Alternative Methods Part 1.......or.......What I will try in order to avoid IVF

Earlier today, I was thinking about how it's important to keep a keep a glass-half-full kind of mindset when faced with fertility issues.  I started thinking back on all the things we tried in the 2 1/2 years leading up to our decision to do IVF.  One night in particular came to mind and I thought it would be good to share.......you know, so everyone could have a good laugh!

So I had read on various online message boards that some women had conceived using Instead Cups.  What is an Instead Cup?  It's a small, malleable rubber cup that's sold next to the tampons and can be used in place of tampons - you squeeze the cup and put in inside your vagina, up against your cervix, and take it out and dump it when it gets full.  It's also been suggested that if you put your partner's ejaculate in it and place it up against your cervix, the alkaline sperm will be able to jump right into your cervix, bypassing the acidic vagina.  What the hell.......let's try it!

Wanting to get the sperm in there as quick as possible (though I've read that sperm can continue to remain viable outside the body for up to an hour or so), I have the Instead Cup in my hand as I, *ahem*, stimulated him orally.  As he tells me we are nearing "go time" (I'm trying to keep this as non-dirty as possible, people!), somehow the Cup flies out of my hand and disappears under the couch!  I dive under the couch and locate it, only to sit back up and realize that I've missed the finale.  No worries - we scoop it in the Cup and I put it in place.

Obviously, since I'm writting this blog, this method did not work for us.  I have serious doubts that it works for anyone, even those who claim that it did.  For couples who have no fertility issues, there is about a 25% chance each month that conception can occur.  I think the couples who claim this method works had simply won their game of chance in the lottery of conception, little plastic cup or no little plastic cup.

Oh, alternative methods of conception, I'm not done with your tales yet!