Yesterday I went to the second antenatal class at my local healthcare centre. This time it was a bit more structured that the one last week.

There was a midwife and a nurse. Firstly the nurse showed us how to bath a newborn baby. It was quite funny as she used a rather large, old doll to demonstrate what to do. Then the midwife talked about breastfeeding which was quite informative.

She mentioned that the hospital here used to have a midwife dedicated soley to helping women get started on breastfeeding but that this is no longer the case. She mentioned how important it is to wear the correct type of bra and admitted that in Spain its very difficult to find a well fitting bra. Generally in Spain you can’t buy a bra with a cup size! Something which I’ve always found rather bizarre. Do all Spainish women share the same cup size? I was a bit shocked when someone in the class undressed to show us her bra and then her breasts (she wanted to know whether they looked normal!).

Her bra was the wrong sort as it had wire under the cup (you’re not supposed to wear underwired bras when pregnant).

Following this people just asked general questions. One woman wanted to know whether she could cut her newborn baby’s hair with a head shaver or whether this might damage the baby’s head! She was worried she might not like how the baby looked with a lot of hair. How strange.

The the midwife talked about how our relationships with our partners would change following the birth of our babies. However, she only focussed on the difficulties and I found this rather disheartening. I am under no illusions as to how hard its going to be – one of the reasons I have left motherhood rather late (I’m almost 38 years old) but I didn’t need reminding at 8 months pregnant going on nine.

I wonder what next weeks class will be about?