Nurses at the Royal Oldham Hospital in Lancashire have taken a much-loved holiday – Halloween – and made it even more scary.
They turned the humble pumpkin into an educational tool on childbirth, with frankly horrifying results.
The picture of the pumpkins, which is now going viral on various Facebook groups, shows ten in ascending order.
The mouths of each gourd is carved to be a stage of dilation of a cervix during birth, with 10cm being the optimum dilation.
It’s at this point midwives will tell you you’re ready to push, as the body is ready to exacuate the child in a dramatic fashion.
At the start of the photo, the Jack-O-Lanterns look adorable, like an emoji or a tiny surprised baby kitten.
As they move on, though, they become frightening creatures with gaping mouths. You could fit hands (plural) in there.
For anyone with a cervix, it’s a scary thought that it might one day transform like that, but such is the miracle of life.
Commenters were similarly terrified of the jaunty-hatted squash. One, on the Real Hooswives of Glasgow Facebook page said: ‘It’s official, never having kids’.
Another said, ‘The expression on 10 says it all OUCH!’ while someone else added that it ‘brings tears to the eyes’.
One person did offer a differing viewpoint, arguing, ‘It’s not scary it’s absolutely brilliant! Well done to those midwives for coming up with such a great visual’.
While that’s certainly true, it’s still a visual that might make you want to cross your legs in anticipated pain (and maybe stock up on birth control).
It’s not the first time midwives have used visual aids to show what happens when a baby is born.
The Royal Devon and Exeter maternity service posted the picture of the ‘Eggstraordinary Cervix’ chart on Facebook at Easter, using different eggs to illustrate the dilation process.
A nurse also made a board to labour (hehe) the point, holding it up to a baby’s head as a stark reminder of what the human body can do.
All we can say is, props to anyone who has the guts to do it.
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