Bump, Baby and Beyond Fair<\/a> in Fort Lauderdale, an event designed to help moms-to-be feel more confident about pregnancy, labor and postpartum care.<\/p>\nFor first-time parents, the unknown can often be the most stressful part of becoming a mom.<\/p>\n
Four months into her pregnancy, Faith Speicher is preparing to welcome her first child \u2014 a baby boy.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m four months pregnant now,\u201d Speicher said. \u201cIt was a little rough in the beginning, but I\u2019m feeling really good. I\u2019m very grateful. Excited to have my little boy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even with a background in health care, Speicher said she quickly realized there were still many things she didn\u2019t know.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think I was expecting to know a lot more,\u201d she added. <\/p>\n
That\u2019s why she spent her Saturday at Broward Health\u2019s first Bump, Baby and Beyond Fair, speaking with doctors, touring the maternity unit and learning about topics ranging from breastfeeding to birth plans.<\/p>\n
Samantha Rooney, labor and delivery nurse manager at Broward Health Medical Center, said the goal was to make sure expectant parents have access to the information and support they need.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want all moms to be able to get the best care possible,\u201d said Rooney. <\/p>\n
Rooney said preparing families ahead of time is important because every pregnancy and delivery experience can be different.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery labor is different,\u201d she said. \u201cSo, I think, you know, just going through the labor process, the unknown, the outcome. And then after postpartum, who\u2019s gonna, you know, am I gonna be okay? Am I gonna be feeling some emotions? You know, maternal health is also very important to remember for delivery and postpartum.\u201d<\/p>\n
The goal is to replace some of the fear surrounding childbirth with facts and preparation long before delivery day.<\/p>\n
For Speicher, the biggest takeaway from the event was confidence.<\/p>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t know all the different options that I had when I was gonna come and give birth,\u201d she said. \u201cI didn\u2019t realize that you can kind of \u2014 not so much plan everything. It made me feel really good to know what to expect, and if it doesn\u2019t go the way that I plan, what is the other option that I have. So it just gave me a lot of confidence.\u201d<\/p>\n
Doctors say communication between patients and providers is a key part of that preparation.<\/p>\n
Dr. Katina Brown Burgess, chair of the Department of OBGYN at Broward Health Medical Center, encouraged expectant parents to ask questions and share their concerns.<\/p>\n
\u201cCommunicate with your doctor,\u201d she said. \u201cTell them what your worries are, what your desires are, what you\u2019re afraid of, because a lot of times we have the resources and the answers they need.\u201d<\/p>\n
For Speicher, preparing for motherhood isn\u2019t about having every answer \u2014 it\u2019s about knowing where to find them.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe more that you inform yourself the less scary it is. Don\u2019t get your information from TikTok University,\u201d she added. \u201cCome to the people who know what they\u2019re talking about and reach out to your community because you need to have people you can trust.\u201d<\/p>\n
Broward Health plans to make the Bump, Baby and Beyond Fair an annual event. Many of the resources shared during the event are also available year-round to expectant families.<\/p>\n
Click here<\/a> to read more stories from Local 10\u2019s Mom to Mom collection. <\/p>\n\ud83c\udfe0 News From Your Neighborhood<\/p>\n
Copyright 2026 by WPLG Local10.com – All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. \u2014 Preparing for a baby can feel overwhelming, especially for first-time parents. Broward Health is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":347821,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[249,251,250],"class_list":["post-347820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347820","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=347820"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347820\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/347821"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=347820"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=347820"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=347820"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}