Normally in the UK at the first appointment with the nurse or doctor they do everything there from bloods to tests to booking the scan etc but not here in lovely Espana, so after the midwife appointment 5 days ago i awaited a phone call from the hospital which happened the same day so impressed, booked for 20th at 1045 couldn't quite understand the rest but I thought I would wing it. so i found out what baby scan was in spanish and off I went for the scan with my husband in tow. ELovely hospital, free parking (not like the UK), straight to reception waited to be seen showed them my best handwriting in spanish he swiped my sip card brilliant little thing and poof up popped all my medical appointments on the screen, perfect wrote down where i needed to go and told me the directions off we go. Unfortunately I forgot what he said so every corner I turned or every member of staff I saw I asked where I needed to go until I reached the staff only zone.....ooopppsss. Luckily found a lovely nurse spoke english and took us down to the basement through to the back off the hospital to a small waiting room fantastic I thank ed her and we waited we other expecting mothers and partners or friends. 30 minutes later we still had not been seen so I waited till the next nurse popped her head out and nabbed her to let her know I had been waiting etc and how long till I was seen she told me to relax and took my documents, 20 mins later I was seen I was bursting for the toilet so when she was doing the scan and pressing down I was trying not to wet myself, on the positive lovely nurse spoke English which was easier and boosted my confidence, i can speak spanish but when i get in a flutter i loose concentration and it all goes blank. but wow what technology flat screen tv to watch our little baby and about 15 free photos too take home along with 2 free 3d scans people pay money for these back home, lovely experience and to be told at 13 weeks what the sex was, was amazing. we are expecting a beautiful baby boy I was 13 weeks pregnant and due around the 24th of august. Exciting......
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Only ten days away from catching up, I did say a lot had happened between the doctors and midwifes, school runs, the dogs, chickens, ducks, work etc I have been falling asleep at 9pm every night shattered is no the word..
Today was the day I went to go to the midwife although at the time I thought i was the scan, so off to Orihuela to a different medical centre then the ones I had previously been too, how many do they have in one town, Orihuela Alvarez De La Riva Health Center. walked in saw the receptionist, 25 minutes later saw the 3 midwifes I did not quite understand why I had so many although the cheeky cow said I needed to loose a few pounds.... well I said that was what I was doing before something started growin inside of me, god believe what she said luckily it was again filling out details etc and then go the next morning to get some blood done, so the next morning at 0800 same medical centre, I am waiting out side at 0800 because it is not open so here I am with 40 other people and me, well I am secretly laughing to myself thinking I have an appointment, doors open i see the receptionist nope I have to go to the room with the same 40 people to wait for my name to be shouted out, oh lord..... well of course my fellow readers I could not take pictures due to the nature of the sample giving ranging from number 1s, number 2s and then bloody obviously the first 2 samples were in pots given before hand from doing it at home I only had to give a pee sample thank god. Moving on, i gave paperwork and got paperwork then waited in what was like a conveyor belt of people, going through this door i gave the new set of paperwork to another nurse whom in turn gave not 1 but 7 vials for bloody.... are you kidding me. round this queue of people I go to then sit down at this table, in a room full of tables with people getting the blood sucked out of them, this male nurse took my test tubes got my arm and put the needle in, ouch. then filled up these vials one by one, of course I had to watch, it was a lot off blood I was surprised I had any left and that was it all done thank you kind doctor for stabbing me and sucking me dry off my blood have a nice day, then home I went to sulk and complain about the vampires in the medical centre .......... apologies for use off language in the last two blogs . When it comes to the healthcare in Spain I can not argue it has to be better then the UK, the system here is so different, waiting for a doctors appointment no problem can fit you in that day or the next unlike the UK waiting 2 to 3 weeks just to see your local GP. on the other hand paperwork is always a head ache in Spain, copies of this and copies off that. so far my experience with the Spanish healthcare system to date has been pretty impressive, from when i sliced my arm open with a wine glass while working in a bar ambulance and local police where there within 5 minutes, 15 minutes later i was being stitched up in Santapola medical centre and sent on my way. Lexi having her jabs done for primary school again appoint at half 3 seen at half 3 that same day brilliant. Of course we no longer live in Gran Alacant and we live in the all Spanish speaking village of La Campaneta. Now I am not bragging about my fluency in Spanish but I did do my residencia by myself. So... because I was still registered in the doctors in GA (Gran Alacant), I had to re-register at the village doctors doe not sound too complicated does it? I go to the doctors, the young lady speaks a little bit of English but I understand that I need to go to the Centro de salud in Orihuela to re-register absolutely fine no issue, google maps and I am there 10 minutes later. ... It was extremely busy but luckily to sort out the sip card, which is your Spanish NHS card, you just had to go to a separate counter . Lovely only 1 person was in front of me, easy change give sip card, give new address 2 minutes later perfect. on my way back to the doctors in my village to see if i can book an appointment that day, bearing in mind this whole medical journey started after the school run so roughly 09:15 , i get back to the doctors at 10:20 not bad really. then to my wonderful shock yes appointment in the next 20 minutes perfect I will wait..... and wait is what I did....40 minutes later yes 40 minutes later I see my new GP nice gentleman cant pronounce his name, but he added details about my *pregnancy* to his computer the usual questions were asked have you taken a test , nope i just woke up feeling pregnant haha of course i did, apparently he did not understand my humour. I was then told after this I needed to go to the centro de salud orihuela to book an appointment with the midwife. I know what your thinking... it is the exact same place I had to go to change my sip card..... Whose laughing now I suppose.
so half 11 I drive back to the the other medical centre take a ticket and sit and wait ... again. Not so bad I waited 15 minutes to be told my appointment was on friday at 10ish I cant remember the exact time it is now all such a blur. so now i had to rearrange work as well, brilliant but it was all sorted and I was back home by 1pm.... exhausting isn't it just reading this imagine doing it then writing about it haha. Bonus was my lovely husband and I went for lunch at the new Dog and Firkin pub in catral, lovely food and lovely staff we have been twice more since...... and relax..... ooo further news today was the day I stopped smoking of course due to knowing I was pregnant.... welcome the e-cig. (its been 2 weeks now since I stopped smoking, yay go me...). I suppose another reason of not blogging for the past few weeks.. here comes another excuse... was because we wanted to keep the pregnancy quite till the scan, but we all know a bit of wine goes down nicely in the sun (FYI I am not an alcoholic haha) but on this occasion knowing I was pregnant 0% alcohol sangria it was and time to tell the neighbour of our new addition.
it was a lovely day but it was very windy to the point we had to sit inside in the end, the down fall of being so open but we are planning on sorting that disadvantage out, the food was amazing and I was craving meat I was in my element...... Doctors tomorrow uh oh.... Sunday mornings are a classic market day in Spanish in the small town of San Isidro about 15 minutes from us down the camino roads *camino is more of a dirt track. vibrant colours of fruit and veg, the smell of churros dipped in chocolate and the smell of salted fish and fresh bread. I do love this market all Spanish and very cheap highly recommend to go and get a bargain, the Moroccan cafe in the centre is nice where you can get a whole cooked chicken for 6 euros perfect for the Sunday dinner. So this market for us a routine on a sunday morning, it has market stalls selling new products but also at the back of the market a second hand car boot which again is brilliant for the little bargains, i picked up some new to me wellies at small price of 5 euros and a warm coat (yes it does get cold in spain when you have acclimatised haha) for the price of 3 euros so 8 euros altogether in pounds probably £6.50 lovely. Moving on we thought we go for a bit of a drive down the random camino roads to see where it would take us, spot anything new we had missed and we came a cross a car show, it was brilliant. you do not see a lot of these things advertised you just casually fall upon them. lexi loved it and even had a go on one of the motorbikes, watching the classic cars race down the road on their little run around the area was great fun there is another one in jumarilla nr Murcia in june for minis which i think we will be attending so watch this space .... So these are the pictures of Narla and Diego 10 weeks old with surragate daddy simba. He does not look impressed but he as grown to love them and so has the others in our pack, so in total we have now have 7 dogs. Simba, Dina, Doogle, Zorro, Korvu, Narla and Diego. Narla and Diego are spanish mastin crosses so will be big dogs but are so well behaved and lovable a great addition to our pack. It is a good job we have lots of land. Ps Should of been blogged on 14th Jan 2019 .... haha So my daughters birthday is actually on the 14th December but as we were away in the UK for the festive period she couldn't have a party with her friends in here in Spain. So our lovely neighbors and us put together a joint party for Elisa and Alexis. The girls are great friends living next door to each other they are constantly up to mischief plus being in the same class at school has its perks, but they are like sisters. one minute they are angels and the next the bomb squad and army might as well turn up to separate them typical girls at that age.
It was a beautiful sunny day in southern spain for the party, we were the only english as our neighbours bruno and valarie along with elisa are from belguim and of course the other participants are spanish. There is nothing better then having a good get together with everyone the girls were behaved just about, everyone turned up and the food oh my god amazing, we made pork kebabs marinated in faijta spices, there was freshly made tortilla and some sort of fish pate, but the best dish of all by far was cristina and arturro, proper spanish paella and oh my lord what an amazing paella it was cooked fresh from a 3 stone ground fire you can not get more spanish rustic culture then that. oh and after the party and a few wines we went out on a whim and inquired two more puppies .... Andys fault!!!! Wow..... I am such a bad blogger, in my defense so many things have happened in the last 6 weeks I am surprised i am still sane and not in the corner rocking myself too sleep with a bottle of wine... I would say vodka but wine is only a euro a bottle in Spain ha ha.
Where do I start in what has happened, well the easiest thing to do would go on face book and check my posts, but i don't; think i have even done that oh lord where has my social media ability disappeared to. so its time to look at my half wrote calender that i again do not seem able to keep on top off and pictures i have taken in my phone. lets start where i left off *looking at my lemon pictures on my phone* I have a new Job. well that good news for once, from working in an airport to then working with the one thing I love the most, Animals. Working at a animal rescue centre/ boarding kennels is such an amazing experience, I feel like i am making a difference in the world a small step at a time. The animals I work with vary, from the obvious dogs to cats and then horse, donkeys, pigs, goats, chickens, guinea pigs etc. I currently am full time so the morning shift starts at 0645 hours so i am up at 5am but on th plus i am home by half 12 before i go back at 1530. only a few days a week and more weekends off then i had at the airport so all in all I am in love with what i do more family time at home, works well around y husbands business and our daughter plus I am giving something back to the animal world. ps. this should of been blogged in January around the 10th Enjoy xxx Good evening everyone, Just a short update today as I have to be up at 6am tomorrow for my trial shift.... fingers crossed it goes ok, god knows it will be freezing at the time. We went to go see my favourite guy Colin today as yet again my car is in need of tlc.... banging noises and the steering wheel shaking is a sign of some needed attention, (another step back as it goes) so my husband will be taking that tomorrow for me after doing the school run as I will be busy on the trial shift. so with a field of lemons growing around the house and as they saying goes when life gives you lemons.....well lets make some lemonade and that is exactly what we did this afternoon after arranging for the car to be sorted. Going knee deep into the field thanking the lord it is not snake season as i could not see my feet, we picked the lemons. There were absolutely loads it broke my wicker basket. Bring the story to a close and experiment in making home made lemonade by my husband and I have too admit as I do not particularly like lemony things it was really nice. (Pictures are below) Have a great evening everyone and wrap up where ever you are as the cold season of the blue January is around. The Optimistic Mummy xx |
Author28 year old mother and wife living a crazy life where 2 steps forward is normally equal to 10 steps back. How ever being the optimistic mummy someone has to be positive... ArchivesCategories |