PR/BR: For the moms (clicky)

marissa01 · September 2011

We have our childbirth class this weekend and was curious as to how many of y'all attended a childbirth class and what y'all thought of it. [Poll]

KCD053109 · September 2011

I had mixed feelings about it. Some of it, IMO, was TMI and unnecessary - and other parts of it was informative. It's been nearly 8 years since I went to the class so my memory at this point is really rusty on the whole shebang.

DowagerCountessofNJ · September 2011

I didn't go. I'm of the mindset that women have been having children since the beginning of the human race and they didn't have child birth classes until the last 40 or 50 years (if even that long) and the population seems to have done just fine without it.

Fancy3Face · September 2011

Nope. I had no interest. I had twins via (scheduled) c-section, so not much about the childbirth classes my hospital offered would have applied to me.

ltsfiance · September 2011

Ditto KCD. Some parts were informative, but other parts I almost felt like saying "duh" because it seemedobvious or self explanatory. I also did all my appointments with a group of 3 other women due around the same time as me,and each time we had some sort of guest speaker or just sat around talking with the midwife and nurse and hearing about theirexperiences and asking them questions, so the child birthing class we went to outside of that was a bit of overkill.

meltoine · September 2011

Sgt M's Wife:
I didn't go. I'm of the mindset that women have been having children since the beginning of the human race and they didn't have child birth classes until the last 40 or 50 years (if even that long) and the population seems to have done just fine without it.

I felt this way too. Looking back, however, I do wish I had taken a Bradley class or something similar. I wanted a natural birth so badly but I had a lot of complications and ended up with Stadol and then an Epi (after 7 hours of Pit). I feel like a class specifically about natural birth might have helped us. The basic hospital class though, seems worthless to me unless you are a 14 year-old who barely knows where babies come from.

Pumpkin701 · September 2011

Ditto Fancy's first two sentences- Nope. Had no interest. I don't really have a reason why. The whole "we're born to do this" sounds hippy to me and wasn't really my line of thinking. I just didn't want to do it. I was at the hospital for L&D 12 hours, got an epidural, and my baby was 7 pounds if any of that matters to you at all.

I did fine. 'What to Expect' was enough information for me and the nurses were great.

SoftSpot · September 2011

I only plan on taking a breastfeeding class. I would've taken a Bradley class, but wasn't going to be in any one place for 12 weeks so I've just been reading and researching. Hopefully that will be enough.

Junebug060609 · September 2011

We went to one. Honestly, I felt like it was more for my DH than myself (I'd already become pretty well versed in what to expect).

I'll let you know if it was actually useful or if we could've done w/o in a few weeks.

mrsredrox · September 2011

We LOVED our childbirth class. It was super informative and she kept the class very fun and interactive, it also helped that she was absolutely hilarious. We figured it couldn't hurt to go since it's only a 2 hour class for 4 days, especially since the both of us barely have any experience with kids. We ended up learning a lot and were glad we went.

DowagerCountessofNJ · September 2011

Lace&Josh:
I only plan on taking a breastfeeding class. I would've taken a Bradley class, but wasn't going to be in any one place for 12 weeks so I've just been reading and researching. Hopefully that will be enough.

I took a BF class and it was a complete waste of time IMO. The LC went over just the basics of BF, all things I had read in my BF book already. There's no real way to "practice" BF (obviously) until you have the baby in your arms. Definitely set up some form of a support system for after birth (whether it's a LC or a friend who's experienced in BF) because when you have a weird question or have problems with the latch you'll want someone you can ask instead of flipping through a book.

styme46 · September 2011

Ours was supposed to be like a 6 or 8 week thing (I can't remember exactly how long since it was over 6 years ago and all) but we only went to 2. I went into labor and had a c-section 3 days BEFORE the class that went over c-sections. I was 8 weeks early so we didn't get to finish out the classes. So I don't know if the rest of the classes would've been beneficial or not. I don't know if we will go the next time around, whenever that may be.

armywifey0609 · September 2011

I voted yes, and I liked it. I liked it more because I got to know the hospital where I was delievering at, not really the whole 'childbirth' part. I also had to have my prenatal care at one hospital but deliever at another. So this was really the only time we got to go to this hospital before I was in labor. It gave DH the confindence that he could get there. haha. Ours was free too, and it was during the day so DH got to miss out on work for a day. HTH

iluvmytxrgr · September 2011

For my first child, I attended a class. It was very helpful to me because they explained the hospital procedures, we toured the rooms, they explained birth and what happens to your body.

GracieLou Freebush · September 2011

I didn't take a childbirth class b/c my entire birth plan was two words-- Epidural ASAP.

I did take a BFing class but ditto SMW that they just reiterated everything in The Womanly Art of Breastfeeding so it was a waste of time other than reinforcing what I had read in that book.

StarJay · September 2011

Junebug060609:

We went to one. Honestly, I felt like it was more for my DH than myself (I'd already become pretty well versed in what to expect).

This was my experience as well. I didn't learn anything from it that my books hadn't covered, but DH refused to read books or let me give him the info, so I drug him to the classes. When I went into labor he was glad he'd went, he felt that he'd learned skills that made the whole situation less nerve wracking for him.

marissa01 · September 2011

Thank you all for your input.

GhostMonkey · September 2011

StarJay:
Junebug060609:

We went to one. Honestly, I felt like it was more for my DH than myself (I'd already become pretty well versed in what to expect).

This was my experience as well. I didn't learn anything from it that my books hadn't covered, but DH refused to read books or let me give him the info, so I drug him to the classes. When I went into labor he was glad he'd went, he felt that he'd learned skills that made the whole situation less nerve wracking for him.

Same for us. I got some additional info and it was nice that others had questions that I never thought of for our instructor (who would pick the brains of multiple OBs in town to get answers for the next class if she didn't know them). But DH got far, far more out of it than I did and it helped that he had a clue what to do and what was going on when things started rolling. Ours was 3 hours a night for 6 weeks. Worth it.

The hospital had an organized reunion to bring the babies to (which started 3 hours prior to my induction. They need to work on their timing). We have done 3 on our own since then. Though our instructor did say she's never had a class mesh so well together and be so interactive (which was probably why we both enjoyed it).

PR/BR: For the moms (clicky)

Re: PR/BR: For the moms (clicky)

Choose Another Board

Search Boards