Bringing childbirth to an orgasmic level

[Ed: So... Does this make them sex offenders? ]

When women describe childbirth they most often use words like painful, excruciating, agonizing, intolerable--maybe empowering, even amazing, but never pleasurable or sensual. Orgasmic? Are you kidding?

The documentary Orgasmic Birth, quietly released last spring, is changing that. The film, which makes a case for natural childbirth, gained attention when ABC's news magazine 20/20 announced that it will air a few minutes of footage on January 2. The news sent mommy bloggers into a tizzy of excitement and now everyone from Lisa Belkin of The New York Times to Tracy Clark-Flory of Salon has written something about orgasming, yes orgasming, during childbirth. (Sign me up for a third! Please!)

The documentary follows 11 beautiful and natural births; two of the women orgasm during labor. Amber Hartnell of Hawaii, who gave birth to her son in a tub in her yard, says: "All of a sudden the orgasm just started rolling through and rolling through, and it just kept coming, and my whole body was spiraling and rolling, and I was laughing and crying." Similarly, Tamra Larter of New Jersey says: "It was happening, and I could hardly breathe, and it was like, 'oh, that feels good.' That's all I could say really."

So exactly how does this work?

In the film, Christine Northrup, an ob-gyn and author of Women's Bodies, Women's Wisdom, explains: "When the baby's coming down the birth canal, remember, it's going through the exact same positions as something going in, the penis going into the vagina, to cause an orgasm. And labor itself is associated with a huge hormonal change in the body, way more prolactin, way more oxytocin, way more beta-endorphins--these are the molecules of ecstasy."

The documentary director Debra Pascali-Bonaro, a childbirth educator and a doula, says the right atmosphere is key. "A woman needs privacy," Pascali-Bonaro told SFGate. "She needs to be in a place where she feels undisturbed and that place is usually at home--not a hospital where you're hooked up to machines and doctors and nurses are coming and going. You need to be with people you know and trust. In many cases, the partner is involved and intimate in the experience but that isn't always the case."

Now before you get too excited, let's talk about the odds of climaxing when pushing out an 8-pound baby?

"In my 23 years of being present at over 850 births, I really can't say that I have seen anyone experience this," says Maria Iorillo, a San Francisco-based California licensed midwife. "Maybe they did and I didn't know it? Can you hide an orgasm? And even if someone did, we are almost looking at 1 in 1000 births. I think it is definitely too high a bar to set for women. My goal is to just have a safe and satisfying birth experience. When we have a majority of women experiencing that, then maybe we can look further."

Pascali-Bonaro says her movie is about much more than orgasms. "It's about sharing the different possibilities that are available to women," she says. "It's about showing women that they can have a pleasurable experience--an undisturbed birth free of unnecessary medical interventions. It's about having freedom of movement during labor and using birthing balls, being upright, dimming the lights. But for some women childbirth is really hard and painful, and I don't want to take away from that. This movie isn't meant to raise expectations. It's meant to inspire."