would you tell your child/ren, how painful giving birth to them was....

[ElenorRigby]

and if so what age and why...
sorry to post this in aibu, just seeking many opinions/feedback

My son was in the house when his baby sister was born. He heard me scream, but he still says it was the best day of his life.

I see no reason to tell my children about pain. They can learn about good pain relief nearer the time.

for those who are quite adament that it shouldn't be spoken abotu unless to a pregnant lady.
can i ask why?

If they asked, yes.

no

I wouldn't give details about birth to a small child just like I wouldn't give details of other 'adult' subjects. I'd give generalised child friendly version. I'd be happy to give full details to my adult child.

I had a home birth with DD, so told DS beforehand in case he heard me and got worried. He was 22 months. I told him that it hurts because it is such hard work but worth it in the end. He seemed fine with it.

Childbirth hurts. Why is that such a big secret? You don't have to do a big "look what I went through for you" speech but I can't see why telling them it is painful is so bad. I tell my children that injections hurt, breaking my leg hurt, childbirth hurts. Different levels of hurt but still the same concept.

My 6yo daughter has started asking recently - she knows that babies grow in the mummy's tummy and come out through the vagina so she wanted to know how they fitted. I just told her it was hard work and pretty painful but was worth it because it only lasted a few hours. She asked if it had hurt when I had her, so I said yes. She seems fine about it (although, worryingly, has decided that vagina is such a nice word that, if she ever has children, she wants to use it as a name... ).

My DD was born by the sunroof method and she a bit about how and why it happened. We have talked about the alternative method of having a baby and she knows it is sore but worth it.

What she doesn't know- and will never know- is that her birth contributed to the damage which has caused secondary infertility.

roomonabroom - agree; my DD - as I already said - knows all about her birth, but I never intend to tell her that her cs is what caused my secondary infertility.

i told ds1.
because we were talking about babies coming out and he asked. so i said that yes, it does hurt, it hurts a lot. I said it hurts because your body is doing a lot of really hard work getting the baby to come out, but that you don't mind all the hurting because then you have a lovely fabulous little baby, so it doesn't matter

he is 5.5 (we had the conversation a couple of weeks ago)

My dds (7 and 5) are quite interested in childbirth and have asked whether it hurts. I explained that it did hurt a lot, but I was so happy to have them that it was all worthwhile. I've also explained how they got stuck because my cervix didn't open enough, so they had to come out via CS.

I can see how it could be difficult to discuss with your child if you had a traumatic birth experience, but otherwise I don't see why it has to be a secret that childbirth hurts. A lot of the best experiences and achievements in life require us to go through a certain amount of physical or emotional pain in one way or another, after all.

Dd1 is 9 and has asked a lot of questions through pg, birth and bf her baby sister now 19 weeks. I've answered it honestly and she knows it hurts but she wants to have babies and for me to be there to help her when she's in labour.

It really depends on the age

when i was a teenager, i grew up in an area with a particularly high rate of teen pregnancies - and it was a massive trauma to me to see a video (not even that gory when I look back) in high school detailing the realities, i then went home and asked my mum a few questions - her veiled responses (along with the video) were the only incentive i ever needed to use birth control well!

seriously, i'm really glad I was introduced to the realities of having children and bringing them up as a teenager - but then i;m not talking about having a chat with your 5 year old offspring about the intricate details of what can go wrong or how much it hurts

whatever is appropriate to your child's age, and they are comfortable with, IMHO. this will differ depending on your family circumstances, how mature they are etc.

i don't think it's helpful to go with outright lying or avoiding the issue though....

No, feels a bit martyr-ish.

If asked directly if it hurt I'd say yeah it did, and then you were born

I wouldn't dwell on any of the finer points of labour, but then I really cant bear when women drone on about their births.

My own mum was a droner. And a martyr. And loved to tell us every gory detail of her births. I find that asking myself "what would mum have done?" and doing the opposite usually sees me right!

i wouldnt labour the point

I hav had 4 c sections and my ds's who love anything gory were facinated by the idea of me being frozen with the GIANT needle and the doctor using a HUGE knife to cut me open. But i suppose children of a more delicate nature could be very frightened by this, everyone knows their own child best. I also like to sing that country song 'no charge' to them

i'd happily tell them about the pain but i'll leave out that i was screaming and crying my eyes out as i was left alone in the induction suite for 7 hours overnight totally ignored as the induction started, and the impact that had on my mental health afterwards. after all, that isn't DD's fault really and i woulnd't want her to think it was. physical pain though, yes i'd definitely mention it if it came up.

Well, me being 25 weeks pregnant has made DD (almost 13yo) ask some very pointed questions about childbirth, and at her age, I feel it is time to be honest with her. I explained thatyes it does hurt quite a lot, but if you have pain relief such as G&A it can take the edge off, and you get your baby to hold at the end of it.

My mum has always gone on for years about how utterly dreadful my birth was, how scared she was, how bad her tears were, how the midwife took her stitches out on the spot cos she'd been stitched wrong etc etc. She was so traumatised that she rarely celebrates my birthday. She would give me her last breath, and we're very close but the experience rocked her world. (I should add that she went on to have 2 more kids, and all 3 of us were just with gas and air.)

Anyway she left me with a terror of childbirth, so much so that I ALWAYS wanted a c section, even before I was pregnant. As it happened I needed one anyway and she was tearful with relief for me cos then I wouldn't have to go through what she went through. V sad really. Thankfully most things are different nearly 40 years later.

I've just answered my children's questions as and when really, giving them as much detail as they seemed to want to know. As they were both c-sections I have a large scar, so the questions started fairly early (perhaps when they were 2 and 3). I've not really gone into the emotional trauma, which I think is the scary part, just been fairly matter of fact about how ds was such a surprise and how with dd we had to go to and from the hospital for several days. I expect in a few years dd might be more interested in the details, and I will tell her everything she wants to know, but for now (they are 10 and 11) they haven't wanted to know many details beyond that which relates directly to them (so although I'm sure they asked if it hurt, to which I said a lot, I don't think that they particularly explored how I really felt about it).

DS2(10) asked me a while back (can't quite remember why, but it lead on from something we'd been discussing) and I just said, yes it hurt a bit but it was worth it. No graphic accounts, or inappropriate detail, but reasonably truthful.

No I don't think I would. DH has already told me off for comparing DS's birth unfavourably with DD's within DS's earshot.

Yes, and I've told her that they came at me with a pair of garden shears and a sink plunger.
She thinks it's funny.
I'll bloody funny her........

I told mine it was pretty painful for a few hours but worth it and also they are boys so I don't think it's too off putting for them.

Interesting thread. Dd is 8months so it hasn't come up yet. She was oxygen starved and possibly brain damaged during the most horrific traumatic experience of my life so dunno what I will tell her, she's fine now though and reaching all her milestones but she will probably have questions when she sees all her tubes on her baby pics from NICU. Pretty sure any subsequent DC's will be c-sections so unfortunately if it. does come up then probably won't be able to whitewash it too much (have always been a tmi person!) but will try to gloss over the worst!

All I knew from my own mum was it was most painful thing ever but worth it, and she did it with just gas and air- respect!