What does the 'C' stand for?

Posted on 2012/07/29 09:34:11 (July 2012).

[Wednesday 25th July 2012]
Another ante-natal class this evening, and I have to admit I'm glad we're nearing the end of the course now. Parts of this evening's class definitely veered away from hard scientific fact. I absolutely understand the importance of breathing properly, but it's unclear to me why exactly we had to practice this in a darkened room with our eyes closed whilst the instructor spoke in what she presumably considered to be a rhythmic soothing tone (and I just found rather grating) saying things like "imagine your baby in your uterus, being nourished by all the positive energy from each breath". Please.

Towards the end of the session we were given a list of questions on caesarean births which you couldn't possibly expect the average person on the street to know the answers to, and yet when any of the men read out their (understandably incorrect) answers the instructor decided to laugh. Thanks for the encouragement and reassurance there. Do you know what the rate of caesarean births is in the UK? I took a guess at 10%, which the instructor apparently found hilarious because it's actually 20%! HAHAHAHAHAAHHA!

It turns out there had been some confusion over what the 'C' in NCT had stood for. We'd both assumed it was the National Childcare Trust, and had thought these classes might have more to do with how to look after your baby than just what to expect during labour. It turns out the 'C" is in fact Childbirth, which probably explains why up until now they'd spent about 10 hours telling us about all the million things which might - and (therefore most of which probably won't) happen in labour. Not undermining what an intense and challenging experience that is, we both thought there's too much focus on that - a period of time when you're surrounded by medical professionals who deal with that situation every single day - and not enough on the bit when you get home and are suddenly all by yourselves and expected to know what to do.

All of that said, after this evening's class I'd decided we got that 'C' wrong again, and it is actually meant to be Condescension.

We'll be doing the NHS antenatal classes as well, and I've heard from other people these can actually be better (and they're free- the NCT classes are actually quite expensive). They're a lot more factual, and as they're typically ran by the actual hospital you'll be giving birth at the information is much more tailored to "this is what will happen" as opposed to "here are some things which might happen... and a recommendation for the type of homeopathic remedies and crystals you might want to use to counteract them".

I was glad when it came time to leave tonight's course, and having not really had a proper dinner we went for some late night tapas which helped to cheer me up somewhat.

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