Kirstie Allsopp and the NCT - what do you think?

[KateMumsnet]

Last week, journalist and MN blogger Linda Geddes accidentally ignited a heated debate when she appeared on the Today programme discussing NCT classes with a representative from the organisation. Fellow MN blogger Kirstie Allsopp - who's been critical of the NCT before - was listening in, and fired off this tweet:

"Turn to BBC Radio 4 for talk of a book about all the absurd myths surrounding pregnancy & birth. More NCT b** as usual though. Lots of people have good NCT experiences, but many don't. This is a very politicised, dogmatic and in my experience, scary organisation."

As she's done previously, Kirstie argues that the NCT is so focused on natural birth that they are letting down women who don't want, or aren't able, to have one by failing to prepare them - with the result that mothers who have Caesareans (for e.g) can feel stigmatized. Here's her blog post - fellow MN bloggers In a Different Voice and When The Baby Sleeps have also posted on the subject.

What do you think - do you agree with Kirstie, and if not, why? Tell us if you blog about this - and if you don't have a blog (why not? ) let us know what you think here on the thread.

Mmm lots of views and I would have to say that the NCT classes were useful however there were comments before and after from the teacher that we all noted at different times as a group .......

that a natural childbirth was the aim and we should strive for this with whale music, balls, massages, baking cakes whilst in labour

Natural childbirth good, induction, interventions bad.

Hospital staff will 'scare' into accepting induction.

We didn't cover enough on pain relief, apart from pethadine generally not good, no other options really covered drug wise and there are others out there like meptid.

That local hospital would induce on Tuesdays or Thursdays to avoid weekends if possible, she made it sound like hospital was already trying to control us, she reiterated that we had a choice and could say no, it was our body etc etc
somewhere in there she said this was for staffing reasons as weekends not as well covered for the interventions which induction brings on, which as we all reflected, like it or lump it is the truth but it didn't come over in a positive light

Out of a group of 7, 6 were induced (including me) and we all felt like we'd failed, teacher did convey an air of disappointment like a 'bad luck you couldn't do it on your own' in my case it was day 13 or 14 after dd and I was already 3cms and DS was out in 4.5 hours, teacher said 'sounds like they should have let you do it on your own'.....well maybe but actually what's wrong with wanting to give birth when hospital has more staff and actually, how long would it have been? As it was it turned out DS born with no waters round him, no one knows where they went but he was very small.

Arf @ 'cult'. I think the reason we shed ours so fast was that they didn't like us either.

Not my experience at all either. I really enjoyed my NCT course and have made some great friends that I see every week and my DH catches up with the other DHs too.

Our teacher talked through c-sections and all the drugs in detail. She had a playmobile toy theatre set with all the people and machines that would be involved. I ended up with a forceps delivery in the theatre and thought of that playmobile set! I knew what job all the crowd of medical staff were doing around me.

Especially appreciated that the course was tailored around what our group wanted to learn about. There was also a great exercise about your first 24 hours when you get your baby home.

I found the NHS antenatal course very brief and not at all as comprehensive. The tour around the maternity ward turned into an advertisement for paying for a private room...

This all just shows how different individual teachers are.

I was very lucky and had a great teacher who gave us facts.
My Dsis had an awful teacher who didn't do much information, but concentrated on 'feelings' and airey-fairy stuff (in her opinion).

In my class, the dads all came along to the bitter end; DSis, the dads stopped coming pretty quickly.

During my time in the organisation, I came to the conclusion that there needs to be stronger guidelines about exactly what is covered and how the subject is taught. There also needs to be a method of feedback to NCT HQ and probably some more checks on the content of the classes.

I think Kirstie is expecting NCT to do the job the NHS should be doing. NHS should provide good antenatal and postnatal support. In my area it does not. She probably doesn't understand this because she had her babies privately and has not had the experience of NHS care, which in my experience is that you are sometimes not given all the facts or choices about your care, nor much choice about the time or place if will occur. It's quite a shock when your previous experience of healthcare has been the odd trip to the GP and you are used to total control of your life.

She also fails to understand there is a difference between what comes out centrally (usually) thorough, evidenced based research and information, although their website is shit and so difficult to use that the classes are just a tiny bit of what they do and that it is the local branches who run things like postnatal support groups, meet-ups, activities, first aid classes and Nearly New Saies... and all for free as unpaid volunteers!

Yes the NCT has an agenda. Yes, it's not for everyone but to label it a "scary organisation" and describe everything they stand for as "bollocks" is very unfair. In the last two years they have changed policy of many things including breastfeeding which is great. Yes, do they promote and support breastfeeding but that's because there's no commercial interest in breastfeeding so NCT provides some balance to the formula companies huge marketing efforts. And of course breasts don't come with instructions unlike tins of formula. I've fed my babies both ways and I know which one was easiest to learn to do and it wasn't breastfeeding.

There are some bad teachers. Of course there are when the quality control relies on feedback from course attendees and IMO that should change. There are other things I would change about NCT, just as there are things I would change about the NHS, my workplace, my supermarket and other places I come into contact with. The difference is I make an effort to do it in an informed, constructive way. Kirstie Allsopp, by her own admission has not. She has never attended an NCT course or group. She has never engaged with the organisation directly (Twitter sniping excepted and really, Belinda Phipps should know better too). She is hugely uninformed and she also has a commercial interest which I doubt she is even aware of because she is so ignorant of the actual facts: NCT has an advertising relationship with Unilever and Kirstie is employed to promote and advertise products for their main rival P&G. Messy.

For the record my first set of antenatal classes were excellent and prepared all of us for birth (1 elective c-section, 1 emcs after failed ventouse and other intervention, 1 epidural, episiotomy and ventouse, 1 epidural vaginal delivery, 1 vaginal with g&a and pethedine and 1 planned homebirth with g&a). The breastfeeding session was rubbish. Nothing can prepare you for a newborn IMHO.

My local branch is great. Brilliant magazine, nearly new sales and activities.

Second class not as good as first but still good.

I also think people forget NCT is a charity and a members charity. That means they act in the interests of members, so if you are an NCT member and not happy with the organisation get involved and change things!

Oh, and NCT classes are not mandatory. If you have zero interest in "natural" childbirth don't do the classes. If you don't want to breastfeed do tho to that session. You might still benefit from an Early Days postnatal course or a yoga course or being an NCT member or joining your local branch or volunteering. Many options to join in are completely free.

The short answer is, I think Kirstie is right.

The long winded version is, I have mixed feelings about the NCT. I was desperate for a natural birth, and felt devastated when I didn't get one, largely because of NCT teaching. I came to believe that any interventions such as epidural, instrumental delivery, etc, were second best, and that a caesarean was a disaster. These interventions are a reality for a great many women, and making them it seem like a failure has no real benefit to the women, but serves only to promote NCT beliefs.

In retrospect, yes, I do feel let down by this, as the disappointment of "failing" at childbirth contributed to me having post-natal depression. Being disappointed at the birthing experience, when you have a beautiful new baby, totally dependent on you, is just really messed up. However, this attitude is not really just an NCT thing, I had some grief from a breast-feeding advisor in the hospital, one day after delivery, telling me what a shame it was I had a caesarean.

On the plus side, I was happy to go through the experience of having a baby with the support of NCT classes and I have long lasting friendships from my NCT group that have been very valuable, and I expect these will be friends for life.

I found Kirstie's blog to be spot on. My daughter is 6 months old and I avoided NCT classes. A friend of mine did attend them but seemed to pay a hefty price just to make some friends.
I've made some wonderful friends without paying out. As some others have said the classes seem to be populated by middle class women who probably (as did I) have already researched to the nth degree. What is this charity doing to help all those ill informed pregnant young girls out there? I've noticed it's a certain age group who attend all the baby classes I go to as well... women and their babies under the age of 25 are few and far between!
It does concern me that those who have Caesareans are made to feel inadequate. I was born that way and my mum said it made no difference to the wonderful bond she had with me whatsoever.

wewereherefirst - NCT courses can cost a lot of money, too much for many. But you don't have to do a course or pay for NCT membership to access local groups or other support.

I attended NCT when pregnant with DD. My primary motivation to go was to meet other mums to be and hopefully make a few good friends. To be fair I did just this and would probably not have survived my first year as a mum with out my NCT girls. However, other than providing an initial meeting to meet these women, and pay £200 for the privilege, I did not enjoy it and would agree with much of what Kirsty has said.

4 out of the six of us were planning either homebirths or births in midwife- led units. During one session, the 2 of us who weren't planning home births (including me) were singled out and made to voice our reasons as to why we didnt want a home birth. We came up with the usual stuff of safety etc. Each point we made was listed and then gunned down by the instructor as being either wrong or misguided.

Both of us remarked afterwards how intimidated we had felt at this point, and had almost left and not come back. It was totally counter productive and made us more set to have hospital births.

Whilst pushing home births to us, at no point did she counsel those who were planning on HB about any potential risk or problems may occur (and actually did in some cases) during home births and only mentioned in passing that occasionally there is a need to transfer to hospital AFTER the birth, not mentioning things that can go wrong before!

Induction was something to be avoided at all costs and it was implied you could control when you went into labour.

She did talk about C-sections and did a role play where we had to hook bits of string up to one of us, via a clothes peg, to signify all the tubes and lines that are attached to mums during labour and c-sections. While I think its important to educate women about what may need to happen during a birth, it was OTT and unnecessarily scary.

There was also an incident where the instructor was talking about the Vitamin K injections for the baby and how it was much better to give it orally rather than the "massive dose they insist on giving in hospital", where I had to practically break my husband's hands to stop him standing up and arguing with her about this.

Celine but the NCT doesn't run all those wonderful things you have listed everywhere, it's very much a postcode lottery, just like the NHS. Once again it's those who can't afford to pay really do miss out!

Could not disagree with Kirstie more.

I went to NCT antenatal classes 14 years ago, cost us the princely sum of £60, to meet naice middle class parents like us, ho ho. The teacher was at pains to be impartial about different birth "choices" (Ha! like you get a choice when push comes to shove ). One of the dads in our group was an anaesthetist and he chipped in with pertinent info. about hospital procedure In a bizarre coincidence he was on duty when I had a hideous induction and gave me a spinal block - another story!

It was only after we had all had our babies and at our "reunion" with the NCT teacher that she revealed she herself had had a hypnobirth with no pain relief whatsoever for her first and only child (respect!). None of us had the faintest idea that she had any inclination towards the "woo" and she certainly did not put any pressure on any of us. I stayed in touch with most of the girls and although at least 3 of us had a really bad time in labour (2 sections) none of us felt the classes made us feel it was our "fault".

However I do wonder whether antenatal classes in general would do better to focus more on coping skills and strategies for once you have given birth and have to cope with the next 18 years+....

I had a great NCT teacher (Mama of four delivered both CS and vaginally) and she was always careful to point out where things might not work out and what could happen. I think one of our first lessons included a discussion on interventions to assist birth including photos (I even sent her a picture of DD1's head after having an scalp electrode to add to her photo album). I went back for a refresher with the same teacher and she helped us work through the feelings left over from our first delivery.

On the other hand I felt very bullied by the Doctors (Consultant told me I was going to kill my baby trying for a VBAC with #2 - in front of my DD leaving me beside myself and sobbing). The information I gathered myself and the experience of my teacher helped me stand up for myself to an extent.

I have been confronted by many negative attitudes to CS over the years having had three CS (1st - meconium & un-dilating cervix, 2nd - giant baby & no labour, 3rd - transverse baby). When swapping birth stories I got skipped over by a class mate from pregnancy yoga and dismissed with "Oh dear, maybe next time." People have said I didn't try hard enough, have suggested I'm lazy or I didn't know what I was doing. SIL who had vaginal water births at home was particularly fond of having a dig.

For me as a new Mama trying to cope with a child not gaining weight these pervasive assumptions that I had done something wrong were really damaging and made me feel isolated.

Now I always repeat what my NCT teacher said when we were discussing attitudes to my CS: "Until someone has had a labour go wrong they can never understand what it's like."

I blogged about Joyful Caesarean births just before number three came along: Joyful Caesarean

I firmly believe the need for a vag-of-honour is harmful and attitudes need to change.

I think NCT attract people who want a "natural" birth believing it to be best and we all put extraordinary pressure on ourselves to be perfect when it really doesn't matter. Does anybody honestly care if they were delivered vaginally or by c-section? What pain relief option their mother chose? i doubt it. A bad teacher will perpetuate the myth of a perfect birth by failing to dispel it but she won't plant the seed in the first place. That comes from unrealistic portrayals of birth in the media and poor education and knowledge of the realities of birth and parenthood. This possibly also plays a part in our high rates of teenage pregnancy too. NCT has a part to play but the groundwork needs to have happened already.

I also think people's perceptions of what other people think can be off. I have a friend who has had a homebirth with her first baby. People presume she is some sort of woo hippy type and that she thinks everyone should birth like that. She is the exact opposite of that. She is almost militant in her views that medicine should be evidenced based and clinical decisions should be based on individual need and known risks. She also firmly states that if she was transferred to hospital she would want to be hooked up to every drug and monitor going if that's what the HCPs recommended! She campaigns for choice in birth whether it be home, hospital room, hospital theatre or MLU. I asked her about Kirstie's comments. She sighed and said that she was disappointed she hadn't done her research before adding that in her [Kirstie's] shoes she would most likely have gone for a c-section too because she has really big babies and that she should not feel guilty about taking the right decision for herself, but equally she shouldn't rubbish an organisation that helps women like her to have the birth that's right for them.

wewereherefirst The NCT doesn't run these local things from their central office, local parent volunteers do. Most are NCT members but not all. If things aren't happening locally where you are that is because you someone isn't bothering to run it.

A bit like you only have a Scout troop where people volunteer to run it or a book club where people bother to organise the meeting and turn up. NCT is the same - low level, local support offering shared experiences but with a parenting angle as the focus.

There was nothing much in my local area until a couple of people stepped up. They do a marvellous job for virtually no thanks :(

And they're free! Or the cost of a coffee or a £1 donation or something. Local support and classes can be and are mutually exclusive.

Sorry not read all thread.

Didn't it used to the Natural Childbirth Trust? So that's why they lean away from sections?

I have good experiences of the classes, also did hospital ones, which gave not much info, a video of a birth, but a tour of the unit, good for making going into hospital 1st time less scary. But awful place and managed to avoid 2nd time, but NCT classes helped with unassisted home birth.

NCT 'friends' were ok, shame since it's very middle class, we all worked and coffee mornings fell apart at about 6 months when we all were working different days etc. I still keep in touch with a few 7 years on.

On balance I think it's a good organisation, has its good and bad teachers. But doesn't deserve the slating people who haven't gone to classes give it.

Correct me if I'm wrong but they have fought to help women give birth the way they want, and for stopping the pubic hair shaving and enemas my mother went through? And for those 2 changes I salute them.

They also campaigned for dads in the delivery room.

Totally agree with WillabyWallaby (and others) that the vitriol and criticism spouted by those who have never even set foot in an NCT class, group or activity is unfair. I might also add it makes some look a teeny bit like sheep or, in some cases, a bit thick

Lucky DH was there for the 1st, since he delivered the 2nd. Another thanks to NCT.

Oh, and the breast feeding councillor that listened to me crying while I decided whether or not to stop breastfeeding at around 2 wks in was the one who helped me feed DS1 to 6mnths and then DS2 to 12months. Again a good experience.

Oh how I love being called a thick sheep. Baaa hurrdurr.

Here is the reason why i don't now want to go to NCT classes. The insults that are thrown if you don't fit in.

Bf, natural birthing cloth nappying. babywearing working class mama here.

I had a good experience of the NCT. I ended up with a forceps birth in theatre in readiness for CS and was so grateful for the really good preparation I had had from my NCT class - I knew there would be loads of people in there, and why. We had a reasonably broad mix of people (all couples though, I imagine it might be off-putting to someone who had to go on their own). In short, I felt really well prepared for the birth, however it might happen. And I met some really lovely people and got used to meeting new people with my "mum hat" on, both of which have been invaluable since the birth. If it's relevant, my DD was born in 2006.

The people I know who joined the NCT classes did so to meet other mums of a similar social level (?!). I wasn't going to spend £200+ just to meet people, would rather spend it on ds! Our midwife ran classes that were a) very funny but realistic and b) totally free! With all the info thats out there in books and on the internet I don't know what you get out of it that you can't get from the free classes (unless you just want to meet "professional" people, tbh I had enough of them at work!)

erm, wewereherefirst I was referring to those posters who are commenting negatively on the content and attitude of an organisation they have no direct experience of. I didn't particularly notice you do that so I'm sorry if you identified with that.

It does kind of kind my point though that people have different perceptions and project things onto others that are not necessarily correct.

Ime people at nct classes do not throw insults. Nor is there a particular fit in the branch where I go. Everyone is very different, the only thing we have in common is geography!

Having read through the thread some of the things people have experienced are awful and there is no place for anywhere and especially not NCT!

Haven't had time to read but just wanted to post that I totally, completely and utterly agree with Kirstie. My local NCT group terrified me and was totally unhelpful and unsupportive when I was unable to breastfeed due to a baby with a palate not optimal and after three bouts of infective mastitis and a breast abscess. Found them unrealistic and unhelpful and speak also as a member of the Maternity Liaison Committee and vice chair of the local CHC. Found it quite shocking actually that a such a bunch of amateurs had so much influence over women and their choice. It did however speak volumes about the ineptitude of information available via local maternity services and trained professionals.