Birthing Class and 24 Weeks Along

After searching through not-too-many-options for birthing classes that were either more natural-birth focused or during the time slots we could make it, I signed Matt and I up for The Birth Zone classes led by Liz Chalmers.

Oh yeah, before I dive into that, here's what the Tater Tot's looking like at 24 weeks:

So the class.

Seeing as we're sort of in this transitory-limbo-state-of-living (more on that later), and we don't know exactly where I'll be popping this baby out (not as in hospital or birth center, as in which state), I wanted to take classes early to be prepared for wherever we end up in July.

Matt was all for it, rearranged his schedule on Wednesday nights for a month and a half and went with a willing attitude, but I don't think he quite understood the point of 6 weeks of 2 1/2 hour classes. Thankfully he was fully supportive even while chugging caffeine en route to the class to try to wake up, so really, what else could I ask for?

We walked into the guest house, slipped off our shoes and found our seats amid 5 or 6 other couples in a comfortable living room. I won't lie, I was checking out the other mom-to-be's bellies and trying to guess how far along they all were. 

The instructor, Liz, is a very personable, charismatic woman who clearly has a passion for what she does. Having given birth to two of her kids in a hospital, one in a birthing center and one at home, she has a very well-rounded perspective it seems. 

When everyone arrived Liz gave an introduction, then  we set out introducing ourselves and giving ourselves a descriptive adjective to go along with our name to help Liz remember. Seeing as there aren't too many K adjectives and in the past few weeks my sense of depth perception has become increasingly off, we're now Klutzy Kait and Mountain Matt.

I was surprised to find how varied the bellies on the various mamas were. One women, who I was certain was due a month before me, was due a week after. When I got home I Googled pictures of women at week 24 of pregnancy and there was definitely the whole gamut of belly sizes!

It looks like its going to be a great class, and I think Matt now understands how helpful the class is going to be, as well as having heard some positive perspectives for giving birth in a birth center as opposed to a hospital. And we found out Matt's insurance does cover birth centers, which is great news! 

That's all the news I've got for you today. I'm sure there's more, but I can't seem to remember anything else so oh well!  Hope you're having a great weekend!