56 Comments
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Bill Southern's avatar

Great piece!

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx. 🙏

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Mark Dolan's avatar

This was great CK. You made a profoundly personal and private experience accessible, funny and thoughtful. Getting to know you thru Substack informs me how much of your identity is tied up in your twins and the group of you make the world a better place. Made me think unfortunately of politics. The bumper sticker WWJDVD came to mind. Half of us are all right with this and we are doomed to slide down the slippery slope. Yuk. Purge if you must. Only the inquiring will even get the question I am afraid.

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx, Mark. Always great to see you here and I appreciate your comments. What's WWJDVD? I try to keep politics off my stack.

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Mark Dolan's avatar

on my phone going to play tennis. will reply privately later -- it all seems so dumb to me.

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Ororo Munroe's avatar

OMLordt, so funny. Puns abound. Jeffrey and I are alike in the way that we like to drown our waffles (and pancakes) in syrup. Kindred souls, there. Also, I'm now curious what it means to "wash" sperm. Like, what do they do? Now that I'm getting into Writing Mode, I seem to see potential stories everywhere. Also, you really look like Alanis Morrisette in that pic.

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx, Ororo. They wash sperm to prep for artificial insemination.

Alanis! ❤️

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Ororo Munroe's avatar

Gotcha. I guess I'm just curious how they do that, though. I feel like I could go down the research rabbit hole on that one. LOL

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Haha.

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Serena Camacho's avatar

Oh my god, this was so good. Funny, poignant, vulnerable. I could picture it all. Thanks for sharing this story.

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx so much, Serena. 🙏

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Rebecca Holden's avatar

Stunning, absolutely stunning, Carissa. Poignant, so real and gosh, hilarious.

You have such a gift. More!!!!!

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx, Rebecca. 🥰🙏

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Tina Neidlein's avatar

Magnificent. So g.d. funny yet also so touching. I will be laughing at “Maybe once I have a child, I’ll be carefree” for days and weeks. 👏👏

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Haha. Thx, Tina. 🙏

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Tim Ebl 🇨🇦's avatar

Eggs, ovar- easy? Haha

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Jeannine Lawall's avatar

I just found this today! Very good, very sad, very funny, all at once. I'm glad to know that you eventually do end up with babies, or it would be too sad. BTW, I think your title freaked out my email program, because I found this when I was cleaning out my spam folder. One little gem, lost amidst a sea of perfidy. I'm happy I decided to make sure there was nothing good in there before hitting the proverbial flush button, or I would have missed out!

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Haha. I didn’t even think of that. Maybe I’ll share on Notes in case others missed it.

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Chris Stanton's avatar

This was amazing, CK. Moving, funny, suspenseful, funny, and funny. I really loved it. And the title--I don't even know what to say.

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx so much, Chris. 🥰🙏

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Shelly Mazzanoble's avatar

Gaaaaaawd, I loved every single word of this! Perfection!

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx, Shelly! 🙏🏻

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Donna McArthur's avatar

The title of this post cracks me up! In the midst of a busy day it stopped me in my tracks and I knew I wanted to come back to this post asap!

You are a talented writer and comedian to be able to turn a life event this challenging into such a hilarious story, I loved it!

Side note: why on earth would they have pictures of mothers and babies in a place like that? How horrible for all the parents wanting a child to see that on the walls.

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx so much, Donna. Click batey title. Hehe.

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Katharine Strange's avatar

Fantastic writing!

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx so much!

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Kristi Keller 🇨🇦's avatar

This was friggin hilarious!!! The non-stop puns and one-liners 😂

I loved this!!!

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx, Kristi. 🥰🙏🏻

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Amanda Jaffe's avatar

CK, this is such a wonderful blend of dialogue that says so much more than the words on the page and interiority that binds it all together. I absolutely loved this.

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx so much, Amanda. 🙏🏻

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Vicki Tashman's avatar

Thanks for your honesty and for sharing this story. I wish I could’ve been there emotionally for you at that tough time in your life. But, as always you spin humor from hurt and make it work. ❤️ And I’m so glad you got your beautiful babies! 👶🏻

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx, sis. Love you. 😘

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Sue Ferrera's avatar

What a great chapter, and so funny in parts. No baby but a commercial. Infertility is no joke though, can be simply heartbreaking. Wondering if you've seen The Man with 1000 kids? Such a horrific story. Anyway, thanks for putting some humor in a tough subject for many!

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Good Humor by CK Steefel's avatar

Thx, Sue. I saw Delivery Man with Vince Vaughn. Very good movie. I will look for your recommend.

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Sue Ferrera's avatar

I'll check that out as well.

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