I recently read a blog written by an obstetric nurse about research done in regards done in regards to how a woman’s child birth experience related to her memory of how bad the pain was. The original study was published in the March 2009 issue of BJOG: An International Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology. It reported that for about 50% of women who have given birth, their memories of the intensity of labor decrease over a period of time. Some women report the memory of pain does not seem to diminish and for a small amount of women, their memory of the pain actually increased over time.
I remember my own birth experience when I had my son 12+ years ago. The pregnancy was difficult, labor was 36 hours long and harder than I had imagined it might be, and delivery was torturous until I was finally put to sleep and the baby was taken by caesarian section.
I can recall every part of those awful couple of days. I swore I would never have another child because I just didn’t think I could stand the pain again. I didn’t want to go through it. Could this study be right? Sounds like I’m making up the pain because of a horrible birth experience?
I can honestly say, “childbirth amnesia” (another term I came across while reading) applies to me for sure. 12 years later, a divorce and feeling too old to have more children, I would do all of it again for another child. I’d endure the pain. I’d endure the long sweltering hours in the closet sized hospital room, I’d let them put me to sleep and miss my baby’s first cry, I’d agree to another c-section and the many weeks of recovery and now a distorted body, all to have another baby.
I thought I’d be one that would remember the pain forever. I thought it would be the constant reminder that I just couldn’t deal with it all again. But, I can and would.
Our memories are amazing things. We can choose to remember certain things. We can suppress memories and remember them later. Our mind can choose to forget the things that will hurt us. Our memories are even variable as to how we feel and remember pain. I’m in awe.
Labor and Delivery Nurse, Melissa. “Study Finds That Memory of Labor Pain Is Influenced By A Woman’s Childbirth Experience.” Nursing Birth. WordPress.com, 30 Mar. 2009. Web. 16 Mar. 2014. <http://nursingbirth.com/2009/03/30/study-finds-that-memory-of-labor-pain-is-influenced-by-a-womans-childbirth-experience/>.
Although I do not have children, I really enjoyed your reading your post. I am the youngest of seven children at 25 years old and till this day, my mother continues to talk about the pain of labor and childbirth. Over the years, I’ve heard many stories, some terrifying and some not so much. My mother always described my birth to be tough, as well as my only brother’s. When I was able to understand the labor and childbirth process, she told me about my brother. She called him a “stubborn” baby. She vividly described how difficult he was to deliver, stating she broke blood vessels in her face. I must admit, this fact scared me. She was unsure if she wanted to have more children after him because of the difficulty, but she had my sister then me. My sister was born two months premature and spent one complete month in the hospital. Then there was me. She described my birth to be the toughest one of the seven, the reason my parents stopped at me. I was born at home; every birthday my older sister shares the story with me, detailing the time, what they were watching, and what everyone had on.
Memory is very interesting. As your post mentions, we can choose what we want to remember, what we want to suppress, and forget. It’s amazing how I can remember vivid details of events that occurred when I was only five years. I remember my grandmother vividly; I can still hear the sound of her voice at times and remember how attached I was to her. It’s a complete tragedies that some spend years building memories and unfortunate circumstances may occur where their memory can deteriorate. Therefore, whether its labor pains or remembering your favorite birthday party, our memory is another amazing aspect of the human mind.
I really enjoyed your blog post and could definitely relate. I can honestly say from experience that the memory of the pain has not diminished, not one bit. Many people have told me that I would forget and have another without even thinking about the pain but it’s the complete opposite. I wasn’t in labor as long as you were, 36 hours WOW. I could never survive it. I was in labor for about 5 hours, only counting the ones in the hospital since I waited as long as possible at home and was actually 5 centimeter when I arrived, but it was the most painful 5 hours of my life and I thought I was going to die. I received an epidural about 3 hours into my labor, it helped me sleep for a couple hours but when it came time push; it wasn’t effective in anyway, I felt it all. I remember screaming, and telling my midwife to just “get her out,” and when I got an episiotomy; the pain was unbearable. I remember feeling so cold from the how bad my contractions were, I remember shaking through each and every one, I remember the “ring of fire” when the baby crowned, and I remember the pain of the episiotomy. My friend recorded me when I began to push, waist up, and I cringe as I watch it like if i was going through it all over again. I remember the pain so well that I feel it. It was truly traumatic for me, and although I do want and plan to have another baby, it’s not because I don’t remember the pain. I don’t think I will ever be able to forget the pain.
Angela Koch
3/30/2014
While I have no children and I likely will never give childbirth due to health reasons, another thought hit me with this. Women talk about how terrible the pain is and yet, we still want to bare children ourselves. Though, the thought of cutting our finger from a paper cut makes people cringe.
My older sister now has a 3 year old and I remember visiting her when he was about two weeks old. I asked her if she had medication and because she said “no” I asked how bad the pain was. She vividly described to me how awful the pain was and painted a picture for me in my mind (since I was unable to be there for the birth). She described the pain in a way that could make anyone never want to endure childbirth. Though, when I have talked to her recently she said that she is willing to get pregnant and surrogate for someone because she loved being pregnant and the childbirth really wasn’t that bad. In fact she told me, “For the first three to four weeks after his birth I remembered the pain clearly, after that time frame it all became blocked and I began to only remember the motions and excitement and happiness and now I vaguely remember the pain at all”!
The idea of forgetting such pain seems unthinkable to me, though I am sure we have all experienced this in one way or another.
Painful Memories comment By Jana Burbage
I am not surprised that childbirth is forgotten after a certain period of time. I have never had my own child; however looking at other people’s experiences more often than not, people will give birth and say it was terrible and end up pregnant again. The famous saying women say while giving birth and looking at the father is, “I hate you for doing this! I’m not ever going to do this again.” I believe you forget how hard childbirth is because once you have a child, your want for another child impacts the way you forget about how hard it actually was all due to the love and want for more.
You can relate this to other kinds of repeated pains that people go through again. People continue to get tattoos, piercings, getting hurt on a bike or skateboard, sporting events and much more. Just because you get into a car accident and experience anxiety most people drive again. I have had tattoos and piercings. I will get one of them done, and I will not get anymore for at least 6 months to a year. After time passes your memory does not stop someone from doing it again, all due to the want of having more, just like child birth. So in the end I believe that the pain you go through can reduce the strength of the memory or forgotten in your memory due to wanting to do it again. The want is a powerful feeling and makes you do something you said you would never partake in again. The brain chooses to remember certain events in your life. At first you remember the pain because you just had it, but after a while it can be suppressed so you will choose to endure the pain again. Other times pain can be so terrible, something like getting set on fire that you know you will never do again because it made such a deep impact on your pain tolerance and memory. Finally, I believe the want to have something is that caused a lot of pain is stronger than the actual memory itself. The whole time in labor, details are forgotten but still sustain in your memory, but the want for another child is stronger.
I was drawn to your post because of the following comments: “I can recall every part of those awful couple of days. I swore I would never have another child because I just didn’t think I could stand the pain again. I didn’t want to go through it…. I thought I’d be one that would remember the pain forever. I thought it would be the constant reminder that I just couldn’t deal with it all again. But, I can and would.” I felt a very personal connection to those comments. Not in relation to childbirth, but to athletic injuries. I sustained two major injuries during my athletic career – I broke my knee and the growth plate in my right knee, and I tore my ulnar collateral ligament in my right elbow. The elbow injury and reconstructive surgery (called Tommy John Surgery) necessitated 18 long months of painful rehab. Also, I feel that recalling this injury sheds some interesting light on my “memories”.
I can remember the details of the day that both injuries occurred – time of day, weather, smells, etc. However, my recall of events leading up to the injuries certainly has been influenced by retroactive interference. Knowing that I injured my elbow has caused me to remember things before that event that most likely didn’t happen. Had I not been injured, I would most likely have no memory of the events at all. I say this because over the course of my athletic career I had warmed up for events hundreds of times and have almost no real memory of these times. Yet now, even 15 years later, I remember the details of that day’s warm-up clearly. Now I question, Did they happen? Or are they clear? I’m a little unsure because “False memories arise from the same constructive process that produces true memories” (Goldstein, p.220). Also, “Additional sources of information that influence memory include people’s knowledge of the world, and things that happened before or after the event…” (Goldstein, p.215). Did hindsight and knowing I injured myself shape my memory of events?
Despite all my “memories” of the events, I have no memory of the actual pain of the injury, or of the pain endured during the long rehabilitation period. I know that it hurt, but I have no real memory of the pain. Why is it that I can remember so many details, yet remember nothing of the pain?
I completely agree with you when you said, “Our memories are amazing things. We can choose to remember certain things. We can suppress memories and remember them later. Our mind can choose to forget the things that will hurt us. Our memories are even variable as to how we feel and remember pain. I’m in awe.” I’m in awe too.
Goldstein, B. E. (2011). Cognitive Psychology (Third Edition ed.). Belmont, CA, USA: Wadsworth.
This was such an interesting post for me. Mostly likely because I have two children and can strongly relate to the topic, as the other students who have commented seem to also relate.
Here I am, 10 years past the birth of my first child, and 5 years after my second and last child, and I have forgotten. While I know I could explain to someone what type of pain it was, I don’t believe I could accurately recall the intensity of the pain.
Along a slightly different yet similar topic, I also have piercings and tattoos. While reading, I wondered if pain in general is something we easily forget, regardless of the context of the pain. I had gotten my tongue pierced a few years back, took it out, and about a year ago decided to get it redone. I didn’t remember it hurting that badly and in that moment, I swore I’d never do it again. Here I am, with another closed tongue piercing (whole other story), and am already debating redoing it. I do remember that I thought I’d never do it again, but I now find myself asking, “Was it really that bad?”
As for my tattoos, I love them and am getting more. I do remember it hurting, but again, nothing to keep me afraid of or away from getting more. So I figured it was time to research how childbirth pain, and or other pain and memory, are related or different.
Randy Reiland (2012) on Smithsonian.com says that, “research shows that any pain lasting more than a few minutes leaves a trace in the nervous system”. This seems to conflict with “childbirth amnesia” or a large tattoo in the sense that we forget the level of pain, but would make sense for a piercing that lasts for a couple of seconds.
Then I found the following: in a recent study (O’Connor, 2012), it’s been found that listening to and focusing on music (music therapy) may actually help to relieve pain while it is occurring. I then thought of how many pregnant women are encouraged to have something like a labor mix tape that they create for themselves. Hospitals and doctor’s offices also sometimes will have music playing in the background. People getting tattoos may often have earphones in and will listen to music during the process.
In conclusion, it made me wonder if we were really forgetting the pain, or if we never retained it in our long-term memory to begin with due to our mind’s focusing instead on distractors during the process. Then when I thought about that, I certainly recall the things I put my focus on while I was in labor, much easier than I can recall the actual pain of the labor.
O’Connor, Anahad. Really? The Claim: Listening to Music Can Relieve Pain. Retrieved on 3/30/14 from http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/02/really-the-claim-listening-to-music-can-relieve-pain/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0
Rieland, R. Pain and the Brain. Retrieved on 3/30/14 from http://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/pain-and-the-brain-107370345/?no-ist
What an interesting read. Recalling my previous child birth experiences, I’m still onboard with having a third child. I had my first son in 5 hours and my second son in 2.5 hours. Most people would think that a shorter time is better and I would agree, and yet have points of disagreement. It was nice that I was in discomfort/pain for a short period of time; however the pain is much more intense. It’s basically condensing a standard labor of 8-12 hours into 2.5-5 hours. When I had my second son, they barely got me in the room before I had him. The pain was so intense that the only thought I can remember is “Oh my God, I’m going to die.” Now, nine months later, the pain is barely a blip in my memory.
What I find the most interesting is what I do remember and do not remember. I don’t recall the pain of childbirth anywhere near as much as I recall how awful my last pregnancy was. I didn’t have morning sickness, but I was sick almost the entire time. I either didn’t want to eat because nothing was appealing, or I had some type of infecting in part of my upper respiratory system. On top of that, my belly got bigger much faster than my first pregnancy, so I was physically uncomfortable for much longer. There was even a point where I told my fiancé that we weren’t’ going to have another child. What I find the most interesting about all of this is that the pain from childbirth was far worse than the overall pregnancy, however the misery I felt while being pregnant is what I remember the most.
This is where memory and memory coding comes into play. My labor was extremely painful, however it was fleeting. Since the time span was so short, there was not enough time for the moment to be recorded well into my long-term memory. On the other hand, pregnancy lasts for 9 month, and from that I was miserable for at least 5 of them. That means every day for 5 months that feeling of misery was firmly affixed into my long term memory through a form of rehearsal. We’re still going to try for a 3rd child, I just hope that I have a better pregnancy than the last.
This is a perfect example of how pain and the memory of can impact our decisions later in life. While I never gave natural birth I have had three csections one as recent as December, so I can relate to what you are saying. My first was terrifying but not because I was in pain but because my daughter was 11 ½ weeks early and I wasn’t allowed to be awake for the actual delivery due to my epidural not working. Because I wasn’t allowed to be awake I didn’t know what to expect for number two, the only thing I was afraid of was getting the epidural because my first one didn’t work and I felt the beginning of the first incision. My second csection along with the pain of the epidural came extreme pulling and tugging and my memory of being yanked all over the table. So fast forward three and a half years I was getting prepped for a third emergency csection and all I could think about was the awful epidural needle and being tugged at and pulled. However, for me these memories faded over time and weren’t as persistently in my mind. The memories and reminders of the pain would only physically come back to me minutes before it was time to relive everything. By physically come back I mean I never really forgot about how big the needle was that was being stuck in my back or how I felt such intense pressure (or the actual first cut with my first) but the memory fades. For me I replaced those painful memories with the memory of all the cute things my little guy is doing. After seeing your post I did some research and found an article about postnatal PTSD associated with traumatic births, it’s said yet not surprising that there isn’t a lot of information on this subject. “Characteristics features of PTSD include: Bad memories and the need to avoid any reminders of the trauma…” (The Birth Trauma assiciation, 2011).
References
The Birth Trauma assiciation. (2011). What is Birth Trauma? Retrieved from The birth trauma association: http://www.birthtraumaassociation.org.uk/what_is_trauma.htm
I, too, have also questioned my memory of pain levels during childbirth. My daughter was born after a very intense labor, during which I begged and pleaded for a C-section because I couldn’t handle the pain. I was not given one and ended up delivering my beautiful baby after three hours of active pushing. Now, over four years later, I can’t recall the exact pain I experienced; I can’t describe it or relate it to anything else. All I can remember is the feeling of joy and love upon her first cry. Although it has been strongly recommended that I do not get pregnant again (due to health problems beyond my control), I would experience it all over again if it meant having another baby.
Most mothers I have talked with have similar experiences. We don’t remember the pain and suffering because of the wonderful joy of being a mother. In fact, many mom-friends of mine have said that the thing they remember the most from their physical experiences with childbirth is exhaustion, which is the same for me. In my own personal life, I was jokingly called an exaggerator of pain by my fiance because of my instant lack of pain after our daughters birth; it was as if the pain had never even occurred.
Several studies have shown that oxytocin plays a key role in this. Dr. Daniel Amen explains that “In addition, there is an amnesic effect created by oxytocin during sex and orgasm that blocks negative memories people have about each other for a period of time. The same amnesic effect occurs from the release of oxytocin during childbirth, while a mother is nursing to help her forget the labor pain, and during long, stressful nights spent with a newborn so that she can bond to her baby with positive feelings and love” (Amen, 2011). It seems as if our bodies and minds are biologically designed to love and care for our offspring; by replacing the memory of physical pain with happiness and love, we are better able to care for our children.
“Daniel Amen, MD Discusses Oxytocin.” Oxytocin Centralcom. N.p., 9 Mar. 2011. Web. 29 Mar. 2014. .
I have also often wondered about memory and how it relates childbirth myself. A mother of four young children, I have had four different experiences in childbirth. Two were relatively easy and the other two were more difficult. I know in my mind that my middle two child births were strenuous but I do not remember the pain vividly. Additionally, I went on each time to have another child, so what gives?
I was interested in your post because like me, your memory of a challenging childbirth did not stop you from eventually wanting more children. So, is it true that what type of childbirth we experience influences our memory of the event? Not so much for me.
Having learned about how schemas and scripts fill in gaps in our memory, my guess is that this plays an important role in what women remember. My guess is that all of the excitement and intrigue of those times has filled in any memory gaps so that now I still long to be back in those hospital rooms, cradling a newborn.
I know from having had previous children how wonderful it is supposed to (and does) feel to hold a new baby in your arms and the pure joy of having them fall asleep on your chest. Even if I could not recall those things, my schema and scripts about having a child probably helped me retain those particular memories. The problematic medical issues which arose during my deliveries, on the other hand, can be recalled but with much less vividness in my memory. I know that these two deliveries and recoveries were grueling physically and can recall the strenuous events of those experiences. However I do not remember pain even though I know it existed. Perhaps this was because they were not a part of the script I have for child birth. Conversely, I do remember my newborns’ smells, cries, first outfits and feedings – something that I knew even before I had children I would savor (although I did not know how much!)
This “forgetting” the pain that I experienced is common for many women, although it has been found that truly disremembering the pain of child birth is a myth. What many of us experience is known as the halo effect, which says that the happiness and reward alter the memory of the preceding pain of labor. Its effect is something close to forgetting, although we don’t actually forget.
This may be true for me because my pain level was moderate. Science seems to suggest that for those of us who did not experience extreme levels of pain, the memory of discomfort diminishes over time. It sounds similar to what the writer of this blog experienced as well. It has been shown, however, that for women at either extreme end of the pain spectrum (excruciating to nonexistent) their memories were consistent over time.
Robinson, Monique. (18 Mar 2014) “Monday’s medical myth: women forget the pain of childbirth”. Retrieved 25 Mar 2014 from theconversation.com
I was very intrigued by your post on both a personal and academic level. My mother did not have easy pregnancies and both of her children, my brother and I, were born via cesarean. Any time I have asked her what drove her to want another child after all of the complications she experienced the first time, she simply replies that she wanted two children and most importantly felt it important that I have a sibling. While she does not deny the pain nor pretend that her experiences were not at times without consequences to her own well being, her recounts are always very matter of fact. Her episodic memories of this time in her life are not distressing and filled with anguish, but more of an authentic recollection of events. She is not tormented by her highly emotional experiences. In light of the relationship between highly emotional events and memory this seems to be somewhat unusual. Why did the complications of her first pregnancy not deter her from a second, and why now does she not have any distressing memories of this time in her life?
Based on what we have learned, this can be attributed to the constructive nature of long-term memory. When memories are recalled the original occurrence plus additional factors such as persons knowledge and expectations are included. In terms of knowledge, my mother had created a concept that her life was going to include two children. She had categorized “parent” as having, taking care of, and rearing children. In terms of expectation, she had a predetermined schema of parenthood. The notion that the joys of parenthood would outshine the hardships of what she was enduring is a sort of self instituted memory error due to suggestion. Following both pregnancies the exhilaration of the newborn child led to future recall biases.
My mother has changed her memory to disproportionately reflect the happy feelings and good instances that occurred surrounding her pregnancies. Every time either of her children succeeds, she feels proud of how she as a parent contributed to these successes and any thoughts of her pregnancy challenges become susceptible to alterations during reconsolidation. As more and more pleasurable happenings occur they disrupt the negative, stress-ridden memories allowing the latter to become less and less.
A few days after reading your post I told my mother that she had “childbirth amnesia”. After a few lightening fast witticisms concerning her lagging memory she expressed to me how the only time she remotely considers the pain she experienced is when she listens to others complain of their own pregnancy woes. Whether this is an example of the misinformation effect, or a means of adequate retrieval cues being provided for her concerning those memories is debatable. Nonetheless while she is always sympathetic to those that seek advice for such matters she attempts to avoid such situations mindful of the discomfort it causes her.
All in all, I am surprised about the results of the study. It would be interesting to know the age of the women who reported the same or increased levels of pain so as to assess how it varies with position within or outside the reminiscence bump. It would also be interesting to repeat this study and include a follow up questionnaire to determine the circumstances surrounding the birth. Labor could be considered a flashbulb memory, so understanding the atmosphere in which the birth occurred could greatly alter ones later recollection. If the doctors were calmer it is likely that ones memory would reflect that and be more untroubled. If the doctors were tense it is likely that ones memory would be more negative as a consequence of how they were informed of the fact that the birth was occurring and that it may contain some complications.
Once again thank you for sharing your opinions of this compelling study. The malleability of memory for all aspects of our lives is definitely a fascinating topic. It can shape not only how we judge the past, but also how we perform daily tasks and imagine our future.
Goldstein, B. E. (2011). Cognitive Psychology (Third Edition ed.). Belmont, CA, USA: Wadsworth.
I just recently had a baby and I would like to say that the pain I felt is something that I won’t forget. My labor was long, like yours, though mine was only 29 hours. Despite all the pain, I still plan to have more children down the road. Before I had my son, I heard people say the same thing a million times, “No matter the pain you feel it’ll be worth it in the end and you’ll forget all about it.” I definitely have not forgotten the pain yet, but I’m sure down the road I won’t remember it the same way. My best friend had a baby almost a year ago now, and even during just a year she seems to have forgotten how uncomfortable she was when she was pregnant and the pain she felt during labor and delivery. I asked her many times how different things felt and she wouldn’t seem to really remember how they felt for her. She focuses more on the fact that her daughter makes her forget the pain she felt. It is amazing what our minds can do. Another example of this is when I broke my arm when I was in middle school. I remember that at the time that it happened I didn’t think that it hurt too bad and I still remember it the same way. It hurt more so after the fact when I would try to do anything with that hand. I’m sure it hurt worse than I remember it, but at the time I didn’t think it hurt too bad either. I remember rather calmly walking up to the gym teacher and telling her that I thought I broke my arm and being sent to the nurses office where my mom was called to pick me up and take me to the hospital.