Tour of Maternity Ward at American Hospital!

On Friday, Aaron and I went on a tour of the maternity ward at the American Hospital where baby girl will be delivered. There were about 20-25 preggo women there with their spouses. Some women were as pregnant as me and some were barely pregnant! I use to hate it when people told me I was "barely pregnant"...I had already dealt with constant nausea, vomiting and coma-like sleepiness and I sure as hell felt pregnant! But now that I'm almost at the end, and I see these women with the slightest bumps, I totally think to myself that they are barely pregnant!

The way things work at American Hospital is that when I go into labor and check into the hospital, they will put me in my maternity room where we will be for 2 nights after the baby is delivered. As soon as I want an epidural, I need to move to the labor and delivery room, where baby girl will be delivered! They said that if you don't want any pain relief (fat chance of that happening! I'm definitely getting an epidural and I know Aaron plans on getting two of them for himself!) they will take you to the labor and delivery room at the point during your labor where you feel really uncomfortable.

So first we saw the maternity room. It was small and kind of grey-ish but that's fine ( I guess!). Then they told us, in true "Dubai" fashion, that there were VIP maternity rooms. So we went to take a look at those and holy cow! They were about 2.5 times bigger, better view, a "personal" fridge and a big couch. It was a lot nicer. The tour guide told us that the room was an extra 4,500 AED extra per night which is roughly $1,233. That's a Louis Vuitton purse or a night at the Burj Al Arab hotel!

We then went to look at the labor and delivery room. The room was fine, once again not much to it and kind of bleak. The equipment was old looking, but I interned at one of the best labor and delivery hospitals in the USA so I think I have a spoiled view of everything to begin with! On our way over the room we walked by the nursery and two little girls had just been born. Aaron and I stopped to look at them and they were so cute. :)

If I end up needing an emergency c-section (please cross your fingers that I won't!) they have one "operating theatre" (that's what they call it here) on the floor maternity floor. If that room is occupied, I have to go downstairs to where they have 5 theatres. The only catch is that the recovery room is shared with all the other patients from the other theatres so they won't let the baby in the room. In that case, baby goes upstairs to the nursery. We would have the option of Aaron either going with baby girl upstairs or staying with me downstairs while I recover (it's 45 minutes that I have to be in the recovery room). Well I told Aaron, that if that ends up being the case for us, he is not letting his little girl out of his sight! I will stay there by myself but I want him to be with the baby!

So overall, it was a great visit. We learned a ton and it is comforting to have a place to visualize where we will be to deliver! Only 3 1/2 more weeks!