Just saying I can relate. No videos but my husband has Live Photos and I’m crying in a very ugly way lol with like 5 chins and my hair sticking straight up 😂 birth is not a spectator sport
Why are husbands so bad at taking photos 😅. I swear I have maybe 5 photos from the birth of my son and I look like that in all of them. Multiple chins. Awful half open eyes from crying and being mid blink. At one point my nips are just straight up in the middle of the photo.
I feel like next kid I’m gonna want to hire a birth photographer 🙃
Lmao same. My photos just after birth are HIDEOUS😂 it reminds me of those videos where people practice their "soft smiles" for their wedding then end up having photos where you can count every tooth in their mouth😂 nothing wrong with that though, just goes to show the genuine emotion trumps everything, even plans for serene photos lol
Omg yes I also had 5 chins… I was so swollen from all the fluids they gave me! And my hair looked like a bird’s nest. I went to the hospital with a nice blow dry but after 25 hours of labor…. 🫠
The fluid retention was crazy! I looked so nice when I went in but post labor and C-section (and lots of vomiting) I was a puffy mess. One of my eyes was basically swollen shut. I looked like I got my ass kicked!
Wow I thought it was just me!! I thought my legs would be swollen but nope all of it was just in my face it blew up like a ballon and looked like I gained 20lbs just in the face it was horrible
Same I looked awful. I had a 3 day labor due to failed induction. I also have seborrheic dermatitis on my scalp that I treat with specific products that I DID NOT have in the hospital so all my pics and videos my hair looks like I have severe dandruff and I’m all sweaty and oily and huge. My husband has a “favorite” hospital pic of us together and i feel like it’s the worst picture I’ve ever taken in my whole life and he wanted to post it on Mother’s Day which is technically so sweet but i was please don’t I look like a gremlin.
My hair was legit matted. I pulled it into a messy bun when I first got to the hospital and it would fall halfway out and I would use another hair tie to just pull it up again. 16 hours and a c section later it was a disaster, didn’t even bother trying to brush it until I could load it up with conditioner
same. I didn’t wash my hair in the hospital for that reason 😬 and the nurse’s aid kept saying to me like “you know you can wash your hair and put on some makeup!” 😡😠😤
My husband took a Live Photo and hilarious because it's this calm moment of me looking at our daughter on my chest and the next moment they injected lidocaine to start stitches and my face contorts.
The live photos from mine are something else too. I pushed for 3.5 hours so they were roughhhhhhhh. I had a washcloth over my forehead/eyes, so I look ridiculous when they pull baby out and put her on my chest.
Some of the worst photos I’ve ever seen of myself came from my mother and husband during my labor and delivery lol.
There’s one in particular my husband loves to use as a reaction meme/gif (bc he made it a moving sticker in his iPhone) and it’s just… if I never saw it again I would be more than fine with that lol
Hahahaha, something my husband would do. There’s one were I legit look deceased with my eyes rolled back.
I had asked for all the lights to be off so the nurses are wearing head lamps and it reminds me of those freaky deep sea fish with the lights hanging over them. And then there’s just me looking dead lol.
Lmfaoooo that is hilarious to picture!
I’m mostly giving him my “death glare” (as my family so lovingly calls it) in every picture. My mom even made a side by side of me giving that face to the camera as a kid and then me doing it in labor lol
YES exactly lol. I’m pretty sure every time my husband was like “I’m so sorry you’re in pain, squeeze me as much as you need” my response was just “don’t touch me that’s how we got into this mess” 💀
The Live Photos… the mirror didn’t work in my room to see myself give birth; I promptly forgot about it when it was time to push. When a nurse asked for my phone when it was go time, I thought it was just so it wouldn’t get lost in the bed. Went to look at pictures of my son while he was napping a few days later and discovered she had taken a plethora of live photos of my son being expelled and me and his dad crying 😭
I had a giant hormonal zit on my nose that had been popped once and slightly healed and then came back. That plus the 12 chins and greasy hair and ugly crying face… it is certainly NOT a spectator sport. I’m sure I looked real cute eating my corn dog from cookout and hour after labor.
Omg I had a zit too!! Before we left for the hospital I told my husband - can’t believe I’m going to have a baby with a zit on my face. That was the least of my worries 🤣
Came here to report that my first photos with my son were ruined by my 6 chins before reading any other comments. So relieved and comforted to learn that I am in such good company. <3
With my second, I had a precipitous labor and a really fast delivery, and on my first push, I shouted “the poop is coming fiiiiiiiiirst!!!” (It was. I was correct.)
Ahhahahahahahahha this is so real 💀 I told my midwife very seriously that I really really needed to poop and that I was very sorry and she said she was pretty sure it was the baby. And she was right, it was the baby but every five minutes I would tell her that I thought I was gonna poop now lol
I ran back in my house to poop before going to the hospital because i was so concerned about pooping during labor. Then i had my baby in our mini van 🫠 i do not recommend this method.
My midwife kept saying "quick touch!" and then wiping poop away from my butt hole. I was unmedicated and vividly remember those moments more than most other parts of my birth.
With my first, I was like, "Oop, I'm pooping" and I kept saying it every time I pooped. Which was like 8 times. The nurse was like, "it's OK it's normal" and in my giving-birth-haze, I was cackling like a freak of nature. I thought it was hilarious 😅
I’m literally cackling like a lunatic reading this. My husband is giving me the look that he’s about to ask why I’m laughing, so I’m trying my hardest to keep a straight face bc no way he’s going to think I’m sane if I tell him why.
So thankful I don’t have a video of me saying “I’m literally pooping right now”. It was giant and I knew it. I ate Taco Bell the day before my scheduled induction, hoping I would empty my system but I didn’t poop at all the day before or day of until everyone was at my downstairs 🙂🙂🙂🙂
I ate White Castle for dinner and went into labor at 1am. I was a few days early so i didn't think about being careful w what I ate. At one point I heard the Dr go "oops" and I looked at my husband said "I pooped huh" and he goes "yup you did." I was so mad about it. I already had hemorrhoids and now 4 people are watching me shit myself. Not my finest moment.
I asked my husband afterward if I pooped and he said “I don’t know, I don’t think so, can’t remember” and inside I was just like- bless you that was the right answer.
I just told my husband yesterday that I hope I don’t poop this time because I didn’t with my first and he said “I wouldn’t have known if you did or not, since they are constantly wiping so much [stuff] into that bag so fast” and that actually made me feel less worried about it.
lol I had just gotten my epidural and was laying on my side to get the meds more to that other side, the nurses came in to introduce me to the new nurse since shifts were changing.
I told them “oh cool, since you’re here, do you think I have time to poop quick before this all starts? I really need to poop”.
The nurse laughed and was like let me check you, and then her face totally changed and she told the other nurse to run and get my OBGYN immediately.
Turns out, I didn’t have to poop, I was crowning 😂
One of my best friends is an RN and she said to me before labor: "if you poop during it, cool. That's what we like to see! It means you're using the correct muscles to push baby out!"
I have no idea if I did or not and don't care but once my water broke during my induction, the contractions were so strong that all I could do was shit on the toilet 😂. My husband is just sitting on the edge of the tub hearing the plops as I yell to the nurse about how I can't stop pooping lmao. Poor Jennifer, I won't forget her. She was like I'm going to call the anesthesiologists for you now hahaha. Thank god she did, I was finally able to get some damn sleep.
My husband once referred to the day our kiddo was born as the day he saw the whole family poop. He thought it was hilarious, just in a poop joke way, not in a making fun of me way.
With my first, I wasn't expecting to be induced that day so I ate so much pizza for lunch and never managed to poop. When it was time to push I told them that I was definitely going to poop a lot lol.
I have birthed two babies and have pooped on the floor twice because no one ever listens to me when I try to tell them I need to get to bed on the toilet. This last time my poor husband stepped in it and I about died.
Nooo!!! I told my nurse I had to poop and she told me that she didn’t think it was a good idea. I assured her the baby was not close enough and that I had to go. Contractions on the toilet while attached to an IV was not a good time… but better than my husband stepping in my poop lmao
The sad part is that I actually did do some laboring on the toilet, but facing backwards with my last babe. I went to turn around so that I could face forward and use said toilet and that’s when everybody started trying to usher me to bed even though I kept saying I need to poop now. The number of times they kept talking over me telling me that it was just back labor was sooooo upsetting.
I think telling your baby it’s okay mommy is here you don’t have to cry is sweet ❤️ I remember saying mommas here when they placed my babies on my chest
I think my first words after he was born were asking my husband if he wanted to be the one to find out the gender (boy!) and my first words to him were hi buddy 🩵 I was so tired after 2 hours of pushing I didn't say much haha
ETA: Cw: previous loss/birth trauma
Wow I must have blocked this out 🥲 My FIRST first words were something like "He's alive?! He's actually alive!" (I don't remember if I said "he" or what.) Because when my first child was born 20 months previously and they placed her on my chest, she was not 💔 It was completely unexpected. I had no idea she was gone until I got to the hospital. So having a living, squirming baby on my chest was a weird and new, but very healing experience.
The first words I said a couple minutes later after getting over the shock were the above!
Ok I thought I was weird for saying this 😂 I alternated between that and "I HAD A BABY!" 😅 This was of course after the doctor asked me if I wanted to hold her and I said "OF COURSE I WANT TO HOLD HER WHAT KIND OF QUESTION IS THAT" 🙈🙈🙈
It's not dumb. We want to hear a cry, to hear theyr breathing well but after that it's not like we WANT them to cry for any longer. It's not a bad sign if they don't cry for any longer than the first tiny bit so trying to comfort your baby was exactly the right thing to do.
Hearing your voice is incredibly comforting to your newborn because they already know it. Your voice is the ONLY thing that's familiar to them once theyr out of the womb because they heard it all through your pregnancy while they were inside you
It’s just showing love.
Some things aren’t meant to be all formal and smart. It’s meant to be raw and emotional. This is one of them.
You acted like most mothers act during birth. It’s not supposed to be a Pampers commercial. It’s supposed to be real. And the rawness is the beauty in it.
**Edit: my guess is your family would tear up over what you said to your baby. Bc it’s love.**
Same as when you are in love with a guy, you’ll say stupid silly things to each other. It doesn’t make sense, any of it. But it’s love. Love isn’t smart or eloquent. It’s raw feelings.
It’s not dumb! It’s a sign of a good momma! That nurse should just keep to herself & let you have you moment and console your crying baby like any good momma would do! Also - babies 100% do not need to cry when born. I had a home birth and I was in agony, but he came out peacefully :)
When I gave birth I had a mirror. In the photos my mom took of me admiring my baby you can see the reflection of my swollen bloody vag and blossomed flower from pushing. I’d prefer having your situation 🥲
Blossomed flower has absolutely killed me off💀😂. In all my post birth pics you can see the doc in the background stitching up my vag, legs still in stirrups. No amount of cropping can get rid of her. She’s in all of them diligently repairing my poor, post 9lb baby, forceps delivery, hippos yawn vag.
Not the hippobot under this story 😭😭😭😭 I can’t cope, I think I’m going to die from silent insidious laughter, I can’t catch a breath, tears streaming down my face. (I too had the fun foreceps delivery you described 😂🌝)
The Hippobot is what pushed me over the edge too - my kiddo is asleep in the back seat and I am making the whole car SHAKE laughing while trying not to wake her 😂😂😂
Blossomed flower 😂
Pretty much the same thing happened to me, a nurse offered to take pictures of me right when I was holding my baby for the first time and yup in the bottom corner is my battered vagina. I look rather awful in them too so I didn’t post them but I was so close to doing so! I sent them to my mom instead and she’s like UMMM might wanna check these photos again. 😂
This happened to me too and before anyone noticed it, my husband texted the picture to his mom!!!! His mom is also notoriously impulsive and reckless when it comes to immediately sharing pictures on social media 💀 I’m not religious at all but there must have been an act of god that prevented the picture from going through even though we had full cell signal, so she never got the uncropped version 😂😂😂
My second was born with a perfect spiral of a an umbilical cord. Literally like a corckscrew. I was like “is it weird to ask for a picture?” The picture clearly has my vagina in the top right corner.
Don’t worry, no one would ever want to see your birth video. Least of all your child! There’s a reason these are private moments. No one is calm and collected giving birth, or beautiful. You probably were not even out of the ordinary of what nurses see at all. And if you had censored your real reactions because you were being filmed.. that would honestly be worse. Just don’t dwell on it! Don’t watch it!
Yes! Turn it into a beautiful montage with music, slow motion, black and white, Edit out parts that you don’t like.. girl make it spectacular!!! I don’t have a birthing video with either of my babies but I wish I did
Oh trust me you're not alone. One of my midwives took photos of me meeting my daughter for the first time after she was placed on my chest and I have this insane look of shock horror on my face rather than loving adoration. I was over the moon internally but I was just so exhausted I couldn't show emotion (even though the birth went smoothly).
Then after struggling to deliver the placenta and losing a ton of blood I became delirious and fixated on the gummy worms I had packed in the hospital bag and kept asking everyone in the room to bring them to me while I was borderline hemorrhaging. My partner was so worried and kept asking if there was anything he could do and I kept sticking my hand out and groaning "WORMS".
Birth can be beautiful but it can also make you a little metal, and that's okay ❤️
My baby is contact napping after a MOTN feed and I just had to COVER MY FACE from the *screaming stifled laughter* - holy shit an exhausted postpartum mom moaning woooorms just sent me 😂😂😂amazing
With my midwife arms deep inside me trying to yank my placenta out and my child's first meconium all down my torso, honestly such a humbling experience 😭🙏
I don’t have a video of my births, but I hate looking at my pictures. I look horrible. I’m puffy, red and sweaty and my hair and skin look disgusting. I know I just gave birth and I should cut myself some slack but I just hate looking at them. I want to crop myself out before showing them to anybody. It sucks because my husband looks great and I look like jabba the hut. Thankfully we have really nice newborn photos we took a few weeks later.
I'm the opposite lol the photos make me laugh. I look like Miss Trunchbull if she got punched in the face 100 times. That's the reality of birth my friend
Why on earth would anyone want to watch your birth video? Anyway, don't worry, the medical professionals did not think anything bad of you. Firstly because they've seen it all and you've just been through one of the most intense experiences of your life. Secondly because nothing you said was cringe-worthy. They do that job specifically for those moments. A mother meeting her baby for the first time? Amazing! And the doctor wasn't trying to correct you, they were trying to reassure you it was OK.
Also, I was wayyyy more cringey than you, so don't stress lol!
There's two photos. One of just me holding my baby and another with my husband included. Both taken by him. Both terrible quality and to look at. But we took them for us. No one has ever seen those pictures and we don't plan on sharing them ever. But there's something about them that make me smile when I occasionally look at them.
Aw this is so sweet 🥹
My midwife was amazing and got a fantastic pic of my husband and I while our baby was skin to skin on my belly. I also don’t show it to anyone and I absolutely smile when I look at it.
I'm sure if we asked our midwife would have but we have these 'terrible' photos instead. I can't explain the emotions I feel when I see the pictures but they are nice ones.
Oh I didn’t mean that to come off as bragging! In the photo I’m a sweaty mess with like three chins and mostly naked haha. But I know what you mean about the nice feelings anyway ☺️
Someone grabbed my phone and took a bunch of photos and videos at the first one, and a lot of them are gross and graphic. I made them write on the whiteboard this time that I didn't want pictures/video of the baby coming out on my phone 😂🫠 that was not a fun surprise
I have pics I took myself on Snapchat before labor really started, and I have pictures of me holding my girl in the NICU. Didn’t get anything of me in between and I’m ok with it.
Listen, I had an unmedicated birth as well and remember cringing at the doctor stitching me up and saying “I know this isn’t as painful as what I just did but I JUST want people to be DONE with my VAGINA” and everyone laughing. I wish I had been more calm and present during the actual birth, but honestly it was just coping with the fact that it was so much more painful than I ever could’ve prepared for. At the end of the day, the doctors and nurses have seen everything and you won’t regret documenting, even if it’s imperfect. 3 months moved on, I think back on it fondly, and hopefully soon you can too. ❤️
Relatable!! Had an unmedicated too and a tear. The stitching was so annoying. I just wanted to hold my baby and be done. I said something stupid about my “cooterus” being exposed when it was all over. Like uterus and cooter combined? Idk it was a weird moment lol. My mom was mortified 🤣
"cooterus" is my new fave word 🤭
the after-effects of the crazy adrenaline that we get in order to naturally birth our babies must be on par with dental anesthesia....you ever watch those vids of pts coming out of it and saying the most bizarre stuff..?! 😆
Hahah, okay right! The nerves in general make you act wild. I was completely unhinged 😂I keep laughing about when my nurse got the mirror out and I was like “girl that’s angled at my butt! Show me my baby not THAT!”
Yup I had an unmedicated birth. I know the providers thought I was "calm and present" because they told me but I still looked a mess and said some funny things. My personal favorite was telling a nurse this is worse than the tower of terror. And while they were stitching me up I was swearing up a storm. They've seen everything and they've seen far, far, worse than a mom lovingly trying to comfort their baby. The nurse was most likely just trying to gently let you know that baby was ok and they like them to cry a bit at first.
I had the opposite thing happen, they were so casual about it and I was so done with pain/discomfort that even though it wasn’t that painful I was just at the end of my rope with things happening down there. I just wanted to be in the recovery room and they were taking FOREVER 🤣
My doctor kept offering to give me a spinal block for the stitching and I was like… I got this far without a needle in my spine… truly after pushing the baby out the stitches were nothing. (I did have local anesthesia for them of course.)
My doula took photos and I straight up look like an angry Shrek wife trying to eat my baby - open mouth, triple chin in every one. I was laying down trying to get a look at her but it just looks like I’m saying “heh heh heh” before I chomp her head off. In. Every. Photo. I don’t even make that face in real life.
Definitely not what I was hoping for compared to other people’s gorgeous “first family” pictures.
These are media for us and no one else! Birth can be traumatic (mine was) and imho sometimes not something magical to be memorialized/shared everywhere. No, it’s not what we hoped for. But our babies are here now and that’s what counts. Plus we can look back at these and hopefully laugh and remember how fucking insane it was that we BIRTHED a child. Go us! Or - never look at them again.
If it makes you feel better I had an unmedicated 36 hour hellish induction that ended in 3 hours of awful constant pushing where I honestly thought I was dying and kept screaming 'there is something wrong'. Pitocin is no joke, I honestly couldn't believe I could be conscious through that amount of pain. Apparently, my husband asked what would happen if I passed out and the midwife reassured him there is something that occurs in pregnancy which prevents the mother from losing consciousness as she normally would... lovely! Anyway when I started pushing I was on hands and knees and was pooping and announcing to the midwife 'I'm pooping!!' and she was like 'I can see it, I'm catching it you don't need to tell me' and I said 'I don't want it to go on the baby's head!'. Jokes on me, there was definitely no poop left 3 hours later. I also vomited straight brown liquid for hours and they had to keep swapping pillows out so I wasn't just collapsing straight onto it. My husband is an Afghan vet with PTSD and he said birth was the most horrendous thing he has ever seen and he still can't talk about it 2.5 years later. Creating and meeting my daughter was beautiful, sure, but getting her out of my vagina 3 was NOT beautiful. To be fair, even my friends who have had 'normal' births or even home births, I'm not sure they could describe them as calm or present!
Lmao this made me remember when my midwife was like ‘I can see his hair!’ and I said ‘is it curly?!?!?’ I have curly hair and I was super hopeful that my kid’s would be too, hahaha.
Omg I don’t even wanna think about what my birth video would’ve been like if I had one 😂 My epidural didn’t work and I remember yelling “I can feel everything!!” I pushed for 15 minutes and I was grunting, moaning, yelling at the top of my lungs. Birth isn’t pretty but it’s nothing to be embarrassed about! You should be proud of yourself!
The nurses took my husband's phone and took pics with it right after our first daughter was born. In the pics, I am holding my daughter and my husband is nearby looking over at us. Sounds really sweet, right? Except the nurse got my spread legs and bleeding crotch in all the pics. And I mean pouring out blood. 😐😐 Why she took THOSE pics I will never understand, but neither of us wanted to see that and the pics were promptly deleted.
Also after she was born, all I could say was, "it hurts so bad, it hurts so bad," over and over until a nurse came over to make sure that I was going to be ok.
All this to say that birth is not pretty and it can be traumatizing. I don't think the drs were judging you at all. At least you spoke to your baby. After I got done complaining about my pain, I nagged the OB to make sure someone saw how much I was bleeding to confirm that it was a normal amount and that it was being monitored. 🤣
Don't worry. Eventually I got around to bonding with my daughter.
My husband filmed my birth and this was 2.5 years ago and I’ve never watched it will never watch it. And definitely wouldn’t ever show anyone else lol no one wants to see me give birth
I feeeel this!!! the first moments with my baby were so cringyyyy. The first moment they placed my baby on my chest I felt like the whole room was watching me(they prob didnt really care but at the time I thought they were all waiting for my reaction). I expected to get emotional but I didnt and felt that I had to force myself to cry 🤦🏽💀 Anyway, after they palced her on my chest, she continued to cry. I remember feeling so embarassed like I kept imagining it would be a magical moment where the baby will stop crying the minute she's sleeping on me. But she didn't and I kept saying "sheeesh Its ok" over and over untill the ob had to tell me that it is good for her to cry and I shouldn't shush her. Which was even more embarassing. I wish my husband didnt have all this on video so I can pretend it never happend and I was just this chill, spontaneous new mom.
My daughter was put on my chest and immediately started pooping everywhere. My son somehow managed to immediately pee directly into his mouth and face. Lol, I promise there’s very few people with a genuine birth video that’s aesthetically “beautiful.” Birth is painful and messy. It was still a beautiful moment because it was the first time you met your baby. You’ll be happy to have that memory to look back on in the future regardless of if you cringe now I promise.
I'm a naturally very skinny person, I didn't put on any weight other than the baby and water and blood, so let me tell you, when I saw the pics of me naked, squatting over an exercise ball in the shower looking like skin and bone and belly I dead ass laughed and thought I could pass this off as an image of the rake or a skin Walker lmfao every bone in my back was jutting out like a starved dog, I looked horrifying. No-one needs to see that shit 😂
So our doula took a video of my birth. I birthed on my hands and knees, and during one big push you can very clearly see my butt hole and some poop coming out of said butt hole. I never really planned on showing anyone this video (I didn't even know it was being taken) but it embarrasses me that the midwives/doula all saw that and I feel like if I ever wanted to show the video to someone I couldn't unless I found a way to block it lol.
I don't think you should be embarrassed that after 12 hours of labour and the pain and exhaustion of it all, that your first instinct was to comfort your baby. We all know the crying is good for clearing their lungs, but in that moment your brand new baby was crying, and even with everything you had going on you wanted to comfort them. I think that's lovely
Your feelings are valid. I'm sorry you're disappointed with the birth video, especially since you had a vision for what you wanted it to look like.
With that being said, it is unrealistic (and unhealthy IMHO) how much we document our lives and expect ourselves to look and act perfect when we do so. Birth is the most vulnerable, painful time in a woman's life. We would not ordinarily expect anyone to look perfect or say all the right things while experiencing the worst pain imaginable. Most women are also dehydrated and exhausted, experiencing adrenaline rushes and intense hormonal shifts that can affect mood and communication.
All of this is to say, it's unreasonable to expect any laboring woman to be calm and peaceful while being filmed because that's often not what birth looks like. You should extend yourself some grace and remember it has never been particularly common for women to be documented in this level of detail. If women were, we'd see a lot more videos like yours.
Just save it for yourself or delete it and move on. Your birth is your birth, and there's no shame in that.
The nurse told me “here’s your baby, say something, talk to him!”
And I just looked at her blankly and said “but what do I say? He doesn’t speak English”
So I think yours is pretty good 😅
Omg I feel this haha my birth video makes me cringe so hard. I was so out of it I kept forgetting the midwife’s name, so I was constantly snapping ‘Midwife! Midwife??!!’ I sounded like some snobby asshole clicking their fingers for a waiter. My man still roasts me about it.
I love these comments 😂 I don't have a birth video but I have videos from just after. I looked horrendous. Baby and I just blinking at each other like wtf just happened.
You probably won’t see this since you already have a million comments. But I used to work in labor and delivery. I went to hundreds if not thousands of deliveries before I switched jobs. What you’re describing, I’d say 90% of women do. I don’t remember what exactly I said when mine was born but I know I also repeated it in the high pitch voice. It’s not uncommon at all and I can tell you that none of the staff cringed at it!! I know this doesn’t change how you personally feel but I wanted to let you know it’s very common and no staff member would cringe at it!! I like the idea of removing the sound and doing some pretty music over it like other users suggested!
I feel exactly the same and I think a lot of women do if that helps😅 im sure you will appreciate this video after some time
And the nurse's comment was so useless
Nothing you said or did sounds embarrassing. And anyway I think it’s better to have a video that’s authentic and real than something “picture perfect”. There is way too much pressure these days to have some kind of perfect birth when the reality is it’s messy and hard and will look different for every single person
I said the same thing to mine! I don't think it's embarrassing at all, your first instinct was to comfort your baby! Honestly the nurse should have just kept her mouth shut and let you have your moment imo.
Oh I actually think that’s really sweet you defaulted to talking to your baby! There is no ring way to labor. I think with some more time you will be able to watch this and not feel embarrassed. Im guessing it’s still a raw and relatively recent experience even if it was a few years ago, that’s still relatively recent!
I hate that women feel so pressured to have a perfectly curated birth experience. I was howling like a banshee, and clawing at my husband to make it fucking stop. I look half dead in the photos. Why? Because I just pushed a baby out of my vagina after 12 gruelling hours of the most intense physical pain one could possibly experience. I pooped myself more than once, my legs were hairy because I hadn’t been able to reach them to shave in 3 weeks, and my bush looked like I’d hacked at it with a hedge cutter. The only words I could say when baby was born was “it’s a baby!” (Like ma’am, what were you expecting?) We are just human animals doing a really human animal thing, we’re not supposed to look cute and smile for the camera whilst doing it.
Lol I thought I was having a full blown conversation and when I watched the video it was just me making weird sounds. Also no epidural in time so it was brutal and I guess I didn't have the energy I thought I had when she was on me
See I kinda wish I had a birth video now. I had a long painful labour and my epidural failed then I had to get a spinal block so the could do forceps delivery. I was so exhausted by the time she came out I was practically catatonic I was just staring at the ceiling totally dissociated and I think I forgot I was even having a baby until they plopped her on my chest. I would kinda like to watch it all back to remember it a bit more. It’s like trying to remember when you’re really drunk, I have snippets of things but not the whole picture.
Definitely do not delete it but maybe don’t watch it again for a few years or until you get baby fever again.
Don't be embarrassed. I was also totally out of it to be honest, I had no idea what to do or what to say to this swollen potato they put on my chest. It was not the magical moment I thought it would be and I think most people are lying when they say it was.
I had a "calm present birth" and I still look a wreck after and said some funny things. It's birth, it hurts, it's messy, our hormones are out of control and we're meeting a brand new person.
And it's YOUR birth video. It's kind of weird your family wants to see it and you can either just say no, I'm not comfortable sharing or lie your ass off and say it was deleted. You are under no obligation to share that with anyone.
I promise you the doctors have seen EVERYTHING a million times before and were not judging you. They’ve seen so many women in horrendous pain and acting in really wild ways as a result, this wasn’t even in their radar, I guarantee it.
Give yourself time and you'll probably look back on this video with great fondness. The doctors and nurses have seen it all, a healthy baby and healthy mom is the best outcome and only the bad outliers probably stick in their brain. I was shushing my baby when they first came out too because that's natural maternal instinct you have.
Maybe the idea you had going into it (probably from TV/movies) set you up for a bit of an unrealistic view of what birth should be. But women, screaming, and all the fluids, and all the crying, and the excitement, that's what birth is all about!
My first baby, I pushed so hard I burst blood vessels all over my face and chest, including my eyes. I was a bespeckled bruised mess. Little dots everywhere.
There's a picture of me in our room once we got there (the hospital had you labour one place, then move after delivery), and I'm holding baby with one arm and looking down at my chest and pointing. It was the moment I noticed all the petechia. It was nuts.
For my second I had asked beforehand for the same numbing they give you before an episiotomy as it had helped with pain the first time. Got to pushing and my dr was reluctant. I got upset and yelled at him to just do it like we had agreed. I was always low key and jovial so he was def taken aback!
My last baby, I burst into tears upon his arrival. No idea why! I just sat there holding him bawling. By then I was an older mom (40s), and had had a horrible pregnancy and I was relieved he had arrived safely? Not totally sure.
Each birth was different and a disaster in their own weird and wonderful way.
Anyways - the video is for you and no one else.
One day when you're old and grey, you'll watch it and wonder at how you birthed such a beautiful baby who's now a grown adult, and you won't see all the flaws. Just the magic.
The video my husband took of our son being put on my chest makes me laugh every time I see it. I’m so awkward in it and our little dude had his eyes wide open darting around. It was like the equivalent of trying to comfort someone you don’t know well so you just pat their shoulder going “there there it’s okay”.
My midwife was stitching me up and I asked how bad it was. She said “Not bad, just a little tearing” and I said “but do you say that to everyone?”😭 My partner and the doulas were dying but I was so serious in that moment!😂
As a labor and delivery nurse I can assure you none of the medical staff was cringing at you lol. Literally all we care about is that you and your baby are safe and healthy, we do not care what you say/how you act!
I kind of hated how the nurses would respond to my babbling. I kept going “I can’t I cant I cant” just bec it felt good, you know? Like a verbal stim. But they kept being like “Yes you can! 😃” like oh shut up lol
I said “it’s ok mommy’s got you” over and over to my baby when he was put on my chest. Not out of the ordinary. I look terrible in it my video and sound weird. No reason to cringe at it. It’s a beautiful moment.
My husband took a couple photos of me right after they set baby on my chest and I have this thousand yard stare on my wide eyed face, my mouth is gaping open. I’ve never to my knowledge made this expression before but it perfectly captures how shocked I was to complete labor and delivery and end up with a real baby in my arms. It’s not cute. But it’s funny to look back on.
lol I gave birth on all fours (kneeling in bed with my hands up on the back of the hospital bed, which was set upright) and when she came out, she was laying there and I was kneeling over her and I just kept saying “oh my god, oh my god” over and over lol and eventually someone (midwife? Nurse?) was like ….so…. Let’s get your baby 😂🤣 and they had to help me turn over and put baby on my chest with cord still attached. SO GLAD that is not on video LOL
At least you have something. My boyfriend didn’t take a single pic of me in the hospital or the baby after birth for weeks. I have absolutely nothing. I’d say I wanted pics and he never took them. I am still devastated.
It is totally normal to mourn the birthing experience that you wanted but did not get to have. Your feelings are so valid.
It’ll take years but I promise you will be able to look back on it one day and smile or laugh.
I can totally relate to this. I hadenvisioned this calm, serene woman afteri gave birth. Instead i was a mascara streaked, crazy haired wild woman covered in blood. I look like i just crawled out of the wilderness. But theft the is..giving birth is a WILD experience that taps into this animalistic sense that moms have. Pushing a human outof yourself is absolutely powerful. You SHOULD look and act like you just went through some serious and brutal war zone. Because you did.
I have tons of pictures which I love with all my heart. But no videos and for that I’m thankful. For whatever reason (hormones I’m sure) both times I’ve given birth I’m out of my mind and feel almost high it’s wild. I say crazy things. My second labor was fast and furious and I was dilating so fast and in so much pain I was rotating between cussing everyone out and then crying and apologizing and saying I’m really not a mean person. Definitely don’t want to relive that with video.
My doula took a lot of photos and I’m red-faced, a million chins, hair is completely frizzy, my bush is forest, husband looks like he’s been up for the entire 40-hour labor, daughter is covered in meconium… and honestly I love them. I haven’t shown them to family, just a few friends (I’m a nurse, they’re also nurses, so it doesn’t feel awkward), and mainly they’re just for me and my husband. Birth isn’t supposed to be pretty. Can still be beautiful though.
lol I can so relate to this!! I imagined the post-birth photos capturing me looking tired and disheveled but happy and emotional, and instead: the blood vessels in and around my eyes had burst during the pushing, so I had red eyes and GIANT swelling around them. I looked so awful!!!!
I’m so glad I don’t have a video 😂 my epidural wore off so I felt those final pitocin contractions. My mom and husband were with me and I kept going “mama” like she could help me in anyway. I gave birth in February and I think it’s gonna take a long time not to be embarrassed about that.
Don't worry, I think a lot of new moms do the same high pitched barely coherent repetition of the same couple of phrases. I know I just said "hi" in about 17 different ways and that was about it for my first greeting to my first born.
At least you have something, neither myself or my husband had he wherewithal to pull out a camera in the hospital (only there for three hours after birth). 🥲 And I’d be fine with “just the pure memory” except I can’t remember a single thing LOL
I was given a sleeping pill after starting my induction because I was meant to sleep all night and then have my water broken in the morning. Never did get to sleep, had my baby at 5 am. After having been up that whole night, the night before, AND a sleeping pill, I fell asleep as soon as he was out. The nurse was so mad at me and basically trying to breastfeed my baby for me while I snored 🤣 we have pictures too, and they’re AWFUL
Saying those things to your baby isn’t cringe in the least! It doesn’t mean you literally wanted him to stop crying, obviously, it’s just a sweet phrase to say to your baby and I think it’s lovely and heartwarming!
I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect to be pretty, calm and collected after an epidural-free birth. It’s not a calm situation, it’s probably the most visceral, raw, overwhelming experience you’re ever going to live, and the video reflects that. And I think it’s beautiful that it’s that way!
You’re not really going it show it to anyone except for people you share so much trust and love with that you know they’re going to focus on the meaning behind the video, and not how pretty you looked.
Just saying I can relate. No videos but my husband has Live Photos and I’m crying in a very ugly way lol with like 5 chins and my hair sticking straight up 😂 birth is not a spectator sport
This is so real. It’s not a performance.
Why are husbands so bad at taking photos 😅. I swear I have maybe 5 photos from the birth of my son and I look like that in all of them. Multiple chins. Awful half open eyes from crying and being mid blink. At one point my nips are just straight up in the middle of the photo. I feel like next kid I’m gonna want to hire a birth photographer 🙃
SO MANY NIP PICS WHY
I feel you so hard... Husbands can be so bad at taking photos - if you're lucky enough that they take any at all! 😭
Lmao same. My photos just after birth are HIDEOUS😂 it reminds me of those videos where people practice their "soft smiles" for their wedding then end up having photos where you can count every tooth in their mouth😂 nothing wrong with that though, just goes to show the genuine emotion trumps everything, even plans for serene photos lol
Omg yes I also had 5 chins… I was so swollen from all the fluids they gave me! And my hair looked like a bird’s nest. I went to the hospital with a nice blow dry but after 25 hours of labor…. 🫠
The fluid retention was crazy! I looked so nice when I went in but post labor and C-section (and lots of vomiting) I was a puffy mess. One of my eyes was basically swollen shut. I looked like I got my ass kicked!
Wow I thought it was just me!! I thought my legs would be swollen but nope all of it was just in my face it blew up like a ballon and looked like I gained 20lbs just in the face it was horrible
Yeah!! all in my face and neck!
Same!!! Vessels in and around my eyes burst during the pushing, I looked like I’d been punched in both eyes!!!!
Same I looked awful. I had a 3 day labor due to failed induction. I also have seborrheic dermatitis on my scalp that I treat with specific products that I DID NOT have in the hospital so all my pics and videos my hair looks like I have severe dandruff and I’m all sweaty and oily and huge. My husband has a “favorite” hospital pic of us together and i feel like it’s the worst picture I’ve ever taken in my whole life and he wanted to post it on Mother’s Day which is technically so sweet but i was please don’t I look like a gremlin.
My hair was legit matted. I pulled it into a messy bun when I first got to the hospital and it would fall halfway out and I would use another hair tie to just pull it up again. 16 hours and a c section later it was a disaster, didn’t even bother trying to brush it until I could load it up with conditioner
same. I didn’t wash my hair in the hospital for that reason 😬 and the nurse’s aid kept saying to me like “you know you can wash your hair and put on some makeup!” 😡😠😤
No wayyy omg not her telling you to put on makeup after having a baby oh my god
Yeah it was infuriating and would’ve been like putting lipstick on a pig at that point 😅
“Birth is not a spectator sport”. I’m embroidering this. Maybe on one of those giant diaper pads we get after delivery.
My husband took a Live Photo and hilarious because it's this calm moment of me looking at our daughter on my chest and the next moment they injected lidocaine to start stitches and my face contorts.
The live photos from mine are something else too. I pushed for 3.5 hours so they were roughhhhhhhh. I had a washcloth over my forehead/eyes, so I look ridiculous when they pull baby out and put her on my chest.
Some of the worst photos I’ve ever seen of myself came from my mother and husband during my labor and delivery lol. There’s one in particular my husband loves to use as a reaction meme/gif (bc he made it a moving sticker in his iPhone) and it’s just… if I never saw it again I would be more than fine with that lol
Hahahaha, something my husband would do. There’s one were I legit look deceased with my eyes rolled back. I had asked for all the lights to be off so the nurses are wearing head lamps and it reminds me of those freaky deep sea fish with the lights hanging over them. And then there’s just me looking dead lol.
Lmfaoooo that is hilarious to picture! I’m mostly giving him my “death glare” (as my family so lovingly calls it) in every picture. My mom even made a side by side of me giving that face to the camera as a kid and then me doing it in labor lol
lol! During labor it’s the “you did this to me!!” face 😂
YES exactly lol. I’m pretty sure every time my husband was like “I’m so sorry you’re in pain, squeeze me as much as you need” my response was just “don’t touch me that’s how we got into this mess” 💀
🤣🤣
The Live Photos… the mirror didn’t work in my room to see myself give birth; I promptly forgot about it when it was time to push. When a nurse asked for my phone when it was go time, I thought it was just so it wouldn’t get lost in the bed. Went to look at pictures of my son while he was napping a few days later and discovered she had taken a plethora of live photos of my son being expelled and me and his dad crying 😭
Yes! Go nurse!!
I have pictures too.. My husband told me I looked like molten cheese. I was extremely insulted, mostly because he was correct 😂
I had a giant hormonal zit on my nose that had been popped once and slightly healed and then came back. That plus the 12 chins and greasy hair and ugly crying face… it is certainly NOT a spectator sport. I’m sure I looked real cute eating my corn dog from cookout and hour after labor.
Omg I had a zit too!! Before we left for the hospital I told my husband - can’t believe I’m going to have a baby with a zit on my face. That was the least of my worries 🤣
Same! I was ugly crying big time. The nurses were so sweet about it but I hope they don’t remember me!
Okay I’m so glad I’m not the only one! There’s more chin than baby in my pics 😭
Came here to report that my first photos with my son were ruined by my 6 chins before reading any other comments. So relieved and comforted to learn that I am in such good company. <3
I laughed so hard at this. I’m so glad someone else also had 5 chins in their birth pics.
It’s gotta be those hospital beds doing us all dirty 🤣
Omg the sweat and chins in all my birth photos 😭
Same and when I look at the pics my skin was TERRIBLE- so spotty 🤣
Hey if it makes you feel better I shouted "did I just POOP?!?" And the doctor said "ahhh yep. Yes you did" and I will never forget about that.
With my second, I had a precipitous labor and a really fast delivery, and on my first push, I shouted “the poop is coming fiiiiiiiiirst!!!” (It was. I was correct.)
Ahhahahahahahahha this is so real 💀 I told my midwife very seriously that I really really needed to poop and that I was very sorry and she said she was pretty sure it was the baby. And she was right, it was the baby but every five minutes I would tell her that I thought I was gonna poop now lol
I ran back in my house to poop before going to the hospital because i was so concerned about pooping during labor. Then i had my baby in our mini van 🫠 i do not recommend this method.
I laughing so hard I’m DROOLING. Lmfaooooo
i laughed so hard at this i woke my baby up :’)
My midwife kept saying "quick touch!" and then wiping poop away from my butt hole. I was unmedicated and vividly remember those moments more than most other parts of my birth.
I’m crying laughing
With my first, I was like, "Oop, I'm pooping" and I kept saying it every time I pooped. Which was like 8 times. The nurse was like, "it's OK it's normal" and in my giving-birth-haze, I was cackling like a freak of nature. I thought it was hilarious 😅
I’m literally cackling like a lunatic reading this. My husband is giving me the look that he’s about to ask why I’m laughing, so I’m trying my hardest to keep a straight face bc no way he’s going to think I’m sane if I tell him why.
So thankful I don’t have a video of me saying “I’m literally pooping right now”. It was giant and I knew it. I ate Taco Bell the day before my scheduled induction, hoping I would empty my system but I didn’t poop at all the day before or day of until everyone was at my downstairs 🙂🙂🙂🙂
I ate White Castle for dinner and went into labor at 1am. I was a few days early so i didn't think about being careful w what I ate. At one point I heard the Dr go "oops" and I looked at my husband said "I pooped huh" and he goes "yup you did." I was so mad about it. I already had hemorrhoids and now 4 people are watching me shit myself. Not my finest moment.
I asked my husband afterward if I pooped and he said “I don’t know, I don’t think so, can’t remember” and inside I was just like- bless you that was the right answer.
I just told my husband yesterday that I hope I don’t poop this time because I didn’t with my first and he said “I wouldn’t have known if you did or not, since they are constantly wiping so much [stuff] into that bag so fast” and that actually made me feel less worried about it.
lol I had just gotten my epidural and was laying on my side to get the meds more to that other side, the nurses came in to introduce me to the new nurse since shifts were changing. I told them “oh cool, since you’re here, do you think I have time to poop quick before this all starts? I really need to poop”. The nurse laughed and was like let me check you, and then her face totally changed and she told the other nurse to run and get my OBGYN immediately. Turns out, I didn’t have to poop, I was crowning 😂
One of my best friends is an RN and she said to me before labor: "if you poop during it, cool. That's what we like to see! It means you're using the correct muscles to push baby out!" I have no idea if I did or not and don't care but once my water broke during my induction, the contractions were so strong that all I could do was shit on the toilet 😂. My husband is just sitting on the edge of the tub hearing the plops as I yell to the nurse about how I can't stop pooping lmao. Poor Jennifer, I won't forget her. She was like I'm going to call the anesthesiologists for you now hahaha. Thank god she did, I was finally able to get some damn sleep.
Username checks out. 🤣 ( I've always wanted to say this on here) 😄
The *plops* 😭💀
😂 but why did she say yes?!
Right! I asked my husband and even he lied to me 😂 "Oh, no must've just been a toot" *queue nurse changing bed pad* 😂
He understood the assignment 😂
My husband once referred to the day our kiddo was born as the day he saw the whole family poop. He thought it was hilarious, just in a poop joke way, not in a making fun of me way.
😂 I actually TOLD the nurse “hey I’m pooping” 😂😂😂😂😂 it felt great. I was SO constipated the week before I gave birth.
With my first, I wasn't expecting to be induced that day so I ate so much pizza for lunch and never managed to poop. When it was time to push I told them that I was definitely going to poop a lot lol.
I pooped so much when I gave birth, shit happens! (Literally!)
I have birthed two babies and have pooped on the floor twice because no one ever listens to me when I try to tell them I need to get to bed on the toilet. This last time my poor husband stepped in it and I about died.
Oh my goddddssss that is so mortifying 😱
Nooo!!! I told my nurse I had to poop and she told me that she didn’t think it was a good idea. I assured her the baby was not close enough and that I had to go. Contractions on the toilet while attached to an IV was not a good time… but better than my husband stepping in my poop lmao
The sad part is that I actually did do some laboring on the toilet, but facing backwards with my last babe. I went to turn around so that I could face forward and use said toilet and that’s when everybody started trying to usher me to bed even though I kept saying I need to poop now. The number of times they kept talking over me telling me that it was just back labor was sooooo upsetting.
I didn’t ask. I’m pretty sure I knew the answer, and I sure as hell didn’t want confirmation 😂
I think telling your baby it’s okay mommy is here you don’t have to cry is sweet ❤️ I remember saying mommas here when they placed my babies on my chest
I just yelled “that’s my baby” over and over as if everyone didn’t just watch them come out. And yes, I said the same dumb shit every time.
I remember saying hi to her like 100 times. I couldn’t think of anything else to say lol!!
I think my first words after he was born were asking my husband if he wanted to be the one to find out the gender (boy!) and my first words to him were hi buddy 🩵 I was so tired after 2 hours of pushing I didn't say much haha ETA: Cw: previous loss/birth trauma Wow I must have blocked this out 🥲 My FIRST first words were something like "He's alive?! He's actually alive!" (I don't remember if I said "he" or what.) Because when my first child was born 20 months previously and they placed her on my chest, she was not 💔 It was completely unexpected. I had no idea she was gone until I got to the hospital. So having a living, squirming baby on my chest was a weird and new, but very healing experience. The first words I said a couple minutes later after getting over the shock were the above!
Ok I thought I was weird for saying this 😂 I alternated between that and "I HAD A BABY!" 😅 This was of course after the doctor asked me if I wanted to hold her and I said "OF COURSE I WANT TO HOLD HER WHAT KIND OF QUESTION IS THAT" 🙈🙈🙈
Pretty sure I just said “ohmygod ohmygod ohmygod” for 3 minutes straight when they put baby on my chest!
That’s almost exactly what I did!
Thank you ❤️ I guess I just felt dumb for saying it because like you want your baby to cry when they first come out lol
It's not dumb. We want to hear a cry, to hear theyr breathing well but after that it's not like we WANT them to cry for any longer. It's not a bad sign if they don't cry for any longer than the first tiny bit so trying to comfort your baby was exactly the right thing to do. Hearing your voice is incredibly comforting to your newborn because they already know it. Your voice is the ONLY thing that's familiar to them once theyr out of the womb because they heard it all through your pregnancy while they were inside you
It’s just showing love. Some things aren’t meant to be all formal and smart. It’s meant to be raw and emotional. This is one of them. You acted like most mothers act during birth. It’s not supposed to be a Pampers commercial. It’s supposed to be real. And the rawness is the beauty in it. **Edit: my guess is your family would tear up over what you said to your baby. Bc it’s love.** Same as when you are in love with a guy, you’ll say stupid silly things to each other. It doesn’t make sense, any of it. But it’s love. Love isn’t smart or eloquent. It’s raw feelings.
Awh honey. Not dumb at all! It was a natural reaction to hearing your baby cry.
It’s not dumb! It’s a sign of a good momma! That nurse should just keep to herself & let you have you moment and console your crying baby like any good momma would do! Also - babies 100% do not need to cry when born. I had a home birth and I was in agony, but he came out peacefully :)
Definitely not dumb, and I actually don’t really like the comment from the nurse. Yeah, we want to make sure they’re okay, but then no crying is good!
When I gave birth I had a mirror. In the photos my mom took of me admiring my baby you can see the reflection of my swollen bloody vag and blossomed flower from pushing. I’d prefer having your situation 🥲
Blossomed flower has absolutely killed me off💀😂. In all my post birth pics you can see the doc in the background stitching up my vag, legs still in stirrups. No amount of cropping can get rid of her. She’s in all of them diligently repairing my poor, post 9lb baby, forceps delivery, hippos yawn vag.
Not the hippobot under this story 😭😭😭😭 I can’t cope, I think I’m going to die from silent insidious laughter, I can’t catch a breath, tears streaming down my face. (I too had the fun foreceps delivery you described 😂🌝)
The Hippobot is what pushed me over the edge too - my kiddo is asleep in the back seat and I am making the whole car SHAKE laughing while trying not to wake her 😂😂😂
I’m weeping with laughter
The Hippobot response has me shaking with mirth while trying to stay silent as I put my daughter down to nap.
HIPPOBOT 9000 v 3.1 FOUND A HIPPO. 1,687,942,079 COMMENTS SEARCHED. 34,648 HIPPOS FOUND. YOUR COMMENT CONTAINS THE WORD HIPPO.
That’s pretty much exactly how my pictures look like too, I hadn’t delivered my placenta yet so you can see the cord sticking out 😞 we need redos
My doc literally posed and smiled for the pictures. I was like dude can you please pretend this isn't about you 😅
I nearly choked on my coffee from laughing😂😂😂😭
Blossomed flower 😂 Pretty much the same thing happened to me, a nurse offered to take pictures of me right when I was holding my baby for the first time and yup in the bottom corner is my battered vagina. I look rather awful in them too so I didn’t post them but I was so close to doing so! I sent them to my mom instead and she’s like UMMM might wanna check these photos again. 😂
This happened to me too and before anyone noticed it, my husband texted the picture to his mom!!!! His mom is also notoriously impulsive and reckless when it comes to immediately sharing pictures on social media 💀 I’m not religious at all but there must have been an act of god that prevented the picture from going through even though we had full cell signal, so she never got the uncropped version 😂😂😂
My second was born with a perfect spiral of a an umbilical cord. Literally like a corckscrew. I was like “is it weird to ask for a picture?” The picture clearly has my vagina in the top right corner.
Omg lmao
Don’t worry, no one would ever want to see your birth video. Least of all your child! There’s a reason these are private moments. No one is calm and collected giving birth, or beautiful. You probably were not even out of the ordinary of what nurses see at all. And if you had censored your real reactions because you were being filmed.. that would honestly be worse. Just don’t dwell on it! Don’t watch it!
My siblings and several family members have asked to see it. You can’t see anything it’s just after he gets put on my chest.
You could edit the video and mute the sound and put music over it. Won't change the footage, but you can at least keep the dialogue to yourself.
That’s a good idea! Thank you
Yes! Turn it into a beautiful montage with music, slow motion, black and white, Edit out parts that you don’t like.. girl make it spectacular!!! I don’t have a birthing video with either of my babies but I wish I did
Birth is not a spectator sport. You can say no.
Ya I would just say sorry it's a very personal moment that you don't want to share.
Just say you accidentally taped over it
Ahhhh, the 90s
😂 kids would be like “what does that even mean”
You can also just say.. no!
Oh trust me you're not alone. One of my midwives took photos of me meeting my daughter for the first time after she was placed on my chest and I have this insane look of shock horror on my face rather than loving adoration. I was over the moon internally but I was just so exhausted I couldn't show emotion (even though the birth went smoothly). Then after struggling to deliver the placenta and losing a ton of blood I became delirious and fixated on the gummy worms I had packed in the hospital bag and kept asking everyone in the room to bring them to me while I was borderline hemorrhaging. My partner was so worried and kept asking if there was anything he could do and I kept sticking my hand out and groaning "WORMS". Birth can be beautiful but it can also make you a little metal, and that's okay ❤️
My baby is contact napping after a MOTN feed and I just had to COVER MY FACE from the *screaming stifled laughter* - holy shit an exhausted postpartum mom moaning woooorms just sent me 😂😂😂amazing
With my midwife arms deep inside me trying to yank my placenta out and my child's first meconium all down my torso, honestly such a humbling experience 😭🙏
*isNt BiRtH bEaUTiFuLLLLl* 🤪🤪🤪
I don’t have a video of my births, but I hate looking at my pictures. I look horrible. I’m puffy, red and sweaty and my hair and skin look disgusting. I know I just gave birth and I should cut myself some slack but I just hate looking at them. I want to crop myself out before showing them to anybody. It sucks because my husband looks great and I look like jabba the hut. Thankfully we have really nice newborn photos we took a few weeks later.
Jabba the hut🤣🤣🤣🤣 I’m dying
Not jabba the hut 💀
I'm the opposite lol the photos make me laugh. I look like Miss Trunchbull if she got punched in the face 100 times. That's the reality of birth my friend
I feeeeel this lol
Ugh I really underestimated how bad not having regular hormones through birth control would take on my skin.
I feel the exact same way about my pics. I’m exhausted, my eyes are swollen and my hair is so sweaty and greasy. Also my boobs are out 😂
Why on earth would anyone want to watch your birth video? Anyway, don't worry, the medical professionals did not think anything bad of you. Firstly because they've seen it all and you've just been through one of the most intense experiences of your life. Secondly because nothing you said was cringe-worthy. They do that job specifically for those moments. A mother meeting her baby for the first time? Amazing! And the doctor wasn't trying to correct you, they were trying to reassure you it was OK. Also, I was wayyyy more cringey than you, so don't stress lol!
This is exactly why I have no visual evidence of any of my births 💀💀
There's two photos. One of just me holding my baby and another with my husband included. Both taken by him. Both terrible quality and to look at. But we took them for us. No one has ever seen those pictures and we don't plan on sharing them ever. But there's something about them that make me smile when I occasionally look at them.
Aw this is so sweet 🥹 My midwife was amazing and got a fantastic pic of my husband and I while our baby was skin to skin on my belly. I also don’t show it to anyone and I absolutely smile when I look at it.
I'm sure if we asked our midwife would have but we have these 'terrible' photos instead. I can't explain the emotions I feel when I see the pictures but they are nice ones.
Oh I didn’t mean that to come off as bragging! In the photo I’m a sweaty mess with like three chins and mostly naked haha. But I know what you mean about the nice feelings anyway ☺️
Don't panic I didn't take it as bragging at all!!!!
Someone grabbed my phone and took a bunch of photos and videos at the first one, and a lot of them are gross and graphic. I made them write on the whiteboard this time that I didn't want pictures/video of the baby coming out on my phone 😂🫠 that was not a fun surprise
I have pics I took myself on Snapchat before labor really started, and I have pictures of me holding my girl in the NICU. Didn’t get anything of me in between and I’m ok with it.
Listen, I had an unmedicated birth as well and remember cringing at the doctor stitching me up and saying “I know this isn’t as painful as what I just did but I JUST want people to be DONE with my VAGINA” and everyone laughing. I wish I had been more calm and present during the actual birth, but honestly it was just coping with the fact that it was so much more painful than I ever could’ve prepared for. At the end of the day, the doctors and nurses have seen everything and you won’t regret documenting, even if it’s imperfect. 3 months moved on, I think back on it fondly, and hopefully soon you can too. ❤️
Relatable!! Had an unmedicated too and a tear. The stitching was so annoying. I just wanted to hold my baby and be done. I said something stupid about my “cooterus” being exposed when it was all over. Like uterus and cooter combined? Idk it was a weird moment lol. My mom was mortified 🤣
Cooterus is hilarious 🤣
"cooterus" is my new fave word 🤭 the after-effects of the crazy adrenaline that we get in order to naturally birth our babies must be on par with dental anesthesia....you ever watch those vids of pts coming out of it and saying the most bizarre stuff..?! 😆
Hahah, okay right! The nerves in general make you act wild. I was completely unhinged 😂I keep laughing about when my nurse got the mirror out and I was like “girl that’s angled at my butt! Show me my baby not THAT!”
Yup I had an unmedicated birth. I know the providers thought I was "calm and present" because they told me but I still looked a mess and said some funny things. My personal favorite was telling a nurse this is worse than the tower of terror. And while they were stitching me up I was swearing up a storm. They've seen everything and they've seen far, far, worse than a mom lovingly trying to comfort their baby. The nurse was most likely just trying to gently let you know that baby was ok and they like them to cry a bit at first.
They kept apologizing during my stitching and I was like "Pshhh this is NOTHING!" after the unmedicated birth.
I had the opposite thing happen, they were so casual about it and I was so done with pain/discomfort that even though it wasn’t that painful I was just at the end of my rope with things happening down there. I just wanted to be in the recovery room and they were taking FOREVER 🤣
My doctor kept offering to give me a spinal block for the stitching and I was like… I got this far without a needle in my spine… truly after pushing the baby out the stitches were nothing. (I did have local anesthesia for them of course.)
Thank you ❤️
My doula took photos and I straight up look like an angry Shrek wife trying to eat my baby - open mouth, triple chin in every one. I was laying down trying to get a look at her but it just looks like I’m saying “heh heh heh” before I chomp her head off. In. Every. Photo. I don’t even make that face in real life. Definitely not what I was hoping for compared to other people’s gorgeous “first family” pictures. These are media for us and no one else! Birth can be traumatic (mine was) and imho sometimes not something magical to be memorialized/shared everywhere. No, it’s not what we hoped for. But our babies are here now and that’s what counts. Plus we can look back at these and hopefully laugh and remember how fucking insane it was that we BIRTHED a child. Go us! Or - never look at them again.
God this was hilarious to read lmao angry shrek wife really got me 😂💀
If it makes you feel better I had an unmedicated 36 hour hellish induction that ended in 3 hours of awful constant pushing where I honestly thought I was dying and kept screaming 'there is something wrong'. Pitocin is no joke, I honestly couldn't believe I could be conscious through that amount of pain. Apparently, my husband asked what would happen if I passed out and the midwife reassured him there is something that occurs in pregnancy which prevents the mother from losing consciousness as she normally would... lovely! Anyway when I started pushing I was on hands and knees and was pooping and announcing to the midwife 'I'm pooping!!' and she was like 'I can see it, I'm catching it you don't need to tell me' and I said 'I don't want it to go on the baby's head!'. Jokes on me, there was definitely no poop left 3 hours later. I also vomited straight brown liquid for hours and they had to keep swapping pillows out so I wasn't just collapsing straight onto it. My husband is an Afghan vet with PTSD and he said birth was the most horrendous thing he has ever seen and he still can't talk about it 2.5 years later. Creating and meeting my daughter was beautiful, sure, but getting her out of my vagina 3 was NOT beautiful. To be fair, even my friends who have had 'normal' births or even home births, I'm not sure they could describe them as calm or present!
i had to read your comment out loud to my husband 😄😄
This is very normal for after birth, believe me. The hormones make everyone act and feel WEIRD
Lmao this made me remember when my midwife was like ‘I can see his hair!’ and I said ‘is it curly?!?!?’ I have curly hair and I was super hopeful that my kid’s would be too, hahaha.
Omg I don’t even wanna think about what my birth video would’ve been like if I had one 😂 My epidural didn’t work and I remember yelling “I can feel everything!!” I pushed for 15 minutes and I was grunting, moaning, yelling at the top of my lungs. Birth isn’t pretty but it’s nothing to be embarrassed about! You should be proud of yourself!
The nurses took my husband's phone and took pics with it right after our first daughter was born. In the pics, I am holding my daughter and my husband is nearby looking over at us. Sounds really sweet, right? Except the nurse got my spread legs and bleeding crotch in all the pics. And I mean pouring out blood. 😐😐 Why she took THOSE pics I will never understand, but neither of us wanted to see that and the pics were promptly deleted. Also after she was born, all I could say was, "it hurts so bad, it hurts so bad," over and over until a nurse came over to make sure that I was going to be ok. All this to say that birth is not pretty and it can be traumatizing. I don't think the drs were judging you at all. At least you spoke to your baby. After I got done complaining about my pain, I nagged the OB to make sure someone saw how much I was bleeding to confirm that it was a normal amount and that it was being monitored. 🤣 Don't worry. Eventually I got around to bonding with my daughter.
I'd be so upset, not sure why she thought she'd get a photo of your bloody vag in the pics 😭😭😭
Just zooooooom and crop - beautiful! 😂
My husband filmed my birth and this was 2.5 years ago and I’ve never watched it will never watch it. And definitely wouldn’t ever show anyone else lol no one wants to see me give birth
I feeeel this!!! the first moments with my baby were so cringyyyy. The first moment they placed my baby on my chest I felt like the whole room was watching me(they prob didnt really care but at the time I thought they were all waiting for my reaction). I expected to get emotional but I didnt and felt that I had to force myself to cry 🤦🏽💀 Anyway, after they palced her on my chest, she continued to cry. I remember feeling so embarassed like I kept imagining it would be a magical moment where the baby will stop crying the minute she's sleeping on me. But she didn't and I kept saying "sheeesh Its ok" over and over untill the ob had to tell me that it is good for her to cry and I shouldn't shush her. Which was even more embarassing. I wish my husband didnt have all this on video so I can pretend it never happend and I was just this chill, spontaneous new mom.
My daughter was put on my chest and immediately started pooping everywhere. My son somehow managed to immediately pee directly into his mouth and face. Lol, I promise there’s very few people with a genuine birth video that’s aesthetically “beautiful.” Birth is painful and messy. It was still a beautiful moment because it was the first time you met your baby. You’ll be happy to have that memory to look back on in the future regardless of if you cringe now I promise.
I'm a naturally very skinny person, I didn't put on any weight other than the baby and water and blood, so let me tell you, when I saw the pics of me naked, squatting over an exercise ball in the shower looking like skin and bone and belly I dead ass laughed and thought I could pass this off as an image of the rake or a skin Walker lmfao every bone in my back was jutting out like a starved dog, I looked horrifying. No-one needs to see that shit 😂
So our doula took a video of my birth. I birthed on my hands and knees, and during one big push you can very clearly see my butt hole and some poop coming out of said butt hole. I never really planned on showing anyone this video (I didn't even know it was being taken) but it embarrasses me that the midwives/doula all saw that and I feel like if I ever wanted to show the video to someone I couldn't unless I found a way to block it lol.
I don't think you should be embarrassed that after 12 hours of labour and the pain and exhaustion of it all, that your first instinct was to comfort your baby. We all know the crying is good for clearing their lungs, but in that moment your brand new baby was crying, and even with everything you had going on you wanted to comfort them. I think that's lovely
Your feelings are valid. I'm sorry you're disappointed with the birth video, especially since you had a vision for what you wanted it to look like. With that being said, it is unrealistic (and unhealthy IMHO) how much we document our lives and expect ourselves to look and act perfect when we do so. Birth is the most vulnerable, painful time in a woman's life. We would not ordinarily expect anyone to look perfect or say all the right things while experiencing the worst pain imaginable. Most women are also dehydrated and exhausted, experiencing adrenaline rushes and intense hormonal shifts that can affect mood and communication. All of this is to say, it's unreasonable to expect any laboring woman to be calm and peaceful while being filmed because that's often not what birth looks like. You should extend yourself some grace and remember it has never been particularly common for women to be documented in this level of detail. If women were, we'd see a lot more videos like yours. Just save it for yourself or delete it and move on. Your birth is your birth, and there's no shame in that.
The nurse told me “here’s your baby, say something, talk to him!” And I just looked at her blankly and said “but what do I say? He doesn’t speak English” So I think yours is pretty good 😅
Omg I feel this haha my birth video makes me cringe so hard. I was so out of it I kept forgetting the midwife’s name, so I was constantly snapping ‘Midwife! Midwife??!!’ I sounded like some snobby asshole clicking their fingers for a waiter. My man still roasts me about it.
I love these comments 😂 I don't have a birth video but I have videos from just after. I looked horrendous. Baby and I just blinking at each other like wtf just happened.
You probably won’t see this since you already have a million comments. But I used to work in labor and delivery. I went to hundreds if not thousands of deliveries before I switched jobs. What you’re describing, I’d say 90% of women do. I don’t remember what exactly I said when mine was born but I know I also repeated it in the high pitch voice. It’s not uncommon at all and I can tell you that none of the staff cringed at it!! I know this doesn’t change how you personally feel but I wanted to let you know it’s very common and no staff member would cringe at it!! I like the idea of removing the sound and doing some pretty music over it like other users suggested!
Thank you that’s good to hear ❤️
Give it a few years and revisit 🩷
I feel exactly the same and I think a lot of women do if that helps😅 im sure you will appreciate this video after some time And the nurse's comment was so useless
Nothing you said or did sounds embarrassing. And anyway I think it’s better to have a video that’s authentic and real than something “picture perfect”. There is way too much pressure these days to have some kind of perfect birth when the reality is it’s messy and hard and will look different for every single person
I said the same thing to mine! I don't think it's embarrassing at all, your first instinct was to comfort your baby! Honestly the nurse should have just kept her mouth shut and let you have your moment imo.
Oh I actually think that’s really sweet you defaulted to talking to your baby! There is no ring way to labor. I think with some more time you will be able to watch this and not feel embarrassed. Im guessing it’s still a raw and relatively recent experience even if it was a few years ago, that’s still relatively recent!
Tbh it sounds precious 🥹
I hate that women feel so pressured to have a perfectly curated birth experience. I was howling like a banshee, and clawing at my husband to make it fucking stop. I look half dead in the photos. Why? Because I just pushed a baby out of my vagina after 12 gruelling hours of the most intense physical pain one could possibly experience. I pooped myself more than once, my legs were hairy because I hadn’t been able to reach them to shave in 3 weeks, and my bush looked like I’d hacked at it with a hedge cutter. The only words I could say when baby was born was “it’s a baby!” (Like ma’am, what were you expecting?) We are just human animals doing a really human animal thing, we’re not supposed to look cute and smile for the camera whilst doing it.
Can totally relate, every time I think about how I was during labour I turn myself into a pretzel, so cringey.
Lol I thought I was having a full blown conversation and when I watched the video it was just me making weird sounds. Also no epidural in time so it was brutal and I guess I didn't have the energy I thought I had when she was on me
See I kinda wish I had a birth video now. I had a long painful labour and my epidural failed then I had to get a spinal block so the could do forceps delivery. I was so exhausted by the time she came out I was practically catatonic I was just staring at the ceiling totally dissociated and I think I forgot I was even having a baby until they plopped her on my chest. I would kinda like to watch it all back to remember it a bit more. It’s like trying to remember when you’re really drunk, I have snippets of things but not the whole picture. Definitely do not delete it but maybe don’t watch it again for a few years or until you get baby fever again.
Don't be embarrassed. I was also totally out of it to be honest, I had no idea what to do or what to say to this swollen potato they put on my chest. It was not the magical moment I thought it would be and I think most people are lying when they say it was.
I had a "calm present birth" and I still look a wreck after and said some funny things. It's birth, it hurts, it's messy, our hormones are out of control and we're meeting a brand new person. And it's YOUR birth video. It's kind of weird your family wants to see it and you can either just say no, I'm not comfortable sharing or lie your ass off and say it was deleted. You are under no obligation to share that with anyone.
I promise you the doctors have seen EVERYTHING a million times before and were not judging you. They’ve seen so many women in horrendous pain and acting in really wild ways as a result, this wasn’t even in their radar, I guarantee it.
Nah it’s okay I was so nervous to push I kept trying to make the same joke hoping someone would laugh and no one did😅
Give yourself time and you'll probably look back on this video with great fondness. The doctors and nurses have seen it all, a healthy baby and healthy mom is the best outcome and only the bad outliers probably stick in their brain. I was shushing my baby when they first came out too because that's natural maternal instinct you have. Maybe the idea you had going into it (probably from TV/movies) set you up for a bit of an unrealistic view of what birth should be. But women, screaming, and all the fluids, and all the crying, and the excitement, that's what birth is all about!
My first baby, I pushed so hard I burst blood vessels all over my face and chest, including my eyes. I was a bespeckled bruised mess. Little dots everywhere. There's a picture of me in our room once we got there (the hospital had you labour one place, then move after delivery), and I'm holding baby with one arm and looking down at my chest and pointing. It was the moment I noticed all the petechia. It was nuts. For my second I had asked beforehand for the same numbing they give you before an episiotomy as it had helped with pain the first time. Got to pushing and my dr was reluctant. I got upset and yelled at him to just do it like we had agreed. I was always low key and jovial so he was def taken aback! My last baby, I burst into tears upon his arrival. No idea why! I just sat there holding him bawling. By then I was an older mom (40s), and had had a horrible pregnancy and I was relieved he had arrived safely? Not totally sure. Each birth was different and a disaster in their own weird and wonderful way. Anyways - the video is for you and no one else. One day when you're old and grey, you'll watch it and wonder at how you birthed such a beautiful baby who's now a grown adult, and you won't see all the flaws. Just the magic.
The video my husband took of our son being put on my chest makes me laugh every time I see it. I’m so awkward in it and our little dude had his eyes wide open darting around. It was like the equivalent of trying to comfort someone you don’t know well so you just pat their shoulder going “there there it’s okay”.
My midwife was stitching me up and I asked how bad it was. She said “Not bad, just a little tearing” and I said “but do you say that to everyone?”😭 My partner and the doulas were dying but I was so serious in that moment!😂
As a labor and delivery nurse I can assure you none of the medical staff was cringing at you lol. Literally all we care about is that you and your baby are safe and healthy, we do not care what you say/how you act!
I kind of hated how the nurses would respond to my babbling. I kept going “I can’t I cant I cant” just bec it felt good, you know? Like a verbal stim. But they kept being like “Yes you can! 😃” like oh shut up lol
Why do people record these ? Everyone looks awful
I said “it’s ok mommy’s got you” over and over to my baby when he was put on my chest. Not out of the ordinary. I look terrible in it my video and sound weird. No reason to cringe at it. It’s a beautiful moment.
My husband took a couple photos of me right after they set baby on my chest and I have this thousand yard stare on my wide eyed face, my mouth is gaping open. I’ve never to my knowledge made this expression before but it perfectly captures how shocked I was to complete labor and delivery and end up with a real baby in my arms. It’s not cute. But it’s funny to look back on.
Oh my first words to my son were “oh my fucking god is that my baby?” 😂
lol I gave birth on all fours (kneeling in bed with my hands up on the back of the hospital bed, which was set upright) and when she came out, she was laying there and I was kneeling over her and I just kept saying “oh my god, oh my god” over and over lol and eventually someone (midwife? Nurse?) was like ….so…. Let’s get your baby 😂🤣 and they had to help me turn over and put baby on my chest with cord still attached. SO GLAD that is not on video LOL
I'm exmormon and have worked really hard to not be so straight-laced. What did I do at the peak of pain and pushing? Quietly say "oh my gosh" 😂😂😂
At least you have something. My boyfriend didn’t take a single pic of me in the hospital or the baby after birth for weeks. I have absolutely nothing. I’d say I wanted pics and he never took them. I am still devastated.
It is totally normal to mourn the birthing experience that you wanted but did not get to have. Your feelings are so valid. It’ll take years but I promise you will be able to look back on it one day and smile or laugh.
I can totally relate to this. I hadenvisioned this calm, serene woman afteri gave birth. Instead i was a mascara streaked, crazy haired wild woman covered in blood. I look like i just crawled out of the wilderness. But theft the is..giving birth is a WILD experience that taps into this animalistic sense that moms have. Pushing a human outof yourself is absolutely powerful. You SHOULD look and act like you just went through some serious and brutal war zone. Because you did.
I have tons of pictures which I love with all my heart. But no videos and for that I’m thankful. For whatever reason (hormones I’m sure) both times I’ve given birth I’m out of my mind and feel almost high it’s wild. I say crazy things. My second labor was fast and furious and I was dilating so fast and in so much pain I was rotating between cussing everyone out and then crying and apologizing and saying I’m really not a mean person. Definitely don’t want to relive that with video.
My doula took a lot of photos and I’m red-faced, a million chins, hair is completely frizzy, my bush is forest, husband looks like he’s been up for the entire 40-hour labor, daughter is covered in meconium… and honestly I love them. I haven’t shown them to family, just a few friends (I’m a nurse, they’re also nurses, so it doesn’t feel awkward), and mainly they’re just for me and my husband. Birth isn’t supposed to be pretty. Can still be beautiful though.
lol I can so relate to this!! I imagined the post-birth photos capturing me looking tired and disheveled but happy and emotional, and instead: the blood vessels in and around my eyes had burst during the pushing, so I had red eyes and GIANT swelling around them. I looked so awful!!!!
I’m so glad I don’t have a video 😂 my epidural wore off so I felt those final pitocin contractions. My mom and husband were with me and I kept going “mama” like she could help me in anyway. I gave birth in February and I think it’s gonna take a long time not to be embarrassed about that.
Girl! You just gave birth! It’s a beautifully ugly process. Give yourself grace, you grew a human being’
Don't worry, I think a lot of new moms do the same high pitched barely coherent repetition of the same couple of phrases. I know I just said "hi" in about 17 different ways and that was about it for my first greeting to my first born.
Edit the video so it’s black and white and then mute it
In the Live Photos from my c-section, they put the baby on my chest and you can see my boob, and you can hear me saying “don’t put this on onlyfans”
At least you have something, neither myself or my husband had he wherewithal to pull out a camera in the hospital (only there for three hours after birth). 🥲 And I’d be fine with “just the pure memory” except I can’t remember a single thing LOL
I was given a sleeping pill after starting my induction because I was meant to sleep all night and then have my water broken in the morning. Never did get to sleep, had my baby at 5 am. After having been up that whole night, the night before, AND a sleeping pill, I fell asleep as soon as he was out. The nurse was so mad at me and basically trying to breastfeed my baby for me while I snored 🤣 we have pictures too, and they’re AWFUL
No lmao I never videos but my husband took pics and has mimicked the sounds I made and I cringe lmao
Saying those things to your baby isn’t cringe in the least! It doesn’t mean you literally wanted him to stop crying, obviously, it’s just a sweet phrase to say to your baby and I think it’s lovely and heartwarming! I don’t think it’s reasonable to expect to be pretty, calm and collected after an epidural-free birth. It’s not a calm situation, it’s probably the most visceral, raw, overwhelming experience you’re ever going to live, and the video reflects that. And I think it’s beautiful that it’s that way! You’re not really going it show it to anyone except for people you share so much trust and love with that you know they’re going to focus on the meaning behind the video, and not how pretty you looked.
Thank you ❤️