Usually I would motivate you to do whatever it takes, and to go for it, and business wise im still there.
But personally we just made a trip that I wouldn't recommend.
Lockdown, Again
It started when the country I live in called off a lockdown, not for the first time, so we knew what it meant. Because of that reason one of my friends said she booked a last minute flight to holland, where we are both from.
I was laughing at the whole matter, and a bit jealous that she could go and I couldn't cause I passed the 36 week pregnancy boundary. but nevertheless my husband said, can't we also book a ticket?
Leaving? Not possible.
multiple NO's popped up in my mind, he was not allowed to leave his country, I was over 36 weeks, I did not arrange any healthcare in holland, I did not want to bother my family with us coming for a month, what about my business in Israel, what about the business of my husband.. etc.
But It became very fast very clear that all my suspected NO's would not matter, I was actually allowed to fly until 39 weeks, just most airlines don't take you after 36, also because AlettaDesign is a Dutch original company I did have insurance there so giving birth wouldn't be a problem either, both of my and my husband businesses where closed by the government for the next month, so even if I want to work I can't because in the end I do need to fire it somewhere and right now im not allowed to go there.
Leaving? Maybe possible.
So it became clearer and clearer there was actually a possibility of going, we called an airline that seemed to be okay with taking 36+ pregnant women, after that phone call we went to the hospital to arrange a fit to fly authorization from the gynecologist. We waited 2 hours for our turn, we got in and the gynecologist was more concerned about explaining not to do home birth in holland and convincing us that healthcare is amazing in hospitals, that he delivered babies in his younger days in the Lebanese war and show us movies about his daughter.
In-between the gynecologist asked how many weeks I was pregnant. we said 38, but when we would be flying it would actually be 38 + 3 days already, 38 + 4 when we would land, he just wrote down 38, didn't ask how I was feeling or checked the belly, wished us a good flight and gave us the paper. We understood now why we waited so long, at the same time we knew the paper basically meant nothing as he didn't examine me whatsoever.
We didn't care, we had the paper, sent it to the airline to check, called the airline again to make sure they received it.
Usually they get this paper 10 days in advance, so the guy on the phone told us that we should just go to the airport the next day and just try to get through and explain if needed. So we packed our bags, made our house nice and clean, and day after at 9 o'clock in the morning drove in the car to get going to the airport.
This whole time felt that we might do a lot of trouble for nothing.
Leaving? Let's try!
At the airport there was a big mess, we where flying first to Madrid, and the Spanish government wanted to have everyone fill in a health declaration, online, so no one was used to this system so everyone was trying to figure out how it worked. At the same time I was acting to be super fit, playing with my daughter and walking around, my husband went up and down to the check in and started helping different families filling in their forms which basically meant that everyone at the check in was walking around and around.
In the end I don't even think they knew they checked in a pregnant women, even though we sent and got all the papers needed.
We where through check in, yes! but we still didn't know if anyone else had the authority to deny my flight.. So all the time at the airport we kept ourselves busy and bigger than we felt.
First Flight, 5,5 hours
At some point we got checked in at the gate, all this time I had a sweater on to make my belly look less big, it was hot, also Im not holding a lot of water, so my belly looked 36 weeks anyway so no person was really bothered cause I seemed like a regular 35/36 pregnant woman.
We got into our first plane, so the stress of the airport made place for personal stress, the next 5,5 hours I needed to make sure my body wouldn't pop the baby. Obviously this is not something you can control, but I knew that with a bit of stress it is less likely to go into labor as you usually go into labor from a place of rest. so I tried to keep this stress in my body to keep myself from having to pay a ticket of 50.000 euro in case the flight needed to land because of me...
I tried to sleep so the hours would pass by, but sleep is relaxing so it made me anxious at the same time.. On top of this going on, my husband hurt his back by holding a 2,5 year old for 5 min above a toilet in the plane with turbulence..
Madrid, 10 hours
So once we got off the plane, we had a daddy with a broken back and basically couldn't walk, a daughter with energy who wanted to go to the toilet, but because of lovely Corona most of the toilets where closed (try to explain that to a 2 yo) and me being more than 38 weeks pregnant.
We had an overlay of 10 hours, so I told myself whatever problem we have going on, we have 10 hours to solve it, everything will be fine. So I took a slow hour to put the stroller together for my daughter, we walked slower than slow to a place where we could set camp, with electricity for our phones and we both slept on the floor a bit (chairs weren't possible cause of corona you couldn't use two chairs in a row even if you wanted)
We got through the night, thank G-d, again we didn't know if anyone had the authority to deny my flight..
It must have been a funny scene, highly pregnant woman takes care of 2 year old, gets some breakfast and puts husband on chairs for disabled. Then folds the stroller back into the case so it could go into the belly of the plane again. No one complained, we got on the plane and took off again. yes!
Second Flight, 2,5 hours
Again stress of the night and airport made place for stress to keep the baby in another 2,5 hours. 2,5 hours seems short and doable BUT I delivered my first daughter in exactly that. the first thing I felt was at 22:00 and 00:30 she was born, apparently second children come faster so having 2,5 hours was not a comfortable feeling to go into the air with.
Again I tried to sleep my way through, and man I felt relieved that when I woke up we only had 38 min to go until landing! that I could do. From that minute finally I knew everything would be fine, we had a CRAZY 36 hours, from figuring out to go to holland and actually going within 24 hours.
But I felt the relieve, the baby would be born close to its grandparents, my family couldn't wait to see us, and everything would be fine from now.
Lets see what's next in store!
Loveee, Aletta
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