My yoga friend turned up at my house and I was immediately glad that I had her to come with me after all because she was chatty and enthusiastic.
I drove us the rest of the way and it was nice to chat and get to know her and she seemed to have the verbal diarrhea that I'm normally the one suffering with so the conversation was flowing rapidly between us.
I even got the opportunity to whinge about her moving away and she was keen on maintaining contact via FB and things which is better than nothing. I have several very good friends who I've never even met afterall
We got a bit lost but once we finally found the venue and walked it, I feared that it was actually a toddler group. There were a lot of children running around, lots of toys and very few pregnant looking women.
The chairs were arranged in a circle and through children's screams, one of the ladies piped up and introduced the session and then prompted the dreaded turn based introductions. I survived, not remembering anything of what anyone else had said, and the same lady continued to attempt to encourage other members to pipe up about their birthing experiences.
It was a bit slow to kick off but soon enough the contributions were more free flowing.
The stories seemed fairly typical to things that you could read on the internet with a quick google search but actually hearing it come directly from people who had experienced it was quite empowering in a way, particularly the stories where the women were having difficulty and yet still resisting procedural pressures from the midwives and still having a happy outcome. Those are the kind of assurances that I was looking for, that you can actually say no.
It also reassured me in the decision to have a doula because that will hopefully save me the effort of even saying no because my doula can enable James to do it for me.
There was another couple of ladies who I was particularly glad were there.
One was very much into hypno birthing which I'm sure everyone has heard of, but her take on how it was applied during labour was insightful. I hadn't really considered it for myself before. She also made comments on the impact of external stresses on the progression of labour that seemed logical to me, things like thinking too much diverting blood to the brain and producing adrenaline due to worries diverting blood to your arms and legs when of course you want all of your blood in your uterus and cervix.
Another was a lady who was quite shamelessly trying to sell a book she had produced on breastfeeding. I had a flick through it and it was a collection of breastfeeding experiences which I'm not sure you could find online so I didn't purchase it, however she is still in a position of authority on the topic of breastfeeding and I've been having trouble finding someone to talk to about my own intentions. She assured me that my plans aren't doomed to fail which is kind of the impression I'd got from other sources which is very nice to hear.
After a couple of hours the meeting concluded and I was left feeling more empowered in achieving the birth experience that I'm hoping for.
In hindsight it occurred to me that it would be an invaluable resource to someone who'd had a negative birth experience and still hoped to have more children, but more importantly to first timers like myself to avoid ever having a negative experience in the first place.
Yet my friend and I were the only first timers there and I was only there because my doula suggested it and my friend was there only because I'd suggested it.
My friends also felt very empowered by it, probably even more so than me, because of her previously keeping herself quite sheltered up to this point. It's enabled her to feel certain about who she wants at her labour and she also learned about doulas and she didn't even know what one was. Not knowing what a doula is seems to be quite typical though.
There is a meeting the last Saturday of every month and we're already planning to attend again.
I'd really recommend them to everyone, particularly people who went through infertility and have had a lot of time to ponder about their labour and are perhaps are more prone to placing too much pressure on themselves or maybe even too much dependancy on medical interventions.
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