fertility clinic I attended went by the unlikely name of the Reilly Institute, which at the time, appealed. It sounded like a place where you do night classes, I remember thinking at the time, not somewhere you’ve to reveal all about your private life and your full medical history, get totally undressed, then undergo possibly the most mortifying medical procedure ever devised by man. I’ll spare the details, but all I’ll say is that it involves lying on a sheet of freezing metal naked from the waist down, while being prodded with a load of ice-cold spatulas, and I’ll leave the rest to the imagination. Trust me though, no torture meted out to witches in medieval times could have been more excruciatingly painful or mortifying.
You know me by now; I did my homework and did it thoroughly. Firstly I found out from the concerned, mercifully sensitive nurse who was looking after me, whether or not the bank recruited, let’s just say, a certain type of donor? Because I was fussy; I wanted someone intelligent, talented, from ‘good stock’, as Helen put it. I bombarded this poor, patient nurse with a thousand questions – on average how old were the donors? (Under age forty apparently is preferable, I knew from my own exhaustive research on the subject. Higher sperm motility.) How and when did donors sign away legal rights to any child conceived using their sperm? And most importantly of all, how exactly was confidentiality maintained?
I must have driven her nearly insane with my inquisition; I requested a full list of donor profiles, then asked for information about each donor’s physical characteristics; ethnic background, educational background, occupation, general health, and hobbies and interests. Some banks will even provide photos, which I took a lightning-quick scan though, then dismissed. Somehow it made the whole mortifying process far simpler not to attach a face to a number on a donor profile.
Made me feel a bit more in control, if that makes any sense.
I’m not exaggerating when I say that the whole process took weeks. I trawled through each and every profile on offer, knowing that this was probably the single biggest decision I was ever likely to make in my life. And finally, finally finally, I found The One. No name, just a number, but this one seemed to tick all the right boxes. Blue eyes, fair hair and fair skin, just how I imagined my little baby would look. Supermarket genetics come to life.
The Chosen One seemed sporty and athletic too: he’d won gold medals for the two hundred metres and was a member of the Trinity College rowing team. This appealed; if I had a boy, I reasoned, he’d have great biceps and would look like he rowed everywhere. And he’d grow up with shiny skin and cheekbones you could grate cheese on, like all athletes seem to have. His profile also claimed that he’d written a thesis on Ireland’s economic meltdown and the subsequent road to recovery, which immediately gave me a mental picture that maybe he worked as a high-earning TV economist, one of those young preppy guys who look straight to camera and gravely tell us we’re all doomed, but do it with such persuasive charm that you end up not really minding that much at all.
What swung it for me though, was that his profile claimed he was musical as well as everything else and played classical piano right up to concert grade. That alone made me almost able to picture him; tall, gifted, clean shaven, articulate and an all-rounder. A real renaissance man. The type that if I ever happened to meet him in a bar in real life, most likely wouldn’t give someone like me a second glance, but would be surrounded by tall blonde modelly women with caramel skin and perfect Hollywood smiles.
But not here. Because in the Reilly Institute, it was me that was calling the shots. And I’d decided on him and that was all there was to it. He was good at sport, academically sound and cultured too – barring him having become a self-made billionaire by the age of twenty five, what more could I possibly ask for?
Then came the science bit. A Dr. Casement, with the cold clinical dispassion of someone who spends half their day looking down a microscope, advised that we needed to find out how many pregnancies this donor’s sperm had previously produced. Ten is the recommended limit apparently, to lessen the chances of a single donor’s offspring ever meeting and producing children of their own, instantly making me think of just about every Greek tragedy I’d ever yawned my way through. But my luck was in; astonishingly, I was the first woman through there to have chosen this grade A specimen. Massive sigh of relief.
Then as soon as the sample was fully medically assessed for family history, heritable conditions, any diseases that could be passed down – not to mention infectious diseases like chlamydia, HIV, hepatitis, syphilis and let’s not forget the delightful gonorrhoea – the rest was plain sailing.
I was told it would take a few rounds of treatment before we’d have a successful outcome, so not to be too disappointed if it didn’t take on my first go. But I was having absolutely none of it. Because under no circumstances was I going through all of this malarkey all over again, so I willed my uterus lining to thicken up and do what it was told and miraculously, astonished everyone at the clinic by getting lucky first time round.
Out came Lily, punctual to the dot nine months later and thus ended my involvement with the Reilly Institute.
Until now, that is.
Chapter Four
Initially, Helen gamely offered to do the detective work for me – the Jane Marple bit, as she put it – but I told her there was no need. Firstly, as any self-respecting control freak will tell you, either you do the thing properly yourself, or it doesn’t get done. And secondly, whenever you’re cold-calling and trying to find out, let’s just say, information of a sensitive nature, you’ve no idea how much this magic phrase works. ‘Hi there, I’m senior editor of the Post and I’m calling to inquire about …’ Works like a charm every time. When people, and particularly Irish people, realise you’re a journalist, they will open up and tell you absolutely anything, if they think it’ll get their name into the paper. Or better yet, their photo. In colour. For all their mammies and pals to see.
The first part is astonishingly easy. Next day at work, I kick closed the inner door to my office and make the call, being careful to keep my voice discreet, calm and business like.
‘Hello, you’ve reached the Reilly Institute, how may I direct your call?’
A woman’s voice, curt and businesslike. So I explain that I was treated there four years ago and now need urgent access to my patient file. For, ahem, personal reasons. We’re terribly sorry, comes the crisp answer, but I’m afraid we don’t give out that information.
As it happens though, I anticipated this and am prepared for all of this red-tape crapology.
Yes, I fully appreciate that, I tell her, but this is a pretty unique situation. As it happens, I’m about to commission a piece about fertility clinics in the Dublin area and this is all part of the research I’m carrying out for the article, writing of course from the basis of my own personal experience, blah-di-blah. I even tack on, astonishing myself at the sheer brazenness of the fib, that I’d be attaching a full-colour photo of the Reilly Institute, with plugs galore.
Funny how lying through your teeth becomes kind of second nature to you when you’ve worked at the Post long enough. Bit worrying, really.
But it really was that easy. A slight, wavering pause, then a supervisor is called to the phone, so I repeat verbatim the conversation with the carrot attached and we’re away.
My file is reopened and here it is.
Wait for it, his name is William Goldsmith. William Goldsmith. Of course he’s a William, I think a bit smugly, sitting back in my swivel chair and gazing absent-mindedly out the window, in a rare moment of self-indulgence. I like the name William; always have. Sporty, athletic,
