Hi Everybody,
My name is Heidi, I am 31 years old and currently 30 weeks pregnant!
My Husband and I are moving to Zurich in the next few weeks.
We are both originally from the UK, but have spent many years living in Tenerife in The Canary Islands, before moving to Boulder, Colorado, USA last year where we had our 1st child together, a beautiful little girl we named Tallulah Faith.
We have been back in Tenerife a few months tidying up our assets here and selling our house, but unfortunately not going back to the States due to my Husbands work commitments in Europe.
We decided that Zurich is a great base for him and also a beautiful place to have our 2nd Daughter, due in May 2012.
I am so nervous about moving to a place I have never visited before and have only gone by what others have to say about the place, but life ́s an adventure, and if you stand still long enough you ́ll start collecting dust! so I am going to embrace the move with open arms and hopefully look forward to meeting some lovely people on the way.
Any feedback on what to expect, where to shop, what to do and where to go with babies and toddlers etc.. would be greatly appreciated.
Welcome to Switzerland. We moved here last year didn't do a lot but I can share with you what I did with my 10 onth old son (now 22-month)
1) we joined a English speaking playgroup Gymboree - good to meet other English speaking moms and their babies. Also you can just walk in to the Starbucks at Oerlikon Maxbillplatz every Weds 9.30am.
2) Zurich zoo - very good place for kids, especially the monkey cage.
3) Swimming pool in Baar Lattich - we got a 3 months pass at 100CHF and it became the cheapest entertainment (apart from the parks and playgrounds) for us and thaere's where my baby learnt swimming with floaties.
4) Juckers farm - they change theme by season, where you can buy fresh fruits and veggies, and let the kids play with the goats.Check this out.
http://www.juckerfarmart.ch/anfahrtsplan_seegraeben.phtml
I am sure that you and your kids will love it here. We are moving to UK next month, already miss it here.
Oh, by the way, don't miss Pouletburg in Attinghausen. They make the best chicken in Switzerland.
Hi Heidi! Welcome to Zürich! I arrived some months ago, so I'm pretty new in here too. I don't have so much information as kthui1 , but I've been in my friend's birth at Triemplispital and I was surprised with their great job, very professional doctors. They may help you... Hope you find many plans to do with your little children for this spring-summer; Zürich has a special shine!
Thank you both for your responses.
All input is greatly appreciated, I have never even visited Switzerland before so am completely clueless, and with the imminent arrival of Baby No2 I am short of time to find these things out at my own leisure!
And aeroplane? Is it ok to travel in your 30th week? All the best!
Thank you for your concern, yes, it is fine to travel, I have a certificate from my Dr stating I am fit to fly, most airlines allow shorthaul flights up to 36 weeks.
We are flying from Tenerife to Switzerland. I travelled from Madrid to Denver, USA at 34 weeks with my Daughter, was a great excuse to travel First
Wow, you are brave!
Take a care and welcome here!
Hi Heidi,
we moved to Switzerland last September, when I was in 20-22nd week of pregnancy, with 3 other children. So I can imagine, how you feel Unfortunately we live in BL, so with places for children in Zurich I cannot help. But I can give you little advice with health insurance. As you are already pregnant, you can use only cantonal hospital and only basic care for delivery. You can pay for private or semiprivate care (room) in health insurance, but for delivery you cannot use it. Or you can use it, but you have to pay for it separately.
Just wanted to tell you this, as I was researching this for a long time
Good luck!
hi elephant,as you have done some research i wonder would you mind if i ask you some questions, i am hoping to become pregnant in the near future, i have a residence permit (L) my husband works here full time and has done for the last 5 years. i am in the process of taking out a private health insurance, as i still live partly in the uk due to work commitments. if i were to become pregnant, am i entitled to go to my local hospital and what care am i entitled to.obv i will soon have the private insurance but i am just curious . many thanks jay x
jeanette, as far as I know, if you want to go to private hospital for delivery, or to have better than basic care, you need to pay insurance for it (I think) 280 days before you get pregnant.
I have L permit too. As I came here, I paid not only "obligatorisch" health insurance (which is only for canton of your residence), but also insurance, that I could go to any hospital in Schweiz (Allgemeine Abteilung ganze CH in Spitälern) for example. Then I found Hebamme (midwife) and for the rest of my pregnancy she took care of me. She could go with me to "her" semiprivate
hospital for delivery, but "her" hospital was in Basel Stadt, which is different canton. If I paid my insurance 280 before pregnancy, I could use this opportunity. But unfortunately, I couldn't, only if I paid it besides my insurance.
So, I went to my cantonal Hospital (which was really ok), had delivery to water, and spent 2 nights in Hospital. It was all 100% paid by insurance company. My visits of Hebamme in pregnancy and then after delivery at home were also 100% paid by insurance company. Before delivery Hebamme twice took my blood for tests, I paid them 100% myself because I hadn't reach franchise limit on my insurance yet (If I had reached it, insurance company would have 90% returned). In hospital my husband stayed in privat room with me, but we had to pay it 100% ourselves.
Hi Heidi,
I think you'll find that Switzerland is a great place for raising children because it is so relatively safe here. However, things are VERY expensive here and the selections in stores are very small compared to what you'll find in the US or the UK, so I strongly suggest that you bring all that you can from the UK that you will need for yourself and for the baby. Baby furniture is also expensive here (and again, a very small selection), so a lot of people go over the border into Germany to buy baby stuff. That's what we did, and we saved a lot of money.
Congratulations on your pregnancy, and I hope you enjoy your time here!
Thank you for your input Elephant. When we had our Daughter in America we had no health insurance so paid all the money ourselves, it was very expensive, the USA is renowned for the astronomical health costs, for the 5 weeks I had appointments with the Dr, delivery and aftercare the cost came to almost $30,000 USD.
I have been looking into the Hirslanden Klink in Zurich and am hoping to pay outright again for all my treatment, we have budgeted around the same amount of money again but our prepared for extra. We will be speaking to the Hospital asap, and are researching all the Doctors who work at the Hirslanden as there costs would be extra. It ́s alot of money, but unfortunately with my Husbands work and travelling we have to do these things.
Am I correct in thinking I can pay outright for my healthcare in Switzerland?
Thankyou for this advice, I absolutely loved the shopping in America, everything was very easy, a supermarket sold everything from Apples to Washing machines!! but I am also used to the shopping lifestyle in Tenerife where its very difficult to get anything without travelling around and paying through the nose. Having looked on the internet the shops seem very similar in Zurich to those in Tenerife. We are having our baby items (crib, chair, etc...) shipped over from the USA, and I am planning on making a quick detour to the UK to stock up on all my hospital and baby essentials, so I am not running around Zurich panicing over where I can buy breast pads from, lol!!
I am hoping Amazon ship to Switerland, they do to Tenerife, then I can sit back and do alot of baby shopping online in the future.
Are you based in Zurich?
It is obligatory to pay at least basic health insurance in Schweiz if you're staying here longer than 3 months. If you pay only basic, but require for example private room, you can pay for it outright. (They send an invoice later.)
Oh thank goodness I joined this forum, I really would have been heading into the unknown, thank you for your advice.
So, if I get basic insurance I am able to go to a private clinic and pay all the costs myself? have I got the grasp of it?
Yes, I suppose it works this way, at least I was offered this opportunity. :-)
But better check before. :-) Good luck.