By Casey Neill
Eliza Lee gave birth to four children at Healesville hospital.
“I moved to the Yarra Valley in 1997,” she said.
“In 1998 I went to have my first child.
“My mum wasn’t around or anyone so I went to a girlfriend and she’d delivered a child there 10 months earlier.
“Healesville was really good.”
Ms Lee’s first birth was only three hours so she said it was lucky the hospital was close to home.
“Then 15 months later I was having my second one,” she said.
“That time I decided just to do midwife care.
“They were really good because I could take in my first child during the labour process.
“It was so good being so close, because I don’t think I would have made it any further from home.”
With her third child, “I was walking up the corridor and she was literally falling out”.
“I couldn’t even get out of the car,” she said.
“I got past the nurses’ station, and that’s when they got me the wheelchair.
“I gave one push and out she came.
“The fourth one I had with the same midwife.
“It was like going home. I slept in the same bed.
“They knew me, I had that rapport.
“It devastated me to know that they were getting rid of maternity services there.
“I don’t think I would have coped in a big hospital.
“I grew up in Apollo Bay. I was used to small community hospitals.”
Ms Lee didn’t have her own immediate family around, so appreciated that her friends could easily visit.
“With my second one I didn’t have a car for the last five weeks, and a girlfriend took me to my appointments,” she said.
“Parking at other hospitals is hard. At Healesville it was always handy.”
