A lot of questions come to mind as soon you discover you're pregnant. Things like, "Is the baby growing healthily?" or "What do I need to do make sure I take care of myself?" come to mind quickly. But what about the unanswered questions? The ones you might never think of? For example: Do doctors microchip babies?
Reddit user, u/oasqss, wanted to hear the truth when they asked:
She'll Just Grow A Cherry Baby
I had a girl call the office because she swallowed a cherry seed and was worried that the baby was going to choke on it.
It Seemed To Have Slipped My Mind
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I used to work at a family planning clinic. Had a 19 year old come in and she was pregnant. She was shocked because she had the Nexplanon (implant in your arm to prevent pregnancy) Doctor didn't feel the Nexplanon in her arm. Patient says "Oh I got it removed last year."
... then you aren't protected from pregnancy. Just a total lack of understanding about how it worked.
Different Holes. Different. Holes.
The amount of times I've had to explain to a patient and/or the father of her baby that the baby in fact does not come out of the "pee hole" is concerning.
Another time, a woman called the L&D unit and told me she knew she was ovulating because the app on her phone told her she was and she had just had sex with her husband. "Am I pregnant"? were literally the next three words out of her mouth.
How Else Would They Find Out?
Midwife here- at least once a month I will being looking after a woman who is shocked to find out that a vaginal examination is the way to check cervical dilatation
Science. A Basic Science Class.
Kinda late to the party. I had a woman call the office to make an appointment, and when I asked her what the appointment was for, she said that she needed a Fallopian tube. I was said, "...do you mean you want to get your tubes tied???"
She says, "No, I'm trying to get pregnant."
???
Pipes Aren't Linked Up The Way You Think
Wife is a midwife - patient called and reported that she was vomiting for the past few hours. Was very concerned that she could possibly be vomiting up amniotic fluid.
Turns out the digestive tract is in no way connected to the uterus.
Just Think About It. For, Like, More Than Four Seconds.
I do ultrasound. When I was a student, I did a rotation at a small OB/GYN clinic. One day, a woman and her husband came in for a pelvic ultrasound. They had come to see the doctor because they were having trouble conceiving. They said they had been having sex regularly for almost a year, and had not gotten pregnant. My instructor asked the patient if she was on medications (standard question).
"Only my birth control pills."
In a year of trying to get pregnant, neither she nor the husband had thought maybe she should stop taking her birth control.
Instruction Up For Interpretation
We get a lot of obese women with comorbidities who don't understand the difference between dont get pregnant and you cant get pregnant.
We had a mom recently deliver a 26 wk baby because Mom's cardiomyopathy and hypertension were out of control. Her cardiologist visited her in the NICU and asked her why she didn't listen to his advice to avoid pregnancy.
Turns out when the cardiologist said "don't get pregnant because your body can't handle it" she heard "she physically can't get pregnant because her body couldn't handle it."
The cardiologist told us this is the second time this misunderstanding has occurred and he now requires his patients to sign some form acknowledging that heart failure is not a form of birth control, rather you should be actively seeking ways to prevent birth to protect your own life.
Well, Technically, There's Already Technology That Can Do That. But, Still...
I work at a microbiological lab and we took routine swabs from a pregnant woman to rule out STDs or other infections that could harm the baby during birth. We used a speculum to be able to see and take samples from the cervix. The patient asked whether we could - since we were already at it - take a picture of the baby with her cell phone.
Through the vagina.
She thought you could see the baby if you looked into the vagina.
There's A Little Bit More Protecting The Baby
A heavily pregnant woman put her finger in her belly button and pulled out something gross. She immiediatly freaked out, making her husband freak out as well. She called my friend, who is a doctor specializing in ob/gyn, and almost cried on the phone:
Preggo: "Help!! I just pulled something out of my belly button!!"
My friend, MD: "... yeah??"
Preggo: "So... have I removed a plug or something? Have I hurt the baby??"
My friend, MD: "But you just pulled something gross from your own belly button.. right?"
Preggo: "Yeah but.. isn't my belly botton connected to the babys belly button? Isn't that how she gets all of her nutrients and stuff?"
And then they had a looong talk about the uterus, placenta and where our belly buttons originate from.
Mind you, this isn't about the preggo not being educated, she is a lawyer. But she caught pregnancy brain. And had a laugh about it afterwards :)
No, No, That Science Checks Out
I work in Public Health and Family Practice. We get our own special ones.
Most recently the lady with chlamydia that stated she did not use birth control because "you cannot get pregnant if you have an STD".
Right.
Yes she knew she had the STD and yes she was sexually active.
This Isn't Thanksgiving
Not a midwife but did have an acquaintance who got pregnant while her husband was in the army deployed. She had convinced her husband that they needed to try and get pregnant. So how do they resolve the issue of long distance and time? They concocted the plan of using a turkey baster, where the husband actually mailed a package of his little soldiers to her and she used the baster on her self to impregnate herself. No doctors were consulted during this time.
And this story all came to light in divorce court when someone actually convinced the husband the baby was not his.
No, No, That Math Doesn't Check Out
Not a midwife but I had an acquaintance try saying that she was only pregnant for 6 months but that her baby came out full-term, like her child was fine and needed zero medical attention due to being so premature.
I don't think she was actively lying, but she was not a bright person. She might have found out she was pregnant at 3 months and just assumed that she was just newly pregnant by the time she found out.
Or maybe she felt bad for drinking/partying early in the pregnancy so she refused to acknowledge it until it was convenient.
A Family Tradition?
We had a woman come to triage one day, in no visible distress, but certain that she was in labor. She denied feeling any loss of fluid, contractions, or pain. When questioned further, she explained that she was already "dilated 4". She was accompanied by her granny, who explained that SHE had checked her granddaughter at home and she was able to fit four fingers inside the vagina, so she knew it was time.
Not in the cervix, in the vagina. 😐
Tag 'Em Like An Animal
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Two of my favorites:
What day of the week do I need to have sex to have a boy?
Do you microchip babies after birth?
That's...That's...That's Not How That Works
I've told this story before, but it bears repeating...
I worked as a telephone triage nurse and received a call from a very concerned young lady. She said that she was pregnant and had gone to an appointment with her OB-GYN that day and had some questions. This was relatively common; patients can sometimes feel rushed in the doctor's office or forget the questions they were going to ask, so they call and ask us later.
Me: Ok, no problem! How can I help?
Pregnant lady: Well, the doctor told me I can't have any more sex until after the baby is born!
Me: (Looking at her record in the computer) Ok. I see you're pretty far along and were having some pre-term contractions, which can be caused by sex. So the doctor recommends no sex so that the baby doesn't come too early.
Pregnant lady: BUT HOW WILL I FEED THE BABY?!?
Me: Ummmm....what?
Turns out, her male partner convinced her that babies needed to eat semen to develop, and this could only be done with PIV sex. I told her this was totally wrong and gave her a quick lesson about the umbilical cord. She was skeptical until I pointed out that single women and lesbians have perfectly healthy babies without constant sex. "Oh, ok! That makes sense!" she said. Then she thanked me and started to hang up the phone- I could hear her calling her partner's name as she hung up. Would have loved to have been a fly on the wall for that conversation!
You Hear It Once, You Hear It A Thousand Times
It goes like this:
Me: Your pregnancy test came back positive.
PT: Oh, I couldn't be!
Me: Are you sexually active?
PT: Yes
Me: Are you using any birth control?
Pt: No
Me: Then why don't you think you could be pregnant?
Pt: Because I couldn't be!
Me: ...
Repeat scene many times over past 20 years. Denial is not a river in Egypt.