Does anything...and I mean anything at all hurt more than child birth?

[Amity]

I have had two c/s, one emergency, one "elective". I stopped analgesia 24hrs post surgery. I have a high pain tolerance!

I snapped my ACL (knee) ligament in February. That hurt as much, if not more, than the c/s recovery.

I've now had a knee reconstruction. That's right up there too.

As is having a large (4.5 by 4.5 by 5cm) ovarian cyst... swelling... and then removed.

I think it's different for different people.

[Heaven]

Hmm.......now I've experienced it I can say it's the worst pain I've ever felt. But I've never really hurt myself, lol. I ended up with a c/section after about 35hrs and once the anesthetic wore off I only ever had panadol and neurofen. I kept asking if they were giving me something else and isn't it supposed to hurt more than this? lol. I thought that all of a sudden it was going to start hurting a lot but it never really did. Of course it hurt but not like you would expect having been cut open!! For me the labour was far far worse.

[Inertia]

I can honestly say that with one it is the worst physical pain I have ever felt... But I will qualify that with, I have never been in any serious accidents, broken any major bones or had any major lacerations or puncture wounds - nor have I suffered any serious burns. After childbirth, I have broken 3 toes and one finger. After that, I had concrete burn on my arm almost 20 years ago.

Its safe to say that I am a respectfully cautious individual who - other than getting pregnant - has done very little else to cause myself physical pain. So I am not a good judge to the saying - "Child birth is the worst pain a woman can experience".

What I will add in closing is - with Samuel, I was having additional localised stabbing pain during contractions that never occured with any of the others - so of the 5, his was the most painful. I have always figured that if this was an additional pain unrelated to normal contractions - then I would have to disagree with the original premise.