[*Mommy2Remington*]

So, as we approach cycle 15- I thought to myself "What if DHs sperm count never reaches its potential of makin' babies?" What would we do?
DH and I have always said we will adopt!!! We don't hesitate about it knowing that we will do anything we can to be parents. We actually have a 4 year mark - if we aren't preg by the 4 year mark, we'll start the adoption process. But one other option crossed my mind today and it was 'donor sperm'. I thought it would be "next to the best" decision" because I will still be able to experience being pregnant and giving birth.
Well, when I approached DH with that option, he well, he freaked!!! He said NO right away!! What the heck!! I was taken back by his answer. I thought at least he would think about it for awhile or that we would discuss it before he told me his answer. I started explaining my argument saying " I would get to experience being pregnant, every womens dream! I would get to give birth to OUR child"
I think the fact that I would give birth to a baby that wasnt his freaks him out but theres really no differance between adopting and sperm donor because either way, it wouldn't be his sperm" I don't know what to say to ease his mind about. He got pretty frustrated about it and told me he didn't want to talk about it anymore.
Any ideas or hints on how to ease DH into feeling okay with the idea of donor sperm? If we did donor sperm, it wouldn't be for a few years and hopefully we woudln't even have to do it. but I would still like it to be an option....Its ALOT cheaper then adoption....

[christylovesherbaby]

Keri, I approached my DH with this when we were first dealing with MFI, and he was so not okay with it. I argued what you just said...an adopted child wouldnt have his sperm either. I really wanted to experience being pregnant, and delivering a baby, and I just gave him time to digest the idea, and brought up again little by little. Eventually he agreed with me...I felt that if I was blessed with a functional uterus, I wanted to try to use it. We got lucky, in that IVF with ICSI with DH sperm accomplished the goal.

I say, just give him some time to process the idea. Bring it up in a few months, and I'll bet he will begin to see the other side of the coin. Of course, hopefully you get that beautiful BFP before that.

Keri I was on the other side of being ok with donor sperm. When we first found out about Adam's 0 sperm count, I was devastated and thought we would never be parents. I didn't want any part of a baby that wasn't mine AND Adam's. It took me a lot of thinking and processing and I'm still not sure I'm 100% ok with the idea of donor sperm, but DH has been on board with it 100% since day 1. I think after the failed IVF cycle and if the Clomid doesn't work I will be ready for it, but right now thinking about moving to donor sperm feels like I'm giving up on Adam's sperm. I don't know that that is how your DH feels at all, but give it some time and I think once you both reach your breaking point with ttc it'll be worth bringing up again. I never thought when I started ttc I would do IVF, I figured I would try Clomid if it was absolutely necessary but that was the line. The further you go into ttc the further that line seems to go too! So just because he says no now, doesn't mean he'll say no later.

I hope you get your BFP waaaay before thinking about donor sperm again though!!

[BeckyM]

With us, DH is the one who brought it up first, and that is what we ended up doing to get pg with our son. In our case, DH has zero spermies, so we have absolutely no chance of having a biological child from both of us. Perhaps that is the difference in his reaction versus what others may be feeling. I don't know.

I hope you don't need to go this route, but if you do perhaps you can use what my DH & I researched and made our decision on in your conversation with DH. So for us, we ended up looking at it as me being the birth mother - and we would know ALL my family history and that I got excellent prenatal care for the entire pg. and with the donor as the birth father, we got alot more info then we would have with adoption.

We looked at both adoption and donor sperm. Either way, we knew that we would be parents and just need to take different roads then most to get there. With adoption, we'd found that you oftentimes don't get alot of information on the birth father, and sometimes very little on the mother. You also have inconsistencies in the amount of prenatal care the mother received during the pg too. Sometimes it was wonderful, othertimes not as much. When we started researching donor sperm, using a bank, we found that you end up with alot of information about the donor. This will vary depending on the bank you use, but you typically receive a detailed medical history form going back several generations as well as other relevant info (hobbies, traveling outside country, occupation, etc.).

And I can say that in this pregnancy, you would never know that my DH wasn't the biological father. He's been to practically every doc appt with me, he's loved my growing body - will rub my belly, sings & talks to Mark, and Mark is going to be named after his Dad. We're even talking about having 1 more child, and hope to use the same donor. DH has even put in his "wish" of having a girl next time. I reminded him there were no guarantees of that.

I can't predict the future obviously, and do sometimes worry about answering questions later on (we do plan on telling our children), what the child will look like, how he'll react with the news, etc., but I also know that this baby is loved by both of us very much and he'll never doubt that. I've also been in touch with other women who have used the same donor, and may even meet up with at least one of them who by coincidence lives not to far from us. Our child will have half siblings out in this world, and I admit it is a strange feeling, but overall I also feel it is a blessing too.