I know that I am still in my second trimester, but we wanted to get a jump start on taking the baby class our hospital offers. We joined the third week of a six-week class, and hope to catch the first two weeks the next time it is offered.
Taking a baby class in a different culture is fascinating!
The most interesting things I learned that I think differ (although how do I really know; I haven’t had a baby before) from practices in the US are:
• They wait to cut the umbilical cord so the mother and baby can bond.
• An enema is almost always administered. (Yikes!)
• Doctors think it is extremely unsafe to try to turn a breached baby.
One doctor described the process of delivery. At the end of his presentation, he showed a picture of quadruplets. (Our hospital also has a fertility clinic.) He continued, "Luckily, Turkey has changed the law, and we can only implant one embryo at a time now, which is good, because multiples are really risky. Even twins are risky. If they were spontaneous, they are less risky, but still they are risky." The nurse who organizes the class then told the doctor that there was a gal in attendance who was pregnant with twins. He looked around the room, so I raised my hand. "They were spontaneous," I offered, with a shrug. And then he said, "My wife got pregnant with twins twice, but each time, one of them 'left' and we were really delighted about that." Ummmm, thanks for the encouragement!?! :-) The funny thing is, there are other words he could have used - miscarried or disappeared, but he used “left”.
Thankfully, my two female doctors are much more sensitive than he is!
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