So I'm Pregnant

(Note: This is a message written Jan. 21. We now post it for your reading pleasure.)

Going to the doctor in Taiwan continues to be an adventure. The healthcare system in Taiwan is great. Like Ontario, simply using the National Health Insurance Card allows you to access great healthcare service at a very low cost. Unfortunately, unlike Canada, the custom of having a family physician is not very common. If one were to have a cold, you would visit the ear, nose, throat doctor. If you were a child, you would visit the pediatrician. If you had an eye problem, you would go to an eye doctor. So what about if you wanted to check if you were pregnant...

So here begins my adventure...

It is Thursday, January 10th. I have decided to check out our local pediatrician to see if they do pregnancy tests. Alas, when I arrived, the nurses told me I have to find some woman doctor (I think - I couldn't understand her, luckily she wrote it down on a piece of paper).

It is Friday, January 11th. My next stop is to visit the local hospital near my school. I go through the emergency doors, obtain a ticket and proceed to the information counter. After handing over my note from the nurse at the pediatrician I'm told that the clinic is open on Monday night. I'm given an appointment for Monday night.

It is Monday, January 14th. I leave school at five o'clock. I walk across the street, once again through the emergency entrance of the hospital. I obtain a ticket number and once again proceed to information. I'm sent upstairs to the second floor whereupon I realize the clinic is not open until six o'clock. I'm number twenty-five. At 5:55, I return. The nurse call me to meet with the doctor. Unfortunately, my capacity to understand the doctor is extremely limited. After several questions, I finally realize they're trying to ask when my last period was. I'm then sent to the first floor to get my urine sample. After handing over my sample, I'm given a slip to proceed back to the second floor to await my test results. Fifteen minutes later, I'm called by the nurse and once again I'm sitting next to the doctor. After much mumbling (I think he said I'm pregnant) he sends me into the next room where I was unpleasantly surprised with a PAP smear.

I then sit next to the doctor again where I think he asked me if I have to go to the washroom. The nurse calls me to the next room and the next thing I know, I'm having my ultrasound. It all happened so fast that my heart didn't know what to do, but then I saw our little singleton. The nurse says a bunch of things I don't understand, but the couple of words I did hear were "bao bao" (baby), "this is where he lives" and something about a "bian dong" (lunchbox)! I don't understand how they all related, but its quite exciting to see a tiny heartbeat, a very very tiny pulse on our very very very tiny singleton baby.

Everything happened so fast I didn't even know how to ask for the picture. Ray will just have to come with me next time.

Postlude
So things have been going well. Our parents know now. They're very happy (in the most extreme sense of the word very). Ray's mom is in town so we've been pampered with soup and words of caution (I'm not sure if you can call the "words of caution" pampering...). But all in all we're happy and healthy. :)