Do You Have A Memorable Phone Call?

SEPTEMBER 1996

As I pack for my trip to France, the place where I will surely be implanted, the phone rings. After three rings I decide to answer. A serious yet deeply breathy tone responds to my Hello.

“This is Gayle returning your call.”

“Gayle? Gayle. Oh, yes, hello.”

(I had called a support group for infertile women.)

Without my prompting, Gayle jumps into her personal infertility woes.

“I know what you’re going through. I tried to get pregnant for eight years and had three failed adoptions.

“Gosh, that’s awful,” I say, realizing my emphatic response could have been interpreted as, “That’s the worst story I’ve ever heard!” and I’m now embarrassed by my own prenatal fanaticism. It’s only been a year for us.

“What’s your next step?” I say lightly, trying to soften my previous exasperation.

“That’s it. There is no next step. My husband and I have come to terms with the fact that we may never be parents.”

My mouth goes dry. The idea of giving up, of being forever childless, never entered my mind. That there are parentless children in the world I can’t imagine Gayle’s end could be her resolve. And here I’ve been whining about a measly year of non-expectancy, yet she’s there anyway, at the other end, ready to listen and help others.

“Are you willing to take fertility drugs?” she says.

“I haven’t come to—“

“Are you insured?”

“I’m not sure if—“

“Because you know most insurance companies don’t cover fertility treatments. Our organization helps people like yourself gain access to the drugs. One of our volunteers goes to Mexico once a month and smuggles Perganol back into the states. We know we’re risking prosecution, but we feel it’s for a good cause.” Then it occurs to her, “How long have you been trying?”

I was hoping she wouldn’t ask. I’m ashamed to answer. My scraped knee seems minor juxtapose her broken ribs, so I say it as though it were a question, “A year?”

Gayle is quiet for the first time in our conversation, so I continue to babble over a potentially judgy reaction from her, “I know it hasn’t been eight, but—“

“Doesn’t matter,” she breaks in, “Pain can’t be weighed, desperation-- measured. You wouldn’t have called if you weren’t feeling the sting.”

“Yeah, yeah, it’s been really hard, really—“

“Why do you want children so urgently?”

I pause because I’ve never actually answered that question for myself.

“I don’t know,” I say weakly. “It’s natural, isn’t it?”

“But it’s not natural to call a support group unless there was some private hopelessness.”

“Yeah,” I say, still bland in thought.

“For some, the reason is shallow. Their friends are getting pregnant before them; they want to catch up. It becomes a competitive game. For others it’s deeper. It emerges from their upbringing, their own parents, or lack thereof.”

“That’s what it is,” I say. “Family. I want a functional family of my own.”

“It’s good to be clear.”

A suspended moment in our conversation seems to be the cutoff point of this pseudo therapy session. I’m reassured for now and I tell her, “I appreciate you talking to me and—“

“You know you can get more involved in our organization,” she says, her tone now hardened by a new agenda.

“Involved?”

“We’re picketing tomorrow if you’d like to join us.”

“Picketing?”

“You have a disease!” she says almost shouting.

“What?”

“Infertility is a disease. Anytime you have to take medication as a cure, you have a disease. But Infertility is not treated like a disease by our government, by the insurance community. We’re trying to get a bill passed that would make fertility treatments mandatory coverage by every health insurance organization across this country.”

I picture myself on the corner of Veteran and Wilshire Boulevard. Other would-be moms picketing, someone’s strumming the guitar, singing, “How Barren I Am,” and I’m handing out leaflets and collecting signatures so a bill can be passed, so I can someday run for Congress, start an Infertility Health Care Initiative... And then I remind myself, I don’t want to get into politics; I just want to get pregnant.

“I can’t,” I say.

“Uh huh.”

“I’m taking my car in,” I lie.

“Oh,” she says knowing full well what it means to be without a car in LA.

“But thanks.”

“Call me anytime,” she says.

“Ok.”

“I hope I was helpful.”

“Very.”

“You’ll get your family, Carissa,” she says and there is a hint in her voice that she hasn’t fully accepted her own, more limited-sized family.

“Thanks.”

But Gayle doesn’t want to end the call and has another agenda.

“If you have a boy will he be circumcised?”

“What? Uh, well, we’re Jewish, so—”

“So? I’m Jewish too. There are 613 laws in the Jewish religion. Does that mean you have to follow every single one?”

“I know that circumcising is in the top 12.”

“Parents these days are opting out. It’s no longer a health risk. There are studies about the benefits.”

I don’t respond because I really don’t want to argue with this woman who was helpful at the beginning of our conversation.

From my silence, Gayle senses that the discussion is over.

“Well, read up, think about it.”

I hang up and head towards our attic crawl space, my hands shaking as I pull out our suitcases. A functional family. That’s what I want. That’s my desperation.

I mull over our dialogue and realize I am clear on something else. If I am ever blessed with a son, I will keep politics away from his penis.

Let’s chat!

Do you have a memorable phone call or convo that you can share?

Do you have a photo where you were the only one who wanted to be goofy?