Dear Dr.

A few weeks after Alida was born I wrote a letter to our Dr/Pediatrician who delivered Ella. She has been our family Dr/Pediatrician since I was pregnant for Nadia and I seen her around town a couple times while I was pregnant for Alida but I hid, yes I really did that. Sounds crazy to say that now but I was not ready to talk to her and most of all I did not want her to feel bad about anything we went through.  I believe she did the best she could and she did what she thought was right in pressuring us to go to Crouse. It is very clear to me that people are motivated by fear and insurance companies, unfortunately.  However she did come to Crouse and advocate for us and she even came to our home for Ella's Dr's appointments after we came home, who does that these days?!? While in Crouse she asked for my permission to take pictures of Ella on her phone to show her nurses who were itching to meet her. Of course I said yes. And after Ella  passed she called me and asked if I minded if she kept the pictures so she could remember her forever, again I said yes she could.  This was my letter:

Dear Dr %$#@,

I am writing you to give you an update on the Phelps’ family. We have had a trying year in dealing with the passing of Ella, but she forever lives in our hearts. This past summer Drew and I got married and we gave birth to our fourth daughter on October 12. From the start we decided that we wanted to have a home birth and we did just that. We did a lot of praying and research and weighed our options and Drew delivered our fourth baby, Alida Pearl, in our home and it was beautiful. I wanted to let you know that our decision was not based out of fear of what happened with Ella, but because we wanted to choose a more intimate path. We had a bad experience at Crouse, as you may know, and Drew has devoted himself to being the lead role in our family, a job he takes very seriously. The feeling of having our rights as parents taken away was a very unsettling feeling that we have to live with for the rest of our lives. We absolutely LOVE and ADORE you for your title and who you are. I wanted to let you know about our new addition and hope that our decision wasn’t one that would offend you in any way. We did not seek prenatal care; being my fourth child I knew my body and felt I would know if there were something wrong. The girls and I did miss our visits with you, and we still play “Dr. %$#@” in this house. Alida was 10 lbs 2 Oz and she’s a dream. Her joining our family has brought a lot of healing and joy to us and the timing couldn’t have been better, with Ella’s birthday right around the corner. We have yet to find a primary care Dr. for her and I was under the impression your patients were based on prenatal care during pregnancy. If this is the case, that is respectable. You are a fantastic Dr. and we greatly appreciate all you have done for us, I couldn’t talk you up enough! We have grown to love you over the years and hope there are no hard feelings.

Until we meet again,

 Maggie Phelps

A couple days after I sent this letter her office called but I was too scared to answer the phone so I let the answering machine get it. When I heard the excitement in her nurse's voice, who we equally adore, I immediately started tearing up. She was explaining how they read my letter and were overjoyed for us! She went on to say that they would love to take Alida on as their patient but if we declined the offer they would completely understand, but they DID want me to bring her in so they could meet her and catch up with us. After about 10 minutes of drying my eyes only to re-dry them again, I finally worked up the courage to call her back and tell her I would most definitely allow them to take her on. After a couple months of phone calls and getting everything squared away we will be going in later this month for our first appointment to so Alida can meet her Dr and nurses and we can catch up on everything that has happened over the year! Thankfully she made the appointment for the time slot right before lunch, knowing we will be running over our allotted time.