OB Childbirth Prep Course – Part I

Last night, Chris and I attended our first childbirth class. When we arrived at the hospital, there was a sign that directed us to our room. One room was for “regular” childbirth and one was for “natural.” Chris and I both laughed when we saw natural. Not that I don’t completely respect women who try or successfully go through the entire process without drugs, but honestly….give me drugs. Please. :)

Overall, it was a good class…we learned some new things, although some things were familiar to us already. But I think that’s just because we’ve been doing some reading and researching. :) Our instructor was good though…she had a great sense of humor and more importantly, she just had a baby 6 months ago, so when we asked questions, she not only gave us an answer as a professional (she’s a labor & delivery nurse), but also as a new mom who recently went through all of it.

The class started with some brief introductions. There were 16 couples enrolled, so it was interesting to see the variety of people and belly sizes. :) Once introductions were finished we started right into some basic information: the anatomy of a pregnant woman and the stages of labor. But my favorite part came when everyone put their pillows on the floor and we practiced some relaxation techniques. This was nice, partly because it was 8:30 PM (close to bedtime) and I was able to lie on the floor, leaning on Chris with a couple of pillows. The lights were low and the music was soft. The first technique was to help the Daddies (or other partner) learn how to help relax the Mommies. This was wonderful! Our instructor walked them through the process of gentle massage from our heads to our toes. I told Chris we should practice this each night. ;) Then we practiced some breathing. This was interesting because she put an animated graph on the big screen which took us from the first cleansing breath all the way through the “contraction” as it progressively got stronger and then finally we were at the last cleansing breath. I thought this was good practice. Not that breathing is difficult, but more so because it was interesting to watch the contraction. Our instructor told us that we would be able to watch our contractions on the monitor during labor and it would look similar. She told the Dads they needed to be aware of how this looked so they can let us know when the contraction is almost finished. I thought this was particularly good. The Dads need a job during all of this, too. Although I’m pretty sure I will wish I could switch roles once I’m actually going through it. :)

The funniest part of the night was during the last 30 minutes or so. Our instructor had us watch a video that kind of brought everything together from the night’s lessons. It was basically an illustrated walk-through of the stages of labor all the way through delivery. The animated illustrations were enough to give everyone a visual understanding of the process. But then all of a sudden, out of nowhere, the video went from illustration to live video. Now it didn’t bother me or Chris, or most of the others, but the funny part was when one of the Daddies just about fell on the floor when he saw a real live baby being born. Apparently, he had no idea what he was in for in all of this, but he was like a 10-year-old little boy. At one point he said, “What’s that?” with a somewhat shaky voice. The instructor just smiled and simply said, “That’s the baby’s head.” I am pretty sure he wanted to cry. Poor guy.