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Woman Sent Away From Hospital Forced To Give Birth At Home
Natasha Ramirez of Sydney Australia says that she was turned away from a hospital because they didn’t have “enough room.” And besides, the nurse told her, you won’t be in labor “for another 24 to 48 hours.” So she went home. “Five hours later baby Anjelita was born” on her bedroom floor, according to Australia’s Daliy Telegraph.
The 27-year-old new mom claims that she was bleeding and “in labour” (they spell things funny in Australia) when she arrived at Liverpool Hospital. Apparently Ramirez was 4 days past her due date, “needed anti-D injections because of her O-negative blood type” and due to complications with a previous birth, and oh yeah — she was having contractions. But a nurse “assessed” her and told Ramirez to go home. She says that she was not seen by a doctor.
Most important detail — mother and baby are fine. Here are a couple of photos.
Still, she’s pissed. The hospital is investigating.
Obviously this story isn’t about hospitals versus homebirth. But it did remind me of one of the most popular personal essays on Babble, Madeline Holler’s “My Illegal Home Birth.” In it, Madeline describes how she broke the law (“breakin’ the law, breakin’ the law…“) by deciding to have her baby at home. But what if she had gone to the hospital, only to be told “sorry, no room at the inn”? What then?
Weird. Again, mom and baby are fine, and hopefully this story, if true, will spur the hospital to be more careful next time.
Image/Source: Daily Telegraph, News.com.au
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11 Comments
[...] to “Glutton” in English (at least online). So this would be the Baby Glutton. But that, like the spelling of “labour,” could just be a language [...]
A Breastfeeding Doll? WTF? | Strollerderby commented on Jul 29 09 at 12:00 pmPlumbLucky commented on Jul 24 09 at 2:08 pmI’ve always wondered, at least since our hospital tour where they pointed out the “triage area” on the L&D floor, “hmmmm…so what if the triage nurse is…wrong?”. Granted, they did tell us that in the (highly unlikely) chance that all 18 LDRP rooms were occupied, we would simply be moved into a room in another floor for the entire (literal) mess. The nurse in charge of our tour said it’d happend one time since the complex opened 17 years prior.
Uh... commented on Jul 24 09 at 2:25 pmUmmm… every english speaking country in the world except the US spell words like “Labour” and “Colour” and “Neighbour” correctly… with the “u”.
patricia commented on Jul 24 09 at 2:42 pmTo Uh…:
1. British English and American English are linguistically distinct variations of the same language. It is correct to write “labor” and “color” etc. in American English, just as it is correct to write “labour” and “colour” in British English. The fact that the rest of the English speaking world uses British English doesn’t make the American spellings any more incorrect or wrong, unless you happen to use them in a British English setting (which this website is not).2. It was a joke, for crying out loud.
Larissa commented on Jul 24 09 at 6:59 pmWhen I worked in a hospital with 20 LDRPs we were busy enough to have women delivering on stretchers in triage and hallways outside the PACU. Not regularly but often enough that they invested in stretchers with collapsable bottoms & stirrups.
tickled commented on Jul 25 09 at 2:39 pmI took the jab at British English as such, but what really tickled me is that the author did so using incorrect grammar, funnily enough =)
Madeline Holler commented on Jul 26 09 at 1:21 amTo answer your question, if Madeline had needed to go to a hospital, Madeline would have most certainly been admitted because Madeline had really fabulous insurance at the time of her illegal homebirth. Really fabulous insurance. Plus, I’m really charming yet bitchy. They would have made room.
PS: Teeeeechnically, I wasn’t breaking the law. My midwife was. Or is it midwioufe?
zaksmom commented on Jul 26 09 at 12:16 pmIn the US, they tend to err in the other direction, if they have room- trying to induce or speed up what may be pre-labor or early labor. And Madeline, I’m so jealous of you- I had a crappy labor experience, ending in a C-section b/c I couldn’t shell out for a midwife. Oh well.
Adelle commented on Oct 01 11 at 4:17 pmWhile it is incredibly charming that you refer to yourself in the third person, being bitchy will get you nowhere when there simply is no space and not enough staff to deliver your baby safely. It will get you some nice nicknames at the nursing station however.
delores commented on Jan 08 12 at 12:50 pmStand by your Midwife-ever hear about the law of consenting adults?
delores commented on Jan 08 12 at 12:54 pm@madelaine:stand by your Midwife.Ever hear about the law of consenting adults?
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