"Bad experience in the Maternal Ward"

I will start off by saying I love the Armadale Hospital Pregnancy Service, I had my son there in 2022 and experienced 0 issues, absolutely loved it in general.

Unfortunately I recently had my first bad experience with a particular staff, i felt that the symptoms and the way i was feeling were being dismissed based in their amount of experience they had doing their job which they kept mentioning and perhaps because I am considerably a ‘young’ mum.

I was 37 weeks pregnant experiencing lots of cramps which i thought was contractions, I called the maternity ward asking if i could come in just so i could get a peace of mind that everything is ok and im not experiencing early labour and the staff was pretty much saying it doesnt sound like i need to come in because i sounded too calm and they were also laughing in the background with their colleague about another matter which already made me feel disregarded. But i waited about 30 mins but i was still experiencing some concerning symptoms, so i went to the maternity ward. The same nurse that I was on the phone with examined me, and again, I believe from just looking at me seeing that i was “too calm” or on my phone while they were monitoring baby’s heartbeat i feel that they made the judgement to not take my symptoms seriously.

Although the monitor did catch that i was experiencing contractions, the nurse said im showing no signs of labour, asking questions whether i like being pregnant which made me feel like they thought i was making it up really made me feel hesitant to call the maternity ward again if i am concerned about something or if i think i am in labour. The nurse as an individual was very kind but as a maternity nurse I felt they shouldn't be so quick to dismiss how their patient is feeling. They may have experience doing their job but I believe a mother knows her own body, even if i was not in labour I just wanted that peace of mind that everything was ok.