h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

All smear tests here are done by female nurses in the Uk never doctors & definetly not male doctors.

Do you in the USA have a choice if it is male or female doctor?

I would not to have male doctor do the cervical test on me.

JA

I'm Rh-ve too, as are both sons. But in spite of my protestations, we all had anti D anyway!

Err, that's not true JAv, male doctors do smear tests in the UK, there just has to be a nurse looking on. My last smeer test (and the one fore that was done by a bloke.

KerrAvon

But can you insist on a female doctor?

for the

JA

Err, yes, I think so. Might have to wait longer tho'.

That reminds me..the most painful finger 'prod' I ever had was by a *female* nurse. Bring on the guys anytime .

Yeah, I've got Rh Disease...or rather I'm sensitized, and so any babies I have get Rh Disease. Last time I think I had...6 or so 'procedures' (won't go into gross detail unless you want it; suffice it to say that blood transfusions had to get to the umbilical cord, and they went via my abdomen )..The only thing that bothers me is that I want to have a baby with you know who at some point, and if would be really nice if the little pickle lived. I try to alleviate my stress on the matter by making it my goal to exceed $150K for the pregnancy and NICU bill (little Nyssa was over $100K I think..god bless Medicaid, eh? )

Thinking about it, I don't think I've ever even *seen* a female doctor, for anything, including icky female things.

So Nyssa..you are have immunity to D protein...urk if 'little pickle' is D+ (as any right thinking citizen should be you know...JOKE!!!!)

We just has a seminar on the whole RhD +/- thing a few weeks ago explaining the mutations leading to it etc. Very eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeenterestink!

Zantic...evil science UC

You are correct sir, and if my grasp of genetics is correct, even if Njan were heterozygous, there would still only be a 1/4 chance that the baby would have a negative blood type. So I'm not getting my hopes up. But yes - it is a fascinating problem, in my opinion (but then, blood disorders have always piqued my interest for some reason).

Nyssa <--- not a , I swear!

Nyssa - any future Njanlet? Njanling? would have a british dad, right? Would the good old NHS be an option, if youcame to the UK for the pregnancy? I'm no suggesting you penny-pinch, of course, just wondered how that sort of thing works out

Nyssa...who you calling sir?

Though I do wonder why you didn't get any anti-D...is it not a routine thing in America...or did you not want it??

Zantic

Talking of 'painful prods'. The worst I ever had was when I was in labour with No 3. Some midwife decided she needed to assess the position of the baby's head and did some squeezy/poky/proddy thing on the outside just above the pubic bone. Well, it would have been okay if she'd trimmed her fingernails within living memory. It was sore.

Um..um...I'm sorry Zantic..No, I didn't get it - I had an undiagnosed placental rupture at about 20 weeks. When they did the test at 28 weeks for sensitivity, hey guess what? I was sensitized . They *should* have taken one look at my charts and given me the shot as a precaution when I went into the hospital with labor-like pains. Hmmm..that could be my seven million dollar lawsuit..I wonder if there's a stature of limitations on such things .

Hmmm...I though it was satndard proceedure to give shots throughout to prevent such an occurance. Oh well....I'm not known for being right..

I'm in the U.S., and they recommend having a pap test every year. I just got my annual exam at the ob/gyn yesterday. I'll admit that I didn't go when I should have when I was younger. I wasn't insured, and not sexually active, so I figured if you don't take the car out of the garage, why get a tuneup? Not too smart, but there ya go.

When I finally got health insurance, I started going annually. My mom had a scare with pre-cancerous cells in her uterus, so I knew it was the right thing to do. I found a wonderful doctor. Just about my age, married, kids, and she really sits down and talks to you. Just what I needed for my first time there! She explained everything she did beforehand, and the entire time she did the exam.

Mammograms ... I'm overdue. I should have had one last year, but was too busy. Now the referral is sitting on my dresser, and I need to make the call.

Birth control ... nobody seems to have mentioned the Fertility Awareness Method. I've been using it for the past year and a half quite successfully. It's completely natural, and involves you tracking your fertility signs: cervical fluid, waking temperature, and cervix position. It involves a little work, because you have to track everything, but ultimately it lets you know exactly when you're fertile, so you can either abstain or use a condom at that time. Since that's the worst time possible for a condom to fail, we abstain for the 8-10 days I'm fertile. It also clues you in when you're about to menstruate, and has the added bonus of letting you know when you're most fertile if you *do* want to become pregnant!

Here's the url for the website related to the book I read about it:
http://www.tcoyf.com/default.asp
It's called Taking Charge of Your Fertility by Toni Weschler, and I got it through Amazon. It's a good book, well written, and I learned a lot!

I also found a U.K. website:
http://www.fertilityuk.org/
I didn't get much of a chance to look through it, so I won't recommend whether it's good or not ... just a link I found with a Google search. It does say it's Natural Family Planning, which is another aspect I researched. The particular book I got on NFP was very stale, preachy, and although it was the same basic method found in the Weschler book, I found their charting method confusing.

I meant to ask Nyssa, did you have any interesting topiary done before going for you exam

Shea - Boy, I have enough trouble remembering to take one pill once a day, let alone tracking all of that stuff It's good if you can do it, though, but I *know* I'd forget...

Well...went to FP on Friday. Repeat smear put off for the usual reasons but decided that the minipill just sin't for me, so am now trying out the three year implant (OK, two year for fat birds like myself )

Have already noticed that I'm much calmer, but whether this is due to the implant, coming of the minipill or because I just had a really good weekend we'll find out in a few days...

Will keep you updated if interested...?

Zantic

"Sometimes it's hard to be a Woman!"

I'll admit I'm not 100% perfect at tracking all that stuff ... I forget to take my temperature immediately upon waking sometimes (once you get out of bed, it rises, and it's not accurate), but I track enough that I can chart! And I'm *very* careful about charting around my fertile phase!