Wednesday, April 6, 2011

birth class: week one

Kevin and I signed up for a 4-week birth class at the hospital.  It meets Monday nights from 6:30-9:00, and we attended our first class this week.  There are 4 other couples, all of whom are expecting a baby boy in June.  Evelyn will have her pick of men!

I read somewhere that in every class, there is one man/couple who has the 6th-grade mentality about everything.  Kevin and I seem to be that couple.

We watched a video that showed women being interviewed about labor.  And then they actually showed them in labor.  Like hello, camera-between-the-legs, vagina-stretched-to-kingdom-come camera angles.  I alternated between being terrified for myself and mortified for those poor 80s women.  At one point, an interviewee said that while giving birth, she reached down and felt the baby's head and it was the softest thing she's ever felt.  Gross.  Not as gross and when they next showed her actually doing it.  That would be when I first dissolved into giggles.  As I struggled to maintain control, Kevin kept whipping out little comments like "I could fit my whole foot in there!"  Which undermined my best efforts to appear mature and older than twelve.

Moving on to relaxation techniques.  Each couple got a huge "bed" with pillows, and the instructor walked around the room telling us how to relax our muscles and joints, which will help labor to be shorter.  Side note: pregnant women are often flatulent.  I whispered to Kevin "I really need to fart!"  And the more I relaxed, the more I needed to pass gas.  At that point we were both shaking with silent laughter, which brought me dangerously closer to letting it go.  Proud to say I held it in though.  Also glad that our instructor has a hearing disability so that she couldn't hear us laughing.

And that's just week one.

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