by Michelle Lynne Smith

Created on: September 01, 2009   Last Updated: September 02, 2009

When my husband and I found out I was pregnant, one of the first things my doctor did was give us a book of childbirth classes her hospital offered. We found some we thought we absolutely had to take, and some that sounded ridiculous to us even then. So we called up the hospital and registered for two classes.

A couple of friends had told us they hated their classes and learned nothing from them, and we had started having our own doubts. So I'll admit we were already a little skeptical when we walked into the first class. It was a breathing and relaxation class, designed to teach relaxation techniques for both the pregnancy and birth. The instructor taught the soon to be moms different breathing exercises that were supposed to help with contraction and labor pains.

By the time my son was born, I didn't even remember any of the techniques, much less use them. Things were happening so fast, and I had a lot more on my mind than remembering how to inhale and exhale properly.

The other part of the class involved the instructor showing the husbands, or whoever was going to be in the delivery room with the mother, different massage techniques that not only relaxed the moms but also eased pain. While getting a massage was great, it was a pretty useless way to spend three hours. For those like my husband, the information was redundant, as he already spoiled me during the pregnancy. For a lot of the men in the class, they made it look so awkward my husband and I joked that it was amazing their wives were even pregnant.

The other class was a four part series designed as an informational session that covered pregnancy and birth. We went to the first one, watched a graphic video that traumatized my husband, learned almost nothing, and never went to the other three classes. Not to say this particular class didn't offer good information, but it was nothing we hadn't read in the book recommended by my doctor. The book was much more helpful, with the added benefit of us being able to read it whenever we had a question, as opposed to having to wait for our scheduled Monday night class.

All in all, these classes were nothing but a waste of time. Coming from two people who knew absolutely nothing about babies or pregnancy, we learned absolutely nothing and haven't even considered classes now that I'm pregnant with our second child.

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