The bright red kettle on our Viking stovetop whistled angrily, practically begging to be turned off. Yet, somehow, despite its obnoxious shrill, I was oblivious to its cries. Lost in thought, I could hear only what our doctors had told us earlier that afternoon.

"You okay, Nic?" My husband came up behind me, wrapping his familiar arms around my waist and giving me a big squeeze. He turned off the stove, silencing the room, and then sighed into my hair.

I turned to force a semi-smile at him, grateful to have such a consistently supportive husband. After thirteen years of being together, seven of them married, Eric and I were in full marital sync, many times anticipating the other's thoughts and words before they even happened.

"I'll be okay. Eventually, anyway. I just thought it would be different this time, you know?" I grabbed two mugs from our white cabinet and poured our tea — herbal for me, Earl Grey for him.

As I filled our mugs, boiling water sputtered out of the kettle, spilling on the counter and splashing my index finger. "Damn it!" I cried, instantly putting my finger in my mouth to try to stop the burn.

"Here, Nic. Put it under cold water." Eric guided me to the sink and turned on the tap. The lukewarm water streaming from the faucet soon turned icy, numbing the pain.

"Feel better?" Eric asked me when I could no longer take the cold. He took a clean tea towel from the drawer to wrap my hand. "Why don't you go and sit down on the couch? I'll bring you your tea. And then I'll order us a pizza for dinner. I know neither of us feels like cooking. Pepperoni and green olives sound good to you?"

"Mmm-hmm ... my favourite. Thanks. I'm suddenly really exhausted." I rubbed my eyes, knowing I was smudging my mascara over my lids but too tired to care.

"And I'll pick up some mint chip ice cream on my way to get the pizza." Eric searched my mascara-smudged eyes. I knew he was trying to find some way — any way — to make me feel better.

"Sure. Whatever you'd like."

Eric picked up my hand to inspect the burn. "I'm no doctor, but I think you'll live." He gave my hand a little kiss and gently pushed me towards the couch.

I sank into the cushions, relieved to find comfort after so many hours sitting on the hard waiting room chairs. Eric joined me. He handed me my tea, and took my feet in his lap to try to massage away the anxiety he knew I was feeling.

I closed my eyes, inhaling deeply, and murmured the words I had said so many times throughout our marriage. "Seriously ... what would I do without you?"

"I really don't know," Eric teased. "But you sure are lucky."

And lucky was right; I had married into pure stability. A gentle giant, Eric was as kind as he was strong. Anyone who knew him instantly recognized his patience and trustworthiness. And as my sister Maggie always pointed out, the icing on top of our perfectly made wedding cake was how madly in love he was with me. I knew how lucky I was to have the husband I did. Everyone who knew us knew it.

Eric and I had met during our summer break between second- and third-year university, when we were both hired to be lifeguards at a local water park. I was a rookie and he was one of the king veterans who constantly picked on newbie guards interviewing for the coveted position of waterslide babysitter. As my final interview pool drill, I had been required to rescue Eric, my unconscious, non-breathing victim from the dead centre of the pool. Although Eric was six-foot-two with 220 pounds of solid muscle as distracting as it was heavy, I somehow managed to get him to the side of the pool and properly rescued. He lived. And our relationship was born.

Six years later I became Mrs. Eric Sedgwick. Except that I was technically still Nicole Fowler, or Nicky Fowler, to those who knew me best. We were married on a cliff at Keoneloa Bay in Kauai, above the Grand Hyatt Resort in Poipu, overlooking the rugged Hawaiian coastline. Alongside a gawky island teenager plucking out emotionally stirring native songs on his tiny ukulele, and the Hawaiian minister wearing a maile leaf lei, we were surrounded by only our immediate family and best friends as we said our I Do's.

Our clifftop wedding far behind us, I blinked back tears and turned to bury my head in Eric's chest. Although slightly less defined than it had been years before when we first met in the middle of a pool, his chest was still as strong. And it felt like home.

"You sure you're okay?" Eric asked me.

"I will be. I'm just frustrated. And sad. I really thought they would have good news for us. It's our turn." I inhaled quickly and my breath caught in my throat.

After years of trying to get pregnant, our fertility doctor had confirmed that I wasn't. Again. It was my fifth negative pregnancy test at the clinic, only this time the devastating news came with an even bigger blow — Dr. Sansi, the fertility specialist who had gained our trust, respect and life savings throughout our need-a-baby expedition, felt that we should take a few months off. She thought the stress might be playing a critical factor in all of our monthly failures, and we only had one more shot at successfully becoming pregnant.

We first suspected something was wrong after I went off the pill and we threw caution to the wind. Although we weren't yet ready to officially "start trying," we were close enough that we'd be okay if something happened. Yet nothing did — and it surprised us, given how energetic and frequent our love life was.

After eight months, panic started to set in, and our spontaneous love life turned into morning temperature checks and routine sex every other day. Afterwards, I would lie in our bed, my bum propped on pillows and my legs raised straight in the air, until I could no longer hold the pose. Yet we still only got minus signs every time I peed on one of those damn sticks.

The months turned into one year of no baby. Then eight more months while we waited on the baby factory list. Finally, we got in to see Dr. Sansi.

We were instantly thrown into testing. I was poked, jabbed and prodded by a funny-looking instrument wearing a condom (medically known as a transvaginal ultrasound, which I was conditioned not to say given Eric's weirdness to the term) and had my cycle monitored by endless rounds of blood tests.

Eric's role in the whole investigative process was much simpler. And as I can only imagine, a bit more fun. Yet his results gave us the devastating answer we didn't want to hear: he had been diagnosed with the condition of azoospermia and, despite its cartoonlike name, there was nothing funny about it.

Eric had a zero sperm count. Zero. Zilch. Zip. Notta one sperm, healthy or even damaged, which meant there was nothing for me to get pregnant with.

If we wanted to have children, we needed to consider a sperm donor, which really wasn't an option for us given my belief that only half-looped men would actually donate their sperm to the masses — and who would want a guy like that to be the father of your child?

Without going with a sperm donor, adoption was our only other option.

Needless to say, we were both emotionally destroyed. I cried for three days straight, and it was the first time Eric had actually joined me in my constantly recurring sob sessions.

On the third day, we got a call from Dr. Sansi's office asking us to come in to speak with her. When we arrived, red-eyed and puffy-faced...