Getting to the hospital when DP doesn't drive

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This is a theoretical question for now as i am not pregnant and don't intend to be for a while.

What are the options for getting to the hospital when you are in labour and your DP doesn't drive? Taxi is the only way i can think of and i have no idea whether they would actually take a woman to hospital in that situation due to possible bodily fluids?!
I wouldn't want to ring an ambulance as it seems a waste of time and resources basically for them to be used as a taxi.

Just a random question from me but when the time comes this is the scenario i will be in! No family living nearby to help either.

Home birth

Well i thought take a car seat and bring a baby back in the taxi in that?

Is that not how it works or am i being naive?

sleepy what did you do with DS until your mum arrived? And how long between you and her getting to hospital?

I may have a similar situation come sept hence why I'm asking :)

Don't worry, that is the way it works OP!

Dh & ds1 stayed in the waiting room and I went in by myself.

Luckily my mum was only 15mins behind us as ds2 had arrived before they got home!

Worst case scenario would have been dh missing the birth which he would have hated, but things were so full on by that point I probably wouldn't have noticed

With hindsight, we left it really late and should have phoned as soon as I knew I was in established labour (parents live an hour away) but everything moved much faster than I was expecting (first twinge to birth was c4 hrs).

And yes, your dh can nip home for the car seat at some point. They're useful things to have even if you don't regularly use a car.

My DP drives but was at work with the car, I got a taxi and met him at the hospital.

I had a lovely chat with the taxi driver who regaled me with tales about the midwife at his first child's birth many years ago, who, trying to help him understand the process of labour, was comparing the 5cm dilation to the width of a vacuum cleaner hose, and full dilation to a grapefruit, and him saying in a cockney twang he never used the bleeding vacuum cleaner and had never eaten a bleeding grapefruit. .

Taxi. Driving your car would be a PITA in lots of towns due to lack of parking/ short parking spaces. I called myself a taxi and told them I was in labour so they were expecting it.

TickleMePurple it was early, in rural Scotland its a medi centre not an actual hospital really and I had to leave as soon as contractions started pretty much. The third one was bonkers, no one was driving anywhere in 6 foot snow drifts. Even our tractor was struggling. No idea what would have happened if we had got into difficulty during birth.

Thanks sleepy

Hello OP

We went in taxi with dd, our third.
It was funny as the lady on switch board was consoling the driver telling him we'd have ages yet, until he relayed back to her that it was her third.
To which she replied don't hang around then.
Even funnier are my very quick labours of 2hours, ds2 90 min and dd 30 mins
yes, they take you, but may insist on rubber/plastic sheets.

I went in a taxi with DD1 3 times mid labour. She was back to back and the hoapital kept sending me home. Finally got admitted at 850am and had her at 11am

I also went in a taxi whilst having a MC at 16 weeks, bleeding and in agony. Driver was lovely and i had wrapped myself in a duvet

Car seat you could take it when making the first journey or get OH to bring it at discharge. I managed to get a lift home with DD1. DD2+3 i had dps and inlaws on standby for lifts.

Black cab drivers should be trained to buckle in a car seat - we were advised not to try pick-up in our/relative's car because there is literally ZERO parking just a cab rank. Still if the hospital is good enough for the Duchess of Cambridge it's good enough for me LOL (seeing the consultants there on the NHS haha, doubt anyone will close a road for our home trip!).

For getting back, we're planning for DH to walk home with the baby in a pram - about 10/15 minutes and me to either walk with him or (more likely!) get a cab on my own.

Went there and back in a taxi. No issue