LOONEY MONTHS

I came home from work today just after sundown and I saw a full moon rising.  A family friend was over. I mentioned it offhandedly and said full moons were fun. She looked at me straight faced and asked why?  so I started thinking.  Why indeed? As an OB I of course think of the busy obstetrical unit. Full moons are busy nights right?  The ancient lore is that full moons make for very busy labor units. This has been suspected since the beginning of time. The reality is that there may be a small increase of maybe a percent or two, but the lore is very strong. Is there something to the ancient lore? May there be a reason to think that Ob units are busy on full moon nights? Is there some ancient anthropological principle involved? So I did a little investigating.

I started listing for myself why I thought the full moon was fun and interesting.  

First the full moon always rises in the east and looks very very full..  It appears to be giant when rising in the east over a distant horizon. Photos of this effect are striking.  You can easily search for these photos. Do a google search for full moon rising, switch to the images tab, and look at the striking photos.

Second a full moon always rises at sundown.  This means everyone sees it at the end of a workday when they are tired and hungry and ready for dinner.  It seems most impressive then.  When it rises most people are not thinking they’ll be looking for the full moon tonight.  It just pops up huge and bright on the horizon.  

Third a full moon strikes people's mood.  It is what is meant by loony, lunatic, lunacy etc.

Fourth, the ob unit at the hospital always groans that a lot of labors are going to come in.  The feeling is that full moons means more laboring women. We all say “uh oh get ready”.  It'll get crazy. It'll get looney around here. But the purely logical folks say that is just an old wives tales. It means nothing right? Which prediction wins, logic or lore? Will the unit be busy or is it just an old wives tale? (midwives tale might be a better term)

Fifth a full moon is the brightest night of the month.  The moon shines bright and full.  Moreover it shines brightest right at midnight. Why? A full moon is always exactly opposite the sun from the earth.  That is pure astronomical  geometry and that is why the moon is full. So the darkest part of night becomes the brightest. And it is brightest right at midnight. That is just weird at midnight. It is like it is not even night. Especially on a winter night with snow on the ground. It is astonishingly bright on some full moon midnights.

There are a ton of human endeavors that are tied to the idea of a month. Paychecks, rent checks, contracts, meetings, mortgage payments, menstrual cycles, birth control pill packages,  and tons more.

So there I am thinking why would ob units get busy on a full moon night? This is very strong old lore. Maybe there is an old truth to be discovered here.  

Now that I have thought about it I think the answer is obvious.  

But first you'll need to come along with some math again. This time we will do date and time math.

You see a human pregnancy lasts just about 40 weeks. We have pregnancy dating wheels that show exactly 40 weeks. We Ob’s always bemoan that everyone calls it 9 months. It is hard to make 9 months out of 40 weeks. We would more likely make it 10 months, if the month is defined as 4 weeks. Many months are defined as exactly 4 weeks. A cycle of birth control pills is exactly 4 weeks, or 28 days. Many paycheck cycles are 2 weekly or 4 weekly. Now think about a pregnancy of 40 weeks. 40 weeks is exactly 280 days. 40 weeks is exactly 10 months, if a month is defined as 4 weeks. This is 280 days from the first day of the last menstrual period.

But conception happens 2 weeks later. Or 14 days after the first menstrual day.

So labor happens, mostly, about 266 days after conception.

So then I'm thinking what happens on bright full moon midnights? Walks on the beach… can't sleep… too bright … romance…. conception. That is what happens. Romance and conception happens. So if conception happens on full moons… where is the moon when labor happens? Where is the moon?

So I looked up how many days happen between full moons. I found it online. 29.53 days happen between full moons. That is a lunar month. There are a ton of different kinds of months. Calendar months are obvious. But lunar months is what I am interested here.

What is 266 days divided by 29.53 days?

Hold your breath…

9.007 moons happen.

This is astonishing. It is not astonishing that there are 9 moons. That is ancient lore.  It is pretty cool that the ancient lore gets a boost here. But, what is astonishing, is that, on average, a baby conceived under a full moon will, on average, labor under a full moon. In fact, labor should occur within a few minutes of 9 moons later.

So there you have it. The first real explanation ever given as to why the lore of Ob/Gyn’s and midwives expects extra work on a full moon night. It is the same reason so many songs are written about romance under a full moon.

If you doubt this then think about evolution of the human species. We have been on the planet as genetically and anatomically modern humans for 250,000 years. For more than 200,000 of those years, a moonless night would have been abjectly absolutely dark. A person would not have been able to find their spouse or their baby, even if they wanted to. They would likely have not even seen their hand in front of their face. So romance, conception, and delivery of babies, would have been really difficult. And very dangerous for the baby. The new mother would have really struggled without effective assistance from any midwives that might have been there. Babies would be far more likely to die. There would have been a very strong Darwinian Evolution pressure to not deliver on dark nights. Bright moon filled nights would have been no problem. For the 200,000 years before humans had fire the human race might have arranged for biology to make conceptions on full moon nights, and labors exactly 9 moons later.

40 weeks has nothing to do with 9 months.  Maybe more like 10 months. But ancient midwives 10000 years ago might have known that a bright moon now meant labor in nine more moons. Or, if not that, they certainly would have known that full moons meant more babies were to be born. That is something we talk about even today in a modern Ob unit. We usually joke about it. But this may be the ancient history of the 9 moons connection.

This 9 moons time frame is too much coincidence for me to ignore. Babies are generally laboring to within minutes of 9 moons after they are conceived. This is crazy. This is lunacy.

Thanks for reading.  

Comments are of course welcome. And questions are welcome as well.

John W Marcus MD FACOG PC

89 North Maple Ave

Ridgewood NJ 07481

Phone 201-447-0077

Fax 201-447-3560.