Baby Bs - Learning to Read the Fine Print

This shot is for Alicia, who kept asking me when I would post a naked belly shot. Here you have it, hope it shocks you as much as me!

First of all - congratulations on your new baby girl, Calia! My friend Calia was due a couple days before me but had her baby last night. I have to admit I'm a touch jealous... I'm sure my time will come eventually.

I thought it was worthwhile to share about two baby classes that Dan and I recently took, Baby Basics and Baby Bonding, and a worthwhile lesson we learned about reading the fine print on these class descriptions.

We went to Baby Bonding first, thinking it was the class where we'd learn about diapering, bathing, car seat safety, and general care of an infant. Oops! The class was NOT what we'd meant to go to. It was taught by a midwife (luckily I'd met enough sane midwives before this point that my respect for midwives in general was not diminished). The first thing we noticed that was weird about the Baby Bonding class is that the midwife kept talking directly to the babies. For example, she started the class by telling the babies (all still living in moms, by the way) that she was going to be telling some birth stories and she didn't want them to be stressed because these weren't THEIR birth stories, they were other babies. She encouraged us to tell our babies everything we did before we did it so that they wouldn't be "startled" in the womb. So, walking in to a crowded classroom (we weren't the only suckers who accidentally took Baby Bonding), you would say out loud, Baby, I'm going to walk into a crowded room now but don't worry, I'll still be right with you! This transcends to after the baby is born, too. "Baby, I'm going to put you in the car seat now so don't scream!" "Baby, I'm buckling you into the car seat now." "Baby, I need to measure you so please raise your right arm."

I mean, I'm all for talking to babies, I am sure they can decipher our tone of voice and love hearing the familiar voices of their parents. But I'm pretty certain their vocabulary isn't so developed at birth that you can ask them to raise their arm to help you put them in the car seat, and they'll do it.

Two other fantastic theories we learned about birth: One is that any anxiety you feel about your upcoming labor is leftover from your own birth as an infant, and things that might have happened to cause you stress while you were being delivered. Really. The other was that my baby will remember her birth and any struggles she had during it, and will tell that story to me by crying after she is born, and if we don't let her "tell her story" then she will grow up with the same kind of anxiety about her own labor.

If this post wasn't already getting out of control in length, I'd disclose some of the incredible exercises she made us do while "role playing" communicating with our babies... but I'll leave it up to your imagination instead. Needless to say, Dan and I both walked out of the YMCA and broke into hysterical giggling that lasted for the entire car ride home. Lesson learned: read the fine print on baby class descriptions!

Baby Basics, by the way, was a 3 hour class we took yesterday morning, and DID cover all of the essential "how to take care of a newborn" issues. Best 3 hours of class we've had. In hindsight, I think we should have had 5 classes on Baby Basics and just 1 class on labor instead of the other way around... too late now! PS. if you are interested, the lady who teaches "baby bonding" is coming out with a book! I know what all my friends are getting for baby presents from now on!

In other news, we went to Ellwood yesterday for what will be the last time before the baby comes. You might think this is due to my increasing discomfort in pregnancy, but it is actually due to the millions of foxtails and burrs waiting to jump into my dumb dog's fur, which take several hours to get out when we get home. I think we'll wait a few months and try again. Meanwhile, we'll have to find another beach to go to!

Dog full of burrs - happy as ever.

38 weeks, as big as I get.