Here Are 17 Shocking Birth Stories That Prove How Differently Pregnancy Was Treated In The ’60s And ’70s

Warning: This post contains mentions of miscarriage, pregnancy loss, and traumatic birth experiences.

Giving birth is one of the most difficult processes a human body can experience. Until recent decades, the topic of pregnancy was considered taboo, causing many moms to not discuss their birth experiences. Today, however, more parents are opening up about just how difficult giving birth was in the 1960s…

That’s why when Redditor u/kettlecornQT asked, “Women who gave birth in the ’60s, what was it like?” both moms themselves and their adult children shared how giving birth has (thankfully) changed in recent decades. Without further ado, here are 17 of their most informative responses:

If you or your parent gave birth in the 1960s, ’70s, or ’80s, feel free to tell us about your experience using this anonymous form!

1.“In 1960, my mom was on her sixth pregnancy. We lived on an island off Seattle, so by the time she made the ferry and got to the hospital, her labor had progressed. The nurses were unwilling to handle the delivery and tried to press her knees together to delay until a doctor arrived.”

“Mom was an early childhood educator and knew that doing so could cause the baby permanent injury, so she kicked the nurse in the jaw and said, ‘This baby is coming now!

My little brother is a professor, writer, loving brother, husband, father, and grandfather! Mom always loved telling the story of ‘The Kick.'”

—u/Spirit50Lake

2.“I was born in ’68. Induction wasn’t a thing, as the popular thinking was that the baby would come when it was time. My mom’s due date was mid-April, yet I was born the last week of May.”

“She told me she had to get weekly blood tests to make sure everything was okay, which confused me at first, until I figured out it was due to RH incompatibility. Nowadays, this is solved by a single injection, but it apparently wasn’t available then.

Because of the RH incompatibility, there was a chance I wouldn’t survive, so she and my father didn’t buy anything for me, thinking that if the worst happened, they wouldn’t have to go home to a house filled with painful reminders.

After I was born healthy, she gave her friend some money to go and buy all the basics a newborn would need. The amount she gave the friend? $20.”

—u/Cuddles_McRampage

3.“My mother had me and my twin sister in 1962. However, she had no idea she was having twins. When the doctor said, ‘It’s another girl!’ my mom thought he was talking about the lady in labor next to her.”

“We were three months premature and had to be airlifted to another hospital. I weighed 2 pounds, and my sister weighed less than that.

We stayed in the hospital for three months, and my parents would receive postcards in the mail with updates such as: ‘Twin A is critical and twin B is in fair condition.'”

—u/lbell12

4.“When my mom gave birth many moons ago, they informed her that I’d certainly be born with severe internal birth defects pertaining to my heart, lungs, etc. (I was also three weeks late.) When she was admitted to the hospital, her doctor was undecided whether it would be a planned C-section or a natural birth.”

“So one evening, after mom finished dinner, the nurse came in to check my heartbeat, but couldn’t find it. She raced out of the room to search for the doctor. The doctor rushed in and couldn’t find a heartbeat either.

They said they needed to perform an emergency C-section STAT to get the baby (me) out of her because I had probably died. Mom was understandably hysterical, so they rolled her into the operating room and put her under.

She woke up the next morning to a perfectly healthy, over 8-pound baby, and a brutal scar because they’d cut her from inside her belly button all the way down to the top of the line of her pubic area — her stomach resembled buttocks and never healed properly, at least externally.

(Also, all the beds in the maternity rooms had ashtrays attached to them. Mom said all the mothers smoked like chimneys while everyone else held their babies.)”

—u/hannibalsmommy

5.“This is what my grandmother told me about giving birth in the ’50s and ’60s in Germany in an army hospital. She didn’t have a private room. All laboring and postpartum moms shared a ward.”

“I can imagine that when first arriving, it must have been scary to see what other women were going through, but I can also imagine that perhaps there was a sense of community.

After giving birth, the mothers were expected to change their own sheets and mop the floor. Can you imagine? It sounds so antiquated!”

—u/ClemlyGlub

6.“I was born in the mid-60s: I probably wouldn’t be here without the teaching hospital at the University of Iowa, as it was a complicated birth. To begin with, I was a month late. My parents went to the university hospital, where it was confirmed that my mom was finally in labor (she could not feel the pain due to a previous operation).”

“She lay in bed in a room for three days, with a med student doing the counting. My parents spent all day reading newspapers. Every morning, the doctors would troop in with med students in the OBGYN rotation in tow to see how she was progressing.

On the third day, her water finally broke, and they told her that if she hadn’t had the baby by 4 p.m., they’d reluctantly do a C-section (they were reluctant because of her prior operation). I was born at 3:30 p.m. I didn’t cry when they spanked me, so they put me in a preemie box.

I am an only child, and I am still apologizing.”

—u/SusannaG1

7.“I was born in 1960, and my dad wanted to be in the delivery room. The doctor allowed him to do it and nearly lost his license to practice medicine because it was a BIG deal then. He was called before a medical board, and my dad had to testify. “

“Dad had been pre-med when he and my mom met, and his medical background was the only reason the doctor was allowed to keep his license.

Mom was also told to smoke while pregnant so she ‘wouldn’t eat too much’ and I was fed formula because that’s what everyone did. My parents also started feeding me cereal at three weeks old so I would sleep longer at night.”

—u/YepIamAmiM

8.“My mother gave birth to a premature baby in 1969, in Italy. It was around noon, and all the doctors had gone to lunch, so she was left alone for a while, thinking, ‘What the heck do I do?'”

“She gave birth in a private hospital, yet it turned out that only the public hospital had a preemie ward.

So she had to be transferred to the public hospital in order for the baby to receive the proper care. When the baby was put into the incubator, a priest came over and wanted to give it its Last Rites. My mother said, ‘No, she is not going to die!’ So the priest scurried away and asked my father, who, having been raised Catholic, gave in.

Anyway, 55 years later, I’m perfectly fine!”

—u/Jaderosegrey

9.“I was born in the ’60s. My mum’s pubic hair was shaved by a nurse (as it was thought to be more hygienic), and she was given an enema. My father had to wait outside.”

“After giving birth, mom was wheeled to a ‘Florence Nightingale’ ward where there were other women with their babies. She was supposed to stay in for a week, but hated it. My mother was 20, but looked 15, and she said the nurses treated her terribly.

In the end, she begged my father to sign her out. (Since she was under 21, she was not legally allowed to leave without his permission.)”

—u/Lazy_Age_9466

10.“I was born in 1969. My Dad waited in the waiting room, and, when I was born after 1 a.m., the doctor came out and told him to ‘come see.’ Dad stood outside the nursery, and the doctor pushed my bassinet over by the window so he could watch me get cleaned up.”

“Mom said the birth wasn’t a big deal because they numbed her uterus when it was time to have me. (Plus, she had already spent the entire day in labor running up and down stairs at our house doing laundry.)

She said the best times each day were when they brought the babies around to be fed. Mom bottle-fed me, so they gave her pills to dry up her milk. She only gained 13 pounds while pregnant because the doctor limited how much weight the moms should gain. She wore her own clothes home from the hospital, not maternity clothes.

My first picture with her is less than 12 hours after my birth; she was standing outside the nursery, wearing a pretty robe with her hair freshly curled and makeup on.

Dad was able to take the morning off after I was born, but he couldn’t miss work entirely.

This all sounds so different from today, but these were some of their favorite stories that always made them smile. It was a good experience for them, and I still treasure that picture of my beautiful mom holding me, looking like she’d stepped out of a salon.”

—u/Playful_Annual3007

11.“My mother birthed me in the ’60s. She and my grandmother told me that the doctor came in, smoking a cigarette, and the ash was about to hit the floor. He told her he had to scrub up, and she told him, ‘The baby is coming.’ He said, ‘Close your legs, I will be back in a few minutes.’ The nurse held her hand and assisted her in the birth, and the OB said, ‘Well, that kid really wanted to come out.'”

“My sister gave birth in 1980, and her kid was 11 pounds, 24 inches long. She asked for a C-section, and the doctor (another older man) told her to quit complaining. She told me privately that the tear and damage done created urinary and sexual problems for the rest of her life.

I NEVER wanted children after hearing these stories.”

—u/OGINTJ

12.“My grandmother told me that when she gave birth to my mother, she was given ether in the hospital. My grandfather, who used to birth dairy calves as a teen, hadn’t been forced out to the waiting room yet, and decided to check her dilation himself when something didn’t feel right to him. Turns out, my mom was crowning faster than expected, so he told the staff and bailed to the ‘Dad Zone’ (aka waiting room). After my mom was born, my grandmother refused the meds to dry up her milk and breastfed my mom.”

“Our family tree is full of super milk producers, and a mom up the street benefited from it as her own infant couldn’t tolerate formula. When the neighbor’s baby’s father saw my grandma in the park, he asked her a bunch of questions while trying not to cry about his baby starving. Because grandma was a breastfeeding queen, they worked out a deal: grandma pumped constantly, and the father showed up twice a day to pick up the milk. Apparently, grandma put out gallons as a side gig in exchange for a silver picture frame when the kid graduated to solid foods. Last I heard, that baby was an adult.”

—u/Aggravating_Lab_9218

13.“My mom had kids in the late ’60s and early ’70s. She says she wasn’t allowed any choices. She was knocked out cold and woke up with a pink or blue card so she’d know whether she’d had a boy or a girl. Her second child was very early, and they put my mom to sleep against her will as she was actively telling them, ‘No drugs.’ However, her doctor said, ‘Trust me, I know best.'”

“When she woke up, she had no card by her bed, and she became hysterical. Turns out, the nurse had neglected to set out a pink card. My sister was fine, just small.”

—u/IslandGyrl2

14.“My Grandma told me that when she was in full labor, she had to wait in the hospital hallway for ‘her turn’ to go into the delivery room.”

“Next to her was a woman who had come in later. This woman got into the delivery room before her (I guess because her labor was further along), and it made my grandma angry because she wondered why that woman got to go into the room before her.

My grandma also told me that she had a friend who did not want to take her underwear off during the delivery because she thought the baby would come out of her belly button.”

—u/EngineeringNew7272

15.“My mother gave birth to me in the early sixties in New Jersey: When my dad dropped her off at the hospital, they took her back and knocked her out.”

“When she woke up at 6 a.m., she was in a room with another woman. She asked where her baby was, and they told her that I was in the nursery. When she asked to see me, they told her that they’d bring me to her at 9 a.m., as that was policy. Being an obedient woman, she spent the next three hours lying in bed and wondering how I was.

They discouraged her from breastfeeding when things got tough. (It was also easier for them to feed me at night if I was bottle-fed).

My dad got to see me through the glass, but didn’t get to hold me until they got home.

When my sister was born two years later, my mom changed hospitals. My dad got to stay with her; she wasn’t knocked out, and she got to keep my sister near her bedside. It was all very modern.”

—u/harchickgirl1

16.“My mom tells the story of my sister’s birth in 1972: She was alone and unmedicated, flat on her back, laboring with my sister in breech position. The nurses wanted a smoke break, so they rolled her bed into the hallway and glanced at her now and then from their break room. They would yell out encouragement from down the hall.”

“It’s a funny story now, but it was scary and lonely at the time.

With me, a few years earlier, her doctor encouraged her to smoke and even put her on diet pills so she wouldn’t gain weight — that was written in my baby book.”

—u/misspeachespickles

17.Finally, “I gave birth to my beloved daughter in 1970, after 18 hours of labor with very little progression, then a C-section. I was awake during the delivery and was able to give her a kiss before she went off to the nursery. Dads were not allowed in the delivery or surgical rooms, and we had no idea if the baby would be a girl or a boy.”

“I spent 10 days in the hospital recovering. The bill to the OB/surgeon was $350, which we paid off in monthly payments!”

—u/Significant_Wind_820

Which of these stories surprised you most? Did you give birth in the ’60s, ’70s, or ’80s? Tell us about your experience in the comments or using the anonymous form below!

Note: Some responses have been edited for length and/or clarity.