Orgasmic Birth (Just…why not?)

Orgasmic Birth is a child birthing method that explores idea that women actually have the ability to enjoy childbirth, that it can be a pleasurable experience and should be private, loving and sensuous. Also that women have the natural ability to orgasm from giving birth. My initial thought was “well these women must be masochists who are getting off on the pain.” Upon learning more about it though there seems to be something more as the hormones released in childbirth are the same as those released during sex.

I first heard of orgasmic birth when Jezebel covered the documentary about the topic awhile back. Watching the trailer for the documentary, I felt excited. I paused for a moment and I realized that I was beaming.

The idea of orgasmic childbirth is clearly an off-putting concept. The idea of combining sexual pleasure with birth is at once shocking because a newborn is thrown into a sexual context. I suppose you could also argue the mother is in a round about way (or maybe even directly) obtaining sexual pleasure from her child.

Though after rolling the idea over in your brain or researching the topic it should become clear that birth as a sensuous experience is not about pedophilia or sexualizing the baby. Yet cultural taboos do remain. The idea of an orgasmic childbirth breaks the social norm and the ancient notion that births, periods and all of the earthy, raw experiences of being a woman are unmentionable, things that we “just don’t talk about.”

This also opens up the discussion for how we currently handle births and treat expecting mothers in hospitals which is directly discussed in the film Orgasmic Birth. On the film’s website Pediatrician, Lawrence Rosen points out that “the way women are cared for as their babies enter the world can profoundly affect their own health and well being as well as that of their infants.” Recently on Early Childcare Blog, Dr. Laura Johns weighed in on the question- What is the most important thing you can teach your infant? Her answer was trust; that an infant’s first task is to develop a sense of trust. I can imagine no better way for a tiny human whose sole mission it is to gain trust than to come into this world into the loving arms of his glowing post-orgasmic mother and nearby father (or other mother) in a safe and comfortable environment. My friend and I were discussing the concept of orgasmic birth and she asked “do you think that the baby and the mother are happier?” We agreed that that a baby being born into in a calm environment full of love and intimacy must be happier than the one who came into a bright room full of masked strangers passing her around, eventually handed to a worn and frazzled mother who is out of her natural environment.

What had me smiling though as I watched the trailer below was this thought: It’s like these women have unearthed a secret of life. Of course this key does not come from hiding birth from your partner, making childbirth a mysterious female affair with midwives and women relatives tending to the mother. Nor does it come from giving birth in cold awkward hospitals, hooked up to machines, with a stranger’s gloved hand inside you. It comes from passion, comfort, tenderness and intimacy. The root of the secret is love.

Trailer for Orgasmic Birth below

Rabbit Write