# Fathers in Delivery Room **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 30, 2009, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476 "2009-06-30T14:39:57Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Baby\_Driver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@Baby\_Driver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baby_Driver)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/1 "2009-06-30T14:39:57Z")
I have an older male friend who often acts as an advisor to me. We talk over the phone a couple times a week and he gets to hear about my various [mis]adventures, such as they are. He told me once that a woman shouldn’t have their man in the delivery room watching the birthing process, if she wants him to maintain his sexual feelings towards her in the future. The advice was duly noted and forgotten (no boyfriend, no baby plans anywhere in the near future). Something I read recently jogged my recollection\*, and I’d like to get second opinions from people who’ve been there: Does watching your partner give birth alter your sexual perception of them? Any men care to weigh in on this one? I’m not looking for the “right” answer - there’s some obvious volitility in the subject (along the lines of, “I’m the one pushing a cantaloupe _you_ fertilized out of my vagina! The least you can do is watch!”). By and large I trust my friend’s assessments, but he’s a bit old-fashioned at times and I wasn’t sure if this was one of them. \*Nancy Gibbs’ recent opinion piece in Time magazine ([www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1905508,00.html](http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1905508,00.html) if you’re curious) about fathers’ increased parenting involvement ---
**Author:** ![Shagnasty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9dc877/32.png) [@Shagnasty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shagnasty)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/2 "2009-06-30T14:46:44Z")
That is crap. I not only saw my wife go into labor but also sliced completely open when they had to do a C-section. I saw plenty of parts of her that she has never seen. I don’t get queasy in the least about that stuff however. It is odd to see a woman fully dilated though. That thing gets BIG and nurses can just stick their hand in there like it is the Chunnel Tunnel. ---
**Author:** ![Anaamika](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Anaamika](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Anaamika)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/3 "2009-06-30T14:47:09Z")
Considering people go on to have successive babies, I presume that this is not the case, and most men resume sexual feelings towards their mates. I am not a man, however, I can imagine there might be a short time where you feel sort of like “WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT ALIEN THING COMING OUT OF THERE…” however, what you end up with is your own little baby, that looks like you, and is so cuddly. So maybe the mix of feelings ends up working out for the benefit? ---
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/4 "2009-06-30T14:50:18Z")
Ask Mr. Duggar if it is (heh) hard for him to get aroused for his wife. (18 times through that log flume) My husband has been front and center for the birth of our kids and his ardor for me cannot be quelled. ( I’ve tried everything, headaches and pepper spray. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/5 "2009-06-30T15:02:22Z")
I’m a father, and I’ve watched all 3 of my kids being born. It’s a completely bizarre phenomenon to see - e.g. all 3 were facing downwards when they came out, I have no idea if that’s standard or not. If my wife had grabbed me 10 minutes later and demanded a quickie, I doubt I’d have been able to oblige. But the 6+ week enforced recovery period was perfectly adequate for my brain to compartmentalize the experience. ---
**Author:** ![Cazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cazzle/32/75_2.png) [@Cazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cazzle)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 3:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/6 "2009-06-30T15:15:05Z")
That sounds like a pretty old-fashioned concept to me. > [@muldoonthief](#): > > all 3 were facing downwards when they came out, I have no idea if that’s standard or not. That’s standard. The other way around, they can get stuck on the way out. ---
**Author:** ![Cat\_Fight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/90ced4/32.png) [@Cat\_Fight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cat_Fight)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 3:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/7 "2009-06-30T15:21:50Z")
It can;t be odder than actually feeling it happen (and seeing much of it - my cousin had a well-placed mirror during her kid’s birth), can it? It’s a pretty big freaking step in a relationship, so I think it’s important for him to be there. If only so he can guilt trip him later. 😉 I have a feeling the guy who said this doesn’t believe his wife poops. Or thinks women should deal with care and feeding while daddy should deal with discipline, that sort of thing. Slightly off topic, but I just went for a walk and, maybe it’s where I’m living right now, but I love how so many younger dads seem so involved in their kids’ lives. They take them out together in their strollers, bring them to the park, and it makes me think the next generation is on the road to equal parenting. It’s sort of hot, but mostly heartwarming. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/8 "2009-06-30T15:29:24Z")
I’m another father who has seen four children been born – make that five including a still-born girl. I’ve had no trouble maintaining a good sexual relationship afterwards. I suspect that a person who has feelings like that of **Baby Driver** ’s friend really can’t imagine what happens in the delivery room. Yes, there are lots of body parts exposed, and squicky bodily fluids that you don’t normally see, but there’s also the miracle of seeing a new human being breathing and crying for the first time. (And I suspect the doctors, midwives and nurses get that feeling too, even after going through it many times before). ---
**Author:** ![Baby\_Driver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@Baby\_Driver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baby_Driver)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/9 "2009-06-30T15:36:41Z")
Thanks for the feedback, everyone. Bit of background on my friend, since there’s been a bit of speculation: He is 70+ years old and had been a practicing pyschiatrist for thirty years. Nowadays he does a bit of prof work on the side, which is how we met and became friends. He has never been married - in fact, he was a Jesuit monk for a period of time but decided to quit the order and pursue a phD in pysch instead. ---
**Author:** ![shiftless](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e9c0ed/32.png) [@shiftless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shiftless)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/10 "2009-06-30T15:40:15Z")
BS. What I saw in the delivery room was so very different from I see during sex that I doubt I could connect the two, even if I tried. Maybe your friend uses spotlights and forceps in ways I never considered? Anyway, I was checking out my wife’s boobs an hour after my son was born (she probably doesn’t need to know this)- is that odd? ---
**Author:** ![Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e56c9b/32.png) [@Harriet\_the\_Spry](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harriet_the_Spry)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 3:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/11 "2009-06-30T15:40:53Z")
Your friend sounds like he’d make an interesting Doper. Invite him aboard! ---
**Author:** ![C3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/c3/32/3108_2.png) [@C3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/C3)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/12 "2009-06-30T15:41:33Z")
My husband witnessed the births of both of our boys and it hasn’t seemed to quell his interest. After my second son was born (VBAC, drug-free, two hours of stitching me up afterward), he did say that he learned I was not to be fucked with. So that’s good. ---
**Author:** ![overlyverbose](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/9dc877/32.png) [@overlyverbose](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/overlyverbose)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/13 "2009-06-30T15:49:29Z")
Your friend sounds like he’s lead a very interesting life. That said, since he’s never married or had kids (or presumably ever seen one born) _and_ he’s 70 years old, which probably means that if he had had children, men wouldn’t have been welcome in the delivery room anyway, he probably has a very skewed opinion on the subject. Just my opinion, of course. Witnessing the birth of our son in no way cooled my husband’s ardor. If anything, he was really in awe of me afterwards. I’d say that weight gain and/or personality changes are much more likely to affect how attractive he finds me. ---
**Author:** ![Zsofia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/7bcc69/32.png) [@Zsofia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zsofia)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/14 "2009-06-30T16:03:52Z")
> [@Cat\_Fight](#): > > I have a feeling the guy who said this doesn’t believe his wife poops. If you’re there in the delivery room, you may also get disillusioned on this one. Two for the price of one! ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/15 "2009-06-30T16:19:00Z")
> [@Zsofia](#): > > If you’re there in the delivery room, you may also get disillusioned on this one. Two for the price of one! Heh. For our first my wife threw up over everything, and peed on the doctor. Let’s just say the actual baby emerging was pretty damn clean compared to that. I wouldn’t have given up being there for anything, and it certainly hasn’t affected my ardor over the past 27 years. Crying babies, kids in the house who never go to sleep - that affected it. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![OttoDaFe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ottodafe/32/356_2.png) [@OttoDaFe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OttoDaFe)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/16 "2009-06-30T16:36:12Z")
> [@muldoonthief](#): > > I’m a father, and I’ve watched all 3 of my kids being born. It’s a completely bizarre phenomenon to see - e.g. all 3 were facing downwards when they came out, I have no idea if that’s standard or not. If my wife had grabbed me 10 minutes later and demanded a quickie, I doubt I’d have been able to oblige. But the 6+ week enforced recovery period was perfectly adequate for my brain to compartmentalize the experience. **muldoonthief** speaks for me (except that we had two instead of three). Especially the part about compartmentalizing. What I find even more bizarre is that a woman, after going through nine months of discomfort — the latter portion being _extreme_ discomfort — followed by the travail of labor & childbirth, would want anything to do with the “privy member” that caused the condition in the first place. Must be compartmentalization with a vengeance. ETA: my father (on whom be peace), who delivered a small town worth of babies during his years as a GP, once said that if men were the ones who gave birth, the human race would have died out within a couple of generations. Puts a whole 'nother spin on “weaker sex.” ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/17 "2009-06-30T16:51:42Z")
> [@Baby\_Driver](#): > > Does watching your partner give birth alter your sexual perception of them? Any men care to weigh in on this one? I was present for my daughter’s birth and still love plowing my wife. I would have been heartbroken to have missed that moment. Might I gently suggest that marriage and parenting advice from someone who has never been married or a parent is, at best, suspect. ---
**Author:** ![MOIDALIZE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e274bd/32.png) [@MOIDALIZE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MOIDALIZE)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/18 "2009-06-30T17:46:02Z")
The word of the thread is “ardor.” ---
**Author:** ![Avarie537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/48db29/32.png) [@Avarie537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Avarie537)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/19 "2009-06-30T18:17:04Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > Might I gently suggest that marriage and parenting advice from someone who has never been married or a parent is, at best, suspect. Good idea. My husband was there to see both of our boys born. He even touched Spencer’s head before he was all the way out. Certainly no drop in ardor in our relationship. ---
**Author:** ![norinew](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/eb9ed0/32.png) [@norinew](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/norinew)\ **Post date:** [June 30, 2009, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476/20 "2009-06-30T18:50:59Z")
Well, I have given birth to three children, though didn’t manage vaginal deliveries with any of them. My hubby watched the whole process, start to finish (although, oddly, they kicked him out of the OR while they were administering the spinal block). The only way witnessing these births ever affected him sexually is that he got to practice saying (over and over again) “Are you _sure_ you have to wait for six whole weeks??” 😉 [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fathers-in-delivery-room/501476.md?page=2)