Parent Education

[Middiemummy]

Hi, just wondering who did the hospitals free parent ed and who did private antenatal classes. What was good and bad? Did it help? As a midwife and hypnobirthing teacher I'm thinking of setting up a service that is sorely lacking in my area and am currently basing all my content ideas on experiences of women I have cared for. Would appreciate any input xx

I did NCT classes as I moved to a new area during the time I should have had NHS provided ones.

NCT was around £170 for 10 hours which I think is slightly expensive and means only people with a certain income can really afford to do it, which is a shame. However they do offer a 90% discount for students which I took advantage of as I was finishing my degree at the time. I think offering this discount for low income families also would be great.

I found the classes really useful - 2x 4-hour sessions on Saturday mornings and a 2-hour session on a weeknight. It was us and 7 other couples which was a lovely group size and allowed us to make friends - however I did notice my partner and I were some of the youngest there at 21 and 27, most others seemed to be mid-30s which again could be down to them having more disposable income to spend on the classes.

We discussed some really useful things - breastfeeding, post-pregnancy confidence, massage, pain relief techniques, nappy changing, bathing baby and more. All really useful. My only issues were that I feel breastfeeding was pushed upon the mums somewhat. My SIL desperately wanted to breastfeed her baby but found she couldn't, and instead bottle fed. The NCT classes kind of made out that breastfeeding is the best and only way to feed your child, and we didn't discuss bottle feeding at all which was a shame. There was also quite a lot of pressure put on the mums about night feeding etc. We didn't really discuss pumping milk so dad could get up to feed, it was just assumed the mum would do all the work which my partner and I both thought was a bit old fashioned and unfair.

Overall the classes were really good and I'm glad I did them, especially with the reduced price. 4 hours was a bit long for a 38 weeks pregnant lady to sit around though!

Also, providing biscuits, tea/coffee and flavoured water is such a little thing but makes a big difference! X

That's really helpful thank you :-) I'm currently putting a structure together and planning on running it over 3 sessions of about 2-3 hours per session... I'm really passionate about making it accessible to ALL women and families and so am planning an affordable alternative (I hope)... was there anything you felt should have been covered that wasn't? It's impossible to cover everything however I'm well placed, I feel, To have a reasonably good handle on areas the women's understanding seems patchy. Such an important opportunity to empower women and families to make the most of their journey x

The local NCT one to us was sadly cancelled due to lack of attendees.

We attended one of the three parent ed classes. Sadly I got stuck at work for the second and was unable to attend the third.

We are both in the hospitality industry , and found the timings / length of all the classes didn't work for us to be honest. Had they been shorter sessions but spread over a longer time frame, we could have at least gone to some!

Second time around, there isn't the same options for classes. A refresher class would be great - updating on new guidance, going through birth techniques again. A chance to make new friends too!

Sounds like an amazing idea! Making these resources accessible to everyone is so so important. I especially feel there need to be more of these things for teen mums and single mums as it does sound intimidating going to NCT classes and similar as a single person.

As I said, although I desperately want to breastfeed I think it's important to teach women that they aren't any less of a mother if they have to or want to bottle feed, and also techniques and learning curves that can come with that.

The pain relief stuff is really helpful and important to teach about, I think. Would be nice to hear more about induction processes, sweeps and the things that can happen after the due date has passed. Also maybe early signs of labour to look out for as I feel it was made out that it's 'normal' for the waters to break and contractions to start, then you relax for a bit and head to the hospital, when for most women this isn't the case and labour can be as quick as a few hours or as long as days.

That's all I can think of really, hope I've been helpful even just a little! And good luck, sounds like you're doing a really good thing x

We did the NHS ones as hypnobirthing/nct ones were just out if our budget. As it is I don't think hypnobirthing would have suited us based on what my friends have told me.
It was 6 hrs on a Saturday which suited us & was full of practical information which suits me. We did have a couple of couples leave at lunchtime as they were expecting it to cover breathing techniques etc which it didn't. We also did a additional 2hr breastfeeding session which was OK but everything was already in the booklet given to us at the midwives.