The Almighty Uterus
Photo by Nadezhda Moryak from Pexels
If chest and biceps were the muscle group of the early 2000s, the 2010s were the decade of the glutes. Everybody was in the gym, doing squats, and the thick backsides of the world finally had their chance to shine.
But did you know, that the strongest human muscle is not a man’s behind, but a woman’s uterus?[1] I discovered this little-known fact in a birthing class my wife and I are taking while preparing for the arrival of our daughter this summer.
In the class we watched video after video of women giving birth, in all its gory splendor. Let me be clear, I’ve seen some stuff, but these videos are incredibly graphic. I mean, there’s PG13, there’s R, then there’s softcore, hardcore, and beyond that are these birth videos.
You see images and angles that are mind blowing: blood, amniotic fluids, poo and vernix, dried up cords and placentas on towels, rubber gloves, plastic tarps, kiddie pools that look like the tide at Iwo Jima.
Not that I haven’t seen these videos before. I remember our High School Sex Ed teacher saved the live birth videos for the day of prom. He’d check out the tv/VCR cart, wheel it into the classroom and make us watch footage of screaming mothers and panicky nurses going through the delivery process.
“DON’T YOU LOOK AWAY YOU HORNY LITTLE PUNKS!!!” he chided us. “THIS IS WHAT HAPPENS 9 MONTHS AFTER PROM NIGHT!!”
These videos left me stupefied and horrified. Fearful of birth and scared of infants.
But the videos in our class now are different. It’s hypno-birthing, which sounds strange but is actually a very natural way to give birth. The women in these videos are calm and focused. In discomfort, clearly, but also not panicking.
***
There is so much to learn from the almighty uterus.
Powerful contractions of the muscle come and go in surges, an involuntary tightening and pushing of the baby down the birth canal. It is fascinating to me that the uterus seemingly has a mind of its own. Our class instructor told the story of a woman who went into a coma while pregnant, and though unconscious, still gave birth to her child vaginally. Apparently, her uterus didn’t need her conscious input to get the job done.
In hypnobirthing, staying calm and using meditative practices are the methods that help mothers essentially stay out of the way and let their bodies do what they were designed to do.
Also, mothers often lose all sense of time during the delivery process. Is it two thirty in the afternoon or is it four in the morning? The uterus is a clock unto itself and predates any of our feeble attempts to arbitrarily define time. It boldly declares what time it is: time for this life to enter the world.
Our instructor says during the birthing process mothers should visualize a delicate flower unfolding. This imagery guides the body to follow the natural flow of what’s happening. It will certainly be difficult. It is clearly labor but embracing rather than forcing makes the journey quicker and less painful.
Said differently, one cannot speed the bloom of a flower by tearing at the pedals.
***
As a man, these videos illicit a complicated response from me.
First of all, why am I bursting into tears watching other people’s babies being born?
But it is also tremendously humbling to watch. I get the sinking feeling that I don’t really know much about anything. Viewing the mystery and miracle of birth I sense my tightly held misogynistic beliefs being shredded to bits. My thirty-six years of “accumulated wisdom” discredited in an instant by a newborn infant and her mother.
That’s because men are out here approaching the world penis-style. Just as a dog pisses on a lamppost to mark its spot, men my age are anxious to make their mark on this world.
We grind, we push, we force, we overpower.
We want our phallic symbols hanging out there for others to see – our trophies, accomplishments, money, fame, buildings and monuments, our REPUTATION, our legacy. We’re essentially immature children, talking trash and comparing schlong sizes.
Men approach life like a zero-sum competition, and we end up fearful and jealous, noxious and silly, a constricted and joyless shadow of ourselves. If something isn’t happening, we’ll make it happen.
***
So many deep lessons to be derived from this small piece of female anatomy. Even in my writing I’ve begun to implement a more “uterine creative process”. That means, I focus less on writing and more on recognizing the stories around me. I prepare myself to receive them and try to not let my mind get in the way of their natural delivery. If it’s not time for an idea to be born, I don’t force it.
I work to accept what life gives me each day, having faith in nature’s timing. To maintain proper nourishment and to be prepared for creative delivery, these are the responsibilities of the artist. And though I may want something to come out today, if it’s not time I let it remain in the womb.
All these lessons often run counter to the messages of the culture we live in. We overprioritize the symbolic glamour of the chest and biceps, an outward showcasing of strength, rather than the hidden power of the uterus with its ability to deliver life. Perhaps this decade it will finally get the credit it deserves. For despite all its ability, no ever commented on a woman’s “big beautiful uterus”.
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