My first delivery was in the fall of my third year of medical school. The second year family practice resident I was working with had just joined our team after being out of town for the first week of my rotation. He was surprised that I had been through a whole week of the rotation and not had my first delivery yet. 'Let's get you a delivery!' he said, and proceeded to find a patient on our board that would be an appropriate first delivery. In my case that meant a G7P6 who had a teenage daughter in the room cheering her on.
I had delivered a plastic baby from a plastic model before but felt confused about the right hand position... should my right hand go on top or the left? what do I do to minimize a tear? which way do I flip the baby onto it's back after it's out? so I asked my resident. 'However you're comfortable' he says, I must have still looked concerned about doing it wrong, because he continued 'Look, whatever you do, just don't drop the baby. Anything else can be fixed'
As I caught the slippery neonate that came flying out of my experienced patient, that turned out to have been the best advice he could have given me! I remember focusing hard on 'not dropping the baby', which I didn't think would be necessary, but those things are pretty dang slippery. I kept less than a foot between me and the patient and remember at one point almost leaning against the patient to give myself leverage to support the baby and ensure that it didn't slip away. Concern for a tear was silly as her vagina was a wide cavernous opening with room for baby and then some. I have since more or less mastered the art of 'not dropping' slippery little ones!
