I love my midwife

I've got a midwife appointment on Thursday. And, what of it? I hear you wondering. Well my midwife and I didn't get off to the best start. When I booked in (first appointment at about eight weeks) it just so happened that it was with the same midwife I had when I was pregnant with the boy. It was like catching up with an old mate. But she gave me the bad news that she was just covering and normally I'd see a lady called Catherine.*
     So, eight weeks later I trot along  to meet Catherine with the boy in tow, and wait half an hour before I'm called in, so I'm already a little hacked off before we even start. The first thing that happened was that she called me Alex. Now I understand that that this is the natural shortening of Alexandra but I actually fucking hate it. And I'm really quite irritated by people who presume they can shorten a name without asking. ITS FUCKING RUDE. On the front of my maternity notes there is a bit that says preferred name. In the accompanying box it says Ali. Not because that is my preferred name, my preferred name is my actual name which as previously mentioned is Alexandra. However, because the world is choc-a-block crammed with absolute thick heads who are genetically incapable of saying a name with four syllables I compromise and accept Ali for all those people who cant be arsed ie. EVERYONE.
     Ahem. Anyway, back to the lovely Catherine and her irritating the fuck out of me. She took my notes, called me Alex a few more times until I had to explain to her in my most polite manner that I really couldn't stand Alex and could she please call me Alexandra or Ali? 'Oh well, I'll see if I can remember. I'm not promising anything though.' SHE'S NOT PROMISING ANYTHING? NOT PROMISING ANYTHING?** IT'S MY NAME FOR ACTUAL FUCKS SAKE. YOU DON'T HAVE A FUCKING CHOICE YOU HAVE TO USE MY NAME YOU BAD MANNERED COW.
      So no, not the best start and then she went on to tell me in front of my son all my blood test results. 'So, you haven't got HIV, and syphilis, where are the syphilis results? Oh, here they are, no you haven't got that either.' It's a good job my son is not particularly observant in the hearing department because I didn't want to explain what they were to him. Fuck, he's probably already had a class at school about STI's but I don't want him thinking about me being tested for them. She could of just told me all my test results were negative, or ask the boy to sit outside for a minute. But no, that is too much like common sense.
      The rest of the appointment passed with little incident other than some sarcastic comment from her about me wearing 'big girl' jeans already. Now I feel all tense about Thursday, because I really hope that we've just got off on the wrong foot. I don't plan doing this pregnancy malarkey again and I want it to be as stress free as possible and to get on as well with Catherine as I did with gold star midwife number one. But just in case we don't, I've practiced my flounce so I can storm out of her office in style.

* Her real name
**????!!!!!!!