Our first baby-related class occurred a few weeks ago.
Moncho and I attended a breastfeeding class led by a lactation consultant who
was very informative. We learned about how to achieve a proper latch. We
watched some helpful, yet slightly uncomfortable, nursing videos (think
colostrum flying across the room and a 45 minute migration of a newborn making
her way to her Swedish mother's awkwardly tan-lined breast). I learned different
methods of holding the baby so we are both comfortable and I'm sure Moncho
learned a thing or two even though he was frequently in and out of the room
between pages from the hospital. More than anything, it was mostly
reassuring. The educational part however probably could have been achieved through some
Google searches.
The best part however came when the 3 hour class ended. The room
where the class took place was serendipitously right next to a wing of the
hospital where Moncho often works and we were able to sneak into a room with an
ultrasound machine and conduct an ultrasound so we could see Anabelle. Never
mind that neither one of us knew what we were doing. Sure, Moncho knew how to
work the machine but I lost all faith in his abilities as a radiologist/ultrasound
tech after 5 minutes of us both awkwardly proclaiming "wait...I think
that's a leg" or "is that her eye? Why is it open like that...that
can't be an eye...can it?" clearly there is quite a bit of skill to
getting those pretty pictures on ultrasound day. Skills Moncho and I do not
posses. We did see her little heart beating. We also were able to identify the
rough outline of her head, maybe a nose and a potential eye. The images were blurry
and out of focus but she was in there and it was fun to try and sneak a peak of
our future!
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| Moncho getting ready to conduct our fairly unsuccessful ultrasound. |
Since writing this
post we have also attended a birthing class. So I’m updating our experience
here as well.
The birthing class, in contrast to the breastfeeding class, was
not reassuring. Prior to this two day 6 hour labor and delivery (horror story) class
I had been blissfully ignorant of what 10cm dilated actually looks like. I was
previously happily free from the horrific mental image of a baby emerging from
a birth canal and very confident in my ability to conquer labor with little
pain and low dramatics. I’m pretty sure I’ve seen a video of a live birth
before, probably in my sophomore year women’s health class at Tufts. I just don’t
remember it looking so dramatic and it certainly didn’t strike fear into me as
a sophomore in college. I’m sure the imminence of my own approaching due date
made me pay more attention to the actual proceedings of the birthing process
compared to when I was 19 years old sitting in a class with the thought of
giving birth light years away.
Either way, maybe the striking fear into my heart thing
turned out to be good for me because ever since taking the class I’ve been
learning and reading everything I can about labor. Watching documentaries,
skimming through some of Moncho’s old med school books, looking up journal
articles about the birthing process while waiting for meetings in the library…you
know, just the normal, if not mildly obsessive tendencies one takes on to feel in
control of an uncontrollable situation. I know it will be difficult but I’m not
the first person to ever be faced with it and I certainly won’t be the last. However,
I still kind of cringe when I hear people say or read the phrase “they call it
labor for a reason”. I’m sure the person who named it “labor” was a man and
never actually experienced labor… but whatever. It’s happening, and it’s
happening soon regardless of whether it’s called “labor”, “a cakewalk”, or anything
else.
