TIMED INTERCOURSE

Sometimes there is no medical cause of infertility except that the couple somehow do not get the timing right. The telephone conversion below will be of help.


“SET ME STRAIGHT, DOCTOR!”
in:
‘A telephone consultation’

When Ian and Tracy got married about 7 years ago, and the young couple wanted to get pregnant, Ian consulted me. Because we successfully handled their needs then, I guess he felt he need to talk to me about his younger sister who had gotten married some time ago and he rang me up. Ian is a Lagos based journalist.

“Doctor,” he began, after we had exchanged all the long-time-no-see pleasantries, “I’ve just spoken to my sister. She and her husband have just left my place. They came a visiting. She’s been married 3 years now, no children, so it was inevitable we would talk about her problems with her fertility. I gave them some advice but I needed to check up on the accuracy of what I told them, with you,” he explained.
‘Oh I see,’ I said, ‘And what was that?’
“It’s this – I always thought that the best time a woman should have sex so as to get pregnant is from 5 days after her menses for about a week of 7 days. I’ve always heard many people with the same opinion but it just came to my mind that I may be slightly off the mark and why shouldn’t I check it with you?”
‘Thanks for asking. You’re not slightly off the mark at all; you’re wide off the mark.’
“Say that again? I didn’t hear you.”
‘You did. I said you were wrong. Very wrong.’
“Ah, doctor, I’m surprised

Culled from the Punch, May 8 1999 by Dr. Oluranti