I'm officially a midwife patient

I've been seeing an OB but he has two certified nurse mid wives in his practice. They can deliver babies too, just no c-sections.

I love my OB. He was great during my miscarriages and when I had cysts and abnormal pap smear scares. I'll probably still see him from time to time. He's very reassuring and doesn't really rush too much.

Donna (the midwife) can take a lot more time for the appointments and doesn't brush me off if I have concerns. My OB loves to quote statistics which I appreciate with my google MD (ha ha) but we all know that stats don't really mean what will happen to us as individuals. If it was so easy to be on the majority side, we'd never had one miscarriage let alone more. And we wouldn't have infertility problems etc. Some stats are comforting but some just aren't.

The first time I saw Donna for this pregnancy, she practically read my chart from front to back. I have a huge chart as you probably do too. My OB always says my chart looks beat up and the nurse just this week mentioned that I have a big chart. Anyway Donna caught things in my history that I didn't even know and things that I'm sure my OB would have missed.

One example was that I'm GBS positive. It was found in my last pregnancy during a urine analysis. They can assume that from time to time I'll have that bacteria again. It's not a big deal and is pretty common but will require an IV of antibiotics before delivery. They normally do a swab once or twice during pregnancy to check for the bacteria. The swab is pretty invasive. Some girls report that they swab not just vaginally but rectally too! Eww.

So Donna noticed that I already tested positive and told me to remind them so I wouldn't have to be swabbed for this pregnancy. They will just assume that I'm positive. Anyone that looks for a way to save me a poke and prod is my kind of person. ;)

I have no problem with a male doctor. Not at all. Again, I love my OB and Chris does too. But there's something comforting when talking to Donna. She has a little better edge. She's had three pregnancies. She has all the female parts that my male OB can only quote stats about.

I may try to go without an epidural for delivery. Donna will be more supportive of that and allow me more time to do my thing. I may end up with an epidural. I may end up with a c-section by my doctor. Who knows. But I'd like to see what happens.

Donna asked me several questions regarding my vitamins, breastfeeding, circumsion, and birthing classes. She gave me a run down of my coming up appointments. I go back in 4 weeks (week 25 of pregnancy) and then another 4 weeks (week 29) will be my glucose test. After that I will go to appointments every two weeks starting at week 31.

So I've officially switched from my OB to a midwife. I'm borderline crunchy. :)