Listen up mums, quit your moaning – Childbirth pain is all in your head!

A post on Reddit has attracted thousands of comments (as you can imagine) after one dad claimed that “the pain of childbirth is a myth and it’s really just all in our heads due to fear and anxiety.”

Yep. It would take a man to make such a ballsy comment.

Related story – Why do we fear childbirth?

You can imagine the comments, here are a few examples:-

– “I hate those examples of “my partner did it, so although I know nothing about it, I know it all because someone so close to me lived it.”

– “Good for his wife. I’m really happy she found something that worked for her. Too bad he needs to generalize her experience to all women and conclude something so stupid.”

– “Ya seriously, the pain is not only subjective it’s also objective considering from woman to woman births are very different, last a different amount of time, have so many different complications.

– He might as well say “I was stabbed and it didn’t hurt at all”.

– “My wife tried all the stuff in labor, did not work at all. All the exercises and walking around and whatever else you could conceivably and it was just completely pain. She refused all medications which shocked the hell out of me. Her contractions where stacked, there was literally no intervals, just back to back contractions for 6 hours. Yeah, childbirth pain is f@cking real.”

– “I’m sure she felt freakin marvellous for the next few hours, into months. You can hypnotise (or whatever) pain during childbirth away, but that’s a no toilet paper zone for a week MINIMUM.”

– “This. Some women do experience bliss and minimal pain during childbirth, and we shouldn’t diminish that. But blaming everybody else for having a different experience is unhelpful and disrespectful.”

– One commenter pointed out, “He’s probably referring to the Hypno Babies or Hypno Birthing methods of managing childbirth. Women practice self-hypnosis as a way to cope with labor pain, or even anxiety during pregnancy.

It worked well for me with my second birth after having a very traumatic and painful birth with my first. There were still moments that were extremely unpleasant, but I was able to focus on my breathing and reframing “pain” thoughts to get through pretty easily. I also had a very supportive hospital team, which many women do not have access to.

It doesn’t work for everyone. Women should be encouraged to research their options and make the choices that are best for them. It would be cool if dude bros would keep their opinions on female experiences to themselves.”

– Another said, “Oh yeah, it has definitely nothing to do with the skin being torn, or abrupt bone rearrangement, no. It’s all in our heads.

Certainly nothing to do with the fact that a newborn has an average length of 50 cm (20 in for you lovely Americans) and weigh 3 kg (7 lbs) either.”

– “To which I say, I dare you to tear a hole behind your balls, then tear it even more until you can shit an 8 lb Thanksgiving turkey, and try not to cry.”

Although to be fair one mum does agree with his theory

Author Milli Hill recently spoke about childbirth, saying the pain is not as bad as women think.

When discussing her latest book, The Positive Birth Book, in an article for The Telegraph, Milli touched on how painful birth really is.

She said: ‘When I was writing The Positive Birth Book, I wanted to reconsider the widely held idea that giving birth is mostly spent writhing on your back in non-stop agony.

‘I wondered why people don’t tell you more about the time in between contractions, when (in a straightforward labour with a well positioned baby), you don’t feel in pain at all.’

‘In my own experience – and that of the many mums I’ve spoken to – in the time between contractions you often feel incredibly strong, excited, or even euphoric,’ she said.

‘As one woman put it, “It’s not a million miles off magic mushrooms, not that I ever tried them you understand.”’

Milli said after doing the maths, she found out 77% of labour is ‘pain-free’:

‘I did the maths, and the results were surprising. In an average eight-hour labour, a woman can expect to be ‘in pain’ for only around 23% of the time. The other 77% is ‘pain-free’.

‘And even in ‘the nightmare labour from hell’ – 36 hours of contractions coming thick and fast – she can still expect to be without pain for around 60% of the time.

‘Why does nobody talk to pregnant women about ‘the 77%’?’

Hmmm she makes a good point. It is just that PAIN is so hard to forget about so we can focus on anything else. Right?

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