Today is the first day in which this baby journey seems a little more real. Most of the baby thoughts use to start with "in the future when i'm pregnant" or "one day when we start trying...", and now that we have an idea of WHEN that phase may begin I feel like it's really begun and there are so many things I need to start researching.
Insurance: We are very lucky to have a great insurance plan with Jorge's work. But I've heard and read so many horrible insurance stories I wanted to start getting information. First things first, I needed to know if we needed to call BEFORE I got pregnant to make sure that I was covered. I've heard of people not having those benefits because they didn't tell the insurance company they were trying to get pregnant. Well what if it wasn't planned!? Obviously that is not my situation since i'm here gathering information beforehand, and the customer service representative with our insurance was able to explain our benefits and specific questions to ask our doctor/facility to make sure they accept our insurance plan and not just the insurance provider. So much information to shuffle through, but right now that's a good start.
Facility: I feel like it's really early to start looking into where I want to deliver my baby since i'm not even pregnant. But, I do have a really good idea of what I want in my birth and delivery which narrows down my options. Right now my plan is to have a natural birth in a freestanding birth center with a midwife. Where I live, that makes it a little more difficult to find a midwife and facility I feel completely comfortable with. There are three facilities I will be calling in the near future to set up initial consultation appointments with and go from there. One is only 5 miles away, the second 25 miles, and the third is a whopping 32 miles away. In the perfect world I will walk into the one right around the corner, love the midwife and feel completely comfortable in that facility, so I'll be crossing my fingers for that!
Midwife: I already know the reactions i'll be getting in the future when people ask me who my doctor is and what hospital I will be delivering in. No i'm not crazy. Yes I've done the research. No i'm not a hippie. Blah blah blah. Trust me, this was all very new to me until I started getting interested in the research and really not wanting a C-section. To be clear, I am not against people who decide to have elective C-sections, epidurals, pitocin, etc. This is just a personal choice I've made for myself and my future baby. I understand that if I am a high-risk patient, I will not be able to have the out-of-hospital birth I'd like, but I believe I can start this process and hope for the best. Pregnancy is not a sickness or disability, women have been giving birth for thousands of years, and I believe having a natural birth is the best for me and my baby. Inspirations for this (and they don't even know it) would be my mom and my Wela (mom's mom). I've grown up knowing that my mom had both me and my sister in the hospital, without getting an epidural. My mom has told us stories how she and all of her siblings were born at home, and how that was completely normal at the time. This is what I want. This is what i'm striving for. (For those of you wondering what ignited this birth plan please watch: The Business of Being Born, More Business of Being Born, and Pregnant in America, to name a few.)
Like I mentioned before, I'm in the planning, prepping, and preparing phases of what will hopefully be a pregnancy in the near future. Even though right now we don't know how long it may take, and it seems so close because of actually talking to insurance companies and birthing centers, I will go with the flow and do everything I can from now until then to be ready.
If you have any suggestions about the preparation phases please let me know!
Heather Ortiz, future mama to be
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