Play a word association game about birth and the words most commonly used to describe labour are likely to be: painful, excruciating, agony. Labour is usually thought of in terms of how much pain you will be in – labour hurts, it’s supposed to hurt, and if it doesn’t hurt, you’re not doing it right. Or so we’re led to believe. But what about experiencing labour as ecstatic, pleasurable, blissful? How about an orgasmic birth?
There is a growing number of women who are experiencing what they call orgasmic birth, describing their labours as sensual and pleasurable. An orgasmic birth is not only possible but it actually has many benefits for you and your baby.
What Is Orgasmic Birth?
Like all mammals, we are well designed to give birth. During the last moments of birth, a massive surge of oxytocin is released into the body. This surge is necessary to ensure the placenta is delivered with minimal blood loss.
Oyxtocin is known as the love hormone. We experience increased levels of oxytocin when we are breastfeeding, and during orgasm and birth. These activities require higher levels of oxytocin, and often require certain conditions to occur as well.
During the last stages of birth, when your baby’s head is descending into the birth canal, nerve receptors are stimulated. This triggers the surge of oxytocin that stimulates the fetal ejection reflex – the spontaneous, involuntary pushing contractions that quickly and effectively push your baby out.
During this final birth stage, women can experience a heightened ecstatic emotional state. In this ecstatic state, it’s possible for women to feel the same sensations as during sexual orgasm, created by exactly the same hormone and stimulated by the physical sensation of the baby moving down the vagina. Clitoral tissue extends up into the vaginal wall, so any pressure in this area can stimulate orgasm.
Studies performed 30 years ago showed that stimulation of the vagina and clitoris can block pain messages being sent to the brain, which can reduce pain sensitivity during labour.
How To Achieve An Orgasmic Birth
The idea of orgasms and birth occurring at the same time takes some getting used to. Yet orgasm and birth happen under exactly the same conditions, because they are both driven by the same hormone – oxytocin.
Oxytocin is a shy hormone; our bodies stop producing it when we feel observed or self conscious. Imagine trying to achieve orgasm under bright lights with an audience standing around watching and talking to you. The same mechanism that applies to orgasm also applies to birth. Oxytocin levels are increased by:
- Privacy
- Darkness or dim lights
- Warmth
- Safety and support
- Quiet
The most important aspect of achieving an orgasmic birth is to labour without being disturbed. In today’s birth culture, this is extremely challenging. Most births take place in hospitals, with about 96% of women labouring under lights, without privacy, and often having to meet specific criteria before being allowed to birth naturally.
Are All Orgasms The Same?
Our perceptions of pleasure, and indeed what stimulates us to experience something as pleasurable, are very individual. Some women experience orgasmic birth in the same way others experience their favourite decadent dessert.
“I felt a power building up inside me, an almost unbearable feeling of being nearly there…it seemed like each time I pushed I would almost reach that peak. As the baby’s head crowned, I felt that sensation as fulfillment rather than pain. My whole body was buzzing and I could only describe it as pleasure.”
Only about 0.3% of women will actually orgasm during birth, according to a survey of French midwives, published in the journal Sexologies. To experience orgasmic birth doesn’t necessarily mean having an orgasm. Some women will experience an ecstatic feeling during birth, without the physical sensation of climax. While orgasm during birth is indeed possible, it’s not the benchmark every woman needs to attain in order to enjoy her birth experience.
“The contractions would build to the peak, the pain being sharpest at the very end. I would feel almost high with the sensation…each surge would lift me further into a vortex of sensation.”
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How each woman feels during birth depends vitally on the environment she is in, and who is in her space. From an early age, women are conditioned to fear the pain of labour and not to expect birth to be a pleasurable, or even positive, experience. Whether you achieve an orgasmic birth or not, having a blissful or pleasurable experience during labour is not something to be ashamed of.
Recommended Reading: Undisturbed Labour – What Is It?
You’ve been prepared by friends, family and even your doctor for the intensity of birth. So it might be pretty hard to imagine that while delivering a baby, you could also experience the polar opposite: the extreme pleasure of orgasm.
Every woman experiences labor differently, and there’s some evidence that a handful of people do climax while giving birth. Practitioners who work with these women say that the intensity of the feeling is about love related to feelings of relief as well as euphoria at welcoming a baby at long last.
Here’s what you need to know about orgasm during childbirth — or “birthgasm,” as it’s called by some.
Is an orgasmic birth really possible?
There is good reason to believe that a few women — though no one is sure how many — experience orgasm during labor or delivery. The most recent count (and it’s a rough one, at best) comes from a 2013 study in the journal Sexologies. The researchers surveyed a group of over 100 French midwives who’d assisted in the births of 206,000 babies. They concluded that “obstetrical orgasm,” as it’s termed medically, was observed in 0.3 percent of births.
That’s not many, for sure. And there’s evidence that this number misses a lot of women who experience sexual pleasure and even orgasm during labor. More than 85 percent of the midwives in the French study said they believed a sexually pleasurable birth was possible, and more than two thirds — 69 percent — said they’d witnessed at least one instance.
The last thing women might expect is to feel something good while in the midst of labor; in turn, those who do may feel embarrassed and even ashamed and might decide not to share her experience with anyone. Those are all understandable feelings that also make it much harder to get an accurate idea of how often orgasm during childbirth actually does occur.
Why does orgasm sometimes happen during labor?
You probably already know that pregnancy is all about hormones — in particular, estrogen, progesterone and hCG (human chorionic gonadotropin). Hormones are also essential to childbirth and to sexuality. Understanding the hormonal interplay that’s happening all along the way, from conception to pregnancy to delivery and beyond, makes it easier to see how natural it can be for a woman to feel sexual exactly when she probably least expects it.
Most important, oxytocin (the so-called “love hormone”), plays a starring role in childbirth. During labor, oxytocin is released in large quantities — in fact, it’s even used to induce labor or spur it on. The hormone stimulates contractions of the uterine muscles and increases production of prostaglandins, which also encourage contractions, and it’s responsible for kick-starting those maternal feelings.
Oxytocin is also released when a woman’s nipples are stimulated, whether that’s during sex, as a natural way to help jumpstart labor or during breastfeeding. The hormone helps move milk into the nipple for nursing, and it plays a big role in sexual arousal and orgasm, too. Some research — in this case, oxytocin delivered intra-nasally in a small German study of 29 couples — links the hormone to stronger orgasms and more contentment after sex.
Feel-good beta endorphins, adrenaline and noradrenaline, also kick in as labor pains intensify; these help give a woman the stamina she needs to complete this Herculean task and provide natural pain relief. In fact, some researchers suggest that orgasm and sexual stimulation may be an underused pain reliever for women in labor.
How does 'birthgasm' work?
Though a birthgasm can happen at any time in labor, it may be likelier to occur closer to delivery, as the baby arrives in the birth canal. As baby’s head applies extra pressure to the vagina, feelings of pleasure may start or intensify for a laboring woman.
While the image might not be one you want stuck in your head — at least not in the middle of mind-numbing contractions — an infant’s head may even hit the sometimes elusive (and still-debated) G-spot, triggering an orgasm.
What does an orgasm during labor feel like?
When a woman feels the contractions of an orgasm and/or extreme moments of pleasure right at the moment of delivering her baby, this may be called an “orgasmic birth.”
You may feel tremendous pressure and sensation in the vagina as your baby’s birth approaches, then a powerful, pleasurable release that’s both physical and emotional. But remember that every woman — and every labor — is different.
Is the baby affected in any way by an orgasm during labor?
If you have an orgasm during labor or while delivering your baby, she won’t be harmed in any way. There’s little reason to think your baby would even feel contractions of the pelvic floor muscles (as can happen during orgasm), especially with powerful uterine contractions happening pretty much simultaneously.
Can anyone tell an orgasm during labor is happening?
There’s no need to wonder or worry if those waves of pleasure are showing up on your face and those around you noticing them. If you do experience a lovely sensation in the midst of all the hard work you’re doing, chances are good that everyone around you will chalk up any sounds or facial expressions you make to the rigors of delivering a new human into the world, not to ecstasy. (Whether you want to correct the record later is up to you.)
Can you encourage an orgasm to happen during birth?
If you’re open to introducing pleasure as a way to ease labor pain, know that this is important to you. Second, consider what the environment is like where you’ll be delivering your baby. Low lighting, relaxing scents, comfy linens and a soft touch can help you relax more and counteract fears and anxiety about the pain to come.
Consider which tools you can surround yourself with while you labor that will make you feel more calm, centered and at home. Some frequently-used comfort measures include:
- A tub or shower
- Dimmed lights
- Music
- Aromatherapy
- Acupuncture
- Massage
- Birthing ball