Orgasmic child birth

[Moontanman]

The first 4 post of this thread were moved from Natural Instinct; child birth, because they discuss a different topic than that thread's

 

I'm not sure if this fits here but it would seem that natural child birth is not always a painful or even unpleasant thing. I saw a show a while back where women were enjoying childbirth, orgasmic child birth. This one woman was having multiple orgasms and making out with her husband as she gave birth in a huge tube of water. evidently not all women are cursed to give birth in pain and suffering! My wife remarked that there was something basically wrong with these women but it seems to be a trend...

 

 

 

Labor Orgasms Called 'Best-Kept Secret' - ABC News

 

Orgasm and childbirth - Times Online

 

YouTube - ORGASMIC LABOUR BIRTH! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h5bm9-B6Ec4

 

Orgasmic Childbirth

[Buffy]

Well, I wouldn't call it a *trend*, although it has become more *acceptable to admit* the well-established trait that some people derive pleasure from pain....

 

And I envy the rose that you held in your teeth, love, with the thorns underneath, love, sticking into your gums, :)

Buffy

[Moontanman]

Well, I wouldn't call it a *trend*, although it has become more *acceptable to admit* the well-established trait that some people derive pleasure from pain....

 

And I envy the rose that you held in your teeth, love, with the thorns underneath, love, sticking into your gums, :phones:

Buffy

 

While I have ridden over the edge of pain and pleasure many times I didn't get that idea of pain/pleasure from this. The woman i saw having her baby and making out with her husband as she orgasmed didn't have the making pleasure out of pain thing stamped on it. I honestly think this is a completely different thing and might be naturally pleasurable to some women, they say most women are capable of this, I'm not sure about that, never having been a woman and never having given birth i can't say what is really happening but this doesn't have the same feel as dripping hot wax or twisting body parts to enhance the pleasure with pain that comes from rough sex.

[Boerseun]

Well now...

 

...it could very well be that when the mother starts with labor, she gets an endorphin overdose, and when the baby is midway through the process, mom gets a dopamine rush on top of it - if having a baby is what would trigger her "reward chems". This completely natural cocktail lands slap-bang on top of the intense adrenaline rush the mother would have, as the process unfolds.

 

Tons of endorphins boosted with tons of dopamine on top of an already adrenaline-infused blood stream make people do funny things, I guess. All I know is that it rocks - and is the only plausible explanation I can think of to explain why people willingly do incredibly stupid things like run marathons - or eat chilli hot enough to be banned by the Geneva convention.

 

So, with that cocktail in her blood, if hubby is close by and mommy's a sexually tuned creature, I suppose spontaneously making out is quite natural - we've just never known about it because of societal inhibitions and the rather clinical nature of delivery rooms which kinda kills the mood.

 

Interesting, nonetheless.

[CraigD]

...it could very well be that when the mother starts with labor, she gets an endorphin overdose, and when the baby is midway through the process, mom gets a dopamine rush on top of it - if having a baby is what would trigger her "reward chems". ...

An important – I’d go as far as say the most important – neurochemical involved in labor and orgasm is oxytocin.

 

The bulk of research in multiple disciplined in the past 5 years are, effectively without contradiction, reaching the conclusion that oxytocin is the “feel good about other people/things” neurochemical. Positive interactions among people in controlled experiment (eg: playing games designed to require social interaction) unambiguously increase oxytocin concentration in blood (which is easier to measure than in the brain). Introducing it into the blood (most easily via a nasal spray) appears to induce feeling of agreement, acceptance, trust, and love, although this is controversial, as oxytocin is much to large a molecule to pass the blood-brain barrier, and is fragile, having a in-blood half-life of only about 3 minutes, so how it could have such an effect is not clearly explained. (a couple of many sources: The Neurobiology of Trust – 6/2008 Scientific American; The Neuropeptide Oxytocin Regulates Parochial Altruism in Intergroup Conflict Among Humans -- De Dreu et al. 328 (5984): 1408 -- Science; the preceding wikipedia link)

 

Orgasm (in both women and men), labor, and breastfeeding release large amounts of oxytocin, so it’s not unreasonable to speculate that it’s responsible for people who have orgasms together falling in love, or mothers bonding strongly with their newborn children.

 

Concerning the subject of orgasm during childbirth, especially conclusions such as those of polls in which 32% of women report having had orgasm during childbirth (Orgasmic Birth - Interview with Debra Pascali-Bonaro), I’m suspicious that the women polled, and anecdotal reports, may be confusing “feeling just like an orgasm” with actual orgasm – which is understandable, as the long-lasting (in the brain, elevated oxytocin levels are believed to persist for hours) effects of oxytocin are similar regardless of what triggered its release. Orgasm is a fairly precisely detectable event (in both women and men), but I doubt reliable detection methods were used by many if any of the women in Gaskin’s poll, or others reporting orgasmic childbirth.

 

This noted, “feeling like an orgasm” and technically having orgasm during childbirth isn’t an important practical distinction, if it make the birthing and subsequent childrearing better for all involved. Likewise, that the loving feelings attending it are caused mostly by neurochemicals, doesn’t diminish their goodness or importance. It’s good, though, I think, to try to keep the actual physiology of all this clear and correct, scientifically.

[Boerseun]

Interesting... although if that particular molecule is too large to pass through the blood-brain barrier, I wonder how it works, then? Detecting it in the blood is one thing, having an actual effect, I suppose, quite another. Might it not be that the oxytocin is merely an artifact of orgasm, instead of the other way around?