I first found Isis more than four years ago.  I was in that stage where we weren’t quite ready to start trying to get pregnant, but I thought about it ALL. THE. TIME.  I read everything I could online, I covertly checked out maternity clothes.  When poking around the maternity section of the Brigham & Women’s Hospital website (the place I thought I might deliver, but ultimately did not), I saw that they outsourced their prenatal education to the then-new Isis Maternity.  I ate up everything on Isis’ site. I imagined signing up for their classes and learning how to breathe through labor, and read all about breastfeeding consults.  Why yes, I do obsess over things long before I need to. Why do you ask?

Anyways, when my turn came around, I took my first Isis class at their original center in Brookline, and it was Parenting Multiples (the class was so-so, but reports from other friends lead me to believe that it’s really awesome now).  I got my prenatal massage there.  And when my itty bitty babies were five weeks old, we started Great Beginnings, the very first in the mom/baby class series.

Oh, how I loved that class.  So much knowledge and comfort.  I loved our teacher, Carole, who had such a way with both the babies and the moms.  I loved our group, the fact that we all got along and that we still try to get together when we can.

Since those first days more than two and a half years ago, we have taken almost the entire Child Development class series. Social Butterflies. Sprouts.

Sign & Sing. Explorers. Lightning Bugs.

There’s a part of me that’s pretty sad about the fact that my kids are about to age out of the Isis offerings.  But we’ve had an awesome time there. It was always a safe place to go. A place where they understood babies who cried, toddlers who touched things they weren’t supposed to, and moms who were exhausted, at their wits end, or celebrating the biggest or tiniest of accomplishments.

So, when my friend Cindy at Isis invited me to a big launch event at the Boston Isis location, I was tickled. While I’ve always been skeptical when a company does some “rebranding,” in this case I think it was a fitting evolution.  It started as “Isis Maternity” six years ago, and quickly became the largest provider of prenatal education in the country. It is the official childbirth education provider for nearly all of the major Boston hospitals.  Their prenatal classes of all varieties (hypnobirthing, anyone?) are great, but they go way beyond those few months of pregnancy. Classes through age 3.  Toys and gear and clothing from nursing bras and slings to puzzles and ride-on toys. Every product is on someone’s “must-have” list, and is the latest in gadget-y, organic-y, and of-the-moment-y stuff.

Their new identity is “Isis: Parenting Starts Here.”  That couldn’t be more fitting. It was really and truly where I got my start. I could go on for days about how the classes there gave me confidence, taught me how to get out of the house, taught my kids how to behave in a group class setting, and always was one of my favorite outings.  Boston-area parents, do yourself a favor. If you’re at all accessible to Arlington, Boston, Brookline, or Needham, sign yourself and your babies up for whatever class you can. If the price seems too high to manage, talk to someone at the center, because they’ve got a community fund to help if the cost is prohibitive.

I have never regretted signing up for a class at Isis, and I bet you won’t, either.