Why seek out new life, when you can create it from the comfort of your own home?

What a long night. Yesterday, Bionca was having some severe pain, that mostly hit when she sat up, but even when she was sitting still, standing, or laying down she was in pain. As a result, we decided to call the doctor and get their advice. They advised us to come to the Triage center at Winnie Palmer, and so off we went at 7p.m.

We check in, and sat. They had a good number of women in there, but they didn’t seem too busy. Boy was I wrong. We quickly learned that all of the triage beds were taken up, and that we would be there for a while, with more women coming in the whole time. A while turned out to be until 1 a.m. (5.5 hours for those keeping score at home) Luckily, our phones are a veritable cornucopia of entertainment, and I am a social person able to strike up a conversation with just about anyone or we likely would have gone insane.

Some parts of the waiting were not so bad. We talked for a while with this woman and her mom that were close to her due date, but had been in there like 10 times already. At one point we even had the whole waiting room laughing and talking. That was a very good thing, considering how miserable most of the women looked. You would think that since they know that that waiting room would be full of uncomfortable pregnant women that they would have some better chairs, and ways for them to elevate their feet.

We didn’t call anyone since we figured that it was a minor issue, and that we would just be sent home, with the plan being that if that changed, that we would let everyone know. Well, since Sha’Vonne was home when we were leaving, we had to tell her where we were going, and then her mom called and talked to Sha’Vonne, and now she and Gabby knew, so the whole time we were there we were I’m trying to manage information (mostly by saying that Bionca isn’t doing any worse, and that we are still waiting). It got a bit hectic at times, but I was able to manage it. There was no way that it made sense for anyone else to come to the hospital, as there was already little room for people.

Eventually we got called back, and Bionca saw the doctor. They used the Doppler device to hear the heart beat which was strong, and Peanut even kicked it. Then they did an ultrasound of her uterus and pelvic exam. Everything came out okay. they basically diagnosed the issue as round ligament stretching, and called it a night. It was pretty cool with the uterus ultrasound, since we got to see Peanut’s head, and we could even see the brain structure. I don’t know if Bionca was as interested in it as I was, but she was really tired.

The worst part was after the exam, we had to wait for about 30 minutes while they did the paperwork to release us. At this point it was 2 a.m., and we just wanted to go home. By the time that we got home, it was 3 a.m., and we about collapsed. We were tired and miserable, yet even knowing that it was basically 8 hours wasted, we would do it all over again 10 times. I’d much rather wait 8 hours to have them tell us that everything is okay when we think that there might be a problem, then wait until we know there is a problem and they tell us, “If only you have been here sooner…”

I can live without sleep, I couldn’t live with those words haunting me. No regrets. Well, maybe one. Next time, I’ll bring a miniature camping kit. If we are going to be there for a third of a day, we should at least make ourselves comfortable.