Things I wish I could have told my clients today...

I have 33 women on my schedule today, not including walk-ins, and I am feeling stressed and tired and overwhelmed.I have no idea how to manage your care today.I know exactly what I should do to manage your care today, but know you're not ready for it yet, and that's okay.I am thankful we are on the same page about going forward with your care.I am pretty sure you think I have no idea what I am doing, which may be partially correct but I am giving it all I have.I did not get to drink my caffeine until it was cold, but I gulped it and it tasted amazing.I have a personal life outside of this office. FYI.I just got off the phone with the administration at my job, and they are not paying to reimburse my maintenance fee through AMCB, and I'm frustrated and trying to let that go before this visit.You are my favorite patient. Period. It's like having a favorite child but the others don't know, so it's okay.I have really been looking forward to seeing you again.I am really worried about you.I ate my lunch in heaves while catching up on this morning's charting. Food doesn't taste as good when one is charting, but I won't be mad at you for that because I would rather look at you and talk with you than stare at a screen. I know you don't know that and that's okay.Your children drive me a little batty.Your children light up my day.I wish we could be friends, because you are really awesome.I am more sorry than you will ever know about your traumatic birth experience, and I remember every moment of it along with you. The strength you are showing now is so much stronger than I feel when I think back on it.The medical assistant and I are still working on our relationship with one another, and it's not always easy. I hope it comes off as easy.I am excited to see you, and noticed when you were surprised that I was excited to see the woman waiting behind you also.Yes, I hug just about everyone who I have seen at least once before.I really need to go to the bathroom.I would really, truly love nothing more than to talk with you about your birth plan for the next hour, and I hope you see something in my motivational questioning beyond keeping the visit to a reasonable amount of time, which I know will be more like 45 minutes and make others late. But I know how important this is for you, and so it is important for me, too.I hope that you know that I am running late because I gave the women before you all the time I could and that they needed and deserved, and I will do the same with you if you can forgive me for my lateness.Oooh, I'm pretty sure I just sounded like I knew what I was talking about, which mostly I did. Feeling a little bit proud of myself.Ugh, I really sounded like I had no idea what I was talking about. Need to work on that one, and feeling very critical of myself.I talked with the woman just before you about yeast and bacteria, and with the woman before her, and I hope my way of explaining it with you comes across as unique and personalized and caring rather than repetitive and disingenuous.It is breaking my heart that you want to transfer your care to a more midwife-friendly setting, because I am trying so hard to make it better here. And I feel really emotional about it, much of the time.Talking with you about long term reproductive plans will likely leave me in a panic for the rest of the day over how I am figuring out how to plan my own family.When I asked if you are planning to continue the pregnancy, and you made a negative comment about those who do not, I struggled with just moving on and being excited for you and not saying something more about the concept of choice and the other women for whom the decision goes the other way, and their struggle or ease with that path.I wish I had a better way to explain the new pap guidelines, because if at the end you are asking "But what if I want the pap smear every year?" I feel that I am not doing it to the best it should be done.It really bothers me that you always run over an hour late, and that I never want to refuse seeing you because I know it took a lot of work for you to get here today. But next time please try to be on time?I make a lot of decisions, all day, and when I get home I don't want to make anymore.My partner is indirectly taking excellent care of you by taking excellent care of me.It is frustrating to me, personally, to feel that you are not more empowered about your own life. And I wish that wasn't the case.I am so impressed, personally, at how in-control you are over your life and your plans, and I am jealous of that. And I wish that wasn't the case.Everything that is important to you, is important to me. Nothing is too small to bring up.Sometimes, this is really difficult, for both you and for me. Or for just one of us.I love every minute of being a midwife.