Sunday, October 08, 2006

The First Hospital Visit

Was blessed to be able to take up an offer to babysit from the son of our good friends from church, Aunty Doris and Uncle Kwang Hong. This morning, we drove to Camberwell train station, met up with Zhao'en, gave him a run-down of Beth's usual behaviour on outings with friends, bought her a Zone 1 train ticket, handed him $ for expenses (they were off to town to see the movie Monster House, which Beth has been asking for since we got here), and waved goodbye.

After a kebab lunch, we drove 1 hr 20 mins back the way we came, to W Mercy Hosp (a literal East-West journey) for my first appointment with the Childbirth Center. I was asked to fill in a detailed registration form before meeting the midwife on duty. In Oz, babies are generally delivered by midwives, who share care of the patient with the obstetrician, unless you ask to be specifically cared for by your doc.

My midwife was a pleasant Italian-looking motherly lady who gave the impression that she's been doing this for a long time and can handle anything. She explained what would happen: the midwife on duty will handle the delivery and call the obs once she sees the head; if he gets there on time, good, but if not, she will do the delivery. She assured me that my obs loves being around for deliveries and will definitely make an attempt to be there when the time comes.

In the meantime, I should not hesitate to call the centre if I have even the slightest question about the bb's or my well-being e.g. if there's bleeding, no fetal movement for 1 day, the water bag breaks etc etc. So that's that. The next time I visit will be when bb's due.

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