To think I was over-drugged for giving birth?

[Purplegras3]

How much anaesthetic did you have giving birth? Looking back now I think I was super over-medicated and it did me no favours bonding with my baby. For the first week after birth I was like a glazed zombie until the drugs left my system. I had 8 epidurals, mountains of gas & air and some other drug I can't remember the name of. I was full-on hallucinating that I was in my favourite tv shows. I couldn't see the room I was in. When the anaesthetist asked me to turn over for another epidural, I asked to whose side was I to turn? And I named the characters I could see around my bed. I could also see my dm at the foot of the bed, naked and standing on a plinth, painted head-to-toe in gold, holding up a bunch of grapes! 😆It's funny looking back but also fucking serious because I couldn't walk for 24hrs after and I couldn't be present to my baby's needs either. Anyone else experience the same as me?

OP, I have had a similar experience with my first baby. Had no pain relief at all giving birth (there wasn’t time) and was perfectly lucid. Then had gas and air to be examined - I had torn badly but not quite badly enough for theatre, and they struggled to numb it with local anaesthetic, so told me to keep taking the gas for 40 min straight. I hallucinated really badly and felt totally out of control but then I tried to stop breathing it in they basically told me I had to carry on. Cue PND and trauma that took a lot of counselling to resolve.

Long story short, second time round was amazing (but bloody painful) with no pain relief again, only local anaesthetic for 3 stitches afterwards. For me the pain of childbirth was preferable to the hallucinations and feeling out of control on drugs. For others pain relief is preferable - I’m not bashing any type of birth, every birth is different and everyone reacts differently - just wanted you to know it’s valid to have felt over medicated and wished you’d had less.

I topped up my epidural billions of times and had diamorphine after labour. Didn’t hallucinate or even feel that odd. Labour does screw you over mentally and physically though so I reckon it’s probably that that did the trick.

Gas and air could do it! Beyonce was literally standing next to my head singing 'Survivor' to me while I was pushing. I was completely off my face. It wouldn't last a week but at the time I was totally wasted and having the time of my life tbh! I found pethidine very trippy with my first, too.

My friend had a recollection of the ‘cookie lady’ coming into the room partway through the labour trying to sell cookies 🤣 But was obviously reassured after by her birth partner that it didn’t happen.

Anyway whilst chatting about birth stories a while later another friend recounted to her how she’d hallucinated a strange woman coming into the room selling cookies when she was in the throes of labour 😳 Same hospital!

I gave birth to my second last week and had a lot of gas and air when they broke my waters. Once it kicked in, I didn’t feel a thing (pain wise) while they were doing it. BUT, I full on hallucinated to the point where it felt like an out of body experience. I felt like I was floating and watching it from above! I could hear the midwife, doctor and my husband talking but really slowly and out of sync but louder than that I could hear the circus song! I am terrified of clowns and I was terrified of being induced so I’m not sure if there’s a link there! I even remember asking myself if I was dead! I reasoned I couldn’t be dead as I wouldn’t be able to ask myself that. Once I stopped the gas and air, it was like I floated back down to the ground and I was totally normal again!

You didn't have 8 epidurals. You had epidural top ups which are just a normal part of having an epidural. If you didn't have the top up after the initial bolus it would wear off after 45 minutes or so.

Except for the 8 times!

My first was exactly the same. Totally and utterly out of it. I don't even remember being given pethidine, that's how much I was out of it on just the gas and air.

Was determined to not have the epidural, but needs must.

Hope you feel better soon.

MsMariaReynolds - I wish all hospitals had a cookie lady

8 epidurals? Come on! I don't think so.

Labour itself, even without medication/ drugs, can make time seem very strange and make you misremember things.

Definitely.

I had flashbacks with DS birth for months. I remember very little from the birth.

i was convinced he was born in minutes apparently it was an hour and I said fuck more than a few times during labour. 😳

I didn't have any drugs.

I'd every drug available on my first child and felt similar like I was on another planet for weeks.

I had diamorphine with my first which to be fair I needed as I had gas and air and that didn’t touch the sides, ended up in surgery with a spinal and felt like I’d been hit by a bus. Hallucations can be a side effect from pethadine, it’s rare, one in about 4000 but it can happen.

you don’t sound over medicated, gas and air is nothing and an epidural just numbs your body it’s not opiate based. It just sounds like you reacted badly which is always a possibility with opiates.

Sounds bloody amazing. You got a free high.

I had a zero drug home birth for my first and the whole experience was weird as fuck with loads of flashbacks afterwards and barely being able to move for days afterwards. I think the pain, trauma and general overwhelming bodily experience is enough to mess with your head. With my second I had all the drugs and it was no less weird, just less pain. Wish I’d had all the drugs the first time to be honest.

I was off my tits after having my first child. I laboured for 12 hours, had the hormone drip for induction, had diamorphine for contractions and was happily puffing away on thr gas and air as a coping mechanism. Then spinal for the csection and morphine after I had him. All within 24 hours. I then threw up all over the ward and shat myself in bed.

I have never had any morphine based pain relief ever again. Even after my second csection, the doctors thought I was mad when I just asked for some paracetamol. They eventually convinced me to take tramadol which thankfully didn't make me shit the bed.

Agree with PPs suggesting a debrief. You have every right to want to make sense of your experience. I doubt you were over-medicated, but every patient responds to drugs differently. Some people can get very high with even a low dose of an opioid (pethidine/morphine etc), other people who are the same size and age can have the same dose and not get high at all. Unfortunately it's trial and error for each individual.

That sounds very unusual to me. I've given birth 3 times and had epidurals all 3 times, and once it's in, they just replace the bag, like an IV.

you absolutely did not have 8 epidurals

It is only one…she means topping it up…

I had a spinal block and an epidural, which was topped up repeatedly across three days, when I had my section. Made my back cold and my bum warm.
I didn’t hallucinate or even feel particularly affected. I expect I was a bit though. I was tired I think.
I think the gas and air and pethidine might have been what was the heady mix for you.

Also it is quite apparent the OP meant epidural top ups so can people let that go now?

That's not 8 epidurals. That's 1 epidural and 8 tops ups.

I take it you've already briefed with a doctor/midwife? To know exactly what kind of pain relief you got and how many times. If you were so whacked out, I'm surprised you remember what medication, how many doses etc.

I was hallucinating on pethadine and when my daughter was born I was convinced I'd given birth to a massive fish as she eventually came out with a big whoosh. My DH thought it was hilarious!

The OP has said that she only got analgesia on one side from the epidural. The anaesthetist was probably using a pinprick test on the skin, to check the level at which the epidural was working, giving the OP (who was understandably distracted by the labour and by the other drugs) the impression that s/he was putting a new epidural in each time.

I think she gets it now

I had an epidural and a spinal. And pethidine and diamorphine I think. I will never have pethidine again, it made me feel very odd. I'm sorry you were hallucinating op, that sounds v traumatic and I also suggest a birth debrief. It might help you unpack it.

Gas and air can make you hallucinate massively. My friend thought she was in an episode of Simpsons for her whole (albeit short) Labour and she didn't have any other drugs.

I couldn't actually stand the gas and air in as it was making me too discombobulated, though I've had it previously for a hand injury and thought it was brilliant at the time.