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So I’m going to relay my experience at my very first birth class. Heather and I decided to go the Bradley Method route. For those of you not familiar with the Bradley method, it’s one part prepping mommy’s body for an optimal natural childbirth, one part good nutrition for a full term, healthy labor, and one part husband coached birth. In short it’s everything a hyper-involved rookieDad with a granola chaser would want out of a birth class. (Learn more about the Bradley Method here.)

This is not an educational anecdote per se. Nooo. I wish it was. I think the only lesson here is: don’t become a caffeine junkie and then try to quit weeks before your first class, when your goal is a good showing and exuding the persona of a loving and supportive partner.

Here’s how it went down….

We arrived at a local medical center offering the class. All the good Bradley Method classes are typically conducted in the homes of the coaches and led by a couple – a husband and a former mother who are certified in the Bradley Method. In my area, this local medical center started offering the classes for like $30, so it basically put the good, classic offerings out of business.  I state this because had this been offered in someone’s home, where maybe it wouldn’t be awkward to excuse oneself, or get some sort of refreshment, maybe I could have avoided the embarrassment.

Earlier that day I was slammed at work. I keep a stash of Slimfast in my mini-fridge at work to be sure to have some sort of sustenance, regardless of how meager, to tide me over if I need to work through lunch. It didn’t help that I skipped breakfast because I was running late to work. I don’t know if my lack of food was a contributing factor to what was to come, but I list it here just in case.

Now on top of a fasting diet of slimfast, I decided that today – today I was going to do the chivalrous thing and ween myself off of caffeine. I had done well to avoid cigars and alcohol – the big vices that Heather certainly couldn’t partake of (not that she’d smoke a cigar, but I’m just saying). The one thing I couldn’t drop up to this point, though, was caffeine. Maybe it’s a career in Web, but getting jacked up on caffeine and working late nights just seems to come with the territory. So that day, I brought my lovely water bottle and decided to forgo the coffee and Diet Coke for a far less stimulating or appetizing H2O.

I did alright all the way up to the 6:30P class. As a matter of fact, I playfully chit-chatted and joked with my wife all the way to the hospital’s education center. But somewhere between the elevator ride, the goofy icebreakers and the sitting on pillows, something changed in my physiology. I can only assume it was the lack of my usual oil tanker load of caffeine I typically have by that time in the evening, but suddenly the temperature skyrocketed. I started sweating – profusely. I hadn’t changed since work, so I was still wearing a modestly conservative buttonup and sweatervest. Upon first break, off went the sweatervest and undershirt, and the button-up unbuttoned to reveal a healthy portion of my bare chest. I went back to my seat on the floor with a sweatervest and white undershirt in my hands and growing sweat rings under the arms of my button-up.

At this point, Heather was eating a snack she brought along of almonds and dried edamame, trying to not to stare at my ridiculous sweating. Away went my ego and out came my id. Looking for anything to stem my discomfort, I asked for some of her snack. She turned away to look in her book for just a moment or two, and I had consumed all but an almond and some wispy remains of the dried edamame. I swear I barely remember it, but I had consumed nearly everything in her little to-go snack-pack.  To add to the shock and embarassment, I spent the endless minutes until the next break blotting my sweaty forehead and face – alternating between a noisy, crinkly bathroom paper towel and my undershirt. A glance around the room told Heather that her husband A) was the only one evidencing these traumatic physical manifestations, and B) was a freak.

As our instructor continued (in a painstakingly slow thoroughness) to read some obvious terms that someone who lived under the rock would know, I – usually a very attentive, excellent even, student – slowly, painfully started nodding off. I pinched my hand, Heather pinched me, and I propped my head up in my hands, straining to keep my eyes open; but alas, it was too much effort and for the remaining 20 minutes of the lesson until breaktime,  it was a war of will – my will against my body, Heather’s will against my body, my body against a lack of caffeine. Shit. It was pathetic.

Thankfully, our instructor called for another break, at which point I shook myself awake and stood up, glistening with sweat and ruddy from the effort of my attempts to stay conscious. With all the grace of an intoxicated one-legged donkey, I strolled over to the instructor, chuckled that tonight was a bad night to ween myself off of caffeine, and asked her where the vending machines were. An elevator ride and somewhat refreshing walk later, and I was standing in front of an oasis of caffeine, chocolate and candy. I wasn’t even that hungry, but I purchased a pack of cheese crackers, a 20oz. Mountain Dew, a pack of Skittles, a Snickers bar, and a pack of M&M’s. The Snickers was gone by the time I had reached the elevator, as was a third of the Mountain Dew. To further add to my poor wife’s embarrassment, I returned to the classroom to yet another poorly made and outdated video of women giving birth, where I distracted the entire class during the video with the crickle and crunch of my slow and steady consumption of every bit of junk food I had just purchased.

Amazingly, by the end of clas I was myself again, but dear Lord – what a piss-poor showing at my first birth class with Heather. In recounting the tale, she laughed so hard this evening that she was in near hysterics. Thank God she has a great sense of humor. Meanwhile back at the ranch, I think it’ll be a while before me and Diet Coke part ways. I never knew you could get DTs from going off caffeine.

Moral of the story: If you are tragically jacked up on caffeine 7 days out of the week, don’t choose the first night of husband-coached-birth class to quit caffeine.  You’ll turn into a sweaty, hungry, sleepy slob, and no one wants a birth coach like that.

-RookieDad Sean