The Nanny Diaries, Part 3

Things are never simple here. Never. How foolish of me to think that we would just simply walk in to the hospital and pick up the insurance card that we had been waiting for since January!!

The man behind the counter looked through his stacks of envelopes and couldn't find one for Stella. I wasn't convinced that he was doing a good job looking, I wasn't even convinced that there was a method to the stacks, so I was starting to lose patience with this whole National Insurance Scheme. Luckily for me, the district manager of the NIS was there and he insisted that despite my having a receipt in hand, there was no paperwork for Stella. Finally, he pulled out the ledger book -- yes, an old-fashioned, pre-computer ledger book that tracks all activity!! -- and sure enough, on the exact date of the receipt is MY name! The man was clearly confused by this, and it turns out that MY name was in the ledger because the receipt was made out in my name since I had paid for the insurance. However, all of the paperwork that had been filled out, and the picture attached to that paper work, was Stella's. I was told that since the receipt was in my name the card would have been made out in my name regardless of what it said on the paperwork. So, I said, that was fine, to please give me my card! But, of course, thee was no card in the stacks for me either. I definitely made a stink. I big huge stink. Stella, at this point, was wishing she hadn't come in. Ghanaians don't tend to protest about anything, so the fact that I was protesting, and loudly made Stella quite uncomfortable. In the end, it turned out that nothing could be done until Monday (it was Friday morning) because the manager was on his way to meetings outside of the office and he wouldn't be at the office until Monday, and then the card would have to be made, and he swore up and down that we would have the card on Tuesday.

I asked if he could write a note saying that Stella was insured so that she could see someone there at the clinic and he said that it didn't work that way, and without the card in hand, she wouldn't be seen.I was skeptical about Tuesday for sure, but I didn't have any other option but to wait and see.

However, I still had a sick nanny on my hands, so Ben drove us to the Akai House Clinic, a private clinic where I have taken Chloe and myself., and paid for Stella's office visit. It's a strange system here where you pay before you see the Dr. No cash, no visit. It's as simple as that. Anyway, I paid and left to go pick up Chloe from school. I told Stella to wait until Ben could return to pick her up from the Clinic. When I got into the car, immediately Ben said to me, Stella's pregnant! I thought so, too, but wondered why he had thought so. His reason was that Stella was producing too much saliva! HUH???

That was the first time that I had ever heard of excess saliva as a symptom of pregnancy! And turst me, I had done plenty of online research about early symptoms of pregnancy and had never come across that one!! Since then, though, I have seen it in pregnancy magazines, etc. Anyway, it was true...Stella had been spitting quite a lot lately...and other things too gross to go into. So, the car ride home Ben was telling me all the troubles that Stella was going to have if it was true that she was pregnant..especially since she wasn't married. And the fact that Carlos was half Nigerian...OH MY...that was enough to make Ben MAD AS HELL....the Nigerians get an awful rap around here--kind of like New Jersey.

When Stella returned to the house, she confirmed that she was pregnant. Well, she hadn't had the test to prove it, but the Doctor had asked her a bunch of questions and given her an exam and had believed she might be pregnant, and wrote her a prescription for a pregnancy test. Luckily, Stella didn't have that kind of money on her to go to the MedLab that was located in the same building to pay for the pregnancy test -- I just gave her one of the store bought tests I'd brought back from the States. Ben's take, though, was that there was NO WAY that Stella didn't already know she was pregnant...although, to this day, she swears she had no idea. And, Ben was pissed off that Stella had wasted my time and money in taking her to the Dr.

The odd thing was that the prescription for the pregnancy test didn't have her name on it. I asked her whose name it was and she said she didn't know, that it was just the paper that the Dr had given to her off his desk. Hmmm....??? I asked her if she was happy about the pregnancy, and she said, "yes"....which seemed so impossible given everything that people had told me. I did wonder if she was faking this whole thing and had just taken this piece of paper off the Dr's desk. I know it sounds paranoid, but the stories you hear around here about things the staff fakes in order to get away with something...

So, I took the prescription with me and had Ben take me back to the clinic. And I asked the Dr. if he had prescribed the pregnancy test for Stella. And he said he had. When I asked him why Stella's name wasn't on the sheet, he was horrified. It turned out that the woman he had seen before Stella was the name he had written on the prescription in error! He begged me not to tell anyone, and re-wrote the form. Then I tried to have a conversation with him about Stella's "options" because I was afraid that she would go to a "clinic" and abort the baby that weekend...it was just something that she had said that made me think this...and not that I have anything against abortion, but abortion isn't legal in Ghana, and someone without means, like Stella, would be having a back alley, coat hanger style procedure! Well, this Doctor, who is Lebanese, confirmed that there were methods that could be done safely, and obtained legally, but since he didn't believe in abortion, he wouldn't tell me anything else. Seriously??

Well, the pregnancy sure would explain a lot...not just the exhaustion or depressed state Stella had been in, but the middle of the night crying, the erratic behavior, and yes, even the disappearing ring!

Tuesday AM, I sent Stella to the hospital on her own to pick up the card, and was relieved to learn that she actually had it. She said they had spotted her a mile away, remembering that she was the one with the crazy white lady. I told her that that was just fine...she may be the one with the crazy white lady, but she's also the one with the insurance card in hand, while other sheepish folks are STILL WAITING!!!

Well now there really truly was a use for that damned card! The problem was that NO INFORMATION whatsoever came with that card. So, now that Stella had the card, what? I had Ben take me to the district office because I thought for sure they would have some information there. I called first and they told me that they had some outdated pamphlets and that new ones were being printed, but I was welcome to the old ones. When I got there, though, the reception was quite icy. There were stack sand stacks of envelopes just like there were at the hospital where we picked up Stella's card. It's no wonder people are waiting four months and longer for their cards! No one would give me any information. They didn't know what I was there for. They said the new pamphlets wouldn't be available for at least another 4 weeks. They wanted to know who the insured person was and when I told them Stella, they said that they had finished the card the other day and got all defensive. So, again I explained to them that the issue wasn't that we were missing the card, but that we were missing information on how to use the card! I finally left in exasperations. As I got into the car Ben brought to my attention that a lady was calling after me. His take was that she was in charge and got wind that an "obruni" was in the office and believed I was a reporter...again, fine with me if it gets me what I want. The lady couldn't have been lovilier. She did reiterate that the pamphlets were outdated and the new ones wouldnt be available for a while, but that the old pamphlets still had pertinent information, the new ones would just describe MORE benefits.

Through this pamphlet we learned where Stella's "home" hospital was and about what level of prenatal care she would get, etc. etc.

The following week, Stella was convinced that she had malaria, so off to the La General Hospital we went. Malaria and pregnancy just simply don't mix!