Friday, September 19, 2014

First Childbirth Class

Brianna and I had our first childbirth class last night, from 6pm to 9pm. There were five couples there, all with due dates in November or early December, and if I remember correctly, four of the ten of us are engineers of one stripe or another. The class leader is a doula with a fair amount of real-life experience, although she didn't always seem to have a firm grasp on the science or anatomy behind the advice she gave.

We watched a number of videos about the third trimester, early labor, potential problems to watch out for, and actual labor and delivery. Nothing terrible new to me there - Brianna and her mom have had plenty of videos and books available about childbirth since we found out Brianna was pregnant.

For me, the best part of the class was getting to tour the labor and delivery rooms and the recovery rooms. The hospital where Brianna will be delivering is recently built, and all the facilities are new and very very nice. All the rooms are single occupancy (or maybe single family - the recovery rooms have little pull-out couches, so I'll be able to spend the night) so there is not even the option of sharing the room with other patients. Apparently we will be encouraged to bring normal clothes (so Brianna won't have to wear a hospital gown during her stay) and a few decorations or personal items to make the rooms feel more comfortable and homey while we are there.

Overall, it went pretty well. We have three more classes to go in this series, and we have registered for a number of "extracurricular" courses like Infant Care, CPR, and Intro to Breastfeeding (I won't be attending that last one, for some strange reason).

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