Off your head in labour and....

[biscuiteer]

...this happens ( insert your experience here): 'You see yourself floating mid air outside the hospital window looking in at yourself in the delivery room' 'among other stuff.
It was 10 years ago. The memory just popped into my head tonight and I realised that I've never questioned whether that is a normal labour experience when you're day 2-3 of an induced labour, on a drip, given diamorphine, gas and air. Wild..
What fuckery happened to you on all the drugs?

I was on gas and air and was absolutely convinced I wanted to shout up the stairs for DH despite being aware that a) we weren’t at home, b) there were no stairs and c) I was looking at him.

Then I threw everything up and the gas and air wasn’t so fun anymore. It was like being that level of “just a bit too drunk” where you lie down and the room is a bit too spinny to fall asleep.

Not during labour but afterwards. I felt like I was floating above the bed, not looking down at myself but just levitating. I remember trying to reach for the buzzer to call a midwife, and trying to scream or shout, but I was paralysed. It was terrifying, I thought I was dying.

I don't know if it was the heat, pain from the c section, sleep deprivation, worrying about DD in SCBU... a combination of all I guess!

All of a sudden felt so Christmassy, declared to everyone that this was the most Christmassy I had ever felt, I could see a tree in the room and it was snowing outside and I was full of Christmas joy.
It was early June.

I had gas an air only. Apparently it was too late for anything else despite me asking 2 hours before for some pain relief!
was moaning that “ you said I could have drugs!” Then so delirious from the contractions in my back that I was talking about Jacqueline wilson books 😂

Wow I never experienced any of that I was on the drip first birth being induced had gas and air then pethidine and then straight on to epidural I literally went all out 🤣🤣
Only thing I did do was hit the gas and air hard and passed out briefly with my tongue hanging out my mouth scared my husband he thought I was dead midwife said it was normal 🤣😂.
Oh and the pethidine made me sick I remember throwing up in the bowl non stop they had to give me another injection to stop the sickness 🤦🏻‍♀️

A Polish friend of mine, had both her children in England, and during her second labour, she couldn't speak any English.

She said it just disappeared from her brain, and her husband had to translate.

Gas and air did nothing for me at all, all it was good for was being able to bite down on the mouthpiece while I failed to dilate past 5cm for something like 8 hours even as the contractions got stronger and closer together. I’d started them 3 days prior so by the time I was given gas and air I was exhausted and had the sensation of being behind glass. I’d forget the beginning of sentences before people finished them. Halfway through my own sentences I was becoming convinced I was answering a question no one had asked and would stop abruptly. I tried to tell people I felt like they were on tv but no one was remotely bothered. By the time I had my baby (on the table in theatre as people were prepping for c section around me, with forceps, shoulder dystocia and a 1.75litre haemorrhage) I had completely dissociated myself from what was going on, and I felt nothing for the baby I’d gone through 5 years of IVF for. That precipitated severe PND and failure to bond with my baby, which I still feel shit about.
But when I returned to hospital with my second round of double mastitis and they put me on an antibiotic drip I was convinced our tabby cat was walking around the ward. I could see him jumping on the equipment and furniture. Apparently I was less than a hour away from full blown sepsis, with a temp of 40 so it was probably more that than the drip!

Everything was green for me too! That's so strange! I only had Gas and Air until I had a crash section. Was it g&a that caused your green???

DD1 I was induced. Epidural failed - you would think they would have noticed the tube wasn’t even in my back by then but anyway - 48hours later of my face on I have no idea what cause I was exhausted after being awake for so long - three doctors came into my room in green wellies and their lab coats and asked me to sign a form . I sort of remember signing it but no idea how I did … then about an hour later in a surgical room of my face on more drugs but daughter was pulled out with forceps .

gas and air made the ceiling tiles move around like a game of Tetris and it made me feel sick so I didn’t bother again 😂 pethidine made me angry and sleepy, I got really arsey with the midwife who I was convinced was waking me up every two minutes (she was doing hourly obs!!) but clearly it was doing the job as I was sleeping!!

First labour, I had auditory hallucinations from the entonox. I told dh there was a tv in the corner of the room and Loose Women was on and that I was annoyed by Colleen Nolan as I now had a Nolan Sisters song in my head. The midwife, humouring me, asked me which song it was. I replied 'I'm In the Mood for Dancing and it's pissing me off because I'm really not!'. During the same labour, I also told dh I felt like a traffic warden, had a giggling fit and slipped under the water in the birthing pool and then insisted on crawling around the floor on all fours and when the midwife asked if I wanted to get on the bed I stage whispered to dh 'will you tell her that I'm not getting on that fucking bed!'
I was much better behaved second time around!

Mine wasn't labour it was an ELCS but once I had the epidural and it kicked in I was laughing hysterically as I felt my legs going numb and asking if this was what it felt like to take drugs, and why people would willingly choose to feel like this. This went on for about 15 minutes 🙄

I didn't have anything too extreme but when I had some gas and air right at the end (for various reasons I didn't have any pain relief before then) I suddenly became extremely concerned that the poor midwife hadn't eaten because she'd been too busy looking after me, so was trying to insist that DH gave her some of the flapjack I had with me.

I remember it as "would you like some flapjack, you must get hungry working like this" which is still odd, but at least polite.

According to DH it was more like a banshee shrieking "YOU MUST HAVE SOME FLAPJACK! EAT IT!!"

@biscuiteer it’s insane the range of experiences the drugs / birth stress / hormones can have on everyone... my imagined calm water hypnobirth plan went raging out with the entonox!! There are some cracker stories here…

Oh dear, DH has just reminded me of something else.

I had to be stitched after having DD1, and it was a bad 2nd degree year so a surgeon come to the delivery room to do it. On his scrub cap he had lots of drawings of uteruses, like you'd get in a text book, so a front view with the fallopian tubes and ovaries etc.
The gas and air was making me loopy and a lovely health care assistant was holding my hand and I started laughing, and when she looked at me I pointed at the scrub cab and loudly giggled to her something like "I thought he had bulls on his hat, but actually it's uteruses!!!"
To me, the uterus drawings looked a bit like a bull's head with horns coming out. Anyway the surgeon looked up at me like I'd lost my mind and I just continued cackling away to myself.

Oh that has sucky thing that you can bite down on! Best. Invention. Ever!! I remember explaining to the nurse why her child had to go and do pony camp (her and other nurse were discussing it and unsure as she was trying to convince child she didn’t like horses due to cost). I also remember telling dh to go in next door and tell the woman in there to stop moaning (she was also having a baby at the time)🙈

Haaaaaaa i remember high off gas and air having my baby i was so off
My head i went back to my teenage years and was with two of my friends smoking weed in lane we used to hide and smoke in 😂😂😂 I did finally come back too reality still laughing my head off