Had my hospital tour--Update!!

And it was nothing like I expected! First, the nurse was super nice. She was happy to hear that I just wanted to do breathing and water for pain relief (oh, and they do births in the tubs there if you secure one of the two rooms with birthing tubs--or they'll inflate the other one they have if the third room that can accommodate the size is available), she asked if Lilly was breastfeeding (O_O Not used to nurses realizing that toddlers nurse, too!) and later asked Lilly if she was going to get in the tub with Mommy when she was having the baby (!); talked about some highlights from natural births they'd had in the past few weeks that she really liked (one of which was the parents choosing to get in the tub with baby for baby's first bath instead of having the nurses bathe the baby--she said that was sweet and touching).

She made it clear that I would be considered a midwife patient, even if I was with Dr. S (who she gushed about and told me about how he would make sure I had all the time and support I needed, no matter what, to have my VBAC and how much she loves working with him, etc.) talked with me about what caused my cesarean (and then said that wouldn't happen there--that they would encourage me to rest and offer pain meds if I thought it would help before they would call for a cesarean, even in the pushing phase--she talked about a mama who got there, was just too exhausted and so they gave her an epidural and she slept for 6 hours, then woke up and pushed the baby right out--which is what I think would have saved me from mine, so that was an enormous thing for me to hear) and from that point on, sounded like she expected nothing less than a VBAC for me.

There wasn't a single baby in their nursery. At the hospital where DD was born, there was NEVER a time without a baby in the nursery! She said "Well, most mamas want their babies to stay with them" when she came out after opening the blinds for us to see. There's a special room they put postpartum midwife patients in to get them signed out asap so that they can go home and bond with their babies and I could be out of there as soon as 12 hours after baby's born.

The papers they gave me say that children aren't allowed to stay overnight, but I'm going to have DH talk to them and see if there's a liability waiver or something we can sign saying that we're totally responsible for our DD so they will let her stay (a L&D nurse friend of mine a while back explained that at her hospital, they once allowed kids to stay, but then one fell out of the bed and got hurt and the parents sued, so they couldn't do that anymore and the nurses were trying to get a waiver written up to allow kids to stay again). If they won't, I don't know what we're going to do--I can't leave AMA or my insurance won't pay, I can't be separated from DD all night (especially since she'd be kicked out 6 hours before her bedtime!). I mean, if it's on the right night, I might have a friend who can take her and stay in the hospital with us (as she works there) and then just bring her to our room at 8am to finish sleeping, but I don't know. I can't have her in another building, I just can't. And that nurse friend is one of the only people I'd trust with my daughter overnight. But I don't want DD to be traumatized like that--cut off from her Mommy at night, for the first time ever without her Daddy there at least (or me without DH, which could be a disaster w/my agoraphobia). So my choice would be DD to be traumatized or me... which means, I'd pick me and that means DH would have to spend his new baby's first night away from them, which isn't fair to him, either.

Anyway, the tour went great, the place looks way better than I expected with a great head nurse and natural-friendly policies, so if we can just get past the kink regarding DD staying overnight, I'll be totally fine going there at the end of my labor to give birth.