind out of anyone's sails.
Not that it's horrible — like mediocre pizza, even perfunctory sex is still pretty good. I'll never stop thinking my husband is a hottie, even when I'm tired and cranky. But by the time I ovulate, I am so OVER IT and you know what? He is too. I always thought a man would take sex anytime, anywhere, any way he could get it, but it turns out that planned, mandatory intercourse for the sole purpose of baby-making can really take the wind out of anyone's sails.
Lately, it's occurred to me that maybe we're trying too hard. I think most doctors would agree that timing sex every other day is sufficient (say, days 11, 13 and 15). That sounds more manageable to me, and less obsessive. (I'm recalling the time he had a 101 fever and we plowed on — pun intended — anyway. E for effort, though.)
Also, I think I need to remember to throw my husband a good one when we're outside my fertile window, just so he knows that I still want him for him and not just his genetic material. Infertile sex would be so scandalous, it might just be sexy.
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Plus, I'm thinking I should ban the following words from the bedroom: egg, sperm, cervix, mucus, ovulating and "I'm so not in the mood but let's do this." That is not good dirty talk and I know it.
I'm going to work on it. You'll know I've succeeded if I publish a new post on mom.com called "Tips for Keeping It Hot While You're Trying for a Baby."
I'll let you know how it goes.
