The Other Side

First NCT reunion outside class (should there be a site NCT-reunited.com?), which was excellent. Of six couples, one is already in hospital with a booked caesarian. The remaining five teeter at the edge of fate with but a few weeks to go.

This was our last meeting before babies arrive. As we parted, T said "See you all on the Other Side."

http://other_side.blogspot.com/ and check out http://myitc.blogspot.com/ for great random blogging and pics

I am not making this up

First NHS Parenting Class this evening. In my cruel, limited middle-class way, I am expecting a very different experience when compared with the NCT.

Step one: identify the father...

Mind you, among the countless numbers of pregnancy-related books, pamphlets, leaflets and admonishments littering the house, one includes advice to new dads: it reads, "Don't have an affair."

I am not making this up, honest.

You might end up trying this at home

The latest pain game at NCT was to stick your fingers in your mouth, and pull it sideways as hard as you could. Amid much hilarity, the conclusion was that it makes your lips sting like buggery, a suitably proximate word.

Small hole, big head. Ouch.

Ever felt you were back at school?

Much hilarity at the NCT class. First, we were asked to remember key points from the previous class. All I could remember was Pain, and that the NCT was against it.* Ever felt you were back at school?

We then discussed methods of pain relief, one of which was distraction. We were tempted to write football, beer and talking about cars, but thought better of it. (What wimps we are!)

More later about Swimming Pool Attendants and The Advantages of a Home Birth from the Pregnant Bloke's point of view...

* Calvin Coolidge, 30th US president and known as Silent Cal. When asked the subject of a preacher's sermon, Coolidge replied "Sin." When pushed to elaborate, Coolidge said "The preacher was against it." Read more at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calvin_Coolidge#.22Silent_Cal.22 and that's where the picture is from, too.

Larger than the top of a jar of gobstoppers

Second NCT class last night, with more about pain, pain management, pain relief and pain. And did I mention pain?

Life-size drawings give you and idea: without being too indelicate, it certainly looks as if it will sting a bit. The course leader held up a plastic thingy showing the size of the normal cervix, with a central hole you could just about fit a pencil into... followed by a 10cm diameter disc, representing a fully dilated cervix. In real money, that's larger than the top of a jar of gobstoppers. And gobstopping pretty much sums it up.

The NCT classes are turning out to be quite a riot. The men trying to make suggestions other than beer, being somewhere else and general hilarity, the women listening intently and ignoring all the pain stuff.

Pregnancy is turning into reality, little by little. When I know how I feel about it, I'll start writing about it.

Pic from the excellent http://www.sweetsncandy.co.uk/

Things that make you go hmmmm

The first contact list for the NCT class so we could keep in touch by email was sent to the women's email addresses only. Things that make you go hmmmm...

C&C Music Factory, http://www.ifilm.com/video/2794880 in the 1990s

Due Date - or not

My younger sister said that at one of her NCTs classes they lined the women in Due Date order, and the class leader said,

"There's only one thing you can be certain about: you won't be standing in the same order when you have all had your babies."

I think we are due last of the bunch, on 8 July, out of six in total.

Making a beer belly look amateur

Satisfyingly, the somewhat obvious theory about women being maladapted to bipedalism was confirmed at the NCT class. Aided by impressively dated-looking posters, the class leader showed what happens to a woman's body during pregnancy, making a beer belly look amateur. One drawing showed the ligaments that attach the uterus to the skeleton, and, sure enough, it is attached to the spine - an ideal design when the uterus is dangling down under a quadruped's spine like a dog, and no good at all for us bipeds.

(Johnson: "Sir, a woman's preaching is like a dog's walking on his hind legs. It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all." Which reminds me: religion.... )

Hmm, the NCT classes have really made me think. Quite an achievement. It's all become oh-so-real. Visit http://www.nct.org.uk/

There ain't no sanity clause

First NCT class tonight, from 8-10pm. General view: excellent and enjoyable. Good to meet other blokes up the duff, so to speak, and hear what they really think. Not to mention that they are a cool bunch of people. The class main messages seemed to be:

• A plan never survives first contact with the enemy, though perhaps put in a slightly more caring, sharing manner


• There is going to be pain, a great deal of pain. We used to say (when I was younger and fitter) that pain is weakness coming out of the body. I managed not to blurt that out. Phew.


• It will all be OK, despite all our fears.

We agreed to a Confidentiality Clause, though not necessarily a Sanity Clause.

Groucho: "That's in every contract, that's what you call a sanity clause."
Chico: "You can't a fool a me there ain't no sanity clause"

Pic from http://www.marx-brothers.org/ and countless other sites

Nice work if you can get it

The NCT is £200 for six classes, two of which are women only. Nice work if you can get it.

Welcome to the NCT

Good news yesterday - we have a place on the local NCT classes. Friends say that by far the best part is getting to meet other local parents-to-be, rather than what you (allegedly) learn. Yesterday was the first parenting class, too, at the local hospital. Suddenly being 14 weeks pregnant seems insignificant alongside women who are tight as drums at 42 weeks.

This is the fun part: we can tell people, we're learning fast, and the sickness and cravings are subsiding. And she's feeling better too.