Thursday, February 23, 2012

How to make love to a plastic cup

Every once in a while you come across a book title which makes you laugh out loud. This is so rare, that when I saw this book featured online, I just had to buy it from Amazon.com . I have just received my copy and would like to review this great book, which is called– How to make Love to a Plastic Cup - The guys guide to the world of infertility by Greg Wolfe.

In general , it's true that women are the neglected sex and are often treated as second-class citizens. However in the world of infertility, it’s exactly the other way round. It's the men who are neglected because most of the attention is centered on the woman. While this is not always an unmixed blessing, it's true that men feel left out during the entire infertility process

In most IVF clinics, men ( also know an DH) are usually considered to just be appendages to their wives. Their only role seems to be that of being a sperm donor ( and a banker !) Of course, if they have no sperm , then they do become the focus of attention, because we need to extract their sperm from their testes – but really that's just about it.

There's not much discussion about what the poor man feels - or what goes on in his head and his heart when he sees his wife crying because she can't have a baby. Most of the books on infertility are written for women - there is very little written for the man. Also, most infertility bulletin boards online are populated by women ; and while there lots of shoulders for infertile women to cry on, there’s very little support available for the man.

The great thing about this book is that it fills this need extremely efficiently . It’s written by a man – and is a short, quick read which means that most men will be quite happy to at least pick it up and browse through it, even if they don't read it from cover to cover . Its written in a very breezy style – and while it’s full of accurate medical information, this is presented in an entertaining format, so it never gets overwhelming or boring.

With chapter headings such as " Begin by Putting Tab A into slot B “ and “ What a prick” ( no, this does not refer to what you think it does !) , this book is tailor-made for men with short attention spans , who just want to know enough so that they can fix the problem. With such a great title, how can you not give it at least one shot ?

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1 comment:

  1. Anonymous10:09 PM

    Dear Dr,

    I asked my DH how he makes love to a plastic cup and he replied 'I see you in everything, honey!' :P

    I too used to wonder why infertility bulletin boards are populated by women? Might be it is because men do not express emotions as much as women do (evolutionarily handicaped!). Until now I have no clear idea how my DH sees our infertility :) I would like to read this book because it is written by a man ( and in that way I wish I could get a glimpse of how men deal infertility) and no wonder the book is short :)

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