Free Sex Cells: The Medical Market for Eggs and Sperm by Rene Almeling Page A

“transition” not unlike Isaac’s, but for Manuel, his “upbringing” plays a role.
    Manuel: There are just these booths, and it’s not too much between your own privacy and what’s on the outside, just that 1.5-inch piece of plywood. 16 In retrospect, it’s not a big deal. It’s just, coming from a Christian upbringing, it’s like forbidden and taboo. This is doingsomething that would always have been just very—it felt bad! And I hate that feeling. Something is looking down and judging me for what I’m choosing to do. That’s what I kind of felt at first. I didn’t present that when I’m there. I’m nice, calm, cool. I’m in. I’m out. Take care of my business. No problem. No big deal. But in my mind, I’m thinking I’ve never done anything like this before. It’s not like I’m a little kid, either. You’d think at a certain point I’d be more comfortable with it, but it wasn’t that much easier. So if I tried it at like eighteen or nineteen, when I think they officially start to allow prospects, then it might have been even more uncomfortable.
    Rene: So over the full year and a half [you donated], are you saying it never got any easier?
    Manuel: It got easier. After maybe a few times, say three or four, it was just routine, because they were so accommodating, so nice, so receptive. At a certain point, I didn’t feel uncomfortable at all. I think that was the whole point. In a way, we’re doing a service, so they’re going to want to make things as hospitable as they can, and they succeed very well, in my opinion. I don’t know how it would be otherwise if it was very formal and impersonal. But it didn’t feel like that, for the most part.
    Rene: What would be “for the most part”? What was uncomfortable about it?
    Manuel: Only if [the donor manager] wasn’t there. When there’s not a familiar face, that’s when it would be a little different, sort of variation in the routine, but not to the point that it actually affected anything.
    Rene: So how does [the donor manager] do that, take something that people find uncomfortable and turn it into this routine?
    Manuel: She has a good personality. She has a good, sincere smile to her and a warm sort of nurturing mother feeling. That’s how I felt with her. That might be looking too far into things. At the time, when I’m going through this, I’m not thinking all these things. I’m just doing it. She was always personable and asked me how I’m doing. It was one of those things where you develop a rapport with someone and that comes in time, of course, but she was like that from the beginning. I was probably the one who needed to make that transition more thanher. She’s familiar with this. She’s seen how many donors come and go? For me, it’s not like I go to various sperm banks. It’s not a routine for me. That was my transition.
    Like Isaac, Manuel relies on the rhetoric of the workplace in that he “takes care of business” and defines potential donors as “prospects.” This description also points to the importance of bank staff in shaping donors’ experiences and establishing donation as routine. In fact, in my interview with the donor manager at Western Sperm Bank, she noted that when she took a vacation, she would often return to find that her “regulars” had stopped coming in. She would have to call them to get them back on schedule.
    Once men do get in to a routine, donating sperm becomes just one more thing on the to-do list. Nathan, a thirty-eight-year-old who had started donating in his early twenties, explained how “you get into a rhythm, and you just think, oh it’s Wednesday, I got to go down to Gametes Inc. Sometimes you forget. Two weeks go by. You have your lulls, or it just doesn’t happen. You just find yourself putting it into your weekly schedule like getting groceries.” Similarly, Greg, a college student, said that he might not make it to the bank if he had a test or if his motorcycle broke down. In