Local hospital where DP works or an hour away?

[TheBeesKnee]

I have a conundrum!

Pregnant and due in May 2023.

The hospital local to me happens to be a hospital where my DP works. It is walkable in about 15 minutes.

The other hospital is an hour's drive away. I don't drive but it's London so I'd have to travel 90 mins on public transport or get an Uber.

I filled in the self-referral form for the local hospital last week, but they haven't contacted me yet.

The more I think about it, the more anxious I feel about having my antenatal appointments and giving birth with my partner's colleagues. It all feels too close and I hate the idea of them knowing if something was wrong, or being vulnerable in childbirth around them.

This was made worse yesterday in a supermarket when I overheard a receptionist from the hospital loudly talk about a patient to her friend/supermarket worker.

Would I be bonkers to go with the hospital further away?

One of the midwives in the unit I gave birth in had had her daughter there a couple of years earlier. The big important consultant, a professor, had delivered her himself.

You are going to get better treatment at your partners workplace than a hospital where no one knows you. You need people around who are kind and supportive. They are not embarrassed or awkward and neither should you be.

100% go local. You're massively overthinking this.

I'm in Obstetric theatres, and I've had both my babies at the hospital I work at. All my colleagues (theatre staff, doctors and midwives) I know have had their babies there too.

My first I was fortunate to only require midwifery care, who I don't know quite as well. However, with my second, I needed an epidural and eventually to go to theatre. I thought it would be embarrassing to encounter my colleagues, but when it came down to it I honestly didn't care. I think the anaesthetic nurse who assisted with the epidural was more embarrassed than I was that he was there.

I know perfectly well there would have been some gossip afterwards. But it would have been about that I had had my baby, he was a boy, and that I had gone to theatre. And that would have been only a few days. It will be extremely old news by the time I return, if not completely forgotten about.

Anecdotally, I've been present for plenty of births of staff, and the partners of staff. I do not remember any of the partners at all. Of the staff, I could probably dredge up the type of operation they had, but that's about it. Time and having seen a few hundred births on top of those dulls the memory a bit

I had a homebirth in a flat, it was absolutely fine. I would never be able to travel 90 minutes in active labour, it's fucking horrendous and doing that publicly when you feel vulnerable and like you're dying would just be horrific.

Why would there be any problem with them knowing you've had an appointment? Close colleagues would know you've given birth etc and others shouldn't be finding out private protected data anyway. I don't understand why you think it's a problem. Pregnancy and birth and all it entails is such a common thing that won't be embarrassing or anything else for the staff involved.

I loved that DH worked at the hospital we used. Meant we had staff parking already paid for, he could pop out to meet for a coffee sometimes around appointments and/or drive me in if they were first thing so more convenient, he knew various people around and the quirks of the way the admin works, access to the staff canteen when the public one was rammed, I was familiar with the place in general from him talking about work.

I could have gone to one slightly closer (only about 5 minutes drive in it really) but the advantages of DH working there were great.

Go with the hospital closest to you. You'd be crazy not to. When you're in labour you won't give 2 shakes of a shit stick as to who sees you or what they think.

I'm an anaesthetist with an interest in obstetrics. With both my kids I gave birth at my local hospital rather than go to the fancy one an hour away - no way did I want to get stuck in a traffic jam in labour! I worked there when having DS1, had left by the time DS2 was born but still knew loads of people there. I waved at the ICU matron as I hobbled down the corridor in labour, had the clinical lead for anaesthetics pop her head in to see how I was doing, and obviously had VEs and stuff done by midwives I knew. When I had a haemorrhage after DS2 I was stitched up (and what felt like fisted!) by a registrar with whom I had done my first obstetric night shift with some years before. It was a really good experience!

On the other side, I have also put epidurals in colleagues or colleagues' wives (probably more stressful!) or anaesthetised them for delivery in theatre, and it's been a privilege.

As a sonographer your DH's immediate colleagues aren't going to be intimately involved with your birth, and the midwives themselves will be used to dealing with members of staff so please don't worry that they'd be gossiping or anything!