“We are our choices.”
-C. S. Lewis

32 weeks

I’m into the 30s… 30 plus weeks and I’m only now having my first antenatal appointment. You know, the interrogation about your lifestyle and living conditions. I’m sitting in the waiting room after taking my ‘ticket’ to see the nurse. I almost order a kilo of devon before I remembered the rule about deli-meats and pregnancy. Also, this is a hospital, not a deli. Gosh, I’m hungry. I’m back with the commoners. Hard chairs. Busy rooms. Again, I’m a number. This is good. I’m back where I belong. I’m obviously pregnant compared to the other expectant women waiting eagerly for their first appointment. One by one a nurse holding their seemingly empty manila folders call them in. I know my name’s about to be called when I see that folder… the thick one being dragged behind the nurse in a cart (ok, slight exaggeration) coming toward me. The appointment starts with pleasantries as she reads through my previous antenatal record and prepares my new beige antenatal record card with my big red sticker. Rhesus negative. I have my anti-D injection booked next week with my obstetician appointment. If for some reason little man’s blood gets into my blood stream, my immune system develops anti-bodies that will try and destroy any ‘foreign invaders’, i.e. future pregnancies. Science is awesome. This isn’t new news. I had it last time too.

As the evidently confident nurse tinkers away she says in passing, “Hey look there, I did this appointment for you last year. There’s my signature right here!”

You wouldn’t believe it. The exact same anti-facebook-profile-ultrasound-mean lady from my small brain appointment is sitting right here… smiling. I don’t know if to laugh at the irony, cry in pity or punch her in frustration… so I just simply say “oh yeah, I remember”. Am I having a sliding-doors moment?

I’m signed off. I’m declared mentally stable. If only they knew what was actually going through this small brain of mine.

 “He counts the stars and calls them by name, yet he heals the broken in heart and binds up their wounds.” – P. H Spurgeon

34 weeks