Do you think I'm overreacting?

No one has actually said I am overreacting, but they don't seem as worried as I am.

 

I am 22 and my boyfriend of 3 years is going to be 23 in june. We want to someday get married and

I have told him it's very important to me that I have a family. He says he does too someday, but he is thinking about taking Remicade. I have heard that it can cause infertility and that Humira can cause permenant infertility (the doctor told us Humira should be a last choice if we planned to get married and have children). I told him maybe he should freeze some sperm, but he says he is too embarrassed to do it. I know we aren't married or even enagaged. It is just important to me that

I can be a mother or it will devestate me. I don't really think if I adopted a child that I would feel the same connection as I would with my own child. I know he won't be comfortable with using donor sperm. I love him, but I couldn't marry someone who wasn't willing to go the extra lengths to have a family with me. I told him if he really cared about me he would not lead me on and say hey I don't know if I can give you children and it's not that important to me if I do have kids or not so I understand if you can't be with me anymore, or I will freeze some sperm because I know it is important to you and someday it will be to me too. I don't want to be trapped in a relationship where I will be unhappy. He himself makes me happy,but this is one life goal I'm not willing to give up for anything. He won't get a sperm count because like I said he is too embarrased to give a sample in the little cup!! So I don't know if I'm wasting my time and all he tells me is just to not worry. His mom tells me not to worry so much too and that one way or another we will have kids.

 

Do you think I am worrying over nothing? I want to know how many guys have experienced infertility from UC medication and what options there

are for male infertility. Have you had babies after taking medication over the years?

I don't know about the effects...but your requests don't sound unreasonable to me.
His reasons for not doing it are silly and selfish. Giving birth is pretty darn undignified (I mean physically) but women do it all the time! He needs to do his little part.

Life does change paths as time goes on. Never in my life did I want to have an "only" child. However, with my health, our financial situation, and the stress of raising a child, it looks like life may have dealt us an only child. We couldn't be happier. I am still having health problems on top of my UC that doctors are trying to figure out. We're just living one day at a time and we'll see how things go. After everything medical we go through, I have a hard time understanding why a sperm donation would be too hard. No one enjoys any of the emabrrassing stuff but once it's done it's done. Does he have any idea how embarrassing having eggs harvested and then implanted would be? I've heard of people having to practicaly stand on the head for implantation.

I think you are being reasonable and protecting yourself. My husband I were going to start trying for a baby in the spring and I started with a flare up about two weeks ago. Someone once told me, you plan and G-d laughs. I now believe it. I would do anything for children of my own and am excited to get better so we can start focusing on me having mood swings from being pregnant. I am on 6 mp though which I know can cause more miscarriages in the first trimester which FREAKS ME OUT. I also know you can't breast feed while on it...big decisions ahead. But for your sake I can definitely see where you are coming from and if you are serious about this guy than he should be able to realize how important this is to you.

I think he needs to do what he needs to do in order to stay healthy. If that means taking Remicade, than that's his decision. As far as donating the sperm, that's obviously his decision, too, as you know. I can kind of understand why you would be upset, but you two aren't married or engaged, and I would see donating sperm as a very personal decision. I doubt his mind is focusing on having children right now if he's flaring. If my boyfriend asked me to freeze some eggs I would be totally freaked out and say no, but then again, I don't want kids so I guess I'm on a completely different life path than you.

First, I want to thank you all so much for all the replies I appreciate them all! You have no idea how much it helps because he really won't talk to me about it.
I know just about everything there is to know about UC. I have read everything I can and gone to the doctors with him since we first started dating. He isn't flaring right now. He is under control with 6mp right now. He is worried he will that he will flare up soon and be forced with the decision of Remicade or Surgery. And as far as me telling him that saving sperm isn't just about me, I told him ya know even if we aren't together in the future I really think you will want to have a family someday with whoever else and you should want to give that to your wife someday. I know being mommies are a big dream for most women. They shouldn't get cheated out of it because their husband was too embarrased to just go do it. He can afford to do it. It has nothing to do with money. His father even encouraged him and would pay for it. I would be exstatic knowing I would get just one child of my own getting to experience pregnancy. Then if I would consider adopting. I have thought about adopting. I didn't mean it as I wouldn't love them like my own. I meant I was afraid I might still feel like there was a void even if I did adopt.
I said I know for a fact that donor sperm is out of the question because he is extremely jealous. I think he might would reject the child and resent it for not being his own.

Other reasons I'm afraid of remicade is that I am afraid of the side effects. It can cause cancer and I don't want to loose him. I have came really close to already. A year ago he had a pulmonary embolism. He's okay now, he just got off the coumadin actually. And before that his senior year of high school (I didn't know him then) he had a blood clot in his heart that required open heart surgery to be removed. Needless to say he isn't the most lucky person when it comes to health.
All he needs is something else that can cause something else to go wrong. If I had UC I do think that I would choose it over cancer.
He does still have the option of surgery. I know it is scary. I watched a video with him and he told me afterwards that I probably
wouldn't want to be with him if he did that. I didn't know why he said it. I told him I would rather him live a full, healthy life. Colon or no colon.
I would still love him lol.

Is remicade really so scary? And is surgery really so bad?

carrotjuice said...
A year ago he had a pulmonary embolism. He's okay now, he just got off the coumadin actually. And before that his senior year of high school (I didn't know him then) he had a blood clot in his heart that required open heart surgery to be removed. Needless to say he isn't the most lucky person when it comes to health.

That could be another reason that he isn't thinking about kids right now. It's hard to be thinking about having kids if you are worried that you won't be healthy enough to provide for them emotionally or monetarily or that they might also have health problems.

I think that having ones sperm frozen isn't a commitment to have children though. It's a safeguard just in case one changes one's mind down the road.