What a way to spend a Sunday afternoon…a trip to preview the facilities at our hospital of choice. Or at least, what we thought was our hospital of choice. After our visit, we’re not so sure.
It started badly, asking directions was a bit hit & miss and it turned out to be (for someone with a well developed bump) a not insignificant walk form the nearest drop-off point to the front door. Okay, fair enough, it’s a new unit, part of a huge re-development of the whole hospital but it means the department is open and functioning in the middle of a building site which isn’t due ot complete and be fully open for a long time yet.
Thus access can at best be described as restricted, and at worst, an absolute pain. Part one of the tour revealed internal politics – the main doors aren’t manned post 8pm so you have to use the emergency children’s ward entrance. Only, they don’t really like people doing that. As our guide for the afternoon helpfully pointed out “try & have your baby in opening hours”. Hmmm.
Another slight problem for us is the fact that our midwives are actually based at a different hospital. So they’ve been telling us what processes we should expect, what treatments might be needed, how the facilities are, how to get there etc etc. Only it turns out that, despite only a few miles separating them, processes differ. Bring on a number of fundamental changes to our likely treatment. Hmmm again.
Admittedly, the facilities are very new, but to the point of not actually having unpacked. And as we were told, no funding through yet for soft touches, like pictures on the walls, TVs, radios, etc etc. And while the midwife led care unit was great to see, we’re not actually able to use it. So it’s obstetrics for us.
Final straw of the day…a mother-to-be getting rushed through reception screaming the roof off (and it’s only just been put on too) while our guide makes a remark about staying at home but don;t leave it quite that late.
So what should have been a reassuring visit to the likely birthplace of our child ended up being our most traumatic experience of the whole pregnancy (and I include a Saturday evening dash to the emergency ward when some worrying signs were showing up), possibly due to the sense that we’d been let down somehow.
That said, it also tuns out the chances of the bean being born there are perhaps less than we thought – divert figures have been pretty high and judging by the size of the group doing the tour, is showing no sign of abating. Meaning we could well be on divert to our midwives’ base hospital anyway.
Will we change? I’m not sure. We’ll certainly be looking a lot more closely at our other option…not least because we could well end up there regardless of any choices we make.