Curriculum Topic: Individual Activity, Teaching Strategy
Activity Type: Labor & Birth, Healthy Birth Practice 4, Cesarean Birth, Medical Interventions
Purpose: Establish the opportunity for cesarean-birthing families to create a positive experience for themselves and their baby.
Supplies: 24 choice cards with opposite actions/preferences on each side. You can have more or less than 24 cards, but 24 covers a majority of topics families might want to consider without being overwhelming.
For example, Side A would be "walk into the operating room" and Side B would be "travel to OR in a bed or wheelchair."
Instructions:
- Ask families to review both sides of each card and place them "choice" side up. Open it up to questions if the class has any inquiries about the items on the cards.
- After they have all the cards choice side up, ask the class to remove eight scenario cards that they are okay with their response being "not chosen".
- Encourage them to discuss with each other to select cards for removal that feel good to both of them if they are partnered. Instruct them to then put the cards aside.
- The class now have 16 cards remaining. Ask them to randomly remove any three cards at random. Have them discuss between themselves how they would feel if these three choices were removed. What would they need to feel good about their experience? Discuss how things sometimes don't go as planned and that parents need to be prepared for the unexpected.
- Then instuct families to put thee three removed cards back into the deck. Participants tend to breathe a sigh of relief at having th option to put these cards back in the pile of choices still available to them.
- Next, ask the families to remove eight more cards. They should be left with only eight final cards at the end. It is a challenge to eliminate another eight cards, so let the families have a few minutes to decide. One suggestion to help them would be to have them select the eight cards that are most important to them. It is often easier to select the eight most important choices rather "giving up" eight more, even though the end result is the same.
- Ask them to put these final eight cards in order of most important to least important. This can form the basis of their cesarean birth plan. Encourage parents to take a picture of the final eight cards to reference as they make their birth plan.
- Encourage them to talk to their health care provider about their cesarean birth choices in advance of their surgery date. Remind the families that they are the "customer" and have the choice to select a facility and provider who may be more open to the choices that the families have deemed important.
Set-Up:
Every family gets a packet of cards and moves to a space where they have plenty of room to spread out all the cards.
Talking Points:
Families who know they are facing a cesarean birth may be grieving the loss of a physiological birth experience. They are delighted to find out that there are many choices to be made that honors their child's birth and feels right for them. This activity also offers an opportunity to discover that they have choices that they didn't even know were an option for them with a planned cesarean birth. They share that doing this activity helps them to feel like they have a choice in how their baby is born and gives them a feeling of control, often in a situation where they have been feeling out of control.
Offering families who know they are having a cesarean an option to plan their births with choices that feel right to them is an important part of the birth process. These cesarean preferences are equally as valid as those that families have if they were planning a vaginal birth. Having families learn about all their options offers an opportunity to create a positive experience for themselves and their baby. An educator or doula could also do this in a typical childbirth class series, as families may find themselves having an unplanned cesarean and still want to have their preferences honored.
LINK: https://www.lamaze.org/Connecting-the-Dots/Post/series-brilliant-activities-for-birth-educators-cesarean-birth-preferences
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