This one's my favorite 😁

Normally, if it's that much of an emergency, you're knocked out anyways, rather than wait for a spinal block.

With my first, I couldn't be moved, with the second, they said the baby was in distress but they still pushed for me to get the spinal and be awake because general anesthesia can depress breathing and stuff in the newborn. They had a good point, but if I had to do it over, I'd be knocked out instead.

It's not for everyone, don't let anyone make you feel obligated to reproduce. I don't regret it for a second because I know and love my children, but between pregnancy (btw, little known fact, you commonly can't take full breaths late in pregnancy because there's a human pressing on your lungs and it scares the crap out of you to not be able to breathe deeply) and birth, it's the most damaging thing I've ever done to my body and has left serious scars on my mind.

Would I endure it all again to have my children? Yes. Would I have done it if you told me what I would go through before I became pregnant the first time with no knowledge of who my children are today? Absolutely not.

I'm not sure that makes a lot of sense evolution-wise, though I like your idea. Animals that don't instinctually care for their young have young that can survive independently. Animals that have defenseless young don't tend to abandon them the way OP says is the norm for her species. Sure, a few are bad parents, but that removes those instinctual behaviors from the gene pool, reinforcing instinctual good parenting behaviors. If that wasn't the case, they never would've made it long enough to become civilized.

I suspect this is something supernatural, that their ancestors were normal humans that became possessed by something in order to produce these unnatural behaviors.

Listen to me, it's so important that you understand this. If you're ever in the position that you have to have a C-section and you have the option to be knocked out for it, DO IT. It is so much nicer to be thinking of your little ones with a little mask over your face, counting back from 10, then gently wake up to your surgeon telling you how it went.

Far better than desperately annoying the anesthesiologist about your oxygen saturation because you don't think you're breathing, you're trembling between the meds and discomfort and anxiety, you're flat on a table with your arms tied down and a bunch of strangers standing over you like you're a frog in science class, and requesting cold clothes to keep the nausea at bay long enough for them to put all your organs back and close you up. I hated everything about it and it was honestly the experience that closed the deal that I would never have another child no matter what.

You forget the most important part, that those hormones and natural instincts cause you to bond with children and brainwash yourself into thinking that it won't be a horrid experience to bring them into the world (pregnancy and birth were terrible for me, but I love my kids).

I find it strange that OP's species as a whole didn't evolve the proper hormones to overcome the trauma of birth and what their newborns originally look like.

Though it seems like some did. After all, the birth she got to watch was the 5th birth of the mother, and she volunteered to be observed, meaning she must have some level of comfort with the process. Perhaps they should simply allow nature to take it's course and allow those that don't want to birth to just not birth.

Have you ever given birth? I did, three times.

The first I was blessedly unconscious for, emergency C-section that they couldn't move me to put in a spinal block, but the healing was pretty painful.

The second was unmedicated vaginal and so ridiculously painful that I figured out why they don't keep the scalpels within reach of the birthing mother. I crapped myself and split to my rectum, worst pain I've ever imagined. Worse experience but better time healing.

The third was another emergency C-section but not as serious and they talked me into being awake "for the health of the baby". Worst experience of the three. I couldn't feel myself breathe and was very nauseated but was terrified if I threw up while I was literally and held open, my organs would fall out or something. The healing was far worse this time too.

Why in the world do humans keep making more humans when the only way to get them out is unimaginable pain and tearing or getting major abdominal surgery that they insist you be awake for?