Again, the very frank and honest explanations of what to expect are extremely valuable. These are things that nobody ever tells you and are usually very difficult to talk about.

The OCEA pre-natal classes are extremely valuable for first-time expecting parents. The information is shared in a very open, practical and fact-based manner without any judgement attached. It's easy to get overwhelmed by all the advice and research that is out there, but the OCEA classes really manage to distill this information and present it in a clear and structured way. The instructors are very experienced and knowledgeable and are great inter-personally. We were particularly impressed by how they handled giving online classes during the pandemic. They also provide a lot of Ottawa-specific information on the amazing resources that are available here. This was particularly useful to us as newcomers. We have many friends who have given birth in other countries, and when telling them about our experience with OCEA they have all said that nothing like this was available to them and it would have been so useful. Overall, we would highly recommend taking these classes.

I was looking to be informed about what to expect during labour and birth and this course did not disappoint! My husband and I feel informed, equipped, and more ready to prepare for the big day to come.

Michelle was amazing! It would have been nicer if the class was in-person and we could practice more positions, but I really enjoyed the class and learned a lot. Thank you so much!

Lilly was fantastic and had a calm yet informative and empowering approach to educating our class on prenatal subjects. She was thorough and welcomed any questions we had, which created a very open and comfortable atmosphere for learning. My partner and I looked forward to our lessons and felt we benefiitted from them immensely.

I’ve taken two courses with OCEA, and both were chock-full of useful and practical information and tips. I like that the instructors were careful about discussing the evidence for various claims, and were very engaging and responsive to questions.

Lilly was so amazing! She was informative without being judgmental, honest withput being scary, and clearly knew the material inside out. We would absolutely recommend this course to other new parents!

Julia was wonderful. Her voice is both lively and soothing to listen to. She’s also really hilarious. I loved the added bits of humour. She gave many opportunities to ask questions throughout the course. If she isn’t sure about something, she accesses her own resources/network and gets back to you with an answer. As COVID protocols are constantly changing within the healthcare domain (hospitals, birth centres, home births), I thought she was very knowledgeable about the current situation within each place. She was very knowledgeable about the birth process and the postpartum period for the family unit. There were many resources that we could access to facilitate some of the topics within the class that could need more attention either in the prenatal period or postpartum period (I.e infant feeding) which was great!

Brandie is amazing! She is so well educated, so encouraging, kind, empathetic, nonjudgemental. You can tell she truly just wants people to be informed and have the best birthing experience and postpartum journey they can have, whatever that looks like for each couple.

Lilly is a very skilled educator. She lays out the course material in a way that is very approachable and spends an appropriate amount of time on each subject. More importantly, Lilly created a safe environment in the class where no one ever felt intimidated by asking a question, and used inclusive terms like "partner" instead of "dad" or "husband" and "chestfeeding" instead of "breastfeeding". I would recommend Lilly's class to everyone I know!

This class was great! She was so well prepared and had wonderful images and props and ways of explaining things that made learning about giving birth very accessible.

Misty was wonderful! Very knowledgeable, approachable, encouraging, warm - we appreciate it so much, especially in the current climate of unknowns. This course was a great experience - will recommend!