Anyone here used a birth center in a city other than where you are?

401 Views 3 Replies 4 Participants Last post by punkprincessmama, Jun 9, 2005

danav

Discussion Starter · Jun 9, 2005

My first two children were born in a free-standing birth center - I had great experiences there and love the midwives. I'm pg again and would love to go back there for this pregnancy and birth, but we now live close to 2 hrs away.

I've been exploring my options in my area, and it's essentially a hospital birth (which I don't want if everything is progressing normally) or a home birth with a direct entry midwife. I am fairly sure my insurance will not be willing to cover a home birth, and this midwife's fee is pretty high for us having to pay it all out of pocket. Plus I'm just feeling jittery about it since I talked with her yesterday, and I can't quite sort out if I'm just anxious about the finances, or if it's intuition that she's not the right person for me to use.

My other option is to go ahead and go back to my old birth center. Making the trips for prenatal care won't bother me, and I'm sure my insurance will cover them (they did for the last birth). The only thing I'm unsure about is the distance when it comes time for the birth - I had pretty fast labors with the first two and I'm just afraid of having the baby on the side of the highway! There is a possibility that I could go stay with friends close to the birth center towards the end of the pregnancy, though. And the midwives there tell me that they have had a number of women come to them from other cities several hours away.

Has anyone here done something like this? Did you have any issues getting there in time when it came to the birth? Would you do it again, or was it too inconvenient?

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AugustLia23

· #2 · Jun 9, 2005

My DP was planning on delivering at a birth center. But we ended up at a hospital. All she wanted to do was get to the place she was planning on having her baby, but after being sent home twice for coming in too early, we were finished. The car rides were just too much for her to bear, so she wanted to just go someplace that we would be accepted.

If you have laboured easily in a car before, than this will probably not be a problem for you, but if you have a hard time managing in the car, then a 2 hour car ride is not something to look forward to. This time we are planning on staying at home, and we are happy to pay out of pocket for the luxury. Think about what is more important to you, when choosing.

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amydidit

· #3 · Jun 9, 2005

I lived in Houston and was using a birth center in Austin... quite a drive! Best decision I ever made though... The trips for the prenatals sucked, but were doable... I was planning on staying at a hotel for about a week before my EDD, but I ended up lucky and didn't have too. I went for my 38 week appointment and decided to stay the night at a hotel because I was too tired to drive home... that night I went into labor. Now, if that hadn't happened that way, and I HAD gone into labor back in Houston I had someone on call to drive me up there at the first possible twinge. I even looked into ambulance transports since some will handle non-emergency transports... the one I found that was willing to do that was pretty expensive though.

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punkprincessmama

· #4 · Jun 9, 2005

With my first we did this. We drove about 90 minutes away for prenatals and the birth. It was definetley worth it. We have family in that city and so when we suspected labor had started we just headed up and hung out at the in laws until things got serious. It all worked out fine.

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