Expectant Parent Series

With seven weeks to go, Nathan and I attended our "How to have a baby and what to do after that" class last Saturday. Several months ago we signed up for the weekend express class that is held on Friday and Saturday. Then, a couple of weeks ago we found out about a holiday party that would conflict with our going to the class on Friday. We decided to attend the holiday party, it was for the local anesthesiologists at a local restaurant that we like and it sounded like a lot more fun than learning about labor. The party was great, I really like Nathan's partners and their spouses and I have limited opportunities to socialize with them.

Well, we didn't want to seem like jerks who thought the first 3 hours of a 12 hour class were not important, so we called ahead to inform the nurse educator and to get the information we would be missing. She loaned Nathan 3 videos. We watched the first which followed three couples through their birth experience and it sent Nathan to pacing the room. The video was at least 20 years old and the information they provided about epidurals was inaccurate and biased. None of the three women had an epidural and one lady was encouraged to take morphine through an IV rather than have an epidural. Now, let me clarify Nathan does not think everyone should have an epidural and respects the choice of individual women regarding the birthing process. He just doesn't like false information being provided to women that makes them think that epidurals are risky or will delay the birthing process. After he had calmed down, we watched the other two videos. One was on comfort measures that the support person can do, apparently Nathan will need to remind me to breathe. I know that my memory has been affected during my pregnancy, but does it get so bad during labor that I will forget to breathe? The last was an informative video on pre-term labor symptoms.

Even before our video experience I had some concerns about taking Nathan to this class. The OB nurses have been teasing him for months about going. I just kept reminding him that he needed to go to learn how to be the support person not the doctor. Fortunately, they did go over some more effective measures than reminding your partner to keep breathing. When we got there we introduced ourselves and the instructor said, "Oh, you are our anesthesiologist. I am so glad to have you here to answer questions." There wasn't going to be a verbal battle over epidurals, I was so happy. When we covered epidurals and spinals, the instructor let Nathan explain more about the procedure. We also watched a video that had two anesthesiologist explain the procedures and risks. I believe Nathan was pleased with the information being presented to prospective patients at Salem Hospital. Speaking of patients, we went to the store that evening and a woman with her husband and three children stopped Nathan to thank him for the epidural. I think it made him feel good.

The class did make for a long day, but overall it was a helpful and informative class. I especially appreciated the tour of the hospital and that our instructor went through basically everything that would happen while I was there. We also met some very nice couples and it was fun to talk babies with people that were expecting around the same time we were. The couple to our left was LDS and had just finished at BYU in August. The lady grew up in Champaign, Illinois and her parents know Nathan's brother. We also got to practice with a baby doll, just so you know Nathan would be excellent at breastfeeding. Also, we are capable of putting a diaper on a doll, so we should be just fine. I don't know why Nathan is so anxious about having a baby.













One more thing, they gave us a huge list of things I should pack in my "going to the hospital to have a baby" bag. For our readers that have been through this process, what are one or two things that you were very grateful you had packed? Do you have any suggestions that are not included on the typical list? Even if you haven't done this before, what are your suggestions?