to by annoyed at this NCT antenatal group

[birthstoryvisit]

Ok, I know I'm being unreasonable, that's why I've name changed, but I need to get this off my chest.

My DS is three months' old. Yesterday, I went back to my old NCT teacher's class to give my birth story (long, epidural, ventouse, lots of stiches). A friend with a wonderful birth (waterbirth, soft lights) went too.

They were horrid to me. Did not ask me one question about my labour (I thought that they'd want to know what some of the interventions were really like). Their basic attitude was "You failed to have a natural labour. I do not need to talk to you because my labour will not be like that. I am coming to classes and will have a lovely, natural birth with maybe a bit of gas and air. You are a failure." They spent their whole time asking my friend about her ante natal yoga and whether it was the raspberry leaf tea that ensured the quick labour.

This isn't just me. The first thing my friend said when we left was "goodness, they were a bit judgy weren't they?". I get it, they're first time mums and in denial, but am I being unreasonable to hope that at least one of them has a long labour and needs an epidural?(I know I am really ). I gave up part of my weekend to try and be helpful. Grrr, won't be doing that again.

BucketsOfBlood is PNPTSD recognised to be a condition? My DH is keen to TTC and whilst I want to have another child, I'm terrified about the birth to the extent where I'm umm-ing and aah-ing. I know a lot my resentment of my particular NCT teacher is misdirected and I probably should address this..!

The women in the NCT class you went back might be feeling all worthy and raspberry leaf tea oriented, but just you wait...

... after 30 hours of an obstructed labour I bet they'll be first in line for an epidural and all the lovely, lovely pain killing drugs and live-saving interventions modern medicine has to offer.

Yes a good proportion of these situations could well be avoided by better birth management, but women and babies do die in labour without them.

Every day I thank my lucky stars that I gave birth in the UK with two excellent midwives, and not in the developing world, otherwise my daughter and I would probably be dead now.

Your birth sounds just like my first, my ds was bruised from the forceps and still has a slight mark now on his forehead.

They would have approved of the second, just gas and air.

They may be not preparing themselves properly by not listening to all sides of the story. I really tried to avoid all of the intervention but after hours and hours of painful labour I went to hospital in an ambulance (I tried to have him at a local maternity home). Luckily the NCT class I attended prepared us for this and we were not phased by suddenly having 12 people in the room (just avoided an emergency caesarian).

sabire, I think you are doing a good job here

BalletGirl, you said: "The NCT 'lady' only seemed to be interested in documenting all the birthstories for her records, when I told her I ended up having every intervention going she rapidly lost interest and turned back to my friend who had a 'lovely' homebirth."

As well as sabire's alternative explanations, I think it's also possible the teacher recognised that a reunion may not have been the place to 'debrief' a birth and as sabire said, she may have sensed you had some feelings about all this....they come across in your post so it's v. likely they came across at the reunion. She might have sensed a debriefing would have been intrusive and uncomfortable for you.

Why is it 'having a go' to explain that babies don't drain breasts at each feed?

I am mystified when people complain the NCT discusses normal straightforward birth as the default situation. It is clear in all NCT's materials and course descriptions that the course is primarily about building confidence and awareness of the safety of normality, and research shows quite clearly this is what women hope for themselves. Agenda setting at the start of NCT courses will reveal that most people sitting there want that, but there will always be at least one couple who know they may need a section - but still want to know about all the other aspects of pregnancy, birth and parenthood, and also what might happen in a section...most courses cover this.

For most mothers and babies, normal, sraightforward birth is achievable and safe, and rewarding to the mum. There is, however, nothing morally superior about it, or morally superior about women who have this sort of birth. I have known scores of NCT antenatal teachers and not one has ever given me the impression they judge in this way - not one. If people feel judged and ignored, then maybe they need to talk about their birth feelings, and if they are really sure the NCT teacher is responsible for them, complain.

I am an NCT breastfeeding counsellor, and I get told on mumsnet that NCT 'makes women feel guilty for formula feeding.' I think in most cases, this is projection. I am certain that we get it wrong from time to time, but mostly, we don't.

I fully support the NCT and their aims, but I do sometimes wonder whether at least some of the teachers (recognising that this is just the experience of my group of friends/relatives) want so much to "discuss straightforward birth as the default situation" that it doesn't always prepare women for the realities of birth in a hospital.

I recognise that homebirths are the best way to avoid interventions but many first time mums, myself included, were not confident to go with that. In any event, by the time you get to NCT classes it is often too late to change (even leaving aside availability with staffing shortages in some areas).

So that leaves a hospital birth. Whilst my NCT class warned me for the fact that first labours could be long, and whilst I thought my teacher was great, I think she was perhaps so keen not to scare us and to keep us feeling positive that she undersold how likely a long first stage was and the pressure that would be placed on your in hospital. For two of us in our five person group, that was the reality. We both ended up with a number of interventions. The 'natural' births were the ones which went quickly and so there was no external pressure to 'manage' the birth process (and mothers with a bit more energy!).

In hospital, there is often a lot of pressure to keep things progressing and I think it's very hard for a first time mum, even if she has learned all about the 'cascade of intervention' to deal with pressure to take interventions like having your waters broken and syntocin. I remember lots of "well, if X hasn't happened in two hours, we'll need to Y". You simply don't have the personal experience to judge whether your situation is one where you could safely say no and push (no pun intended) onwards, or whether you really are one of those situations where things like this are needed. Particularly given that many women will have missed (in full or in part) at least one night's sleep by that point.

I am not sure that there is an easy solution to this, except perhaps greater use of doulas where it is financially viable. However, I do think that perhaps there is a case for the NCT pushing mothers harder to consider the 'long and slow' scenario so that, if it happens, you are more prepared about how you're going to deal with it. I would also have welcomed my class being a bit more upfront about the 'stopwatch culture' of many maternity wards, which I was led to believe (both by NCT and NHS classes) had pretty much died out.

For my next one, I will think long and hard about a homebirth. If I do go for a hospital birth, I feel I will be far more prepared for how to deal with it and hope to avoid more intervention. However, I feel that most of that will come down to having 'been there, done that', and I don't know how the NCT could supply that.

Hmmm, didn't really give any answers there did I?

I just want to know what an unnatural birth is???

redllamayellowllama Check out

www.birthtraumaassociation.org.uk/

PNPTSD is a very real syndrome, many women who have had unpleasant or frightening experiences in their labour can experience symptoms such as flash-backs and panic attacks for some time afterwards. This association (founded and still run by Sheila Kitzinger) aims to help people who have suffered any kind of birth trauma to reach some kind of resolution and understanding of their experience and it's impact on them.

Who's talking about 'natural' and 'unnatural' birth, thebody?

I don't understand your point!

BSV I can see your point. I was on the other side of it. I attended a MW run NHS course and was a mother who had a first baby at home with paracetomal and TENs machine.

The parents at the class all looked at me (or so I felt) as a born again hippy who obviously had a fanjo like a bucket and was heavens above also BF her baby (DD needed a feed halfway through my description of the birth).

I came away feeling good though as the MW who invited me explained things can go like my birth experience but equally they can go massively interventionist and medicalised. She tried to present a balanced view and show mine was one way it could go but not the only way. I did feel a bit of a weirdo though but this is very likely my projecting what they thought. Although a few of the questions were a bit "why did you not want pethidine/epidural/managed third stage" in an are you mad tone of voice?

I would hate to feel any of the Mums there felt threatened or upset by my story if theirs had not turned out that way. It was and only could be my story of my birthing experience.

I feel sorry you were not given more support by the course leader and participants.

Congratulations on giving birth to your new baby. The birth is just one tiny part of the parenting of your child. Enjoy your baby and try to put this to the back of your mind. They do not deserve your time and effort.

I just think it's sad that so many women seem willing to think the worst of other mothers and their motives, on the basis of exchanges which are so open to misapprehension.

No one who has given birth themselves and then spent 3 or 4 years studying childbirth and parenting (that's who long it takes most mums to qualify as NCT teachers - they study part time) without knowing how complex labour can be and how strong womens' feelings are about what they and their babies go through to achieve a birth. I makes me very to hear so many people jumping to the conclusion that antenatal teachers think mums who have difficult births are 'failures'; nothing I have seen or heard suggests that this is the case - very, very far from it. And I speak as a mum who's never had a straightforward birth herself.

sabire, I share your

When mothers are feeling sensitive about an experience - I'll use infant feeding as an example as it's what my NCT work is, but it could equally well be labour and birth - they are liable to see whole dictionaries of meaning in a look, in silence, in a throw-away comment.

The woman who uses a bottle after switching to formula after a bad bf experience in a roomful of people who (she thinks - she cannot know) are breastfeeding/have breastfed will report that other women 'looked down their noses at her' or the fact they say nothing means 'they made me feel I was a terrible mother'.

If one person makes a daft comment, it is felt as a crushing blow, and even a non-daft comment can feel like hidden criticism. This is heart-breaking, but it is not these other mothers' fault. And if the gathering happens to be an NCT one, it is not NCT's fault, either!

NCT gets blamed for poor attitudes and lack of support from midwives and HVs who are nothing to do with NCT - while NCT works very hard to train and inform HCPs in how to support and help mothers with difficult breastfeeding...and I know the same goes for labour and birth.

Tiktok, I can totally see where you are coming from. A lot of the anger at the NCT is misplaced and it's very sad. They do a lot of very valuable work.

However, do you think that there's an element of the points I made in my post above creeping into it - that women feel that the NCT encourages natural birth without being totally, brutally honest about how difficult it could be, particularly in reference to my point about nursing staff at the hospital. Could it be that women feel that the NCT told them that one type of birth was possible and that, when the medical staff tell them it's not (and the 'not' is what happens, validating that opinion as correct, even if it wasn't), they feel misled?

My personal experience was of a very bossy midwife who told me that they had to break my waters as I wasn't progressing. My contractions pretty much stopped for two hours afterwards (various hyphotheses why), leading to syntocin and an epidural. I had missed two nights of sleep with back labour by this point and was physically incapable of arguing with her. I sometimes still wonder what would have happened had I had the emotional and mental reserves to do so. I really wasn't expecting to have to battle with the medical staff to avoid intervention, and the NCT classes had very much taught that the hospital wants to avoid them as much as you do, so it's only with the benefit of hindsight that I realise that maybe it wasn't the only way the situation could have been handled...

Is it impossible that this NCT group is a bit rubbish?

I understand you saying don't paint us all with the same brush but OP doesn't sound like she is hung up about her experience and looking for blame. She just wanted to share it with the people she had started the journey with.

Instead of validating her experience they pushed her aside. They may have been thinking other things but surely they failed by not addressing it and concentrating on the other story?

She felt ignored. That doesn't mean she necessarily was ignored or looked down on, and the other people at the class may well have seen the whole thing in a very different light - we only have one person's interpretation of what happened.

'goodness, they were a bit judgy weren't they'

was her friend's comment as they left.

I accept that the OP's experience was bad - the women came across as rude, even if their behaviour came from a different feeling. I feel sorry for the teacher who probably realised this but naturally enough felt unable to kick the arses of an entire class of grown-ups.

Powdoc, sorry you had such a battle Would it be worth telling your teacher of what your reality was like, with the bossy midwife and your exhaustion and inability to put up a fight? It's hard for teachers to get the content right, sometimes, I think - probably the unit where you gave birth would say very strongly they want to avoid unnecessary confrontation, and it may be you got a member of staff who was out of step with this.

Hindsight does make you see things differently. It took me quite a long time to realise that actually, I was treated quite badly in labour with my first baby, and indeed my second.

I opted for home birth second time round - would have avoided the hospital at all costs.

It was a truly wonderful empowering experience.

Powdoc I would recommend it if you are already considering it.

I did sort of de-brief with her (though more about the exhaustion than the midwife) a while back. DD is six months' old now, so it's all a bit water under the bridge.

I actually also went back to speak to an NCT class recently and, whilst they weren't rude, they were definitely uninterested in my story (we also had someone with a 20 minute arrival at hospital to baby story - much more dramatic). I think maybe she had asked me back as part of the response to my feedback on my experience (i.e. to tell a less rosy story). Maybe it's inevitable that you block this stuff out as an emotional protection system...

The midwife I got was a locum . I am sure she wasn't on board with current policy and behaviour. Her main interest (until I had the epidural and she had to stay) seemed to be drinking tea at the nurses station and periodically hooking me up to continuous monitoring for 'just a half hour' then wandering off again.

She was also on the post natal ward where she told me I had to stay in overnight because I had had an instrumental delivery. However, I'd had four hours sleep by then (on and off) and was a lot more fiesty. I told her that the midwife who was at the delivery said that wasn't necessary (had delivered in very early hours of morning, so had been in 12 hours post-birth by this point) and sent her packing to find the ward manager. Still feel quiet satisfaction that, whilst my birth might not have gone to plan, I got me and my daughter home for the first night of her life (given that I knew there was no medical reason we couldn't be home).

Hindsight is a wonderful thing isn't it. I wonder if you're considered high risk for a homebirth if you've had an instrumental delivery first time .

powdoc I had ventouse first time and home birth required nothing but gas and air.

See how you feel.

Oooh maybe then. Not that I'm planning number two just yet!

I had a forceps birth after receiving 'care' very similar to yours. I had my next baby at home.

It's very unlikely that anyone would feel that your first birth being assisted is a sound reason for discouraging a homebirth next time around.

That's good to know. Maybe then.

I was a raspberry leaf tea hippie-in-denial.

Two c-sections later I am reformed

I'm sorry you had this experience at your NCT group. I agree that first time expectant mums are living in cloud cuckoo land most of the time (it's not their fault, though!).

Birth isnt a test that you pass or fail. No sane person (who has given birth) think this.

tictok, I had just the same experience as the poster 20 years ago with NCT.

I had forceps and stiches blah blah blah..councellor told me that it was a shame I didnt have a 'natural labour'!!! if I had had a natural labour I would also have had a dead baby..

lot of shite talked about labour imo.. its a process to get your baby out of your body, sometimes its easy and sometimes its hard, have had some experience with 4 kids and all births and labours different. None of that my doing, just luck...

we need to be bloody glad that we can have intervention if we need it, and save our pity for the poor women in the third world who regulaly die in labour..

thebody - tad unfair to be using a memory from 20 years ago to make a point about the use of the word 'natural', doncha think? Of course it wasn't acceptable for someone to use it with you in that way then, and it does indicate we all have l...o....n....g memories when it comes to anything to do with our births

I can confidently say this sort of judgy use of the word 'natural birth' (as in 'it's a shame you didn't have one') would not be part of normal NCT interactions these days.