A Must-Watch for Clueless All Parents-to-Be

My husband and I were pretty clueless about pregnancy and parenting when I found out I was pregnant. I knew we needed to learn as much as we could before the baby arrived, so we wouldn't be more overwhelmed than we needed to be facing parenthood. We read books, took classes at the hospital (childbirth, newborn care and breastfeeding) and checked out some videos from the library. This all helped, but was very time consuming.

I was recently introduced to the Laugh and Learn DVD Series (Childbirth, Breastfeeding & Newborn Baby Care). Wow! I watched the DVDs and all I can think is that I wish I had known about this series three years ago.

Sheri Bayles is the nurse with the personality behind the successful DVD series. She is an award winning childbirth educator and lactation consultant. Plus she is the mother of twin boys, so she knows what she is talking about.

The great thing is that you can watch the videos in the comfort of your own home, on your own time frame (you can press pause every time you get a little overwhelmed about the childbirth explanation or if you feel the need to pee every 10 minutes) and even go back to certain parts as a refresher when you are reaching milestones like giving your baby it's first sponge bath or deciding what pump to buy for breastfeeding.

The About Childbirth DVD was great. I don't think I was the only one who still felt a little clueless about the whole childbirth thing, even after the classes I took. These two dvds about childbirth are very thorough. In them, Sheri gives some great pros and cons of using drugs like demerol, pitocin and epidurals. She also talks about the window of opportunity and how it works. I found the part about a c-section to be especially interesting since I really didn't pay attention to it in our hospital childbirth class only to find myself having a c-section for my son. It's best to just pay attention to it all just in case.

I would suggest watching the dvds then passing them on to your pregnant friends when you are done. You might just want to write your name on the dvds, so you can get them back as a refresher for baby #2!