My Vasectomy: Far from Fixed
“This is by far the most bizarre thing I’ve ever done,” I said.
“Hmm. Really?” Elaine asked as she released my penis with one hand and my balls with the other.
No, this was not a tawdry sexual encounter at your local massage parlor. Although there was a fair amount of tugging, there was no rubbing. Elaine was my nurse. At that moment, she was wiping away the beta iodine from my privates following my vasectomy.
Watching my doctor and nurse work on me like everything was just another Friday made the whole situation bizarre. There’s nothing about a vasectomy that’s normal.
Unlike most of my male friends who break down getting snipped to the basest level of nut jokes and a reason to watch sports for a weekend, the day of my snip-snip, I found myself unconsciously introspective and melancholy about the whole thing (I still made nut jokes of course).
While it’s promoted as being routine, there’s nothing normal about a vasectomy.
On your big day, you wake up, shave your sack, lay back, and some doctor you’ve never met before smiles at you and literally takes a swipe at your family jewels. Doc shakes your hand, you pay your $30 co-pay, your wife drives you home, and you get your choice of frozen peas or corn (I prefer peas) before you get unrestricted access to the remote control.
It’s treated almost like a celebration — a rite of modern-day, middle-class, suburban passage.
Easy. Not for me. Here’s why.
D-day (Get it? “D” Day?). As the time to head to my voluntary sterilization procedure drew near, the ticks and tocks of my watch seemed to grow louder. I didn’t feel right. Was I scared? No. I found myself overcome with emotion about the prospect of being unable to father any more children.
I couldn’t hide it; it was all written over my face. My wife, both understanding and surprised by my reaction, gave me the out. “Don’t do it,” she said. The funny thing was, I didn’t want any more children. At the time of the Nut Job, my wife was weeks away from delivering our second child, Zinnia, but she would be our family’s seventh child. We have a blended family. My wife has three kids from a previous marriage, I have two, and together we have two. Nuts. I know.
My emotions were not driven by fear of pain. While no man can look forward to having a scalpel taken to his boys, I’ve endured extreme pain in my past. I’ve nearly severed my big toe and a thumb, both resulting from ridiculously stupid accidents.
So why the Eeyore reaction?
Here’s the thing. No one warned me that I might have these feelings. Instead, they made me watch an “educational” video from my health care provider that focused almost exclusively on telling me the procedure was not reversible (technically, it is). I had to sign waivers after that. Nothing about, hey, you might break down and start crying. The HMOs placing Risk Management over human beings. Shocker? Hardly. It’s the HMO credo.
So, if it wasn’t pain and it wasn’t wanting more kids, what gives? My guess? Caveman urges.
In Alan Miller and Satoshi Kanazawa’s book, Why Beautiful People Have More Daughters, the evolutionary psychologists argue that human beings as a species, in evolutionary terms, are relatively young. As such, humans are driven by innate urges. For men, it’s to procreate. Early and often apparently. If that’s the case, then it stands to reason that if a man can no longer procreate, he may have a feeling or two about that matter. Does it matter if the man chooses to shoot blanks or if he has weak swimmers on his team? I’d argue, no.
Armed with my mournful feelings and evolutionary psychology theory, I set out to talk with my male friends about this phenomenon. I should’ve stayed at home with my new friends, peas and corn. Every male friend I shared my story with told me he didn’t have melancholy feelings anywhere close to mine. Typically, after telling me no, they immediately pivoted to a nut joke. Curious.
I shouldn’t be surprised. It may be trite to say that men don’t talk about their feelings. But it’s true. Men almost never talk about how we feel as it relates to our gender role/identity, and the expectations that go along with them. As men, we gloss over anything emotionally vulnerable as quickly as possible. Shit, we can’t even hug emotionally. Just watch how we routinely do that weird handshake quasi-hug thing when greeting a friend.
Showcasing my stubborn arrogance, I refuse to concede that I’m wrong. Anytime a guy asks me about my vasectomy experience, I’m going to share my busted-balls-no-baby-making-blues. This sets up two potential outcomes. First, I very well may become the butt of their witty man jokes. However, by sharing my experience the gent, in question might not feel as weird and isolated if he has an emotional response to the procedure. I’m willing to pay that price.
It doesn’t really matter. Because when Fun Friday comes for the soon-to-be sperm challenged, and Elaine has you by the balls, literally, you’re going to be a different man. As the beta iodine is wiped away, so too is your ability to meet your evolutionary responsibility. And that’s OK. I’m here to talk to you. Find me in the frozen vegetable aisle.
This article originally appeared in The Good Men Project.
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