Hospital Tour - The Battle Plan

As a final act of pre-natal education before baby go-time, Terri and I attended the IWK birth unit tour last night. What an adventure…

There were about nine couples in attendance, plus a few mothers, representing a broad range of class, age and… footwear preference. We had a couple pushing 50 from Truro who already had a 15 year-old and a 9 year-old at home. Not to be too judgmental here, but he looked like the guy from Happy Gilmore who had the nail driven into his head; she looked… like a zombie (I’m an asshole). We had a mother-daughter team from Beaverbank whose only question – after a looong spiel on what to bring to the hospital, when to come to the hospital, when you will be asked to leave the hospital, and how to prepare – was “how long until I can take birth control again?” There was the bossy mom and her mute husband. The loud, chatty couple from Ottawa. The mom showing like she was smuggling a full-grown man under her top. And the two couples who looked stupid familiar because we see them at the gym all the time (which took a while for me to figure out).

We were shown the waiting areas, the place to admit, the elevators, the recovery rooms, and the surprisingly non-surgical-looking birth unit itself, where we were shown the tools of the trade, the baby “landing pad”, the baby “heater” and, um, the bathroom. Disappointing, there is no television in the birth unit, so if she goes on a Saturday night I'll have to miss the game. I’m kidding of course, but that is apparently why there is no television in the room – people were more interested in their serials than in pushing out a baby, or support thereof…

We took plenty of notes, and I felt prepared when we left last night, but this morning I seem to have forgotten many of the finer points. Good thing we took notes! Speaking of notes - of note: in an informal survey of all couples that knew the sex of their child – all but one were having boys. We still have no idea.

Tickticktick…