In this third article of the 19th Midwifery basics series, the authors explore the topic of pain in labour. They address the ‘women’s paradigm of pain’, how this relates to midwifery support, and ways of approaching labour pain in practice, using pain theories. Humanising birth calls for re-imagining old ideas in new ways. Although there has been a long history of labour pain being medicalised, pathologised and seen as too much for women to bear, there has been an even longer history of women witnessing the power of birth and acknowledging the role of support – and now that midwives are also enaging in research, emerging evidence supports this.