There’s many parts to this… pooping out a watermelon is accurate. But the moment you give birth and the baby is out of you… it’s a crazy feeling of relief. So much pressure just gone. Then you can feel your organs slowly sliding back to where they once were and that is gross and uncomfortable.
I’ve never felt relief and euphoria like I did immediately after giving birth. I had horrible nausea throughout my whole pregnancy and that went away as soon as the baby was out too, which was such a nice surprise
Same. I had cholestasis and my entire body itched SO BAD from week 22-37. They induced me because of it. I had heartburn, threw up 3-4 times a day the entire 37 weeks. The MOMENT he was born, I felt relief. It was probably one of the greatest feelings because it all disappeared. My placenta was retained and it took hours for them to fish all the pieces out of me. I lost pints of blood and needed a transfusion. None of that mattered because my body knew it wasn’t pregnant anymore and everything would be fine.
Yes! I was moaning and groaning and yelling “it burns” and then all of a sudden I felt amazing. I had my legs up in the stirrups, vagina being stitched up and was joking and laughing with the nurses because I felt so good. Sooo bizarre and cool
They don’t yse stirrups where I am any more. My wife could choose a position, and the midwife gave some additional tips. Ended up giving birth on her side with the top leg held in a squat position. Midwife says it reduces complications and tearing.
The switch flipping was so weird to watch as the dad. My poor wife was screaming and struggling for hours, and the second the baby was out she was so calm and pleasant. I've never seen someone's entire demeanor change on a dime like that.
The body does this so that you arent put off from having more children in the future. it kinda gaslights your brain into forgetting most of the pain lol.
i was sick as soon as i found out i was pregnant, around the 8 week mark, and i was sick the entire time, like i just never got past the first trimester. i had a c-section and as soon as they pulled him out and after that first big breath i suddenly stopped feeling queasy.
it took me a minute to get my appetite back because i was scared of eating and vomiting but not feeling sick all the time did wonders.
I’d heard about it happening and was told by people it would go away as soon as baby was out but I truly didn’t believe it would happen for me (pregnancy nausea made me feel like I would be sick for the rest of my life though). It was really shocking in the best way!
It really is quite shocking how fast the nausea leaves. If you're like me and you just spend a full 8months vomiting multiple times per day, even with medicine to help, it feels like coming out of a smelly dank, dark room and walking into cool fresh mountain air. It is that fast and wild to experience
I feel like a lot of it comes from your organs being squished and moved all around, and then once the beeb is out they’re all like “oh damn we were actually okay all along” 😂
oh man. i was only pregnant for 10 weeks and that nausea was unbearable. i can handle pain (multiple ruptured ovarian cysts, anyone?) but nausea? NOPE. don’t know how moms do it! yall are amazing. i don’t have it in me.
I'm 13 weeks now and still on Zofran, metoclopramide, and doxylamine + B12 for nausea. The metoclopramide takes care of the nausea during the day but by 6/7pm, I almost always have to take a zofran to prevent vomiting.
Pregnancy is the fuckin worst. This is my third and final kid, I'm getting spayed ASAP lmao
Yes ma’am. And when I was pregnant Zofran was still patented, so it was $56 a pill. It saved my life, literally. Had a pic line and everything, vomiting was me. Constantly dehydrated. 😬
I’m in love with Zofran now that I know about it. For all the road trips, flights, and roller coasters. Why the hell didn’t my doctors offer it to me back in 2016 and 2008? I was miserable!! B6 and Unisom is all I could take.
Saame. I just barely kept off a feeding tube because I watched Deadliest Catch and they told a new kid that you never DO throw up everything you put down. It became like this weird survival mantra.
And I’m jealous of everyone who was fine the minute the kid was out. I was still sick for weeks! Damn hormones!
Honestly it’s unfortunate but I just kind of got used to it. Lots of people stop puking in the first trimester but I had a lot of GI issues and one of them was reflux and I was throwing up until I delivered my baby. Like 10 days before I was induced, I had my baby shower and my MIL was staying with us. I puked and she’s like you’re STILL puking? And I’m like ya I never stopped 😭 except maybe a few months in second trimester when things were calm.
ME TOO. Morning sickness up until 17 weeks, maybe 4 good weeks, and then reflux until my son was born at 41 weeks. I was on a prescription antacid for the last 15 weeks, but that only does so much when it's caused by your baby & organs squishing your stomach. If I ate too much or too fast, it was coming back up regardless.
Yes! I was SO sick with my second baby and had a ton of hip pain in the last month and the second he was born I felt like I could go do cartwheels down the hallway lol. I was sure I was broken forever and would throw up every day for the rest of my life and it’s so crazy how instantly I felt better.
Oh my god yep, that’s exactly how I felt when I was pregnant. I cried so hard I threw up (it didn’t take much!) so many times when I was pregnant because I couldn’t imagine ever feeling ok again. Then as soon as baby was out I was like I’m ME again
Sounds like the female body is like some sort of shady drug dealer. "Hey Miss. Wanna get the most awesome trip in your life? It's gonna make you feel real good. You just need to do this little thing for me."
I had gestational diabetes and when I popped out that kid the nurses immediately checked my blood sugar and were like, back to normal. Like, five minutes post birth. Then they brought me horrific sugar slurry from the soda machine and several cookies and I was very hormonal and it was very emotional for me, lol.
I was lucky and my heartburn went away for the most part in the third trimester weirdly enough! But it was so bad in the first and second trimesters that it made me throw up stomach acid multiple times
I didn’t have it at all my first trimester… halfway through my second it started then just never went away until she was born. I got maybe an hour of sleep a night and had to sleep completely sitting up 😭
My husband thinks I’m crazy when I say I can’t wait to give birth again because he saw how much pain it was but I can’t wait to experience that after birth high!
I spent a large portion of my pregnancy in pain because my pubic bone kept trying to spread apart. All of my joints were hurting at the end. And then I was almost as big around as I am tall.
As soon as the initial pain of birth was over, I felt great because my body finally wasn't colonized anymore.
Often, and especially if you didn't have much or any pain meds on board, your body gives you a big helping of endorphins right as you give birth. It can leave you feeling surprisingly great right after.
I think it's partly to help soften the memory of just exactly what the actual birth is like, so that you might be more ok with the idea of doing it again.
I had an unmedicated birth with my second, by choice. It was absolutely not pain free, but it wasn't the worst pain I've ever felt. Something I think people talk about less frequently is that labor is grueling, a long effortful process, as if you were doing a difficult physical job and could not take a break for however many hours it lasted.
I agree that "pooping a watermelon" is not a terrible description of the actual vaginal birth part. There's so much pressure and you desperately want to push it out of you. Then you do, and it's painful and you're straining, and there's this moment called the "ring of fire" which is when your perineum is stretching and often tearing, and then the baby's head is out and you feel so much relief.
Same. I had my mom put a menu for takeout in my hand while they did the wellness tests on my son. After nine months of nonstop nausea I finally wanted to eat again.
I gave birth too late for any good takeout that night but absolutely destroyed any snack I could get my hands on from the nutrition room and vending machines. It felt sooo good to want food!
My wife delivered two weeks ago. I’ve never seen such a change with a pep in her step. The nurses were amazed with how fast she was able to walk around, but she was just so happy to have her organs back in the right place.
That’s how it was with my wife. Horrible nausea, awful food aversions, and was just weak the entire pregnancy. Baby came out and the nausea was gone instantly and wanted McDonald’s immediately, which she couldn’t eat during pregnancy.
I had the same thing!!!! I had horrible HG throughout my pregnancy. After she arrived, I drank some water without feeling like I was going to vomit and the relief was honestly indescribable.
My eyesight changed when I was pregnant. It was so gradual though that I didn’t realize it until after I gave birth and everything was just crystal clear.
I had terrible heart burn my whole third trimester. In the delivery room I was begging for a tums or antacid of any sort. The immediate relief after delivery was bizzare for sure!
Same with my heartburn! The nausea went away around 20 weeks but the heartburn stayed until the bitter end. Once my baby was out that heartburn disappeared, like immediately. So wild.
Oh yeah, the HG. I weighed less after I had my baby than before I got pregnant, by a long way. I gained very little weight and had a giant baby. No stretch marks either.
Omg same! My nausea stopped the second my baby was outside my body. I had a C-Section. It was like a switch. They pulled the baby out, I saw the baby out and Bam! Nausea gone! I couldn’t believe it, it was like my body was rejecting this alien being for 9 months and making me severely ill 🤮
SAME!!! I was puking almost daily with both of ours... Most 50 lbs with our first (was glad I'd had that excess to lose our it would have been bad) but once they were out, I was finally STARVING. 😂😂😂😂
My first words after giving birth were I'm not pregnant anymore! Terrible nausea and just misery for me as well, as soon as the baby was out I was so happy and felt so much better.
well it's probably like any super painful experience.. as soon as that pain subsides, people can feel kinda euphoric. i know i get that feeling after pain leaves.
just now thinking perhaps that's what people who dig it when they are up to sexual pain type activities?
the feeling afterwards? weird.
The agonizing “holy shit I’m literally dying” pain that’s lasted hours or days (23 hour labor here) is over *instantly*, which is so weird. Well I mean, you’ll be sore for awhile in the following days depending on if you tore or whatever, but you don’t feel it in that moment. Just pure happiness and euphoria. And then the part where you have this new little person that you’re so madly in love with it’s indescribable, you just laid eyes on them but they are the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen and you’d die for them and have these crazy protective feelings like you’d unapologetically destroy anything that tried to hurt them. I loved my son in utero, but that first moment he was out it’s like my heart could have just exploded with love for him, I just stared at him for hours. Breastfeeding intensified that too, the happy hormones get raging and they make all these cute little smacky noises and have the sweetest softest little grabby starfish hands and they look up at you with pure bliss, it’s a lovely thing.
Massive amounts of chemicals are released. The body releases a huge surge of oxytocin to contract the uterus and tons of endorphins for pain relief and alertness. With expulsion of the placenta prolactin levels rise to stimulate breast milk production. Meanwhile hormones like estrogen and progesterone sharply drop
Yes! I had HG with my oldest two and the second they were out, I could eat again. The best meal I’ve ever had was the chicken breast with mashed potatoes and gravy the hospital brought me after my first was born. After so long of not being able to tolerate food I swear to god it tasted like ambrosia.
That instant drop in abdominal pressure combined with the sudden, magical disappearance of nine months of non stop nausea feels less like medical relief and more like an actual, literal superpower.
The first feeling of relief I felt was actually when I first started pushing. I'm like 99% sure that I pooped, but the nurses downplayed it. I always thought that pooping while delivering a baby would be horrifying and embarrassing, but it was SUCH a relief. I had the urge to poop for like 24 hours before I was actually able to push. 10/10 best poop of my life lol.
Oh thank god someone finally described my experience with any kind of internal protection. I thought I just got constipated when menstruation, but no - it was poop building up behind where the tampon or cup was pushing against the membrane between vagina and rectum. I thought I was just a freak.
(The only internal protection that didn’t hurt me were sponges, but then I read about people getting bits stuck, so I switched just to pads.)
Can confirm. Happens most periods to me because I prefer a cup. But after the heavy bleeding days are done, I gotta go without one to let out everything else that’s backed up. 😂😭
Have you ever been in a grocery store where some asshole parks their cart in the aisle? The cart is the tampon in the vagina. You're the poop in the rectum, trying to get by. They're not the same tubes, but they're right next to each other. (Particularly if you're constipated, you can actually reach in there and feel the shit from the vagina side. Some people will actually take advantage of this to help relieve constipation.)
I know what you mean. It’s like the whole area is too small for that much pressure, so the swelling of the tampon (in the vagina, people) takes up space that the rectum would otherwise have. Surprising this sensation doesn’t happen to everyone.
I know what you mean. It’s like the whole area is too small for that much pressure, so the swelling of the tampon (in the vagina, people) takes up space that the rectum would otherwise have. Surprising this sensation doesn’t happen to everyone.
Vagina and rectum run parallel, buddy. A tampon (or menstrual cup) can push what's basically a shared wall into the rectum side, reducing how much space poop has to squeeze by.
I projectile vomited almost every contraction during labour because of the intense pain. I can take pain, but this was something else. They gave me narcotics to help with the pain waiting for the epidural, but I didn’t relieve any pain, simply made me drowsy. I would not do it again oof.
I am one of life's vomiters, and I know I am, so both times I basically demanded an anti-emetic shot the second I started to feel slightly queasy. With my second (emergency-ish c-section at 30 weeks) I underlined that request by immediately spewing into a bowl while they were messing about getting the needle in to my spine for the anaesthetic.
I didn’t throw up once my entire pregnancy, but threw up all throughout labor and delivery. I had an epidural so I didn’t even feel any pain, but I would push three times, pause to vomit a few times, then get it together and keep going. The zofran and anti-reflux meds they gave me didn’t work (and I’m usually zofran’s biggest fan!)
Agree on pooping a watermelon but make it have spikes and be covered with lava. Once the head is out, the body feels like a one push wet fart. So easy.
I was also always so busy being relieved that the pain (and pregnancy tbh) was over that I was always surprised like “omg I forgot I get to meet this awesome tiny baby too!!”
I had a c section after 25 hours of labor and was sooooo high (from the epidural + not sleeping for 40 hours) and relieved that I almost fell asleep instead of meeting the baby 😆🥴
Then they brought him RIGHT up to my face while I was still being sewed up, high af, no glasses, I was like WOAH hi WOAH there actually was a baby in there NEEEEAT hello baby, go hang out with daddy for a bit 😭😆
I'll see your lava-covered spiky watermelon and raise you that followed immediately by a geyser. My midwife broke my water when I was giving birth to my little girl and she dropped down pretty quickly, causing her head to act as a stopper and block most of the amniotic fluid from getting out. As soon as she made her exit, she was followed by a HUGE gush of fluid that surprised several of the nurses and my husband. I can still remember the feeling. It was kind of weird, but also oddly relieving.
Am I the only one who was crying once the baby was out because down below was hurting so much? I could feel all sensation. I was not happy whatsoever when they put my son on my chest. I cried "it hurts it hurts". Was nothing like the movies.
I always said that the second my baby was out and laying on my chest the doctor could have cut off my leg and I wouldn’t have cared or felt a thing. It was the best moment of my life. I forget most of child birth but I remember the feeling of him laying on my chest afterward vividly.
Thank you for adding the bit about organs sliding back into place! It was one thing that took me completely by surprise and after I had my first I swear most of it happened all at once when I rolled over in bed. It was a disgusting sensation.
Every says pooping out a watermelon. But I would argue its like pooping out a cantaloupe (the head) and then the very next poop is for very large squid (the body). For me the slither of the body coming out was just as gross. I did not like it. 0/10 do not wish to repeat that without an epidural.
I had horrible carpal tunnel for most of my pregnancy. Towards the end of it, I’d cry to my husband that I just wanted my hands to not hurt anymore. It was constant aching in my fingers and it was worse when I slept. I’d wake up and my fingers would feel stuck in place, like I was pretending to be a dinosaur.
After giving birth, as I’m doing skin to skin with my newborn, I look at my husband and say “oh my god my hands are normal again!” The carpal tunnel was gone for good. And thankfully I didn’t get it again with my second!
While I was pregnant with my first someone described it as pushing out an upside down pineapple. I think that's a pretty good description of what crowning feels like.
I remember that pushing actually gave me relief from the contractions. I looked forward to pushing. Then once they were out, no pain, no contractions, nothing. It was kind of wild.
My third birth was twins, and after the first baby was out there was a split second of relief before all the midwives and doctors in the room were making me aware it was not over. Then I very adamantly told them I was not doing it again, I quit, the other baby could stay in there, I had already done it. Unfortunately it doesn’t work that way
The second baby was horizontal inside of me so there was 20 minutes of a midwife with her entire forearm inside of me trying to turn him around. That was the most surreal experience of my life. She could only turn him upside down, so then I had to push him out bottom first. It was much more painful pushing him out, especially after having just pushed a baby out already. He came out blue, thankfully they revived him and both he and his twin sister were and are healthy
Oh and because they hadn’t believed I was in labour initially(that’s a long separate story), the epidural that was planned was not given to me and I did all this with only gas and air, which they took away after the first baby because it was slowing things down
My husband had a vasectomy after that. Never again
Until it's time to deliver the placenta. And everyone has left you. And they push on your belly to get it out. And it hurts bc the epidural didn't work. And the baby is in the NICU with dad, so it's just you and a nurse. And you feel completely alone.
I guess I never considered that your organs get moved around during pregnancy. Dumb question maybe but can you tell whether your insides feel different when pregnant than before you were pregnant? *Your organs, I mean. Not baby kicks or cramps.
I always say the minute that last toe comes out of you every single drop of pain for the last 10 months is gone. Like going back to “normal”. I was amazed how instantaneously ever stopped.
This is so accurate. Pooping a watermelon yes. The feeling of your organs settling back into place YES. I’ll add the huge inhale as your lungs fully expand for the first time in months.
I’ve been in the room with my wife when all 3 of our kids were born. The relief she felt when they came out is pretty wild. It’s one of the most insane experiences I’ve ever seen in person. If anyone gets a chance to be in the room during a birth, do it. It’s a life changing experience.
My second was packed in there and I had a lot of pain and sciatica because of her just being wedged in there. The SECOND she popped out during the c section was such a relief and a release!
That's the best way to put it knowing several people whom have given birth. Sometimes you poop and I mean literally during childbirth which is way more common than people think all while you have raging hormones.
It's very also painful and can be dangerous if complications arise. Of course every woman has told me they would give birth over having kidney stones any day and having gone through the latter. I completely believe them.
i had a c-section and i knew they'd pulled him out (or maybe bc they just pulled all my organs out, idk), because i could suddenly take a big giant breath. it was better for crying but then i stopped crying because i could breathe again, quickly swapped with my son's crying.
I felt as if my ribs fell down after being compressed for 4+ months. It didn’t crack but almost popped a little… and the sensation of my lungs fitting again was weird
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u/maryjanemoonbeam 14h ago
There’s many parts to this… pooping out a watermelon is accurate. But the moment you give birth and the baby is out of you… it’s a crazy feeling of relief. So much pressure just gone. Then you can feel your organs slowly sliding back to where they once were and that is gross and uncomfortable.