what, are you pregnant or something?

ah yes, words of true wisdom, spoken by the secretary of my supposed new doctor.

I call, as instructed by my doctor in Moncton, to set up an appointment for next week with my new doctor here in Fredericton. Sounds easy enough. I call, and am on hold for about 10 minutes. Not a good start. I finally get a person, and I tell her who I am, that I've been referred and am meant to set up an appointment. She asks my name, of course, which I give her. She asks me who I was referred by, which I also tell her (both of my doctors, just to be extra clear). She says to me, 'who were you referred to?' I say, 'Dr. Mills'. She says, 'well you know Dr. Mills has a waiting list.' I say, 'no, actually, I was not aware of that. I did not choose a doctor here, I was simply referred upon being released from hospital bedrest for 2.5 weeks to home bedrest.' She says, 'what, are you pregnant or something?' I manage not to laugh right out loud, because I'm actually pretty annoyed at this point. I tell her yes, of course (why the fuck else would I be on bedrest and then referred to an ob/gyn??), I'm 34 weeks along, and really do need to have a doctor. She says they'll call me when they get my file. Very handy.

So, I'm torn between tears and rage, can't get a hold of my original doctor, am now going to try to get a hold of the guy who took over my care when my original doctor went on leave. Not happy though. I don't know if I'm on bedrest for eternity, until 40 weeks, until 36 weeks, until the baby decides to come on out. I don't know if I start having masses of contractions again, if I should worry or just let nature take its course, as the nurse told me to do when I called L&D and she didn't know how far along I was. I think not worry though, because when I told my Dr that I was having masses of them the other day, he said that yes, I'd probably notice that more as I got closer to the end.

All in all, folks, this has been a really frustrating experience. I really don't feel that the bedrest is doing me any good. It's not like I'm actually resting; I'm just lying/sitting around all day feeling useless and bored. The doctors even say that there's no real proof that it helps, but it makes them feel like they're doing something. Fantastic. Glad we can keep the doctors happy. Bedrest makes me kind of depressed and overly emotional, and my muscles, such as they are, are atrophying as I sit here.

update...even though I haven't posted this yet. I got a hold of my doctor in moncton, or her office, and told the secretary there what had happened. She's like, why don't we just call them and tell them you don't *want* to deal with mean people, and we'll refer you to somebody else. I said, ok! So she's doing that now, calling another doctor (a man, because I really don't care), and seeing if she can get me an appointment. Wonderful. I love friendly and helpful people even more than I hate stupid and mean people.