Scott and I decided to follow the doctor's advice and try to have a baby. Everyone else was doing it, how hard could it be? We were surrounded by couples who seemed to be able to breathe on one another and conceive a child. We jumped into the ring thinking it would only take a few months, at most. I happily threw away my birth control, positive it was the reason we had been child-free for over two years.

One year later we were sitting in the infertility waiting room. It was a room that seemed to try to cheer up a whole bunch of miserable women. There were beautiful fresh flowers on the table, oriental rugs on the floor, and damask upholstered furniture. It didn't look like a doctor's office, but rather a day spa for the rich and famous, of which we were neither.

We sat down with our Cuban doctor, and discussed our situation. I kept glancing at Scott who almost had a pained look on his face, one of such profound concentration I was actually impressed. The more I looked at him the more I realized he was desperately trying to understand the doctor who had a heavy Latin accent. Since I worked with the poor uneducated Mexican population, such speech was normal. I hadn't noticed at all. I just kept hearing Scott say, "Can you repeat that?"

The doctor kept asking us how often we were romantic. It was embarrassing. Looking back I realize that in all the time we spent with that office, I never once heard the doctor use the word sex. Obviously, he never struggled with infertility, since romance is certainly not part of the equation. It is sex, that is all it is.

We left the office with scheduled appointments and lab orders. I knew none of them would be fun. Especially for Scott, since most men are squeamish about such things. However, if we wanted kids, this was the way to go. In my heart, I knew this wasn't for us. I did not want to waste my time trying to conceive with a bulb syringe. Scott, however, really wanted a child. A biological child. Though he loves his adoptive family, he has never seen one person who resembles him. He needed that. Since I am a carbon copy of my father, seeing a mini-me was not high on my priority list.

We spent one year with our wonderful Desi Arnez doctor. He was patient and kind. We had a timeline and a line in the sand. We made the decision before we began the infertility rollercoaster that we would only go through it for one year and we would not subject ourselves to invitro-fertilization. We sat in the floral colored waiting room for the first time in January 1998. We were told we needed to try invitro in January 1999. We were done