The pain associated with childbirth is no secret mystery. We’re constantly inundated with images of women screaming and sweating as they push their babies into the world. They don’t call the process labor for nothing. It happens every day, but it’s not easy.
One woman in China wanted her boyfriend to understand the pain women endure bringing children into the world, so she signed him up to participate in a labor stimulator. While it might have seemed like a good exercise in empathy, the man ended up with severe health consequences.
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The woman made her boyfriend undergo three hours of childbirth simulation, and afterward, the man was hospitalized for real. He underwent surgery and had to have a portion of his small intestine removed, China Times reports. The man underwent the simulation at the request of his girlfriend and her mother, who insisted he experience this type of pain before they got engaged.
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Chinese man hospitalised after 3-hour birth simulation at lover’s request, sues https://t.co/NvrBjF8ZoT
— South China Morning Post (@SCMPNews) March 3, 2025
Initially, the man refused. Eventually, they were able to convince him and he was hooked up to electrodes that send out electric currents that mimic the feeling of contractions. Many hospitals have offered this simulation experience for decades.
On the Chinese social media app RedNote, the woman, who has not been identified, explained how it all happened. She shared that for the first 90 minutes, she manually increased the pain level.
For the rest of the three-hour session, the pain level was set to maximum. “My boyfriend started screaming and struggling at level 8, swearing and crying at level 10, and by the end, he was gasping for air. My sister and I kept wiping his sweat,” the woman wrote, according to South China Morning Post.
The man was left with abdominal pain and shortly after he got home, he threw up. A week later, doctors found that the simulation damaged a part of his small intestine. He had to undergo surgery to have it removed.
The girlfriend shared that she had no intention of hurting her boyfriend. “I am willing to take full responsibility as long as he recovers,” she wrote.
Meanwhile, the man’s mother has called off the potential engagement and is suing the woman. A lawyer said if doctors link the injury to the simulation, the girlfriend could be held financially responsible.
Some people on RedNote were outraged. “They should bear the consequences for doing such a reckless thing,” wrote one user. “They are making trouble for no reason.”
