Inconceivable that it could be good

There is talk {and perhaps it's me just chattering incessently to myself} about the new NBC show Inconceivable. I can't believe this show is going to even remotely resemble real life as we know it.

Certainly, in order to be a popular prime-time series, it will have to cover the stereotypical issues about fertility, infertility, REs, and infertility clinics that we frequent-visitors to those temples of baby-worship know all about from sensational tabloids and tv shows.

• How about a mix up with sperm, egg or embryo, that will result in the birth of a child clearly of the wrong race?
• Or the unwanted intervention of a mad-scientist doctor whose patients' children look so coincidently just like him?
• Perhaps a clinic full of desperate, blubbery, willing-to-do anything women whose sole purpose in life is portrayed as a desperate need to bear their husbands a son?
• Maybe they'll follow the woman, whose husband is incarcerated for murdering his wife's sister {they were having an affair}, but she desperately wants to be inseminated so as to bear his love-child?
• I know! Let's explore the world of embryo donation, stem-cell research, and other controversial topics via a group of Hollywood writers who might very well present an incredibly uneducated perspective
  

I'm not doubting that situations like this occur, and even stranger ones probably occur in yours and my clinic, I question the ability of a Hollywood team to produce a show that accurately portrays the pain, the science, the emotion, and the burden that is infertility. What about the majority of IF patients, who are just regular men and women and have the most basic desire of all - to have a family?

I know that in itself isn't very sexy, {infertility is not about being sexy, believe you me}, and regular people aren't glamorous, and stories like mine aren't always exciting, but they are real. And shows like this one make me nervous about the type of message being broadcast to a largely-comatose viewing public. A public whose beginning knowledge on the subjects of infertility, adoption, conceiving, etc. are at a scary-low-minimum to begin with.

So great - we have a show coming out with a creator who states about women: "Now they can borrow an egg or a uterus". Which I suppose is true, but sure sounds smug to me.

The Mercury news reports that "The promotional clips for the new Inconceivable, a drama set in a fertility clinic, use 3 Dog Night's "Momma Told Me Not to Come'' as a theme song." Classy, man. Real classy.

But on the other hand, the creators do have some experience in the world of fertility clinics, and appear to have some decent thoughts on the matter:

In today's cultural climate, Pennette and Goldstick are well aware that
"Inconceivable" is likely to draw some fire as it shines a primetime klieg light on a highly controversial new medical frontier. As writers, they're committed to leavening the drama with healthy doses of humor, citing as their inspiration how David E. Kelley walks that fine line even when his characters are dealing with murder cases and the like."It's too sacrosanct a subject to be irreverent, but we also can't be nonstop melodrama," Goldstick says. Adds Pennette, "Just as the doctors in this world always say, we'll have to work at finding the right balance."

I think a lot about how infertility affects my dealings with other people, and about how it will continue to affect my dealings in the future. The people who know what J & I are going through are sensitive, open to talk when I need to, and appropriately inquisitive about the specifics. But the casual conversations, the group discussions about babies that take place among young women who are all in active-baby-fever, the unknowing comments that take place in the grocery store checkout line -- these are the interactions that make me nervous. And thinking that another source of misinformation is heading out full force into the greater world scares me a bit.

I've got my comebacks ready, my standard answers to the "when are you going to have kids, already?" questions, and I feel confident in who I am and where I'm going {within reason, of course}. But I wonder about my future, should our baby be born with donor genetic material, adopted from within the US, or adopted from beyond our country. So many preconceived notitions abound, and I worry, even now, about how I'll react.

I was killing some time and enjoying myself thoroughly over at The Naked Ovary and came across the most horrifying story of a police officer's disgustingly ignorant comments about international adoption. I admire the way she kept her chin up and ignored the stupid bastard while everyone else cowered with embarrassment. How am I going to deal with a**holes like this person? With the well-meaning stranger who comments on how my baby looks just like his daddy, when I know quite well that he looks absolutely nothing like his father?

Of course,I'll watch this darn television show with baited breath and I'll probably be disappointed. Who am I kidding? I'm sure I'll be disappointed. Why can't everyone else just watch Discovery Heath documentaries like I do??