Alanis Morissette's home birth was "beyond pain"

Alanis Morissette, who gave birth to her son, Ever, on Christmas Day 2011 at home with the help of a doula and a midwife (and no drugs), has opened up about the event to the US Today show.”The experience was beyond pain,” she said. “It was a transcendental experience. I just went to this whole other world.”Without the help of medication, “I basically had to be the little soldier that I am and really focus on this new beautiful creature coming out of me,” explained the singer, 39, who married rapper Mario “MC Souleye” Treadway in May 2012 at their home in Los Angeles.

“I would do it again,” she said. “And in the same breath, it wasn’t the easiest experience of my life.”

Morissette has also been puzzled by negative reactions to her baby-raising method, attachment parenting. “I get curious if someone’s really off-put by it or horrified or judgmental. What part of it is gross?” She puts the reaction down to “a severly under-touched society.”

“I think a common misperception about attuning and tending to a child’s needs so constantly is that they don’t grow in their independence, but I think that the opposite is true … They learn that connection is safe and they learn to stand on their own two feet in a way that I know all parents ultimately want for their kids.”

Did you have a drug-free birth? Would you have a home birth if your pregnancy presented no problems? And what are your views on attachment parenting?

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138 Comments

- - jenniw said
  - 14 Jan 2015
    2:44 pm
I’m not totally into the attachment parenting thing as in my opinion it has to lead to parenting burn out. However, I agree with the comments about child birth – although I had my boys in hospital I had a drug and intervention free experience and I would say it was “beyond pain” as well

- - mom94125 said
  - 03 Jan 2015
    1:35 pm
i get how when you labour you just withdraw into yourself and tune into your body and you just try to ride the contractions out

- - mom92217 said
  - 01 Nov 2014
    8:12 pm
Congratulations to them they look so happy

- - mom57522 said
  - 27 Sep 2014
    11:45 am
Drug free for both births but in a hospital.

- - ginoula5 said
  - 13 Aug 2014
    10:31 am
Thanks for sharing, love Alanis.

- - 3timesamum said
  - 16 Jun 2014
    1:32 pm
No time for drugs with 2 of mine. I don’t think I’d ever want to have a home birth as a plan, but if I didn’t get to the hospital then that’s a different matter.

- - twinmum2 said
  - 31 May 2014
    7:16 am
My aim was to have healthy babies and not necessarily a drug free birth.

- - mom57522 said
  - 30 May 2014
    3:12 pm
I think how you have and raise your child is up to the individual.

- - Gracelow said
  - 29 May 2014
    4:23 pm
All the best to her and her family

- - kazh said
  - 22 May 2014
    8:19 pm
Ah yes, my childbirth was painless and blissful, haha

- - rachaelchara said
  - 10 May 2014
    7:52 pm
Interesting and infomative reading. Good luck Alanis.

- - cheezel said
  - 05 May 2014
    6:49 pm
I think each to their own is the key

- - kylesnova said
  - 14 Apr 2014
    11:21 pm
I would not have wanted a home birth, and I’ve done both, had a good labour with an epidural, had a bad epidural experience and given birth to our last child without one, which may be empowering but was jolly painful, and, if I’m honest only because I waited too long to request the pain relief

- - mummy liana said
  - 22 Mar 2014
    11:34 pm
thanks for sharing was a good read

- - jodie80 said
  - 16 Mar 2014
    5:41 pm
i would not have a home birth to much can go wrong. And give me drugs im no super woman lol