Papa and Daddy and Babies in Alaska

Excerpts
Chapter "The Quest": On Thursday, December 12, 2002, in Los Angeles, it all came together. The egg donor flew in to have her eggs harvested. She yielded twenty-three eggs, a bountiful haul! John and I flew in to donate sperm. We overheard some whispering among the clerks. "Should we put them in one room or two?" one asked the other. "Separate rooms!" came the reply. Heaven forbid we should have any fun while masturbating!
    So into separate rooms we went. My room had a sofa covered with a big sheet of paper. It had a TV and a VCR and two boxes. One box said "Hetero"; the other said "Same Sex." I opened the "Same Sex" box... It was empty! Was this a cruel joke? I opened the "Hetero" box. It was full of straight porn magazines. Gulp. I opened the cabinet beneath the TV and found various videos. They weren't labeled. I tried one after the other -- all straight porn. I have to do this, I told myself. So I closed my eyes and thought of John Ashcroft.


Chapter "Breathless": Turning Zola over is not as easy as it sounds. Zola and Veronica are just like foot-long, bony beanbags. To turn them over, you've got to draw their knees and arms to their chests and turn them rotisserie-style so that their heads remain even with their bodies. You've also go to manage the various wires and tubes and CPAP nozzles that are attached to, or inserted into, their bodies. Then you arrange them comfortably in their new position and ensure that they stay that way with the help of "bendies" and "frogs." A bendy is a cloth-covered, padded tube with wire in it, which stays in whatever shape you bend it (usually a U), with the baby's head sticking out the top of the U. A frog is an actual beanbag with four "legs" radiating out from the center, which you place around the baby's head to hold it in position. In this way, you've formed a comfortable nest. Lisa's so adept at turning Zola over, she makes it look as easy as a fast-food burger flip. I, however, was terrified I would flub, Zola would flop, and Lisa would flip.

Chapter "Heinous Anus": Ann told me that there is a nerve that runs from your throat all the way to your anus, and if you gag hard enough, the nerve can be so stimulated such that you can pass out, and in preemies this is easier to trigger, and it can be a cause of the incidents. While she's telling me this, my mind is trying to relate it to something I know and understand, and I immediately think of Dr. Seuss's fantastical creatures, in particular, a lion with a very, very long tail. Now, this lion's tail is so long that he can use it as an alarm clock. At night before he goes to bed, he bites the tip of his tail, and the tail is so long that it takes all night for his nerves to carry the pain impulse from the tip of his tail to the pain receptor in his brain. He registers the pain in the morning and wakes up. [Silly me, it's not a lion at all-- it's a Chippendale Mupp, of course, from Dr. Seuss's Sleep Book.] My brain is skipping around in Dr. Seuss land, twirling its forefinger through its golden locks of hair, thinking about the long, long nerve wending its way from the throat, down the stomach, along the large intestine, to the small intestine, and ending up at the anus, when suddenly I realize that I'm supposed to be paying attention to Ann, and I snap my brain back from Dr. Seuss.
Note: John corrects Gary's error in anatomay later in the book.

Chapter "Nick-U": Before John and I first came up here, I had never heard of the acronym NICU. When I got here, I pronounced it "KNEE-coo," as if it were the diminutive of Nicolai, and the nurses looked at me as if I had just flown in from Romania. When John pronounced it, he (like everyone else) pronounced it "Nick-U." Yes, I feel as though I'm attending Nick-U, or Nickelodeon University. Like the TV channel of the same name, it's kid-centric. Nick-U does have a serious side, but we do have time for fun between classes. Classes are impromptu and intense (for me), in which I ask questions and get answers, or the nurses simply offer information and explanations, or I listen in on conversations between caregivers. I can repeat a class as often as I like, and no one gets impatient with me (to my face, at least!). The nurses, doctors, respiratory therapists, physical therapists, nutritionists, lab techs, and social workers are there to ensure that we graduate. When John and I graduate, we will be sent home with the most precious gift imaginable: our daughters, and the knowledge and ability to give them the care that they need.