Pregnant and Abroad

Pregnant and Abroad

So, here we go again! I’m 7 weeks pregnant and Alfie’s little sister or brother is due on 16^th January 2012. I’m already sick as a dog and feel fluey, tired and miserable. Headachey, queasy and VERY grumpy. I don’t recall being in this bad a mood last time round but I’m sure Pete will say different. All I want to do is stay in bed and eat toast all day. Or crisps. Any carbs in fact. I don’t want to drink water unless forced but am constantly thirsty. Everything smells. The house smells, of what I’m not sure, but it’s not pleasant. Aircon smells, cupboard smells, cooking smells. Just not what I want to smell anyway. It all makes me feel sick. I don’t want to eat but can’t stop eating as it’s the only thing that seems to make the sickness abate for a while. That said, whatever I eat can make me feel sick too; nothing too rich, nothing too dairy, nothing too sweet or well, sickly.

Yesterday I went for a lie down at 11am and woke up 2 hours later. I did feel a bit perkier that afternoon but by 9pm I felt dreadful again and was sure I was coming down with something. How can a little apple pip make such a big difference? We had a scan while we were in Bangkok last week and you couldn’t even see our little baby at 1.4mm, just the yolk sac (yuk!).

Having a baby abroad, mmm. We can’t actually have the baby here in Myanmar because it’s not safe. Although there are plenty of hospitals, obstetricians and midwives the blood products (in case of emergency) cannot be guaranteed so most people opt for going home or skipping over to Bangkok. We had booked our trip before knowing I was pregnant but it seemed serendipitous so we checked out the maternity hospital and had some blood tests and scans while we could. We didn’t actually see the birthing centre but I have it on good authority, from ladies who have had their babies there, that it is much like a 4-star hotel. That is one advantage of private medical insurance I guess.

One thing I hadn’t considered was that after the birth we will have to wait for baby to get a visa before being able to return home. Which means we will have to wait for baby to get a passport too. Wowzer, hadn’t reckoned on that. And it took us over 6 weeks to get our visas. Great. What with having to go over a month early because I can’t fly past 36 weeks, we could be spending quite some time in Thailand. Hmmm.