What could have made your antenatal classes better?

[emereen]

I’m a midwife and thinking of starting up some classes.

I’d like them to be unique and actually worthwhile!

more information/sessions on post-birth and how to care for baby. 90% of the sessions were all about giving birth.
practical and factual information about baby sleep, for example, I didn't know (and therefore it stressed me out):

• newborns have active noisy sleep and they aren't actually awake
• they are designed not to be put down (you won't make life harder for yourself holding them for naps)
• after 4 month regression sleep cycles are 30-40 mins and they will 'crap nap' until they learn to extend them

also more focus on PP mental health and feelings

Mine was actually really good (I did NCT).

I would say that what actually made it really good was that it encouraged building relationships with other mums/couples going through the same thing.

The format was once a week for 6 weeks and there was time for a tea and cake break in the middle and then there was an actual social session after the 6 weeks were finished. The midwife didn’t organise or attend, but at the last session, she basically asked who wanted to be in charge of setting up a group chat and gave us time to decide on a date we’d meet for coffee before our babies were born.

It set the groundwork for relationships that went beyond the class and that was probably the most valuable thing I took away from the class. Our dc are in secondary school now and I still keep in touch with 4 mums!

The other thing that was really helpful was focusing on what it’s like to have a new baby and the fourth trimester and normalising a lot of the things that people freak out about (like not being able to put baby down, what sleep is like the first few weeks, etc). I feel like there is a lot of emphasis on birthing, but that’s almost the easy bit about having a baby. I appreciated being able to talk about our expectations for the first weeks and months. I think this was especially helpful for some of the dads who really had no idea how much life was about to change.

Also to add to the above, the midwife who did ours hosted us in her home. Maybe that would be weird for a lot of people, but I felt it made it a lot more comfortable sitting around in someone’s lounge rather than sitting in like a classroom or village hall sort of setting.

Ours were shit. NHS loads of people. No one looked like they wanted to be there. Only good part was tour of the delivery suite.

Really explaining latching and different positions for feeding. Explaining how common tongue tie is, and how to get it diagnosed.

Nothing - mine were great (NCT). The NHS one was pretty rubbish.

I did NCT and I felt that too much time was spent on birth and not enough on post-birth and caring for a baby afterwards.

Get them to bond as a group. Split men and women if both come to discuss intimate topics as people are more likely to open up.
Also make the point that in the group there will be bottle feeders and breast feeders. Co sleepers and people who follow a strict routine. At the end of the day everyone is becoming parents for the first time which everyone has in common. When the babies are older no one will care about these issues which seem so important at the time.
If you can encourage them to meet up for coffee before the babies and then do a reunions after.

Hi, I’m an Antenatal Educator already. Along with those great ideas, here’s some things you might not have thought of.

1. if you’ve got kids, take some time to seriously debrief your own births / infant feeding journey. Not taking your own experiences into the courses is really hard if you’re still holding on to anything.

2. upskill yourself on latest thinking about child development, infant behaviour etc. find the really good evidence based websites for info.

3. Take some time to learn about adult learning styles and group facilitation. You can be an amazing midwife but know nothing about how to ‘teach’ adults.

4. Think about inclusivity. Seriously think about it. Organisations like Five Times More would be a good starting point. Also think about venues, times, group dynamics etc.

Happy to share anything else if you need.

Don't shame c-sections, bottle-feeding etc. All it will do is make people either defensive (if that is their choice) or feel shit just at their most vulnerable time (if it wasn't their choice but they need to do it anyway).

Yes! The first thing our NCT teacher said was “welcome to the National Childbirth Trust. Not the Natural Childbirth Trust.” One woman in our group was expecting twins so she knew there was a good chance she’d have a C section, and we covered that in detail.

No gimmicky cringey exercises!

Something about the secret timings/limits of things, beyond which midwives start proposing action (or upping the pressure). It felt like they had a plan that I wasn’t aware of. For example, I was taken aback by the shift at 38 weeks from “everything’s fine” to “let’s get baby coming out soon”, rapidly changing to “let’s book in a sweep/induction” once the dreaded 40 weeks mark approached. It made me feel like I’d done something wrong that my babies didn’t pop out before their “due date” and it would have been helpful to know the likely plan when they didn’t and also that this was very normal!

Similarly with breastfeeding, I didn’t know how critical the day 3 weigh in would be. Midwives suddenly shifted from “you’re doing great” to “we might need to hospitalise” when DD lost 10%. I wish someone had told me it was absolutely critical to get as much milk down my baby as humanly possible in those initial days, I was just cuddling and recovering and feeding as much as she wanted. We ended up on a hellish feeding plan. With DD2 I knew to be more proactive and she didn’t lose as much weight.

I get that they don’t want to cause stress, but I wish I’d known about these “targets” and what would happen afterwards. It wouldn’t need to be a big deal in an antenatal course, just “once you get past 38 weeks your midwife will be eager to see things progress and will talk about an induction once you’re over 40 weeks”, and “3 days after birth there will be a critical weigh-in. If your baby has lost too much you will be given a plan to help, but it’s better to get as much support as possible before that, so ask for help”.

Sorry for the essay! It’s great you are asking.

Oh! And please mention colic or Purple/inconsolable crying. Some babies stop crying when they are warm, dry, fed and cuddled. Some scream for hours whatever you do. I didn’t know this.

Agree with much less on the birth and more on the post natal period and what to expect like midwife checks, postnatal recovery, fourth trimester, wind (yours and babies!).

And not using the phrase "cascade of interventions".

I felt a lot of birth interventions / outcomes were presented as rarities when really they are very common (and basically everyone woman in my group experienced one).

So emergency c-section, use of forceps/ventouse, inductions. All presented as rarities and I think all but one woman in my group experienced one or more of these - and was left having to process this in the moment as it hadn’t featured ‘in their birth plan’.

No shaming of women who want an epidural. I was outright labelled as tokophobic for insisting on an epidural.

Midwives ought to be aware that women talk to friends who have recently given birth at their local hospital, and if friends have had poor experiences, that's going to influence the birth preferences of women giving birth later.

Probably don’t refer to the women in the class as birthing people. That was my experience anyway.

Thank you so much, everyone!

This was the case in a class that I went to. The birth section was all about natural birth and breathing exercises but one person ended up with an instrumental birth and all the others C-sections for varying reasons.

One thing I did like about the class was a section on infant first aid (given by a qualified instructor).

I did centering pregnancy (not in the UK, but it's an international program with scientific back up). The basis is very basic, which is a good start depending on group. My midwives were good at tailoring it to the group and taking into account our varying education level. For me, the best bit was that each midwife in the practice lead one session, so by the end I'd met most of the midwives and it wasn't strangers showing up in my house when I was vulnerable.

Yep ditto. Only one out of 8 of us had a birth that didn't involve either a c section or forceps. Yet I swear 50% of the nct was related to breathing exercises at home (I was induced so didn't do anything at home!).