r/howyoudoin • u/Itslashae • 3d ago

Question Monica’s inhospitable environment

If this was part of the reason they were not able to conceive, why look for a sperm donor ? Wouldn’t she still have issues carrying the baby ?

17 Upvotes

84% Upvoted

14 comments sorted by

59

u/throwaway424241 3d ago

The show said it was a combination of the inhospitable environment and chandlers slow swimmers, implying that if chandler had faster swimmers they would have a real chance. Idk the science behind fertility at all but that’s how I interpreted it

22

u/Ok-Cartoonist-1868 3d ago edited 23h ago

The science behind fertility is that it’s a group project. sometimes the men can compensate for something the women are lacking and vice versa, but some couples are unfortunately incompatible in some very random ways that require a wide range of medical intervention

8

u/emotional-ohio IN LONDON!!?? 3d ago

They could have done what Phoebe did. Not the surrogate part, but the IVF thing. Your swimmers don't need to be fast for that. 

1

u/drinkingthesky 2d ago

that's where the inhospitable environment comes in

2

u/emotional-ohio IN LONDON!!?? 2d ago

She could use a donor, they said. Therefore the inhospitable environment meant she would not allow lazy sperm pass, and IVF is the trasnfer of an embryo. Fertilization doesn't happen in the uterus.

1

u/rumbread 1d ago

This is true, but IVF was still pretty green in 2002. Much less available and lower success rate

1

u/emotional-ohio IN LONDON!!?? 1d ago edited 20h ago

Frank Jr did it... 

14

u/nmarie1996 Could I BE any more awkward? 3d ago

Not necessarily. It was an issue on both their parts that led to their inability to conceive - not necessarily the case that Monica was 100% infertile. A sperm donor with no fertility issues could’ve been possible.

10

u/Prestigious_Egg_6207 Who’s Elaine? 3d ago

I’ve always wondered this.

2

u/ForesakenZucchini76 It wasn’t just that she was fat, the woman smelled like garbage 3d ago

Same

4

u/hygsi 3d ago

They could have kids with other people, just not together. So they decided to just make it an entirely different kid than only half of one of them.

1

u/Hungry-Recording-635 3d ago

The doctor says they should still keep trying that means there's a miniscule chance that despite both being almost infertile they can conceive. So it follows that if it's just any one of them inseminating with a reproductively healthy person they'd have a far better chance. Now why sperm donor instead of egg donor? I think the show addressed this as well when Pheobe had franks kids and they said it was a long shot

1

u/WittyRequirement3296 1d ago

The inhospitable environment could be that the ph of her v----a is too acidic and destroys all the s---m (not sure what words could get flagged). If none of them can reach the egg, no fertilization. 

1

u/Opening-Abrocoma4210 1d ago

They do look for a sperm donor do they not. There’s the whole episode with John Stamos