Well, after our inital tortoise-like pace, our meeting with the consultant had felt like a new beginning, like things would suddenly shoot forwards… Sadly that wasn’t the case. Having been told that he would send out a letter to ourselves and our GP surgery, instructing them to begin our fertility tests, we heard nothing further.

After a month Chris tried to get in contact with the consultant, but we didn’t have his email or phone number, so in the end we had to contact the children’s hospital, and hope they got back to us. While our email didn’t get a reply, it must have hit the mark, as a week later we got a letter, as did the surgery.

For Chris, his fertility tests are relatively straightforward. He was sent a sample cup and a sheet to fill out and return with some of his semen. One small hiccup in this was that the dog, who has a particular penchant for cardboard, decided to nibble away at the cardboard box the sample tube was in, and at the same time ripped up the sheet Chris needed to fill out.

A very embarrassed Chris then had to phone up for a replacement sheet, which he claimed to have lost. He didn’t feel telling them that the dog ate it would sound believable.

Knowing that his part to play was relatively small, Chris sat on his task for several months, only ringing up to book once my tests had started. Unfortunately, it then turned out that the next date for bringing in samples was at the end of June, so it seems that I might actually be finished before him, though I still have a way to go.

For me, there’s a big list of tests needing to be completed. While we’ll both contribute 50% of the DNA, my body is the one that will have to carry the baby for its first 9 months. So although I don’t have any known issues, it makes sense that when they’re spending all this money ensuring the ingredients are right, they also want to know the oven works.

I know for a lot of women this can feel very dehumanising and uncomfortable, being constantly poked and prodded. For me, I’m seeing it as a bit of a free MOT, although I would prefer it if there weren’t quite so many needles.

After our GP had received their letter, we were told to wait a few days and then call up. The problem is our GP surgery has a long-term staffing issue, and getting through to them on the phone can be next to impossible. However, to my surprise, someone from the surgery actually rang up and left me a special number to call to jump the queue.

Ringing them back I was told I would need to go to the Women’s clinic in the next village over, in a month’s time. I was a little surprised that I’d need to wait so long, but simply thought that was how it needed to be done.

A month later and one of our two cars became faulty and undriveable. Chris headed to work in our other car, and I reminded myself I needed to get to my appointment later that day… in the next village over. I suddenly realised my mistake. Normally my appointments are in the surgery in the same village, and I just walk there, but I couldn’t walk to this one, and now I didn’t have a car.

Having checked the very sparse bus timetable I realised I could get there but I wouldn’t be able to get back for five hours. So I decided to ring a taxi. Having booked the journey (at £24 for a 5-minute ride there and back) I realised Chris had also gone off with my wallet, and I didn’t have any way to pay. In a panic I messaged my parents, no reply. My siblings, no reply. My best friend, no reply. Chris’s mum, no reply. In an age where everyone is constantly on their phones, I seemed to have needed a hand at the one moment everyone decided to go technology free.

Finally, my brother, thinking I was a scam, rang me up to find out what I needed. Getting him to pay for the taxi I could finally get to my appointment.

Walking into the nurse’s office I expected this to be the place where I would finally get some answers about what my fertility tests would involve. Except… the nurse didn’t know who I was or why I was there…

It turned out no one had thought to discuss my fertility tests with the nurse who would be undertaking them. Tutting, and saying something about the system not having any information on me, she asked what day I was on on my period. I said I’d finished last week. ‘Well,’ she said with a sigh, ‘we can’t do anything today then.’

It turns out the blood tests need to be taken on the 2nd and 21st day of your cycle. So I hadn’t needed to wait a month at all, I’d just needed to ring up on the second day of my period and book in my blood test, in my village, without a £24 fee.

To make the journey a little more purposeful the nurse decided to take a vaginal swab, to assess whether there were any Sexually Transmitted Diseases. As my smear was up to date, she said I didn’t need this particular test. As many STDs can cause fertility problems, it made sense to check for these at this stage.

As is the way with the smear test, I had to get undressed and get up onto the trolly bed, so she could take a sample, which she bottled up and sent off, telling me I would need to ring up to get the result, and then book in my blood test when I was ready.

Cut to several weeks later and I rang up to book in my bloods. I was very relieved when I started my period on a midweek day, with a clear work diary the day after. It had been very possible my second day could have fallen on a weekend, when the surgery would have been closed, or on a day when back-to-back meetings prevented me from getting there.

Having had all of my immunisations and vaccines over the years I’m very used to getting stabbed with a needle. I don’t like it, but I’m happy to put up with it when needed. However, vaccines shots tend to be in the upper arm, whereas blood samples are taken from the crook of the elbow. And it is so much more painful.

Chris has very little sympathy with the pain of getting bloods taken, in part because he has to have regular blood samples taken every three months to ensure his kidneys are functioning well. But he also claims the vaccine in the upper arm is more painful than a blood sample.

A few years ago I tried to give blood, but was told my veins were too small, and they wouldn’t be able to extract any blood from them. I don’t know if this has something to do with why it’s so unpleasant giving a blood sample but I certainly think it’s a step up from the normal needle stabbings.

In my first test, the nurse showed me a long list of things they were testing for. Half of them I didn’t even recognise, but I didn’t want to waste her time by getting her to explain them all to me.

Having tested the blood, the nurse sent me a text the next day saying my iron levels were low and she’d left some iron tablets at the pharmacy for me to collect. Low iron is very common in women of childbearing age, in part because it’s lost during menstruation, and during pregnancy. Low iron levels can lead to tiredness, pale skin and shortness of breath.

I do feel tired a lot, but I think every adult I’ve ever spoken to says the same. I’ll be interested to see if the small brown pills, that I have to take three times a day, change that, but so far all they’ve done is messed with my bowel movements.

I find I forget to take the pills fairly regularly, again something I can’t complain to Chris about, as he has to take handfuls of pills at a time several times a day, and is very good at not forgetting them. Something that doesn’t help is that I’m not supposed to take the pills with milk, which binds to the iron. As I have cereal for breakfast this means I can’t take the pills when I get up, which then leads me to forget them later on.

Aside from the low iron, all my other tests came back normal. On the 21st day of the my cycle I returned for my second blood sample, which is soley for progesterone. Progesterone is a hormone that causes the lining of the womb to develop, making it a suitable environment for a fertilised egg. Testing on these two days of the cycle helps show the the progesterone cycle is functioning well.

I had a different nurse for this second test, a particularly grumpy one who stabbed one arm and failed to draw blood and then stabbed the other particularly painfully, leaving an impressive bruise.

Finally, my last test came back all clear. With the significance of these tests, and the potential information they held, it seemed odd only to get a ‘the notes say the test results are OK’, at the end of them, but I didn’t even know what questions I would ask if I could. Plus the surgery receptionist was unlikely to have known the answer.

With my blood work done I’ve been told I will have to go to the hospital next for a physical exam, though no one has told me if I need to book this, or what it involves. I do feel a little lacking in information, which would worry me less if I thought the people at the other end, controlling my schedule, had everything in hand.

I’ve asked for someone to get in contact to tell me what to do next, which they were supposed to do today, but I haven’t heard anything. I guess tomorrow I’ll have to chase them and hope that at some point the next tests will become a little clearer. With my last post having been in January, and this now being May, I don’t hold great hopes of things speeding up in this next stage.