And here I thought teaching my daughter about sex education was going to be hard. It appears that she already has such a mortal fear of childbirth that that possibility alone will be enough to keep her away from boys.

I was just trying to be a responsible parent, teaching my little angel about where babies come from and how they get into the world.  When we got the latter part I explained to her that both she and her brother had been born by c-section and what that was and why they had been delivered that way (don’t worry, it was at a four year old’s level of comprehension – I only used the words “god-awful pain” and “mind-shatteringly excruciating contractions” sparingly).  It turns out that for months she had been fearfully imagining her  adult self with her stomach being hacked open and a baby being ripped out and how much that could hurt, all because her mother forgot to explain the concept of anesthesia.  She told me in no uncertain terms that she did not want to have a baby in her tummy.

I straightened her out about the procedure and explained that most mommies deliver babies vaginally (I left out the “wanting to die because of a labour that wasn’t accomplishing anything but causing me vast amounts of pain” part) and how, eh-hem, “special” that is.  Her response to this? “I don’t think I would like that.” Umm. Yeah. I concur.

Despite this aversion to pregnancy, she remains fascinated by childbirth, particularly of the c-section variety.  I was watching a YouTube video of a surgeon performing a caesarean delivery the other day. When she came into the room I stopped the video.  She asked what I was watching so I told her but I had no intention of continuing to watch with her in the room. But she asked if she could watch it, too.  I thought about it. I explained that there would be lots of blood and it might look kind of “yucky” (yeah, that’s slightly understated).  She still wanted to try it.  Was it wise or unwise?  I’m not sure. But I let her watch it with me. We didn’t watch the whole cutting part (I had no idea there were so many layers of stuff to cut through before you get to the actual uterus), just the part where they pulled the baby out.  She was glued to the screen.

I suspect that deep down she still has a healthy amount of fear.  But really, is that so bad?  Childbirth is scary.  If that fear keeps her from making bad choices, especially as a teenager, then I think I’m ok with it.  Would it be bad if I occasionally dropped a few words about the varying, disgusting and painful horrors of pregnancy and childbirth as she grows up? Maybe that would be taking it a bit too far. Effective? Yes.  Appropriate? Probably not.