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Forever a family of four

Where do I begin. Wait, let me check and see if I've had enough coffee... oh you shut it. I've already admitted that I continue to drink coffee while nursing. Just don't tell my mom about all that Mountain Dew. She'd FLIP.

So a few months ago, I'd say the morning we brought Marlo home, I told Jon that while I had enjoyed and would recommend having a natural childbirth, that I was in no way, under no circumstances, not ever, NUH UH, going to do it again. And that in order to make sure that the future played out in this exact way, he was going to have to hold up his end of the bargain. It was his turn. Dude needed to have a certain procedure taken care of, because I've heard that condoms and birth control are not one hundred percent effective, and you know what is? Say it with me conservative Christians: ABSTINENCE!

Related tangent: I don't know if I have told you this story before, but in Los Angeles I had a very close friend who'd grown up in Valdosta, Georgia, and every summer she attended Bible School at a local Baptist church, and they'd hold rallies for Jesus that included one group of children screaming, "WHEN I SAY JESUS, YOU SAY JESUS. SAY, 'JESUS!'" And then another group of children across the room would scream, "JESUS!" Kind of like cheerleaders at a football game, except Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ was the one passing the ball.

I don't know why I love that chant, but I do, I LOVE IT, maybe because Mormons would never participate in something so blatantly irreverent. You just can't go tossing around the Lord's name like that, haven't you read the ten commandments? I think it's the one right after THOU SHALT NOT DRINK COFFEE. Oh, wait. Wrong book. Doesn't matter. All I know is I love shouting JESUS! Almost as much as I love shouting SHINGLES!

So a couple of weeks ago Jon went in for a consultation with a urologist and saw some weird, funky movie starring men in very tight European shorts, apparently, I don't know, I wasn't there, I'll let him tell you that part of the story. And then yesterday we drove down to the same hospital where I delivered Marlo for his vasectomy. We'll get to that part in a second, but first, I cannot even begin to explain how nauseated I felt when we turned the corner and I saw that hospital. Like, hobo on a bourbon binge fell off the train and woke up naked next to the dumpster outside of IHOP nauseated.

Yes, this is now The Hobo Blog.

Because last time I was there I was having contractions so violent that I was certain I was going to look down and see that the lower half of my body had been ripped off all while Leta was in the back seat going WHY IS MOM MAKING THAT NOISE?! So when we pull into the parking lot I involuntarily turn toward the empty back seat and go MOMMY IS FINE! MOMMY IS FINE!

If THAT isn't a picture of someone perfectly sane.

So Jon is lying there on the operating table – hoo! I know I'm not a guy and I cannot relate, but if I had balls I think I'd rather not ever have them and the words OPERATING TABLE in the same sentence – nude from the waist down, and I'm sitting in a chair next to him, holding his hand, situated just enough below the table that I don't have to see anything. Because, you know, I'D LIKE TO SLEEP AT NIGHT.

And remember, Jon almost fainted once when a nurse approached him with a needle to draw his blood. Not when she put the needle in his arm. WHEN SHE WALKED UP TO HIM. So you can imagine the wincing and almost losing consciousness that was going on as the doctor prepped his tray full of scissors and scalpels and KNIVES AND GUNS AND GRENADES!

Jon is out of breath, sweating, clutching my hand, and I am doing everything I can not to laugh. Because the doctor has not even touched him yet. And I'm trying SO HARD to be the support that he needs when suddenly the doctor gently drops a wet, sanitary wipe directly ON THE AREA (notice: I have not once used the word NADS, BOW BEFORE MY RESTRAINT) and Jon jumps three feet into the air. Literally. Every limb of that 6' 3'' body came off that table. What did it look like? Remember when Kramer would clumsily open the door to Seinfeld's apartment? THAT.

And that doctor is all, DUDE, it was a napkin! OH MY GOD. I felt like I was trying to muffle my laughter during the eulogy at a funeral!

The cringing and flailing limbs continue as the doctor injects a local anesthetic ON THE AREA, and then when he performs the dreaded poke test Jon flatlines on the table. Dead. Gone. And then he suddenly comes back to life with a hearty WATCH IT, BUDDY!

That's exactly what he said. WATCH IT, BUDDY. And it seemed so appropriate, like, he couldn't have phrased it better, because when someone is holding a scalpel over your balls? What do you call him? STAN? JOE? NO. YOU CALL HIM BUDDY. Buddy and your balls. THE TWO GO TOGETHER.

I imagine Jon felt like he was staring at a gun and was trying to calm the mugger down. Like, buddy, listen. You have the rest of your life ahead of you, buddy. Please don't kill me. Here, take my wallet, buddy. Just leave me my balls.

And this is the part I will not ever forget, the best part, the climax of the vasectomy, no pun intended. Jon is going OW! OW! OW! STOP! OW! STOP! STOP! And the doctor holds up both hands, steps a foot away from the table, and goes I AM NOT EVEN TOUCHING YOU. He waves both hands in the air to prove it, and Jon feverishly looks up through the sweat that has now flooded his eyes and goes, "Oh. Okay."

And then I was done, I had my head between my knees and I let it all out, the laughing until I cried, the guffaws, I just couldn't hold it in any longer. My poor little bunny:

10.29.2009 Daily, Jon 341 comments

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  • Anonymous said:

    FIRST

    10.29.09 - 01:19 PM / 1
  • Daddy Scratches said:

    I know firsthand that there's nothing pleasant about getting a vasectomy ... but, good god, it is EVER SO MUCH BETTER than the fear of more children!

    (Frozen peas, Jon. Frozen peas.)

    10.29.09 - 01:19 PM / 2
  • Elinda said:

    Well, he deserves it after what he put you through! I'm not even taking my baby daddy to the doctor for the big V. I'm going to do it myself. With a steak knife.

    10.29.09 - 01:20 PM / 3
  • Emily said:

    that is HILARIOUS! i'm going to have my DH read this later. he just had his consultation yesterday and has the big "procedure" next month. i'll have to ask him about that video...

    10.29.09 - 01:21 PM / 4
  • Louise said:

    Wow, I am from Valdosta, Georgia and was raised Baptist. That really made my day. I always refused to participate in the chanting.

    10.29.09 - 01:21 PM / 5
  • Jasie VanGesen said:

    Best story ever.

    10.29.09 - 01:21 PM / 6
  • Sandi said:

    That was the best thing I've read in a long damn time! Thank you Jon for going through HELL so we could laugh at you!

    10.29.09 - 01:23 PM / 7
  • jennifer said:

    JESUS!

    10.29.09 - 01:24 PM / 8
  • Jillian said:

    Awwwww.....snip snip. Doesn't it make you just a little, eensy, weensy, bit sad?

    10.29.09 - 01:25 PM / 9
  • Jenn said:

    Oh Heather, I really needed that laugh this morning. Thank-you.

    Or should I thank Jon?

    10.29.09 - 01:25 PM / 10
  • Laurie said:

    I am so not letting my husband read this. He's NEEDS a vasectomy (read: I will not have a third child, and I will not take BC much longer) and he's more nervous than when they took him into the OR so he could donate a portion of his liver to our son. Sheesh!

    10.29.09 - 01:26 PM / 11
  • Katrina said:

    See I always viewed the shouting of "JESUS!" as something one might do after being hit with a baseball in the nuts, or say, during/after a vasectomy. Perhaps with the addition of "EFFING CHRIST!"

    Not something one would do just for THE HELL of it. Baptists are weird.

    10.29.09 - 01:27 PM / 12
  • Disposable Wombat said:

    My story....

    The whole procedure is done. Nothing but cleaning up. The nurse comes in with a silver spray can, shakes it, then sprays. I am suddenly alive and wide-eyed as nerve endings THAT I THOUGHT WERE ASLEEP screamed to life. I give the nurse a WTF? look and she smiles, and says....

    "It's alcohol. The anesthesia only kills the pain nerves - not the temperature nerves."

    I KNOW she did that on purpose.

    10.29.09 - 01:28 PM / 13
  • Hayley said:

    I just sent this link to my husband without reading it all the way through first. I've been trying to get him to snip snip- and I think I might've been counterproductive in showing him this!

    All I have to do is leave him home with our 2 year old and 4 month old twins and that ought to reverse the damage I've done. I HOPE.

    10.29.09 - 01:29 PM / 14
  • Anonymous said:

    Oh Heather, I really feel for John, but on the other hand, I haven't laughed that hard in a very, very long time. Thanks for sharing!!!

    10.29.09 - 01:31 PM / 15
  • kcbelles said:

    Poor Jon - such a tramatic ordeal and what does his wife do? Laugh! But then, he shouldn't be surprised; he should know by know what you find quirky. My best wishes goes out to him for a speedy recovery. And thanks for sharing, Heather - totally hilarious byplay.

    10.29.09 - 01:31 PM / 16
  • Anonymous said:

    My husband's balls inflated to the size of melons and he couldn't walk for weeks because he decided to organize the garage after the procedure. Duh. I swear they ask for it.

    10.29.09 - 01:31 PM / 17
  • d3 voiceworks said:

    a guy i worked with at a radio station years ago left the record player on (yep, record player) after cueing up the sunday programming and hitting play. while he fetched a cup of coffee up the street, the stylus got caught in a groove on jesuschrist__jesuschrist said only in the way the big religious peeps say it.

    my dh needs a vasectomy, too. i get fearful when he's feeling, uh, amorous.

    10.29.09 - 01:31 PM / 18
  • Jen said:

    The doctor who performed this procedure on my husband (here in Austin), is named Dick Chop. Not even kidding on that one.

    10.29.09 - 01:32 PM / 19
  • Jo said:

    Buddy and Your Balls sounds like a GREAT band name. Maybe Jon could be the lead singer?

    10.29.09 - 01:33 PM / 20
  • Constance said:

    I have a vivid memory of my mom and I taking my father to the hospital for this same pleasantry when I was probably around Leta's age. He walked through the swinging doors and then several minutes later they wheeled him out in his little robe and he looked completely crooked (b/c, you know, who would want to SIT after that?). My crooked dad said, "All done, no big deal". His expression said, SACRIFICE.

    10.29.09 - 01:33 PM / 21
  • Kat said:

    Oh this one is gonna get TONS of hate mail! I can see it now! "FIRST you bully your husband into getting a vascetomy and then you use his pain to remind everyone how you had natural child birth and how horrible it was." I can hardly wait to see how your hatefans run with it.

    Seriously though, I lol'd.

    10.29.09 - 01:34 PM / 22
  • Heather said:

    That was effin' funny.

    10.29.09 - 01:34 PM / 23
  • Kelly Kjellberg said:

    im just glad im not the only one who laughed at my husband while he was getting his 'procedure'...

    10.29.09 - 01:34 PM / 24
  • habenne said:

    OK- so we're 11 months post second child and 6 weeks post V-DAY (might I mention how impressed I am that you were able to accomplish the V in nearly half the time it took me..nice work), and needless to say, watching my husband 'recover' from his V was one of the most amusing experiences of my life (I too, survived, natural childbirth the second time around). So, Day 3 POST VASECTOMY: Husband dramatically hobbles from the bathroom, tighty-whiteys in hand and says, "Babe, can you wash these for me (he is normally a boxer guy- so we are stretching the use of his three existing pairs of tighties- the less giant white underwear in my home, the better)- and by the way, he says, THERE IS SOME BLOOD." First thought I have is, ewwwww, second thought, poor guy- I guess he is really suffering......
    I head to the washer with the 'bloody underwear', which upon examination, had, and I'm not shitting you here, a ONE CENTIMETER IN DIAMETER spot of blood. Like seriously, I don't even think the cast of CSI could get a DNA sample from this ridiculously miniscule speck. I think a vasectomy on an ANT would generate more blood than this. Anyone whom has ever given birth should know that there was nothing left for me to do but to laugh my ass off for 5 minutes (in the privacy of the garage)...and then, I sweetly grabbed a cold beer, the bag of frozen peas and went to soothe my poor, bloody, sperm-less man.

    10.29.09 - 01:34 PM / 25
  • Olive said:

    I just cackled in my quiet office and embarrassed myself.

    "Why are you laughing?"

    "WATCH IT, BUDDY."

    I'm dying over here.

    WOW MY CAPTCHA... "Snip Banana." How fitting!!!

    10.29.09 - 01:35 PM / 26
  • Maggie May said:

    I keep having the great luck to read posts about balls lately.

    Now that is true love, Double Dooce.

    10.29.09 - 01:35 PM / 27
  • Amanda said:

    I'll be sure NOT to let my Husband read this post. I may never get him to hold up HIS end of the bargain.

    Men, they don't even know what the meaning of pain is! :)

    10.29.09 - 01:35 PM / 28
  • lynn said:

    Laura! Laura! I love it - I can just hear him calling your name - and you laughing in the other room. Years ago my neighbor got snipped, came home from the hospital and after a pain pill spent the entire evening laying in a lounge chair by my pool with a bag of frozen peas. He didn't look like he was suffering - man-up boys - it's a 10 minute procedure not a 9 month one!

    10.29.09 - 01:36 PM / 29
  • Zoe Right said:

    Ahh, Poor Baby (nope couldn't hold it in BAHHHHHAAAA- HAAA-HA) damn that is funny!

    10.29.09 - 01:36 PM / 30
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