Midwife classes

I attended my first prenatal midwife class last night. Basically, rather than going once a month and meeting with my Dr. for 15 minutes, I attend a class with 6 other pregnant women (all due around the same date) on a monthly basis. There we do the norm, check weight (yes, I'm gaining!), blood pressure (totally normal 108/67), urine test for sugar and protein (-/-) and the baby's heart beat (more on that in a minute). The difference is I get to do most of the checking myself. If Austin's with me, he does my blood pressure and dips the urine to see the results, I weight myself and everything gets written down. After quickly completing those steps, we go in for "tummy time", yes my Midwife is so cute with her sayings, and check the baby's heart beat. Once the basic is covered, the next 1 1/2 hours are spent with the women and my midwife.

Last night we went over nutrition, exercise, Mom's desires for the class and a general overview. Over the next few months, we will cover labor and delivery, breastfeeding, baby care and so much more. It's a great time to bond with other Mom's that are going through the same things I'm going through, as well as get to know really know my midwife.

I loved the way the midwife, Janice, described what she does. She said, "Basically, I help you have a "home" delivery at the hospital". Her C-section rate is less than 10%, which is encouraging and she is very hands on with natural child birth. As I stated before, her energy and personality is a joy to be around. It was hard not to hug her with I left last night!

On to the baby!! It was a blessing and relief to hear Baby S' heart beat. It was very strong; bouncing between 152-162. When Janice put the heart monitor on my belly you couldn't hear the heart beat right away (which is nerve racking to say the least) but you could hear some "movement", at least that's what I was told. Janice told me it was the baby moving and kicking. NO idea how true that is, but it made my heart melt!!

We just scheduled our 20 week ultra sound. We can't wait to "see" the baby. The last two ultra sounds where amazing and the baby was so small you could hardly tell it was a baby. But at the 20 week ultra sound we'll get a good look at his/her arms, face, legs, entire body!!

More belly pictures to come!
Thanks for being a part of Baby S' life already!