Babble

 I think it depends on your hospital. We are giving birth at a very reputable hospital in NYC and our hospital "lamaze" (we did very little lamaze technique) class was so helpful and informative. The books all have an agenda that they're trying to push. (Bradley thinks we should all give birth like farm animals. What to Expect is more medical establishment.) I felt that our instructor gave a very balanced presentation. So it might be better to ask around about specific classes and find out which are worthwhile and which are not.

Our hospital offered a one-day 'blast' course, where my husband and I spent a few hours learning about positions, breathing, massage techniques, etc.   The instructor also spent far too long pushing her own agenda about what kind of birth she thought we should have, but that's another story.   I'd been doing yoga for seven years before I had the baby, so the breathing relaxation stuff wasn't new to me.

The only thing I found useful from the class during active labor was the 'hoo hee-hee-hee' breathing thing and the advice about counting my way through the contractions as a focus technique.  (keeping my eyes open long enough to focus on anything, like another poster mentioned, would have been impossible).    By the way, I had an epidural once I got into intense, active labor (that was the plan), and I still found the breathing/relaxation techniques useful.   The two definitely aren't mutually exclusive.

 Nutshell version:  A class or DVD or book can certainly be helpful, but it's not essential.  And unless you hire someone to do so, no one in the room is going to force you to use any particular method.  

Whether you are planning to use pain medication or not, it is so important to educate yourself on the birth process and the benefits and risks of all the interventions that could come your way (including pain medications - there ARE risks).  How you get that information depends on what works for you.  Classes are often the most effective given that once there, you have to pay attention.  But, you have to make sure you are choosing a quality class.  Shop around.  There are good and bad hospital classes, and there are out-of-hospital classes, as well, including Bradley, Lamaze (the official one), Birthing From Within, Hypnobirthing, etc...  

Some people feel that books are sufficient for self-education.  (They work well in addition to classes, too.)  I agree with some of the commenters here, Ina May's Guide to Childbirth and The Thinking Woman's Guide to a Better Birth are great resources that lay out the benefits and risks and cite their sources. 

I'm not convinced that our childbirth class isn't going to be a waste of time either.  I mean, I've read about a dozen books throughout this pregnancy, asked my doc lots of questions, spoken to other women who've delivered children -- I don't feel like there's going to be any big suprises for me in the delivery room. (famous last words...)

However, my husband has something of a "crammer" personality -- he hasn't really been reading books and he's just not interested in baby shows.  It's not that he doesn't care, he just figured we had time, and we should just deal with the curve balls that the pregnancy itself was throwing us.

 He's starting to get anxious that he feels unprepared and it was at his urging that I booked the class.  I think it's for the best -- unless I want to witness him up 'til 3AM binge-reading pregnancy books.  Which no one should have to endure.

I'm sure he would be fine even without the class but his anxiety level is going to affect mine, so I think it will be worth it.  Of course, I haven't attended the class yet. 

I never took a Lamaze class or any other birthing class.  Nor did I really read about it...sure, I flipped through those pages in the pregnancy books, but that was about it.  My philosophy was--women do this all the time and have done this for hundreds of years, why do I need to take a class. Of course I do have degree in Biology, so this health and science stuff is my life.  But the nurses were all super helpful, they were more surpirsed by the fact that we didn't know if we were having a boy or girl than if we took a birthing class or not.

With my first I had an epidural and my second came so fast there wasn't time for anything...literally I was raced up to Labor and Delivery and the nurses were like, "we don't have time to check you in, get her to a room and start pushing"...30 minutes later the baby popped out.  I did most of my laboring in the car-ride to the hospital and just breathed the way that felt natural.

I do recommend taking the hospital tour of the labor and delivery area....if for no other reason you will know exactly where to go on the "big day".