I keep forgetting to write about this; maybe I just wanted to keep it to myself for a little while. It makes me happy. That rarely happens when it comes to conversations!! And so, the set up: I was in the hospital with elevated blood pressure and contractions (34 weeks). I had an older nurse. We learned that she had been on the Labor and Delivery unit for thirty years. While I understand that young nurses need experience, too, I like having an experienced nurse when I’m having complications. She was very attentive, very thorough and very gentle. And funny to boot.

As she was inserting my IV, which, by the way, she did so well that it didn’t hurt at all, she was asking me questions. Of course, we had already done my health history. She was fully aware that there were two previous live born children. And so she asks (and the rest of the conversation follows):

Nurse: How old are your other children?
Munchkin’sFirstMom: *stumbles for a second* BigBrother will be two next month. Munchkin will turn four in December.
Nurse: Oh, so she’ll be your big helper!
Munchkin’sFirstMom: Well, she was placed for adoption at birth.
Nurse: *doesn’t miss a beat* That had to be very hard. One of the hardest things I can imagine, really. *continues to stab my arm gently and continues* Do you have contact at all?
Munchkin’sFirstMom: Actually, yes. We have visits and so on.

And then we launched into a discussion about the extent of our contact, where J and D live and driving across the state of Pennsylvania. She never flinched. Granted, being on L&D for thirty years, I would assume that she’s seen a few things in her time. To even know to ask about contact shows that she at least has an iota of understanding about recent adoptions. Do not balk at the topic shows that she has some respect or at least common decency not to let personal opinion interfere with work. But she didn’t treat me differently from that point on. I was still her patient. She was just as fun-loving as before.

Previous nurses have dropped the subject of my daughter as soon as the word adoption was mentioned. Others stumbled over themselves trying to back-pedal the conversation. Others suddenly had a lack of interest in my care. Not this lady.

I wonder what the chances are of getting her when I go into official labor. Slim, I assume.