Help Antenatal Classes !!

[EKirky]

Hi All, please can you help, I am looking for Antenatal classes and cant seem to find anything inbetween a few hours of FREE Yoga or paying over £200 for NCT? - we are expecting our first Baby at the beginning of March and im very confused it seems to be all or nothing?

Hello, have you talked to your midwife about it? I think she suggested the ones we went to - all free with the NHS. I looked at NCT too but it wasn't local to me.

We went to one (it was one of a set of three or so) at City Hospital, which was a couple of hours on a Saturday afternoon, with partners.

I went to a day-long one at the local health centre, women only on a week-day - as everyone was local it served the purpose of providing a group of mums to met up with afterwards.

DP and I also went to an 'active birth workshop' at QMC, which was about an hour, about a month before the birth. That was really a good opportunity to familiarise ourselves with the midwife-led side of the delivery suite, which is where we planned to, and did, go for dd's birth.

thats really helpful thanks.. do you know where i can go to book on to these type of classes - ive searched the internet but couldnt find them :)

I think you might be able to book yourself on the City Hospital ones - I seem to remember searching their website, then phoning them to book (sorry, it was almost four years ago!).

The Health Centre one came from info passed on by my midwife, that wouldn't be publicly available to book. Could you call your community midwife team?

QMC - can't remember if it was via MW or direct with the hospital.

There should be some basic antenatal classes provided by either the hospital you are booked at or your local community midwives may run some free classes. As always, the free classes will be limited availability and be mostly basic information with limited time spent covering practical elements for childbirth preparation.

There are private classes out there but they will range in cost depending on what you want ie: hypnobirthing, breathing, relaxation and active birth???

I myself am in the process of setting up private antenatal courses in Ravenshead and Radcliffe, because (as a community midwife) I have found many women do want more than the basic classes offered. However, they aren't up and running until Feb 2016 so this may be too late for you.

Good luck with your search,

Jenny