Test, He Calls

Few days later the centre got back to me - come in for a test run, was the invitation, for a chat and a donation. The email contained a scary list of those who can't donate for medical or other reasons, and a comforting paragraph about how much money a donor can make, plus the one key rule repeated several times - three days abstinence. Seventy-two hours - "no more no less", it claimed, but I doubt they need it timed to the minute.

Did the maths and booked in for four days time. They passed, extremely slowly.

Turned up at the building, a rather grand affair. fine pastel colours everywhere, mammoth original stair case leading to a mysterious second floor, and vast waiting room with coffee machines a-go-go. Told the cute girl on reception I had an appointment. She then asked for the name of the doctor I was here to see. I gave it, and was sent OUT and DOWNSTAIRS.

Yes, turns out I went to the women's clinic by mistake. Same address, but the building above the basement housing the sperm donation centre, and so I was sent from the glamourous world of the women above stairs down some rickety old stairs from to where the masturbating men are hidden. How lovely and sleazy.

Sign I'd overlooked reads "Enter in basement". No punchline necessary.

The first visit was a test visit, to make sure frankly that my sperm was up to scratch. After a brief chat and signing a contract with the doctor, they gave me a tiny pot, for obvious reasons, and a plastic bag with a big biohazard sign on it. Delightful to know that something which comes out of me is to be labelled as a biohazard. Hey ladies.

There were two rooms, a blue one and a pink one. I chose pink, if any amateur psychologists would like to know that. This was obviously once some sort of medical clinic as there is an emergency cable on the wall - and god knows the mind reels wondering which farcical emergencies would require me to pull that. I was unimpressed with the lack of facilities in the room. A tiny sink is what passes as the luxury item; there is no lavatory in the room, for whatever reasons I don't wish to think about. There are no mirrors in the room, but there is a shiny metal pedal bin which occasionally reflects back at you things you don't want reflected.

Most worryingly of all if you're as paranoid as I am is all that was hiding my privacy from the world was a weak deadbolt and a sign which manually switches between "Vacant" and "engaged" which I will inevitably forget to manipulate.

There is also a wicker chair, highly unsuitable on which to masturbating, and a strange wooden cushioned seat better used as an examination table than a place to relax. It also wobbled, hitting the ground quite audibly, so I wasn't sat on that for long lest the entire building hear my rhythm.

There was also two plastic magazine holders on the wall, one with straight porno mags, the other with gay porno mags. I'm not a big fan of such items, and plotted for later visits to smuggle in (not that I think they'd disapprove of it) my pornography of choice.

Finishing into the pot was more complicated than expected. One can't be on one's back because, well, gravity, and anyway that wobbly wooden table was far too noisy. All one has to do is wait until one is at the point of no return and aim downwards - not too sexy, not too pleasurable. Also dashing through the mind is how many other people have used this room - and how many missed the pot. Eurgh. No wonder that cleaner I saw going from room to room earlier was so miserable.

Also wondered how much of the pot should be filled - didn't seem more than about a fifteenth of this tiny container. Is that enough? Should I be worried? What if the results were bad? Always a possibility at this early stage.

Felt very uncomfortable throughout the whole endeavour, and unhappy by the end of it. Dropped off the biohazard bag in the correct place, awkwardly nodded at the doctor, and rushed out first moment I could. Had a wank when I got home, just to remind me it could be fun after all.

I Got Into Dogwalking The Same Way

So what was the catalyst for me to donate sperm in the first place? Glad you asked. The short answer is money. The long answer is paranoia.

End of January 2013 I went over to a friends' party for drinks and nibbles. And, as these events tend to go, I was offered drugs. Don't think ill of me - I'm no great drugs enthusiast. If offered at a social event I likely wouldn't refuse, but I'm not of the mindset as many of my friends have been of 'You know, I could really go for some drugs right now'. It's a rare treat, like watching children's TV, or eating pigeon. 

Anyway, flash-forward to me getting home and the drugs comedown was treating me very badly. I was left rather sleepless and paranoid for much of the rest of the weekend. The paranoia hit at its worst at three separate points, each about two hours apart as I tried to sleep. These moments of despair were related to different topics - love life, work life, money worries - and lasted only a few increasingly gloomy moments until I snapped out of them into a better mood.

It was the middle one, about money worries, which I was inspired to leap out of bed and get online seeking employment. Jobs applied for, a Google search for quick money near my location lead to a number of possibilities. Most were impossible (Rent your parking space!), unappealing (Become a dogwalker!), or too desperate to contemplate seriously (Sell your hair for use as wigs for chemotherapy patients!). But also in amongst them - sell your sperm! The paranoia about money went of the window, and paranoia about being a thirty-year old single with no future kicked in.

Maybe I should give sperm, I thought - gets the family genes passed on, with no messy relationship or responsibility necessary. Plus the very generous £35 they were offering per donation (what an advance from the twenty odd quid they offered the teenage me!) wasn't to be ignored, neither.

With what little sense I had left in my head I filled in the website's contact form, and went to sleep.

Metrosexual

Let's jump back to my teenage years. But let's not stay there long, as they were awful.

It's the start of the 2000s, I'd just started attending a college and, to say the least, was socially pretty awkward. Also, pretty broke. Often my school lunchtimes were spent in the college library scouring the Media Guardian for job ads for which I would inevitably fail to be qualified.

The Metro was and remains a weird little beast. A free London paper halfway between the National Enquirer and those local papers which are half articles about protesting parks closure and half full page ads for sex clubs and chatlines.

The Metro was a little lax about its advertising policies back then and so accordingly also had ads for sex chatlines, 'Gentlemen's Clubs', dubious psychics - all things good for a giggle. They also had one for sperm donation.

Now this is enough to make a broke student stop giggling. I may not have been qualified for much, I did know one thing - I had sperm, lots of it. And they were offering something like £20 a time!

Picture the dream life of a student - one feels horny so gets on a tube to London Bridge (for this is where the advert said they were based), wanks oneself off, and collects £20 for the pleasure. And if you're a student as horny and unsatisfied as I was, payment could range into three figures a day. The high life indeed.

Well, this remained nothing beyond a dream. I realised perhaps selling sperm wasn't the most illustrious way to start a career, and forgetting the whole notion I went back to bedroom socks and non-payment. Well, not quite forgetting - there were a few self-inflicted orgasms around that time after which I thought "Well, that could have been £20". Thankfully this stocktaking soon passed.

No, the whole idea was forgotten - until…

Become A Sperm Donor Donor

A bit premature - and that's not a word I want to use often on this blog - but if you enjoy my writings feel free to to throw some money my way. You get nothing for your money bar a sense of satisfaction.

   

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You ca also follow me on Twitter – http://twitter.com/cashinhandblog

Won't be much there, just notifications when the blog is updated and the occasional odd retweet about sperm. Do follow, and feel free to interact and retweet. And please promote my blog for me! I obviously can’t do it on my personal Twitter or Facebook or else that’s the whole idea of anonymity out the window.

Welcome To My Next Three To Six Months

19th March 2013 I had an appointment with a councillor to talk over and straighten out any issues I may have had with a recent endeavour. At some point during the session she asked me what I did, and amongst other things I must have let slip about being a writer. “So monetize this – write a blog,” was her response.

So here we are. I’m writing a blog about about my recent decision to become a sperm donor.

Although it’s not really donating, as they pay a fee for every successful deposit. That’s why this blog is called Cash In Hand. But we’ll talk about that, both the morality and the technicalities of receiving payment, in depth later on.

You reading this are the first people I’ve told. I’ve not told my parents, or any of my friends. I’ve not got a partner but if I had, I wouldn’t have told her by now either. I’m quite a private person in reality, which is why this blog is anonymous. We’ll deal with this in some depth too, later on.

Sperm donating is an unusual experience for me, to say the least. At type of publication we are a few weeks and one donation into the process. As the blog continues I hope it will find a more diary-like shape, with a few odd pieces along the way.

In addition, the enormity of what’s occurring – that I may, some way down the line, be responsible for dozens of human lives – has, as of time of writing, not yet quite sunk in, as I’ll later explain. I’m currently in a state of practicality – times, dates, fees, etc, and by extension, this blog. It’s my hope that as my thoughts and feelings about what I’m doing change as they inevitably will, I’ll post them on here as and when they come to me.

I also promise to try my very best to avoid bad euphemisms – sperm is sperm, penises are penises, and wanking is wanking from hereon in. It’s also hoped that, despite the title, I avoid any tiresome puns about the above – but no promises.

I’ve no idea how this blog will go, but it’s my intention at the close of my donation – somewhere between three and six months, it’s estimated – to turn it into a book. Privately published eBook, maybe, but certainly something solid. If you’ve any interest in publishing or serialising this blog, or want to commission me to write something fresh, please feel free to email me –cashinhandblog@hotmail.com

The above email is also if you have any comments, questions, or suggestions for blog posts. All welcome.

So that’s the introduction to the blog. Now let’s go back a few weeks to the beginning and we start my adventure swapping sperm for cash.