It goes without saying that giving birth is the most essential trait of any species, so I’m confused as to why it’s such a painful process for not just humans but also many other species. I’d venture to assume that the reason as to why sex feels so good is because, if it didn’t feel good, we wouldn’t want to do it, and if we’d feel discouraged to have sex, our species would trend towards doom. So, why is it that giving birth is such a painful process if it’s inextricably tied to the instinct of proliferating our species and keeping it alive?
In: Biology
Your body is being ripped open and you’re pains a watermelon through a garden hose. It’s always going to hurt
Animals don’t really have much choice about giving birth. It is going to happen regardless, and considering it is a fairly traumatic event it makes sense that it is going to hurt. It hurting isn’t going to discourage animals from giving birth, that point is long past.
If an animal is vulnerable while giving birth then it also makes sense that it is more painful for them, as it can induce them to find a safe and secure location to complete the process. Of course this also combines with the fact that animals which have a more traumatic birthing process are also the most vulnerable, and damage to the body is already generally painful.
A couple of things here. Giving birth hurts because it’s a physically traumatic process and there’s really no way around that. For mammals to survive outside the womb, they need to be developed enough to nurse, move, etc, which means they need to be pretty big. That said, it doesn’t seem like it’s *as* painful for other mammals as it is for humans, because of how we’ve evolved (large heads, upright posture which limits the size of the pelvis and birth canal, etc.) This is one of the reasons by the way that human infants are so helpless for so long while calves, foals, etc can walk or run within a day of birth: our babies have to be small enough to even make birth survivable, and the compromise is that they come out basically not quite fully developed.
The other thing is, evolution doesn’t care how comfortable something is. Species survive and change just based on if enough individuals survive to reproduce. So if the pain isn’t so bad that it actually affects our ability to survive, it won’t get changed except by coincidence.
For humans, the thing is that beauty standards and what is commonly perceived as attractive changes. The measurements corresponding to the ability to give birth to children with less pain is not being actively selected for.
Once you get pregnant, no amount of pain is going to deter you from giving birth. So getting pregnant is the fun part.
Also, women and babies used to die in childbirth quite a lot, before modern medicine. Turns out having a baby with a brain just barely not big enough to kill you is the best strategy for our survival. Something that nearly kills you is going to be painful.
You know some people claim that giving birth on your back is what’s causing the pain and They Advocate being on your knees or water birth and all these other things that they say is more natural.
The baby is as big as any way possible because development *in* the womb is safer than being outside of it.
It is juuuuust small enough to be birthed alive and best not completely ruin the chances of further reproduction for the mother. Women with too large babies won’t have another. Women with way too small babies have fewer chances of them reaching reproductive age. It’s a balancing act. (Or was, before the advent of good medical care)
How painful it is and how much physical damage the mother’s body takes along the way is utterly irrelevant. That baby will be pushed out whether the mother wants it or not, whether the pain gets unbearable or not. At that point there’s no going back.
Usually giving birth releases a barrage of hormones to encourage the mothers to connect with and care for the baby, instead of eating the damn thing that just hurt her so much. In animals with a faster reproductive cycle eating the young is totally an option. In humans it’s rather frowned upon, but post-partum depression and a lack of connection aren’t that uncommon.
Biologically/evolutionarily, it’s not the comfort (or even survival) of the mother that’s important. As long as that baby gets out in the best possible shape, it’s fine.
I remember learning “the average baby head is 101% the size of the average women’s pelvic opening”. We’ve evolved for bigger heads, and that’s what keeps things painful
Because having a big brain is more important than avoiding pain, biologically.
Also if you think humans have it bad, look at hyenas. They also have relatively large babies, but they have another quirk of their reproductive system.
See female hyenas have penises.
Ok, not exactly penises, but the clitoris grows to be a pseudopenis about the same size if not larger than the make penis. Also they have a pseudoscrotum that covers the vagina.
So instead their birth canal goes through their clit/pseudopenis. So giving birth is like pissing out a giant kidney stone.
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