Rumer's Story, part 16

Appointments again

Sunday 28th to Monday 29th June 2015
26 weeks pregnant

So on Sunday the 28th June, we met Chris's parents for lunch in Woodlands in Marylebone, a vegetarian Indian restaurant we'd frequented a number of times. We showed them the latest scan pictures and told them Rumer's name. I'd anticipated that most people would, at best, take time to get used to her name - after all, it was hardly in the top 100 - but everyone immediately proclaimed to love it. I still have no idea if they meant it or not. My parents, whom we'd told on the phone, also claimed they liked it.

On the Monday, we'd ended up somehow with a busy schedule. Chris was working an early shift; we then had an appointment with the Dale midwife Mollie at home; then a lunch meeting with Nelly Lister, the yoga teacher, in an effort to recruit a doula; and finally a vet appointment as our orange cat Tom had managed to tear his ear in a fight.  Frustratingly, both the cats got ill while we were having all our problems with Rumer. We spent nearly as much time at the vet's as the hospital!

Chris was not having fun at work at the time. I was fortunate to still be off. My GP kept wanting to sign me off, and every time I was about to go back, something happened to keep me off for longer. He just about managed to get home as Mollie arrived at the door. I invited her in while Chris got changed and rushed downstairs. Mollie, like myself, never was one for accepting cups of tea etc, only glasses of water, so there was no ability to delay.

We shared with Mollie our experience with the antenatal class and Khushi Holloway's appointment. We had a long list of questions about stillbirth. Mollie decided that most of them were too clinical to answer herself and suggested we email Khushi Holloway with them, along with a copy of our stillbirth plan, to check everyone was happy with it. We also shared our new research with her regarding survival and treatment for T18. Honestly, I think Mollie, like most midwives, didn't know a lot about T18, so this information was as new to her as it was to us. She suggested we share that, too, with Khushi.

I declined the pointless random blood glucose testing in favour of my glucose tolerance test next week. I accepted a physio referral for mild pelvic girdle pain, and Mollie invited us to the team picnic at the weekend. We rushed out of the house, late to meet Nelly Lister for lunch on the local high street.

Nelly Lister was fine except that she had kippers for lunch and we are both vegans. We had a veggie breakfast, which was actually quite nice. Nelly wasn't prepared to commit to being our doula herself but suggested she could contact the regional rep, and they could maybe see if there were any doulas who were keen to help. She suggested that if there were, a rota would be useful. We were happy with that. She asked us to forward her our stillbirth plan and she would discuss it with the regional rep for Doula UK. (Unfortunately, their website had no contact details for regional reps or for people in our sort of situation.)

Nelly very kindly paid for lunch and we went home to take Tom to the vet for a follow-up after his ear needed to be glued when he got into a scrap with another cat. His ear was healing well, but he needed to keep the cone and stay indoors for a couple of weeks. This did not make Tom happy, but on the other hand, perhaps it was a good thing when we were out of the house so often.

We had a cardiology appointment coming up the next day, and a scan on the Thursday. We had also been chasing Elysia Crouch up for the neonatology appointment; all this new information: we wanted to discuss it and agree our approach. We underestimated quite how difficult that would be...

Stillbirth questions

Questions

Stillbirth plan

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