Ugh

My last midwife appointment, instead of being “a celebration of pregnancy,” as it’s been touted to be in their reading materials, was more of an exercise in making me upset, annoyed, and resentful. The whole thing started off badly. Since they’d already received the data from the ultrasound people, I asked for more details as what I was told from the tech the day prior was pretty basic. While I was told that she was about eighteen centimeters long, I wasn’t given any specifics on whether we were actually further along than we thought (as I’ve suspected from the very beginning). I also asked for reassurance about being asked to come for a second ultrasound, as I know it’s not the most common situation when it comes to ultrasounds. And then it went downhill.

She said, “Do you want something to be wrong with the baby?” she asked me.

I looked at her without replying, because I didn’t really understand the question. She went on to spout out new-agey crap for the next half hour (truly wasting my half hour) about how even thinking a bad thought will harm me and my baby and my spouse. By being knowledgeable about other people’s histories and situations (by reading books and blogs), she says, I am harming my family. Instead of being armed with all of the possibilities and information, I should walk around in a little dumbass lala-land stupor and just assume all is well. When I asked a basic question about which prenatal class to take (as I’ve never done this before and don’t know about the resources available) she told me that it was a decision I’d know how to make. Obviously. But I still want her to tell me where/when they are. At the hospital clinic they had a clearly posted sign on the wall. I wasn’t asking for a metaphysical speech on each thing I asked, but instead that is what I got. If I “already know” all the answers, as she kept asserting, I’d fucking crawl into the woods and birth my child amongst the trees and return to society with my face gleaming from eating the afterbirth. WTF? The whole situation was irritating and incredibly frustrating.

I want my medical professional to offer me medical advice. I understand the point she makes about a woman’s body “knowing” what to do, but I’ve never been in the situation of being pregnant and giving birth, so some input from the person who supposedly knows what they’re doing would be really appreciated. In the end, I didn’t even get to ask the questions that I’ve had written down for three weeks (which, thank you very much, ARE important to me) because I felt so frustrated about being given some hippy-dippy nonsensical answer to really concrete yes or no things I was asking.

When I got home I was really emotional and upset and Toby basically told me to ignore it all and to hope that we got the “good” midwife when it comes to giving birth. He also suggested going back to the clinic, but I don’t want to be so wishy-washy. I’m really regretful for not trusting my initial intuition about the place and at least I’m letting it be a lesson to myself to trust my mom intuition because it does indeed mean something. I’m fully aware that giving birth will be one day of my life and all I can do is concentrate and work with my man and my baby to be the best that it can be. And in the meantime, I will not go around dangling crystals over my belly and not reading books because that’s what this flake believes.