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Natural Birth
mrshall10210
member
Hospital Birth Class
mrshall10210
member
FTM. DH and I are scheduled to attend an all day (like, 6 hours, ack) birthing class at the hospital where we'll be delivering. I understand that we will get a tour of the hospital, and part of the class will be focused on newborn care. Aside from these two things, I feel like I am going to be more frustrated than anything sitting through this class. I expect it will be 0% relevant to someone planning a natural birth. While I suppose I could use this time to feel them out and discuss any concerns, I don't feel like speaking up and being the lone crazy woman who doesn't want meds.
I'm not sure I need a tour THAT badly, and I can always buy a good book on newborn care... I think we will survive.
I don't know the stats on our hospital, but I'm sure the induction and c-section rates are high. I see a CNM and after discussing things with her, am pretty satisfied that I'll be able to do things my way, but I don't think natural birth is a popular option in my area.
Did anyone go to their hospital birth class despite planning a natural birth? What was it like? Did you think it was worthwhile? Am I going to be discouraged? Should we even go?
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Re: Hospital Birth Class
I think it's good to go and get a feel for the hospital, how L & D works there and their policies as they present them vs how your practitioner couches them. They canbe very different so it would be good to be prepared before labor and know where you might find friction.
With that said, go with the understanding that not everyone is making the same choices as you so you'll need to respect the other women attending the class but in the same token don't be afraid to get your questions answered. You have the same rights as they do to not be judged on your choices.
i found a childbirth education class that WAS focused on med-free birth to be very beneficial. Do you have anything like that available in your area?
There's nothing. I don't even know anyone younger than my mom who has given birth naturally. It just doesn't seem to be a thing around here. It seems like everyone just gets induced when it's "time". When I discussed it with the midwife, she barely batted an eye but said to just make sure I was VERY clear with the nurses, because they would have no idea what to do with me.
We would have to drive an hour and a half, one night a week for Bradley classes (which is what I really wanted). So we're reading the book instead, and reading other books. I think there *might* be a Lamaze class, but after studying up on the Bradley Method, I'm a little turned off to the idea of Lamaze, although admittedly I don't know much about it. There are no doulas that I can find and as far as I know, no options for home birth - which DH would be 100% against anyway! I feel like we're on our own.
It might actually be beneficial to hear what the tone is about meds and management of labor, and shoot some questions in there in line with your birth desires. It might give you a good idea of where you might need to push back more and where they'll be pretty accommodating. You might ask:
1. Are there nurses that are comfortable helping with a natural birth?
2. How often do you have women achieving a natural birth in this hospital?
3. Do you have any recommendations for how to achieve a natural birth?
4. Do you provide anything like a birth ball or squat bar to help a woman in labor?
The answers might give you a level of comfort about when to go in, or whether you'd be better of staying home a looooong time before going in.
I did bradley, but my two-time doula is a lamaze childbirth educator and I took a VBAC class from her last pregnancy. It was awesome, she didn't push the old lamaze methods at all, and I think Lamaze has changed a lot over the years. I think that would actually be a good option. You might ask around about what it's like.
And despite having only a low percentage of NB, my hospital does do a lot to support it and the tour was good for feeling out the atmosphere. It also got me more comfortable with the labor and delivery wing so it wasn't some scary place to me anymore.
The other attending parents rolling their eyes at the thought of NB was annoying, but I still got a lot out of it.
Eta: it was also really good for DH. He had no desire to read about birth, so the class gave him the basics he needed and I filled in the rest in conversations with him.
We took the hospital class, which was 3 evenings of 2 hours so about the same length.
It was relevant. They went through things like stages of labour, pain coping for the early stages of labour (because everyone needs to be a few cm, even if they want an epidural), hospital post-birth procedures, very basic newborn care and breastfeeding advice. Mostly, it was a good general overview for my DH. I didn't learn much but it wasn't just a 6 hour sales pitch for the epi.
I don't think a class is REQUIRED, but depending on how engaged your DH is, it can be a good tool.
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I learned a lot about postpartum care for me. I had a bad tear, and a lot of what I learned in that class helped. Also it helped prepare my husband for the possibilities of this or a csection.
We also covered different positions to labor in and push in. Finally, we had to watch a video of a csection. I knew I really didn't want one, but this helped me to open my eyes that there is always that chance. So our instructor helped to point out suggestions to put in our birth plan just in case.
Of course the tour was nice. We got to tour a delivery suite and then the postpartum suite.
Overall, there was a lot covered that I already knew, but there was a lot I never thought of. It prepared me for all circumstances and outcomes. Plus, I spent time with the hubs, and made him take me out to dinner afterwards!
All this!
I was pleasantly surprised with how much there was about the natural birth process in our class. They explained the same as above, that since Epis aren't given until 4 cm you need to know how to manage pain no matter what. Also, they were realistic in that some epis dont work, and youre still feeling the pain. I had planned to have a natural birth with my first but due to a very prolonged labor my MW recommended and epi at the 48 hour mark. I was really happy to have some knowledge about how they worked and how they were placed since I hadn't researched that part.
My hospital offered a 4 week / 2 hours per week free class. I thought going in that it'd probably be pretty useless as I'd already done all the research and such, but there were some aspects that were useful. One of them was a question for each of us to fill out that helped my husband and I figure out that we stood in slightly different places wrt pain and helped us come up with a better plan how to deal with my desires and what he could do to help.
My hospital does happen to be pretty NB friendly if you want it, and the classes did go into relaxation techniques and pain management. The classes really helped me feel good about picking the hospital over the birth clinic next door. Being able to ask all the questions about hospital policy and figuring out what I could and couldn't get away with was very reassuring.
In the end, I was able to have a happy intervention free birth which was what I wanted. Knowing the hospital policies helped me a lot because I was able to use that information to guide my choices about when to go to the hospital, what to ask for when I was there, and how to phrase parts of my birth plan and requests. For example, I knew that if I wanted to be pain med free, I had to tell them upfront that I didn't want pain meds and that I didn't want to be asked if I was sure. So in the end, the class was useful for me.