Prenatal Class #3

E&I have been talking a lot about the classes thus far and she pretty much hit the nail on the head the other day when she made the observation that the hospital is making pregnancy sound like a disease and that the medicalized steps surrounding childbirth is their way to cure you of this affliction. As a result, anything positive that can come out of the experience of bringing life into the world is relegated to the back of a long line of pain, fear, drugs and pain.

In more positive news, the teacher & our fellow classmates have really grown on me.

(I skipped the breastfeeding class as I've made the assumption [Never a good idea, I know] that I won't be doing too much breastfeeding. Based on what I got from E, breastfeeding a baby is a lot like eating a hamburger except that you're the hamburger.)

This week's class was on pain management & cesarians.

The pain management portion explored all the ways that medicine will make you feel better without mentioning that there exists any (not even one) other methods to cope. Prenatal class continues to play up the tremendous amount of pain that a woman will experience without any reassurance whatsoever other than 'we're really good at sticking this needle into your spine.' One the other hand, some of the drugs they offer sound really good and, should we end up in a hospital, I will seek out ways to get the nurses to administer them to me.

A fun game E&I will play during the birth: Tell me when you'd have the epidural if you were actually having one. I'm curious to know if there will even be a point at which she regrets it. I suspect there won't in spite of class basically saying that the pain is so intense, so constant and lasts for such a long time that any non-medical pain management is simply not conceivable.

Throughout the classes the length of time a first-time mother will spend in labour has been at odds with what the literature we've been reading, as well as what the midwives have been telling us. At this class we realized that the reason why is that epidurals add to length of time a woman is in labour. In effect, by utilizing medical pain management, you are making it harder on your own body as well as that of the baby.

Part two was cesarian section. I saw a video of one a few years back at school and, once the video started playing, braced myself for a bunch of goo spilling out of a woman's stomach, assuming they would show one too, this being a prenatal class and all. Instead, the cesarian was shown as a sterile, Sesame Street-type cartoon where there was no blood or fluid and the baby was delivered by the giant, gloved Hand of God.

The most insulting part of this was the family they chose the depict in the video was the only one planning a holistic non-medicalized birth; in effect pressing home the point even more strongly that anything you try that is different to the medical model is doomed to failure.

Home birth class on Monday (Assuming it's not cancelled. Again). It'll be interesting to see if I come away from it with less snark.