“I took part in preparation classes to please my wife. I thought I would only follow them half-time. Finally, I participated in all the courses. I was happy to share these moments with her. The teacher was a sophrologist midwife, a little perched, suddenly, I had to hold back some giggles. The sophro moments were very relaxing, I fell asleep several times. It encouraged me to delay going to the maternity ward, helped me stay zen, to massage my wife to relieve her. Result: a birth in 2 hours, without epidural, as desired. ”
NICOLAS, father of Lizéa, 6 and a half years old, and Raphaël, 4 months old.
7 sessions of preparation for birth and parenthood are reimbursed by health insurance. Register from the 3rd month!
I haven’t taken a lot of classes. Maybe four or five. One on “When to Go to Maternity”, another on Coming Home and Breastfeeding. I didn’t learn anything new from what I had read in the books. The midwife was kind of a new-age hippie. She spoke of the “petitou” to speak of the baby and only had it for breastfeeding. It swelled me. In the end, my partner gave birth by caesarean section in an emergency and we quickly switched to bottles. It made me tell myself that there is really a gulf between these theoretical courses and reality. ”
ANTOINE, father of Simon, 6, and Gisèle, 1 and a half.
“For our first baby, I followed the classic preparation. It’s interesting, but it’s not enough! It was very theoretical, I felt like I was in SVT class. Confronted with the reality of childbirth, I felt helpless in the face of my partner’s pain. For the second, we had a doula who told me about the contractions that transform a woman into a “wild beast”. It prepared me better for what I experienced! We also took a singing course. Thanks to this preparation, I felt useful. I was able to support my partner with each contraction, she managed to give birth without anesthesia. “
JULIEN, father of Solène, 4 years old, and Emmi, 1 year old.
The expert’s opinion
“Childbirth and parenthood preparation classes help men to imagine themselves as a father.
“For men there is something foreign about pregnancy and childbirth. Of course, he can have representations of what the woman is going to go through, but he does not see it in her body. Moreover, for a long time, in the delivery room, we did not know what place to offer to future fathers and what to make them do. Because whatever we say, it’s still a story of women! In these testimonies, the men follow the lessons with an infantile posture: “It inflates it”, it is “to please” or it is “in course of SVT”. During pregnancy, paternity remains in the realm of the imagination. Then, the moment of birth will come when society will send him back an image of a symbolic father (by cutting the cord, declaring the child and giving his name). The father of reality will be born later. For some, it will be by carrying the child, by feeding him… The Preparation for Birth and Parenting (PNP) courses encourage men to begin to imagine themselves as a father. “
Pr Philippe Duverger, child psychiatrist at Angers University Hospital.