We gave our pram away.

I love to hear birth stories. That was by far and away the most interesting session in the early nurse-supervised-days of our Mother's Group, where we all got to sit round and find out about everyone's different labours and deliveries. (Although, the Baby First Aid session was also fairly memorable; shouting WAKE UP BABY at a rubber baby doll before attempting CPR on it whilst simultaneously praying that I never had to do that to a real child.) Every birth story is so very different, even if you have the same circumstances as someone else, such as emergency caesar or VBAC or whatever. I'm always willing to hear the full blow-by-blow account and will gasp sympathetically at the appropriate moments.

Anyway, this week Fixit and I discovered a similarly fascinating type of story - the Vasectomy Story. I was under the impression that men didn't really discuss their vasectomies. You know the way men all wince in sympathy when you take the family pet to be neutered? As if the mere thought of any pain or damage to the family jewels was too terrible to be considered? This behaviour led me to suppose, mistakenly, that men didn't like to even think about, let alone discuss, assaults on the meat & two veg. Apparently, however, undergoing vasectomy is more on par with childbirth. In that It's Fun To Share!

We've heard about elephantitis. And bruising. Of days and days of pain. (And days and days of whingeing if you hear the wife's version.) Of tear-filled eyes upon first sitting astride the motorbike an entire week afterwards. It's all been very interesting.

Going ...

I therefore feel that I can share with you all the fact that Fixit was Done last Friday. I may as well tell everyone here, it's been a very public vasectomy for the poor man. All the blokes at his work know, as do all my friends, our newsagent and our chiropractor. So far I've held off on telling my Tap Students but I wouldn't put it past me.

Going ...

True to form, Fixit was incredibly stoic and made no fuss at all. I was the one getting all twittery in the lead-up, no doubt making it worse for him by regularly asking him if he was sure he wasn't nervous. I had to restrain myself from giving him reassuring pats on the bollocks. He said once you've seen your bone sticking out of your leg, a simple surgical procedure (even one that involves needles directly into highly sensitive areas) doesn't seem too dramatic. The whole thing took 30 minutes which included paying the bill. The only moment of drama came when Fixit instinctively braced as the first needle approached, whereupon the surgeon said very sternly "Don't kick me! I've got an open needle in my hand and you wouldn't want it going into the wrong place, now, would you?" Fixit said he wondered to himself where on his body could possibly be worse than the area for which it was heading. The only place he could think of was the eyeball.

Gone.

He was advised to make me wait on him hand and foot on Friday night, which pretty much happened. And he told me at about 8pm that what he really felt like was a glass (or 2 or 3) of scotch (sadly we had none), but that was as pathetic as he got. There has been some swelling, nothing scary though. He was a bit slower around the house over the weekend, but still participated willingly in chores such as dish-washing, clothes-washing and yard-clearing, as well as the fun stuff like visits and cafe brunches. There was no need for pain-killers or frozen peas. Sure he drank red wine every night but then so did I.

The worst part of it has been the news that it will take at least 8 weeks before we can really relax about the whole contraception thing. So the night away from the kids, staying in a hotel (his sister's forthcoming wedding) isn't going to be quite as much fun as I'd thought...