What It Feels Like To Have A Vasectomy

Working on Uncle Ed's farm gave me two distinct experiences that haunt me still.  The first only happened once as I recall, but it left a big impression.  We cut hogs.  Those who have never witnessed or heard the ritual of such an event will never quite get the visceral, or is it surreal, cognition of slicing a pig's nuts with a knife.  Mind you these things are done without anesthetic, compassion or recuperative healing.  Force them into a chute, clamp a bar over their heads so they can't escape, body block on either side so they can't move and then slice.   At least it is quick.  It was one of those group things Ed did with area farmers, so it was all day.  I don't know if I ever got immune to the screams.  This was the day one of the farmers hired man took the balls home for evening Mountain Oysters.  Bub Greer, a wise smiling man I liked, told the kid he'd better watch out, they'd make him potent, and the kid said, "It's alright, I've had them before and they haven't hurt me yet."

The other activity sered into my brain is shelling corn.   Corn cribs are riddled with rats.  They get shelter and food so its easy to see why.  When you get toward the end of the corn the rats have no place to hide so they start running willy-nilly to escape.   Shovels slamming onto cement to kill them was a common sound and many helpers took delight in the sport.   I was not one of them.  I never knowingly killed any.  Except maybe one.  I kept on shoveling because that was my job and because I detest violence, death and blood.  But by doing so I had to be on the lookout for a rat running  up my pant leg.  It happened a couple times, but once one made it up to my nether regions.  The thought of a teeth filled rat mouth munching on my future kids terrified me.  I was able to squeeze little Ratatouille into submission, and after I took off my pants, and a little check of my vitals, a catastrophe was averted.  No kids yet but already protecting them.  

I mention all this by way of professing that I am a bit of an expert on vasectomies.  You see, I've had two of them.  I'll repeat that: I've had two vasectomies.  I defy anyone to match that record.  Sure there are probably a few in the world who have had a couple, but we are a rare and admirable bunch who have defied convention, laughed at the odds, and marched right back into the arena again like heroic gladiators spoiling for the lion.

  

My first vasectomy occurred after both Mackenzie and Brendan  had been born and somehow the decision had been made to forgo a third.  When you are married to a feminist decisions sometimes germinate and come to fruition in a slightly different perspective.  It seemed I was the one to be run up the chute, get my head clamped in a steel bar and provide the Mountain Oysters to anyone who wanted them for supper.   

Dr. Currie assented to do the operation after asking if I was aware of the consequences.  It could be reversed if I had second thoughts afterward but it was a procedure of questionable results.  Full speed ahead, or as Brendan would later bring into my consciousness, Two To The Wind.  

The big day arrived and I was ushered into a small room and told to strip and put on one of those god-awful robes open in the back.  An assistant hen cam in and helped me onto a gurney with stirrups.  She then put each foot into the stirrups and then lifted my robe to do some prep work.  I looked at her eyes to try to get some idea of where i placed in the hierarchy of male genitalia she had seen in her career, but she revealed nothing.  A true professional.  Like a junior high kid I would have preferred some lewd remark validating my manhood, or at least a sigh of regret on what was about to take place.  I wanted a small tear perhaps on how the world was going to change, about how the gene pool was going weaken maybe just a little.   

My nervousness was obvious, and she did a nice job by asking mundane questions geared toward relaxing me.  It didn't help much.  She did a little shaving, talked about my soon to be only two kids in the family and after that I kind of clamped shut.  Alone with my thoughts and wondering about why I was here in the first place.  Too late for second thoughts this was going to happen today.  I was in the chute.

After a while in walked Dr. Currie AND Dr. Hill.  I never did know why it took two to do it, but I imagined myself special:  a priest needs an assistant to conduct a Mass,  it takes two workers at Wal-Mart to move a heavy box, Mormon missionaries always travel in pairs, an article for the American Medical Journal about this especially well-endowed fellow in the Midwest.  

A kindly quip, an introduction to the other good doctor, followed by the classic, "You'll feel a pinch" and we were off to the races.  Whatever they shot me with numbed the area and I was left to peer up at two guys fiddling with stuff no man should let other men fiddle with.  Doubt was creeping in.  I felt a tug here and there, not excruciating, but good enough to let me know we were still working.  You'd think two doctors would make it go twice as fast but it seemed to lag a bit.  

      

In a while it was over and I was alone in the room.  My feet were still hiked up when the nurse came in and did a little gauze work and gave some instructions for the rest of the day.  No heavy lifting, no calisthenics, no jogging.  My feminist wife took me home.  Was that a self-satisfied glint in her eye?  Score one for the good guys (or girls)?  I'm sure it was my imagination - I had done something for equality and it was a relief to have the damn thing over with.      

The rest of the day I lounged on the sofa feeling like I had a 20 pound tumor between my legs.  Then the pain killer started to fade away and the full effects of traumatic invasive surgery began to take its place.  As far as pain goes it wasn't as bad as stubbing your toe but more than bumping your head.  It wasn't as bad as getting kicked in the nuts, but more than a toothache.  

I had instructions to take Tylenol as needed (it was needed), and after two or three months I was to provide a sample to Cottage Hospital lab for analysis.  That's when it got wild.  You won't want to miss Part 2 of "What It Feels Like To Have A Vasectomy."