Take a Cleansing Breath...

Week Two Childbirth Class Recap:

Because I care a great deal about snacks at meetings, we will start with an easy recap: grading of snacks at sessions one and two.
Session one snack: Individual bags of mini M&M cookies = A
There was something else, but I don't even remember what it was because I was very excited about the cookies and that's all I had. They were excellent, and I will admit that since there were extras at the end of class, I took another bag for the ride home. Ssshh! Don't tell!
Session two snacks: White Cheddar Cheez-Its, chocolate/vanilla sandwich cookies, kettle chips = B
Cheez-its were pretty good but lately I'm liking sweet over salty so they did not hit the spot. I did have two cookies but they were not nearly as tasty as last week's cookies.

On the agenda of this evening's class:
*Things the partner can do to assist during labor - i.e. Baby B's dad could: get me ice chips, give massages, walk with me, play games (early stages only), speak encouragingly, etc.
*Labor and birth - including graphic videos!!!! One of a drug-free childbirth and one with an epidural.
*Breathing techniques - I am good at these because they're pretty much just like the breathing in yoga class. She is always telling us to "take a cleansing breath" which is just a deep breath. We did this at the end tonight. Also, she had pictures of babies for us to hold as a "focal point" to look at while we breathed. The husbands were supposed to select one. Dad picked one that had FOUR babies on it for me to look at, so I used a basket in the room as my focal point instead.

Areas of concern:
*Clearly, the birth videos. Just watching them was a little intense and I was almost crying in class. I am pretty sure that I will cry through all stages of labor. My crying is generally triggered by tiredness, frustration, anger, pain, and strong emotions in general (or my husband might say by pretty much anything)- all of which laboring mothers appear to feel. Sorry in advance to Baby B's Dad, all nurses, and doctors.
*Medical queasiness of Baby B's Dad. Given the fact that he has spent a lot of time in hospitals and had numerous gruesome injuries growing up, you would think that stuff like this would not bother him. I am already aware of his reactions to needles, blood, etc. and just figured as long as he stayed near the head of the bed and ignored the action at the foot end he'd be ok. Tonight, Dad admittedly had dizziness, queasiness, and the sweats all just watching the videos...I will soon be accepting applications for "on-call backup birth partner."

Input needed:
Given the crying, low pain tolerance, queasiness, etc. we are thinking some kind of drugs will be in order so the labor and delivery is a little more pleasant for all involved! Feel free to enlighten us on your experience of pain meds vs. no pain meds either by commenting or sending me an email. But please no graphic horror stories!! We were scared enough tonight.

Also if anyone wants to go for restaurant pancakes sometime soon let me know. I am getting the craving.