Prior to actually giving birth myself, I liked to believe that I had watched enough episodes of "One born every minute" to know what the drill was.
I mean; the basics are rather quite simple; your baby is inside you and it needs to come out.
However; I will be the first one to tell you that until you have actually delivered a baby from your uterus into the world, you don't really get it, not completely.
For instance, now, two babies later, I have a whole new level of respect and love for my own body and, also, a whole new understanding of how strong, powerful and badass women and women's bodies really are. And whenever someone asks me what giving birth is really like, I always tell the person asking that yes, it is painful, but it is also by far the most exhilarating, amazing, and super-woman-y thing you will ever do, and that I, personally, felt like I wanted to do it all over again once my babies were born. That's how incredible an experience it was.
When it comes to explaining the process, though, few things have struck me as accurate as this clever video that UK midwife Liz Chalmers recently shared. Chalmers, who works as a childbirth educator in her midwifery practice, gives a demonstration using a balloon and a ping pong ball, and, well, you just need to see this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=URyEZusnjBI
The demonstration, which lasts for three amazing minutes (far shorter than the real thing, by the way, mamas), models how the cervix thins and dilates during labor and what contractions really do to a woman's body.
And probably, if you have given birth, you'll be amazed at how accurate the demonstration really is. (Well, apart from the whole ping-pong ball shooting out across the room. That — thankfully — is not quite how it happens...)
