Here in Beijing, there are basically public hospitals and private centers, which cater a lot to the expatriate foreign population and upper-middle class Chinese. I’m going with a private birth center, which only handles prenatal and birth, as opposed to a general hospital, which also has many other patients.

One of the considerations I had to think about was finding a place that would be fairly hand-off with regard to my birth experience. I’m planning on having a natural birth using relaxation and breathing techniques and wanted to avoid the common thing in hospitals where the doctors try to encourage meds to “ease pain” or “get things going faster.”

The center where I’m going to be birthing, Amcare in Beijing, seems to be pretty good about that. A friend of mine had her daughter there last year and was pleased with the experience. She told me that the staff was really good about letting her do things her way- not pushing meds and such- and mainly staying out of the way unless needed.

Other people look for other things- I know some women who want all of the latest drugs to take away pain, want to be induced or schedule a voluntary C-section and have their baby at a specific time and date, or have a water birth. I think choosing where to give birth is an important part of the whole process, since being somewhere that is uncomfortable or that has a birthing philosophy quite different from what you want or expect can be stressful to the mother, which in turn can cause the baby to become distressed, leading to potential complications.

To other moms-to-be, I would recommend thinking about what kind of birth experience you want early in the pregnancy, so you can decide where you might want to choose to have your baby. Talk to some of the doctors and/or midwives at the place you’re thinking about to help decide if it is a good fit for you.

Most importantly, I think being an advocate for your own care and the care of your baby is something every pregnant woman should be thinking about. If you want something particular, speak up and let the staff know. It’s far better to figure all these things out beforehand, but remember, things might not always go according to plan. So considering how you want to handle possible emergencies or complications is another thing to discuss with your potential birth center or hospital.

I’ve mentioned already that I’m not planning on bringing any DVDs to watch during the first stage of labor, but I’ve been contemplating exactly what I want to be doing during early labor.

Usually, the first stage of labor is fairly uneventful. A lot of it seems to be waiting for the cervix to slowly stretch out to a large enough size for the baby to get through, which means having contractions at a steady pace over what could be a really long period of time. Some people go through literally days of first stage labor, and at the very beginning the hospital will even send people home unless they are already having contractions five minutes apart consistently and/or she isn’t five centimeters dilated.

So after thinking about it, I guess I can see why someone would want to bring something to do during that time, because while the contractions will take focus, the four minutes between each one probably get boring pretty quickly.

I’m probably going to bring my ipod with some relaxing music, but I’ll probably spend most of my time chatting with Justin and waiting for things to progress. Maybe a deck of cards will be worth dropping in the “hospital bag.”

Another thing on the list that I’ll be checking off is that I will want the freedom to walk around during labor. I’ll probably want to wander around the halls to help keep my mind busy as my body slowly prepares itself for my baby’s arrival.

I’ll be leaving my trusty laptop at home, but I’ve already warned Justin that I’ll probably be taking over his iphone to log on to Twitter and tweet my progress for everyone following along from the other side of the globe! He’s not too sure of that idea, but I’m kinda looking forward to tweeting my progress.

In other aspects of early labor, I’m still a little undecided about whether or not there’s anything else I will want. I’m a little worried about something I learned recently- that most hospitals won’t let you eat anything once you’ve checked in for labor. All most women are allowed to have is ice chips! If I end up having a long labor, I’m not sure how I’ll survive on just ice chips during the hard work part ahead! So I think I might be requesting being allowed to have a little fruit or something light during early labor (or making sure I’m well-fed before I head to the hospital!)

So now I think I’ve got most of what I want during early labor figured out. Only nine more pages of birth plan to go!

For those who don’t know – a birth plan is basically a list of your preferences for birth. It covers things like whether you want pain relief medication or not, whether you prefer a vaginal birth or C-section, and who will be in the delivery room with you. Some hospitals and birth centers encourage the development of a birth plan to be shared with the doctor or midwife who will deliver the baby, while others don’t even mention the idea and just leave all choices up to the doctor in charge. My center is obviously one that encourages birth plans.

Before I got the questionnaire, I had been thinking a little about what to put in my birth plan. I had some idea of the basic things to be covered, but when I got my questionnaire, I immediately became curious about what else could be in there to take up ten pages.

After reading through the list, I found many things that I hadn’t really considered and might not have thought of without the questions, so I figured I’d share what it covered in case any of my readers are making up their own birth plan and might have overlooked something.

The first basic category was about the mother’s wishes for during labor. Some of the questions involved what I want to bring with me, such as music or DVDs, for the early part of labor that mostly involves a lot of sitting around. I have to decide whether I might want to do things like walk around, bring a light snack, or take a shower during that time.

As labor progresses, the questions move into things like the type of pain medication I want and whether I want to use breathing techniques or other methods to help ease labor pain and who will be there “coaching” me if I’m wanting that.

There’s a section on Cesareans and whether I want to go that route or what my wishes are if I end up needing an emergency C-section. This includes stuff like whether I want my partner in the room with me during a C-section and whether I’d prefer local or general anesthesia if it comes to that.

There’s a section on who will cut the umbilical cord, whether I’m planning on banking the blood and whether I want to wait until the cord has stopped pulsing before cutting the cord. There’s even a question about what to do with the placenta, since some people choose to take it home and others have the hospital dispose of it. (I’m checking off the one that says “I want to see the placenta first and then have the hospital dispose of it”- which Justin thinks is weird, but I was a biology major and when else am I going to get to take a look at a placenta?)

Another page involves post-birth questions, such as if the baby will be cleaned first or placed directly on me and a whole series of breastfeeding or formula feeding questions.

There are some questions about emergency situations, including requests that the father accompany the baby if an emergency occurs and the child has to go to ICU or be transported to another hospital. Not something anyone wants to think about, but I’m glad it was on there- just in case.

For the remainder of the list, I have to decide things like who will be allowed to come visit after the baby is born, whether I want hospital meals or to bring my own food and the level of involvement I want me and my partner to have with things like giving the baby baths.

All in all, the questions are pretty thorough and I’m glad I got the chance to think about all these things before the birth. I have been warned by pretty much everyone, though, that things never really go according to plan during birth. So I’m viewing the whole thing more as a loose set of guidelines.