Link:
The second half of the class was also great. The company is called Parent Craft and it’s based in NYC, if anyone is looking for a labor & birth preparation session. (I’m also hoping to take their Fourth Trimester course.)
Elsewhere:
Unrelated to birth (???), but I really enjoyed this recounting of a mushroom trip: “My Psilocybin Journey Into Forgiveness.” [Joseph Dana]
In my experience, it gets less scary the more pregnant you become. Or maybe the same amount of scary is drowned out by wanting to not be pregnant anymore.
If I recall correctly (my oldest is now 15, ack) the most important thing my birth class gave me was permission to trust my intuition and to listen to my body. I'm embarrassed to admit that before age 32 I wasn't so good at that.
In the throes of labor, the baby's heart rate began to drop every time I had a contraction and the docs wanted to screw one of those fetal heart rate monitors into his skull. The doula teaching our class had mentioned that at hospitals there's often tension between protecting the institution from risk, in case anything goes wrong, vs. protecting you and the baby. I had this "sense" that he was fine, really, and this invasive intervention wasn't needed, so I refused it. He was born a few minutes later, all good! But in that raw moment where I had to choose between trusting the doctors and trusting myself, I'm still amazed that I chose to trust myself.
It's so interesting, Edith, that explanation of the difference between pain and suffering. In my day all the pregnant moms put together a "birth plan" for how things would go, and not a single one of us had a birth that went exactly according to plan. To your point I suspect that for some of us the suffering was not from the pain but from not being in control. Surrender and trust,, know that you're lucky to have skilled pros around for when nature doesn't cooperate, and listen to your bod : )