There is an idea out there that infants don't feel pain or don't feel it as strongly as adults do. I know not everyone believes this and maybe even most people don't believe it, but I have seen it used to justify everything from neonatal circumcision to piercing little babies' ears.
Now I'm not an expert on pain or infants and I don't remember being an infant, but I do remember most of my life and I know that pain was worse for me when I was younger.
When I was 11, menstrual cramps had me doubled over on the floor weeping. Now, worst case, they have me sitting with a heating pad while I translate normally and a maybe tiny bit cranky. Around the same age, the band of a bra felt hideously constricting and uncomfortable. I noticed it all day, every day. Now I wear underwires all day without noticing, and can even fall asleep in them.
When I was a child, standing or walking for long periods of time (in retrospect, probably an hour or two) was exhausting. My feet hurt (in running shoes) and I was tired and desperately wanted to sit down. Now I can do that in heels effortlessly, and any discomfort is not even worth mentioning.
When I was a pre-schooler, I couldn't stand it when the seams in my socks were crooked or rough or in any way less than perfectly comfortable. It seriously bothered me - I could feel the seams! Now I don't give a second thought to how my socks fit, and sometimes I walk around in shoes that cause blisters (Q: why? A: normal breaking-in process) and consider the discomfort acceptable collatoral damage.
So if the younger you go the more sensitive to pain you are, why would the sensitivity just drop at infancy?
Even if you don't remember the details of how you experienced pain in childhood, just think about infants. Have you ever seen a new baby in the doctor's office who has just gotten a needle? They're bright red and screaming their poor little heads off! How did it feel when you last got a needle? Maybe "Oh, look, a needle." Maybe a quick sharp pain. Maybe you felt a bit oogie if you're sensitive about needles. But you probably didn't feel the need to scream until you turned red, even if you did allow your Id to take over. Think about a baby who needs to be burped. What do they do? They cry. Think about the last time you had a burp that hadn't come out yet. Can you even remember? It's completely negligible.
So how on earth did some people somewhere at some point once arrive at the conclusion that babies are less sensitive to pain.
2 comments:
When I was a child, people said animals don't feel pain. Any animals, even high-level mammals!
I think it's a way of rationalizing and justifying certain behaviours classed as "traditions". Checking our empathy at the door and acting as if babies are not humans.
Is this a commonly-held belief, do you think?
I can't believe people would think animals don't feel pain! Have they never heard the noise a dog or cat makes if you accidentally step on its tail???
I have no idea how common this belief is. When I see people on the internet present it as fact, it isn't challenged nearly as vigorously as I'd expect. I've never heard anyone express it IRL, but it doesn't often come up. ("Aww, what a cute baby! Does he feel pain?")
If you google children are more sensitive to pain than adults or children are less sensitive to pain than adults, you get a lot of information clearly stating that children are more sensitive to pain, but the information is presented in such a way that they seem to expect some people to think children are less sensitive to pain.
My own parents wouldn't question that babies feel pain, but they were very surprised when I once mentioned to them that standing or walking for long periods of time was far more difficult when I was a child. And this despite the fact that I did complain whenever my feet hurt when I was a kid.
I wonder if the whole "kids are resilient" thing is a similar myth as well? Or, for that matter, the "children crave structure and boundaries" thing? I certainly don't remember craving structure and boundaries.
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