Help, moving to Finland to have a baby!

[rinso]

1- if you come as a tourist, you can stay for 3 months, but all costs you have to pay for yourself. A good option is to get the European health insurance card, so you can get some of the Kela services for free (get the info from the DHSS)
2- after 3 months you have to register with the police. They can require a prove of income. I know of cases where teleworking was not accepted, but it is the judgement of the local officer.
3- if you want to avoid all the fuss, marry him.

[Tiwaz]

Well, I do not know how common family rooms are actually. Our kids, last one being born about a month ago, had mommy go to common maternity ward and that's it. I had to go back to sleep at home.

Well, it is only couple days and for first timers it is good time to get some advice from midwives "manning" the ward.
Then one doctor's checkup later you are free to go.

Not really a big hurdle, and wards generally are very accepting in regards to visits of fathers. Rest of extended families tend to have much more limited access. I think it was something like 2-3 hours in the evening for grandparents at TAYS. And during that one epidemic year and half ago I think there was strict "immediate family only"-policy.

By the way, about midwives. All I have met have been young enough to most certainly have good grasp of English. And if you drag the responsible knuckledragger to join you in giving birth, he can make himself useful by being translator. (Honestly, it can at times be bloody boring there while waiting for something to happen. Specially for first time.)

[Sara]

Well, I do not know how common family rooms are actually. Our kids, last one being born about a month ago, had mommy go to common maternity ward and that's it. I had to go back to sleep at home.

They are kept for first time parents, we tried for one last time because of any potential language issues. The shared room was fine though, only two other women in there with well behaved babies

[Pursuivant]

Yeah, for the "getting married" part you just need to make a decision if you get married in the UK or Finland and the travelling party figures out the exact paperwork needed to make it happen. If you come from the UK then you need to get the town registrar office records and whatnot (better check with the FIN embassy as they need to be stamped and apostilled) as you come here you are a "tourist" so the services at UK emb are for "residents" for 6 months or longer IIRC. And then when you have the baby, well, if you are not married its an "English baby" until the "father comes forward" and that may then prove interesting registering the tyke at the UK emb (Sara would know the hoops and whistles) - also paperworkwise - there is no such thing as a "birth certificate" in Finland, you can get some paperwork if you ask specifically from the hospital, but all the papers are "draft from the registry" so you need the Embassy paper for the kid grown up to avoid "stupid questions of a paper that doesnt exist"... So in any case - getting married "on paper" is to avoid the extra crapola regarding the bureaucracy. You can have a party/ceremony then with the rents later on, but if you plan on coming toFinland to have a baby you don't need the bureaucrats on top annoying you.

[simon]

Well, I do not know how common family rooms are actually. Our kids, last one being born about a month ago, had mommy go to common maternity ward and that's it. I had to go back to sleep at home.

They are kept for first time parents, we tried for one last time because of any potential language issues. The shared room was fine though, only two other women in there with well behaved babies

And for parents with new born twins, triplets.

[Freya]

This thread made me thinking, isn't there such a thing as homebirth in Finland?

[Tiwaz]

Well, I do not know how common family rooms are actually. Our kids, last one being born about a month ago, had mommy go to common maternity ward and that's it. I had to go back to sleep at home.

They are kept for first time parents, we tried for one last time because of any potential language issues. The shared room was fine though, only two other women in there with well behaved babies

Well, it might be hard to imagine, but I was first time parent once upon time. And there was no family room.
Actually, first time there was another woman with twins in the same room with my wife.

So there might be family rooms, there might be not. But either way, it is hardly something that will be the end of the world.

[rinso]

This thread made me thinking, isn't there such a thing as homebirth in Finland?

not really.
Midwives normally make no house calls.
There might be private organisations that do, but I never heard of them.

[Tiwaz]

This thread made me thinking, isn't there such a thing as homebirth in Finland?

not really.
Midwives normally make no house calls.
There might be private organisations that do, but I never heard of them.

And to add to this... Why the hell you want homebirth Freya?

What if you get some sort of complication? Hmm?

Honestly, whole concept of "homebirth" is one of the most idiotic I have heard of. It works when everything goes smoothly, but when anything goes wrong it is total disaster.

There might be connection between lack of practices like "homebirth" and neglible infant mortality in Finland.

[Freya]

This thread made me thinking, isn't there such a thing as homebirth in Finland?

not really.
Midwives normally make no house calls.
There might be private organisations that do, but I never heard of them.

And to add to this... Why the hell you want homebirth Freya?

What if you get some sort of complication? Hmm?

Honestly, whole concept of "homebirth" is one of the most idiotic I have heard of. It works when everything goes smoothly, but when anything goes wrong it is total disaster.

There might be connection between lack of practices like "homebirth" and neglible infant mortality in Finland.

I can understand why you feel that way but I am not willing ot get into this discussion, I hope you understand.

@rinso Thanks for the reply

[tizlit]

Why it is so important for the child to have a Finnish citizenship?

[Kutittaa]

Well you could get an abortion? That might sound like a bit of 'coffee' humour but I'm serious. You're planning one of the hardest moves in the middle of having a child at the same time?

Well like many other people have said saying 'I do' will make the equation a lot easier and the welcoming a lot more 'warm' by coming here. That or you should probably have the baby in the UK, I mean, why can't you have the baby in the UK? Is there something stopping you from doing so there..?

If you want to have the baby born in Finland to help with Finnish Citizenship then well...
In the long run if you stay together for long enough the child will have citizenship eventually through it's father. You should answer everyone elses questions first.

Either way having the child here is going to cost a fortune, we're not liable for people who want to walk into Finland and have their kids without getting at least something in return. Regardless of you being EU or not, like someone else said, it's not 'An emergency'.

[Rip]

In the long run if you stay together for long enough the child will have citizenship eventually through it's father.

The child can have it more or less immediately anyway, but there is bit more paperwork needed if they are not married and the child is born abroad.

[willow3lions]

Hi Sara,

It's unfortunate that you are subject to unwelcome greetings. Forums can often be like that.

I do not have any specific knowledge regarding the pathway to giving birth in Finland however, my wife (finnish) and our two children returned to the UK for the past 18 months before returning back to Finland. Being a british citizen, and after having both of our children in Helsinki, we thought it time to 'try' living in england. Yes, the NHS is free, and provides good cover for children but we found daycare an unmountable issue (thinking further down the line). Also, it took the UK government 8 months to recognize that my children were MY children. Kela and government here appear to be centralized which allows information to travel quickly. Unlike the decentralized systems in the UK (NHS, SHA, PCT etc).
My wife worked remotely for a finnish company at home in the UK and i worked a regular job. Both of our children (3.5 and 1.5) needed to be in day care for us to work. Day care in England is very poor unless you pay privately for it. We were paying 1,600 pounds a month which after rent, utilities etc, left us with little. We were essentially working to pay the day care bill.

From that perspective the care for young children, education etc is better in Finland, from our perspective. Also, i feel the world speaks English, but only 5.5million or so speak Finnish, so it is much better for our children to grow up in Finland to learn the language and culture for fear of it being lost by living in the UK or USA.

I wish you the best of luck with the birth. Put pressure on your partner to navigate the system in Finland to enable your birth here if you choose. As a previous poster mentioned, most, nearly all medical staff will speak english.

[Kutittaa]

I wish you the best of luck with the birth. Put pressure on your partner to navigate the system in Finland to enable your birth here if you choose. As a previous poster mentioned, most, nearly all medical staff will speak english.

That's absolutely untrue. I am yet to find a single person who works in a hospital that speaks satisfactory English to my standards. No one I have spoken to so far, has even been able to speak conversational English. I remember 2 incidents:

1. A Japanese family were yelling and crying because they could not understand their doctor and what he was saying. This caused the woman's husband to act in a really stupid way and start yelling and throwing his weight around. I quote hearing the words "Why you do-- why no one here speaks English! What is the point of us-- of anyone learning English if you do not speak it?!" - "We've been waiting here all day, my son he is sick why no one comes to ask for us!? All day we have been waiting and when we ask the desk person she no speak English!!" - The actual incident lasted over 20 minutes.

2. I went to the hospital with my best friend who was involved in an accident on a bike with a 10 year old kid. My mate suffered a concussion and I had to escort him there. The kid however was totally unharmed by the incident. My mate who was 'sobering' up if you will, wasn't able to understand the doctor. When he spoke English and quoted "Mun Suomi on tosi vahan, ja olen 'sammunut'" the doctor replied with a bunch of technical gibberish. Long story short we ended up finding where to go after harassing the doctor and the receptionist. Even then NO ONE spoke English because no one could. Not because they didn't want to, because you can quite easily become a Doctor without even learning a minimum requirement of English, because there is no minimum requirement. There is no requirement at all. After an hour of waiting for nothing because we didn't understand where to be we finally harassed the receptionist some more who sent another 'Non English Speaking Doctor' who told us simply to "Come" to which my mate finally got his head examined.

The times that I have had to go to the hospital here in Finland have been an absolute NIGHTMARE. Not only is there not a SINGLE SIGN in English of where you should go to see the relevant doctor you need. There is absolutely no assistance avaliable from the employees.

Legally Finland states that if you do not speak 'sufficient' Finnish that you 'must' provide an interpreter/translator for the use of 'social services'. Which is fair enough, though no one does.

The point is, I strongly disagree with the above poster. Sure maybe everyone in Helsinki speaks English as another language in hospital. But don't go to Oulu or Rovaniemi. NO ONE there, not even the really young 'Lähihoitajia' (young teen nurses) speak sufficient English to provide a service in the language. So I strongly recommend that if you go to a hospital be accompanied by a Finnish<->English speaker! As for midwives? I'm sure they speak Finnish, but you're only going to need their assistance once or twice, depending on how many kids you have lol. My wife sitting next to me disagrees.

Best advice in this thread:

"Have the baby in the UK"
"Have the baby in the UK"
"Have the baby in the UK"
"Have the baby in the UK"

Saves the headache of extra paper as others have said, the problem with HUUUUGEEE costs and in the end the child still gets Finnish citizenship. No one holidays overseas just to have a kid... when it's easier to in their own country.