If you are on your own, you will need a full time helper. This is not as bad as you think! We use a combination of nursery of school and nanny to be with our children while we are at work.
Hello
Don't be nervous about not being able to get anything, it is a massive international city with a fairly sophisticated shopping population. Long gone are the expat days of waiting for the boat to come in with the annual shipment of HP Sauce and baked beans (Kenya in the 80s!).
There is a mark up here though so basics like M& S knickers and school shoes are worth buying in advance but there is nothing, that I am aware of, that you can't get delivered if it isn't here.
We've been here 7 years.
It all comes together pretty easily here. Have a look on googlemaps. The corniche has loads and loads of apartment blocks, once you are here, have a wonder around and ask if any are empty. Do you know your allowance yet, as that will determine where you live more than anything!
Good luck, it is a very easy life here...
I have delivered my second and third here. I went private for the second but had a terrible NT scan so was referred to a specialist in Dubai. Dr Pour Mirza was great, very professional and despite seeming a little gruff was extremely compassionate during that pregnancy and then my last. He is a fetal medicine consultant trained through the UK and Germany. He runs many of the industry seminars on the latest developments and is very keen on knowledge transfer building a community to support women in pregnancy.
Dr Pour Mirza's Abu Dhabi clinic is at Emirates Palace, in a stand alone unit in the grounds, so perfect parking too.
I delivered the second child at New Al Noor, which was pretty average. No NICU just SCBU. Because of that i was then at the Corniche as i had a problem pregnancy. If you cannot get a referral there (because you are having a good pregnancy, so there is a silver lining!), I believe Bright point are being talked about very positively. They have/ will have level 1,2,3 NICUs.
http://www.fetalmedicine.ae/en/
