NCT classes

[EmsyW]

Hi ladies
Just wondering if NCT classes are worth signing up for ? I know you get to meet other women but just wondering about the content?
Thanks for your advice!

For me, content was nothing that you couldn't read on the internet. Was also some... interesting... advice at times, which was basically the leader trying to make their personal experience, into fact Also certain agendas pushed etc. As with all these things.
Meeting the other women was absolutely worth it for me, but then I had no other friends with babies.

The content was completely pointless. It was worth every penny to make amazing friends, though!

In my experience, the main reason anyone goes is to make friends! But the main bit that DP and I found helpful was the information about what happens if you end up in theatre. She had all these little models of people acting out all the different roles - you would not believe how many HCPs are in that room with you! It made it much less scary.

I thought the content was more useful for my husband than it was for me as I had already done a lot of my own research, and having twins meant a lot of it wasn’t applicable to the way my birth was managed. I think a lot of it depends on your teacher and her particular agenda.

Although I’m only in touch with two of my friends from the group, it was invaluable in terms of supplying a network for the first nine months.

Didn’t learn anything and didn’t make any close friends (nor did anyone else in my particular group, really bad mix).

From what I read it seems to vary wildly depending on the group and who leads it. Ours was fantastic both in terms of content and meeting people and both DH and I are really glad we went. That said, the nhs run classes in our area are really top notch and the content of those classes was just as good. On balance the birth bits were better at the nhs classes and the looking after a newborn bits were better at nct (the nhs class was a bit 'thou shalt breastfeed and if you have any problems it is solely because you are doing it wrong') but both were very good and if you were in the same area I would highly recommend both.

Same as PP, i read everything off google but the friends were invaluable, especially in the early days, at least one other person was always awake at 1/2/3 am when I was awake with the baby so I could chat x

Terrible content - the free NHS course was wasaay better. But I met a lovely bunch.

I would do it for the instant parent network not the content. Our group was great for that. As pp said in the first few weeks/months it is fab to have people to message at 1/2/3am. Also good to have someone to meet up with on mat leave. Yes, you will meet and make some friends at baby classes etc but it is nice to have that NCT group too. Although I guess it won’t always be the case, ours at least had a fair amount in common in terms of parenting choices (in particular breastfeeding, weaning, slings etc) and types of jobs (professional, long-ish hours, which meant we all had similar balancing issues to contend with on returning to work so it was great to have people to talk those over with). We didn’t meet up that much after the first 6 months as everyone gradually went back to work and some people moved house etc. But we were still in frequent contact, so invitations to the kids’ birthday parties, messaging around all the milestone things etc. We are now 2.5 years on and our NCT group still messages each other a fair bit - now it’s about potty training the original “babies” and lots about the second babies that are appearing (half of us have now had a second).

They are worth it imo - but maybe take the info with a pinch of salt.

Thankyou ladies.
This is more or less what I thought. A lot of my friends have children already but I moved recently and live an hour away from where they are so think the network of support wouldakenit worthwhile doing a course x